Chapter 239.2: Alpha 1.0, Lifestyle Professions Getting Buffed Again?!
The plains of River Valley Province were mainly concentrated at the north and south ends, which linked the east and west in the form of strips on the map. They were the important transportation channels from the eastern provinces to the western provinces.
They were basically the corridors.
The large area sandwiched by 2 corridors was dominated by hills and gentle slopes, with a few plains scattered sporadically.
Most of the pre-war cities were also on these plains, or at least centered on the plains, spreading out to the hills.
Most of the survivors of Clearspring City were doing well largely because they sat right on the east-west transportation hub, where there were large plains.
Unless the route was blocked by heavy snow, there were usually many caravans passing through the northern or southern suburbs of Clearspring City, and they usually brought a lot of good stuff.
The location of Remote Creek Town was right at the northernmost edge of the Elm District, which was also the northernmost edge of this southern corridor.
After passing through the hills to the north and continuing to walk for more than 20 kilometers, one would arrive at West Continent City controlled by the Fang Clan.
Whether it was to protect farmland and the safety of Longevity Town, or to ensure the smooth flow of trade routes, Remote Creek Town had to be controlled due to its strategic location.
"If I were from the Bonechewer Clan, I would wait until the fall and come back again." Vanus, who was standing next to Chu Guang, glanced at the direction to the north and continued. "Would you like to consider deploying a 100mm cannon on the hill? It has average anti-armor capabilities, but it’s no problem to blow up infantry and break the tracks of some vehicles."Chu Guang looked at him and said, "That’s part of my plan. Speaking of which, how far can the Army’s artillery hit?"
Vanus thought for a moment before answering. "The effective range is 11 kilometers, but sometimes it can reach 13 kilometers. If it is a rocket-assisted projectile, the range may be doubled. But from the batch of shells you seized, it seems that they are all ordinary high-explosive shells."
When attacking Pioneer before, the two howitzers he used were the Army’s standard 100mm artillery equipment, which could hit Longevity Town more than ten kilometers away from inside the forests of Elm District.
It was just that the cannons didn’t play a role in the battle.
Not only were most of the projectiles fired were intercepted by a higher-tech point defense system, they were also locked by drones and blown up to the sky by the Enterprise’s employees with two metal hydrogen bombs.
But frankly speaking, compared to the high-tech equipment of Enterprise, which was expensive to manufacture and maintain, this kind of cheap, easy-to-use, simple, direct, and powerful large-caliber artillery was more suitable for the environment on the wasteland.
After all, using a good thing like metallic hydrogen to deal with marauders was too wasteful.
It was like shooting a cockroach with a submachine gun.
After leaving Wrench, Liu Ding and other guards here, Chu Guang led the players back home.
After a whole winter of hard work, Chu Guang finally opened up the space for development.
Now that spring was here, if he didn’t start farming, his men would starve to death.
After returning to the shelter, Chu Guang first opened the Shelter System, went to the Administrator Menu, and confirmed the reward points.
Due to the diligent work of the players during this period, the reward points consumed in the celebration some time ago had recovered a lot, and now there were a total of 271 points.
"It’s time to open the loot boxes again." After some deliberation, Chu Guang selected 2 advanced loot boxes, 5 intermediate loot boxes, and 21 basic loot boxes.
With the slight shaking of the wall, the alloy door opened, and the reward from the loot box was quickly sent out along the conveyor belt.
Looking at the things on the conveyor belt, a surprised expression appeared on Chu Guang’s face. "This…"
It was a set of jet-black exoskeletons with blue lines visible on the surface, and the shape was somewhat similar to the Type 5 exoskeleton, but it was not small in size; it was much larger than the Type 5 exoskeleton.
To make an inappropriate but vivid analogy, if the Type 5 exoskeleton was a basketball jersey, this new exoskeleton would be the American football attire. There were heavy composite plates hanging on the chest area, and its scale-like armor linings covered almost 90 percent of the user’s body.
[Type-6 “Heavy Cavalry” police exoskeleton: Improved from the Type 5 model, which has stronger bulletproof ability than the Light Cavalry exoskeleton. Not only can it resist the shooting of light weapons, but it also can resist shockwave and fragmentation damage from explosions to a certain extent.]
"Not bad." Chu Guang put it on with great interest and moved around with it to test it.
Its power source was probably a chemical battery like azide or solid hydrogen, and its battery life was 24 hours under normal use.
Compared with the nuclear-powered exoframe, this thing was more suitable for daily use, and it could be recharged when the electricity was used up, so there was no need to find cold fusion batteries everywhere.
As for the other advanced loot box, the reward was very general, it was an EMP grenade.
So far, the things he obtained from the advanced loot box were the most useless.
The rewards from the intermediate loot boxes and basic loot boxes were not bad, including 2 syringes, 2 boxes of bandages, a box of antibiotics, and a lot of cans, portable food and condiments.
"It’s a pity that there aren’t any seeds this time."
It would be perfect if he could unlock a few more high-yielding crops!
After confirming the rewards, Chu Guang came to the office, turned on the computer, and logged on to the official website to check on his players.
Players were still as enthusiastic as always.
The two factory managers of Steel Plant 81 were having a heated discussion with cloud gamers, whether to change the 20mm autocannon into a 37mm rapid-fire gun to increase the charge of the cannonball and produce a greater explosion effect.
