Mission 13

[Dyntheos]

M13 - Balcora Gate

[nicadaemus]

k, i've had no trouble with the game so far, everyone was complaining about 12, i managed to take that one on in one try with a good combination of EMP scouts, platforms, sub system bombers, and good overall micromanagement...however, i cant seem to take on mission 13.

i tried this mission about 4 times now, 1st time there were 5 BC's to fight against right away...the rest i had to fight only 2 BC's right away, that wasn't the major problem, and neither was taking the bottom gate, as i noticed the main vagyr force (with 7 friggin BC's left was just waiting there for me to attack.

newayz, after i took the gate and was heading back to the MS to repair/top up fleet to take on that remaining armada...the 7 BC's hypered in on my MS, and obliterated my carriers, nabaal station, and the MS. ive tried this 3 times and even with my fleet already there i cant fight them off, they go for the MS right away and i lose. :wtf:

i felt myself a capable admiral and was able to take the other 12 missions no problem, but i met a stonewall here and even tho i feel like a pansy asking for help...i am:

can ne1 gimme a decent strat to take this mission on? ill give it a couple more goes but im sure the same thing will happen again :confused:

[Tuftears]

Some users have suggested scuttling most if not all of your frigates at the end of mission 12 before taking on mission 13.

In my case, starting with a full fleet, I sent my five destroyers escorted by resourcers to take on the bottom gate-attacking force, my bombers to take out the engine and then the missile launcher on the closest battlecruiser (there was one), and I used my frigates to wipe out their closest frigates plus the battlecruiser-- it won't regenerate its engines in time.

I sent my main fleet one way to attack the battlecruisers, and was trying to catch them in a two-way attack, since the battlecruisers can only point one way, and I had just built and scrambled 20 ion platforms to try and take out the shipyard... When what should happen, but all five of the remaining battlecruisers (they started with nine, I lost one battlecruiser taking out four of those) hyperspaced.

So where did they go?... Behind their shipyard. Apparently they felt the tactical situation was going against them! I'm not sure they were right, but it allowed me to secure one of the gate power sources, and my ion platforms got close enough to *almost* take out the shipyard...

I rebuilt, pushed forward, and succeeded in taking out the shipyard-- you don't have to destroy all the Vaygr to succeed, just rescue one of the power nodes and destroy the shipyard.

On the other hand, some forum posters have suggested that you can capture one of their hyper-capable battlecruisers, which is something I want to try!

[theBlind]

Make sure you leave M12 with a decent fleet (max it out, if possible) and at least around 5000 RU. Make sure your capships are repaired and grouped for action.
Once in M13, ignore the group of 5 Vagyr Battlecruisers right next to your starting position. Race your fleet (make sure your dreadnaught is amongst them and do no use strike group formation) to the lower energy generator (if the BCs close by treaten your fleet, just send a few corvettes their way, they have no fighter cover to speak of and you need only very little time). Start to build the full 20 ion platforms at your mothership and the shipyard. let them stay where they are you need them later on.
Once your fleet is in firing distance to the lower group, kill them all. Once you start firing at them, the first BC group will try to turn and hunt down your fleet, but they won´t arrive there at all during that mission. Now turn your attack fleet towards the enemy group at middle height, again attacking them all-out. Start moving your mothership to the left-hand side if viewed from mothership to gate and have a few small craft ready for the hyperspace ambush about to come.
Meanwhile, your fleet should have already engaged the second enemy group and since your BCs are close, should be inflicting massive damage. Make sure the dreadnaught is close to the gate (I don´t know how close, but I think it could be a trigger). Target the shipyard and its protection fleet in addition to enemy group two. Shooting the yard will trigger the hyperspace ambush against your mothership. Move away and distract them with your strike-craft held back for this purpose. Once the shipyard is down, you´ll get a cutscene telling you the dreadnaught is communicating with the gate. This will then end the mission.
Total time: less them 10 min. Ships lost: none to speak of. A destroyer or two, some strike-craft.

EDIT: right-hand ... left-hand ... who cares ;)

[Reignfire]

This mission went a little quick for me. I think I had:
2 BCs - used against frigates and up
Dreadnaught - used against frigates and up
Movers - used against fighters and up
Corvettes (Maxed out 1/2 and 1/2) - used against fighters and up
Destroyers - used against frigates and up
...I think that's all

Basically I destroyed the attacking group
killed the Shipyard (off to the left)
killed the fleet attacking the middle power generator
then both the top and bottom generators were destroyed and at that time my Dreadnaught was close enough to trigger the gate which = end of mission.

