Hard Light Productions Forums
Hosted Projects - FS2 Required => Blue Planet => Topic started by: Thaeris on December 25, 2009, 12:36:15 am
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I decided to replay BP: AoA, as I've not played FreeSpace for quite some time.
This time around, I decided that I'd play the mission "A Time for Heroes" a little smarter and hit those lousy heavy flack turrets far out with Trebs in my handy-dandy Ursa...
It sounds foolproof, but it doesn't seem it is. The Sath in general is notorious for hard to hit or damage weapon systems - as it's such a massive model, one might simply assume it was poorly designed as there's so much area to cover. Thus, beam turrets are hard to destroy and must be hit at a special angle, etc. However, I wasn't aware that this went for the forward flack guns as well...
After firing 5 Trebs at each turret I figured they'd be dead or in serious hurt. No. Not a scratch. There's no obstructions to the flack guns, but even at point-blank range the Trebs were hardly doing a number. Oddly enough, the Ursa's cannons rapidly tore into the turrets... What's going on?
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I recall reading (can't find the thread) that the Sath front flak turrets are a row of cones; your Trebs usually explode between them, not impacting the turrets at all. Happens in retail as well.
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Bad hitbox design.
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Besides, that mission is practically tailor-made for the Boanerges. Killing the beams is way easier here than in Bearbaiting, IMHO.
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Because they don't take second salvos, just lob a Helios dual-fire and move on.
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Yeah, and since you can get three dual salvos off without having to wait for reload (only lock-on), It's just a matter of seconds to kill the beams. It's usually not worth the effort to kill the flak guns, just remember to launch your bombs from point blank range at full afterburner.
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I'd advice against complete point blank in blue planet, or you might end up killing yourself with the shockwave. Get quite close, but not too close.
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150 meters followed by a dive usually does the trick.
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I remember the first time I played the mission it was with the Ursa. Even at full power to engines, those flack guns are lethal. After they set their sights on you, you're in for hurt. I get the impression that the Boa would be a good subject for the mission, but it just lacks the diversity of weapons/capabilities I'd like. I'd almost rather have the Medusa for this mission...
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I had no problems with passing it on Boanerges, you should also try.
Ursa is a bit too slow for this and carries less bombs.
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There's pretty much a risk you're taking regardless of the ship you fly, you either take stronger weapons and more of them for less speed or more speed for weaker weapons and hull, all in all your turn radius is too wide to really effectively evade the flak so you wait for them to lock onto your wingmen's Cyclops bombs.
Obvious statement.
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Did it with the Ursa again. I confess that this is one of those missions where getting it right the first time is pretty tough, regardless of what you do. I blame part of that on the poor design of the Sath model.
I'll need to try this once more WITHOUT flying in the general direction of the Sathanes before it arrives, and not dump all power to engines while lighting the burner as much as possible at the same time... ;) Regardless, this is how I handled it:
The second primary bank should be fitted with the Maxim. This slot is just great for long-range accuracy shots against those flack guns...
Wingmen coordination is quite important. First, order them to form on your wing. They'll follow you anyway, so this shouldn't matter. However, it should ideally keep them from ramming each other. When the Sath pops up, order all of them to attack the closest beam turret. Keep power to engines full until you're just at the edge of your range limit on the Maxims to the flack batteries. Once you're in position, revert all engine power back into engines and shileds. The Ursa's a surprisingly refreshing bomber - it has a HUGE cannon capacitor. With an augmented recharge, it's just enough to get the fire you need down on those flack guns. Once they're gone, this mission is much, much more simple...
Like all AI wingmen, they'll be pretty stupid. However, given enough time, the rest of Alpha wing will indeed do a good bit of damage to a beam turret. Cycling your wingmen through the turrets while you attack a different one will knock out the beams very fast indeed. As this operation is time-sensitive, good decision-making makes all the differrence. And not to spoil any mission design elements, but attacking the initial turrets closest to you is a very pertinent decision...
