zwanzig_zwoelf
Graverobber Foundation
Yes. I'll try the VM method a wee bit later. Surprisingly, other DX8/DX9 games work just fine.
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Let's scavange even from the scavangers, Soldiers of Anarchy
- Thread starter Gordon Shumway
- Start date
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Throwing even more speculations around, the game was develloped for Win98 and WinXP. The first one could only handle 1023 MB RAM. So the game has to cope with a very limited storage and consequently messes it up. In that time the VGA apperture size (BIOS) was a critical parameter. Even though DX and the Videocard driver should manage any storage allocation (especially using the local storage on the card), it is not impossible, that the game simply overrules the system.
Another theorie: To determine the OS an application can use different techniques. Originally the question was Win98 or WinXP, so a common technique is to call a characteristic file, which is not likely to be changed in a future version (e.g. kernal modules), handle the failiure (if it is Win98) as a legal exception and branch the program depending from errorlevel. NVidea Forceware Driver worked that way. So if the Program calls some kernal module from WinXP, which is not present in Win7 anymore, the program might behave, as if it run on Win98.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Now we still have to engage our fight against this naughty gang...
Mission 4: Two Roads, One Way (Part 2)
Mission 4: Two Roads, One Way (Part 2)
Our last steps were the preperations for the great battle, now Prof Petrow will establish the colaboration. He steps to the gate of the Claw- base allone. If any other party member enters the zone around the base, the gang turn hostile and the game is over. The guard has to be adressed when the short cutscene is over, waiting too long will turn the gang hostile and.... game over!
After the dialogue with the guard our Prof Petrow has to follow him to the Claw boss and adress him. If he waits more than 30 sec, the Claws turn hostile and... zilch!
The boss has no clue at all, that our Prof Petrow is not a member of the Claw gang. Delivering the right password seems to be absolutely convincing especially if that password is "shrapnell". Our new allies allready plan a raid against the TFR and provide the empty T 55, we allready have noticed.
From now on, all team members can freely enter the Claw- base, they can enter the TFR- base as well, if they survive. Feodor grabs the tank and moves to the battlefield after Prof Petrow has taken the gunner position. This tank is only equipped with 5 rounds of HEAT- ammo, we will need them. Independent from the chosen partner the following battle will consist of several waves. Two Humvee and a BTR leave the TFR Base and head to the center of town. Our mines at least kill one of the Humvees.
Boris takes the remaining mines away, we want those heavier vehicles the less damaged as possible. In town the remaining TFR- units are confronted with the appearance of two opposing lone fighters. These "agents provocateurs" start the battle, which results in a few 14,5mm bullet right through our ally.
The enemy loner stands right behind the tree. Now there are two vehicles and a lone soldier from the TFR in town.
Our allies counter that with two Humvees, which die after a heroic battle, in fact the TFR- Humvee is still alive and the BTR hardly got a scratch. That way our team can perform all the kills and receive the experience. The next wave will start, if two out of three enemy vehicles are destroyed or (more precisely) their crew is killed. To get those forces moving and perhaps isolating one of them we start to shoot a 73 mm HEAT on the BTR.
Of course ALL enemys of that place come to the shooting site but one after the other and our BMP 1 has allready left. This loner seems to be a bit too curious, unfortunately for him, the BTR has allready decided to retreat and is totally unaware of the enemies, that lone soldier might have seen. Vehicles have a shorter detection range than unmounted soldiers. So our Humvee uses the opportunity to fire a few more rounds and our BMP 1 returns to his firing position to give that BTR another "HEAT and retreat". After two 73 mm HEAT in its backside this thing is ready for the killing blow, which is performed by a 73 mm HESH. This annoyes the remaining Humvee and forces my BMP 1 to move away from shooting site and also triggers the next wave. So if any preperations need to be done it is possible to control the events by preventing the triggers. We will use that later. At this moment accidently four houses are blown up.
Another enemy loner appears and 2 enemy BTR are entering the scene. Our allies engage them with a BTR and a lone soldier, which last not much longer than the first battle group. All enemies survived.
For the destruction of the enemy Humvee we need the empty BTR. The momentary positioning gives us the right opportunity. A tailshot with a 73 mm HEAT lures the enemies away and Ivan, who has waited near the field grabs the empty BTR.
Of course he has to be fast, very fast. That lone TFR- soldier catches a bullet some time later (Actually I forgot when.). Another odd discovery reveals some extra loot.