[IWAssassin]

I find using so-called "Gate is down" tactics to be the easiest way past this mission. Immediately send EVERYTHING thats not a producer to the bottom attackers without formation. Move to the middle, then the top. Finally take out the shipyard.

Completely IGNORE the rest of the enemy fleet. If they're attacking you too much, a few gunships will distract them. Once you destroyed the 3 frigate groups and the shipyard you'll win, regardless of the fact that 90% of the defense fleet is still intact and your fleet has probably suffered considerable damage. You dont need much of a fleet at all at the start of the next so dont worry about it.

[Dawn Falcon]

moving your mothership and carriers away from the fighting is a good idea

[The Casualty]

Hmmm, I had a somewhat different strategy. I had come out of mission 12 with not quite a maxed out fleet. Firstly I took out the 3 closest BC's with my strike craft while moving my heavies and frigs in capital phalanx towards the shipyard. They were almost there when the strike craft were done, so I sent them without formation at the shipyard. They arrived right before my main force opened fire, and I put them to work on the platforms and escort fighters while my cap ships killed the shipyard. After it went down the mission was easy. I sent my heavies to the top force, my frigs to the middle, and divided my strike craft between the middle and lower groups. The enemy frigates will mostly ignore you and continue firing on the gates, which means they go down fast. Once the cap ships cleared the top gate, I just bandboxed everything and sat back. Didn't lose a single gate and went through with a virtually untouched fleet.

It might be harder if you try to fill your frigates to the brim though, I had severely depleted frigate forces at the mission start and thus there seemed to be fewer enemy cap ships, but the number of frigates at each gate remained high. The word of the day for this mission is quickness. Multitask your forces to attack every gate at once as soon as the shipyard is down.

[Mushy]

I entered this mission with hardly nothing (3 carriers, 2 BC's, the Dread, 20 harvester and some useless utility stuff) - I thought I could build it up before the action started. But as with mission 12 I cut through everything with my group of 2 BC's and the Dreadnaught followed by 20 harvesters (make sure you replace them) and 8 squads of bombers that mostly played a long as bait.

I didn't loose any of the gates, but I was a little worried at first that I would loose, I mean it actually takes quite some time to get the heavy hitters turned in the right direction...

In some respect I find it pretty odd that the way to cheat the game is to enter the mission with your pants down...

[Avocet]

I had a BEAR of time with this mission. This put mission 12 to shame difficulty wise.

After struggling through and failing numerous times, this is what I finally did, in order to win.

My fleet disposition after 12.

(group 1)
8 gunship corvettes

(group 2)
14 bombers

(group 3)
4 pulsar gunships

(group 4)
2 Hiig Battlecruisers (I vastly prefer them for their 360 range)
5 Hiig Destroyers
1 Dreadnaught

(group 5)
3 flak frigates
3 torpedo frigates
14 Ion frigates

(group 6)
All above groups combined

(group 7)
20 Resource collectors
4 Mobile Refineries

(group 8)
10 movers

(group 9)
4 carriers

(group 10)
Pride of Hiigara
1 Shipyard

First think I should mention is I'm a pause micromanager. I'm a fiend about it. I spend more time paused than I do playing sometimes. It helps, trust me.

When I hypered in, I immediately sent 9 and 10 as far away from the action as I could. Not that it mattered, they only get in a scrape in the very beginning, that 2 easily dispatches. I sent 5 at the bottom group of frigates, and 4 at the top group. 4 was harrased along the way, but with the help of 2 to take out subsystems on the two battlecruisers they sent and 1 and 3 to take out strike craft, I had no problems getting my fleet into position.

5 arrived first, and using pause micromanagement, they ate first the assault frigates that turned on them, then the missle frigates, one by one. This group required little help, and chewed through their targets with ease.

4 made an almost passing glance at the middle group, which would have been a combination of both strike craft and frigates. With the help of 1-3, the middle group was done with before 4 even arrived at the top crowd of frigates. When 4 did, it was fast. 5 destroyers, 2 battlecruisers, and the dreadnaught will do that.

While all this was happening, the Vaygr started to send the (I believe 8) battlecruisers as well as countless frigates and strike craft to put a stop to me. To keep this massive group that had stymied me before at bay, I used group 8 as a bit of a sacrificial lamb. I bandbox attacked everything in the area of the shipyard, and they provided a nice distraction while 4 and 5 finished their work. The entire time I used 1-3 to the fullest, 1 for fighter groups, 2 for frigates and subsystems, and 3 for the relatively small number of corvettes they sent at me.

