The Let's Play Archive

Super Robot Wars W

by Brunom1

Part 101: Mission 30 - Dream of the Goddess, Ambition of the War God


Mission 30 - Dream of the Goddess, Ambition of the War God





A rather impressive array of mecha greet the arrival of the Valstork and the accompanying junkmen: Stern Kugels belonging to the Crimson Group.
Horis has heard that the Eurasians were cranking these out in place of the Aestivalis.
This might be related to all the activity at Nergal's factories lately – though the mysterious president hasn't shown himself for the gossip world to see, it's certain he's up to something or other.



Kazuma then makes to hand Flay off to the Artemis forces; she thanks him for his help but he tells her not to worry: spacemen are all about helping their fellow humans.
He hopes she'll be able to see her friends and father on Artemis, and Lowe adds the admonition to use her unexpectedly-saved life well.



The Artemis soldier orders Kazuma to hand Flay over through empty space instead of properly docking.
It's not clear at first what the haste is for but they do it anyway; as Kazuma declares “Mission Complete” in Gai-style, Mihiro feels bad for Lowe who won’t get a chance to see the Artemis' Umbrella... though if he did, it would imply some sort of enemy attack, so maybe it’s for the best.





At that moment, Garcia activates it: a barrier of light that surrounds the station.
He declares that the hostage has been recovered, and orders the immediate capture of the unfair space pirates; Kazuma quickly realizes that we’ve been had and Lowe figures there's no way we can elude this many forces at once.
The only choice is to fight until a chance to flee appears and, for Kazuma's part, he's always hated being called a space pirate, and plans on a little payback.



Well, nothing we can do. Artemis’ troops are incredibly weak so let’s go make quick work of them.














Aye, this won’t be difficult.



Next in line is Lowe, who also oneshots a Mobius.



Enemy Phase!





Aboard Artemis, the Aestivalis pilots Ryouko and Yamada (who still goes to great lengths to make sure she calls him Gai Daigouji) see the battle, recognizing Kazuma's distinctive style.
Gai is quite glad that he’s alive but Ryouko is confused, not understanding why he’s supposedly joined the “space pirates”.



Elsewhere, Murrue is observing the battle and finds it odd that the Federation troops are fighting some other group, not Zaft; regardless, Muu thinks this may well be the chance the Archangel's needs to escape Garcia's clutches.
Muu is sure that Garcia's intentions are bad, given how they've been made virtual prisoners and the dock to their ship has been sealed.
He tells Murrue to wait for the moment when the enemy attack affects Artemis itself, which will surely throw things into chaos.
But what about Artemis' light barrier?



Garcia meanwhile wants to get his hands on both the red Mobile Suit and the Trailer units, which he thinks would let him go home with his head held high.
The subordinate once again protests that the process of capturing them would surely result in losses to their existing forces and asks if he should deploy the anti-ghost forces: Lion’s Sickle.
Garcia sees no reason to sortie that group of Aestivalises, and plans to go "eye-for-an-eye" by sending out Gai (Murakumo) and the Serpent Tail.





Gai, Kazuma and Lowe quickly recognize each other and the second-in-command is worried about this; still, Garcia figures Gai won’t try anything while they have their little “guest” in custody – Elijah.
Lowe didn’t expect to see him so soon but figures, from the looks of things, that he’s not here to give us a warm welcome; Indeed, Gai quickly orders both of them to surrender their units immediately.
Lowe figures Gai’s been hired by the Artemis army but Kazuma thinks something’s odd about him accepting this mission; Gai merely says these are different circumstances and figures further dialogue isn’t needed – he moves to attack and Lowe and Kazuma have no choice but to fight back.



All mooks start coming over. The Stern Kugels prove just as ineffective against Valhawk.



Uh, oh. They’re getting smarter. Thankfully, Shihomi is available with a couple of Support Defends.












That’ll do.




The Stern Kugels prove themselves to be slightly more resilient.



