[Kestrellius]

So the title should pretty much make the situation clear, but to elaborate: I'm trying, for a second or possibly third time, to get through FS2 retail on Insanity. Last time I got to "Feint! Parry! Riposte!" and gave up because I hate that mission forever, but this run I just can't get past Romans Blunder.

Traditionally my strategy with the second half of this mission is to take out the Glorious as quickly as possible, since Fenrises are pretty weak, but I think that only works on lower difficulties where you have some wiggle room. And by the time I get to the cruisers, half my fighters are usually gone. I've tried about everything I can think of -- a decentralized attack to create a furball where I can evade easily, C-3-1'ing individual targets, taking out the freighters first, taking out the freighters last, summoning support to draw a little more fire, using Rockeyes at long range to force hostiles to break off, using various energy configurations...I've tried to lure the fighters back, as Command suggests, with little success -- usually, by the time they take the bait, my wingmen have already charged in and there's nothing I can do to keep them from engaging everybody at once.

But no matter what I do, I lose too many fighters too quickly to eliminate all the escorts, and I'm faced with the apparently inescapable fact that six Myrmidons can't beat thirteen Lokis plus two cruisers and change.

So, thoughts?

[Kolgena]

Try using rockeyes to knock out the AAA turrets on the Fenrises. Otherwise, use C37 as a means to have your wingmen "hold position" on you. In the engagement, use R to see who's targeting you, then C31 him and pick another target to joust, or just serve as a dodge tank to have enemy AI waste shots on you.

It's also pretty critical not to let any wingmen die in the first half of the mission.

Don't worry if you're struggling a bit. This mission is actually pretty hard on insane.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

Yeah, on insane this is one of the thoughest mission in the game.

I don't have anything to add to what Kolgena said, it's good advice. I tend to use the "dodge tank" strategy myself.

[Buff Skeleton]

I had a hell of a time with the retail campaign on Insane too, and ended up pretty much cheating through a few earlier missions out of frustration. But I got some good advice in this thread here on general survival tips and stuff: http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=92402.0

Funny you mention FPR though -- that's always been one of my favorite missions. But once I tried it on Insane, my opinion shifted a bit

[Kestrellius]

Well, I got past TRB the other day. I tried the strategy of staying in place at the start, or going a little bit to the left, so that the freighter group jumped in right next to me and I'd draw their fire. It wasn't an instant win or anything, but it was an interesting thing to try. I think my eventual victory was just luck, really.

"A Lion at the Door" gave me some trouble for a while (of the "repeated screwing up/bad luck" variety, not the "mathematically impossible" variety), but I got through it. "Mystery of the Trinity" was easy enough, as was "The Great Hunt". "Slaying Ravana" was a nightmare that I eventually decided to resolve by just cheesing the mission. It wasn't worth it. (Even after deciding to not engage the Ravana and just let the corvette deal with it, it took several tries. I kept going to the corvette to watch the battle and at least feel like I was participating, but I kept being unable to resist the urge to attack the Ravana once it got to like one or two percent health, and I'd die as soon as I got too close. In the end I just set my time compression to x64 and flew away from the battle. However, fun fact: apparently, time compression affects damage ticks. So, the corvette was basically unable to damage the Ravana, because its slash beam would spend one frame on one side of the Ravana, and the next on the other side, and never actually make contact. I flew back near the fight when I saw that the Ravana wasn't taking damage, so I lowered the time compression once I figured out what was going on.)

"Sixth Wonder" was fairly straightforward. Took a few tries, especially since I initially forgot to give everyone Akhetons to disarm the Cato without destroying it and triggering the arrival of the Hawkwood. But I got through it. I'm going to do "Into the Maelstrom" now.

[Grizzly]

Try FreeSpace Blue!

[General Battuta]

Try FreeSpace Blue!

[Kestrellius]

I'll get to it. (Out of curiosity, does it make it so that in TRB, the Psamtik can arrive before all the fighters are destroyed? It occurred to me recently that that might make that mission a lot less ridiculous.)

I still haven't played FSBlue, Age of Aquarius, War in Heaven, or any of a couple dozen other essential mods. This is because my install is borked in some way or another, and a bunch of stuff didn't show up. Sooner or later I'll reinstall my game and get it right, but I've been putting that off for like two years.

Also, I'm at Battle of the Wilderness now. Surprisingly enough, I got through FPR rather easily. Still took a few tries, but, among other things, hanging out at the Rampart and waiting for that first wave to come to you really helps.

[Kolgena]

No, Psamtik still waits on fighters before it shows up.

Slaying Ravana becomes orders of magnitude easier and much less ridiculous.

FPR is about the same, but the Rampart will always die now because the Repulse will now instagib it every time with 1-2 BGreen hits. It doesn't fail the mission (thank god, since there's nothing you can do) but you get reprimanded in debrief. As you've discovered, the best strategy is to C38 the Rampart for the first wave, then solo drag the next few waves of hercs back to your blob of friendlies.

Best thing about FSBlue: TAG systems work across many missions now, and boy is it glorious.

[General Battuta]

The Rampart thing could be caused by the BP AI table, or it's a code change. Don't recall altering the mission. Unless I accidentally added all ships beam free...

[Kestrellius]

I am eager to play it, if only for the Sathanas' "beam forest", as somebody put it. That sounds awesome.

also you should have the Pegasus be playable in more missions if you haven't already

Actually, as I noticed during Endgame, the Pegasus is pretty much exactly suited to Insanity. Small profile, and nobody can target you. Probably the most survivable ship in the game.

Oh and update: I'm on Beerbaiting Bearbaiting now.

...yeah. Well, I imagine I'll get through it eventually. I did manage to get all the beams and flak guns one time, but then proceeded to get plastered by the Beleth and her escort. So that was fun.

Like, I'm actually rather fond of the whole debeaming process. There's a method to it, it's interesting, it's challenging. What I'm less fond of is trying to do it while everything is shooting at you, and then having to do it again if you fail at another, unrelated challenge.

[Grizzly]

The AI orders I placed for that mission was: Alpha wing on the first flak gun, other bomber wing on the other flak gun, and the fighter wing just engages enemy. Should make the "Everybody shooting at you" phase of the mission a lot easier. The AI are rubbish at taking down the forward beam cannons but they do reasonably well against the flak guns.

[Kestrellius]

Yeah, I've tried something similar. They don't really seem to get to the flak guns effectively though, for whatever reason.

[Snarks]

Actually, as I noticed during Endgame, the Pegasus is pretty much exactly suited to Insanity. Small profile, and nobody can target you. Probably the most survivable ship in the game.

Isn't the Pegasus' stealth scripted or something? I thought all the stealth ships were just normal ships unless the mission designer did something with the AI.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

Nope, stealth ships are stealth ships in FS2. FS1 did have untargetable ships (Shivans & the Loki in ST) that required being flagged as such in FRED, but in FS2 any ship with a stealth flag in the ships table will be invisible to radar unless tagged or near an AWACS.

BP did some extra scripting to their stealth system to keep it fresh & prevent it from being a game breaker.

[Kolgena]

The AI orders I placed for that mission was: Alpha wing on the first flak gun, other bomber wing on the other flak gun, and the fighter wing just engages enemy. Should make the "Everybody shooting at you" phase of the mission a lot easier. The AI are rubbish at taking down the forward beam cannons but they do reasonably well against the flak guns.

Players are rubbish at destroying the beams too. It doesn't help that each turret is basically a giant 3D hoop that you can swish your bombs through.