Retro Game Walkthroughs for Homeworld Cataclysm (PC Games)
Submitted By: Cycloon
Homeworld II is brilliant, no qualms about it, and there are several things you should know –
1)Like Max Payne/2, Homeworld II has a responsive difficulty feature. Do really well on one level, and the next will have more enemy ships, even if you have a fleet the size of a galaxy (I wish) the enemy would have more – HW has always been about challenge, and this is obviously no exception.
2) Unfortunately, unlike HW1/Cataclysm, salvaging is waaay harder, and you can’t go past the pop cap. This means direct attack/force is the best way to win, as Marine Frigates are pretty much useless. However, the nature of HWIIs maps means one can win in pretty much anyway they want. This is simply a guide.
General Tips:
• Fighters are much less effective this time around. Ships such as multi-gun corvettes and Flak Frigates are useless against anything heavy, but sublime at hacking enemy fighter squadrons apart, just keep them covered
• Use the special abilities of some ships. Scouts and their sensor pings for instance are really quite useful.
• Don’t use other special abilities – I never used Defense Field Frigates or minelayers. Multiplayer might suit these better, but I never needed them in the single player campaign
• Pause the game. It means you can respond to things much quicker, evaluate battles and decide where to place your paltry reinforcements. Pause = essential in later levels.
• Salvaging is all but useless in HWII, which is unfortunate as it was one of the best bits about the first game and its expansion pack. Marine Frigates are weak, large, get attacked while salvaging and are pretty damn lame. Only build unless you are totally loaded and free for time, or you need one for a mission objective.
• A lot of the probes are only useful for multiplayer. Sensor distortion/Proximity etc – pretty much useless against the AI.
• Use groupings – Grouping harvesters/refineries etc means it is easy to get them away from danger quickly, and while strike groups work well by themselves, grouping units such as Movers means a quick and easy access to them.
• REINFORCE – Once a battle is over, waste no time in reinforcing a depleted group. Even if a battle is still going, build more ships. PAUSE and decide what to do best.
• Don’t overestimate ships abilities. The Dreadnaught may seem insanely powerful, but leave it undefended against concerted attacks and it’ll die very quickly. The same with Sajuuk and any heavy capital ship. That’s the beauty of HW – its very challenging and tests you a lot.
• Reach Population Limits all the time. You can never have too many ships, and HWII severely limits the amount you CAN have, so use all those that you can.
• Research ship weapons/armor/subsystems, then probes etc.
The Single Player Campaign
Mission 1: Tanis
This is very easy. Order the harvester to harvest and it’ll scoot off. Follow the tests only when you have at least 3 interceptor squadrons. Once the drones are dead, a Vagyr force will attack. Beat it off and construct more fighters. Take out the hyperspace gates with your bombers and keep them covered with the interceptors. This is really just a tester for your skills.
Mission 2: Angel Moon
You must defend the transports. There are two lines in a V-shape, and an enemy carrier in between. As soon as the level starts, dispatch all your bombers towards the carriers location, in between the ‘V’ and attack the fighter facility. While they are attacking, send interceptors to cover the right hand line (looking from behind the mothership) first. Build more interceptors and harvest – send more to cover the furthest transports, then some to protect the bombers if needed. If not, send a force onto the left line, covering the transports.
If the game says ‘Transport safe’ just check – they aren’t always. Once the carrier is out of action, some frigates turn up. Concentrate the bombers on them, and then Soban arrives. Leave him to nail the frigates and eliminate any more enemy fighters attacking the transports. This level is very easy as well, but gives you a taster of capital ship combat and decision making. Be quick in reaching the furthest transports and keep an eye on them. Build gunships to help you in the next level before you leave.
Mission 3: Sarum
Send fighters and gunships to cover the yard. Research all attacking ships upgrades (i.e all the fighters you use/gunships etc) and beat off the attack. Build up your bomber forces and reinforce your fighters if necessary. Build atleast four collectors, and have them mine the closest resources, or the mining operation location, using a mobile refinery if necessary. Dock any damaged ships, destroy the probes ad
enemy probes, if you are quick enough you get a lot more time. A carrier then appears ‘east’ of the mining operation, so prepare some welcome for it there, bombers and fighters, with gunships taking the brunt of the fighter battle, the bombers on the carrier.
