M09 - Counter Attack
|
|
|
#1
M09 - Counter Attack
Dont get owned! This mission is nasty
These suggestions are both from the Strategy Guide and from my experience playing the game.
1. Build at least 6 resource collectors and start repairing the Dreadnaught.
2. Research Fire Control towers for the MS and a carrier. If you're not sure of the value well guess what? Any ship within a single tower gets a 15% hit chance and damage increase. Overlapping towers give you 30%!
3. Build 2 defense field frigates and have a minimum of 4 destroyers.
4. Keep your ships on a tight leash. Don't spread your fleet out. (me: I build at least 2 minelayers and started building mine walls at the 12 and 6 o'clock posistions. Be sure to keep the 12 maintained for later.)
5. Ensure all research upgrades are done on all ship classes.
6. Once the Dread is partially repaird it will regain engine power. Start moving it aft of your MS ASAP! Move your entire anti-capital force with it.
7. Create two mixed control groups of bombers and movers. And move these to MS twelve and three o-clock positions, just on the edge of sensor range.
8. Extend your sensor range by deploying probes to the edge of the MS sensor range. This gives you more time to respond to pending attacks.
9. Hyperspace Gates: Use your bomber/mover force to take down all four gates. (my experience: I used just bombers. Then I only attacked a gate that was either lightly guarded or not at all first then worked my way around. If you time it right they'll be left alone and easily destroyed. Then you can leave the bombers there until the Destroyers start warping in.)
10. Shipyard: Protect the shipyard!! Start moving it towards the Dread to shorten the trip. The yard almost immediately comes under attack from either 1 or two destroyers and a handfull of frigates. (me: If your bombers are still out roaming then bring them in and flank the capital ships and take them out! Also group 2 destroyers and force attack the capital ships as well. Keep the other two close to your MS) Repair the SYard with collectors.
11. Extra Credit: There's a Vaygr shipyard 38 clicks off your MS starboard bow. (ME: way out there!). It will continuously churn out ships as well as be a drop-off point for the collectors. Take it out! (Me: Do this while your destroying the gates. And if you do be prepared to defend the SYard without bomber support!)
12. 15 Minutes of Hell!: That's right 15 freakin minutes! If you destroyed the Gates then most of the larger ships will not show up but be prepared for some frigates and fighter/bomber squads. Keep your fleet together!
13. Carriers, First wave: They appear at the 2, 4 and 8 o'clock positions. These should be easy to kill. The one closest to the SYard is the easiest. You should have at least 2 destroyers and anti-capital force almost within striking range when it warps in. Take it down. Use your bombers to sneak attack the others.
14. Cariers, Second Wave: Oy vey! Two more hyperspace in at your 3 and 9. Let their strikecraft come to you! You will tear them up within your Firecontrol range. Use your bombers to take the carriers out again. (Me: be sure to keep your bombers at full power or close to it. You have time, so do it!)
15. "Battlecruiser, 12 o'clock sir!" (me: if you kept your 12 oclock stocked with mines then let the fleet come to you! The mines will obliterate them.) Use the two groups of destroyers to take down the flanking destroyers. Put your bombers on full alert and take down what's left of the BC!. (me: Basically, put all anti-capital on the BC.)
That's it. Hope that helps.
I used the pause button liberally in this mission, and truthfully, it made it much easier. Basically, I continuously kept tabs on every ship my enemy threw at me and countered it one by one. Without pause, I probably would have been overwhelmed and obliterated.
Couple points:
When the Battlecruiser came my way, I had 4 Marine Frigates in the wings with 10 resourcers all set to repair them. I then engaged the BC with my interceptors. Next, my bombers took out the engines and missle racks. Finally, I sent in my Marine Frigates and captured it. Then I transferred my resourcers to repair the BC.
As for the last Vaygr forces on the map, Minelayer Corvs worked wonders. If you do it right, you can park them just outside the "radius of attack" of the Vaygr ships and let them lay homing mines without reprisal.
You face a wide variety of EVERYTHING in this mission, so make sure you have a wide variety of counters. I find keeping your fleet in a massive group helps as you'll have all weaknesses covered. The only stipulation is to send out bombers as SOON as you find a jump gate or construction ship to take it out. Makes things a LOT easier in the long run.
#6
This is a very tough mission if you play it exactly by the objectives.
If you want to play it slower, don't start to repair the dread immediately. Repairing the dread is a script trigger that only sends more pain hypering in to visit you.
If you delay the repair you can take the mission in stages. First, the immediate ships that surround you. Then a carrier group dispatched out to pop the enemy shipyard in the corner. Then regroup back in the center and repair the dread, and the final battles.