Those objects are definitely not placed (or spawned) here but can be picked up. Technically this finding seems to be a bug, so one might considder it unfair to pick those items up. Well I can cope with that, but I am greedy, so Akim picks them up. Our T 55 will now enter service. The BTR, which has not been shot by our BMP 1 catches a 125 mm HEAT in its back. So this BTR could be emptied by a single 73 mm HEAT or (more expensive but lower damage) HESH. It would certainly not stand another 125 mm HEAT. The next wave will be triggered, if the crew of one of the two BTR of the recent wave is eliminated and there are some tasks to fullfill before.
Boris has allready spotted the next wave in front of the TFR- base, a T 55 and a BMP 1. If those can be emptied or captured before they engage, our mission would be easier. So we target the BMP 1.
That 125 HEAT seems to explode beside the BMP 1, but it does hit. There was no good opportunity for a real tailshot, so the impact hits more of the side armour, which can withstand a bit better. Our tank has allready turned before shooting and can retreat out of range, before any of the enemy tanks has turned its turret. The further retreat was significantly eased by the hilly terrain. To finish the BMP, we need our own, though that enemy most likely does not stand another 125 mm HEAT. The BMP moves a bit faster than the T 55, so a different shooting position could be found. The enemy T 55 (which can outreach the 73 mm cannon of the BMP 1) was obscured by several trees. Our BMP 1 shot a HEAT and retreated right over the edge of the plateau around the TFR- Base making the two enemy tanks following. Our heroes waitetd in shooting range but out of detection range, so the BMP could be shot a second time. That shot really finished its crew, even though the T 55 noticed the shooting and our BMP 1 had to retreat temporarly for another time.
That APC was a bit difficult to capture, but the 8 HESH rounds make it worth. Back in town, the second wave still holds positions. The captured BTR 80 needs only 3 seconds to shred the enemy Humvee in pieces and 5 more to retreat. The less damaged BTR, which has allready catched a 73 mm HEAT still needs treatment. Another 73 mm HEAT and a HESH will do the job, but 40 mm grenades are cheaper.
It is possible to engage the closer BTR 80 with the Humvee, shoot one Grenade and retreat behind that building, before one of the two APC has noticed it and turned its turret. Of course our Humvee is noticed almost exactly the moment it is in shooting range, but the trees and the corners of the building provide enough cover to retreat and the gunner of the closer vehicle might be killed allready. In fact the pathfinding algorithm can ruin that plan, so I would not recommend that way as a standard solution. It turned out, that the BTR had to be shot 2 times until that "permanent flame effekt" indicated a 80 % damage and the yellow marker indicates the gunner to be killed, forcing that BTR to flee. Boris plants a new minefield, because we expect that T 55 to come, when one of the BTR on the field is emptied.
Those enemy BTR carry a bit less ammo (measutred in trade value), than it takes to capture them, so capturing seems not interesting on the first look. But we will take the least damaged vehicle home which nets around 8000 nines and there are some ways to use those captured vehicles later, which relativate their value. This shot comes from the western edge of the field, to catch the front of the BTR. A tailshot would have destroyed it and I did not want to waste a HESH round on that worthless junk, for I only want to grab its ammo. The remaining BTR can be ignored for now.
The T 55 hits one mine as planned, which spares one shot with a 125 mm HEAT. Even though we eleminated that BMP 1 in advance, things sped up a bit. The T 55 rolled eastward, followed by our T 55 that looked for a good opportunity for a tailshot. One more 125 mm HEAT would be needed and one or two 73 mm HESH (or one HEAT and one HESH). Meanwhile:
Boris takes cover. Fortunately he knows How not to be seen. Boris retreates a bit further from the TFR- Base. Actually the TFR owns 2 Cayuse, the other one still stands on the heliport, where he was spotted before. This wave engages directly to the claw base, the radio message from our allies should be taken serious. If any TFR- unit enters the Claw- base... needless to explain. The heli only needs to fly over the base to enter it. Fortunately the TFR have not read the rules of this game and does not engage the Claw- base from the south, from where they could reach it. The flight goes over the field in the center slightly to the north to that place, where the former minefield secured the road to the Claw- base. From there the Cayuse turns to the south and heads straigt to the base. The Claws have deployed their Shilka there, which could shred that heli, but that unit might be misplaced somewhere. Fortunately Helena is allready alarmed and has readied her RPG. If you fire and the target is still moving, this would happen:
The RPG cannot guide its grenade. When that Cayuse attacks one of those claw units, it will stand still for a few seconds, providing the opportunity we need.