When I had saved all three parts of the gate, I turned 4 and 5 on the shipyard. I used 2 to disable subsystems on the battlecruisers, but they still managed to get about 3/4 of the frigate group. It was of little consequence however, as 9/10 pumped out new ion frigs to prepare for mission 14. The shipyard went down very quickly under that kind of combined fire, and with it, the mission ended.

Grand total of time, about 20 minutes, (a lot of it spent in pause micromanaging)

It ended up being like 4, insanely hard at first, until the pattern for winning is found.

[Sebas_V]

my version:

i moved every thing towards gate (with a turn) ran into 1 enemy battlegroup and destryed it.
Let my strikers safe lower generator.
Then move fleet behind gate and start building some ion frigs (note first time in game)
I let them attack the BC group wich started near your jump point, they die pretty vast but they are a diversion.
Then i have my fleet: 1 Dread 2 BC 4 Dest (bombs gun/puls )
Attack the Shipyard from behind.
There were a lot of frigs there and a few other stuff (BCs Ds)
After a while all thats left are the BCs and the Shipyard.
The BC's came from the ion attack.
After picking 1 BC at a time, i finish the Shipyard.
Note losses were high lost all destroyers and all bombers, and a few puls/guns.
Well mission ends.

[rolfski]

After a few struggles I went a completely different way:

1. Killed off the fwd enemy BC while sending my Destroyers with pulsars/gunships to secure the bottom gate.

2. Regrouped and rebuild my fleet again at starting position. No need to defend the bottom gate. It somehow won't get attacked again, which imo is a mission design weakness.

3. I noticed that as long as you don't attack them and don't get the Dreadnaught too close to the gate you can simply ignore the enemy BC's. They won't hyperspace/ambush you.

4. Now for the surprising part: I send my attack fleet just over the enemy BC's to the upper left quadrant behind his shipyard, completey unnoticed! :twisted:

5. From the MS/ starting position I send a few distracting platforms to attack the enemy while engaging the shipyard from behind with my attack fleet: Dread, BC's, DD's and ions

6. By the time the enemy respond it's too late: I only lost a few ions on that mission.:lol:

[Solarmech]

Here is a bit of a different strat and slightly off the wall. (Normal for me)
What I did was send my strike craft and movers to the top gate followed by two defence frigate and a pair of mine layers. I concentrated my first attacks on any assult frigates in residence, used the DF, to keep the power generator from takine to much damage and mines to help kill (stand the off a little and let the mines find their way in) and back it up with the old 20 ion platform rush. (Go after the assult as the enemy missile frigates cannot target strike craft very well if at all wich leaves them dead meat for strike craft) If you "activate" the BC's and they start jumping in behind you, (good chance they will) make sure you have a have a minefield set up to welcome them. Six or seven mines hurst even a BC. May not kill it, but it hurts it enough to make it a much faster kill.

When I started I had a full load and a HUGE amount of RU's. I lost a lot of strike craft, but only lost 1 destroyer and a couple of frigates. sm

[dbrower]

suppress the BCs with bombers, while going low after the low group, avoiding the high BCs and their torpedos.

defend main fleet from infiltrators with pulsars, then have them support the bombers.

only hint is to be a little passive about the later BCs. Don't attack them with bombers until they are clear of the gun platforms near the shipyard.

I killed disabled BCs with dread, but didn't need to; having it kill shipyard from below would have been faster.

-dB

[dbrower]

I went back in after replaying 12 last night and found myself up against only one BC instead of the 9 from the previous excursion.

What was different was that I hadn't built up quite so much, and had mixed in torps with ICFs.

The big change in defensive strategy was that the shipyard was pumping out many, many, many Heavy missile plats and Heavy missile frigs. This was a mess to take out.
My dread bit it, and I went to bed.

So, lots of BCs is not the only possible opposition.

-dB

[Wankey]

Ok, here's what I've got up against starting that mission:

My Fleet:

2 BC's (one Hig Bat with Firecontrol and one Vag Bat with Hyperspace inhib and Firecontrol)

21 Ion cannons frigs

5 Destroyers

full bomber squadron

full pulsar squadron

4 carriers

and the Dreadnought.

