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quote:Oddly, the game doesn't identify the UCS Heavy Rocket Launcher as a heavy weapon. Which is why you can mount it on top of advanced plasma cannons, for absurdly overpowered lategame units. Also fun - putting shadow generators on top of advanced plasma cannons. Oh, and on the NEO point...I did like what they do with him later. Mwee hee hee.
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Feb 17, 2013 04:36
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DatonKallandor posted:I don't think you mentioned the UCS special feature of Spiders being allowed to mount heavy rocket launchers. Or if you did, I missed it and you're not emphasizing it enough. You're absolutely right. I saw your post before I did the Egypt mission. Let me just say, your wish has been granted  Loxbourne posted:Which is why you can mount it on top of advanced plasma cannons, for absurdly overpowered lategame units. Also fun - putting shadow generators on top of advanced plasma cannons. I just finished the Egypt mission. My hatred for NEO grows stronger every day.  It would've been fairly simple but instead it took around 2 hours to do.I'll have to try that trick with the Heavy Plasma + Heavy Rocket. Sounds like it would destroy everyone. And since NEO keeps turning my army against me I'm doing a lot of rebuilding 
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Feb 17, 2013 06:00
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Spiders can mount Heavy Rocket Launchers
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It's cheesing it, but I believe the hackings happen at specific time-marks, so before you hit them you can hide your units in your albatross (and I think tunnels too? Not sure on that one) and they'll be unaffected.
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Feb 17, 2013 07:03
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Nephilm posted:It's cheesing it, but I believe the hackings happen at specific time-marks, so before you hit them you can hide your units in your albatross (and I think tunnels too? Not sure on that one) and they'll be unaffected. Oh no the tunneled units are definitely affected. I spent a long time searching for a turned Mammoth that was down in the tunnels. I wanted to make sure I had killed everything so I could get the auto-transfer at the end of the mission. If you've played Egypt you'll know why I was down in the tunnels with just a Mammoth.
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Feb 17, 2013 07:45
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Wow, shields make one hell of a difference. I'm surprised.
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Feb 18, 2013 09:07
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Yeah the game is balanced in way where both energy and conventional have up and downsides. Conventional only has to hit health, but takes armor into account - which means some units are super vulnerable, while others aren't. Energy weapons ignore armor but have to burn through health and shields. And shields have a lot of hitpoints - that's the reason energy weapons generally have far higher damage output. They're hitting bigger hitpoint pools.
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Feb 18, 2013 21:52
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Shields in vanilla E2150 work differently to the expandalones. They were considered heavily overpowered in the original.
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Feb 18, 2013 22:31
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I like the shield / energy weapons mechanic, although it does mean that going all energy or all physical is better than combined arms. Also, when would you NOT want to shield your units?
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Feb 19, 2013 01:53
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Hermetian posted:I like the shield / energy weapons mechanic, although it does mean that going all energy or all physical is better than combined arms. If you are constrained by the unit value cap, you might forego shields on artillery units and armed backliners, but that can backfire spectacularly if you get flanked.
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Feb 19, 2013 02:16
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Hermetian posted:I like the shield / energy weapons mechanic, although it does mean that going all energy or all physical is better than combined arms. Air units can be shielded but it's generally pointless. You can also shield your Mammoth/Gruz and Harvesters but again, if your construction or mining units are under attack a shield isn't going to help.
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Feb 19, 2013 02:32
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axeil posted:Air units can be shielded but it's generally pointless. You can also shield your Mammoth/Gruz and Harvesters but again, if your construction or mining units are under attack a shield isn't going to help. In this game air units don't need any. In the sequels (or the mod packs I listed on page one) against any UCS forces? 