Go back to the shipyard and you will receive a carrier. Build flak frigates and more gunships. The last wave involves heavier opposition. The Infiltrator frigates should be your primary targets. A combined fleet of bombers, flak frigates and gunships and any other fighters should make light work of this force. Order bombers onto the infiltrator frigates, then the enemy carriers. Gunships/interceptors/flak frigates should engage the enemy fighters. Keep up the concentrated fire on their capital ships and the fighters will run out of reinforcements.
Mission 4: Ghenna Outskirts
Build all the bombers you can, and bolster your force with pulsar gunships and some more frigates. Send bombers in between the centre and right hand hyperspace inhibitor and destroy the carrier that should be there – be quick, a quick strike in and retreat from any fighters is the method here. Send your whole fleet into the central area and destroy the second carrier that should be there. Then capture the hyperspace gate and destroy the inhibitors. Do this on another one, but leave one alone. A small fleet appears when you go near a gate, so be prepared and keep reinforcements handy. Once all resistance is finished, warp your fleet through the gate, leaving small contingent including a marine frigate behind. Destroy the fleet on the other end of the worm hole. Then send the marine frigate through, with any escort. Try and nab the destroyer with your marine frigate. If not, that’s cool, but it is very useful. Destroy all enemies, then repair at the mothership and reinforce – now destroy the final inhibitor. You will warp to the enemy base, where a large and deadly strike force awaits.
Destroy this in any way you can – head on attack works, as does trying to draw them back to safer territory. You get a lot of RUs at the end, so losing ships isn’t that bad. Just annihilate the enemy.
Mission 5: Gehenna
There are 3 garrisons to destroy in this level, each at the end of a chain of dust. Split your force into two equal parts and attack the centre and right hand groups – build more frigates at base as required. The central base is well defended, and you will need to regroup the two forces before moving on back at your base. You need to do this to prevent these two garrisons from interrupting you later on. A pretty hefty strike force is needed for both – a lot of frigates/gunships and a few fighters for cover.
Recuperate at base, and then move up the left hand cloud. You should come across the final garrison and the Oracle. Destroy the garrison, then repair and reinforce before docking a marine frigate at the oracle. This level is comparatively easy.
Mission 6: The Karos Graveyard
This is quite a nasty level. The mothership has to short jump twice to reach its destination. Attack the group of ‘movers’ that appear first with most of your forces, and try to eliminate all of this group before the MS jumps again. Use overwhelming power on the movers, smaller ships are more effective, and they are deadly in large numbers.
Move all your forces in between the next two hulks and stave off the movers, while salvaging the derelict – it is guarded so be very careful. Keep the forces up and you shouldn’t have a problem. Research anti-mover weaponry as soon as possible. When the MS jumps again, rush to the last three hulks it arrives at and stave off the movers continuously. Finally, when the MS gets in position, the movers shut down. Just keep them away from the MS for as long as possible, and victory shalt be thous. Yes.
Mission 7: Derelicts
Send probes to scout the action spots, and build a mover construction facility as soon as possible – about 10 movers, grouped, should be sufficient. Keep your fleet up to strength and ready for any Vagyr forces. Split the main fleet equally again, like in Mission 5, and build destroyers to reinforce both equally. Then, leave one fleet near the mothership, and move the other ‘northwards’ as it were, slightly to the left and way in front of where the MS is ‘looking’, near the action spot on the sensors. Restrain all ships from entering the dust clouds, unless you want them to die, and that’s bad, as the Vagyr will turn up. Wait for them to half materialize out of the clouds, and hit them with everything – keep your ships in order, and try and stay stationery and hit their ships one at a time, everything you got. Don’t follow if they retreat, and you can use Movers to destroy the nearby wreck and clear the clouds – leaving them exposed to your superior firepower.
Meanwhile, the other strike group should be sent across the map, to the parallel cloud ‘arm’ from the first battle. A second fleet appears here. Use the same tactics, and try and wipe them out as quickly as possible. Once done, reinforce the fleets (as always). Use the Movers to destroy the hulks as quickly as possible – a CTRL + LEFT CLICK drag across the sensors screen (focused only on the hulks) and sufficient numbers should make light work of this. Leave one force at the mothership, and keep the other ready, in between the two previous battle sites. More Vagyr forces will move in, and a pincer from the MS forces and the 2nd fleet should be sufficient to destroy this quickly.
Finally, once the Movers have destroyed all the debris and hulks, move the combined (and reinforced) fleets to destroy the carrier that might be hiding in the ‘left’ hand area, and use the Movers to finish the objectives.
