Part 25: High Noon

High Noon


BloodWulfe uploaded the briefing as usual:
Watch the briefing here / Mirror (3274KB)
Listen to the briefing here / Mirror (547KB)
Keep in mind these two assume you only got two beam cannons. If you get all 4, it just reads this:

quote:

The Sathanas has entered the Capella system and engaged the Colossus. Your exceptional performance in Gamma Draconis has significantly improved the odds for the Alliance. We are deploying your wing to provide bomber support for the Colossus. Eliminate any target of opportunity, but do not take unneccesary risks.

This mission is pretty snoozeworthy if you've taken out all 4 beams. You can pretty much just loiter around doing nothing. For extra spice, I loaded it from the tech simulator and did a run where 2 beam guns were still operational; the Colossus took a whopping 7% damage and sat at 93%. Woo. (On my "real" run, which counted for the campaign, Colossus stayed at 100%. This has no real bearing on the plot, but hey. Nerd Cred!) The only tricky part is this: The Sathanas deploys 4 Basilisk fighters, Cancer wing. You need to destroy them and the second respawn wave (Cancer 5-8) before the Sathanas is destroyed. If you don't, a scripted trigger might not fire, and you'll fail the mission. However I have a foolproof anti-Basilisk strategy which I will illustrate, so don't worry about this at all.

Here is how you kill a Basilisk. It's not a real secret:

Pair of Trebs, right to the face. Ideal at long range, so they can't manuever out of the way. Rinse and repeat!
Past that just sit back, enjoy the fireworks.

Command: Listen up, Alpha. Eliminate targets of opportunity, but be careful. It's all up to the Colossus now.
It's not really "up" to the Colossus to kill what amounts to a blind, drunken old man of a juggernaut, what with me having pulled the vast majority of its fangs. I could do this mission with a Perseus and some spare time and maybe a Fenris to deal the finishing blow. Colossus is overkill

Anyway, the Colossus starts by closing the distance and firing with its frontal guns,

Then turning to clear its broadside firing arcs:

Command: Colossus, the juggernaut has sustained only moderate damage. You need to direct more energy through your main guns.

Colossus: We're having difficulty stabilizing the power grid, Command. Shutting down non-essential systems.

Command: More firepower, Colossus! The hull integrity of the Sathanas has fallen below fifty percent.

Colossus: Heat sinks were not made for this kind of abuse, Command. We'll melt down our cannons if we push any harder!

Command: We're almost there, Colossus. Target has gone critical. The war must end here and now.

Colossus: Secondary and tertiary reactors are down. Fire control is on the verge of redline. We're giving it all we've GOT!


Listen to this exchange right here. (Mirror) It's doubly hilarious because the Sathanas is doing literally nothing - it can't DO anything - and Colossus is freaking out over firing at maximum rate and power when they could probably go and loiter around and smoke a few cigarettes and then maybe shoot the Sathanas a couple times, real chill-like. Mostly because there is no reason to hurry at all.

Ah, well.

Command: The Sathanas is going down! All units, stand clear.










GTD Phoenicia never forget



Okay Shivans, what now? You brought the Ravana and we smoked you. You bring the Sathanas, and I (really, just me - three missions to take care of this jerkboat) took care of that. Anything ELSE in your little bag of tricks?

I thought not. Finish off Cancer wing, and Command will tell you to jump home.



Oh yeah, and then there's this:

Hell yeah. That's gonna look really nice on the ol' killboard.

NEXT:
Guess which loose end we're finally going to tie up?
If you guessed "whatever happened to those refugees in the first mission," you're wrong.
Sorry.