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Feb 19, 2013 02:59
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UCS Hellmaker posted:In this game air units don't need any. In the sequels (or the mod packs I listed on page one) against any UCS forces? Oh trust me, I won't be so naive in the expansions. Anyway, I'm working on the Egypt update now, it should be up soon. Let me preemptively say: gently caress you forever NEO. Hermetian posted:I like the shield / energy weapons mechanic, although it does mean that going all energy or all physical is better than combined arms.  If you're the ED you can't go all energy since lasers and ion cannons won't allow you to destroy any buildings. Plus all armies will need some physical weaponry or they'll be vulnerable to air attack.
axeil fucked around with this message at 03:15 on Feb 19, 2013 |
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Feb 19, 2013 03:06
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 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsiS9kUyxM8 The weather situation continues to deteriorate. Even though Egypt near the Nile is fairly lush the map here is going to be sand and desolation. Everything is dead because it's just too drat hot now.  As I pointed out at the end of the last update, Africa is one of the few areas on the planet that the UCS and LC have under control. The ED assault in Madagascar failed and while we've gotten some reports of ED activity deep in Africa, we need to hold North Africa and keep the ED from pouring in. Fortunately, the UCS still controls the rich deposits in South America and with LC support it should be easy to wear out the Dynasty forces. But before we start measuring drapes in our spaceship we need to repulse the ED here.  The base will again be set up in a tight formation. The hills to the northeast and east will provide excellent cover from ED attacks.  We've held off on the (first) UCS bomber, but given that the LC has been fielding the Thunderer in our last few allied missions I think it's about time we match their aerial assaults.  Our main structures built, it's time to create our defensive grid. No Fortresses, we'll be going all Large and Small Tower this time. The ravines give us a great natural choke point so we'll only need a few Small Towers in the base to defend against air attacks.  Our sisters in the Lunar Corporation are up in the northeast of the map. Thus the ED are either directly north of us or directly east. If they're to the east then the LC will probably be doing the majority of our fighting. Sending our land forces all the way across the Nile will require us to move up to the very north of the map and a bridge will probably be destroyed before we reach the opposite shore.   The first ED assault has been repulsed by the LC mobile defenders and superior Guardian/Defender placement. I'm so happy we're allies, they're really doing a great job.   Our Panthers are en-route but will not reach the battlefield before the LC have wiped out the ED tanks. What a shame.  The LC, feeling the initiative is in their favor have taken the fight to the ED's doorstep. Unfortunately the ED have put lasers and cannons and rockets on their doorstep because they are not very nice neighbors, not like the LC and UCS who are probably the best friends ever in history and nothing will ever come between them.  The LC laser walls are extremely impressive. The only gap our robots can use to get to the ED base is at the very edge there right next to the Nile River.  Our Mammoth robot has always wanted to see the Great Sphinx and the Pyramids. He's a real connoisseur of history. I bet he's taking pictures to send back to his robot family. Oh and look at that, our new bomber is done. Hooray for new bombers. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvAuPCCtqzo I'm not sure about it becoming the standard offensive weapon of our air force; the Night Barons are still pretty drat good. Plus we don't have any weapons for it yet.  Wait what are you doing Mr. Mammoth! This is a UNESCO World Heritage site you can't go off building on it.  Is our Mammoth trying to rob the graves of the Egyptian Pharaohs? That seems a bit rude. On the other hand they will explode into a million pieces or burn to a crisp soon. It'd be rude to not take advantage of all the riches that are certainly hidden in these tombs, right?  Try digging there Mr. Mammoth. I'm sure you'll be able to find King Tutankhamen's riches. Damned American tourists always trying to take a piece of history home with them...  With our Bat finished, why don't we work on our next major aerial upgrade. Perhaps say a flying Harvester, holy poo poo!  Our Panthers finally show up, long after the battle is over. I know robots can't really interpret human emotions but I bet all the women in those Moons and Meteors and Thunderers are looking pretty displeased with our tardiness.  Mr. Mammoth has made it into the Egyptian tombs. Now to find the hidden treasure.  Well I guess taking out one Laser Wall that wasn't even connected to the grid is impressive. Good job Dynasty.  The buried treasure!   And we are now 10,000 CR richer. There are nine of these hidden in the tunnels underneath the Egyptian Pyramids. 