Well, we’re out of support defends. Still, we can shoot back with Home’s Mass Driver.












Damn it!
Two more Stern Kugels attack but Home’s accuracy prevents it from doing any damage.

Gai goes after Lowe but we should be fine.



: Now that our machines are on a level playing field, it won't be like before...!
: It's down to a difference in skill. You'll die for sure.
: Hey, shut up! We'll take him out junkman way!
















Good man!



Player Phase!



Well, that was some more damage than desired but Kisato can cast a quick Trust to heal some of that.



Good thing is that those Stern Kugels have lined themselves up nicely for a chain attack.
















Thank you, Kazuma.



Lowe and 8 get a level; Lowe learns Multicombo L2.



Home might as well take out the last Mobius. Either way, I’m keeping it protected with Alert.



As battle wears on, Ruri tells Harry to try hacking the base again, using the keyword "AKITO", the reverse of the message "OTIKA" flooding the base's computers.
He complies, and discovers a secret thirteenth dock containing a list of A-Class Jumpers – humans capable of performing Boson Jump, including Akito!
While Harry asks why the Eurasians have this data, Garcia berates Gai for his apparent ineptitude in battle.



Nevertheless, Liam and the others admit that Lowe is in no shape to best Gai, who’s a Coordinator and has more combat experience.
The Professor may have the answer: Lowe's famed good luck will probably prevail when push comes to shove; if anything, she thinks Lowe’s idiocy is, at least, on a higher level than a regular Natural…she reckons he just might pull something so crazy that it could surprise the enemy.
Akane figures they need to think of something or things will get even worse but she’s interrupted when Carret detects an approaching unit.







It is an unidentified mech, who quickly heads for Artemis.
Garcia recognizes the “ghost” but thinks that even the fastest mech will be powerless before the Artemis' Umbrella.









However, the ghost mech Jumps right through it, quickly blowing away the generator.
Horis is quite astounded that such a small mech could have Jump engines, and it's pretty clear to him that this is no space pirate mech.
Garcia is livid at his “perfect” plan being shattered like that and sends out the Lion’s Sickle.
Both Elijah and Muu realize that the chance to escape is now.





Ryouko meanwhile is looking forward to putting the hurting on the ghost mech - who rapidly flees the area; Ryouko orders her troops to pursue.
However, before she and Gai (Daigouji) can follow, Kazuma recognizes her voice and hails them; Ryouko figured it was him after all and Gai wants to know what happened with him joining the “space pirates”!
Kazuma quickly explains that he’s done no such thing and that they were merely defending themselves.







Elijah shows up right then, free from his captors.
Kazuma now understands why Gai Murakumo was following Garcia’s orders, while Gai Daigouji cannot believe his commander would do something so dirty but Ryouko had a feeling, ever since coming to this base, that he was up to no good.
Kazuma cuts in, telling her to save this for later – “they” are here!







It’s the Zaft military, led by Dearka, Yzak and Nicol, who quickly destroy the remaining Artemis’ troops and realize that the Umbrella is down.
Yzak plans to strike the Archangel and the base as well, the better to wipe out the Strike, while Dearka figures Athrun is missing out, having been called back to Plant.



The Zaft folk start aiming at Artemis, with Flay and several Heliopolis’ refugees aboard, and Shihomi elects to save Artemis for humanitarian reasons, which is okay by the Professor.

: Sorry, Kazuma… but we’ll need help from you and that red guy if we’re gonna do this.
: Fine by me. It’s a Spacemen tradition to help people out. But, Gai…
: You called?
: Your name is Yamada!
: You’re gonna help us, right?
: Is that a job offer?
: This isn’t the time to talk shop! You mercs are too inconsiderate…!
: Very well. I have a “debt” to repay to this base’s commander, anyway.
: I would’ve done this even if I hadn’t joined with you.
: Heh…a mixed team of Junkmen, Trailers, Mercs and a couple of Soldiers, eh? Not too shabby!
: Ooooooh! A battle with the blazing Red and the cool Blue! My soul is burning even more!!
: I see you haven’t changed one bit, Gai…
: Gai Murakumo…I’m sorry we have to ask for your help a second time but we’re counting on you!
: Come, Zaft…! I won’t let you to put a single hand on those civilians…!