After playing this level 5 times already, I have never been able to save the original Shipyard. (I do NOT like the ultra-conservative population limits in this game. The Vaygr don't seem to have this strict of limits and can throw just about any number of vessels at you. If the US Navy worked with these limits, we'd be stuck with 5 canoes, 20 sailors, and maybe a few 9mm pistols.)
My advice: worry about your fleet, not the shipyard (Nabaal). I simply built another one and had the Dreadnought dock with that one. Also, don't dock the Dreadnought with the Mothership. (I did that just to see if the MS could repair it, and then I couldn't get the thing to undock!)
Now, I'm going to go relax and take up drinking again.
What I found useful was having three Minelayer Corvettes creating a minefield behind the Mothership (around 4-6 km out I think - between the first and second "click" marks). When the enemy Hyperspace Gate ship showed up, the mines instantly went after it and destroyed it. Interestingly enough, this somehow nerfed the incoming enemy fleet, and they didn't get ANY destroyers behind my fleet until later. It's ironic. I had moved my main battlefleet behind the MS to deal with the Destroyers (knowing they would arrive) and instead had the minefield destroy everything.
Small note: Minefields do not go after corvettes or fighters. So you may want to send three Gun Platforms into the center of the Minefield to protect your Minelayer Corvettes from enemy attack. It appears that the only thing that the enemy enjoys targetting more than Marine Frigates is Minelayer Corvettes.
#9
This is what I did.
I had 3 major battle groups in the start of this battle.
1.) Large force of Pulsar/Gunship corvettes. These took down enemy corvettes and fighters no sweat, which was what the enemy forces had the most of.
2.) Large (Maxed) group of Torpedo Frigs. Not only did these own capital ships, but also provided anti corvette and fighter defence
3.) 5 Destroyers for anti capital ship/frigate power.
When they had multiple targets for me to take down, such as hypercpace gates and carriers, I imediatly sent the destroyer group twards one of them, and took them down. The frigates went to another one at the same time, and took them down. I keept my corvettes inbetween my mothership/shipyards/carriers and the destroyer group to provide anti figher and corvette cover. During this time, I also cranked out Gun Turrets to keep the fighters and corvettes off. The Torp Frigs could deal with both capitals and strike craft, and were faster, so I would use them to take down the rest of the objectives.
The trick in this mission is always keep your bombers busy. Once you spot a carrier, launch your bombers at it, then dock them and relaunch for the next target. Hyper gates and carriers are first priority.
I had 7 bombers, 6 gunships, 3 destroyers, 8 torp frigs and 2 carriers. I was able to hold off all forces losing only half of my torps but easily replacing them.
Just make sure your torp frigates target in this order. Laser vettes, missle vettes, frigates. Gunships take out the bombers, fighters, enemy corvettes. Destroyers work on the caps, then frigates, and bombers do the assaulting. You can even throw 4 intercepters to guard the bombers.
When this mission starts, send your mothership to just underneath the resource pocket located above and behind her. This will let you use the same force to defend your MS and resource operation, as well as put you in a good location to rescue the shipyard when it arrives.
I discovered many things mentioned here the hard way. Move towards the lower
resource pocket with some carriers,
build a big minefield, and gun platforms of
various types without moving them.
Do not dock the dread.
kill first wave; kill attack from the
bottom; then kill the shipyard. Then the carriers. Move the now idle platforms up north; kill the other carriers, the
tidy up capturing the BC and killing everything else.
Where is the rumoured second shipyard? I never found it.
-dB
When i played this mission i built 2 minelayers and deployed them in front of and behind my ms, but they both got killed before they could do anything much. Also, I didn't even notice the shipyard, probably would have been easier if I had.
I start this level with:
1 MS
1 dreadnought
1 carrier
1 destroyer
3 Torpedo frigates
3 bombers
9 movers
7 resource collectors
1 mobile refinery
4 probes
and 5160 resources
I tried ALL the previous suggestions but I get massively overwhelmed anyway every time.
Should I go back to an earlier level and beef up my fleet? Or what?
If you capture some hyperspace gates, can you keep them for later missions?
-dB
There's a problem. I captured the BC and then the game keeps pointing to that ship (in the map screen) saying that I must destroy it.
plus the level doesn't finish.
Any problems?
I come into this mission with, I think, quite a nice build up:
4 Int
10 bombers
10 movers
9 gun & pulsar corv
3 minelayers
10 torp
3 ion
4 marine frigs
2 def frigs
5 destroyers
21 resource
2 carriers
90,000 something RU's, everything researched and build
and then I am simply being totally overwhelmed.
