File: 1356755691444.jpg-(48 KB, 672x345, jokerredbackground.jpg)

STAGE: THE VAULT

The world around you is a study in decay - The walls of the cylindrical chamber fibrous and knotted with rusted pipes and flutes, tarnished columns of pitted iron and steel. Red, throbbing light shafts down from far above, beating against the cracked black shale of the floor; The atmosphere holding a dry, static charge, as if great electromagnetic machines are toiling away nearby.

With a ghostly, rasping buzz, screens flicker to life - Cyclopean eyes showing crackling snow, a thousand different shots of the unfolding tableau. The footage is looped, smash-cut; A tinny echo of the last few moments replayed again and again.

> "Holy SHI-*fzzzzzz*"
> "...red Jok...*kkkkkshhhhhh*"

The ground trembles, as the hunched, ogrish thing before you - Humped-back and matte-black, squirming faces pushing from a grotesquely swollen torso like living tumors - takes a step forward. It's clumsy, without grace, the spined knuckles of its colossal arms screeching against not-concrete; Vestigal limbs flexing and uncurling from the Amaglam's torso, waving like fronds, like pseudopods, in writhing motion.

Horribly, your mono-optic sensors recognizes it - Parts of the malformed, asymentrical *thing*, at least. The Players Argent Prominence killed...The Players you killed - They're within this malformed newborn, black oil weeping from eye sockets, exposed teeth and jaws clacking and mashing idiotically...

You can *feel* the trembling waves of distortion broadcast by the Nihl Sphere - An icy-cold *warping* you can neither control nor stop. The Amaglam *keens*, reaching for you with stunted limbs - A long, continuous, tooth-grinding wail - an unholy combination of a human shriek and the mindless champing of grinding jaws.

(Continued.)

The monstrous thing, this stitched-together obscensity - It lurches toward you, unsteady on its twisted legs...A lumbering stagger that *accelerates* to a pounding charge, with the ponderous unstoppability of a glacier. It is still *expanding* as it comes towards you, filling the curving corridor before you - A match for the hall at the back - the Amaglam's ink-black surface still shifting, still *changing*...One great arm slicing through space, digits squirming like maggots as they writhe towards you with blind tenacity.

> HP: 93%
> METER: 10%
> COBALT BOOSTER: 100%
> ASSAULT SHROUD: 136%

YOU HAVE CONTROL

>>22274155

You really should have called it LEGION. You know, "We are legion, because we are many?"

>>22274149

Oooohhhhh, fuck.

It looks like it's melee-focused, so back the hell away. Pop our guns and start shooting thiss thing.

>>22274227
*this quest

>>22274227

I'll bite. I like the setting, the giant robot battles and the combat system, and the girls. The various heroines are well-developed as characters, and are quite distinct personality-wise. (And they're also really hot.)

Generally, what I really like is the protagonist himself, who is several shades of stone-cold awesome.

>>22274155
Scrander dash backwards and spray small arms fire. In fact, if we can, jump into the air and shoot it. If it jumps, tackle it back to the ground.

FUCK I'M TIRE
WHY DO PEOPLE LIKE JOKER QUEST SO THAT I WERE TO BEGIN IN EXPLAINING WHY IT'S SUCH A BAD QUEST.

>>22274236

This. Use the jetpack and hover out of reach, as we unload into him.

Your not serious are you.
this is a joke right

>>22274308
I would respond but find your use of capslock and abuse of the English language rustle my jimmies more than your troll post. Reporting.

>>22274312
I'm not sure the ceiling is high enough for that.

>>22274308
What is there not to like about JQ?

>>22274357
Not really a joke
>>22274272
Although swear this is

You guys told me that I could explain why joker quest was shit last thread I decide that would

The Scrander's reactors whirr to life - Red particles fuming forth as the turbines cycle up, the jets flaring as you *leap* back; Your forearm Vulcans spit cohered flame, scorching emerald lances of plasma sizzling across the distance towards the warped Amaglam.

Your targeting sensors are a confused jumble of ghost-readings and warnings - But it's a massive target, impossible to miss. A hail of searing bolts explodes against the thing's oil-black surface; It lurches, shuddering beneath the impacts - The great mass checked in mid-step, as your snap-blasts fireball against it...

-But it swings for you anyway. You're already out of reach, rising towards the low ceiling as the pitch-black fist cannons out; But grotesquely, in defiance of all anatomical sense, it *extends*. Articulating out with the gunshot cancophy of snapping tendons, artifical muscle propelling the limb forward - You twist aside just in time, but it catches you with a glancing blow to the shoulder, the heavy, slugging impact slamming you off your feet.

The thing's *arm* - You can see the surface *squirming*, hungry tendrils of pseduostuff reaching out from it - Like tiny fingers, like maggots, as the bludgeoning fist cracks down. Something even *worse* is happening; The hulking torso shifts and warps, as new tumors push out from the surface - You can make out the glint of not-steel, the eyeless holes of *gun barrels*...

> HP: 90%
> METER: 14%
> COBALT BOOSTER: 100%
> ASSAULT SHROUD: 125%

YOU HAVE CONTROL

>>22274508

Tyrant Burst the fucker. Fire the concentrated beam right into his arm, and keep up the vulcan shots. As soon as we can, launch napalm missiles.

>>22274508

Ugh, so many freaks.

>>22274622

THIS. Follow up with a photonic burst.

>>22274508
Is there any cover we could duck behind that could take a hit? I'd suggest constantly moving from cover to cover while firing Cobalt Boosted vulcans. Also should charge up the Tyrant Burst system. I think a number 3 would get the best results.

>>22274495
I was expecting you to explain in that thread, but you disappeared. I don't see you explaining much now either.