90,000 free credits is too good to pass up.  The UCS robots encounter withering resistance on their way to the ED base. The might of the single-Grozny 20 mm airforce cannot be understated. I almost didn't make it out here   Us robots are smarter than those Moon ladies. We used the perfectly accessible back door.  That was undefended. The ED is not having a good day today. And one less power plant makes our day even better and their day even worse.  Why not make it two power plants?  Or two and a third under construction?  How bout we throw in some Khrushchevs?  Or some Refineries or some Gruzs or som- Oh, gently caress YOU NEO. The LC are our best friends forever they'll never break our alliance. We just need to let them know that we've had uh, programming errors. Again.   And I'm sure those Panthers that NEO stole from us are on their way to great the Lunar Corporation. This is a diplomatic disaster. I better get Sombra on the phone. What time is it on the Moon? Do they even have timezones there?  Welp, at least those Small Towers I built around the base are doing good work at taking out these traitor Harvesters.  But we have newer better fly-y-er Harvesters so we don't need to mourn the loss of the old, lame land-based one.  And we shouldn't neglect the upgrade. The upgrades here work in the same way the upgrades to the land Harvesters work. Unfortunately we can only research the Harvester V now.  Even though we lost our attack force, the ED are flat on their back like a turtle. Nothing the Night Barons can't fix.  Their bellies are baking in the hot Egyptian  You're not helping! Why is that, President Axeil?  They're just questions, President Axeil. It's a test, designed to provoke an emotional response. Shall we continue?  And I shoot Sombra with the  I think this means I'm a replicant. Sorry Sombra, I guess we can't be best friends any more   Of course I had the Night Barons on stand by in case anything like this happened and they were able to knock out the LC's mines before they could train their rockets on us. The LC army is now crippled and unable to rebuild. That's what you get for making us upset with your questions.  The Night Barons are continuing to lay waste to the ED base now that power is out. I'm in the process of rebuilding my army so the Night Barons are going to be all we've got on offense for a bit.  The ED navy are hiding out in this protected bay near our side of the Nile. Good thing we didn't try to build a bridge over to the other side as I don't think we would've made it far before being incinerated.  But it's pretty simple to take out some boats that don't have any anti-air capabilities.  The first Panther hP is in the tunnels looking for our missing Mammoth and the location of the last few artifacts.  Not here...  The Night Barons have taken out the last power plant serving a production building. The ED base is all but dead at this point. Oh and I see the ED took our stolen Condor and used it for their own reloading. Disgusting.  Found it! Yes I will take 30,000 CR for (almost) no work, thank you very much.  We're almost halfway done with Project MARS. All those auto-mined resources at mission end are really helping things out.  This is the last Power Plant.  Er well it was the last Power Plant. Now it's just a bunch of scrap.  With our flying Harvesters able to fly around and mine even better now, I say we finish upgrading the Heavy Rocket Launcher.  We've only got 2 Panthers so far, this one and the one marching around the tunnels looking for the missing Mammoth. This rebuilding sucks.   And the Night Barons have found a few of our old traitor units. Unfortunately we've got no way to disable them and bring them back into our fold so I give the order to kill them.  Except for this guy. You've seen how tough the Panther Rs are against air units and the Night Barons, despite being the most experienced units in the UCS army, are still not that tough.  Too bad he spots us heading back to base and engages. The Night Barons take their first loss since Japan   We need those new Bats right now! Let's get working on their rocket launcher.  The survivors of the attack move back to base to get repaired. We lost 2 Gargoyles there. They were good robots and will be missed. Their comrades don't seem too sad though. Robots are bad at feelings.   To make matters worse, there's still one more Panther R out there shooting at our airforce.  At least we can take out this Spider P without losses. And if you notice on the radar our land forces are rebuilt and almost ready to lead a strike on the LC base.   The resistance the LC are putting up is stunning.Exclusive video of our attempt to break through the LC lines: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Pq9Mj6pZGQ  This is ridiculous. The LC commander must be one of the most brilliant in the war. I've never seen such great funneling from a commander not-named Axeil. We've got to cut through the sharpest teeth of the base here.   But even the sharpest tooth is nothing compared to the Grizzly and Panther hP.  These Defenders are easy to pick-off since the LC commander has forgotten to give her structures shields.  The batteries here are the key to the LC base. If they fall, the base falls. Unfortunately they're defended by 2 Guardians, and a Defender.  