Enemy fleet:

9 BC!!!!! 9!!!!! FRIGGING NINE BATTLE CRUISERS!!!

Huge amount of fighers (can't count, it's all a mess)

a MASSIVE fleet of frigits shooting at the gate.

3 Carriers, 1 shipyard.

Firstly, how the hell do I even kill ANYTHING??!!!

all 8BC concentrate fire on MY BC's and they die instantly.

my bombs try to take out the nine BC's missles, but are cut down by their HUGE amount of fighters.

I tried the scout EMP strategy but the fighter screen they have is WAY too unpenetrable.

my frigs are just useless as they can't get anywhere near the BC's before getting ripped apart. (Ion cannons frigs are useless in this strategy)

If I send my ships toward the gate, my mothership gets the FULL 9 BC's attention.

Man, they should've had some kind of beta testing before they realeased it.

[DJRowley]

I had (i think) a maxed fleet but with about 18 torpedo frigates and 3 flak frigates. I don't remember seeing any BCs....

[Droquzon]

Weird, I didn't go up against any BC's but the one beside the shipyard. I came into this mission with supercap's and corvettes maxed, along with all 10 movers, 2 carriers and 10 harvesters. Odd.

[CrazyWolfHW2]

Last night I have finished m13 with the following manner.

My enemy has
- 7-8 BCs.
- no destroyers
- 30-40 HMFs
- 10-15 Assults
- groups of Fighters
- 1 carrier
- 1 shipyard


- I started with full fleet. with around 50000 RUs
- Used the similar strategy as I did in m12 to micro-managed my fleet
- I move all 5 of my destroyers with a DFF to the bottom of the gate and tried to eliminate the HMFs around there. I was able to eliminate all HMFs there but at the end I have lost 4 destroyers over there.
- Build many ion platforms
- use 4 minelayers to place mines on the RHS of the MS and in front of the Super capital.
- the rest of the strike group attacked whatever come from the front.

Long story short.
- At the end, I was able to removed everything from the map. And I have to removed everything from the map before I can finish this mission. Don't know why some other people do not need to.
- I lost one gate.
- 1 BC
- all fighters but rebuilt 8
- all corvettes but rebuilt 6
- 2 DFF but rebuilt 1
- 4 destroyers but rebuilt 1
- all frigs but rebuilt 3
- all movers but rebuilt 4
- all resource collector but rebuilt some

I basically has spent around 30000 RUs on this map, and you know what, I got 110000 RUs when I started m14. I got almost 90000 RUs only in this map. I think at least around 60K RUs were from the wreckages.

[phinex]

When I jump my max fleet into this mission, I encounter 8+ BC and 10+ Destoryer, uncountable frigates and fighter/bombers.

first time, I move my whole fleet to the bottom of gate, without borther the huge BC fleet beside my starting point, then everytime i try to attack shipyard, will result two fleet fight back. spend a hour to beat those hyperable BCs! end up with failure, lose all my fleet and RUs50000.

second time, I change my strategy, use my BC,Destoryer,Frigate fleet guad the resource near the start point. focus whole fleet to againist the first attack wave (1 BC, 8 frig, 8 fighter/bomber). then i send all my gunship, bomber and mover to the bottom of gate. and pull my fleet back to avoid contact with enemy's Huge 6+ BCs+Destoryer fleet. focus in secure bottom of gate.

after secure the gate, pull everything back to my intial point, repair and replace the lose (minor loss). then slowly move whole fleet to the left resource mine and fight againisr the BCs. if you can win this, the rest mission is a piece of cake. (you should win it easily with your max fleet).

I gothrough this mission with max fleet and RUs 80000 afterall!

[leixusam]

In this mission, I got 2 marines, 2DFFs, and all others are ions. But the enemy has 10 BCS!!!!!!!! Ok, this is how I did, after lots of sacrifice:
1, I attacked and secured the bottom gate
Oh yeah, BTW, one of my Vaygor BC has a hyperspace inhibitor on it (captured in M12), I guessed that prevented the enemy hypers on my MS.
2, Then the BC armada got on me. All my ships died, but surprisingly, my 2 BCs and DN didn't evev take any damage, and somehow managed to destroy all ten! :bandit:

And by looking through all your posts, maybe that bringing ions to this mission will trigger loads of BCs? I'll try using torps next time. But capture a hyperspace inhibitored BC in 12 would be useful, I guess.

Oh yeah, have any of you managed to capture a BC with a hyperspace module? I tried, but with 10 BCs in front of me... poor marines... So, can you really capture it and put it for your own use?