One Claw- Humvee was destroyed (providing a little additional loot) and Helena gained a level. If we had allied with the TFR, the ultimate weapon of the Claws would have been a shilka. Our tank problem still has to be solved. While we had to take care of the Cayuse, the T 55 still advances.
If that tank will stop a few seconds on that crossroads, Prof Petrow and Ivan can shoot him. If not, our tank has to criss- cross directly to the claw base, to catch it there. Fortunately our BMP 1 has allready redeployed in a nice shooting position. Though it is right in shooting direction of our tank, noone would deploy a unit right there (maybe in an angle of 60°), so don't try that at home! We put all our positive waves in it and the T 55 did stop and catched a 125 mm HEAT.
Oh, quelle surprise... this tank has (at least) 3 crewmembers, the third one is manning the AA MG (another thing a normal tank crew would never do while beeing shot from another tank). In that exposed position our BMP 1 can score an easy hit and kill with a 73 mm HESH and another one for the rest of the crew before they manage to turn their gun. Fortunately Ivan has one 125 mm HEAT left, because we havent, noticed that TFR- BTR 80 leaving the base and engaging the Claws right over that crossroads.
So it takes another crossfire (125 mm HEAT + 73 mm HESH). Both vehicles are heavy damaged, but the T 55 provides some usefull ammo. This finishes the last wave. The remaining BTR 80 without gunner can be emptied by a flame grenade on the ground nearby. This method is tricky, because the vehicle will most probable be destroyed by a direct hit, but it is cheap and holds no danger. We managed to capture the BTR with more than 90 % damage.
Now our allies increase their demands, we should defeat the TFR by destroying three targets in their base. Of course, we have to do that work. After that (friendly spoken) "mediocral" performance during the battle it is clearly obvious, that the Claws are not capable for that job. So for compensation the Claws offer more supplies (Actually we could have taken them before.).
That crate directly beside the boss contains three bundles of explosives. Those can be used to destroy the targets but there is no obligation to do so, any other method is also allowed. The other crates hold some more or less usefull items.
That kind of crates contain (how surprizing!) heavy ammo. As allready explained, any ammo of 14,5 mm or more except RPG and 40 mm grenades is counted as heavy, so characters cannot take them into their inventory (but they can lift them to reload the guns in a vehicle...). The inventory of that crates is only displayed for a few seconds and added to the group (party) inventory. This inventory allready holds all vehicles, which have been brought from home or occupied during that mission. All items in the inventory except vehicles, which have to be abandoned due to the lack of drivers are transferred automaticly into the global inventory in the bunker and can be accessed there for the first time.
So our next step is the conquest of the TFR- base.
After the dialogue with the guard our Prof Petrow has to follow him to the Claw boss and adress him. If he waits more than 30 sec, the Claws turn hostile and... zilch!
The boss has no clue at all, that our Prof Petrow is not a member of the Claw gang. Delivering the right password seems to be absolutely convincing especially if that password is "shrapnell". Our new allies allready plan a raid against the TFR and provide the empty T 55, we allready have noticed.
From now on, all team members can freely enter the Claw- base, they can enter the TFR- base as well, if they survive. Feodor grabs the tank and moves to the battlefield after Prof Petrow has taken the gunner position. This tank is only equipped with 5 rounds of HEAT- ammo, we will need them. Independent from the chosen partner the following battle will consist of several waves. Two Humvee and a BTR leave the TFR Base and head to the center of town. Our mines at least kill one of the Humvees.
Boris takes the remaining mines away, we want those heavier vehicles the less damaged as possible. In town the remaining TFR- units are confronted with the appearance of two opposing lone fighters. These "agents provocateurs" start the battle, which results in a few 14,5mm bullet right through our ally.
The enemy loner stands right behind the tree. Now there are two vehicles and a lone soldier from the TFR in town.
Our allies counter that with two Humvees, which die after a heroic battle, in fact the TFR- Humvee is still alive and the BTR hardly got a scratch. That way our team can perform all the kills and receive the experience. The next wave will start, if two out of three enemy vehicles are destroyed or (more precisely) their crew is killed. To get those forces moving and perhaps isolating one of them we start to shoot a 73 mm HEAT on the BTR.
Of course ALL enemys of that place come to the shooting site but one after the other and our BMP 1 has allready left. This loner seems to be a bit too curious, unfortunately for him, the BTR has allready decided to retreat and is totally unaware of the enemies, that lone soldier might have seen. Vehicles have a shorter detection range than unmounted soldiers. So our Humvee uses the opportunity to fire a few more rounds and our BMP 1 returns to his firing position to give that BTR another "HEAT and retreat". After two 73 mm HEAT in its backside this thing is ready for the killing blow, which is performed by a 73 mm HESH. This annoyes the remaining Humvee and forces my BMP 1 to move away from shooting site and also triggers the next wave. So if any preperations need to be done it is possible to control the events by preventing the triggers. We will use that later. At this moment accidently four houses are blown up.
