[JoeCool]

Hi All,

I'm having a great game of FSport. I have a little trouble with getting it to load every time, but nothing I can not handle.

However, I'm having problems. I have followed the Lucifer into sub space, but I can not even destroy on of it's reactor cores; I and my wing-men keep getting killed first!

Has anyone any tips or tactics?
What ship should I use? What weapon load out?

Cheers.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

I would recommend a bomber carrying 5 Harbinger : one for each reactor, and space superiority fighters for your wingmen.
Tell your wingmen to blast the enemy fighter and head for each reactor.

EDIT : Freespace wiki recommends flying a Herc : http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Good_Luck

[Rodo]

fly superiority fighter, shoot down wing after wing of shivan fighters, let your bomber wing take out the Lucy's reactors.
IIRC on medium difficulty you only need to destroy one of the reactors alone, the others are managed by your wingman, at least that's what happened last time I played.

[Tantalus53]

Ive made the run from the Bastion to the Lucifer in an Ursa before, if your in the mood for a challenge at first. In all consideration, that Banshee Turret comes in handy at the very end shooting down Shivans.. Follows the "If you want it done right" thing...

[JoeCool]

Thanks much!

[Mura]

You got the name wrong, tho. It's Lucia Fernanda ;D
if your wingmates aren't doing their job, boss them around to do your bidding, it's always fun to make them bully a single fighter that just came out of the bay.

[Mongoose]

At least in retail FS1, the mission practically plays itself on Easy, and I think even on Medium; I seem to remember it being fairly straightforward on the Port, too.  Shivan fighters have rather weak armor, so your fighter wings generally make short work on them, and provided nobody on Delta gets picked off by a stray fighter, their Harbingers tear through the Lucifer's reactors.  I usually go with the default Herc loadout, and other than picking off Shivan stragglers, all I do is help out on the last reactor to speed things along.

[JoeCool]

At least in retail FS1, the mission practically plays itself on Easy, and I think even on Medium; I seem to remember it being fairly straightforward on the Port, too.  Shivan fighters have rather weak armor, so your fighter wings generally make short work on them, and provided nobody on Delta gets picked off by a stray fighter, their Harbingers tear through the Lucifer's reactors.  I usually go with the default Herc loadout, and other than picking off Shivan stragglers, all I do is help out on the last reactor to speed things along.

Well, I dunno what I'm doing wrong...

I'm very busy at college, so I don't really have time to be "stuck" for too long on any game. I must have tried it 8-10 times on normal (which I played the rest of the game on) I was getting no where, despite getting my kill count in the double figures, Delta Wing kept getting shot down!

I said feck it and put on very easy. Only one Delta ship got destroyed, I shot down 20 or so fighters, but I still failed the mission! Why? Delta was not quick enough. By the the time the Luicfer jumped out the still had 3 reactors to destory!!

Am I missing something here? Very Easy with 3 reactors left to destroy??!!

[Mongoose]

Weird...maybe there is something different about the Port version.  I know Delta always made it with several minutes to spare back in Retail, and I don't even remember any Shivan fighters getting close to them.  Have you tried commanding the fighter wings to ignore the Lucifer and engage the enemy?

[Goober5000]

Am I missing something here?

Did you issue the ignore-ship order?  Try not doing that, and see what happens.

[QuantumDelta]

Yea, that's the most common fault, as long as you can keep the bombers alive vs the fighters (not too hard) the mission is pretty self playing even on insane FSPort.

[IronBeer]

Try this: don't give your bomber wing any orders. The rest of your wingmen, I'd say leave them alone except for Alpha wing. Have Alpha wing bounce between "Engaging" and "Covering [You]". Keep the rest of Alpha nearby so you can tear up Shivan fighters as a wing.

Loadout:
Don't change anything at ship selection.

For yourself- Take a Banshee in the 2x under-cockpit mount, and Disruptor in the 4x mount. I'd recommend at least one bank of Interceptors.

For the rest of your pals, distribute Prometheus and Banshees (where applicable) roughly evenly. Spread the Interceptor love around a bit too. And don't mess with the bombers, if you even have the option!

Strategy:
For the first part of the mission (rush for the node), you need to hoard your missiles. Fighting with just a pair of Banshee is a bit tough, but not impossible. Mop up the initial fighters as fast as you can, and keep your wingmen alive. After that, pretty much just haul ass to the node. Don't forget to buff your engines with the ETS.

Once in subspace, follow the advice I've laid out earler, let all wings except Alpha just do their thing, and wreck fighters with yourself and Alpha. A 4x bank of Disruptors (remember the loadout tip) can destroy a reactor fairly easily, in a pinch you could probably destroy 2 out of the 5 personally. I usually just get one. The most important thing is to keep the bombers alive. Spend your missiles freely now, and even a twin Banshee tears apart flimsy Shivan armor.

Hope this helps!

[Sushi]

Yea, that's the most common fault, as long as you can keep the bombers alive vs the fighters (not too hard) the mission is pretty self playing even on insane FSPort.

There's actually some hardcoded cheats to make the bombers more effective just for this mission.

[QuantumDelta]

P.S;


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDs8cCxZRvY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHZJHw4YD3k

[Cobaltred]

I think there might be something going on with the FSPort version of this mission at the moment.  I'm playing on medium and got through FSPort without too much difficulty, but despite racking up 11 or 15 kills on this mission, I've yet to have delta take out a SINGLE reactor.  After about 8 or 9 minutes delta dies, with all 5 reactors still intact and the Lucifer at ~98%.  Given how all the walkthroughs talk about how this mission is insanely easy, I feel like something weird is going on.  I've never even seen delta hit the Lucifer.  Can a vet give this a try and see if I'm crazy?

Edit: Just tried again.  Started with all 16 allies at 100% health.  Had 11 kills with 3 minutes left when the last delta went down.  1 reactor down, Luci at 66%.  We were pretty much taking down the fighters faster than they were spawning, most of the time there was maybe 1 or 2 manticores up.  Delta just seems useless.  It's really frustrating!

Edit again: I just watched the 2nd youtube video you posted QuantamDelta.  You did a nice job, but I'm killing the fighters at at least that rate and it just seems that Delta is doing NOTHING on medium.  Something weird is going on...

ISSUE IDENTIFIED (I think): I put the game on very easy, sped up time, and just followed the deltas to see what they were doing.  They almost never fire their bombs.  They park themselves ~1000m from the Lucifer and fire their guns over and over.  Every 3 minutes or so, one will fire a bomb off.  There seems to be an issue with their AI.  In the game where I watched them (very easy), they took out 2 reactors in the 10 minutes, the second with 1 minute left.  The other 3 reactors were at ~60%, 90%, and 90%.

[Mongoose]

Yeah, that's definitely some sort of bug.  Delta should fire off a round of bombs as soon as they're in range.

[Dilmah G]

Luis Fernando. Good job!