Immediately destroyes all the gates,but then have constant attacks simoultaneously from 4 directions (8, 10, 12 and 3 o'clock)
When the shipyard appears it is immediately attacked by 5 destroyers with dozens of bombers and corvettes. Destroyed in less than one minute. I cannot move from the dread to protect it as there is constant attack from the front and sides.
Build lot of platforms (agressive/do not move).
Put out lots of mines at 6 o'clock, no help. Seems the mines start disappearing by themselves after a certain time?!
Found the other shipyard, destroyed it and is still being attacked constantly from the same direction. Cannot find any carriers.
Is the game punishing you for having a nice build-up or am I overseeing something here? I am getting devastated.
I start that mission with this kinda fleet and Im not having too much trouble there...
2 scout, 4 int, 8 bomber
4 gun, 4 pulse and 4 minelayer corvs
8 torp, 6 flak, 3 ion, 2 marine and 2 def field frigs
5 destroyers
4 carriers(every damn module built)
20 harvesters and 4 refinerys
the dread and about 155000RU and all researches done.
incase u dont believe me, PM me and gimme ur email and ill send u the save game.
And where is the second shipyard....Ive only found the one at 1 a clock high.
ohh....about those gates....when the mission starts send minelayers at 3, 6 and 9 a clock positions that way u can kill the gates so fast they wont have time to be activated and u will have way more ships for killing off the first attack....and use bombers to take out the 2 gates at 12 a clock because u need the remaining 1 or 2 minelayer to mine the path of the missile frigs in the first attack.
u can also do the same thing when the carriers jump in.....they wont even have time to get out of hyperspace before they are destroyed. And u dont have to deal with the fighters it was gonna launch.
Impressive fleet (and RU's) I must say.
I did finally overcome this mission and, yes, found that hitting the 12 and 6 o'clock gates as soon as they arrive seems to be essential. The first waves are greatly reduced, especially in respect of attacking the shipyard (only 1 in stead of 5 destroyers).
Funny enough I found all the ships which did not make it through to attack me, standing idle at the the end of the mission, just behind the BC, and they only reacted when I attacked them.
:3d:
Here are the exact positions of where and when to set the minefields for the incoming carriers and for the final attack as well. Note that the times are all relative to the dreadnaught repairs beeing completed also distances and directions assume u havent moved ur mothership. Im also assuming u have 4 minelayers. (5?.....even better)
first u mine the places at 3, 6 and 9,5 a clock positions exactly 12 kilometers away from ur MS. thats where the gates will arrive. if u send the miners right as the game starts u will have time for this. And as I said before.....use bombers to kill the gates at 12 a clock.
Exactly 3 minutes after u dock the dread the first 3 carriers will jump in at:
1,5 a clock/16 kilometers away from mothership
4 a clock/20 kilometers away from mothership
8 a clock/12 kilometers away from mothership
u will need to have the minelayers in position before u dock the dread or they wont have time to lay enough eggs. 16 mine minefields are enough. so 1 minelayer in each position is enough.
5:20 minutes before the dread is repaired 2 more carriers will jump in at ur 3 and 9 a clock high positions their exact positions are as folows:
9 a clock/7.5 kilometers up and 15 kilometers away from MS
3 a clock/7.5 kilometers up and 12 kilometers away from MS
Again u will need to have the minelayers at those positions about 3 minutes before the carriers arrive.
The second these 2 carriers arrive u need to send all 4 minelayers to mine the area the last Vaygr attack group (including a BC) will jump. And this time they will need escorts, because the enemy fighters will start targetting them. Use all ur fighters and corvs for this.
All ships in the final attack will jump 10 kilometers away from MS to 11, 12 and 1 a clock positions the second the dread is repaired. The 12 a clock position is 2 km up/10km away. I sent 1 minelayer to 11 and 1 a clock and 2 minelayers to 12 a clock position. all of them had full minefields set when the Vaygr showed up but non of thier ships were destroyed. However the BC and destroyers were heavily damaged which made them a lot faster kills. If u send 3 minelayers to the 12 a clock position the BC should be destroyed.
Also gunplats are a good thing to have in this mission. With those u can set up such a crossfire for the incoming fighters that only about 10% of them will ever get close enough to their targets to even fire once....in any case they will only have time to fire once and with 2 def field frigs nothing can hurt ur ships.
This way this mission will get a lot easier...I didnt loose anything. not a single ship...ok well individual fighters yes but no squads were lost.....or frigs.
Well I am through (now going into mission 12), but something in your reply seems interesting.
The first time I tried there was a ShipYard at 11 o'clock close to the resource pocket. I never saw that again.
