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Author Topic: Military victory?  (Read 3009 times)

shibby1295

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Military victory?
« on: September 01, 2015, 04:09:38 pm »

My playstyle often results in an endgame where the LCS acts 'openly'--that is, I amass a well-armed well-trained force that enables me to stop worrying about reducing heat and moving safehouses, instead breaking sieges as they come and repeatedly assaulting the police station to keep them out of commission.

I enjoy reaching this level of combat superiority, but it lacks a climactic ending. The same battles keep recurring unchanged, and once the thrill of blowing away the forces I used to fear wears off, it's a bigger nuisance than managing heat was as I continue to pursue a public opinion victory.

Some of the sites (especially the bank) provide satisfying final challenges for infiltration-type skills, but nothing does it the same way for direct combat. And ideally there'd be something that ties everything together.

Thus, I propose an alternate victory path of executing a coup d'etat. It might look something like this (details don't have to be this way, but they should give the idea):
1. Attack the White House. Rack up enough kills, and you can take over the site (like how CCS safehouse takeover used to work) as a safehouse.
1a. Maybe have to do the same with other important buildings?

2. Hold your new territory against a brutal military siege.

3. Learn that an arch-conservative provisional government has convened itself at an undisclosed location and established martial law.

4. Find a sufficiently important conservative and convince them to disclose said location. And try to do it quickly, as more of those sieges are coming.

5. Launch a raid on same location, which turns out to be a heavily-fortified bunker. Getting in the front door requires stealth/disguise, security, and computer. Once inside, you encounter a checkpoint that cannot be passed nonviolently. This triggers the alarms, and the leaders lock themselves in an impenetrable panic room. But all is not lost--the compound's power is generated by a nuclear reactor. Fight your way to it, and mess with it to make it look like a meltdown is imminent. The leaders' security will then change plans and attempt to evacuate them. Intercept them en route, take out the security detail and the leaders, and fight your way back out, and you've won the game.
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nanomage

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #1 on: September 01, 2015, 07:30:56 pm »

but how is this winning the game? You've just destroyed the federal government (and backup government) without actually liberilising anything. The military and paramilitary agencies will go rogue, the states will secede, and whatever results can hardly be called L+ America.
Even if the ability to stage a coup is to be implemented, there has to more to it than just that. You have to act quickly and have your own replacement government ready to be installed before you start, and you should cut off and disable the army and NG instead of confronting it. Given LCS is heroic enough for 6 people in a safehouse to shoot down planes and decimate armoured squads, but there has to be a limit somewhere
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Conradine

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #2 on: September 02, 2015, 06:12:47 am »

But then YOU will have the power, and that is nice!
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a1s

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #3 on: September 10, 2015, 10:24:48 am »

but how is this winning the game? You've just destroyed the federal government (and backup government) without actually liberilising anything.
Well, clearly we will pass all the liberal laws and then hand the reins off to a democratically elected. States won't really want to secede (since they are now part of a liberal utopia) and we have dealt enough of a blow to the conservative lobby that paramilitaries will be licking their wounds.
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scrdest

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #4 on: September 10, 2015, 10:52:13 am »

At that point, it would be literally open war with the government and US in general. You would alienate literally everyone, nobody would recognize your legitimacy, and you'd have to fight a nine-man Tank party to boot.

but how is this winning the game? You've just destroyed the federal government (and backup government) without actually liberilising anything.
Well, clearly we will pass all the liberal laws and then hand the reins off to a democratically elected. States won't really want to secede (since they are now part of a liberal utopia) and we have dealt enough of a blow to the conservative lobby that paramilitaries will be licking their wounds.
The entire point of the game is that you need to *convince* people that a liberal utopia is, in fact, a utopia. If the public opinion is L+ already, taking over a building would be pointless, whereas if it's anything less you're actually alienating people. Just look at the Russian Civil War.

