Detailed Demeter review

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igariokas
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Detailed Demeter review

Post by igariokas » 07 Jul 2015, 18:28

Photos will be attached later to this post!!!!!

This is detailed Demeter Research Division Review. Long one, if you are lazy, skip to the last paragraph, my opinion is stated there :)

It was my third Berget, and so far the best one.


I was commander of Demeter Research Division.

Actually, Demeter was the only reason for Ikaros be in the area.
Our background story was the following (extract from oporder):

In 1984 IKAROS corp. began a project under the name of "Project Genisis". This was a very early experiment with Prions (prions was discovered in 1982), with the plan to create a disease and a cure for it, for huge economic gain.

Creating/finding the prion was an easy task, which was named "Pathogen X". The cure was however proved to be more difficult. Experiments where rushed, and a semi-successful cure was created in what was called "Substance Alpha 3-5".

IKAROS sought for a good place to do field testing for both the prion, and for the cure. Ikaros searched a semi-evolved yet rural country, and found Fadjikestan. Due to the closeness of Poldavia and Liburania, Krasnovo was seen as the best choice.
Due to the rushed experiments, a major draw-back was discovered: Substance Alpha 3-5 would not reach it's full effect for at least 30 years, which is now 2015.

This "Project Genisis" is the main and only reason for IKAROS being present and the reason for IKAROS staging the coup in Fadjikestan, to subdue NGF forces standing in the way of finding "Positive A specimen", i.e. Fadjikies that show signs of effective Substance Alpha 3-5. Another problem that arised from the rushed experiments, was that Substance Alpha 3-5 can not be seen in a blood test, if there is to much adrenalin, nor-adrenalin and cortisol (stress hormones). Therefore, to get a clear result, the test subject must be in a calm state when drawing blood.


The area.
Terrain is beatiful but hard. I am not complaining in any way, but it seems both sides had more trauma comparing to Solleftea site. Anyway, if I was to choose I would definitely vote for Harnosand again.

Logistics
Good. Everything needed was in place.

Krasnovo & Civilians
Excellent. Need more civilians. It was >100 Police and ~30 civilians. we need like 100-150 civilians and 10-12 police :)

Gameplay
Our main missions were:
Establish research facility
Find old research lab, pickup or destroy documents there
Find lost crate of Pathogen X (the virus)
Collect blood samples from civilian population, send the samples to Poldavia (main safezone was the airfield), get the results, extract positive A specimen if found. To get samples to Poldavia CP 1,2 and 5 should be under Ikaros control. Results would also be available for pickup only if those cp would be under Ikaros control
Protect civilian population at all costs, until specimen A is extracted to safety (since it was planned to extract him/her/them on Saturday, civilian population was an asset throughout the game)

We started at gamestart, informed all commanders about what we were searching for and since all this stuff should be handled carefully and with hazmat suits and gas masks, we asked not to touch anything suspicious, any building, box or whatever similar. Man, there were a lot of boxes in the territory :). We’ve got something like 10 reports, which we checked and they were there for a long time :)

Nearly at gamestart we have got a hint on where to place research facility. It was right under the windmill at cp3. Now, that was a pretty scenery there. One could enjoy it for hours. Well, we've done a great job establishing our research lab, put a head in the jar, a lot of glassware, some stickers on wall etc. I am sure someone will place a photo of it (we even made it to Krasnovo Praf, local newspaper). After that we had split into two teams. Team 1 went to Krasnovo while team 2 stayed in the lab. In Krasnovo we at once began spreading propaganda about Ikaros and Demeter, spend a lot of money in the bar (we had nearly unlimited funding according oporder and were given pretty much money), just purchased a drink for every person entering the bar. This time ingame economy worked much better because you could buy real life things for ingame money, like coffee, tea, bottled water, cookies, etc.
After speaking with some civilians, promised some help to Doctor in exchange of him letting us work in his hospital, speaking with bartender, priest etc, team 1 got back in the lab. Team 2 left to town to continue the propaganda thing.