[antialias]

an alternative approach: running the gauntlet

take out the bottom group as usual (move all your ships down there) then go behind the gate and rush the shipyard (attack with BCs and have all your forces guard the BCs so that they all arrive in range at the same time. once your BCs open fire focus everything on the shipyard - ignore all other enemy ships. if your dreadnaught is close to the gate when the shipyard blows the mission ends. the battle goes on during the cutscene (and your forces get mauled pretty badly during that interval) - but I have the feeling that losses incurred during the cutrscene are not counted - at least I took ridiculosuly little losses from the swarms of heavy missile frigs, battlecruisers and heavy weapons platforms that were protecting the shipyard - by rights there should have been only scrap metal left.

sending in a group of ion plats to distract the enemy just before you hit is a great way to save your ships. using defense field frigates works well too.

[leixusam]

Ok, here, I re-did M12 and retired all my ion frigates, this reduced the enemy BC number to 6, making it way easier to kill. First, I rebuild my ion frigate fleet, and send them out with DDs to take out the lower gate fleet. While doing that, I have my BCs dealing with their BCs with the help of strikecrafts and bombers. I lost a BC, but then I captured one with a hyperspace module. Yes, YOU CAN CAPTURE THEM!

Here's a picture of the capture BC hyperspacing...

Ok, there's something wrong with the pic, go right click on it, then click show picture.

http://www.geocities.com/leixusam/ss00102.jpg

Then after taking the BCs out (and use bombers to take out carrier), you can go back and repair your fleet. The enemy won't be able to pump out any more BCs, all they have are bombers. If you are afraid of them, build a flak frigate or two. You can take out the enemy resource op near the destroyed carrier, and they'll put new resource collectors there for you to destroy!:tooth:

I waited until everything is repaired and attacked the shipyard's protection fleet (the top and middle gate fleets). Save after that, and destroy the shipyard.

Ships I have in the beginning of the mission.
2x BCs
1x Dreadnought
5x Destroyers
11x Bombers
7x Gunships
5x Pulsars
12x Resource Collectors
3x Marines
1x Captain Soban (counted as a marine too)
1x Scout (ping)

With these, not much resistance will be found.

[Candy Andy]

heh let's get spoiled
can some1 tell me the storyline of this mission?

[Hotice]

I finished mission 12 with full fleet force consisted of:
14 bombers
12 gunships
10 movers
2 BCs
2 carriers
1 DN
18 Torp. Frigates
4 refineries
20 RCs
1 shipyard.

I finished mission 12 twice. First time I finished it with around 28k RU spent. I thought that was too much so I played it again. This time I didn't lose too much. My entire fleet is in full strength when entered mission 13. Soon as I entered this mission, I pause the game looked at the situation. I ordered MS, shipyard, and 2 carriers to build 5 Ion Platform each. I started from left use bombers/gunship/movers attack all the enermy offensive sub-system. Ordered Torp. frigates to move to far left side and attack when all your BCs and DN are firing their main guns. Un-pause the game. Move in kill small ships via bombers/gunships/movers after then took out all the sub-systems. Let BCs, DN to kill the large ships. Once your BCs and DN are started to fire their main gun, move in frigates from far left and attack one ships at time. Order your Ion platforms into the center of gate and on Aggro setting. After you have done all these, start to rebuild lost units and this mission is over in about 6 min at most. I went through this mission in 20 minutes without any lost.

[Candy Andy]

finnaly beat ms 12
now I got a prob. with this ms
how do u hit the yard
I mean wen I tried it I lost everythin but my naught
or should I ignore it and hit the defense groups

[antialias]

right from the start move all your production ships (MS, carriers, shipyard) to the right. move your heavies (DN, BCs downward and somewhat towards the bottom group of ships attacking the generator). set your frigs to guard one of those ships (the one furthest away from the group of BCs in the center.

a small group of frigs and destroyers will attack your position. pulsars, bombers and your destroyers can handle them (take out the AFs first! focus fire!). after that is taken care of set your DDs, bombers/pulsars to also guard one of your BCs.

ignore the enemy BCs halfway between you and the shipyard for now. do not trigger them! if you attack them you will lose too much time and the generators will be destroyed

let your DDs overtake the BCs and open fire on the bottom group of frigates attacking the generators. some of the frigates will turn towards you. attack those and kill AFs first!. assign each destroyer his own AF to kill and set your pulsars on another one (despite what it says in the manual AFs are not really effective against pulsars).
once all but 2 AFs are gone send in the bombers and kill the rest of the group (AFs first, I cannot stress this enough). by that time your heavies should also be almost within striking distance.