Oh and two Main Bases. We can't repel firepower of this magnitude, we need to take out the batteries now!  The batteries are down, but the Main Bases are still firing on our strike force. Those dastardly Moon hippies must have hidden another battery somewhere in the base. We'll pull back and wait for morning to re-organize and repair.  Then we will bring the hammer down on the LC   Onwards! We've found the last of the LC power grid. It's defended by two Main Bases but I know we can take them out before they get us!  And with a little help from the Night Barons we manage to do just that.   All that's left now is a little cleanup in the LC and ED bases.  How humiliating is it to see a UCS flying Harvester mining your resources while your base is still standing? I think it's pretty drat humiliating.  Cleaning up the ED base is just a matter of applying enough super hot gas and exploding projectiles until the buildings go away.  Easy right? Also it appears that with our alliance dissolved GOLAN has ordered us to fall back and focus on resource procurement. We won the battle for Egypt but we've lost the war for Africa. I can't believe GOLAN would let NEO get away with this though! I know if we can just find out where that bastard is we can get him, once and for all. We can't let him get away with destroying our alliance.  293,350 CR  GOLAN, I think we're doing just fine on resource procurement. Look at these robots GOLAN. Can you explain to them why their little Patty Panther or Timmy Tiger won't be coming home for recharging tonight? Can you tell them that we know who did these horrible acts but that we will not go after them? Will you not give these robots a chance at vengeance for their fallen brethren? If you will not let them have their revenge, then I will.   Take that Major Win and Major Wlad.  I will have my revenge against NEO. I will not stop until I've burned every building in Mozambique to the ground and received confirmation of NEO's death. I'm glad KAIN IX agrees with me. He's a robot who knows something about honor. We're coming for you NEO. And you won't get away this time. I guarantee it.
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Feb 19, 2013 04:34
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Is the giant stash of buried credits supposed to feed into the "ALIENS REALLY BUILT THE PYRAMIDS" theory? Because I sure can see it that way.
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Feb 19, 2013 09:00
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But... we don't have any testosterone. We are a robot.
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Feb 19, 2013 09:07
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axeil posted:
From years old memory, I could of sworn that you *could* laser beam a building apart, it just took an impractical amount of time and laser beams to do so. But I'll be god damned if that laser light show wasn't pretty for the time! 
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Feb 19, 2013 09:09
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Ulvirich posted:From years old memory, I could of sworn that you *could* laser beam a building apart, it just took an impractical amount of time and laser beams to do so. But I'll be god damned if that laser light show wasn't pretty for the time! Yes, they can in fact. It takes a lot of lasers to do it, though. Also, ion weapons are extremely useful against buildings. Just bring a few upgraded repairers along and laugh.
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Feb 19, 2013 11:51
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The Lone Badger posted:But... we don't have any testosterone. We are a robot. No, we're the President of the United [Civilized] States. We're about the UCS's only flesh and blood commander.
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Feb 19, 2013 12:40
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Cythereal posted:No, we're the President of the United [Civilized] States. We're about the UCS's only flesh and blood commander. We're also a replicant.
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Feb 19, 2013 14:22
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We need a million credits for our robostarship, right? How are we doing, having just picked up a third of that in a single mission?
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Feb 20, 2013 07:56
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Cythereal posted:No, we're the President of the United [Civilized] States. I thought the president was an AI.
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Feb 20, 2013 09:00
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No, the UCS has elected officials, they just almost always defer to what the AI tells them to do. It's the de facto president, I believe.
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Feb 20, 2013 09:17
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Not elected officials. Randomly chosen officials, with very short terms. Because that leaves no room for training, they have sophisticated AI "helpers" - which is the thing that makes the actual decisions. The human in office just stamps it and approves.
