Part 17: Campaign Mission 6O: Olaf's Navy! Rout Run

Mission 6O: Olaf's Navy! Rout Run (or "Imagine a rocket launcher stamping on a cruiser's face - forever")

Meanwhile, in another other leg of the trousers of time (picture a pair of trousers where one of the legs is also a pair of trousers...)


olaf has botes!
oh no not botes!
yes! don't worry too much though his land forces aren't that great you can probably just capture his hq
hq capture? hah no that's for sissies
hey that's an idea! let's rout him!
wut

Don't worry, Nell. I have a plan. I think.

good enough for me!
i think you guys have been facing olaf too much lately



Well, I guess I can't argue with that, Nell. After all, we've got another encounter with Olaf after this.



I dunno, he is wearing blue but I don't think it's dark enough to count as navy.

Day 1


Hey, Paul! What's Fog of War, again? Do you remember?

Hmm... You know what? Since I'm doing this mission twice, may as well hear what Max has to say. I mean, I know what Fog of War is, but Andy clearly isn't sure so maybe he should receive an explanation before he goes out to fight Olaf in it...

The things I do for my country... (sigh)

Hehehe

This gray stuff that's blocking our vision, that's Fog of War. As you can imagine, the enemy is out there, hidden.
Wow, that's creepy. So how do we find the bad guys?

"The bad guys". Oh, Andy . I'm glad I didn't skip this.

Well, recon units have a good vision range, so let's send them out first. But they're pretty weak, so we'll have to protect them somehow. All right. Let's get moving.



Not much else to say. The plan is a somewhat cheesy one: first up, deal with the battleships and clear out the land forces the same way we did in the HQ Capture run. After that... well, someone jokingly suggested we just waited the 99 turns for Olaf's ships to run out of fuel. Well, I guess that would be an option, but... What we can do though is wait for the subs to run out of fuel. That'll only take... hmm, 60 fuel capcaity, 5 fuel drained per turn... 12 turns, give or take a turn? Meanwhile we can pick off the cruisers at our leisure.



First few moves are the same as the HQ capture run. Battleship and sub go into hiding, rocket and medium tank set up chokepoint, recon goes scouting.



Going to hang back a bit more with my tanks this time, though. Since we're not rushing off to Olaf's HQ this time, may as well hang back and let him come to us at first.



APC and arty get into the forests, and my lander moves into its decoy position. Since trying to keep that lander safe failed rather spectacularly in my first attempt at a Rout run here, I'm just going to leave it to the wolves.



The infantry just sort of cluster around aimlessly. I guess it's a bit weird for them, not having to do any capturing. At least they can stand in the mountains and provide vision I guess?

hahahaha botes!
i think i'll just leave him to play with his toys

Day 2



Again, subs are in the green circles.



And again, this battleship is threatening my chokepoint.



Bye bye, Mr. Battleship.



Meanwhile my medium tank attacks Olaf's light tank at the chokepoint. Not going to attack with my rocket launcher, though.



Let's see if it can do anything useful from this forest. The artillery also moves closer to the fray... which leaves my APC exposed to battleship fire. I swear I wasn't deliberately trying to get the APC damaged this time



Oh well, whatever. Let's see if putting these footsoldiers in the mountains will help me see anything. Hmm... not really. You never know, though.



Not gonna happen, Olaf.





Day 3



So Olaf's 1HP tank retreated. We'll get round to it in good time.



In the meantime, let's carry on with business as usual.



My rocket launcher can't help out much with the ships yet, but it can at least attack the tanks that have shown up in the north.



Boom. We're going to be doing slightly less damage, given it's Blizzard, but it all counts.



The tanks work together to cripple the other tank, and... that's it for this turn. The ground's too bogged down with snow to bother moving anything, and everything's pretty safe (even the 2HP APC's out of battleship range).

Day 4



Olaf joins his two damaged tanks together as his remaining battleship looks to get up close and personal with my land units.



First let's take care of the tank.



Then down goes the battleship. Heck, given where it's positioned I could have assaulted it with three different indirects. But this'll do the job. Meanwhile I send my APC in for some repairs. Doesn't really need them given we've taken out the major threats to it, but gotta keep that sub fuelled.



Sending the scouts out, while staying wary of Olaf's hidden rocket launcher. Oh hey, there's that tank we knocked down to 1HP earlier.