Ah, the Gundam SEED kids – they were much more annoying in Alpha 3. Nevertheless, let’s take a quick look:






All three gundams are made of sturdier stuff than most but they are not so problematic if you know how to deal with them. Nicol and Yzak, in their Blitz Gundam and Duel Gundam are medium-ranged attackers (though Nicol tends to be more support-oriented than Yzak, who’s a front-line fighter) but Dearka and his Buster Gundam are snipers (complete with a MAP attack).

While they aren’t, offensively, different than most enemy commanders we’ve faced, they do bring some new tricks to the table.
All three Gundams come equipped with Phase Shift Armor which reduces the damage from all attacks (except Beam Weapons) by 1000; Duel and Blitz come equipped with special shield parts called Anti Beam Shield which covers that weakness somewhat (it still needs to be triggered by the Shield Block skill) and, FINALLY, Nicol’s Blitz has one extra safeguard in the form of Mirage Colloid which is, essentially, Double Image (activating, as always, when over 130 morale).



Of course, being named characters, they have a crapton of Pilot Skills. First off is Nicol:

Now, here’s Yzak:

Finally, here’s Dearka:
Conclusion: hit these kids hard and hit them fast as you don’t want to let them get close enough to start supporting each other. While Beam attacks work well, their naturally high Skill stat paired with Coordinator gains means that there’s a good chance you’ll trip their Shield Block – nevertheless, they’re still Gundams and will get wrecked from Valored attacks or even regular Super Robot attacks.

There’s also one small tidbit that’s worth mentioning:

Secret Alert!
Gundam SEED has a few secrets in this game and here’s your first step towards one of them: you’ve two turns, starting from the next player phase, to kill Nicol.

In my opinion, this secret isn’t really worth it but Nicol is still worth some goodies and cash, so…

By the by, Kazuma didn’t get a chance to fight Gai Murakumo as the plot kicked in but he did have stuff to say to him:

: Kazuma, I've no choice but to fight you right now.
: I owe you a lot, Gai... but I'm not going to let this stupid, senseless battle kill me!



Now, Casting Iron Wall, Strike and Assail, we can get the Valstork close enough to blast the kid (even though it’s not a beam-type weapon, Dual Proton Cannon will still deal some nice damage).














See?



Garcia gets the news of the Archangel's crew's impending escape too late to do much about it.
Kira runs into Flay on the way to the ship, who recognizes him as one of Sai’s friends; there’s no time to talk, as Muu says that if he knows her from Heliopolis, to bring her a board quickly.







The Archangel quickly flees the area as soon as it puts out to space; Gai Murakumo reveals that, when they came to Artemis seeking help to escape from Zaft, Garcia captured them as well.
Kazuma sees that the situation of the Federation Army must be very complicated if they’ve gotten to the point where they would imprison their own forces[/b].



Nicol and Dearka recognize the white ship but are unable to pursue due to our group in front; Yzak is pissed at the sight of losing it again and decides instead to wipe out Artemis as an example to the Earth.
Ruri meanwhile orders the Nadesico to stay on patrol pattern A: if that list means what she thinks it means, this battle is far from over.
Problem is, Zaft is still attacking…






Saburouta then deploys, telling Harry to leave the outside enemies to him.
Despite his usual demeanor, he’s still a brave Jovian Soldier and promises to show his skills to Harry; Gai (Daigouji) thinks this blazing turn of events is just like Geki Ganger ep. 28, but Saburouta informs him that that show is now waaaay out of style.
Kazuma and Mihiro think they’ve heard his voice before but Saburouta tells them to talk later, after the enemies are dealt with.