Somewhere at 00:30 lab was attacked, and since all of Demeter there were armed only with low power smg, all were hit. The attackers just knifekilled us to finish their job and went away. They didn't search us, although I had something like 10k $ and some valuable maps on me, and also oporder, which could give some valuable advantages to GCT. Good for us. Same evening doctor was brought to HQ for questioning, and I convinced him to start new Krasnovo healthcare program, which would help the population to become healthier and of course, one of the healthcare program points was establishing blood bank with the help of Demeter research division. Doctor was exited with idea and asked for special bandages, syringes and iv bags, which were delivered to him in the morning (sorry Doc, we didn't know that those items we gave you, were leaking, broken etc. We received those syrynges from GM, but didn't know that for you we should search other ingame items). Went to sleep.

Day 2 was a great day for us.
First, we have recovered the old transmission regarding possible location of first research facility (transmission said 4…5)
Second, one of Minerva units found old cargo plane crash site in which we found old aerial image with some locations marked (possibly Pathogen X crate). Asked for help in HQ, and they gave us 2 platoons on a search mission there at once.
Later that day Demeter began the blood bank thing in the city. Since we had agreement with doctor, we didn't need to transport our subjects to lab, just escort them to the hospital. Soon we had several blood samples. We asked for a support from the priest, reporters, and several other people to spread the word about great new healthcare program. Also paid for an advertisement in Krasnovo Praf about healthcare program.

While we were in Krasnovo, Hades arrested a guy with a red hair (sorry, don’t remember the name), and after interrogation they decided to give this person to us for testing (Hades thought we are making experiments on people). So I gave hime a task: he works for us for 2 hours, convincing people to give the blood sample. Every person he brings to us, reduces his 2 hours by 20 minutes. And if he manages to bring more than 5, he would get paid.
The blood sample procedure was the following: we took a blood sample from civilian (we had some movie blood, so it looked awesome), put it in the test tube, and fill in the paper. At the same time civilian filled his part of that paper offgame, describing his/her emotions, if he took alcohol etc.

After we’ve got positive that CPs were under Ikaros control we have delivered blood samples to Poldavia. Since it was late already, we’ve been promised to get the results in the morning.

Later in the evening we have got a call from doctor, that the supplies we provided were bad, syrynges and bandages were not steryle, iv bags were leaking. Decided to meet in the morning.

During second day we had multiple attacks on the cp3 and the research facility, and only once someone was interested in the map we had, it seems nobody really cares about any intel they can get (and we had plenty of ingame information)

Late in the evening we had attack on Ikaros base, and part of Demeter, since they had only small arms, barricaded themselves with several other commanders and international reporter in HQ, to be the last line of defence. Other part of Demeter took another reporter and left to the woods, to hide reporter from everyone (backup plan, if HQ gets invaded, that reporter would be an exchange for Ikaros taken officers). As far as I understand, attack failed, since nobody have got close to HQ. We delivered reporter back and went to sleep.

