I promise that this is the right topic for this post, it's not just thread necromancy. Even if 2.1 strategy is becoming somewhat passè.
I actually took two tries to handle this one, and looking back I probably could have made it through the first time. This is part play-by-play, part strategy, since this scenario is hard enough that I think some detail on my approach might make for useful or entertaining reading to folks. Perhaps that is arrogant of me, but I blended a couple of approaches that I thought might be worth sharing.
The key to victory is to hit the Warlords first-and fast!
jump one ship in to clear fog of war, Teardocs will gradually spead out either to the first jump in point or back towards the station. Seperate the VSDs and overwhelm them with your assualt cruisers and fighters. Focus all your ISDs on Teradoc, kill him quick to get rid of his Fleet bonuses. Once that is done kill the station and mop up. You WILL take casualties but it is doable. Take the planet.(Land a few troops and walkers or Maulers and wait for your bombardments and Bombing runs to charge up, use tactically)
This will give you Pellaeon and some BADLY needed breathing space, hit the lightly defended asteroid belt next then hit Harrsk, focus fighters and bombers on Harrsk, kill him and his fleet is easy to take apart, bypass the ground battle, and head to Odik with all your fleet. KILL Delvardus's Praetor and then mop up his fleet, losses are irrelevant(EXCEPT Pellaeon, do NOT lose him he doesn't respawn) Take the planet from Delvadus's few ground forces. Congrats you now have Night Hammer AND Col. Cronus along with the ability to build Crimson Command VSDIIs. From here your path to victory is clear.
I'm not picking on Lord Xizer, it's just the best way to highlight how I did or did not vary from his advice.
#1 - I hate multi-front wars, and in this scenario I identified neutralizing the Yavin-Mon Cal front as my top priority. So, I'm completely ignoring "hit the warlords first and fast" here.
--PART ONE--First, Failed (?) Campaign
I gambled (correctly) that Teradoc would just sit around doing nothing at Hakassi until somebody came to kill him, so I left the Maw completely undefended to secure the "Northern" front. I wasted some money on building Golans at the May just in case, a mistake in hindsight. Took Bimmisaari for ground production, and played "whack-a-mole" with the Republic fleets at Yavin and MonCal until I finally wiped them all out. I then left a Carrack Cruiser over each of Yavin and Mon Cal to prevent re-spawning, while not wasting any ground troops on that quagmire. I then took out Teradoc (lost 1 ISD and 1 Carrack, I mistakenly let them concentrate instead of following Xizer's advice) and conquered Hakassi to get Pellaeon.
Now we come to where I think I went wrong. Since Hakassi was the only link to the Republic forces outside of my next planned line of advance, I paused to fortify my position with HVGs and shipyards. I did take the asteroid field for income, but then waffled between pushing out further and maintaining my fortification until I had 2 HVGs and 2 Golans. This left me caught somewhat flat-footed when the Republic combined two major fleets for an attack on Hakassi. I inflicted moderate casualties on them, but elected to flee rather than risk my fleet's destruction. I was hoping to do hit-and-fade attacks on the Republic fleet in order to allow my HVGs to whittle them down, but the mid-map starting point left me no time to get my Carrack Cruisers away from their forces long enough to even take out a single opposing ship. The NR had now built up a sufficient force at Khomm to make taking even it cost-prohibitive from space, AND I stupidly left my entire ground army on Hakassi, where they were now trapped. I then considered the campaign "lost" and started over.
--PART TWO--Same Idea, Better Execution
So, I think there were two key things that I could fix to make my overall strategy work. The first was to reduce the "northern" NR fleet much more efficiently than I did in Part One - I ended up letting Ackbar jump around me enough times that I had to rebuild space stations over Kessel and Bimmisaari 3-4 times combined, and an effort that could have been completed in 3-4 weeks ended up taking 8-10 weeks. The second thing was to keep my main land army moving rapidly forward once it was prepared. I hadn't decided how to handle Hakassi once I took it at the beginning, but as you'll see, that choice ended up being taken out of my hands anyway.
Now I'm getting into a little more detail, even for things that I did in both attempts at this.