>>22274429
The answer will scare you
I been analyzing joker quest to see why I stopped enjoying it and was shocked by how bland the characters were how OP was railroad

>>22274741
It was 4:00 fucking a.m. in the morning, I type slowly, and bad internet

>>22274508
Hmm. We ought to plug those holes. Interceptors out and firing, two please.

>>22274946
>The answer will scare you
Fucking what. I don't think that means what you think it means.

>>22274946
Funny, I still don't see you explaining anything.

>>22274622

In the instant before the thing can recover - Before the sickening liquid-flesh of it's arm can retract - the Tyrant Burst system spews forth a single ice-white beam. The blast is savage; You're aiming right for Div-E Sepid's...The *thing* using Div-E Sepid's form...grotesquely muscled arm - The ray lashing out with a light flash thunderclap of displaced air.

The Amaglam's heads shriek as one, the blindingly bright light seeming to dislocated against it's night-black surface; Dark, clotted vapour boils forth, as - For a moment - you glimpse the gaping *hole* you've made in it's arm, before the roiling flesh *flows*...Actually flows, in a sickly, uneven tide...to seal the wound.

You dash to the side, before it can reorientate - Your dual Vulcans blazing, the rotary cannons churning as howling bolts; Each impact spends itself against the thing's surface, the same black smoke rising forth - It's like you're trying to boil away the ocean, with your shots...As if this *thing's* warped form is made of something impossibly dense-

>>22274741

The hall's eerily empty - Except for the flat, blocky shapes of unidentifiable machinery, the tangle of columns and pipes in a snarled architectural nightmare. Your thrusters fuming with blue flame, you hurl yourself behind the scant cover - Crimson armor screeching and scraping as it draws sparks...

-As a storm of shots explodes around you. Something like a jagging laser beam sears into the ground with an acrid *hiss* - You hear stinger rounds clatter off the floor, off the walls, off your armor, leaving scars-

(Continued.)

...And then there's the big one. You don't even *see* what it is, but there's the hard *slap* of a concussion - The force bruising, as your cover splinters - and you're punched back, your vision fizzling with distortion. The Amaglam lumbers forward, pseudopods coiled into the vague approximation of weapons - You can see arms, a half-dozen, more, straining against the corded muscle of the thing's torso.

There's the cycling whine of charge, as it brings more guns to bear; And all the while, the air's getting *colder*-

The hallway's coming to an end, opening up into a larger space at your back - You only have the vaguest impression of movement, swirling grey wisps writhing in agitation...

>>22274974

As gun barrels slurp of out the Amaglam's elbows and shoulders, ragged clumps of ammunition and explosive forming with sickening organic slowness, you trigger the Tyrant Burst system - A brilliant flash blasting forth, so bright it bleaches the corroded red of the walls to white.

The Amaglam *shrieks*. All of its mouths scream it with, a chilling multi-part symphony - Right as your spinning Rifle Bits lift from your shoulders, looping towards it as they fire. The slagging beam slashes across the thing's fleshy shell - Something explodes, thick black gore spewing outwards in echo of the destruction. It *burns*, weird green flames licking unevenly at the thing's chest - Right before a *massive* weapon stabs out at you...

-You can hear the metallic rasp as the charge builds; Even as it lurches forward, filling the hall with it's mass - The thing's going to trample you!

> HP: 85%
> METER: 21%
> COBALT BOOSTER: 42%
> ASSAULT SHROUD: 111%

TIER ONE WEAPONRY UNLOCKED

YOU HAVE CONTROL

>>22275143
If we want to do major damage to this fucker we'll need to save our meter, get enough to introduce him to our Fusion Annihilator.

He isn't the cleverest of guys, turn on the Afterimages from the Assault Shroud, use the Scrander for extra speed, move back some to get out of the hall, and then use the extra room in the space behind us to dodge out of the way.

Keep the Rifle bits attacking it, focusing on the massive weapon it's charging, focusing our Vulcans on the same thing.

>>22275143

This goddamn thing. NAPALM MISSILES, now.

>>22275244

You can actually *feel* sparks crackle over your armor, as that hideous weapon charges - A weird, pulsing anti-light building, as you scramble back, your armored boots scraping against the black shale of the floor; Even as you bring your Vulcans up and *fire*...

-The Amaglam's substance lunges at you. The half-cohered limbs push free from the thing's smoldering chest - Green fire eating into it - and surge forth in hissing tendrils, each one tipped with a snapping, fanged maw. You're blasting away at the thing, plasma bolts hammering into it's torso, splintering the myriad of wailing faces - But it *wrenches* you forward, momentarily off-balance, and your left-arm Vulcans slashes a line of divots against the wall, as other coiling pseudopods punch through the shimmering ghost-images of your Assault Shroud.

This conjoined abdomination - It's hideously strong. You set your heels, the Tempest Scrander flaming; But more coils of it's roiling substance have snagged your right leg, your left arm - You can feel barbed talons raking against your crimson cuirass, trying to find a way in...

-And in the instant before the Amaglam's still-forming cannon fires, your right-arm Vulcan and Rifle Bits fire as one. Pencil-thin particle beams lance through it, above and below - More coils of the Amaglam's substabce clawing out at them, snagging one of your Rifle Bits, dragging it into the thing's mass with a sickening *slurp*-

The weapon misfires, as the charging element is punctured.

The Amaglam's arm explodes.

(Continued.)

It roars. It roars and squeals and shrieks, muscles spasming and arms twitching, tortured nerves sending contradictory messages through its unnatural form; A crazed confusion of armor shards and pulsing flesh, writhing onto itself as it tries to *heal*...Heedless of the slash-stabbing rays of your Rifle Bits, lancing it again and again from every angle at once, opening up rents in it's form.

The thing's tentacles contract - Then they release you, explosively, *hurling* you away with all the force you can muster. Your Tempest Scrander fights to balance you, but you go pinwheeling through the air...