LCS is not a military organization, even if you go all armed activism. It doesn't have the structure to go through with a popular revolution, it's essentially a covert cell terrorist organization simply by gameplay constraints. A reasonable simulation of going for a military victory would essentially require making a whole new game.
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a1s

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #5 on: September 10, 2015, 12:09:36 pm »

(LCS isn't about reality, it's about elite liberal perception. Keep this in mind for the rest of the post)
but how is this winning the game? You've just destroyed the federal government (and backup government) without actually liberilising anything.
Well, clearly we will pass all the liberal laws and then hand the reins off to a democratically elected. States won't really want to secede (since they are now part of a liberal utopia) and we have dealt enough of a blow to the conservative lobby that paramilitaries will be licking their wounds.
The entire point of the game is that you need to *convince* people that a liberal utopia is, in fact, a utopia. If the public opinion is L+ already, taking over a building would be pointless, whereas if it's anything less you're actually alienating people. Just look at the Russian Civil War.
Russian Civil war was fought in an age before internet (and citizen journalism,) thus it clearly does not apply.
LCS has to spend it's time convincing people to adopt liberal policies, because they have been brainwashed by the Conservative Media. If the public experienced the Liberal Utopia, there would be no need to convince them further.

LCS is not a military organization, even if you go all armed activism. It doesn't have the structure to go through with a popular revolution, it's essentially a covert cell terrorist organization simply by gameplay constraints.
LCS is what's called a "vanguard party", consisting of a small but highly motivated core. Once the revolution gets in gear they will be joined by ever-broader layers of (currently) less socially conscious citizens, until full revolution can be achieved. Kind of like cotton candy.
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Neckbeard

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #6 on: September 11, 2015, 01:12:08 am »

The problem here would be recognizing the legitimacy of the new government that you install.  By violently killing political leaders, you basically cast them as martyrs in the public eye and you legitimize the need for the CCS (since they clearly love America more than you do).  Any surviving members of the previous government will hold emergency power, and presumably would run the country in a police state until the LCS is wiped out.  Any laws you and the new government passed would be ignored.

Even if you went and killed of the remaining members of the previous government somehow, the state polices, military, and covert agencies would still stand against you since your squad would be treasoners basically.

The only way I see something like this being a valid course of action would be to restore democracy after the conservative re-writes the constitution.  As in, assassinate the King and his cronies.  The people might appreciate a violent insurrection when they are being forcefully bred and sold off to corporations and crap like that.
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SlatersQuest

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #7 on: September 11, 2015, 09:27:25 am »

On that note, I did have ideas for a a civil war mode in LCS where your actions would instigate a violent revolution. It would still be influencing public opinion, though, because that would be the source of strength for the rebels. You could, however, save the country even after the Arch-Conservative amendment is passed if there is already military opposition to the state.
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Rolan7

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #8 on: September 24, 2015, 10:54:06 am »

Killing sprees somehow do convince people in LCS-world.  It's always struck me as somewhat bizarre, but it's pretty much the default and fastest strategy.  Martyrdom doesn't apply to conservatives for some reason.

To alienate people, you have to harm a moderate or liberal (or get spotted doing crimes before the alarm's raised... for some reason)

Given that, seems reasonable that they could pull off a coup-d'etat.  Even though it's completely unrealistic.
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Neckbeard

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Re: Military victory?
« Reply #9 on: October 20, 2015, 10:41:32 pm »

Killing sprees somehow do convince people in LCS-world.  It's always struck me as somewhat bizarre, but it's pretty much the default and fastest strategy.  Martyrdom doesn't apply to conservatives for some reason.

To alienate people, you have to harm a moderate or liberal (or get spotted doing crimes before the alarm's raised... for some reason)

Given that, seems reasonable that they could pull off a coup-d'etat.  Even though it's completely unrealistic.

Yea, I've always found that to be weird actually.  It really only makes sense if you are either killing armed criminals (or super criminals depending on the mod), genetic beasts, members of the deathsquad, (maybe?) firemen, and defending your base from other factions.

Shooting a bunch of teenagers and highschool dropouts shouldn't move the populace towards liberalism on drug control, for instance.
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