Mosquito drew a picture with a pencil that only he could understand, showing the new equipment being developed by Goblin Technology. It was a Crab Tank armored by Crackleclaw Crab shell, powered by wood-powered engine, equipped with an 88mm short-barreled mortar and a 20mm autocannon!
Although everyone mocked him that it probably wouldn’t even block a shot from a tank, Mosquito still insisted that it was a piece of equipment that met the needs of the wasteland.
"How can there be so much steel for tanks! And this is wasteland, brothers, how can there be so many tanks for you?"
"Obviously what we need is heavy equipment that can quickly harvest soft targets and can traverse rough terrain. It doesn’t need a lot of protection, as long as it can protect against bullets."
"The Crackleclaw Crab’s shell is perfect for this! With eight robotic legs, it can traverse ravines, pits, and bunkers like a spider, clearing the way for our troops across the board to provide direct fire support! Even the Deathclaw would have to run away like a reptile in front of the 88mm mortar!"
Failed Successfully raised an eyebrow and mumbled, "Although I don’t understand it at all, it sounds awesome."
Lightning Professor snorted, "How do you plan to coordinate the movement of the eight mechanical legs? And what if one breaks? I’d say it’s better to just install tracks, or get big tires, like an off-road vehicle!"
Mosquito giggled to himself sinisterly in a corner, "Hehe, it’s none of your business! I certainly have a way to do it!"
Highland Security Guard stood at the side and suggested, "You guys should hurry up and build a plane. Wouldn’t a piston-propeller plane be much better? It can not only strafe the enemy line, but also do recon missions. It’s more than enough to fight a few bandits."
Great Ivan also decided to join in the conversation. "Why don’t you build an airship directly! That thing can drop a lot of bombs. I’m talking about tons of explosives!"
"Get lost! It’s easy for you to say. Why don’t you get into the game and do it yourself?" Mosquito barked suddenly.
Bathroom Goer, who had been watching the whole time, finally spoke, "But to be honest, you can try to build a wooden plane. I remember that the British’s Mosquito Bomber seems to be made of wood and glue, and it can even be made by furniture factories. Only the engine, landing gear and connecting parts are made of metal. But it can carry 4,000 pounds of bombs, and is especially fast, comparable to BF109. The only drawback is that it may cost a lot of pilots.”
"How about Russian’s Polikarpov Po-2. It seems to be a wooden plane too, and it was in service for half a century."Athlete Foot chimed in excitedly at the side.
Irene gasped, "Bedcheck Charlie? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)"
Looking at the content of these players’ exchanges, Chu Guang was very pleased.
Airplane.
That’s good shit.
If there’s an airstrip in Longevity Town, it shouldn’t be a problem to fly a plane to West Continent City to take a few photos from the sky to see the deployment of the Fang Clan of in that area.
That way, we can be better prepared for the next attack. Better yet, we may even be able to find an opportunity to attack them.
However, that was not the priority at the moment.
The worst was over. Shelter 404 had been preparing for the battle for a whole winter. What was needed most now was to develop themselves.
After entering February, there would be a large wave of caravans passing through Clearspring City, and the buff of being Enterprise’s Permanent Strategic Partner would soon come in handy.
Before that, he needed to be fully prepared to seize the historic opportunity.
"The food seized from Black Snake should be able to feed another 300 people. Although it is a month ahead of schedule, now is the time when more manpower is needed. The shelter needs more Lifestyle Profession players, especially those who have farming experience. It’s time to release Alpha 1.0." Chu Guang nodded to himself.
It was not difficult to select those players.
The number of applications has exceeded 100,000. Based on the questionnaires, it was more than enough to select 300 players with user labels such as "Agriculture-related occupations or majors", "Farming tendencies", "Business game enthusiasts", "Hard-working", or stuff like that.
There was no need for these 300 people to go farming obediently. It was neither realistic nor in line with the logic of the game.
But as long as a tenth of them, even one twentieth of them could be like Makka Pakka, who couldn’t wait to farm 24 hours a day, that would be enough for Chu Guang.
It was best that these players could combine their real-life experience to improve agricultural tools and planting techniques and bring them to the wasteland.
Now that the industrial zone was able to independently produce the portable steam engine, and Mosquito even started to make crab battle tanks, it should not be a problem to build 2 tractors before the spring plowing started.
With some other cheap and easy-to-use tools, as long as players could solve one third of the production mission, they could help Chu Guang a lot!
After thinking for a while, Chu Guang opened his document and started to type.
[Alpha 1.0 version update announcement!]
[Major update]
[1. The number of closed alpha players has increased to 1100!]
[2. New occupations such as "Farmer" and "Operator" are added, and the agricultural and commercial systems are fully upgraded!]
[Optimization]
[1. Richer mission content: The game content is expanded to the Remote Creek Town area, and more mutants can be hunted. However, please be careful, there are Deathclaws wandering in that area. Because all your equipment will be dropped upon dying, low-level players please proceed with caution!]
[2. More NPCs and merchants with unique styles: After the game time enters February, there will be merchants from the eastern and western provinces passing through Longevity Town.]
[3. A richer ecosystem: Starting from the new version, players can capture mutant cubs, domesticate wild animals, and turn them into pets. They will become your good helpers, whether it is helping you search for prey, carrying goods, or plowing in the fields... For more gameplay, please explore by yourself.]
[4. Fixed a few bugs.]
[...]
[New Expansion: "Forging Swords into Plows" is now online!]
[Beta testing will be opened after the expansion pack is unlocked, so stay tuned for more new content, new maps and new elements!]