Hey, that works for me. Ryouko, Saburouta and Gai (Daigouji) will need a turn to get closer but we still have units that can attack.



I can’t help but feel like we got the short end of the stick: Gai (Murakumo) found a load of weapons for his Blue Frame and we found…Flay – and she didn’t even stick around long enough to do anything/anyone!










Not bad.



Enemy Phase!



Home is still protected so it can take a free hit on the JINN.



The Valstork grabs the attention of several mooks.












Some four GINNs got oneshotted while the CGUEs barely hang on.




After the Zaft suicide train stops running, Nicol decides to chain-attack both Valhawk and Valstork; it only serves to get his health further down (thankfully, we didn’t trip his Anti-Beam Shield).

Yzak and Dearka didn’t do anything.



Player Phase!



Most southern mooks moved in closer but out of attack range. Home takes one down to critical state.



As for one of the few northern ones that lived, Gai (Murakumo) moves in for an easy kill.


[/url]
Finally! Casting Spirit enables Gai (Daigouji) to show off his swanky new Aestivalis Custom Gai and his new, and improved, Gekigan Flare!



GAAAAAAAAAAI SUUUUUUPEEEEEERRRR UUUPPEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRR!



As for Ryouko, she can still get close enough for quick shot at Home’s JINN.








You go, girl.



Lowe moves in and fails to get a critical…where’s your “amazing luck” now, son?



Either way, Nicol is about to go down (Cheer and Bless are cast) from a Valored Full Accel Impact and I’ve just remembered that I never got around to showing off its dynamic finisher.

: I don't give a crap about Naturals and Coordinators...
: But I'll give it to anyone who won't respect the sanctity of life!




Nicol is worth several levels, a Thruster Module and a Multicombo +1.





All these levels bring a lot of extra prizes: Kazuma learns Spirit, Support Attack and Defend L2 and Multicombo L3 (the maximum); Shihomi learns Commander L2 and Horis learns Alert.



Enemy Phase!



Even though Valguard shares some attacks with Valstork, he gets a boost to all of them so the torpedoes will be more than enough to oneshot a JINN.












The best thing about broken size modifiers is to see a ginormous robot dodge like that.



Blue Frame’s 8-Tube Missile Launcher is nowhere near as strong but it has its uses.






Aye, good enough.




One more dodge, one more kill. I don’t want anyone calling this athletic robot “fat” again!



Yzak finally moves and decides to go after Valguard of all things.
















Away with you, boy.



Player Phase!



We need to take out Dearka and Yzak now or we’ll lose their goodies. To get things done, Lowe uses Valor and moves in to pick an assist from Kazuma.


: Hey, they look kinda like the Red Frame.
: Likely those Federation units stolen from Heliopolis.
: So they're Red's cousins, right?
: Looks like ZAFT strips and reuses old stuff just like us junkmen!




Aye, that’s more than enough.



Gai (Murakumo) will finish him off – with Valor, of course.



: I see you've repurposed the Federation's new technology.
: If our machines are equal, it comes down to the pilot. Engaging...








A wimp like you shouldn’t have been voiced by Domon’s voice actor.



Yzak is worth a level, a Servo Motor and a Support Defense +1.



Gai also learns Commander L2.



Both Gai Daigouji and Elijah move after Dearka.



: I may be a soldier now, but my burning spirit is as Super as ever!
: Behold my Gekigan soul, ZAFT!







: Are... are these Creuset's men?
: We're up against the absolute best of ZAFT!








Followed closely by Kazuma splitting off and calling for a Proton Cannon Focus.










Whew, that was close.

For whatever reason, the pre-battle numbers didn’t run but here’s Ryouko’s new and improved Distortion Attack:

: I don't care if you're Natural or Coordinator! If you wanna go, I'll be happy to fight!





Dearka is worth a level, a Chobham Armor and a Support Request+1.



The level also gives Ryouko Prevail L4.

