While this was actually done based on the rules from Reunification War, I figured the treatment of the subject was more appropriate for the Hall.
The following video file was found on a disc located in the rubble on Earth. It has never been broadcast in its entirety before now.[The setting is a press conference room of the sort found all over the Inner Sphere, decorated in white, silver, and black. Behind the podium on the stage is a large black curtain with the symbol of the Word of Blake. A bulky figure in a red cloak appears from under the curtain, quickly revealed as a bespectacled, lab coated APOLLYON when he shucks the cloak off in what's supposed to be a dramatic motion, takes the stage behind a podium. He wears no pants.]
APOLLYON: Thanks for tuning in! I'm Apollyon, Precentor of the Manei Domini, but in my spare time, I'm also on the board at the Manei Domini University of Strategic Arms, or MEDUSA as we like to call it.
[APOLLYON smiles enthusiastically. Members of the AUDIENCE in front of him, all of them chained to their seats, can be seen smiling back nervously as the camera pans over them.]
APOLLYON: Before we get started, I want to thank our partners from across human space for their generosity in assisting us in today's public service announcement. Manei Domini Public Holovision depends on the support of our patrons and viewers like you, so give generously! And you will give generously, right?
[AUDIENCE nods frantically. APOLLYON's smile is gleeful, even boyish, as he continues.]
APOLLYON: Good, good! Let's get started then. Safety in nuclear arms is everyone's responsibility, of course! So today, we're here to talk about the 'zone of death' and what it means when you're using my personal favorite nuke, the Crockett! Okay, let me make something clear. The 'zone of death' I'm talking about? This is the area where if you're in it, you're dead, no questions asked.
1 It is not a 'safety radius'. The only safety radius is outside the possible scatter zone of a warhead's secondary effects. Remember, the more you know!
[APOLLYON takes a sip from a glass of water to let the AUDIENCE respond; a few members titter nervously.]
APOLLYON: Okay, the Crockett's really a tiny peewee of a nuke, only a half-kiloton, but it's not how big it is, it's how you use it that's important. A surprising number of today's battlefield machines can potentially survive close encounters of the nuclear kind with one of these babies, so unlike with, say, a Peacemaker, you really do need to be accurate instead of saying, "Eh, I'm within two kilometers, close enough!" But there's still a lot that
can't survive and being right under it, well...
[The curtain behind APOLLYON parts, revealing a projector screen. The house lights dim and a projector whirrs down from overhead. APOLLYON points a finger which obligingly projects a little red dot of light on the screen as it projects a map of the southwestern deserts of North America. A cute little neon green mushroom cloud hovers over the White Sands Proving Ground.]
APOLLYON: This is our nuclear test range, not far from the historic Trinity test site at White Sands. Today, we're preparing to detonate a genuine refurbished Star League Defense Force surplus Type I nuclear explosive device, better known today as the Crockett-I.
[The view obligingly zooms into the area, resolving to a scaffolding supporting what is indeed an SLDF Crockett-I. Directly underneath is a large quad 'Mech. APOLLYON's finger drifts down to highlight the assault unit.]
APOLLYON: For my money, this is the toughest single assault 'Mech to ever see even limited production, the GTR-1
Great Turtle. VEST sent MEDUSA one for testing purposes but I don't think they quite expected us to test it this severely! We're going to see if one of the toughest 'Mechs ever built can survive a point blank nuclear blast, ladies and gentlemen!
[APOLLYON gives another one of those boyishly enthusiastic grins. It's disturbingly out of place.]
APOLLYON: That doesn't describe our next contestant, though! It's never been described as tough except as part of tough love. I give you the LCT-1M
Locust, the most thinly armored production BattleMech in history!
[Behind APOLLYON, the screen pans to reveal a beat-up looking LCT-1M in all its Unseen LRM boat glory. The colors of rust and primer dominate the hash of parts used to assemble the machine but it looks to be about as intact as the LCT-1M gets despite the disreputable appearance.]
APOLLYON: The
Locust is at what our scientists estimate is just a bit too far, just inside its personal zone of death, 300 meters from the detonation point. At this range, there should be enough blast and thermal damage to eliminate it completely regardless of the vagaries of chance. Again, I have to caution you, 300 meters is just the closest you have to get to guarantee destruction. In something with this little armor, well, being anywhere around is unsafe. So's turning the ignition!
[A laugh track is played.]
APOLLYON: For the sake of comparison, a much tougher
Locust, a classic LCT-1V, was also found, assembled by our crackpot team of technicians, and placed it
here, a mere 30 meters from the bomb.
[The screen pans and then zooms, revealing a similarly Frankensteinian Unseen LCT-1V with machine guns in place of the missiles and much less notional looking armor plate.)
APOLLYON: If you look here, we've placed a Scorpion on the field to demonstrate the comparative toughness of tanks. Its zone of death is estimated at 210 meters.
[A crane is shown lowering a Scorpion marked up with the colors of the Regulan militia into place.]
APOLLYON: And this is a wheeled APC full of instrumented test dummies.
[Another crane lowers an APC in similar markings down. A small beep is emitted from APOLLYON's head.]
