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I feel like the balance of capital ships has shifted a bit, although I would need to fire up the classic edition to check. There have been a couple of times I thought that enemy destroyers had scuttled themselves to avoid being captured, but in fact it was just a single salvo of heavy cruiser fire destroying them from near full health. I don't remember them being that devastating originally.

Strike craft were largely useless in my playthrough just now. Once I got drone frigates I didn't seriously use them ever again. Even sending over 50 attack bombers against a heavy cruiser it still just slowly swats them out of the sky, while the bombers only just beat its damage control teams (until enough bombers die, and then its pointless to continue). My squadron of interceptors I used against the turanic raiders just melted and did very little damage. I recall always preferring the heavy corvettes to fighters, but I thought the strike fighters actually at least did some damage and could use their speed despite their fragility.

In other news, I completed HW1:R just now, having salvaged 9 of the 10 heavy cruisers I encountered*, along with having a fleet of around 20 destroyers. I do feel that gameplay suffers from all the salvaging, because despite being hilarious, it means that I got through the campaign without ever actually having a proper fight. The closest I came to one was when I nearly lost a destroyer to an enemy fleet that came out of hyperspace at an inconvenient angle, and it took too long to wheel my vast capital ship wall around to engage properly and only a small proportion of them could fire.

* the last HC was in a group of 3 and 50km from the mothership. Given it takes 6 salvage corvettes to capture a HC and you can have a max. of 14 I wasn't going to wait the half hour or so to get the corvettes back out there...

If strike craft are really that horribly underpowered, it's going to make the final mission(s) in Cataclysm really difficult.

Perhaps luckily they didn't remaster Cataclysm in this re-release because they lost the source code I believe.

But yea the Super Acolytes would suffer a lot.

Really, nobody on either side was having a good day.

The same single moment in time, seen from the perspective of some of the last ships left alive on the battlefield.

Meant to post these Earlier...
But.. BEHOLD!!!
The Awesomness of the Banana ship is mine at last!!!


The grand unwrapping!


It;s ALIVE!



SO proud

ooooooooooooooo..................


But wrong thread, methinks....

Yes, it was, but not anymore. ~Edi

OK... SO I am stuck on the Ghost ship mission.
Keep in mind, I never played HW1, so I may be missing something...

After using something like 30 scouts as decoys, I sent all my frigates to attack the ghost ship, It's HP went down to about 80% and then BAM! I suddenly have control over the fleet of enemy ships about to attack me! I hear "new research available" And then.... Nothing...

Under my objectives it says "send a scouting party to investigate" Um well.. I kind of did that... but it's treating it as if I never did... Now what"?

...Well, it sounds like you ignored every last thing the mission instructed you to do, which is probably not a good start. Now, that said, the scripting for that mission is in a bit of a bad state, as what happened to you isn't what should have happened to you, but given that what should have happened to you is to have y our entire fleet stolen by the Graboid Field because you sent in capital ships... Well, I think you're not too badly off.

Stand off, let the captured fleet come to you, chew it apart with your capital fleet from outside the graboid range, steal what you can if you like, and then send in your strike wings to mop up the ghost ship itself until it triggers the 'send in a salvage corvette' objective. My guess is that the mission scripting is freaking out that it's frigates that are doing the beating and throwing a tantrum.

hmmm makes sense.. The VERY first time I did it I went bumbling in with my whole fleet and it got stole, there was a message I got... And then all the other times I kept my forces back. So... In others words I HAVE To let them capture some of my fleet for it to be done "Right"

Not necessarily; I didn't. The sequence I followed was:

Obliterate defending fleet from beyond the range of the capture field.
Send in corvettes and fighters to pound on the ghost ship.
Pound on the Ghost Ship until I'm asked to send in a salvage corvette.

You are right, though, in that as it stands it's a very touchy mission, and one where a lot of people are reporting weird issues. It needs work.

The way I beat that mission in the original was to attack with Defenders and scouts, and a couple of repair corvettes for tanker support. The scouts drew the fire of the missile destroyer while the Defenders plugged away at the ghost ship itself largely undisturbed. Not sure that'll work in the remake though.

It very much won't, if only because if you're doing well you'll have a much, much larger fleet of assault frigates to contend with. That said, it's not terribly hard to bring your own capital battlefleet to bear if you're careful.

I parked my capital ships just out of range and lured the controlled ships out with corvettes, while sending all of my attack bombers (I'd built 20 odd in the previous mission, knowing it was coming) to blow the crap out of the missile destroyer. It worked quite nicely, and there were even a few assautl frigates left over that I gained control of.

White Haven wrote:It very much won't, if only because if you're doing well you'll have a much, much larger fleet of assault frigates to contend with. That said, it's not terribly hard to bring your own capital battlefleet to bear if you're careful.

*sigh* Gearbox had the time and budget to pull in Karan S'jet's original VA for HW2 and redraw all the HW1 cutscenes for high-definition, but they couldn't spend a few days of playtesting doing something about HW2's largest game-balance issue? Well, that's just hoopy...

'Largest game-balance issue?' Oh fucking cry more, why don't you. Aww, poor baby, you've got a large fleet and you have to shoot more things, my heart just bleeds for you.

Seriously; not hard. HW2 wasn't particularly hard with a max-capacity fleet, and HW1 isn't hard over-cap. If you are failing, then you, personally, are doing something wrong, not the game.

Zaune wrote:

White Haven wrote:It very much won't, if only because if you're doing well you'll have a much, much larger fleet of assault frigates to contend with. That said, it's not terribly hard to bring your own capital battlefleet to bear if you're careful.