Opening moves - combine entire space fleet over Kessel, build 2 probe droids at Kessel, build 2 tax collection agencies on Kessel, start building Lancer Frigates at The Maw (NR fleets would chew up my force when I headed "West" otherwise) until I had 6 total, and bring combined space and land forces all together to Bimmisaari. Took Bimmisaari with no losses - I didn't use the speeder bikes at all, and kept my 3 trooper units concentrated to gang up on the piecemeal warlord troops. I focused on force-moving my troopers incrementally towards the mining facility near the middle of the map, as I ended up not getting there in round 1 before the warlord forces were killed. I completely ignored the civilians and let them do some of the work of reducing the warlord forces for me. I immediately started building a prison, light factory, barracks, and heavy factory on Bimmisaari in order to build my forces for the main campaign to the "west". Only other building activity was the periodic checking on the Maw Lancer production line - I needed 6 total before going West.
*Eliminating the NR's Northern Fleet*
There are 3 crucial pieces to this part - Speed, Getting to Mon Cal before they build any heavy ships or many Golan platforms, and SPEED. I knew that Ackbar would most likely strike out at Kessel to destroy the space station there, but I was fine with that as it was just a temporary way to get probe droids over Yavin and Mon Cal anyway. I went from Bimmisaari to Yavin with my space forces, leaving all ground troops to hold Bimmisaari. The Yavin space engagement was an easy, loss-free battle. I left 1 Carrack in orbit to prevent any rebuilding of space forces, turning Yavin 4 into a relaxing Timeshare resort for those pesky Jedi, who would be irrelevant for the rest of the campaign. At this point, my probe droid was showing me Ackbar in orbit of Mon Cal, with the Level 3 shipyard in place, plus 1 MC-90, 1 MC-80b, 1 Dreadnaught, and some fighters. It was all or nothing at this point, but I was committed regardless of how Ackbar behaved. If he stayed at Mon Cal, then a slow, deliberate, micro-heavy siege campaign would be needed to win the day. If he left for Kessel, I'd lose a worthless shipyard, but would gain a divided enemy AND I was confident that the AI wouldn't send ground troops so early in the game until the orbit of Kessel was secured. That hyperspace lane was long enough that I'd be easily over Mon Cal before they could dispatch such a land force. Just prior to my arrival at Mon Cal, Ackbar and the other 2 Capital Ships departed for Kessel (I get no "enemy fleet approaching" notification when Ackbar moves for some reason), so it's my entire remaining force against a Capital Shipyard, 1 Dreadnaught, some fighters, and a single Golan 1 platform. Beautiful! I left my other Carrack in orbit of Mon Cal and raced to Kessel to destroy Ackbar and his fleet.
All goes well initially in space over Kessel, and the NR AI is dumb enough to bring the cruisers at me piecemeal. Ackbar starts maneuvering away as soon as my bombers strike at him, and the MC-90 and MC-80b proceeded to come at my entire stationary fleet (at initial entry point, 3 ISDs on the front line with Daala and the Escort Carrier behind, with a concurrent line of all 6 Strike Cruisers and 1 Dreadnaught stacked on top of the ISDs for maximum concentrated firepower) sequentially, instead of combining power on one side of my defensive line or the other. The only problem with this approach of letting them come to me is that once the MC-90 and MC-80b were all destroyed, Ackbar fled into hyperspace before I could race my fleet down to take out his engines. This would be a small factor in the decisive event of my campaign.
Following the battle, the skies over Mon Cal, Yavin, Bimmisaari, and Kessel are all clear of NR rabble. I send my space fleet to The Maw to await the last 1.5 Lancers (50% done on #5 of 6 at this point), and notice with dismay that my build order on Bimmisaari will leave me with a choice between waiting entirely too long to get my ground force combined with my space fleet, or leaving my fleet in orbit over Hakassi for an extended period awaiting ground troops. I chose the latter option, sending my fleet to Hakassi (now including 6 Lancer Frigates, 1 of which is in the Fleet Scout slot) to confront Teradoc while building the following ground force on Bimmisaari to go with my 3 troops and 1 biker scout:
- 4 AT-PTs
- 2 Specialists
- 1 XR-85 "Doom Laser"
I also start building Tie Defenders one at a time at The Maw, to supplement my Hakassi defense force once I take it. My thinking is to have Tie Defenders as my hit-and-fade force to combine with HVGs to deal with any NR attacks of sufficient strength to make me retreat.