Mission 8: Dreadnaught Berth
This isn’t easy, but it is simple. Basically use your movers, covered by the WHOLE fleet (bar any turrets you leave to defend etc) to first collect the dreadnaught (find it with a probe). Attack the Keeper if you can to force it to withdraw for a while. Destroy the drones.
Use a drone to get an idea of the Power area. Send Movers/Fleet over, and keep attention off the movers as they do their job. Once they have finished, the Keeper should be trapped. Job done. Simply use the fleet to keep attention off the Movers.
Mission 9: Counter Attack
This can be evil. You come under attack from 8 hyperspace gates positioned all around your entry point. Repair the dreadnaught as soon as possible, and dock it with the shipyard when it turns up.
Divide your fleet into 2/3 groups and try to use them to quickly deal with attacks as they come in – focused on the MS AND the Shipyard. Keep on reinforcing, constantly. Make a new group if you have to, and get to Pop. Limits if you haven’t already. When you get a chance, send small fleets of Interceptors/bombers to eliminate the gates. Whenever a carrier appears, get rid of it as quickly as possible. This level is all about reaction to random events as they happen. Keep on top by slowly eliminating the gates/carriers, and reinforcing the forces and protecting the MS/Dreadnaught especially.
A final fleet warps in when the Dreadnaught is complete, but the DN can easily deal with the heavies while your fleet finishes the rest off.
Mission 10: Keepers of Sajuuk
Very simple again. Fend off the Keepers as they appear, you can’t kill them. When the Bentusi show up, protect them and the DN at all costs.
Once the DN comes online, use it to attack the keepers, until the Bentusi self-destruct to kill all 4. Awwww. Never let your fleet become so depleted the DN has to face the Keepers without any heavy backup – this is essential.
Mission 11: Sacrifice
Send probes to the locations of the core, except for the Bentusi one, unless you want to see Vagyr force strength. Research Advanced Shielding, and while you fend off any Vagyr attack, send a collector and 2 Defense Field Frigates to the nearest Core piece. When you get close, activate a frigate and send all 3 in, or so the shields just reach the Core. Send the collector in and keep an eye on the Shield charge. When one ship is nearly drained, activate the other – Do not wait for a shield to fully run out, they take a few seconds to activate. Move all 3 back, covered if you want to be extra careful.
Trouble is, the Vagyr are also doing the same thing. You get notification, and go for them. Divide in to two groups, equal, with the DN in one, and attack the enemy as soon as possible. You can attack with one huge force, but then the Vagyr may get the other piece, and you’ll have to chase them, with 5 minutes to stop them. Fun.
The two Vagyr groups aren’t small, but using carriers to reinforce on the spot and careful concentrated fire on their heavy ships should win you through. Pause to check and order both situations about. When they are dead, collect the other two fragements in the same way.
Mission 12: Thaddis Sabbah
This is possibly the meanest opening to an RTS ever. But only after you move forwards.
Gather all your forces together, and prepare to reinforce hugely. Move the forces forwards, wipe out the enemy harvesters, and then get hit by the Vagyr forces. At least 20 destroyers appear in the whole battle, 4 battle cruisers too, and hundreds of bombers and them Lance fighters and assault craft. Concentrate on the heavies, gunships and flak frigates covering your capital ship. Constantly reinforce, build up huge queues in the carriers, you need to reinforce the whole time. It is advisable that you should not move to far forwards – keep a position, move up or down if you want, but never go forwards or let up fire for a mili second – brute force and reinforcements are the way through this hectic crisis!
If you manage to beat off such a dramatically huge threat, and with simple direct concentrated fire and reinforcements, you should, proceed forwards towards the enemy base. Destroy the next wave of enemy ships, and then get within striking distance of the base, destroying any enemies, then go for Makaan. He will retreat pretty quickly, and then move off, leaving gunships and fighters in range of the base. Send in a Marine Frigate when prompted (attack with the Fleet if you aren’t, and if it drops below half health it should say to dock) and cover it with the gunships and interceptors.
Once Saban is free, cover the ship and prepare to receive a LOT of RUs. Hey, can you see through the wreckage?
Mission 13: Balcora Gate
Important note - only one subsystem needs to be left at the end. I managed to save all of them, but if you can’t, don’t worry.