Once the beams are down, DO NOT STICK AROUND. The only bomber you have access to for that mission that might stand a chance at fighting the small Dragon swarm is the Zeus, but that obviously doesn't have the ordnance necessary to knock out beams. Gather up yon homies and proceed to the Orestes. Afteryou're at a safe distance from the madness going on over at the Sathanes, rearming and then doing a Braveheart charge back at the enemy is not a poor decision, as long as there's enough of you left. Keeping your head while rolling with the madness goes a long way with this mission.
Now, if you can keep that in mind, this mission actually can be pretty fun. If not, it's terrible. The best thing of course is when it's over, as you can then fly the pattern about the Orestes. The truly best thing about this mission, however, is that Universal Truth is right behind it. This made me very happy until one of those blast-darnit anti-ship torpedoes exploded nearby, vaporizing my poor Myrmidon... :lol:
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Usually what I do is assign one bomber to each cannon and take the fourth myself in the Boanerges, they manage to be competient enough to destroy at least two cannons while I destroy my own and steal another. The Helios torpedos are mostly ignored since the Wingmen launch Cyclops bombs which the flak cannons intercept. If I'm unlucky the Sathanas will get one beam shot on the Orestes.
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I'm only playing on Medium (as many of the missions don't seem to be possible with harder difficulties) but I just tell my wingmen to target one of the four turrets while I cheerfully wipe out the other three really quickly (3 banks of Helios makes for a happy bomber pilot). Seemed to work quite well as long as I make sure not to actually fly into the maw between the beam arms lest the flak rip me to shreds.
As an aside, this campaign uses Fury's AI right? I wasn't sure (although it could be because the Balor really makes a mockery of shivan spacecraft).
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No, custom AI is not used in AoA, not even in the upcoming re-release. AI tweaks are exclusive to 3.6.11 builds only, which means they won't work on 3.6.10. Custom AI will be seen in the sequel.
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Ah, that makes sense (as I was told that your AI makes the shivans do scary things even on Medium).
Just finished BP and I must say that while it was a nice bit of story-telling work, I'm a little disappointed that I didn't get to see the Blue Planet =D
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It has a nice skybox, don't worry. :)
Age of Aquarius should be possible on Insane. I've done quite a few missions on Insane, as well as Zacam (so far as I remember.)
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Well there are certainly missions that could be done on Insane but there were a few that I'm wondering how they would be completed. For instance, in one mission where a certain non-GTVA/Shivan large capital ship (which, of course, can't defend itself) must not be destroyed, assigning all the other wings to nullifying the appropriate enemy beams failed me (on Medium) as they seem to take their sweet time shooting down beams (when it should only take them 10 seconds). Pumping all my energy to engines while having them cover my tail lets me just barely complete it (two times I removed all the large beams only to watch the last 6-8% get whittled away to zero while I raced with all speed to try to shoot down the last anti-fighter beam) so it seems faster beam recharge would only spell all sorts of doom. It doesn't help that the target to be protected eats six full LRBs no matter what =(
Sometimes I wish there was a place where everyone could collaboratively accumulate mission tactics for every stage =)
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Keepers of Hell is certainly hard, but are you sure you're playing the most recent version of the campaign? It was rebalanced to be a little easier.
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You know, I was just playing the one that came with the installer. It didn't even occur to me to grab the updated version since my usual tactic at dealing with failure is to simply push harder :blah:
Well, that just gives me an excuse to play it again =D
Finding Sanctuary. Alpha: Alpha Wing, did you see that? <== shouldn't that be Alpha 1: Alpha Wing, did you see that?
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Likely should. Good catch.
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Oh wow. The updated version of Keepers of Hell is entirely changed in terms of difficulty. The big capital ship isn't just a huge target anymore and I don't have to deal with two rampaging Liliths! It's like an entirely different mission now (and I can
definitely see how one could beat it even on Insane without any hassle). Got the bonus objective on my second try (the first try I died via a collision with my own bombs :lol:)
I've noticed some seams in the skyboxes for some of the dense starfield nebula. This is already a known issue right?
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Known and fixed in a VAed version.