once that group is killed angle up and kill the second group. do NOT go in with bombers or pulsars or frigates, as they will get too close to the shipyard and attract the huge fleet there. you might want to add 20 ion platforms into the mix. did I mention you should build ion platforms from the word go? do so. put them near the bottom gate somewhat in direction of the second power generator.

during the liberation of the first 2 generators keep all your frigates out of it! exception: with a bit of micro you can use the defense field frigates to good advantage.

do not move your carriers,MS,shipyard too far away from your fleet, but keep them on the other side of the action

after that you can go 2 ways:
A) reinforce your plat horde, set up the defense field and FCT laden BCs behind it. trigger the BC horde by a quick hit and fade on one of the BCs engines with your bombers (completely take out the engine! then retreat). wait for them to lumber in and cut them to pieces. you should have plenty of experience how to do that without losses from mission 12. rebuild/repair/solidify your position and trigger the shipyard's fleet with a quick visit by your pulsars (do not stick around to kill anything! just hit 'd' as soon as the enemy reacts). if they do not get drawn towards you you might have to scuttle your ion plats and build new ones a bit closer to the enemy. you can also use the ion plats to trigger the fleets by moving them extra close and following up with your fleet.
since the enemy craft are of different speeds you will get several waves attackin you.
strike craft will come first - let your flaks and pulsars handle those. once the frigates start entering the scene withdraw your flaks. focus fire the plats, DDs and BCs, DN on enemy AFs. once they are down to 2 send in the bombers to finish them and the rest. by now the enemy DDs and BCs arrive. handle as usual. use your defense fields.

you can trigger both groups at the same time if you want. it gets more 'interesting' that way.

B) the second method is the kamikaze method: kill the bottom power generator frig fleet as described. then move everything to the OTHER side of the gate. build 20 ion plats. now comes the tricky part: DN to the front, BCs a bit behind, dds a bit behind that and frigates/pulsars/bombers yet even more behind. the setup should be so that your ships reach firing range of the shipyard at the same time if you give them the word 'go'. (you can also give everything a guarding order on the DN. now send in the 20 ion plats and start your engines. the enemy will see the ion plats first and attack them. have everything attack the shipyard and ignore all enemy craft. you will take major losses. however once the shipyard is down and your DN is close enough to the gate the mission will be victorious. the cutscene will start and in the background you will see your fleet getting shreddered to pieces, but any casualties incurred during a cut scene are not counted (or so it seems), so your actual losses are pretty light.


the trick in this mission (as in any other 'fleet action' mission) is to create an opening in which one of your craft can operate with impunity. usually this means eliminating anti-fighter/anti-corvette craft and then letting your bombers/pulsars have a nice day.

note. use pause/micro for all tricky parts

Note: I never had the enemy BCs hyper in on me. maybe the sensor distortion probes I have with me or the proximity of my mS to the rest of the fleet prevents this?

Edit: My fleet loadout at start was: 1DN, 2BC, 5DD, 13Flak Frigs, 5 Torpedo Frigs, 2 Defense Field Frigs, Soban, 12 Pulsars, 14 Bombers, no movers, 20 collectors (set on repair) , 4 carriers, MS and shipyard

[Candy Andy]

AW HAIL NO WUT THE FK?????
I BEAT MS 13 AND I HAD MOST OF MY FLEET BUT MY NAUGHT WAS ON THE VERGE OF DYIN
IT STARTED COMMUNICATIN WITH BALCORA AND DEN
IT DIED AND I LOST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WUT THE @%#^$ I"M SO &#%#& ANGRY SOMEONE TELL ME HOW TO BEAT THIS BEFORE I GO ON A RAMPAGE

[Hotice]

DN is the key for that gate. If the DN dies, the mission surely would fail. Why don't you assign a few RCs to repair the DN while in combat? Keep it alive is pretty easy unless you don't have much to protect it. One way to do this is just keep the DN from combat. Only use it once you've finished off those BCs/Destroyers and such.

[antialias]

I guess you went for the kamikaze strategy?

make sure your BCs (or something else with staying power) gets focused on in battle by entering enemy detector range first.
the setup I described in my last post was not to say which units should enter battle first. just to account for different speeds so that everything arrives at roughly the same time. (I have had the problem that my strike craft and frigates arrive way too early before my DDs and BC/DN show up...and by the time the heavies do the rest is toast.)

change your setup a bit to move BCs a bit forward - that should do the trick.