From the off, move your fleet forwards, your building queues should be filled from the last level. Destroy the waiting fleet, which is tough but the hardest foes on the level, and then power onto the nearest attack group around the gate. They consist of light capital ships and fighters, and so aren’t that difficult to deal with. Harass the other groups with bombers if you can as you destroy one, and then move on. Leave the shipyard till last unless it starts churning out heavies, in which case still concentrate most fire on the power attack groups. Simply destroy all Vagyr forces to win.
Mission 14: Balcora
This is the end of Makaan… and quite easy despite it. Immediately group your forces together. By this time, all major groups should be at your Population Limits.
Fend off the attack as it comes in, this should be easy. Turn ‘left’ and go ‘up’ to face the smaller attack. Follow their movement line and destroy the shipyard and forces you find here. Now move towards the Hulk, but keep your side of it. Form up, repair and regroup etc if necessary, then move forwards. Makaan has a Dreadnaught, several battle cruisers and destroyers and many smaller ships. Use you DN on his, with some destroyers for support, and use the rest of your fleet on his BCs, then his Destroyers, then his small ships, and finally him once only fighters and corvettes are left. If you need to move off, do so and regroup, but keep on plugging away. You have enough RUs to win, and if you get beaten off, don’t be disheartened, he does not attack. Reinforce and attack again.
Before you leave, group 3 small Interceptor squadrons together – make 3 groups of 3.
Mission 15: Return to Hiigara
This is hectic. As soon as you start, move Sajuuk and your fleet forwards, and annihilate the battle line in front of you, moving forwards towards a carrier in the centre of the map.
As soon as you get the planet killer warning, dispatch the 3 Interceptor groups to the asteroid belt, at the 3 points – leave them just in front of the belt, on the Planet killers side, and leave them on aggressive. These guys will shoot down the missiles that the Killers launch, and keep an eye on their progress – A quick tap of space will show you if they are in position, and these are just as vital as any other force in the level.
Meanwhile, Jump Sajuuk (press J and choose a location) to each of the planet killers and destroy them with its giant laser. Use one fleet to cover Sajuuk – mainly light and fast ships will do, and use your heavies to search out the enemy carriers and shipyards. Once the enemy heavies and shipyards are gone, this is easy, as Sajuuk + Fighters can deal with the Killers, the missiles and their escorts, and your main fleet can search out any heavier ships left.
Job and game done.
Thanks for reading.
1)Like Max Payne/2, Homeworld II has a responsive difficulty feature. Do really well on one level, and the next will have more enemy ships, even if you have a fleet the size of a galaxy (I wish) the enemy would have more – HW has always been about challenge, and this is obviously no exception.
2) Unfortunately, unlike HW1/Cataclysm, salvaging is waaay harder, and you can’t go past the pop cap. This means direct attack/force is the best way to win, as Marine Frigates are pretty much useless. However, the nature of HWIIs maps means one can win in pretty much anyway they want. This is simply a guide.
General Tips:
• Fighters are much less effective this time around. Ships such as multi-gun corvettes and Flak Frigates are useless against anything heavy, but sublime at hacking enemy fighter squadrons apart, just keep them covered
• Use the special abilities of some ships. Scouts and their sensor pings for instance are really quite useful.
• Don’t use other special abilities – I never used Defense Field Frigates or minelayers. Multiplayer might suit these better, but I never needed them in the single player campaign
• Pause the game. It means you can respond to things much quicker, evaluate battles and decide where to place your paltry reinforcements. Pause = essential in later levels.
• Salvaging is all but useless in HWII, which is unfortunate as it was one of the best bits about the first game and its expansion pack. Marine Frigates are weak, large, get attacked while salvaging and are pretty damn lame. Only build unless you are totally loaded and free for time, or you need one for a mission objective.
• A lot of the probes are only useful for multiplayer. Sensor distortion/Proximity etc – pretty much useless against the AI.
• Use groupings – Grouping harvesters/refineries etc means it is easy to get them away from danger quickly, and while strike groups work well by themselves, grouping units such as Movers means a quick and easy access to them.
• REINFORCE – Once a battle is over, waste no time in reinforcing a depleted group. Even if a battle is still going, build more ships. PAUSE and decide what to do best.
• Don’t overestimate ships abilities. The Dreadnaught may seem insanely powerful, but leave it undefended against concerted attacks and it’ll die very quickly. The same with Sajuuk and any heavy capital ship. That’s the beauty of HW – its very challenging and tests you a lot.