APOLLYON: Sorry, thought I had my cell turned off. ...oh. I've just been informed by the production staff that members of the Regulan militia have decided to work off their debt to message of Blake after they were caught raiding our facilities by volunteering as crash test dummies. Always good to see community service programs working, isn't it? Anyway, let's move on.
[APOLLYON gestures at the screen, where an Elemental suit
2 painted Jade Falcon green is being lowered into position. Through the cockpit glass, the warrior inside can be seen frantically trying to get out.]
APOLLYON: This is Star Captain Bob. He was generously provided to us by Khan Marthe Pryde for the purposes of advancing the cause of battlefield nuclear safety under the terms that she never had to see him again after this broadcast. We're going to put him in his Toad suit... here, about 510 meters out. Another 30 meters toward the center of the blast is Tai-Sho John Smith, provided by the Black Dragon Society for the same purposes and under the same terms, operating a suit of Kanazuchi armor.
[APOLLYON turns and watches the screen himself, the laser dot following the progress of a blood red Kanazuchi with a black dragon decorative motif as it's moved into position. SMITH looks about as happy to be here as BOB is. A void black Nephilim is placed next to it. He turns back to the AUDIENCE.]
APOLLYON: One of our own, Adept A. N. Ymous, has graciously volunteered to demonstrate the robustness of, ahem, combat survivability enhanced individuals in what's really one of the tougher battle armor suits out there, even tougher than the Kanazuchi. Let's have a round of applause!
[APOLLYON's applause is as disturbingly enthusiastic as his smile. The AUDIENCE's is much more tepid.]
APOLLYON: Now, also provided by Khan Pryde is one of their few remaining
Erinyes ProtoMechs. They declined to provide us with a pilot, something about retention rate statistics, so we've loaded some ballistic gel in. These are about as safe as the Kanazuchi is.
[The
Erinyes is off loaded and then the cockpit is packed with a ballistic dummy in the shape of Elvis.]
APOLLYON: In the interests of scientific curiosity, we've added a few more things.
[A schematic of the test range is displayed, laid out in 30 meter hexes in a manner strangely reminiscent of a popular fighting robot game. As APOLLYON speaks, various hexes light up as a hand reaches down from the heavens and places a hand-painted miniature of each unit.]
APOLLYON: A Savannah Master here, at 450 meters. A Saladin we bought off a scrap dealer inward of it at 360 meters. Way closer is a Hetzer at 60 meters. Don't worry, we tightened the bolts first! At 30 meters, we've placed a Goblin. Right next to it is a nice little COM-2D
Commando straight from the Lyran Army Surplus Store.
[APOLLYON turns to fully face the AUDIENCE again.]
APOLLYON: And of course, us, here at 3000 meters.
[As APOLLYON speaks, a rumbling sound starts and the walls begin to retract into the ground, the ceiling unlocking and folding in along the side walls. APOLLYON is smiling boyishly, rubbing his hands together in glee. MANEI DOMINI ADEPTS circulate through the audience, handing out welder's goggles, and then assemble in ranks behind the AUDIENCE, donning their own goggles. At about this time, the music cues,
"What a Wonderful World" by Louis Armstrong. APOLLYON puts on his own pair and turns around, then produces a small clicker not unlike a garage door opener with a big red button in the middle. Giving the audience a quick grin over his shoulder, he pushes the button.]
[An actinic flash, bright even through blast filters and home holovision sets, washes the shot out immediately. The scene cuts to a slow motion aerial shot, following the progress of the blast wave against the hex map from before. Each hex flares in a cheerful radioactive green as it is completely engulfed and then fades to a sullen red. As it washes over the final markers, the shot cuts back to the former studio. APOLLYON has raised his arms and the MANEI DOMINI ADEPTS are elbowing each other and snickering as the audience screams in silent terror. Then the blast front washes over them, coating everything in dust and ash, as the music fades, APOLLYON speaks again in an obvious voice-over.]
APOLLYON: What a rush! Let's see what's left of our test subjects, mm?
[Slowly, scenes of horror unfold. The Hetzer has a recognizable rear frame but is otherwise a charred, blown corpse, and has the distinction of being the most intact of the units in really close proximity to the bomb. Behind it, the Savannah Master's fan juts up jauntily Bits and pieces of carbonized, fused
Great Turtle armor, useless as anything other than curios or scrap metal, can be found in a small radius. A pair of smoking foot actuators mark the site of the LCT-1M
Locust's demise. Of the battle armor, nothing is found aside from bits and pieces of unidentifiable metal. The humans in the blast radius are generally charred, smoking wrecks.]
APOLLYON: Well! I hope we've all learned an important lesson here, boys and girls: Don't ever be too close to a nuclear weapon going off! See you next time!
1: The zone of death is defined for rules purposes as the point where blast damage is sufficient to destroy all armor and all internal structure in all directions reachable from the forward hit location table. The hit location table simply doesn't matter. If the unit is in there, go ahead and toss the record sheet in a fire. It is, as stated above,
not a safe radius. Damage should disable or destroy a unit clear of this point. But it's a simple rule of thumb which is really all I'm after.
2: Because of the nature of how area effect damage is distributed to battle armor - all suits in the squad get to enjoy the full treatment - it's not really necessary to test anything other than individual suits.