*sigh* Gearbox had the time and budget to pull in Karan S'jet's original VA for HW2 and redraw all the HW1 cutscenes for high-definition, but they couldn't spend a few days of playtesting doing something about HW2's largest game-balance issue? Well, that's just hoopy...

What, you mean having this show up at the ghost ship?



That's okay, all of them became mine.



Cost: ~4 corvettes and I think 2 bombers. :p

Playing HW1 and 2 again, it reminds me why my favorite was Cataclysm. Not just because of how much cooler Kuun-Lan was than both Motherships, but that the level design was just... better.

It starts off with you intervening in a fleet battle, and goes off the rails from there on. It never has a 'Defend yourself against this invincible enemy BS ship as you lose units' section, or a 'Oh no, asteroids!' mission. Even the only escort missions were 'Protect a fast target from a pursuing fleet after you did crazy commando stuff', and 'That Cruise Missile Mission' which everyone loves. Also the last mission was a real desperate battle, unlike HW2's...

Unlike Sajuuk which you never even really get to use, you get the Siege Cannon for what, 3 missions? That's pretty good.

Unifying your fighters into a fighter-bomber with expendable missiles was a much better design than fuel. Though I never cared for the linking fighters into corvettes thing.

Yeah, I think Cataclysm was really the high point of the series in fact. It fit really well with the lore and expanded it in a consistent way, unlike HW2 which retconned everything to be shitter than before, in favour of loads of mysticism... The way it worked, I feel like it solidified a lot of ideas that were in the first game, enhancing both in the process, both story and mechanics wise.

Mission and unit design were certainly superior.

Nephtys wrote:It never has a 'Defend yourself against this invincible enemy BS ship as you lose units' section

(14.8 year old un-spoilered spoilers) I swear that the section where the Bentusi are attempting to leave is basically exactly that. You have to lose a capital ship in order for fleet intelligence to bring them around. Was there another way?

The 'Defend from Bentusi' mission was indeed a 'hold out' scenario, but it was different. You had to IIRC also strike at some objects, and it was very brief, while having very very major story impacts. Unlike the seventeen ghost ships that either Mothership encounters, or yet-another-hyperspace-inhibitor type thing. I think it pretty much resolves within two or three minutes for the most part, due to how horrifyingly strong the bentusi ships are. It also, fortunately, introduces you to Super Acolytes....

Also, Cataclysm really gave a feeling that the Hiigarans now had a home and were becoming a potent local power, but still had to deal with constant threats to them, new political intrigues externally (ie, with the Republic) and internal kiith dynamics.

Plus small touches like how Somtaaw wasn't given even a mention at the end of the first battle, and that the description of the Kuun Lan in the last few missions..

Plus that was probably the best mission in the game story wise. Seriously, look at this:



"We... are... not... monsters..."

"No, you're worse then the Beast! At least the Beast doesn't pretend to be righteous!"

It still gives me goosebumps...

No. We will not be BOUND!

That line gave me chills.

@Neph

I never had the chance to play Cata, but I miss that I didn't. You and countless others have said how amazing it was, and how much HW2 was a "step backwards" from the world built up in Cata. Having Played HW2 at least, I can feel what you mean by it.

Playing HW1... Obviously I 'knew' what happens, and 'knew' the story, but never played it either until the remastered was released, so I didn't know exactly HOW things happened...
Your comments about "Small group of refuges taking on invincible Empire" are spot on I feel.

One of the early missions after you get production going, is simply to take out the fleet that Nuked your world. At that point it was believable, because apparently the Planets missile defense infected "significant" damage on the enemy fleet. So I could see out 'rag tag' group going after it in vengeance.

But from there... From there apparently they decide the next course of action is go STRAIGHT to the heart of the Empire and basically go Nuke IT! Now "In game" you obviously spend that time building a giant wall of death so near the end you just steamroll over the enemy fleet ((At least that is what I am assuming)) But.. in terms of a "Story"

It just feels.. Empty... I mean, Up until the point, I was really feeling their loss, the devastation, the sense of helplessness... I wanted to see where that would go... Having lead straight into "Were going to take on the Empire that nuked us all in one go" Was.. Not what I was expecting

The biggest gripe I hear from people looking back on HW1-2, from those who played Cata, isn't that hey were "bad" games, so much as squandered potential... Having played HW2, and now playing HW1, I can really feel what you mean.

But... you don't go right through the heart of the Empire, you take a route through a bunch of hazardous terrain to try and avoid the empire (The Asteroids and the Nebula), travel through regions of space avoided because of the Ghost Ship, sneak through a small outpost near a supernova where a big deal is made about how the interference stops them from calling to help and by god you better stop that carrier jumping out.

Then you save the Bentusi, survive an ambush and link up with the rebels, who after helping call his buddies sends you to the weakest point in the defences around your homeworld.

It's not quite the "Take on the whole heart of the empire single headedly" you seem to portray it as.

Nephtys wrote:The 'Defend from Bentusi' mission was indeed a 'hold out' scenario, but it was different. You had to IIRC also strike at some objects, and it was very brief, while having very very major story impacts. Unlike the seventeen ghost ships that either Mothership encounters, or yet-another-hyperspace-inhibitor type thing. I think it pretty much resolves within two or three minutes for the most part, due to how horrifyingly strong the bentusi ships are. It also, fortunately, introduces you to Super Acolytes....

I wasn't trying to say it was a bad section, just that fight until you lose ships is exactly what it was.

The Bentusi in Cataclysm were just beautiful. So much great dialogue.