• Reach Population Limits all the time. You can never have too many ships, and HWII severely limits the amount you CAN have, so use all those that you can.
• Research ship weapons/armor/subsystems, then probes etc.
The Single Player Campaign
Mission 1: Tanis
This is very easy. Order the harvester to harvest and it’ll scoot off. Follow the tests only when you have at least 3 interceptor squadrons. Once the drones are dead, a Vagyr force will attack. Beat it off and construct more fighters. Take out the hyperspace gates with your bombers and keep them covered with the interceptors. This is really just a tester for your skills.
Mission 2: Angel Moon
You must defend the transports. There are two lines in a V-shape, and an enemy carrier in between. As soon as the level starts, dispatch all your bombers towards the carriers location, in between the ‘V’ and attack the fighter facility. While they are attacking, send interceptors to cover the right hand line (looking from behind the mothership) first. Build more interceptors and harvest – send more to cover the furthest transports, then some to protect the bombers if needed. If not, send a force onto the left line, covering the transports.
If the game says ‘Transport safe’ just check – they aren’t always. Once the carrier is out of action, some frigates turn up. Concentrate the bombers on them, and then Soban arrives. Leave him to nail the frigates and eliminate any more enemy fighters attacking the transports. This level is very easy as well, but gives you a taster of capital ship combat and decision making. Be quick in reaching the furthest transports and keep an eye on them. Build gunships to help you in the next level before you leave.
Mission 3: Sarum
Send fighters and gunships to cover the yard. Research all attacking ships upgrades (i.e all the fighters you use/gunships etc) and beat off the attack. Build up your bomber forces and reinforce your fighters if necessary. Build atleast four collectors, and have them mine the closest resources, or the mining operation location, using a mobile refinery if necessary. Dock any damaged ships, destroy the probes ad
enemy probes, if you are quick enough you get a lot more time. A carrier then appears ‘east’ of the mining operation, so prepare some welcome for it there, bombers and fighters, with gunships taking the brunt of the fighter battle, the bombers on the carrier.
Go back to the shipyard and you will receive a carrier. Build flak frigates and more gunships. The last wave involves heavier opposition. The Infiltrator frigates should be your primary targets. A combined fleet of bombers, flak frigates and gunships and any other fighters should make light work of this force. Order bombers onto the infiltrator frigates, then the enemy carriers. Gunships/interceptors/flak frigates should engage the enemy fighters. Keep up the concentrated fire on their capital ships and the fighters will run out of reinforcements.
Mission 4: Ghenna Outskirts
Build all the bombers you can, and bolster your force with pulsar gunships and some more frigates. Send bombers in between the centre and right hand hyperspace inhibitor and destroy the carrier that should be there – be quick, a quick strike in and retreat from any fighters is the method here. Send your whole fleet into the central area and destroy the second carrier that should be there. Then capture the hyperspace gate and destroy the inhibitors. Do this on another one, but leave one alone. A small fleet appears when you go near a gate, so be prepared and keep reinforcements handy. Once all resistance is finished, warp your fleet through the gate, leaving small contingent including a marine frigate behind. Destroy the fleet on the other end of the worm hole. Then send the marine frigate through, with any escort. Try and nab the destroyer with your marine frigate. If not, that’s cool, but it is very useful. Destroy all enemies, then repair at the mothership and reinforce – now destroy the final inhibitor. You will warp to the enemy base, where a large and deadly strike force awaits.
Destroy this in any way you can – head on attack works, as does trying to draw them back to safer territory. You get a lot of RUs at the end, so losing ships isn’t that bad. Just annihilate the enemy.
Mission 5: Gehenna
There are 3 garrisons to destroy in this level, each at the end of a chain of dust. Split your force into two equal parts and attack the centre and right hand groups – build more frigates at base as required. The central base is well defended, and you will need to regroup the two forces before moving on back at your base. You need to do this to prevent these two garrisons from interrupting you later on. A pretty hefty strike force is needed for both – a lot of frigates/gunships and a few fighters for cover.
Recuperate at base, and then move up the left hand cloud. You should come across the final garrison and the Oracle. Destroy the garrison, then repair and reinforce before docking a marine frigate at the oracle. This level is comparatively easy.
Mission 6: The Karos Graveyard
This is quite a nasty level. The mothership has to short jump twice to reach its destination. Attack the group of ‘movers’ that appear first with most of your forces, and try to eliminate all of this group before the MS jumps again. Use overwhelming power on the movers, smaller ships are more effective, and they are deadly in large numbers.