*The Hakassi Space Campaign - AKA "The Campaign Is Decided Early"*
The usual Teradoc battle ensues, except this time I heeded Lord Xizer's words. As soon as my Lancer reveals the map, I see 3 Crimson VSDs stay near the middle of the map while Teradoc's remaining forces head towards the Level-2 Shipyard. I jump all 4 of my ISDs on top of those 3 Crimson VSDs the instant that they turn around towards the rest of Teradoc's fleet, then pause again to place my 6 strike Cruisers and 1 Dread just behind/beside the ISDs to ensure that the ISDs take the initial volleys from the Crimson VSDs. All 3 non-Daala ISDs lock tractor beams onto the VSDs to prevent their escape. I leave the game unpaused while organizing my forces in my standard line formation (3 ISDs in front, Daala and Carrier behind, all Strikes and the Dread aligned along the same line as the 3 ISDs) to give my ISDs' shields time to recharge. I win this battle *without losses* my obsessively microing the approach of my fleet towards Teradoc's forces. Inching my offensive line forward just as one of the VSDs tries to do a quick "swing out to fire a volley, then flee to recharge shield" routine provides just enough firepower to either destroy (if it lingers) or cripple (if it flees quickly) each VSD that tries this. Once the ISD-II comes forward, Daala swings around my line to whichever side it approaches, and my fighters and bombers join the fray for the first time. Teradoc's lack of fighter support is key here - my fighters are expendable to keep his Lancers focused away from my Bombers, while my Bombers soften up the ISD-II just enough for the combined firepower of 2 ISDs (1 regular + Daala), 3 Strikes, and 1 Dread to take out the largest remaining threat. My regular ISD has yellow hull my the end of this, so Daala takes its place on the line for the remaining advance and eventual elimination of the enemy forces.
So, just like last time, Hakassi is mine, but now I am both wiser AND suffered no losses of any kind. The only wrinkle is that I'm still waiting on my ground troops, but I'm several weeks ahead of schedule from last time, so I estimate that I should still have time to get to Odik before the NR brings the hammer down on me this time. Boy, was I wrong!
Ackbar's retreat from Kessel took him back to the main/western NR region, and his addition to those forces apparently triggered the AI's "ok, I have enough ships to go take Hakassi now!" logic. Although he does not arrive himself, every other major ship in the NR arsenal heads to Hakassi. I have no idea what is about to happen, because since Hakassi is still owned by the Warlords, I get no "enemy fleet" approaching message. There are two crucial differences between this attack and the "normal" NR attack I faced in Part One over Hakassi from the NR perspective.
1) Since it is happening earlier than expected, the NR has apparently not combined its two major fleets (from Kuat and Coruscant, I would assume) into a single force like it did to me the first time. This means I am facing 3 fleets (1 from Tsoss Beacon, 1 from Kuat, 1 from Coruscant) instead of 2.