Let's bring in some heavy hitters to deal with it (this is another reason why I wanted to let my battleship and sub take care of the battleship, frees my rocket up to go on ADVENTURES).

Day 5



We begin today's action in medias res.



Rocket takes down that recuperating tank as my northern taskforce assembles at the bridge.



We can't really risk surfacing the submarine just yet, what with all those subs and cruisers around the place. But we do need to keep it from sinking. A top-up with the APC seems to be in order. Yes I'm sorry I haven't used Hyper Repair to help fix you up, Mr. APC. If you're wondering why I haven't used Hyper Repair yet, that's because I'm at a bit of a loose end for what to do with it. I guess I'm holding it back for an emergency?



Medium tank and recon move up and find out just where Olaf's cruisers are having their nap.

Day 6



Not that we're going to keep that vision for long.



See, we've got an HQ tank to hunt down, and we're going to need that recon's spotting power to find it.



My northern task force shuffle around a bit. I need to be able to drive that recon up to the forest next turn, and it wouldn't be able to reach there otherwise. No sense in heading in until we've damaged the HQ tank, certainly.



Rocket moves up a little, to the edge of Olaf's rocket's range.



As an experiment, I'm going to plop down a save and see what happens if I surface my sub here.

Day 7



Aaaah ohgodwhat that's far too much stuff for my battleship to shoot at and my other indirects can't hit any of it either. Reload! Reload!

Day 7



Let's pretend that never happened.



And instead focus on beating up Olaf's land units. Geez, HQs can protect a lot of damage (well, four stars = 40% attack penalty = only 60% of expected damage done. Even for a medium tank that's going to hurt. Or... not. You know).



Medium tank attacks HQ tank, recon moves in to spot that rocket so I can hit it.



Which I proceed to do.



Recon heads back down south to cruiser spot again, and my rocket launcher edges ever closer.



General moving and capturing.



# Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow #



The tank moves off the HQ to come and give me what-for. Oh well, as long as it doesn't kill anything outright, I'll live.

Day 8



Hmm. I think it's time for a...



TRIPLE SHOT!!!



Or in other words, recon finishes off rocket launcher, full health tank attack's Olaf's tank, damaged tank finishes the job off. Well, that's Olaf's land forces completely destroyed.



Not much to do now but plug away at the navy. I can't really do much with my battleship until the subs run out of fuel, so if you want a vision of the future, imagine a rocket launcher stamping on a cruiser's face - forever.

Day 9



Yup.

Day 10



Yup.

Day 11



Oh hey, Olaf joined those two cruisers together.



Yup.



Rocket launcher's running a little low on ammo. So it's time for my APC to stop nannying my sub and go deliver some supplies elsewhere.

Day 12



Hmm, that last cruiser isn't in range of my rocket launcher.



Better move it, then.



And finally, there go the subs. Who knew sinking could be so explosive?

Day 13



You know what? I'm actually going to do it.



I'm going to use Hyper Repair. Maybe that extra 10% attack power will let me one-hit-kill the final cruiser and save us all a turn.



Hmm... about a one in three chance of pulling it off...?



Nope.



Oh well, with the subs down, at least my battleship can come out of hiding. I also surface my sub. See if I can tempt that 1HP cruiser out a bit (Why? I dunno, something to do I guess).



Oh man, is this Blizzard going to turn the tide in Olaf's favour?

Day 14



Nope.


My beautiful navy has been destroyed! You... You villains!

I almost feel bad for the guy. Still, with Andy calling Blue Moon "the bad guys" and Olaf calling Orange Star "villains", who's the real enemy here?

My guess? "Him".

Now you'll have to face Olaf's Sea Strike!

The mission, and the eponymous fleet. How meta.



He says as we get a B-rank for being really, really slow at that. Could probably have taken more risks for a faster completion time. Maybe I shouldn't have sent my rocket launcher east, and instead let Olaf come to me. But hey, it's a rout on Olaf's Navy! I've never done that before.



And speaking of things I have never done before... I know next to nothing about the bonus mission, Olaf's Sea Strike!, other than that it exists. I don't know what's out there, I don't know which CO is the best choice. I even did my best not to spoil myself for it.



So I'm going to leave that completely up to you guys. Andy, or Max?