All the times I tried I never saw the first carriers! I sent out bombers going against the stream of fighters coming my way and there was no carriers anywhere!
The two later carriers at 9 and 3 o'clock: Yes, they came.
I captured the BC and for fun also tried to capture the destoyers. Succeeded with a combination of EMP, DF and 20 R repairing the MF's (4). The cap on ships however meant that the destroyers became enemies again after a few minutes, so seems the cap on different ships is very firm.
By the way got through 10 and 11 losing only a few scouts so still don't understand why 9 was so difficult for me.
It's really nice if u got all 14 fightas on bombers cuz while your fleet battles to keep dreadnaught alive u can just take out the hyp gates 1 by 1 in seconds
Effective for da carriers 2!!
Also use the minelay strat for 12 clock and 4 clock cause like 12 vaygr frigs come form dere right when the destroyers do so if u forget about them they will blow up you destroyers and hit your 'naught
Minelayers!!
I really don't know what to think about the minelayers? Yes, the mines are extremely effective when they hit a target, but due to the time limit they either disappear before the target arrives or you have to wait starting mining very late and get your minelayer blown to pieces.
I have tried to set up impressive walls of mines (5 corv) just to see all the mines disappear one by one when the enemy arrives.
What do you think of mines/this time limit?
:?:
The destroyers never came from the shipyard in my game cuz I killed the shipyard...it built only 2 destroyers before I killed it and I killed those too along with the shipyard. I used all fighters and corvs for it. movers stayed home tho. The shipyard I kill before I repair the dredd. that way u dont have to fight the carriers and the shipyard all at once.
And the way to keep ur minelayers alive is to have them retreat from the field the second the enemy appears. Or to have fighters and corvs as escorts. Best way to keep them alive is to do both. Retreat the minelayer and ur fighters will have an easy job in killing the fighters chasing the minelayer.
And about the time limit in mines......yes...I think its too short too. if u set a miner to do a 16 mine minefield its a never ending job. just as the job is done it will have to start all over again.
however.....while the minelayer isnt as fast as a lance fighter. If u retreat the minelayer just at the right moment it will get away and u will still have enough mines left to hurt the enemy.
just drop your mines in battle and escort your 'layers with movers
problem solved
Will give them another chance based on your advice. Thanks.
I just replayed this, knowing what I learned from M12 and later.
It's surprisingly easy. Move most stuff down underneath the 6 o'clock resource patch. Build a big minefield there slightly offcenter to the left. Build gun and ion platforms there, and keep your heavy fleet near there. Assist the dread, move it down south when it comes alive, but do not dock it until later.
Then go out with pulsars and bombers as a tag team. Kill the hyper gates with one or the other, attack light stuff with pulsars, and once cleaned off, with the bombers. Move towards the shipyard at 2 o'clock high, and kill it.
Ditto when the extra carriers show up. Your pulsar/bomber strike group will do the damage, while you protect the shipyard and dread with everything else, especially the platforms.
You can capture the BC and the destroyers if you want at the end to keep from building any. Similarly heavy missile frigs, but they can be harder because they tend to come in mutually protective groups. They are easier to snatch one at a time.
-dB
Will give it a try next time I play through. Am now up to my ears in Mission 13. Thought 9 and 12 were hard!!!!!!!
Like one other poster, I also had problems after capturing the Battlecruiser. The game wouldnt finish. DRAT!!! I really needed that thing! Even after reluctantly scuttling it, the game still wouldnt finish! Any suggestions? :boohoo: :boohoo:
#30
Capture the BC if possible.It really helps in the next mission.
Funny, everyone mentions a shipyard, but I've pinged and been all over the map and never saw it. But I did get two "extra" destroyers that sort of hid in the corner of the map and never did attack!
Grifman
Sometimes the shipyards hyper out before they get destroyed. On mission 9 it might just hyper out after certain conditions apply. I typically destroy it before I'm close to the end though. There is an RU patch that's far out, a bit to the right and high that it's always shown up next to in my games.
I have done everything in mission 9.
1. Repaired and protected the Dreadnaught
2.protected the shipyard
3. destroyed everything in the area
But I done all this and the games at idol. in the objectives menu, destroy all vagar units is unchecked and so is protect the dreadnaught.
I have sent probes and searched high and low, but there is no where else to look!!! I have completed everything!!!
Has anyone else had this issue???????
Is there any vagar units hiding that I havent found that you know of???????
please let me know, I'm stuck!!!
#34
Try building a scout and pinging. The same thing happened to me, and that did it. There were some Collectors that were hiding in my case.
My Interceptor is better than your Interceptor.
