advance/early chapters : p atreon.com/Ritesh_Jadhav0869
"Extraction successful. Welcome home."
Accompanied by the Commander's voice, Ace returned to the familiar Special Ops Department lobby.
"It's a shame there's an NDA," he sighed softly. "If I could have live-streamed or made strategy videos in advance, I can't imagine how much attention I would have gotten."
However... even though it was currently under NDA, what about when the period ended?
If he prepared the materials in advance and released the videos as soon as the NDA lifted, he could still capture the first wave of traffic.
Ace was always an action-oriented person — if he had an idea, he'd ask or do it directly. He immediately logged into YouTube and messaged Delta Force: Hawk Ops' official account.
[TheXclusiveAce: "Quick question — can I record videos and prepare materials in advance during the NDA period?"]
["No videos will be released during the NDA period; they will only be released after it ends."]
It would most likely be seen.
After all, YouTube has a creator message weighting mechanism; the higher a creator's subscriber count, the higher their direct messages appear in the inbox.
Although there were certainly other big creators with millions of followers who had messaged the Delta Force team, Ace also had over 300,000 subscribers, so it would be visible with just a little scrolling.
Of course, it wasn't possible yet — it had only been less than two minutes since he sent it.
While waiting, playing two more matches was the best option.
The pros and cons of the AK-12 were already very clear: it was cheap and had a decent rate of fire. Although its flesh damage was low, its armor-piercing exceeded most weapons in the same price range.
Compared horizontally with other weapon stats, the K437 assault rifle — which was more expensive — had 34 flesh damage and 35 armor-piercing, while the AK-12 had 27 flesh damage and 41 armor-piercing.
From this, it could be seen that the AK-12 was a relatively extreme armor-shredding weapon.
Its practical application scenario would probably be teammates carrying two balanced weapons, such as the K437 or M7 assault rifle, while one teammate carried the AK-12 to break armor — of course, this was when money was tight. Who would use an AK-12 if they had money?
As for ambushing... there was no need to evaluate it. Ambushing, when undetected, meant a first-strike advantage. If you couldn't win with a first-strike advantage, it was purely a skill issue.
"Let me see what other guns there are..."
Ace sold most of the items in his stash, keeping only the High-Speed Solid-State Drive.
Afterward, he repeatedly entered and exited the training camp, trying to see if there were any other weapons with high stats or good value.
Suddenly, the corner of his mouth twitched slightly.
"The M14 marksman rifle..."
"39 flesh damage, 41 armor-piercing, 727 rounds per minute rate of fire."
Ace quickly calculated in his head: flesh damage per second was 472.5, and armor damage per second was 496.8. The raw data alone was already astonishing.
Moreover, this gun, unlike some weapons that required headshots, also had extremely high damage to the abdomen. Theoretically speaking, in a gunfight, you could just spray center mass.
And — it had a very authoritative advantage: bullet velocity.
As a marksman rifle, it not only had full-auto capability but also an astonishing bullet velocity of 748 meters per second. Oh my god, M14, sir.
Most assault rifles had bullet velocities between 500 and 640 meters per second. Faster bullet velocity meant hitting the enemy sooner. Every 0.01 second faster to hit the enemy could potentially make the opponent die one step before you.
With a rate of fire similar to most assault rifles, combined with high bullet velocity and damage, this was the epitome of a weapon with no downsides — except for its cost.
Similarly, a fully modded M14 cost 570,000 HAF, while other assault rifles generally ranged from 380,000 to 450,000.
Although a half-modded version was playable, he believed most people couldn't handle a half-modded M14, as its recoil was indeed somewhat terrifying.
Ace casually favorited the M14 and then continued to check other weapons.
After a while, the second weapon that caught his attention appeared.
The AS Val assault rifle. This gun had only 29 flesh damage, but its armor-piercing was as high as 48, and it had a rate of fire of 972 rounds per minute!
Flesh DPS was 469.8, and armor DPS was 777.6. It was 14 points lower in flesh damage per second but nearly 300 points higher in armor damage per second.
"Oh my god..."
He entered the training camp to test it, and the damage was indeed off the charts. The recoil wasn't too bad either — at least compared to the M14 — though its efficiency at long range wasn't great.
The reason was its bullet velocity: only 330 meters per second.
"What a shame," Ace shook his head slightly. "A god in close combat, but it falls short at slightly longer distances. However, it should be very strong inside the Admin Building."
"Except for the relatively high cost of ammunition..."
He had played with budget weapons, and although he was an ambusher, he was already eager to enjoy the finer things. So... what was an AK-12?
Are we that close?
First the M14, then the AS Val — a perfect pair.
The plan was set. Ace briefly studied the attachments and finally put together a standard fully modded M14 — some red rarity items weren't even as valuable as his gun.
However, making money was for spending. HAF could be earned again, but the satisfaction of entering Standard Dam with a fully modded gun and kicking ass was very real.
It was a pity that Blake had added a restriction against bringing Tier 4 bullets — otherwise he would have prepared two magazines of Tier 4 ammo.
Could it be that Blake had already anticipated that some people would bring high-tier bullets to bully new players?
As expected of the developer who could create Delta Force, truly prescient.
Ace didn't know that Blake added this restriction purely because in his previous life, Delta Force in its early stages had a bunch of god-tier players with five-piece sets plus Tier 5 bullets aggressively stomping Standard Dam lobbies — so he directly brought in restrictions from later seasons ahead of time.
[Matchmaking started]
[Matchmaking successful]
[Please confirm operator]
[Operator confirmed: Vyron]
"Mission will be accomplished!" Vyron's lock-on voice line came through the speakers.
Ace did not choose Stinger this time for a simple reason — he had already spent all his HAF to equip Tier 3 helmet, Tier 4 armor, and a fully modded M14 with three magazines. Wouldn't playing Stinger be an insult to this set of equipment?
Whether there were combat losses or not wasn't important. Since he decided to kit himself out like this, he was going for the thrill.
[Spawn location: Barracks]
Ace glanced at the map. The Barracks was in the upper-left corner of Zero Dam.
This location was decent — although not the West Building Prime Spot, it wasn't far from the West Building.
However, a large safe had spawned in the Barracks this round. It wouldn't be too late to open the safe before entering the building.
"Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!"
The safe was quickly unlocked. After searching for a moment, he couldn't help but complain:
"A large safe with four two-slot items: three Horn Ornaments (Purple) and one Dancing Lady (Blue)."
"What kind of Delta Force is this? It should be renamed 'Horn Force' or something..."
Complaining aside, he hadn't found anything good at the start of the match, so there was no need to be too picky.
He put them in his bag for now and would swap them out later if he found better items.
The four items combined were worth 75,389 HAF — just a lump sum.
"Enter the building!"
Although he got a decent chunk of change, the goal for this round wouldn't change — enter the building, kick ass, and enjoy the thrill of killing.