Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Star Citizen: Sierra Hotel

Inspiration. There are so many things out there that inspire us to do things in our lives. I wrote in an earlier post about how Star Citizen has inspired me to dabble in flexing my creative muscle. There is a lot more to my creative process and inspiration than just what Cloud Imperium Games have promised us.

Movies are a MASSIVE inspiration for me. I am a slave to movie quotes in that I speak in fluent conversations with friends. Quoting movies are so emblazoned in my dialect that it has become part of my daily speech. So I am not really sure if its life imitating art, or in this case art, imitating art but I am able to draw a lot of parallels from experiences to movies.

Maybe it all goes back to me saying that Star Citizen brings out the child within us. When I was a kid I played out movies, constantly. I was an only child. My parents worked late at night running a restaurant and golf resort, so they were busy or sleeping a lot. I was gifted with a very powerful imagination and I grew up in the era before video games were on my radar. They exited, but I was intent on playing out Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade in my backyard. My mom had this exercise contraption that was mostly used to dry her work clothes, for me, it was a speeder bike as I zipped across Endor. Couch cushions and pillows from the spare room piled high on in the living room were the defensive positions at Rourke's Drift where I fought shoulder-to-shoulder with Michale Caine in Zulu.

So when its almost second nature for me at this point to draw parallels to movies when I am presented with the opportunity. Star Citizen is ripe with opportunity. I have long said that fighter pilots are cliche. Their macho bravado, cowboy-like swagger and the way they just carry themselves as the biggest and the baddest that ever lived. Fearless, and with a cold and calculated way they go about solving problems. I grew up watching Top Gun, Flight of the Intruder, Black Sheep Squadron, Iron Eagle not to mention the endless classics that came on television during patriotic holidays.

There is an old saying, that there only difference between a fairy tale and a "war/sea" story is how they begin. A fairy tale starts with "Once upon a time" and "war/sea" stories start off with "There I/we were no shit...":

So there we were, no shit. Shooting guns and blowing things up on Daymar. There was not much going on and we were just making some jokes, kicking some brass, and playing with some fun toys. Just kids with new shiny things showing off, and having fun. We were enjoying a good laugh as we pretended to be those annoying YouTube tactical celebrities. "Just drive it on target..."



Caught up in the moment. Situational awareness was gone, and before I realized it, there was a pair of Avenger Titans above us, boxing us in...slowly. We were not in an armistice zone, and we have been showing off quite a bit of wanton disregard for noise ordinances. The hair on the back of my neck started to stand up as I realized how naked I was not being in my hornet fighter.

I told you that I have been playing wargames with these guys for years. It's nice to know how often we can all be thinking the same thing, at the same time. As I mentioned to the guys "Hey they are starting to box us in..." I started to move to my Hornet. At the same time, my squadron mate makes his way to his Cutlass.

A newcomer in the group speaks up about the situation and mentions that perhaps we should consider not being on the ground in the open, but rather in our ships. To which we laughed and replied, that we were not only on the same page, but we were already halfway through the boarding process of getting in our ships.

Flight ready and off the deck, we move to show our new "friends" that we are awake and ready to rumble. If they wanted to bushwack us, they would have. So unless they showed any signs of aggression I was content on just "communicating" with them.



Several high speed, head-on, close but neutral passes later, I started to notice a trend. I was having to make more sudden movements to avoid collision. This avenger was trying to clip me, or at least it felt like he was...still no "real" aggression so I kept on "communicating".

My wingman was busy with the second avenger. I kept in constant communication with him and we knew where each other were. I never really felt more people would show up, but you never really know out there. He was reporting similar behavior, it appeared the Avengers were trying to ram us.

I am not sure what happened but one of the Avengers decided that enough was enough, bugged out and went home. Leaving his wingman out to dry. Looking back I wonder if the pair were having a similar conversation that was going on between my wingman and myself. I was having to talk my wingman down who was ready to engage them from the moment we dusted off. Perhaps the conversation ended with one of them saying that he was going to be more aggressive and the other fellow left him to face his fate, alone. Or perhaps he had to go take the trash out, who knows. My guy bugged out and gone, I turn to backup, my wingman.




Just as I got to full burner and make my way to my fellow aviator, he reports a hostile action. The Avenger collided with him, damaging his shields and hull. From that point, it was fight on. It was not pretty.

This was in the days before 3.0.1 so not naturally our missiles did not lock and fire properly. Well, they didn't do shit at all, just a red circle giving me the middle finger as I close the range and go to guns on the ramming prick.

Well, of course, the fight goes on as he continues to try head-on shots on me, over and over and both of us failing to make much of an impact. At one point I placed a few good shots and he decided that playtime was over. He headed for the deck.

This made my mouth water. I was so caught up in the moment that I actually thought that him heading for the deck was a mistake on his part because I had this cocky, larger than life, I am a living god feeling that once he broke atmosphere I was going to wax the dog shit out of his tail. I actually said to my wingman who was reporting him diving for the deck "Good" I wanted the prick down there because I knew I was better.



As it turns out, atmospheric conditions are not currently as much of a factor as I would like them to be when it comes to flying, and it's not really much different than flying in space. The ships act the same its just now there are rather large objects you can drift into. Which is exactly what this moron in the avenger did...killing my mood. He just dead sticked it right into the ground and started to flop like a trout the out of water. I laugh as my wingman and I close the distance.


He laid there helpless as we proceded to remind him of the consequences starting shit. For he that does not start shit, knows that there shall be no shit. We blew him all over the red mood and went back to doing whatever random nonsense we decided to move off on. 



(Actual Footage From entire story)
I got to live out the opening scene from Top Gun and Iron Eagle II ...I was right there with Maverick and Cougar dealing with Migs. I was chasing the angles with Cooper and Cobra over Soviet Airspace...only it was not a movie. It was a real experience with a real-life friend shared in a virtual environment.

The Fighter Pilot community has a term, Sierra Hotel...shit hot. To be Sierra Hotel one has to be good, and I mean really good. It is not a term that is simply thrown around willy-nilly and it carries a lot of meaning.


CIG, and Star Citizen are both Sierra Hotel.


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