[procdrone]

Well, depends how we count civilian lifes against military lifes.

Im sure there was much more people on board those ships, then on board the station... not considering economical and tactical loss of 3 cruisers and a frigate.

But yeah, those were civilians, so they have a priority.

[-Norbert-]

That's a remix...?

I was always convinced that they use the original...

confused o.o

The ingame cutscene has the original, but the linked trailer has a remix that (as far as I know) Darius made himself.

[Frak_Tastic]

The Nelson's charge was a waste of lives and manpower.  If he had been one of my commanders I would have court marshaled him for committing to a hopeless battle and losing precious ships that won't be replaced.  He would have lost his rank and his ability to command permanently (well, for as long as the UEF survives anyways).

To fight a delaying action (the only real alternative) I would have deployed skirmishers and harassment attacks, but committing major UEF capitol assets in a pathetic frontal assault was just plain stupidity.  Dropping bombers in to hit engines and irritate the GTVA is about all the UEF could do.

Also, why did the GTVA deploy so far from the station?  If they wanted Artemis Station intact, I'd just jump within weapons range with overwhelming firepower and order them to surrender.  By coming in slow and from max detection range just guarantees a chance for the defenders to fry everything of importance on the station.

Granted it's a cool scene and it dramatizes what non-mil people think 'honorable' people do in battle, but in the end there is no good way to die.   Nelson's CO was an idiot and a bad commander.

[FrikgFeek]

It's hard to sue dead people, isn't it? Also, I don't remember seeing a successful bomber strike against any of the TEI destroyers in BP, ever. Not for lack of trying though, but the anti-fighter beams and TerPulses just shred any small craft that get in range.
And BP is pretty good at demonstrating that "honour" isn't something that wins wars, especially in act 3.
Besides, who says they wanted the station intact? I'd say that the mere threat of blowing it up allowed them to take down Buntu capships which are more important than whatever equipment and logs they had on that station. And Steele might have even predicted pointless heroics from people who haven't faced real war for an entire generation.

And that same kind of false heroism you'd usually see in movies is what got Carthage and her escort fleet killed/captured. Though it is kinda interesting how the story keeps going on about tragic loss of life and camaraderie, but in actual gameplay  wingmen are either expendable or invulnerable. Disabling beams or killing bombers is always a higher priority than helping Beta 3 who's crying about a bogey on his tail. Beta 3 getting blown up won't fail you the mission.

[Rheavatarin]

The outcome of battles are defined by what happens before. Unfortunately, we don't know exactly what came before the Nelson's charge. Maybe the Atreus jumped in next to another station and successfully destroyed it. The TEV battlegroup was then working its way over to Artemis station. Maybe the Nelson, having seen the total destruction of one installation was doing the only thing it could to delay the TEVs so the evacuation of Artemis could be as complete as possible. Court marshaling the commander of the Nelson (assuming he survived) based entirely on the very limited view from the cutscene is ridiculous.

Has anyone considered what the Cormorant was doing within beam range of the Atreus, and a Diomedes, and a Chimera, and (I think) a Hyperion? I'm frankly surprised she lasted half as long as she did before exploding.

[niffiwan]

I'm pretty sure it was the case that the CO of the Nelson (Captain Mence) disobeyed orders to destroy Artemis station himself (i.e. in order to deny its resources to the GTVA), in a similar situation to what Captain Gennedy did to Simak station (i.e The Blade Itself). In that case Mence probably considered a suicidal charge to be his only way out, unable to kill UEF civilians, but facing a court marshal and disgrace if he didn't follow orders.

[procdrone]

About GTVA fleet coming in from afar... maybe gas giant gravity well prevents from warping in close? Look, that Nelson jumps in rather far from them already.

[Mars]

Well, depends how we count civilian lifes against military lifes.

Im sure there was much more people on board those ships, then on board the station... not considering economical and tactical loss of 3 cruisers and a frigate.

But yeah, those were civilians, so they have a priority.

I wouldn't be so sure; there's no reason to think that there aren't many more lives onboard the station.