Another enemy loner appears and 2 enemy BTR are entering the scene. Our allies engage them with a BTR and a lone soldier, which last not much longer than the first battle group. All enemies survived.
For the destruction of the enemy Humvee we need the empty BTR. The momentary positioning gives us the right opportunity. A tailshot with a 73 mm HEAT lures the enemies away and Ivan, who has waited near the field grabs the empty BTR.
Of course he has to be fast, very fast. That lone TFR- soldier catches a bullet some time later (Actually I forgot when.). Another odd discovery reveals some extra loot.
Those objects are definitely not placed (or spawned) here but can be picked up. Technically this finding seems to be a bug, so one might considder it unfair to pick those items up. Well I can cope with that, but I am greedy, so Akim picks them up. Our T 55 will now enter service. The BTR, which has not been shot by our BMP 1 catches a 125 mm HEAT in its back. So this BTR could be emptied by a single 73 mm HEAT or (more expensive but lower damage) HESH. It would certainly not stand another 125 mm HEAT. The next wave will be triggered, if the crew of one of the two BTR of the recent wave is eliminated and there are some tasks to fullfill before.
Boris has allready spotted the next wave in front of the TFR- base, a T 55 and a BMP 1. If those can be emptied or captured before they engage, our mission would be easier. So we target the BMP 1.
That 125 HEAT seems to explode beside the BMP 1, but it does hit. There was no good opportunity for a real tailshot, so the impact hits more of the side armour, which can withstand a bit better. Our tank has allready turned before shooting and can retreat out of range, before any of the enemy tanks has turned its turret. The further retreat was significantly eased by the hilly terrain. To finish the BMP, we need our own, though that enemy most likely does not stand another 125 mm HEAT. The BMP moves a bit faster than the T 55, so a different shooting position could be found. The enemy T 55 (which can outreach the 73 mm cannon of the BMP 1) was obscured by several trees. Our BMP 1 shot a HEAT and retreated right over the edge of the plateau around the TFR- Base making the two enemy tanks following. Our heroes waitetd in shooting range but out of detection range, so the BMP could be shot a second time. That shot really finished its crew, even though the T 55 noticed the shooting and our BMP 1 had to retreat temporarly for another time.
That APC was a bit difficult to capture, but the 8 HESH rounds make it worth. Back in town, the second wave still holds positions. The captured BTR 80 needs only 3 seconds to shred the enemy Humvee in pieces and 5 more to retreat. The less damaged BTR, which has allready catched a 73 mm HEAT still needs treatment. Another 73 mm HEAT and a HESH will do the job, but 40 mm grenades are cheaper.
It is possible to engage the closer BTR 80 with the Humvee, shoot one Grenade and retreat behind that building, before one of the two APC has noticed it and turned its turret. Of course our Humvee is noticed almost exactly the moment it is in shooting range, but the trees and the corners of the building provide enough cover to retreat and the gunner of the closer vehicle might be killed allready. In fact the pathfinding algorithm can ruin that plan, so I would not recommend that way as a standard solution. It turned out, that the BTR had to be shot 2 times until that "permanent flame effekt" indicated a 80 % damage and the yellow marker indicates the gunner to be killed, forcing that BTR to flee. Boris plants a new minefield, because we expect that T 55 to come, when one of the BTR on the field is emptied.
Those enemy BTR carry a bit less ammo (measutred in trade value), than it takes to capture them, so capturing seems not interesting on the first look. But we will take the least damaged vehicle home which nets around 8000 nines and there are some ways to use those captured vehicles later, which relativate their value. This shot comes from the western edge of the field, to catch the front of the BTR. A tailshot would have destroyed it and I did not want to waste a HESH round on that worthless junk, for I only want to grab its ammo. The remaining BTR can be ignored for now.