-And smash headfirst into a row of arcade cabinets. Sparks fly out - Your vision's swimming at the sudden and inexplicable change, the pulsing beat of electronic music and orange light momentarily dazzling you. You're *still* in your armor - You can hear the servoes groan, the sensors fighting to cohere...But you're *here*.

You're in the real world.

> "-the *fuck*-"
> "-a monster-"
> "-is that?"

(Continued.)

File: 1356760907293.jpg-(209 KB, 442x612, Well shit.jpg)

>>22275588
>You're in the real world.
Well shit.

Also, running JQ when SWQ is on might have been a mistake methinks. Except for the part where my vote counts for more

File: 1356760916996.png-(366 KB, 547x308, jokerinterceptors.png)

You can hear voices, utter confusion and milling panic - People are scattering away from you, as you wrench your gauntlet free from the guts of a Virtual Fighter cart; It's like you can see *two* overlapping views at once - In one, there's the Amaglam, flailing and snapping as it rights itself...In the other, you can make out the SHEOL STAR ARCADE'S floor, the machines you've just demolished.

When you shake your head to clear it, the Amaglam vanishes - And you're in the swirling visual confusion of the arcade, at one end of the games pit; Some people staring on in white-faced panic, girls screaming as they back away-

...And, crazily, for one moment - You see Yui. Her hands are clamped over her mouth, her brown eyes so *very* wide; You almost didn't recognize her, in a miniskirt and white shirt - So *different* from her (rather prim) uniform. Frost fumes against the screens of the machines next to you...

-As she begins to scream loudest of all.

> "-away from it! Away!"
> "...the police. SOMEONE CALL THE POLI-"
> "-kamen Rider, I *know* it is..."

> HP: 74%
> METER: 27%
> COBALT BOOSTER: 42%
> ASSAULT SHROUD: 97%

YOU HAVE CONTROL

>>22275710

Holy shit.

> [X] "GET THE HELL AWAY FROM HERE, YOU IDIOTS."

>>22275710
Whelp, we're on Youtube tonight, so we'd better make this look good. Can we transfer over? We wound up in the Red World as Anon, so we should be able to jump freely.

Or is it still *here*? Are the interceptors?

We ought to try and clear the arcade regardless. Too late to stop a panic, so we might encourage them to run faster. Turn up the volume and say, "Anyone who doesn't want to star as a monster food in the first real life Kamen Rider episode might want to leave while they can."

Pray we can jump back to the Red World, unless we want to shoot civies we're at a disadvantage in a crowd situation.

>>22275710
Well, shit. Tell people that we're the Red Hero of Justice, and that we're fighting for their lives. Tell them to run like fucking hell.

>>22275831
>>22275837
>>22275845

A frozen moment, to take stock - Yes, you really *are* here. You're here, in full armor, glass crunching beneath your limbs, gears ratcheting as you struggle to right yourself; Plastic and metal have crimped under your weight, the electric fire of the Tempest Scrander sizzling out in tics of flailing lightning...

You yell - It doesn't matter what you yell, not really. You don't think they can *hear* you - Not your words, anyway. But the static-distorted snap makes people lurch away - You see another girl grab Yui by the shoulder, jerking her back so hard she nearly falls...

-And some people are coming *towards* you. You don't take them all in at once - The world goes BLACK, then light again. BLACK, then light again, as frost spiders across the ground - The power is fluctuating, the icy cold of the Nihl Sphere blistering the air...

The world goes red, again, and the Amaglam is looming over you. One spined fist raised. You get your legs under you, throw yourself to the side as it comes down; But not *quite* fast enough. The weight - It hits you with the force of a battering ram, cracks spidering out beneath you as your chestplate takes the impact, your breath exploding from your lungs...

Then you hear arcade cabinets crunch apart, shards of plastic flying out in all directions as they're demolished. You shake your head; You're sprawled on the floor of the arcade, the light pulses on and off in a staccato beat, wavering back and forth...

(Continued.)

>>22275710
This is too confusing. Is the Nihl Sphere still sub-zero? I think Amalgam tapped the sphere somehow to burst its restraints, the side effect of that was pulling us into the Red. I wonder what the fact that we're in the Real now means? Sphere drained? Connection severed when that main gun blew?

Whatever the case we need to get back, the Amalgam might be capable of existing in both worlds, we did sort of sense it before this happened. If it can hit us without leaving the Red we're screwed.

File: 1356762350106.jpg-(78 KB, 500x375, video-arcade.jpg)

Before you, the air is shimmering, unfocused, above the main space of the arcade. A dent appears in the floor, then another, another two - Something invisible shoulders through a UFO-catcher machine, adn it disintegrates, shearing apart as it tumbles down. Gouges appear on the cinderblock walls - A huge raking split raking through the Mario Kart pods, demolishing two at once.

Stripes of ice are tracking across the ground, vanishing as quickly as they've been made - Cold blue flame leaking from the Tempest Scrander, as the Amaglam distorts reality around it...

-It's trying to come through. You don't know how, but it's trying to *come through* - The Nihl Sphere is still blitzing the area with *cold*, but you can make it out, now - The Amaglam's horrid silhouette like a looming, malicious shadow. Sparks fly as it wrenches one of the pachinko machines free from the stand - Raising it to *throw*...

-Behind you, you can hear the wails and shrieks as people scramble for the doors - But they must have a dozen different ideas where it *must* be, because there's nothing to slow the sheer tide of unhinged panic.

> HP: 66%
> METER: 33%
> COBALT BOOSTER: 42%
> ASSAULT SHROUD: 71%
> RIFLE BITS: 1/5 (ACTIVE, ATTACKING)

YOU HAVE CONTROL

>>22276106

Oh, jesus. We gotta make sure the people here don't get hurt. Fire a Cobalt-Boosted shotgun blast at the thing, shoot the projectile out of it's hands.

>>22276106
Keep on shooting the fucker. Lure it away from people, back the direction we came.