Move all your forces in between the next two hulks and stave off the movers, while salvaging the derelict – it is guarded so be very careful. Keep the forces up and you shouldn’t have a problem. Research anti-mover weaponry as soon as possible. When the MS jumps again, rush to the last three hulks it arrives at and stave off the movers continuously. Finally, when the MS gets in position, the movers shut down. Just keep them away from the MS for as long as possible, and victory shalt be thous. Yes.
Mission 7: Derelicts
Send probes to scout the action spots, and build a mover construction facility as soon as possible – about 10 movers, grouped, should be sufficient. Keep your fleet up to strength and ready for any Vagyr forces. Split the main fleet equally again, like in Mission 5, and build destroyers to reinforce both equally. Then, leave one fleet near the mothership, and move the other ‘northwards’ as it were, slightly to the left and way in front of where the MS is ‘looking’, near the action spot on the sensors. Restrain all ships from entering the dust clouds, unless you want them to die, and that’s bad, as the Vagyr will turn up. Wait for them to half materialize out of the clouds, and hit them with everything – keep your ships in order, and try and stay stationery and hit their ships one at a time, everything you got. Don’t follow if they retreat, and you can use Movers to destroy the nearby wreck and clear the clouds – leaving them exposed to your superior firepower.
Meanwhile, the other strike group should be sent across the map, to the parallel cloud ‘arm’ from the first battle. A second fleet appears here. Use the same tactics, and try and wipe them out as quickly as possible. Once done, reinforce the fleets (as always). Use the Movers to destroy the hulks as quickly as possible – a CTRL + LEFT CLICK drag across the sensors screen (focused only on the hulks) and sufficient numbers should make light work of this. Leave one force at the mothership, and keep the other ready, in between the two previous battle sites. More Vagyr forces will move in, and a pincer from the MS forces and the 2nd fleet should be sufficient to destroy this quickly.
Finally, once the Movers have destroyed all the debris and hulks, move the combined (and reinforced) fleets to destroy the carrier that might be hiding in the ‘left’ hand area, and use the Movers to finish the objectives.
Mission 8: Dreadnaught Berth
This isn’t easy, but it is simple. Basically use your movers, covered by the WHOLE fleet (bar any turrets you leave to defend etc) to first collect the dreadnaught (find it with a probe). Attack the Keeper if you can to force it to withdraw for a while. Destroy the drones.
Use a drone to get an idea of the Power area. Send Movers/Fleet over, and keep attention off the movers as they do their job. Once they have finished, the Keeper should be trapped. Job done. Simply use the fleet to keep attention off the Movers.
Mission 9: Counter Attack
This can be evil. You come under attack from 8 hyperspace gates positioned all around your entry point. Repair the dreadnaught as soon as possible, and dock it with the shipyard when it turns up.
Divide your fleet into 2/3 groups and try to use them to quickly deal with attacks as they come in – focused on the MS AND the Shipyard. Keep on reinforcing, constantly. Make a new group if you have to, and get to Pop. Limits if you haven’t already. When you get a chance, send small fleets of Interceptors/bombers to eliminate the gates. Whenever a carrier appears, get rid of it as quickly as possible. This level is all about reaction to random events as they happen. Keep on top by slowly eliminating the gates/carriers, and reinforcing the forces and protecting the MS/Dreadnaught especially.
A final fleet warps in when the Dreadnaught is complete, but the DN can easily deal with the heavies while your fleet finishes the rest off.
Mission 10: Keepers of Sajuuk
Very simple again. Fend off the Keepers as they appear, you can’t kill them. When the Bentusi show up, protect them and the DN at all costs.
Once the DN comes online, use it to attack the keepers, until the Bentusi self-destruct to kill all 4. Awwww. Never let your fleet become so depleted the DN has to face the Keepers without any heavy backup – this is essential.
Mission 11: Sacrifice
Send probes to the locations of the core, except for the Bentusi one, unless you want to see Vagyr force strength. Research Advanced Shielding, and while you fend off any Vagyr attack, send a collector and 2 Defense Field Frigates to the nearest Core piece. When you get close, activate a frigate and send all 3 in, or so the shields just reach the Core. Send the collector in and keep an eye on the Shield charge. When one ship is nearly drained, activate the other – Do not wait for a shield to fully run out, they take a few seconds to activate. Move all 3 back, covered if you want to be extra careful.
