Well, it's not the difficulty per se that killed it. There are technically harder campaigns out there. It's just that the gameplay becomes... kinda monotone and kinda frustrating on insane. I didn't really think of lowering the difficulty because I kinda forgot about the max player attackers and max missiles locked on player ... thing since most mods use saner numbers nowadays. For the other factors it didn't really seem like I'd have more fun if I died 20% slower and had 20% more weapon energy.
$Max Missles Locked on Player: 2, 3, 4, 7, 99
$Max Player Attackers: 2, 3, 4, 5, 99
Hey, those numbers are totes retail!
As for Epsilon 1... well I was just couldn't get enough straightman deadpan so I brought him along. Delta 1 would probably have been the saner choice if I knew it would be a mission where your wingman needs to blow up lots of capships.