Saburouta was too far away to get here in time but he did have stuff to say to the Gundam kids:

: ZAFT...so, Coodinators. I do still owe George Glenn, but I think that's just about expired.
: Sorry but this is happening!




Creuset radios in and orders Dearka to recall the troops immediately.
He's gotten information that an emergency has occurred, and that help will be on the way to the Artemis area; as they retreat, Gai Daigouji taunts them to stay away or get another pummeling from him.
Still, Kazuma finds this retreat to be very strange and Horis says that they managed to intercept a bit of their communication and it seems something big happened on Zaft’s area of influence.
Inside Artemis, Garcia is livid at everything that went wrong: losing the Archangel, the umbrella being destroyed, which leads his second in command to think this is far enough.
Right then, Harry detects the 13th Dock opening…



From inside it emerges the original Nadesico, supposedly inert ever since the Zonuda attack.
Ruri says that it’s a replica of our old ship.







The Nadesico B then shows up, much to everyone’s surprise.
She introduces herself to everyone, adding that Omoikane is also here with her; Garcia is furious that these ships could have launched without his permission.





He doesn’t have time to fume, though, as his second-in-command, declaring himself to be a member of the "Martian Successors", informs him that he's become unnecessary.
The Successor starts attacking Artemis, proclaiming Garcia to be the sort of scum that have led to Earth's downfall; Ruri tells that this fake Nadesico’s firepower comes from the fact that it’s equipped with THE Y-Unit - in fact, she presumes that the ship was made specifically to drive the Y-Unit.
Akane tells her to hold on, recollecting how we dropped the Y-Unit inside Jupiter’s oceans; worse yet is the realization that Kazuma and Ryouko get: if that’s our Y-Unit, then inside it is the Boson Jump’s targeting unit.








The Martian Successors' shock troops and the “ghost” arrive on the scene at the same time .
Kazuma recognizes Hokuten’s unit, the same red mech that they saw during our last battle with the Jovians; Hokuten berates the "avenger" as immature, even after all this time.



When Kazuma asks, the Martian Successors proclaim themselves to be the enemies of Earth, and Jupiter, and all those who seek to control space.



The ghost's pilot has almost nothing to say, despite Ruri’s calls.



Leading the show is apparently General Kusakabe, formerly of the Jovian army.
He announces that his forces are beginning a new battle for the sake of a brighter future and tells everyone to behold the power that will propel them to victory: the targeting unit, legacy of the Ancient Solar Culture.



As everyone watch, the cube unfolds like a flower, revealing... Yurika, somehow fused to the innards of the gadget.
No one understands what she’s doing there, having thought she and Akito had both died during an “accident” – it seems that was a lie.



Ryouko is livid at what they’ve done to her captain but the ghost pilot warns her not to get careless.
The warning probably saves her life, but her mech gets badly damaged when Hokuten intercepts her charge.



Hokuten says that the spiral of space rises in a single night to the heavens, like the Hisago vine.
Will the Akito perish in front of his woman? (I’m just gonna call him by name from here on out because come on…if it wasn’t clear enough from him spamming his name across Artemis’ computers, it’s clear from Hokuten’s spiel.)





Hokuten escorts the false Nadesico out of the battlefield and the remaining Successors block our way.
Kazuma tells Lowe to be especially careful of Hokuten’s soldiers as they seem way more dangerous; as for Gai Murakumo, he tells Elijah that their debt hasn’t been repaid, so they’ll continue to cooperate with us.





Just then a new ship, registered as Nergal’s, piloted by Lapis Lazuli appears, and Akito orders her to support him.
Saburouta finds it odd that we’re working with the “ghost” now but all that matters to Ryouko is getting the Successors for what they’ve done, and Ruri orders the Nadesico B into the fray as well.


I think that’s long enough for today. Next time, we’ll wrap this whole mess up and see if we can grab Akito and have him tell what the hell just happened.

See you all then!