Oh... the embarassment

[AKDejaVu]

A couple of people had taken the opportunity to destroy A43 and render it capturable.  I saw this coming and voluntarily grabbed an M3.  This was my first M3 sortie this tour.

I'd noticed on a few base captures, as I hovered above that M3s seemed to experience some kind of "no troops" bug.  I made damn sure that I had my 10 troops loaded before I launched.  I double checked as soon as I spawned.  They were there.

The cover was excellent and the area was totally devoid of enemy.  The fighter hangars and vehicle hangar had stopped smoking and were due up in less than 5 minutes.  I was rolling into the field.

As I got to the map room, I stopped and prepared to unload my troops.  I pressed the "O" key to open doors and wasn't rewarded with the usual "doors open" response.  I tried to release my troops and received a "bay doors not open" system message.  I began to panic.

I instantly went to key mapping and found that the bay door open button was no longer mapped.  I quickly selected "O" and assigned it, then exited.  Still no luck.  I quickly went to the joystick map area and tried to map a joystick button.  Still no luck.  I felt an impending sense of doom as the fighter hangars came back up and the flyers began to panic.  I informed them of my predicament.

I would not give up.  I tried re-assigning the keys once again, as well as the joystick.  Still no luck.  Out of sheer desparation, I went back to key-mapping and tried clearing the assignment prior to assigning the key.  Viola!  My doors opened and the troops were off.  All this after sitting like a moron in front of the map room for 5 minutes.

For those that I've cussed for having the same problems, I'd like to postumously apologize

AKDejaVu

[loser]

yup had that happen before...i have also had the misfourtune of rolling the infamous empty m3 for miles only to get wasted after the hangers came up.  

[hblair]

Interesting story. Gotta love those balls-to-the-wall captures. I have a lil story myself..


Monday night The Assassins had launched a mission with some cooperation with fella rooks to take back A18 (large airbase located on island) We were enroute, almost there in B-17's when I get screen freeze lockup. I reboot frantically. We had two goons already enroute to the base. My PC comes up, I dial up fast, click click click, I'm in the MA, I do the only thing I could do by then, go to hangar grab a C47, type .fly, get in the air, then tell the boys on squad channel WTF just happened. Getting sitreps from 18, I hear that the field isn't dead yet, they're having some trouble with cons upping.

I think our first goon tried to make a run for it and got splattered at the field. From what I remember, second goon gets to field and gets some troops in but gets zapped from a rolling TBM or something. The pressure's on me now. I'm of course full throttle on the deck headed to A18. I get close to the field and grab a lil alt to get to the level of the field, 1500 ft or so I think. There's still some bomber hangars up! With the usual color that can be found on the assassins roger wilco channel, I let the obsceneties fly. Going against my better judgement, I throttle back to land at the field with the BH's up. "TBM rolling" I hear on RW. "Get his ass!" I *say* on RW. The TBM lays into me good before he died, got my rudder and one engine, I kick the plane to full throttle, pull the nose up, and try to get out of the danger zone. "Kill the GD BH's!!!!" I type on channel 3, so the guys will understand the urgency of my situation.     They start strafing the BH's with everything they got. BH's down! I throttle back to land my goon. Throttle back. Throttle back! My F**kin throttle is stuck!! Arrgh! "VH due up any second!!" I read on channel 3. The squaddies on RW are politley asking, "Are you dropping HB?"

I try desperately to get alt with my one engine stuck at full throttle. The plane doesnt want to climb at all! "whats the alt of A18?" I ask on RW. Looking at the altimeter, I'm still a couple hundred feet short of a safe drop!

People asking on channel 3, "HB, you dropping?" "hblair?" "You ok HB?"

I point the C47 towards the maproom, 2-300 ft short of the needed altitude. .salvo 10, doors open..
I pull the stick back til I'm stalling over, drunks out, as I figured, I stall into the ground...
Ask on RW, "My guys get in?"
Then I see the message in the buffer before they could answer me. It's ours. Another heart attack narrowly avoided.    

I'm the rook national hero for the minute.  

Then we hit the next field.    


[This message has been edited by hblair (edited 03-14-2001).]

[Moose11]

I remember that sortie.


What was also fun was... Sunday night I think, I rolled an M3 as you dragged the planes at the field away.

As I neared the bomber hanger, one 190 took off from the field. I hid inside the hanger as he flew away.

Dropped the troops, and most of them were to the maproom when someone must have woken up and that 190 came back and killed a couple.  

Was fun shooting at the birds taking off from the safety of the BH though.

[Beltfedd]

On a side note:

I was that 1st goon HB...  The field was skillfully cleared by my co-horts, not an enemy within miles.  I get the go ahead from my mission-mates to drop, not wanting to look like a newbie I set up a perfect run right over the map room.  Thinking to myself, "Damn, this goon stuff ain't that bad!" and patting myself on the back for a job well done, I then hear, "Belt's troops just splattered all over the field".  

"What? What happened?"
"You have to be 750 AGL dude"
10 seconds later...
"Oh"
*hangs head in shame*

Talk about embarassing!  Oh well, live and learn...  


Belt