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Feb 20, 2013 12:58
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DatonKallandor posted:Not elected officials. Randomly chosen officials, with very short terms. Because that leaves no room for training, they have sophisticated AI "helpers" - which is the thing that makes the actual decisions. The human in office just stamps it and approves. Officials also serve to take the blame for any mistakes. Your usefulness rating goes up if you become an organ donor, even if you're still alive and awake while they're being removed from your body.
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Feb 20, 2013 13:51
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Teledahn posted:We need a million credits for our robostarship, right? How are we doing, having just picked up a third of that in a single mission? We were right at about 510,000 credits to go. We just picked up another 300k or so which puts us pretty close to the finish line.
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Feb 20, 2013 14:18
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I just finished the Mozambique mission. That was one hell of a fight and NEO is more of a dick in this mission than we've ever seen. I'll probably post the update tomorrow or Saturday.
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Feb 22, 2013 02:52
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I'm curious as to how many monuments/landmarks are in this game. We saw the Christ statue back in Rio de Janeiro with the LC, and the Pyramids now... I assume the ED has at least one, but are there others?
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Feb 22, 2013 05:00
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Byzantine posted:I'm curious as to how many monuments/landmarks are in this game. We saw the Christ statue back in Rio de Janeiro with the LC, and the Pyramids now... I assume the ED has at least one, but are there others? There's Mayan ruins too. I just played around in the level editor for about half an hour and I could've sworn back when I had this as a kid you could add Pyramids and monuments to your maps but now I can't find that option 
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Feb 22, 2013 05:46
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The New York map has a battered Statue of Liberty. Speaking of which, I was playing around in the skirmish mode and greatly appreciate the UCS flying harvesters. They can be merrily mining away at distant ore fields and move quickly enough to give you a solid income stream. They give the UCS a huge advantage on island maps. It's covered a bit more in the manuals, but UCS officials are chosen by lottery. This is supposedly to prevent the "entrenched politics" that caused WW3.
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Feb 22, 2013 09:33
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  Thank you KAIN IX for finding NEO. Leave it to us to eliminate this scum.    Our base setup for this mission is very odd. We're in a very deep and narrow valley but we've got teleporters to the western and eastern ridges.  Additionally, the eastern ridge has our mineral deposits only a few steps from the teleport exit. For this reason, we'll focus development on our eastern side.  We can finally get the last Harvester upgrade. This will allow it mine as fast as our old Harvester III but also to fly.  Speaking of mining, it looks like we're halfway done with our evacuation ship. UCS News has more, although I think they're a bit behind on the times. We're 50% done, not 30%. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUmB798q2Sg  Our eastern mining base will be vulnerable due to its reliance on Energy Transmitters instead of a regular Power Plant. So I build some Large Towers right on the edge of the resource filed. This should hopefully fend off any attacks we encounter.  In a similar vein, I send the Mammoth to a natural choke point to create an even more impressive Large Tower matrix.  Mining operations have begun and as you can see the three towers have been upgraded to the heaviest weapon mounts. 2 are Heavy Plasma and one is Heavy Rockets. I think things are pretty secure here, no?  One of our scouts has found some ED Tunnel Entrances near the center of the map. If you recall from the LC version of this mission, the ED had an underground shortcut to our base. The UCS version is no different.  Unfortunately, on our way to scout out the tunnels one of the scouts runs into some very strange tanks. I've never seen ED units like this before.  Just like our defenses to the east, this barrier in the north should be able to fend off any ED units who get ideas about charging into our base. The tight arrangement should force them to slow down while allowing for good firing angles.  Another scout has found the main ED base. It doesn't look very well-defended though. I think we may be able to take it early and really put the pressure on NEO.  Our last living scout has made it into the ED tunnels but unfortunately he was pursued by the strange ED tanks we saw earlier.  