We have 30% meter, so we could unleash the Annihilator, but that might cause a bit too much collateral damage.

>>22276106
Panic is good, it makes people get away from here, which is what matters most. New priority is to protect the civilians. To that effect, the Interceptors should attack its arm. Making the pachinko machine fall on it would be satisfying as well.

The Nihl Sphere is causing this, huh? Feeding this monster to it had damn well better shut it up.

>>22276106
There's one place where we can be sure there are no civs and that's right behind the distortion where there is no exit to the outside so blast the machine out of the distortions hands and continue to retreat. CBoost the FA and when we shift red again let Amalgam have it.

>>22276106
We could try shoving the Nihl Sphere into the Amalgam distortion.

>>22276176
Shouldn't need to waste a Caster shot on that. an arcade machine hardly has the durability to stand up ti our plasma vulcans.

>>22276205
Wait, the Nihl Sphere jumpstarted this motherfucker. Since to date it's been absorbing energy rather than expending it, I think it's trying to recoup its loss by sucking the heat out of everything around us.

This could be bad, wow. On the upside, it probably will go back to normal if we feed it Amalgam.

>>22276292

We want to stop it from hitting civillians, overkill is best in this instance.

>>22276176

The schematics of the Plasma Caster sketch themselves into being - The blunt, ugly ingot outlined by arching, angular lines filling in with grey. It seems to take *longer* than before, somehow, as broken glass crunches underfoot; You're on your feet, swinging both arms up as the Amaglam *hurls* the entire glass-and-steel mass forward in a violet motion...

-You fire, and the Cobalt Booster in your chest flares with azure light. The photonic burst is a meteor of sapphire flame, splintering into an expanding halo of high-velocity scattershot; It takes the pachinko machine in mid-air, and explodes it in a hail of silver balls and flaming debris. The sound it makes it atrociously loud, as the thing comes smashes down - The blast punches *through*, and takes the Amaglam in the chest. Eerie green light flares, as the thing's *faces* rupture...Pixels of light, almost lost in the swirling visual chaos, drawn to you...

You think, dimly: The whole is not more than the sum of it's parts. When you killed them the *first* time, they were weak; Crammed together in this walking abortion of a body, the destroyed Players are *still* different entities - They can be killed indiviually or together.

Somehow.

>>22276194

You break into a clattering run - Sprinting down the rows, your Assault Shroud trailing afterimages. Now that you're in motion, it distorts you further - Anyone watching would see a chaotic, jittering silhouette, particles of its substance fuming away from its form.

The Tempest Scrander at your back *roars*, and it kicks you into the air - There's more space *here*, but not enough to fly, not really - as you hurdle an entire row of fighting-game machines. The Amaglam is shading itself into being, gaining weight, gaining *realness* by the moment - One twisted arm reaching out towards you, fingers squirming with motion...

-And you remember that Div-E Sepid had some kind of distortion weapon, just as the wall explodes.

(Continued.)

File: 1356763993969.jpg-(62 KB, 450x329, jokergasmask2.jpg)

A grazing dent craters the far wall, in the instant before it blows out - Spalling and fist-sized chunks of brick smashing into your helmet, hard enough to daze you. You demolish a DDR machine beneath your weight; But - Small mercies - the Amaglam is turning to *follow* you.

Maybe it's drawn to the icy aura of the Nihl Sphere, an ember smoldering with anti-heat. Maybe some part of it just loathes you. Or maybe it simply wants - With the instinct of a wounded animal - to kill you first. Either way, as your Plasma Vulcan spits a quick hail of bolts into the thing's flank, it's turning in your direction...Instead of murdering it's way through the wailing dozens of teenagers and students and *people* struggling away from it.

If you can-

> "HAAHHHHH!!!"

-You jerk back, as an energized blade cleaves through a change machine, missing you by a hair. Your defensive shift lets you take in your attacker - A beige-and-brown player, amber light glowing in the rounded sockets of his helmet-

GALLOWGLASS, his ID tag reads-

...As he swings for you again. His weapon is a robust-looking shortsword, like an oversized army knife crackling with force; Heedless of the utter chaos, he brings it down again in another flailing slash - One you just manage to deflect, the edges shrieking against your right-arm Vulcan cannons - as Gallowglass drives towards you, each step a blow and each blow a step.

> HP: 61%
> METER: 26%
> COBALT BOOSTER: 30%
> ASSAULT SHROUD: 54%
> RIFLE BITS: 1/5 (ACTIVE, ATTACKING)

YOU HAVE CONTROL

>>22276529

> "God, you FUCKING MORON. I have HAD IT with YOU ASSHOLES."

Punch the caster into his chest, and blast him.

>>22276529
Try to maneuver so that he's between us and Amalgam. Either Amalgam stops its attack or it hits him to try to get to us. Then get some distance between us and Gallowglass and shoot the fuck outta him. Have the rifle bit attack him from behind as well.

>>22276529
Keep on moving, we can't let this guy tarpit us with Amaglam on around. Keep on luring them away from civilians, keep Gallowglass between us and Amaglam, and open fire with our Vulcans on Gallow, aim to take down his legs to reduce his mobility.

>>22276529
"Are you actually retarded?! Focus on the horrific Corrector/Player hybrid unless you want to be responsible for a repeat of Nara Dreamland!"

If that doesn't get through to him, Scrander Tackle him. We can deal with idiots after the Frankenstein's monster is dead.

Speaking of which, anyone up to using Fortress Mode? Set it up and fire missiles. If enough of it is enclosed it might take extra damage.

>>22276646
Yeah we could block off the path to the civvs with fortress mode and then use the rockets with impunity. I recall some of the Amalgam players being weak enough to die outright to a rocket. Also should put the other interceptors into action.