Although I personally prefer the 'kill-em-all' approach to this kamikaze scheme. it's so much neater

Apart from that: what Hotice said. 20 Resourcers on repair duty is a must for all of the later missions. and use your defense field frigs (pause/micro) in front of your DN.

BTW anybody have this happen before? I replayed this mission the other night and in the cutscene at the and I saw two MS! one was lurking in the background while the other one was flying through the gate...looked damn funny :lol:

[Candy Andy]

thanks beat it
by da way I got da 2 ms's thing 2!!!
Pretty dam funny:lol:

[mko]

due to i edittied my rus. vagyr used 10 bcs on me!

[dbrower]

One more helpful hint: be patient and capture two hyper BCs before killing the shipyard and exiting the level. They are handy in M14.

-dB
-

[FoolishOwl]

All the walkthroughs I've read emphasize the importance of postponing achieving objectives until you've built up your fleet for the next mission. Mission 13 proved to me that this is very, very bad advice, and isn't the way the game is designed to be played.

I'd postponed rescuing Soban in Mission 12, so I could build up a full fleet. As others describe, there was a large fleet of battlecruisers. They were tough, but once you can bring the dreadnaught to bear, battlecruisers don't last long. The battlecruisers weren't the problem.

The problem was that there were somewhere between 80 and 100 frigates bombarding the power nodes. Oddly, no one mentions this problem. I could find no way to kill them fast enough to save a power node. They were a far, far greater threat than the battlecruisers. If I managed to survive for more than a minute or two, the enormous firepower of the frigates destroyed the power nodes two or three minutes after mission start.

I tried several of the tactics folks described in this thread, with no success.

Finally, I went back to a saved game near the end of Mission 12, and scuttled most of my frigates and capital ships. I came back into Mission 13, and faced one battlecruiser and about a dozen frigates. The dreadnaught easily destroyed the battlecruiser and the shipyard, while my strike craft took out one of the groups of frigates. Then, my combined ships took out a second group of frigates, when the dreadnaught activated the gate and ended the mission. It took only a few minutes.

My conclusion is that the intent of the game designers is that players complete mission objectives as quickly as they can, and start each mission with a small, ragged fleet and a lot of resources. Then, you've got a short breathing space to assess the current threat and begin building your ships. You're not expected to end a mission with a full fleet. If so, the game basically assumes you're Superman, and throws an exponentially greater threat at you. Basically, you're supposed to be in combat at most times, with only short breathing spaces, and you're expected to be building the fleet while fighting. That's the game, not creating a perfect fleet through taking advantage of the exploit of ignoring urgent mission objectives.

With this in mind, I found the final missions to be quite easy, once I figured out the basic tricks to them, even though my fleet was ragged and smaller than the optimal fleets walkthroughs discuss.

[Starblade]

That's called a 'dynamic fleet'. We already know that the game adjusts to your strength.

[antialias]

There is no real problem taking out large amounts of frigates if you enter with a maxed out fleet (actually it's more fun that way). You just need to get a move on the bottom group from the word 'go' (don't stay around to tangle with the small group coming towards you - it's only purpose is to delay you. Don't let it!...your strikecraft can handle them - they will slaughter them and catch up in time to take part in the 'node liberation operation'). As soon as your DDs come into range open fire (don't wait for BCs and the DN, they can join in when they get there).
If the node is badly damage concentrate on missile frigs hitting the node (not the ones turning towards you). If health is still good take out the assault frigs and let the bombers have a nice day.
Massed scouts with emp also work well.

Throw ion plats into the fray which you should be building from the very beginning and sending down there ASAP. Get your carriers with FCTs down there. Use mobile refineries if you have them. Throw the kitchen sink at them - it's a close call, but should work every time.

[Invector329]

This mission was a cakewalk. I dont remember my exact fleet specs, but I remember I beat it inside of 10 minutes.

Take your whole fleet and take out the first wave of attackers. Than take out each force attacking the gate one at a time with your whole force, I got through with almost no losses at all ((with the exception of a incept squad or 2 :3d:

[theolein]

I came into this mission maxxed out on everything, and the opposing fleet had 9! BC's sitting a little to the left and forward of the gate. There were also no less than 20 frigates at the top and bottom power nodes and about 10 frigates and 10 ints at the middle node. I went straight for the bottom node and the BC's started getting edgy.

