Part 35: Mission #31: 20 June 2654, Valgard System

Mission #31: 20 June 2654, Valgard System

Previously on Wing Commander: Lots of stuff got exploded. Also Iceman rocks!


No beers for me, I guess...








Mission Time!









Ha ha, yes we did, that's awesome.





They're probably moving; we may have to hunt around a bit. So we're launching all the wings along slightly different courses. Maverick, Stay alert. Once again, you're with Iceman, as Mu Wing.









Then head to Nav 3. Get rid of any enemy ships and head for home. Your return flight should be via Nav 1. That way you'll avoid the minefields entirely.






Well, thanks...





Ok then, so on surface, this seems to be very similar to the previous mission, but for some reason I am always wary of those missions that give you an unusual flight path to follow! In any case, let's have a go at it.

• Mission Video (Youtube)
  

I guess the theme was the same, but the mission was for sure, considerably harder than the previous. If nothing else, there were a lot more enemies. I'm pretty sure that killing 20 in one mission is a personal record so far; not to mention that Iceman killed a few more himself! And wouldn't you know, that this is not even the mission with the biggest number of enemies in the entire WC1/SM1/SM2 list?

In any case, I think it's mostly obvious that this one would be a damn near impossibility with any other wingman--in the sense of ending the mission with them actually alive! So we are definitely lucky to have Iceman around again--sure, he got damaged, but again he didn't need assistance despite all those heavy fighters around.

Collisions... as I've mentioned in the video, this seems to happen to me a lot more with a Rapier than any other fighter, even if I am not using the afterburners, so I'm inclined to conclude that AI simply isn't efficient enough in tracking your position--this is especially problematic with slow/heavy ships like Gratha or Jalthi. You may have noticed that there were a couple of close calls with Krants also, but they are fast enough that they were able to avoid it in the end.

Speaking of afterburners, you will definitely have to lay off the button in this mission, otherwise you will end up without fuel at some point and be basically a sitting duck for all the enemies flying around! So you need to ration it carefully if you want it to last to the end.

In order to win the Valgard series, out of 9 capital ships in these two missions you need to destroy at least 7--this makes the two Fralthi at Nav 3 here the prime candidates to skip if you are having trouble with this.

And those playing the synonym bingo can keep counting all the different expressions for 'destroy' used in debriefing!

And again there is no medal, but at least we're approaching 300:



Next time on Wing Commander
Staying at home on a Saturday night...