Sometimes there are 4 destroyers just sitting there (foward and a little above you). Sometimes the shipyard doesn't hyper out. At other times it's some collectors or leftover gates (though I think the mission will end if you do not destroy all the gates)
Ping the map (make sure you look at it from all angles), send probes to all the resource patches.
This is one of my favorite levels. I've played it over again many many times, I find it most enjoyable because it's basically a CONSTANT battle, no breaks, just action and reaction ^_^
I have never seen the shipyard people keep mentioning, but I have seen those destroyers antialias was talking about.
I have noticed an interesting glitch however. Sometimes, the enemy Vaygr forces are painted with the same colors as the Hiigaran Navy (white stripes on teel background). They even have the Hiigaran Navy badge.
The Hiigaran colors only appear on what seems to be HALF of the Vaygr assualt force, as I did see ships were painted like the regular Vaygr fleet. Has anyone else seen this glitch?
Haven't had the glitch, but the Shipyard in the direction of the destroyer group seems to vanish (hypers out?) if it cannot produce anymore (no resources/collectors) or the last wave has been destroyed. I'm not absolutely sure what the trigger is. Probe the area early and you will find it.
This is a fun level.
Just a constant swarm of pulsars gunships and ints to defend against the small stuff and a roving band of 5 bomber squadrons to take out the gates and assist in taking down the caps.
had a a ring of 6 gun plats around both my shipyard and MS and sent out my 2 destroyers and 4 ion frigs cap ship hunting (usually went after carriers and other destroyers) with a about 3 torp frigs on both the SY and MS.
When the battle cruiser appeared I left the defence to the plats and sent everything after the BC again using my destroyers and ions to pick off the destroyer escort it has before focusing in on the BC
I usually do it the other way around: 20 frigs (10 torps, 10 flaks) stay home along with 20 gunplats and 4 refineries.This takes care of anything the carriers throw at you without one bit of micro (20 resourcers on repair - as always). Move shipyard nabaal towards your MS. Pre patch I did this with ion plats, but they couldn't hit a single interceptors if their life depended on it after they were nerfed.
Then send out 14 bombers, 12 pulsars and 10 movers to go hypergate/carrier-killing in two or thre separate groups. It's fast and efficient, and you shouldn't lose a single squad.
5 destroyers easily take care of any frig groups that come from the shipyard.
has anyone else noticed that when you click on a Defense Field Frigate, the name is spelled wrong? It says "Defence Field Frigate" defense is spelled with an "s"
Just a random thought I couldnt find anywhere else to put ^_~
'Defence' is the british/canadian spelling. Relic is based in Canada. Get it?
It's still wrong! :-P
But seriously, I had an easy time (easy, but busy) just using my (5) destroyers and dozen or so ion and torp frigates to take out the heavy stuff, with interceptors and pulsar vettes for the light stuff. I didn't even use movers, and I only built plats near the end, when they didn't even matter anyway. I did lose a number of ships, mostly vettes and flak frigates, but they were easily replaced throughout the fight. I also ignored the hyperspace gates until they were undefended, then sent some strike craft to take them out quickly and get back to my MS in time for the next wave. Not really a brilliant strategy, but by simply massing my forces in one location, it was easy to handle everything the Vaygr threw at me. I think that simply keeping an overwhelming concentration of firepower is more important than using whatever "tactics" are suggested by the various ships' abillities.
Hi,
I think that capturing the Shipyard from mission 7 would make it faster to dock the Dreadnaught - but then, it might might be better not to hurry for that objective.
Could someone tell me the exact locations of the other (than the 5 marked) hypergates ?
I guess that destroying all hypergates as soon as they appear would get rid of 90% of enemy's forces - according that cariers and shipyard come through them.
I wonder if an unit is repaired faster by several resources collectors than by a single one ? It's logical, but I read a walkthrough where it was said to send one RC to repair the Dreadnaught and others to harverst.
Last edited by teeky; 13th Nov 05 at 8:47 AM. Reason: error
Has anyone found out why some have to actually destroy the BC at the end? I've played this mission from the very beginning a dozen times trying to keep the BC but no luck...
Anyone know how to work around destroying the BC ('sides modifying the persists)?
EDIT: NVM, 'twas just a piddly little missle frigate left that was keepin me.
Last edited by ScarleTomato; 14th Jan 06 at 9:41 PM.
Yes. There are ships that just hang around, doing nothing. I got a lonely assault frig just sitting there 15km from the Pride of Hiigara. It didn't attack even when I got my ints to pester it a bit. I destroyed it and the mission ended.
There are currently 2 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 2 guests)
Posting Permissions