So I sent my bombers and pulsars on a subsystem killing mission jumping from one missile subsystem to the next and thus keeping the BC's from being able to hit my fleet at long range. I also sent my movers to wack the left resource collectors.

In the end though, I had to fight my way through the entire mess of BC's and massed frigates. Even with the help of my ints and pulsars I lost 5 destroyers, 2 BC's and most of my frigates. With a massive rebuild going on I eventually killed the whole opposing fleet.

It was fun.

[Skandalos]

My fav tactic is to send all my destroyers and all my frigs along a waypoint circumventing any vaygr attack forces to the top power node including 2 carriers following them, both being set to a frig building line. This force will save the top node pretty fast.

My strike craft and my BCs/DN take care of the first attack wave, after which I order them to sit tight and let resourcers do repairs on the BCs.

After the top node is safe my DD/Frig attack force returns to my main force, I replenish lost frigates and destroyers. Then I take care of the big bunch of Vaygr BCs on the left asteroid spot. 4 carriers in a frig building line provide a constant stream of bait for enemy BC fire. I rarely lose a destroyer or a BC. After the 9 or so BCs are gone the rest is a piece of cake.

Did anyone try and succeed in saving more than one power node?

[atmawpn]

My record is 2 nodes, couldn't save the third in time >.<

I threw strikecraft and frigates into two of the nodes then prayed while I tried to take out the 7 Vaygr BCs with 2 BCs, 5 DDs and the Dread. What saved my fleet was the nonstop pumping out of ionplats from all production lines, and crazy microing of Defence Field Frigates.

Did I mention that the colls were scurrying around my BCs trying to save them from getting torn apart? :)

[archangel17]

I found it easiest to isolate Makaan in the earlier mission and leave him for the last, have the DN and 2 BC hold what he sends at me at bay while I max out only my Corvettes and whatever is left stay as is. Once I get to the next mission have the DN take out what it can in a position creating line of sight with Balcora and the MS, while pumping out whatever I could to eradicate what my corvettes couldn't on thier first strike against the Vaygr. I actually left a few of the attacking Vaygr over cause of the losses and took out the shipyard AND 3 of the incoming enemy BC with my own but leaving the Dreadnaught as cover for the mothership (cloaked on Collectors mind you) and while they slowly chewed away at it I finished off the Vaygr with two nodes remaining. Scary thing though, the DN was nearly dead before I hyperspaced. Whew!

[CreepyKeepers]

I have actually become so annoyed by this mission I don't even want to play it anymore :S

I am just not good enough to press the advantage. The BC's cannon does so much damage my destroyers and Battlecruisers just died, or the Dreadnaught got killed by 2 BC's. I am at ze end of my tether with this mission, I just want to see the cutscene at the end of it, then move on.

[Kelvins]

I don't like this mission either

[4ries]

It seems impossible to to this but as said b4 in this thread: when you are attacked its merely diversion (as Makaan went through the gate and wants you to stay at the gate... which is pretty stupid of him because he needs three cores to power up sajuuk)

I finished the mission by saving the bottom node (easiest way since Fleet Command states there has to be atleast one node left to activate the gate...)

As soon as you kill the bottom frig group make sure your dread is with your attacking force. Send it close to the gate and it should trigger the gate. (am not sure though, havent played hw2 in a long time...)
Dunno if you HAVE to take out the SY though.

[Code Slinger]

Yes. It is possible to save all three power nodes. Here's a screen shot of that.

85475990@N00/268059185
[add the Flickr prefix, I can't post a URL]

You can see there are no Vaygr attacking the gate and all of the power nodes are operational by the beams from the floating bars to the central gate.

[amagill]

I had trouble with this mish too ( 7 BC's !!! ) but i think i found a relly good strat: Send battleships and frigates to the lower gate generator. Que up 40 ion platforms. Lay a bunch of mines just outside of where your reasourcers are lined up. When the group at the generator has killed the lower gate group, retreat them. When they are back at your MS. Send the 20 ion platforms right up to the BC group. When i did this, the BC jumped right on top of the minefield leaving the platforms to waste the frigates there. Full attack these BC's, for me they were jumping in and out which made things easier. When the BC's are dead, Send everything ( including the additional 20 platforms ) to the enemy frigate groups and mop up. All the time use you strike craft to disract whatever enemy that is most dangerous to your capitals and frigates, and make sure your resources to repair your capital ships. At the end i had lost 2 BS and 6 frigates. Pretty good IMO.