Part 74: Mare Pacifium

When we last left our robotic heroes there was talk of getting some additional firepower. This mission, we make that a reality.




Why are we conducing our field testing in the middle of LC-land? Wouldn't it be easier to, oh I don't know, set up a controlled test environment like we had at Stanford Labs? Of course the robots at Stanford Labs went mad...but still! Seems a hell of a lot safer.



We'll need to immediately start building. You'll also want to order your units to move somewhere, anywhere, or they'll run outside of the starting area. You do not want them to do this. Why's that?



This is why. About 20 seconds or so into the mission you'll be attacked by the LC. These units are, for the most part, above the tech level you're currently at. Making things tougher, we can't bring in the Albatross until the LC are pushed out of here. Oh and there's a big resource constraint. I'll be trying to keep these guys alive as long as I can.





We manage to drive off the LC attack. It'll be the first of many, but we've now got a bit of breathing room. And look at that, we have our first bit of Artillery placed. That Solar Power Plant looks like a good target; let's see what this artillery can do.

Oh and in the meantime I research the 1200 PSU shield upgrade.



Up...



And boom!

Yeah. One artillery shell was enough to level that power plant. The LC is in deep shit.



Artillery also works great against incoming enemies. The reason it's so important to stay in the starting area is the natural choke-point you're given. It will force the LC to slow down and bunch up, which means your artillery will have no problem taking care of them.





It's very helpful to use a spotter when you're working with artillery. The range on the guns is ludicrous and if you rely on the building to do it's own scouting it won't be shooting until things are right on top of you. You do not want that. So I've sent a Condor out to help find some targets. Unfortunately the LC rockets have an affinity for my Condor and it gets shot down a second or two after that second screenshot.



Yeah guys like you can break through artillery and massed plasma.





We have a small refueling, repairing and resupplying base running now. Unfortunately the LC are harassing us with-HOLY FUCK DID WE JUST SHOOT DOWN THAT METEOR WITH PLASMA!?

Yes. Yes we did. Plasma-AA is some of the best AA in the game. It hits just as hard as plasma, doesn't need to be resupplied and is really fantastic. The only downside is that faster units can outrun it. But given how the AI works, this is almost never an issue.



I've found the solution to our scouting issue: the Scout! It's like it was designed to work with the artillery. Now we can see the entire LC base. It's just a matter of shelling it into oblivion now.

Meanwhile, I research the 50% guided rockets. It's not as crucial as on Earth, but it's still the most useful upgrade available right now.





Did you know there are actually two LC bases next to our location? Yeah neither did I. Fortunately that second one is just as vulnerable to shells as the first one is.



La-la-la more shells...hey why did they stop?

Actually, where the hell did all our money go?





Oh. This is artillery's flaw. It's almost as expensive to reload as the Missile Control Center. 3 shots costs 1,500 credits. If you have an entire battery of these pounding the enemy you'll bankrupt yourself. At least on this mission it's not like we need a big army or lots of research, so spending tens of thousands of credits on ammo is ok.





La-di-dum, shelling bases is so fun..



Especially when the power is out tra-la-la...



So the battle becomes a rout.





Shelling this base is fun too but I'm tired of singing.



While I wrap things up in the orange LC base, my army group has found a third LC base. Good grief people.



The artillery is too busy pummeling the orange base so I just kill these guys the old fashioned way.



Once again, there's no resistance in the orange base once the power is down.





The blue LC commander obviously hasn't been in contact with her sisters or she'd be scrambling to destroy that artillery piece right now.







Welp. Her loss.





The final base also falls quickly. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say the UCS artillery test went well. What do y'all think?



ARES XIV agrees. We may not use it as heavily as in this mission, but it's invaluable for cracking into tough LC positions.




And now we can bring in the Albatross. Free Panthers and Jaguars? Why sure, I'll take them.

I also do research on the Spider chassis and final rocket upgrade while we wait to finish loading everyone up.







I spent 33k on ammo this mission. Yikes.

But then again, I only lost 7 units despite being surrounded by the enemy. Most of those units built were Repairers, Harvesters or other support vehicles.



With our new artillery in tow, it's time to hit the second SUNLIGHT power station: Beta Quadrant!








Our final piece of music (well until the ED campaign that is) is the new UCS night song. Enjoy!



One additional thing, this update instead of taking a screenshot of the new techs I researched I just included it in the text. What does everyone think about that? The updates are usually 50+ screenshots and I know it can be a real strain when we have multiple updates on one page. This cuts down on some of those screenshots, but still gives you the info. Should I stick with it, or go back to the old way for the next update?