Remember the Rust Kaiser fight that When I left this quest and it will explain why I say this quest is so horrible.
But I'm not going to start there I'm going to start from the beginning to show you my point of view on this.
Now when I first got into joker quest and thought it was the best quest in /tg/’s history but that was when I was still green.
I mean the best part of the quest was where we used a jetpack to impale a killer shark-man-thing.
Seriously it would be heresy to say it wasn't.
We also took the only character that wasn’t a friendly or hostile and made her our girlfriend not to mention she is most interesting character we have in this quest and refuse any other girl.
The first half of was pretty awesome.
Joker quest had a lot of potential so what do I have to complain about?

The first major problem is how the characters are bland and their dialogue has a tendency to be unnatural.

second problem is how OP handles our character

Third the railroading

Fourth how uncreative OP is

And finally [sarcasm]that wonderful Rust Kaiser fight[/sarcasm]

>>22276744
Which should I elaborate on?

> "You're gonna *die*, Joker! Gonna chop you up-"

You were wondering when other Players would turn up, but - Really? Really? That, here? *Now*? - But *of course* that here, now.

That everywhere, always.

>>22276588
>>22276592

You leap back, but there's nowhere to go - You're literally fighting your way down the aisle, and this bastard is tenacious. His shortsword comes around in another whirring chop, and this one bites into your side - He follows it up with a solid kick that cracks against your knee; Your leg threatens to buckle beneath you, your shots fouled by his furious but not especially fast assault. He's just *too close*...

>>22276646

He only cackles in response - And you think: Fuck this.

As your legs bunch beneath you, you trigger the Tempest Scrander - Slamming into him *hard*, your gauntleted fingers gripping his wrist, forcing his hand out and to the side. Gallowglass manages a static-laden *grunt* of surprise...Before the two of you leave the ground in a twisting spiral.

The flight's a brief one, nearly uncontrolled - You glance off the ceiling like a skipping stone, and suddenly you're *both* plunging towards the ground. You hit hard, with a tooth-rattling impact...But you're right on top of him, and the landing draws a staggered *THUD* as his head cracks against the ground.

(Continued.)

>>22276744
Cool story, bro.

>>22276757
Everything.

>>22276771
Will do

>>22276758
*fingers crossed* Please blow a hole in his chest with the Plasma Caster

>>22276582

By some twisted miracle, you've totally cleared the confines of gaming lanes - You're now in the flat square just before the rows of sticker-photo machines. You make out - In a brief flash - panicked faces goggling at the Players who've smashed so violently down before them...

-Before you punch the Plasma Caster into Gallowglass's chest, and pull the trigger.

There's a sound like FOOM, as the blast chews into him; A corona of blue light stabbing out in all directions from the backwash of the shot. He gurgles, as the shots actually punches *through* his torso - The edges glowing red-hot, as he twitches and bucks beneath you, the lens of his helmet cracked; Not dead, but barely alive.

The fight's momentarily out of him, as you look up - The lights have settled into the dull pulse of emergency lighting, as the Assault Shroud whirrs away from you, reassembling itself as a shifting wall of tesselated hexagons; Not a true prison, but the beginnings of one, a crude half-sphere of nanomaterial, open at the back. The Amaglam slams a punch into it, and fragments skitter off from the wall...

(Continued.)

>>22276744
Damn you're slow. Also, vague.

File: 1356765721400.jpg-(112 KB, 601x900, jokerhucast.jpg)

As you hear an ozone-laden hum, and a flash of violet light.

There's someone else - Another opportunist - who's hacking at the Amaglam from behind; A figure in purple and silver (TYRIAN EDGE, your jittery sensors inform you) armed with a hissing, smoking bar of cohered energy. He stabs at the Amaglam - His blade drives into one of thing's tree-trunk legs...

-And it casually backhands him aside.

You almost wince, as he's hurled away - He hits the end wall, slides down, is lost from view amid a tangle of pinball machines. Your half-glimpsed enemy is confused, having momentarily lost sight of you - It hammers another spined fist into your Assault Shroud's shimmering barrier, which is splintering beneath the horrid strength of each blow; It seems disorientated, the myriad of warped faces peering in every direction at once, muscles rippling beneath the black pseudo-flesh...

> HP: 53%
> METER: 37%
> COBALT BOOSTER: 20%
> ASSAULT SHROUD: 0%
> RIFLE BITS: 1/5 (ACTIVE, ATTACKING)

YOU HAVE CONTROL

>>22276945
Unload maximum amount of missiles into his face, and then try to find a way out of here, maybe tempest scrander to the roof.

>>22276945
Well at least this interloper is attacking the monster. Turn on the rest of the bits, they were made for this.

>>22276972
Let's hold off on missiles, we don't want it to break through any time soon.

>>22276972

Wait, wait. KILL GALLOWGLASS FIRST. That fucker does not get to live, he's a total faggot.

>>22276945

> TYRIAN EDGE
> he's purple

Dohohoho, I see wut u did thar, Op.

>>22276987
True, we should make sure he's finished off. Stomp his skull in?

>>22276945
Okay, let's finish off Gallowglass, just shoot him in the head or something.

Now that we're behind the barrier we can charge up a full Cobalt Boosted Fusion Annihilator, drop the barrier, and turn Amalgram into slag.

>>22276945
FFFFFFFFFFFFF

That wasn't what I was hoping for, I wanted to block the the path to the civvies behind Amalgam so our rockets wouldn't hurt them when we unloaded the racks on Amalgam.

Oh well. Vulcan Gallowglass in the face till he turns into XP and launch our remaining interceptors and set them to attack Amalgam. Also, Cobalt Boost them.

>>22276987
>>22277009
I doubt he's moving with a hole in his chest.

>>22277033
Interesting proposition. I was under the impression that Assault Shroud material that goes into barriers is lost to us the same way afterimages and doubles are.

>>22277039

> I wanted to block the the path to the civvies behind Amalgam so our rockets wouldn't hurt them when we unloaded the racks on Amalgam.