Trouble is, the Vagyr are also doing the same thing. You get notification, and go for them. Divide in to two groups, equal, with the DN in one, and attack the enemy as soon as possible. You can attack with one huge force, but then the Vagyr may get the other piece, and you’ll have to chase them, with 5 minutes to stop them. Fun.
The two Vagyr groups aren’t small, but using carriers to reinforce on the spot and careful concentrated fire on their heavy ships should win you through. Pause to check and order both situations about. When they are dead, collect the other two fragements in the same way.
Mission 12: Thaddis Sabbah
This is possibly the meanest opening to an RTS ever. But only after you move forwards.
Gather all your forces together, and prepare to reinforce hugely. Move the forces forwards, wipe out the enemy harvesters, and then get hit by the Vagyr forces. At least 20 destroyers appear in the whole battle, 4 battle cruisers too, and hundreds of bombers and them Lance fighters and assault craft. Concentrate on the heavies, gunships and flak frigates covering your capital ship. Constantly reinforce, build up huge queues in the carriers, you need to reinforce the whole time. It is advisable that you should not move to far forwards – keep a position, move up or down if you want, but never go forwards or let up fire for a mili second – brute force and reinforcements are the way through this hectic crisis!
If you manage to beat off such a dramatically huge threat, and with simple direct concentrated fire and reinforcements, you should, proceed forwards towards the enemy base. Destroy the next wave of enemy ships, and then get within striking distance of the base, destroying any enemies, then go for Makaan. He will retreat pretty quickly, and then move off, leaving gunships and fighters in range of the base. Send in a Marine Frigate when prompted (attack with the Fleet if you aren’t, and if it drops below half health it should say to dock) and cover it with the gunships and interceptors.
Once Saban is free, cover the ship and prepare to receive a LOT of RUs. Hey, can you see through the wreckage?
Mission 13: Balcora Gate
Important note - only one subsystem needs to be left at the end. I managed to save all of them, but if you can’t, don’t worry.
From the off, move your fleet forwards, your building queues should be filled from the last level. Destroy the waiting fleet, which is tough but the hardest foes on the level, and then power onto the nearest attack group around the gate. They consist of light capital ships and fighters, and so aren’t that difficult to deal with. Harass the other groups with bombers if you can as you destroy one, and then move on. Leave the shipyard till last unless it starts churning out heavies, in which case still concentrate most fire on the power attack groups. Simply destroy all Vagyr forces to win.
Mission 14: Balcora
This is the end of Makaan… and quite easy despite it. Immediately group your forces together. By this time, all major groups should be at your Population Limits.
Fend off the attack as it comes in, this should be easy. Turn ‘left’ and go ‘up’ to face the smaller attack. Follow their movement line and destroy the shipyard and forces you find here. Now move towards the Hulk, but keep your side of it. Form up, repair and regroup etc if necessary, then move forwards. Makaan has a Dreadnaught, several battle cruisers and destroyers and many smaller ships. Use you DN on his, with some destroyers for support, and use the rest of your fleet on his BCs, then his Destroyers, then his small ships, and finally him once only fighters and corvettes are left. If you need to move off, do so and regroup, but keep on plugging away. You have enough RUs to win, and if you get beaten off, don’t be disheartened, he does not attack. Reinforce and attack again.
Before you leave, group 3 small Interceptor squadrons together – make 3 groups of 3.
Mission 15: Return to Hiigara
This is hectic. As soon as you start, move Sajuuk and your fleet forwards, and annihilate the battle line in front of you, moving forwards towards a carrier in the centre of the map.
As soon as you get the planet killer warning, dispatch the 3 Interceptor groups to the asteroid belt, at the 3 points – leave them just in front of the belt, on the Planet killers side, and leave them on aggressive. These guys will shoot down the missiles that the Killers launch, and keep an eye on their progress – A quick tap of space will show you if they are in position, and these are just as vital as any other force in the level.
Meanwhile, Jump Sajuuk (press J and choose a location) to each of the planet killers and destroy them with its giant laser. Use one fleet to cover Sajuuk – mainly light and fast ships will do, and use your heavies to search out the enemy carriers and shipyards. Once the enemy heavies and shipyards are gone, this is easy, as Sajuuk + Fighters can deal with the Killers, the missiles and their escorts, and your main fleet can search out any heavier ships left.
Job and game done.
Thanks for reading.