Day 3. In the morning we have sent one team to Krasnovo to continue the blood bank thing and went to research facility.
Before noon received the sms that the courier from Poldavia is coming from airfield to Ikaros base. We tried to secure a path for him, but unfortunately didn’t find him. Thanks god, he made it safe to our base (I talked to him after game, and he was going from safezone to Ikaros HQ, and his mission was to ask first person he met where to find Demeter research. Thankfully, the first person he met was Ikaros soldier :))
We received a positive ID on one of our test subjects, meaning we already had one specimen A, and one with probability of 25%, meaning further testing was required. Several blood samples were taken under drugs, so needed to repeat those. Gave another batch of blood samples to the courier and organised transport back to airfield for him (thanks Mechs).
Later that day PR guy came to me, showed me the newspaper, which was telling bad things about Demeter. We decided to turn reporters to our side. First, we decided to sabotage the printer, which was used for newspaper printing. This excellent idea was brought to life by PR guy, his team, and one Minerva platoon. They initiated a bar fight during which “someone” broke the printer. After that reporters were brought to HQ for interrogation. We together with PR guy decided to play bad cop good cop scenario, in which I had the good cop role. Some great larping and reporters were convinced that GCT are bad guys and Ikaros and especially Demeter were the good guys (which was true at that moment, at least, partially). The printer was promptly repaired and reporter went to do some research to have Krasnovo Praf extra issue in the evening.
After that somebody with
At the same time, the team which was in Krasnovo discovered, that all equipment we left in the hospital, was destroyed. It was desided to hire the bikers gang to transport one of our scientists to HQ to get replacement. At the same time they managed to order new supplies for doctor from Import Export company.
Suddenly, 2 officers from Poldavia arrived (great roleplaying guys!), together with them we went to our lab, uploaded all research data to safe servers in Poldavia, and our mission with new research facility was over. We have received some radioactive materials to our lab and decided to build a dirty bomb which we later could sell to arms dealer :)
Approximately at noon we found out that I am on VIP list of GCT forces (it was odd, that nobody even tried to arrest me and bring me to the GCT base, I was always with my name tag and insignias visible, but everybody from GCT I met, just tried to wound me, not arrest me or something). We decided to have fake Demeter commander, and one of our teammates gladly took the name :) At the same time there was an attack on Ikaros base, and Ikaros managed to get Mech commander. Since after interrogation he was not really much of interest to Ikaros, he was given to us. We decided to exchange him for a promise, that GCT mech would not engage Demeter, if Demeter would not fire upon GCT Mech units. Our fake commander and several other guys went to exchange. Exchange went messy and our fake commander was captured. The funny thing was, he was never questioned, or even searched properly. He never was introduced to psyops or other interrogation unit, just executed after asking what he was and what demeter was doing in the area :( I thought that this time we could give some intel to GCT, but it seemed, nobody wanted any.
Later in the afternoon, we have moved out to scout for an old lab at line 45 on the map. We have found it approx after one hour of search, put on our hazmats, masks and gloves and began to sweep the area. Abandoned building, several bones, some chemical substances. One most probably with a virus. After searching around the lab, we found old documentation with the diary of old experiments, and a hint about NGF weapon facility. We have heard about that facility already, one of Ikaros units found that, and we learned, that it needed a code and a key to open. At that moment we most probably hade a code (found one within documentation), so we only needed a key.
We decided than to move to Krasnovo, to speak with reporters. I spoke with reporters, giving him some intel on what we found, explaining him all things about the virus, and about Demeter searching a cure. We told him that actually we are in Krasnovo to protect the civilian population, so reporter agreed to print out Extra issue of Krasnovo Praf. Photo is attached.

Right after that Demeter have received the intel that Hades police or part of it may be corrupted and they could do nasty things to civilians and other Ikaros units. All Demeter together with civilians took shelter in the bar, also some Minerva infantry have taken cover on the roof of the building. For civilians to be secure, we decided to put biohazard stickers on the building itself, and some Demeter personnel in hazmat suits outside. No one was let in, our explanation was “Demeter is commensing operation inside the building and it is biohazardous area, not safe without hazmat suits”. That seemed to help, several people who tried to enter the building went away. In one hour time general Ford with several platoons and Mechs came in to clear out the situation. After speaking with Hades he cleared out that Hades are still friendlies. At that moment he needed to be evacuated since the GCT began attacking the town. Demeter with civilians was holding the building for long time, but, unfortunately, GCT forces were better equipped and had better weapons :) they broke in the bar with engineer, and have taken it room by room. I had very good position in the last room, and it was nearly impossible to break in withoud the sound grenade (good for us they didn’t have it. we had a strobe light pointed towards he door, and our door was opening inside the room only.) We nearly hold it till game off, but, GCT has taken the room finally, killing everyone in there. It was sometime around 2:55. That was a really good fight, thanks all sides for it, it was really unforgettable experience. As far as I understand, not all buildings were taken, GCT forces concentrated on the bar, because they had a mission with a computer on the top floor of it.
Went back to base.