(My apologies: I think I wasn't clear. Yes, you did create a shape like that - A barrier between the Amaglam and most of the people. Tyrian Edge was attacking from the side that was left open.)

>>22277068
>>22277039
Oh, Okay then in addition to what I just posted we need to move into position to be able to target Amalgam with a full Triskalion barrage. CAn not us the Fusion Annihilator while in the Real, it'd be like a nuke going off.

>>22277033
>>22276987
>>22277009

Gallowglass is *still moving* - Remarkably tenacious, though his armor is molten and slagged, threads of amber light pulsing from the reactor beneath, as you shove yourself to your feet. You wonder if he's trying to claw away, until his arm comes out in one last swipe...

-His sword is still in it.

You get your arm in the way, just in time - The moaning blade chews into the barrels of your right-arm Vulcan, shattering the grip and the drivers, seizing it's function as it crunches through...But the reinforced mass means that it stops the cleaver from shearing the limb right off.

Barely.

Your remaining Vulcan stabs into his faceplate, and you *fire* - That gas-mask cracking, as plasma bolts scorch into it, a strangled, choking gurgle coming from his throat-

Before your boot comes down, and smashes his head in. You put all your weight behind it, and you actually *feel* it give...Stomping not *on* him, but *through* him...

-The rush of green motes that billows forth lights you up from within. You can feel your armor drinking it in greedily, on the verge of a *change*...

(Continued)

>>22277148
I wonder if it's possible to level up mid-fight....

>>22277213
Do you even read this quest?

>>22277213
We've done it before.

>>22277148
>Down a gun.
Also fuck.

Can we take his sword or did that dissolve with him? If nothing else that's something to throw at Amalgam.

You don't even know what hits you, next - It must have been another projectile, another thrown arcade console - but it takes you away, horizontally, lifting you in a kicking, thrashing arc. You land first, on your back - Shoving the weight away, looking up to see the Amaglam looming before you; It's missing one arm, now, the liquid flesh struggling to form another - All of its eyes on you at once, stinking of death and char and madness...

The Triskelion launcher's racks flip open. Smoke boils around you, as you launch everything.

EVERYTHING.

Eight missiles lift off, their double-helix contrails muted against the murky light of your barrier. Then another four, in rapid succession, right on the heels of the first. The Cobalt Booster in your chest sputters, goes out - Utterly drained by your barrage.

You may not know this, but - This was the absolute best thing to do. This...entity, whatever it is - The primoridal, blunt force of *fire* is exactly what you need.

Two of your missiles go wild - Slapped off-course by lashwhips of the Amaglam's roiling stuff. Two more fall short.

That leaves seven more to plough into the target.

(Continued.)

>>22277232
My memory of past chapters is kinda fuzzy, and we really haven't leveled up recently.

>>22277249
I'm the one hates joker quest and can remember that.

Flames roar up. Blue-hot. Sour, fierce. There's fire *everywhere*, all of a sudden - Sticky blue flames crawling across the Amaglam, sifting down as it ignites like an oily slick; You can actually *see* the way its substance pulls away from the thing's hulking frame, seeking somewhere else, *anywhere* else, to cling fast, to survive...

There's fire everywhere, before you. It lights the chamber, for one delirious moment - Blank faces, contorted in fear, watching the Amaglam thrash and howl and claw at itself, only spreading the tarry flames further...The voices are wailing in unison, now, a hellish chorus that pierces your mind-

It's still burning, as it topples; The world filling with a noxious stench, ichor splattering - In defiance of physics, the napalm clings to the inside curve of your Assault Shroud's barrier, eating through it like acid...

(Continued)

When the Amaglam dies, it dies with a vengeance. It *comes apart*, in moiling black-and-green smoke; The world flickers around it, like a shroud of collapsing energies...Real, then red. Real, then red away.

You're being drawn back. You're no longer on the faux-marble of an arcade floor, but on pitiless black shale and sleet. Everything shivers at the edges, as if it's on the edge of coming apart-

...And all the energy released from the Amaglam's death surges into you, in a violent surge. For a moment, you think it's another attack - It's shot-through with hellsmoke, writhing with purple lightning, and it hurts, it hurts, it *hurts* as your feet leave the ground...

-And a scream is wrenched from your throat, as the Red Joker's armor churns with released potential.

@#$%%^&
ERR@%
%#@#@$$

> R4D JO1<ER LEVEL uP
> SELE<T B()NU$.

[ ] FORCE (WEAPON UPGRADE)
[ ] METER (FASTER METER GAIN)
[ ] GUARD (DEFENSIVE UPGRADE)
[ ] SURVIVE (VITALITY UP)
[ ] EVOL (ABILITY UNLOCK)
[ ] ROULETTE (RANDOM RELIC)
[ ] RELIC UPGRADE - ASSAULT SHROUD
[ ] RELIC UPGRADE - TEMPEST SCRANDER

YOU HAVE CONTROL.

>>22277406
[x] METER (FASTER METER GAIN)

I think we had agreed on this earlier. It really sucks not being able to get access to our higher tier weaponry easily.

>>22277406
No chance to feed the Sphere, eh? Well damn.

Meter then, or Evol. Prefer meter for sure.

>>22277406
>[X] FORCE

>>22277448
We already dumped two levels into FORCE. We should try getting something else.

>>22277406
[X] METER (FASTER METER GAIN)

Meter, for the love of all that is good and holy in this world, we ought to improve Meter.

>>22277457

Yeah, let's go with Meter for now. Meter or EVOL seem to be the best.

>>22277457
Did not see that there is fifth tier

>>22277406
Roulette.

Force or meter, either will boost our meter gain.