It's just as important to remember that his charge accomplished absolutely nothing.

It may have succeeded in getting a few more people off the station.

Which would have counted for a lot more if the station had self destructed as expected, but it did not. It's likely the civilian station was taken with few or no casualties. The charge was a waste.

[General Battuta]

Sometimes people decide that they need to put their principles first.

Sometimes people decide their principles have to bend in the name of victory.

History gets to argue who chose best.

[Darius]

The Freedom Fighters remix is one from Skyworld

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMauJmQHsns

[Azrael15]

Thanks, Darius. Weirdly enough, I own Skyworld but don't have that track.

[FrikgFeek]

That's the kind of charge you'd make against Shivans, or some other omnicidal race that you know won't even bother with trying to capture the station or minimise civilian casualties. Against anything else it's just a waste of lives. Sure, the GTVA killed a few civilians here and there, but it's not like they're actively trying to exterminate the people of Sol.
The way I see it, the supposedly "brutal and hellsih" war in Sol is nothing compared to the 2nd Shivan incursion.

[General Battuta]

There were probably more civilians in the line of fire during the Fall of Jupiter alone than during the entire Second Incursion (maybe inclusive the NTF uprising? not sure on that). Also maaaaybe more total human combatants, though I'd have to check the math.

[Dark Hunter]

Right. The Shivans got as far as Capella in FS2. That was the only inhabited system they reached, and we know that almost the entire colony was evacuated before the sun went pear-shaped.

The NTF Rebellion would have caused more civilian casualties than the Shivans.

[FrikgFeek]

You sure about that? I mean, you don't directly see much of it but the player is told through the command briefings that not everyone actually made it when evacuating contested systems. Also, in the first incursion they glassed Vasuda Prime, that's more civilian casualties than pretty much anything the GTVA can do.
And why exactly would human combatants matter more than human and Vasudan ones? And I'm pretty sure that just counting the lives on all the destroyers and the Collosus will get you more human combatants than the 7 Tev and 3 Buntu destroyers in Sol.

You may be right though, the Shivans really didn't do that much damage to civilians in the 2nd incursion, not for lack of trying though. But still, that doesn't change the fact that the GTVA doesn't randomly go around glassing planets and blowing up civilian stations and refugee convoys for the lulz. They're just soldiers, not some hellish force that you'd give up 8000 lives just to delay.

[TrickMagnet]

the tev's originally sent probes and messages through the portal talking of peace, then arrived not long with a full fleet of firepower declaring war

would you really trust them not to butcher anything they came into contact with?

[FrikgFeek]

Yes, of course I would. False peace messages leading to war are hardly anything new in human history, and most conquests don't end in complete genocide. Besides, the very first thing the Tevs tried to do was force a surrender. If they were omnicidial they'd just charge in and start beaming everything to death and glassing every planet they secure the orbit of. It's not like they warped in and instantly went full Sath on the Renjain.
It should be pretty obvious 18 months in that they don't plan on doing **** like ethnic cleansing of all the Buntus.

[AdmiralRalwood]

It should be pretty obvious 18 months in that they don't plan on doing **** like ethnic cleansing of all the Buntus.

Well, that would be rather impossible given that Ubuntu is not an ethnic group, but we can't actually state categorically that no cleansing is planned without knowing the specifics of Contingency MORPHEUS.

[TrickMagnet]

maybe it's just me, but i'm not exactly willing to wait around for the first time of an instance to happen to prepare against it. can't imagine i'll feel great about potentially sacrificing tens of thousands of people because "oh well uh i didn't think they were going to murder 20,000 innocent people with stray beam fire! won't happen again guys!!"

[FrikgFeek]

Prepare against it? That was an obvious suicide run. And "Stray beam fire", really? Installations can take more punishement than one stray beam, unless they're already heavily damaged. Sure, a stray beam could hit the station and kill a couple hundred people but that's still no reason to fling 3 capships with crew on board into certain death. That in itself was sacrificing around 8000 lives because he wanted to feel like a hero.