Last day. Last day was as usual, getting ready for a skirmish somewhere. But also our main mission was to extract positive A specimens to safety. We had positive ID on several positive A specimens (Arm dealer, Red haired guy, Nazir) Just in case we decided to exctract a doctor also, for him to be able to heal civilians in case they get wounded. All Ikaros personnel were instructed to take specimens A to HQ if they met them. Before the invasion of the town we have got intel, that we have sensitive document given to random Ikaros soldier in Krasnovo. Asked for help from Mech unit, and took 2 cars to Krasnovo. Losolos, cheief of Hades had confirmed he intercepted the documents, so we went directly to hospital to take it from there, and we entered Krasnovo in the middle of firefight. I was wounded, and thanks for Mech guys (and lady) I was healed and brought back to safety. That was a very quick but very exiting mission. The documents contained info on one more positive specimen A. Then we together with battalion moved out to Krasnovo, and the hell broke loose :) Fighing everywhere, a lot of shots, artillery strikes etc. We managed to extract arms dealer (Thanks to PR guy and his minions) and his bodyguard. We have checked and the bodyguard didn’t give blood. So we took him to the lab, took his blood sample and needed to take the blood sample to helipad in Krasnovo suburbs (GM trailer next to the bank). That was a mission of a lifetime for our driver. He showed he was real professional, since he managet to drive through Krasnovo and deliver the blood sample to helipad. After that he was airlifted to safezone. it was something like 14:40 when he delivered the sample to Krasnovo. 14:50 we have got result that the bodyguard was also a positive A specimen. So we managed to extract 2 specimens. I think the overall mission was a success.




Overall experience: Near perfect. A lot of Larp, a lot of missions, plenty of combat.
Cheating. I didn’t see excessive cheating (people may sometimes misinterpret hits, since some fights are really adrenalin filled),

I have got one mark: If you are a medic, please make sure healing is not magical within 20-30 seconds. Do your job and spend those 2 minutes. Have seen several fast heals without bandage.

I will definetly come back next year and I hope that the story will evolve but will stay pretty much the same.
Thanks guys and Berget for a great game!

Over and out,
Igariokas

P.S. Please feel free to comment Demeter team, or ask any questions, or put your thoughts on us, or comment the storyline (especially if you were the one close to us) and I will try to comment. Thanks

JKangas
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Re: Detailed Demeter review

Post by JKangas » 07 Jul 2015, 18:58

Wow, I had no idea that there was so much going on with Demeter...I did spot Demeter guys with the scanning device while I was respawning in Krasnovo, though.
igariokas wrote:Second, one of Minerva units found old cargo plane crash site in which we found old aerial image with some locations marked (possibly Pathogen X crate). Asked for help in HQ, and they gave us 2 platoons on a search mission there at once.
We did sweep the marsh area east from CP8 quite extensively at around 1300-1500 but never spotted anything resembling box, warning signs or biohazard markings. Later we learned that perhaps the crate was not there at all - was it ever recovered?

Mission was not a fail though. We had a couple of highly entertaining skirmishes around CP8, as apparently Ikaros forces were focused on CP10/11, with less friendlies to keep GCT away from other CPs like the one we held during the search.
B8: 1st Poldavian, 1st Coy, Fox Sq. 3
B9: The Firm, Zansian Sq. K, Pizza Delivery Guy
B10: Zansian 1st Coy, Alpha Pl, 1st Sq.
B11: Raven Guerilla Mursu Coy, Alpha Pl, Alpha Sq.
B13: Ikaros Mursu Coy, 1st Pl, 1st Sq. "Front Squat - Etukyykky"
B15: NAF FINBAT Air Cav, Fox 3 Pl.

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Arradin
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Re: Detailed Demeter review

Post by Arradin » 07 Jul 2015, 19:20

Very good read, Thanks!