The final Harvester upgrade is complete! From this angle it's tough to distinguish it from the Harvester III, but trust me it's different. This will revolutionize our mining processes. No longer do we have to worry about obstacles or set up our Refineries so close to the mineral fields.  With the Harvester done, it's time to research our ultimate land unit, the Jaguar. Just like the Crusher (and Ural) the Jaguar has two hard-points, one supporting all weapons and a second for non-heavy weapons. It's an extremely expensive walker but makes an excellent fortress buster.  Well look at that. Those strange tanks have found our mining operation, along with a Caspian L. These weird tanks are similar to the Grizzly in that they're not buildable but are very strong tanks for the ED. Unfortunately for the ED they're only very strong tanks in the early to mid game. Our advanced plasma weaponry should have no problem cutting them down.  It's very true, unfortunately the ED aren't complete idiots and know our weakness on the ridge is our reliance on Energy Transmitters. We'll need the Mammoth to rebuild or or economy is toast.  We've got our Spiders from the Main Base ready to go. Our first order of business before any base assaults will be to destroy the ED's tunnel shortcut.  Remember when we were worried about Grozny helicopters? Now they only last a few seconds when bombarded by our Heavy Rocket Launchers.  We've located the exit for the ED's secret tunnel. These Small Towers are a joke of a defense. This might work if it was the 6th mission, not the 16th.  Unique ED Heavy Tanks are also outclassed here.  Destroying the Tunnel Entrances is trivial at this point.  But wait! The ED have begun a counterattack. Now this is the sort of stuff we've waited the entire campaign to see from the ED. Aggressive attacks and counter-attacks with a focus on our weak points. Too bad they still don't have shields.  I'm starting to think our defenses on the eastern ridge are not up to par. This is the second time the ED have threatened our power grid.  And now they're using our teleporters to get to the heart of our base. This will not stand. Thankfully they had their laser unit target a Small Tower, utterly squandering their penetration of our defenses.  To respond, we'll build a wall, and thus force the ED to pass our towers directly instead of driving around them like they just did.  The Jaguar is done and I've created a terrifying monstrosity of a unit here. It's a hP, hR, hR unit. It does 560 points of damage. It takes almost 5 minutes to build. It's going to be amazing, I can't wait.  You. Little. Motherfucker.  And to make matters worse, our army was in the heart of our base to reload and repair before the push on the western ED base. At least NEO's gotten his kicks in and only taken the (comparatively) worthless Spiders.  They're no match for our new hP, P Panthers. Sadly, they did manage to take out the Aerial Supply Depot, so we'll need to build a new one. The Spiders fled for our western ridge as soon as they saw the Panthers emerge from the transport.  And the ED has sent in its air force. For once this is a pretty smart move. Our units at this point are only 3 hP, P Panthers and a single hR Spider. For once they may be able to do some damage before we can kill them.  To increase the pressure, NEO sends over the Spider Ps. Fortunately the Panthers can do more damage than the Spiders can. I bet NEO wishes he waited a few minutes so he could have these walking monstrosities.  We couldn't really defend our western ridge with all the traitor Spiders in our base so the ED makes sure to deny us that approach to their base. This would be a problem if we actually had planned to attack from the western ridge. Fortunately for us, the path from the valley is actually a better choice for this assault.  We've moved over all our other Panther and reserve Spider units so it's attacking time. We run into some mild resistance outside the base, but massed plasma is (surprise!) really, really effective against unshielded units.  Our assault force is only 8 units and a Repairer: 4 Panther hP, Ps, 3 Panther Rs and a Spider hR. Despite this being the smallest main assault force we've ever used it's undoubtedly the strongest.  Let's research the final Jaguar chassis. By the time we've burned the ED base to the ground it should be ready to go back at our base.  And our wall looks pretty drat good. There's still a small gap but that will be closed up very soon. The ED are about to be at a disadvantage and I don't think they have a clue.  This base has one of the worst defensive grids I've ever seen. And they only have unshielded Siberia Ls for base defense. Is this really meant to be the HQ of the great hacker NEO? This is a total and utter joke.  Run back to your 20th century movies NEO. A real commander is coming for you. Just sit there quietly and wait for your doom, it won't be long now.  With the mobile defenders gone, we'll focus on the Repairers next. Why the ED are keeping all them out front with no defenses is a question that will be asked in war colleges for the rest of the Earth's short lifespan.  Our wall seems to be working to keep the 2nd ED faction's army from sneaking around our defenses.  Leveling the base should be trivial at this point. Go to town my robots!  