File: 1356768489817.jpg-(69 KB, 468x600, jokersmasher.jpg)

The *pain* - It's blinding, all-consuming. It is the Vitruvian Device again, but a thousand times worse. It feels like something's clawing it's way from your throat - Your limbs locking in spasm -

Your silhouette warps and shifts - Weapons sketching themselves into half-formed existence, vanishing as quickly as they come...It feels like your bones are forcing themselves into painful new configurations, piecing themselves back together...

FR()ST C4STUz LE\/4L ^P

Cold blasts our from you, explosively - Everything around you freezes, rising in arctic columns and pillars before they shiver apart like glass. You're on your knees, smoke swirling around you - The Nihl Sphere pulsing greedily as it drinks it in.

What was that? What...What was *that*? For a moment you saw...You *felt*...

(Continued)

>>22277446
>or Evol

Evol is what got us these meter hungry interceptors to begin with how the heck would we support a higher (hungrier) level?

>>22277457
Force also seems to unlock higher tier special weaponry.

>>22277572
Which we'd probably never reach with our current meter gain rate. We hardly ever have a chance to use the railgun unless it's a really nasty fight.

>>22277515
>>22277466
>>22277446
Roulette and Evol are awful choices because of how boss characters seem to be specifically designed against them

>>22277614
Your opinion doesn't matter.

>>22277587
Meter is gained via damage dealt, Doing more damage per shot gives more meter per shot.

>>22277547
Ah, come on. Why's it all have to be so confusing.

>>22277614
Especially since we're already drowning in relics, and if we really need more badly, we can just steal them from defeated players or ask Argent to make one.

...And then, as quickly as it began, it's over.

It's over. The pain goes away, and your armor shimmers with a familiar red. You get your left hand beneath you, as you sway to your feet...

Your right arm feels...Clumsy, somehow. You look - To see that it's encased in a massive mechanism; Like a 'H' turned on the side, double-barreled and monstrous - thick cables coiling across the surface, finely sculpted with narrow fins and vanes as it churns the air around it to a full, roiling boil, heedless of the fractcal tracery of heat-sinks.

Even in standby mode, it glows red - The charging elements within at a constant smolder. It's a weapon, you know instinctively - Gravitic suspensors taking the weight as you stand, your gauntleted fingers wrapped around the handgrip.

Your ID tags it: NOVA CANNON.

As your grip relaxes, it begins to shimmer away, to leave your hands free...As it tightens again, the weapon fades back into solidity. It's like a half-real shadow, like your other guns...Ready to come when you call.

(Continued.)

>>22277623
Meter upgrade probably gives us a better return than Force.

>>22277614
We've never used Roulette and we constantly misuse the interceptors, they should be launched all at once to maximize their damage output and also let them cover each other. If we had specialized in Evol from the start they probably would be on the level of Gundam funnels by now.

File: 1356769078746.jpg-(646 KB, 1920x1080, H-Gun_v2.0_Final.jpg)

>>22277639
>Your right arm feels...Clumsy, somehow. You look - To see that it's encased in a massive mechanism; Like a 'H' turned on the side, double-barreled and monstrous - thick cables coiling across the surface, finely sculpted with narrow fins and vanes as it churns the air around it to a full, roiling boil, heedless of the fractcal tracery of heat-sinks.
...We Gantz now?

(not actually the weapon I was thinking of, but close enough)

> METER UPGRADED

> WEAPON TIER ADVANCED

In combat, you now begin at 12% Meter, and you gain increased Meter from receiving and inflicting damage. All Tier One weaponry can now be fired freely, provided you have sufficient Meter - You no longer have to reach 15% Meter to have access to Tier One weapons.

The NOVA CANNON is a powerful matter/energy converter - When triggered, it fires a tracing beam to 'tag' the target...Before explosively converting the target's mass into energy. Due to massive cooling requirements, this weapon cannot be used simultaenously with your Plasma Vulcans - Also, it is strictly single-shot, with a delay between blasts.

However, it compensates for that with ruinous firepower.

(Continued.)

>>22277725
>Before explosively converting the target's mass into energy.

So we have a handheld gun that shoots antimatter? Holy shit.

>>22277659
remember the Rust Kaiser fight because I do
>>22277619
My grudge is against OP not you. I want OP to improve his quest not pull the bullshit he has been.

>>22277750
Can't help but notice you still haven't gone into any detail about what you think the problem is. You just dumped a buch of generic complaints that could be applied to any quest and often are by people who just don't like quests.

>>22277725

Odd, warped symbols flicker across your HUD, as the smog around you clears - Inhaled by the Nihl Sphere, the grey quartz of the surface darkening to an inky black once more. You eye the thing warily, as you push yourself to your feet...It's still pulsing, with the steady, regular beat of a living heart - But you can feel the hunger at the very edge of your mind, as part of you as your crimson armor.

It's...You can still see it. A tiny, almost imperceptible chain of gibberish, like scrapcode - A ghost in the machine.

EXEC_REND

You *know*. You know the odd, warped harmonics needed to bring *that* forth - Whatever it is. Like a memory that isn't yours, coiling within your mind like a virus; Thinking about it *hurts*, until you push it to the side.

-And the world comes back, all at once. Your vision swims, and you're...You're...

Beneath you - Floor. It's cold, against your cheek; A vile taste in your mouth, dull pain in your side - Bruises, new and old. You can't seem to *see* right-

...Like a moving forest, legs pound past you - Running, scrabbling, fleeing, a babble of white noise. You're still *in* the arcade, but nowhere in the room you were inbefore - Were you really here? Did your body come with you?

You don't know.

Something's jamming into your back - The plastic edge of a fallen cabinet, half-toppled on you; It crashes down as you shove it to the side, forcing yourself upright. The lights are dim, the doors cracked open at last - To reveal the deeper darkness of true night, as people kick and punch and struggle to get through it. It's pandemonium, moving around you like shadowplay against a wall...