The interraction with you guys were amazing, and even thought i were not overly happy to help you with letting you use Civilians as test subjects ( Which was what i thought you were doing, and that is propaganda i was spreading ) , i didnt have much of a choice, did i? :D

Very very good stuff larping with you all, and i hope to see you next year!

( Someone told me you were looking for me during Saturday, but before i could find you, i got shot and dragged out in the forest, now missing... )
Please send ticket & payment questions to:

payment@berget-events.com

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igariokas
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Re: Detailed Demeter review

Post by igariokas » 07 Jul 2015, 19:21

Jkangas,
Well, it was not there at the time of search. It was forgotten to put there. Gm put it there next day. The box was never recovered. Very sorry for you guys to spend several hours :)

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igariokas
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Re: Detailed Demeter review

Post by igariokas » 07 Jul 2015, 21:48

Arradin wrote:Very good read, Thanks!

The interraction with you guys were amazing, and even thought i were not overly happy to help you with letting you use Civilians as test subjects ( Which was what i thought you were doing, and that is propaganda i was spreading ) , i didnt have much of a choice, did i? :D

Very very good stuff larping with you all, and i hope to see you next year!

( Someone told me you were looking for me during Saturday, but before i could find you, i got shot and dragged out in the forest, now missing... )
Of course you had a choise :) but you've chosen wisely. We had a backup plan, but it was not really good one, we would have lost a lot of time. It was a very good thing that we have got a cooperation agreement with you. And by the way, we were actually trying to get you a new hospital building. Even thought of taking bankers wife as a hostage for him to agree to sell the building. But unfortunately we have ran out of time :(

It's a pity we couldn't extract you to safety.

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Re: Detailed Demeter review

Post by Dolnage » 10 Jul 2015, 16:07

igariokas wrote:Jkangas,
Well, it was not there at the time of search. It was forgotten to put there. Gm put it there next day. The box was never recovered. Very sorry for you guys to spend several hours :)
Not the first time we've been looking for something that doesn't exist.

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Felix
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Re: Detailed Demeter review

Post by Felix » 10 Jul 2015, 17:45

Like last year, larping with you was fun(igariokas), and this time the Demeter group was hands down the coolest military larp group available to play with.

My character had an agenda to help the GCT, but you guys had me fooled in the end. After the GCT had shelled the village, in violation of their promises not to do so, and your talk made more sense than anyone elses, I was convinced you guys might actually not be bad at all.

And thanks for the party/siege in the bar, that was a blast.
B12: UA 17
B13: Ismoili Khoshbakht, owner of Import Export Transport Inc.
B14: Civilian

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igariokas
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Re: Detailed Demeter review

Post by igariokas » 12 Jul 2015, 18:28

Felix wrote:Like last year, larping with you was fun(igariokas), and this time the Demeter group was hands down the coolest military larp group available to play with.

My character had an agenda to help the GCT, but you guys had me fooled in the end. After the GCT had shelled the village, in violation of their promises not to do so, and your talk made more sense than anyone elses, I was convinced you guys might actually not be bad at all.

And thanks for the party/siege in the bar, that was a blast.
Thaks, it was a pleasure to LARP together. And the bar party/siege was the most surreal thing ingame. Imagine GCT coming in the bar and hearing hard music, seeing lights, strobes, several people dressed in full hazmat :) they had to loose their minds for a sec.

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fruhest
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Re: Detailed Demeter review

Post by fruhest » 26 Jul 2015, 01:33

Thank you for the time we spent playing with demeter!
This was my first Berget and I did not expect much larp at all, so it was a very pleasant surprise!

The bar fight and "interviewing" the reporter afterwards were the bext parts, i.m.o...
Yay, airsoft!
B13 - IKAROS - Squad Leader of Jeep Squad
B14 - NAF - Squad Leader of Jeep Squad intelligence unit
B15 - UPIR - Commander of UPIR PsyOps branch

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