Proverbs 16:18: Pride goeth before destruction...  ...and a haughty spirit before a fall.  All war is deception.  We have fallen right into NEO's trap. And as Sun Tzu also said: "He who is prudent and lies in wait for an enemy who is not, will be victorious." We have been imprudent. And we have paid for it with our entire army for a second time.  NEO now controls the strongest fighting force the UCS has ever constructed. True, his base is in ruin but there are two ED factions on this map. We've only managed to neuter the first.  But we have a few aces in the hole: The Jaguar II hP, hR, hR.  The Grizzly.  And finally the Jaguar II hP, P, P. With these forces we will defeat NEO once and for all!  Oh and one last thing. We've also got something called a "Shadow Generator." Wonder what that does?  Rebuilding will be long, but we've got our first piece of the puzzle.  The Night Barons are still around and I've ordered them to work on softening up the approach to NEO's HQ. They perform as the Night Barons always do.  Meanwhile, NEO continues to send more attacks at our eastern flank. They're not getting through any more though.  Our second piece of the puzzle is ready. We just need to send him to the battlefield.  15,000 CR makes advanced shadow research the most expensive research in the game. It's very, very worth it though.  We need the Night Barons to take out as much of NEO's Radar as they can. I misjudged NEO earlier, almost to my doom. He knows exactly what we're planning here. He may be one of the most competent commanders the Eurasian Dynasty has in their employ. I will not doubt his prowess again.  What's this strange new tower I've built? And why am I ordering my units to lights off?  The battle for the skies is extremely fierce outside NEO's base. I think he's figured it out. NEO must destroy the Night Barons here or face utter annihilation.  Our forces are arranged. This is an even more impressive attack group than the one I lead into the western ED base.  It's going to be extremely close, but I think the Night Barons will have the Radars cleared out in time. So right now you might be asking why the hell do I care so much about Radars? I've never given them any consideration. Well it's time to take you out of the dark. So to speak.  This is the Spider SHADOW.  What can the Spider SHADOW do?  Why it's simple: the Spider SHADOW brings the same benefits of a Shadow Tower to the front. That is, so long as our units have their lights off and are near the Spider SHADOW they are completely invisible to enemy units.  Not invisible on the minimap, not invisible to auto-targeting. Literally invisible.  Our heritage with stealth tactics have allowed us to merge our earlier sneaking with the new, modern UCS army.  And why did I worry so much about Radar? Simple, Radar is the only thing that disrupts the Spider SHADOW's cloaking power. To take NEO completely by surprise we couldn't have him detecting our units and shooting them now could we?  In a bit of a setback, it looks like we'll need to install plasma cannons on the space ship to destroy any errant asteroids. But I'm sure things will still be fine. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JD1F8g30SEc  With the majority of NEO's base in shambles it's okay to send a few units out of the cloaking field to clear out the unpowered base defenses.  There it is. There's NEO's HQ. We've got footage of the final assault on the HQ: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pp4TCfg6WY0  His home.  His tomb. We let him see our mighty Jaguars just before his HQ collapses. He'll know forever that he failed to plan for our resourcefulness and cutting edge walkers.  NEO IS DEAD! But there's a 3.2% chance he survived. There's no way though, right? The building collapsed in mere seconds once our Jaguar hPs began firing.  Unfortunately there's still those pesky traitor units to deal with. Once we've wiped them out we'll finally be free of NEO.  I order the Night Barons to work on softening up the traitors while our stealth army is en route.  It is an utter disaster. The strength of the new heavy rockets and the sheer firepower of the Panther R chew through the Night Barons. They scatter after the death of half of their strength.  We must invest in the Bat for future air operations.  Battered and utterly humiliated, the Night Barons retreat back to base. For the remainder of the campaign they will be nothing more than a local guard force. They've completely lost the ability to project power. Still, they had an incredible run. If you recall, the very first mission where we used stealth tactics involved the Gargoyles that would become the Night Barons. How fitting that their last mission involved the final evolution of our stealth strategy. Night Barons, as President of the United Civilized States, I hereby award you the Distinguished Flying Cross. I know you're robots so I doubt you care but your service in this war has been of the utmost caliber. We appreciate it.   We'll upgrade the Bat's weapons as well as its chassis.  Our stealth army has finally made it to the traitor's location. Once again, we've got video of the confrontation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9QG_GX3mzA  Unfortunately during the fight, some of our units get out of the Spider SHADOW's range. They only take minor damage, but it stresses how carefully you need to manage a stealth army.  