2) Since it is happening earlier than expected, the NR has not built any noteworthy additional forces to supplement its starting fleets, whereas in Part One I was facing additional Endurance and Nebula-class ships
#1, as it turned out, saved me. My defensive alignment should now be mentioned, as it was crucial to the outcome, and was identical for the first two battles. I immediately shifted from the default, initial, horrifically stupid AI fleet disposition to a modified version of my standard line formation. My 4 ISDs begin in a diamond shape formation, with Daala in front. This is a great way to make her very dead, so she is directed behind the back ISD in the diamond, while the side ISDs are shifted to be in-line of that back ISD. I want to give the AI as much room as possible to spread out on their way to me, but trying to run all the way back to the corner is pointless with no defensive platforms to aid me. I put 2 Strikes and 2 Lancers on top of my 3 front ISDs, with the Lancers slightly in front to intercept the horrifying hoarde of fighters heading my way. The carrier is positioned just behind where I sent Daala, as I learned in Part One that sending it all the way to the back corner is a great way to get chewed up by the AI's "scour every corner of the map for no reason" fighter tactics. My bombers also head back there, and my fighters hang out over my middle ISD for the moment. As soon as the initial fighter wave is repulsed by the Lancers, my fighters swoop in to kill off as many A and E-Wings as possible, before quickly moving on towards the inbound B and K-Wings. The AI tended to concentrate bombers to the northern side of the formation in both of the major battles. At approximately this time, Daala is now moving under/over/through the middle ISD in my line formation. I have no qualms about taking advantage of game/AI quirks whenever I can, especially in this campaign, so I immediately issue her a stop order, then order her to face back towards the NR fleet as soon as she is as close to co-located with the middle ISD as possible. It's two ISDs in the same place, thanks to Daala being on another Z-axis by virtue of being a leader (I guess that's why?).
The first major NR fleet (presumably from Kuat) consists of a single MC-90 and a large number of Coronas and Sacheens (10+ Coronas, ~3 Sacheens), plus an Assault Frigate and (I think) a Dreadnaught. There are, of course, several independent fighter groups, including at least 1 K-Wing and 2 B-Wing groups. This fleet is repulsed with little difficulty, and no losses, thanks to the combination of AI stupidity (fighters spread out all over, frigates allowed to get ahead of capital ship, ships turning around to run away after getting close to my line for no apparent reason) and my defensive formation providing a heavy dose of concentrated firepower. A couple of Coronas and some fighters escape, the rest of the NR fleet is turned into burning debris.
The second major NR fleet (Coruscant?) consists of 2 MC-90s, 1 Nebula, 1 MC-80b (I think), 1 Dread (I think?), possibly another Assault Frigate, and another large number of Coronas and Sacheens, plus fighter support. In the first battle, the MC-90 seemed to target Daala (I figured since her ship starts out at the front of the diamond on the map, the AI might issue orders to initially target her), so I expected them to conveniently come into the middle of my formation again. Instead, the enemy fleet initially bounces back from my line (the 2 MC-90s soak up enough fire that the Nebula/Dread/80b get some heavy shots in), then angles up towards the north of the map/left of my line, and a single ISD takes the brunt of their remaining firepower. I lose that ISD and 1 escorting Strike Cruiser, but the entire NR fleet is destroyed.
The third NR fleet consists of some leftover frigates from the NR's victory at Tsoss Beacon, and is easily repulsed with no losses.
I now look at the History chart, and the Military Graph is shocking. The NR lost so many ships that we are now essentially at equal military strength, and I haven't even taken Hakassi yet! Ackbar's still alive somewhere, but he might be their last capital ship at this point, and by now my ground troops are en route from Bimmisaari. I take Hakassi, wait for the intial built of a shipyard, 1 prison, and 1 HVG, then leave Daala and all my Tie Defenders (11 squadrons from the Maw by the time my ground troops arrive) at Hakassi while Pellaeon and the rest of the fleet (with the ground troops all right behind him) head to Tsoss Beacon, Khomm, then to take out Harrsk en route to Odik. I swing over Abregado and leave a Strike Cruiser in orbit to guard my flank from any NR rebuilds on the way. Odik falls before the NR is able to replenish their fleets, and now my victory is assured. I've taken all NR and warlord planets "behind" Hakassi, and am taking my time to move Daala around for her production cost bonuses now that my Level 2-Shipyard at Hakassi is backed up by 2 HVGs, 11 Tie Defenders, Pellaeon, 2 ISDs, and the remaining frigates from the original fleet. The Military Graph shows that I now have superior military force to the NR, and I only have a single point to defend at Hakassi. My ground troops were all randomly killed at Odik (I lost none during the battle, but 100% of them on the ground were counted as "units lost" after the battle). That's kinda lousy, but ultimately only changes my timeline, not the final result.
My experience seemed different enough from both the "get to the warlords ASAP" and the "race back from Odik to face the Republic" posts that I thought it was worth sharing, hopefully someone finds it useful while 2.1 still exists for a short time.
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