You inhale, sharply, drawing breath into dust-dry lungs. You're about to stand, when you *feel* - Actually feel - a dragging, icy caress, that makes your skin prickle with goosebumps-

A voice, in your ear, so quickly you may almost have imagined it-

(Continued)

> "It's never over, Joker..."

Div-E Sepid. You can *hear* his voice, from an infinite distance: In the crackle of flames, in the sagging moan of the Amaglam's dissolving form...

-But then you look, and there's nothing; Nothing and no-one, there.

No wonder the world is haunted.

JOKER QUEST

EPISODE 32

TO BE CONTINUED

>>22277893

(Gentlemen; Once again, thank you - You've been a wonderful audience. Unfortunately, it's getting late, and I must be off for now - My apologies for the abrupt ending, but this looks like a natural break point.

Have a very merry belated Christmas; I'll update the equipment sheet by the next instalment, where I'd be able to give it a more thorough evaluation.

And, as always, good night and God Bless.)

>>22277893
>No wonder the world is haunted.
No wonder they say? And yes it is you bastard we ate you and fed your remains to our pet rock.

Thanks for running OP, see you next time. Happy New Year!

Get anything nice?

>>22277806
How about reducing an entire to interactive cutscene rather making an epic battle?
How about making our jetpack useless after waiting three to get a chance to test it out after it was upgraded?
This is only one of my with this quest.

>>22277937
*problems

>>22277937
Are you complaining that he included us? I think. Be clearer.

>>22277976
IT WAS A FUCKING RAILROAD!!!

>>22277937
You thought a jetpack would be useful when fighting in an enclosed space? In two of the three fights we've had since we got the thing it was the players choice to seek battle in enclosed locations.

>>22278001
No it's not. Railroading involves taking control away from the player, not having bad things happen when players try things.

Railroading: DM says your character does "X".
Not railroading: When you try "X", consequence "Y" results.

>>22278001
The Rust Kaiser fight you idiot.
>>22278049
He gave Rust Kaiser that bullshit ability to eliminate our fucking jetpack
And by the a railroad is where a GM forces the game to go where he wants it to by eliminating our options or assuming direct control.

>>22278113
Rust Kaiser always had the ability to fuck with our equipment. That was evident from the first fucking time we fought him.

>>22278113
Remember the first time we tried to convince Rust Kaiser a saint by exposing how holey he could be?

You know how that ended? With him tanking a point blank whatever the fuck, no selling it, saying something in capslock, then jizzing rust over everything in his reach like a demented oxidization machine set on "UNHINGED LUNATIC SWINGING A COFFIN". We know his abilities because the first time we saw him, he slapped our shit.

>>22278113
His name is fucking Rust Kaiser. Rust kinda implies that he fucks with equipment function.

He's got two big schticks. First, he is one tough motherfucker who hits like a truck. Second, he has his rust wind thing which fucks with delicate or precise instruments or equipment.

>>22278171
And electricity neutralizes rust.
your point?

>>22278113
So you object to OP creating challenges deliberately designed to fuck the player over? What in Christ are you doing on /tg/, that's been a staple of tabletop gaming since Gary Gygax started dreaming of Castle Greyhawk. Was it a dick move? Yeah probably, we could have ended Pazuzu.

But no one at the time complained that it was "unfair"; and we had plenty of options as to how we dealt with the situation. Because we had the ability to choose it cannot have been a railroaded situation. We simply chose... poorly.

>>22278184
Not so much fucking with the player then kicking and saying they suck

>>22278182
And in our transformed mode, we're made completely out of metal, which rust can fuck over.

Your point?

>>22278201
No, that would have been permanently ruining the damaged equipment.

>>22278201
Also, OP has shown numerous times that he's willing to delete his own posts and rewrite them when he sees that he missed a response. That's like, the polar opposite of railroading.

>>22278201
Guy, hey guy.

Why are you such an entitled little pansy?

>>22278184
>>22278201

We had ample warning there was someone on the ground preparing to take a shot at us during the Nara Dreamland fight. We decided to put all our focus on taking down Pazuzu and got blindsided because of that.

>>22278205
Then why give us back our fucking equipment only to throw us into that.
>>22278224
Not exactly
the first time I noticed him railroad was when he gave the MC psychic powers
>>22278232
You guys couldn't notice shit and he knows it.

>>22278290
>psychic powers
?????

>>22278290
Jesus. I think you don't notice shit, but i (and i think the majority of the other players) was still aware from the first fight that rust Kaiser had a rust storm ability that would fuck our equipment over. We still wanted to fight him. OUR FAULT, not the OPs. We could also have gone to the Arcade instead.

>>22278290
You're not exactly putting forth any convincing arguments for your case here...

>>22278316
Remember when the MC broken down crying in front of natsumi saying I'm sorry?

>>22278339
It was because everybody was too intent on REVENGE. The same reason why we almost got fried when the Citadel exploded.

>>22278339
I will still consider it poor game design and since we're clearly not getting anywhere so let's move on.

>>22278376
YOU STARTED IT. Why are you even still posting here if you hate the quest? Just go away quietly.

>>22278376
Move on to what? You've proven nothing except that your reasons for disliking the game are frivolous.

>>22278400
Thank you. I don't know about the rest of the Anons, but I've had enough of this joker. Saging now, and goodnight.

>>22278352
Uh, no

>>22278400
I use to like in case you didn't I once did like joker quest
>>22278417
I'll find the link for you.

>>22278417
Seems my memory is a little exaggerated but this does count as some sort of psychic
suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/21421091/#p21422437
suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/21421091/#p21422437

>>22278475
Alright, how? Explain clearly. The onus is on you after all.

>>22278475
Not seeing it, are you sure you quoted the right post? That's not one of OP's posts.

>>22278528

Yeah, that's a write-in.

The actual post by the OP is below. If I recall, it was Natsumi who broke down in front of us after we tried to go into the Corrector hive. Then we friendzoned her, and we friendzoned her hard.

It was glorious.