Fortunately it doesn't change the outcome.  NEO's traitor army is dead. NEO is dead. We can finally pull out and focus on the final stages of Project MARS.  NEO's probably a plasma-charred corpse. I wouldn't be surprised if we never find his remains. Let's not worry about it now. There's less than a 4% chance he's alive according to ARES XV. He won't be bothering us anymore.  We're 75% done with the spaceship. Now I agree with GOLAN IV: we need to focus on these last 250,000 CR. Worrying about NEO at this point is pointless.  The Bat is ready for the battlefield. They'll be replacing the Gargoyle as the standard UCS air unit from here out.  Another 30,000 for Project MARS? Sounds good to me.   2258 to 978 with 160 kills . We more than doubled the ED's score in this mission. Good job robots. Earth looks pretty bad. That must mean we're in the final batch of missions. From here on out we'll only be mining for minerals. First stop: The Andes mountains.
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Feb 23, 2013 07:35
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The ED not having or using shields seems to make it rather easy, doesn't it?
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Feb 23, 2013 10:40
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So will there be any room for meatbags aboard the UCS spaceship?
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Feb 23, 2013 11:07
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The Lone Badger posted:So will there be any room for meatbags aboard the UCS spaceship? The robots can ride on the outside.
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Feb 23, 2013 12:31
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The plan is to rescue all of the UCS citizens, which is why the ship is so darn expensive compared to the LCs. And I imagine the LC also got a discount because they already had a lot of the tech needed for it too - they had energy shields before the war began (the reason you still need to research them is because they didn't work in an atmosphere) as well as antigrav engines for spaceflight.
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Feb 23, 2013 12:55
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DatonKallandor posted:The plan is to rescue all of the UCS citizens, which is why the ship is so darn expensive compared to the LCs. And I imagine the LC also got a discount because they already had a lot of the tech needed for it too - they had energy shields before the war began (the reason you still need to research them is because they didn't work in an atmosphere) as well as antigrav engines for spaceflight. No, the reason the LC had to gather so little is because they mined all the minerals on the moon, which meant that they only needed the minerals they couldn't get from the moon like noble metals and stuff.
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Feb 23, 2013 13:30
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According to the manual, the LC sent their first terraformers to the Mars as soon as 2090. They have most of the infrastructure already in place by now and so need less materials for their transport.
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Feb 23, 2013 16:00
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It's not the terraformers you're building the ship for, though. The reason it costs less is both mining the moon, and because of the lower population. LC's terraformers are already there and working, whoever makes it to Mars is going to reap the benefits of them. It's just that getting there in the first place is a steep hill to climb.
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Feb 23, 2013 16:31
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Don't forget that the LC starts with their spacedock already built, while the UCS has to build it before they can start building the ship.
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Feb 23, 2013 18:30
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The differing faction attitudes to their evacuation ships is actually a neat little plot point. Later 2150 titles and 2160 build on it further. Yes, the UCS solution is to save everybody and build a gigantic spaceship to do so with. Stocked with AIs, robot servants, robot armies, and flat-packed infrastructure for the new world. And shyeah, those guns are for meteors. Suuuuuuuure. We haven't seen the ED approach yet, but it's rather less nice. What's interesting is that the cutscene implies the LC are the last to leave.
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Feb 24, 2013 02:18
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The LC are doing fine on the moon. Cover yourself in Regolith, and enjoy the glut of power that your solar cells are now bringing in. They're not dependent on crops, surface water, or air conditioning to stay alive, so they can stick it out until the whole drat planet explodes.
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Feb 24, 2013 02:42
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