The T 55 hits one mine as planned, which spares one shot with a 125 mm HEAT. Even though we eleminated that BMP 1 in advance, things sped up a bit. The T 55 rolled eastward, followed by our T 55 that looked for a good opportunity for a tailshot. One more 125 mm HEAT would be needed and one or two 73 mm HESH (or one HEAT and one HESH). Meanwhile:
Boris takes cover. Fortunately he knows How not to be seen. Boris retreates a bit further from the TFR- Base. Actually the TFR owns 2 Cayuse, the other one still stands on the heliport, where he was spotted before. This wave engages directly to the claw base, the radio message from our allies should be taken serious. If any TFR- unit enters the Claw- base... needless to explain. The heli only needs to fly over the base to enter it. Fortunately the TFR have not read the rules of this game and does not engage the Claw- base from the south, from where they could reach it. The flight goes over the field in the center slightly to the north to that place, where the former minefield secured the road to the Claw- base. From there the Cayuse turns to the south and heads straigt to the base. The Claws have deployed their Shilka there, which could shred that heli, but that unit might be misplaced somewhere. Fortunately Helena is allready alarmed and has readied her RPG. If you fire and the target is still moving, this would happen:
The RPG cannot guide its grenade. When that Cayuse attacks one of those claw units, it will stand still for a few seconds, providing the opportunity we need.
One Claw- Humvee was destroyed (providing a little additional loot) and Helena gained a level. If we had allied with the TFR, the ultimate weapon of the Claws would have been a shilka. Our tank problem still has to be solved. While we had to take care of the Cayuse, the T 55 still advances.
If that tank will stop a few seconds on that crossroads, Prof Petrow and Ivan can shoot him. If not, our tank has to criss- cross directly to the claw base, to catch it there. Fortunately our BMP 1 has allready redeployed in a nice shooting position. Though it is right in shooting direction of our tank, noone would deploy a unit right there (maybe in an angle of 60°), so don't try that at home! We put all our positive waves in it and the T 55 did stop and catched a 125 mm HEAT.
Oh, quelle surprise... this tank has (at least) 3 crewmembers, the third one is manning the AA MG (another thing a normal tank crew would never do while beeing shot from another tank). In that exposed position our BMP 1 can score an easy hit and kill with a 73 mm HESH and another one for the rest of the crew before they manage to turn their gun. Fortunately Ivan has one 125 mm HEAT left, because we havent, noticed that TFR- BTR 80 leaving the base and engaging the Claws right over that crossroads.
So it takes another crossfire (125 mm HEAT + 73 mm HESH). Both vehicles are heavy damaged, but the T 55 provides some usefull ammo. This finishes the last wave. The remaining BTR 80 without gunner can be emptied by a flame grenade on the ground nearby. This method is tricky, because the vehicle will most probable be destroyed by a direct hit, but it is cheap and holds no danger. We managed to capture the BTR with more than 90 % damage.
Now our allies increase their demands, we should defeat the TFR by destroying three targets in their base. Of course, we have to do that work. After that (friendly spoken) "mediocral" performance during the battle it is clearly obvious, that the Claws are not capable for that job. So for compensation the Claws offer more supplies (Actually we could have taken them before.).
That crate directly beside the boss contains three bundles of explosives. Those can be used to destroy the targets but there is no obligation to do so, any other method is also allowed. The other crates hold some more or less usefull items.
That kind of crates contain (how surprizing!) heavy ammo. As allready explained, any ammo of 14,5 mm or more except RPG and 40 mm grenades is counted as heavy, so characters cannot take them into their inventory (but they can lift them to reload the guns in a vehicle...). The inventory of that crates is only displayed for a few seconds and added to the group (party) inventory. This inventory allready holds all vehicles, which have been brought from home or occupied during that mission. All items in the inventory except vehicles, which have to be abandoned due to the lack of drivers are transferred automaticly into the global inventory in the bunker and can be accessed there for the first time.
So our next step is the conquest of the TFR- base.
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Gordon Shumway
Literate
Let's finish this little "gang problem".
Mission 4: Two Roads, One Way (Part 3)
Mission 4: Two Roads, One Way (Part 3)
Getting closer to the TFR- Base Akim discovers three new guardposts.
Each guardteam is armed with an M 60 and a RPG 7, fortunately sneaking up from behind is possible. So Ivan, Prof Petrow, Anatoli and Victor put on their sneakers. Though we only brought a M 60 and two shotguns (and lootet a single UZI), we can't engage into a longer shootout. The first voley should eleminate at least the RPG- gunner. The RPG from the opposite guardpost could reach our group but the direct line of fire is obscured by the sandbag barrier. So this RPG- gunner had to run around it. The M 60 is out of range. The enemy will shoot on the first target, he can see, ignoring other targets he detected later as long as the initial target is in sight. If that target is obscured, the enemy will advance. We plan to kill these guards before they detect our group. If the opposite guardpost is alerted, those guards should be forced to advance to find a line of fire, giving us some precious time. Our group will retrat instantly behind the top of the hill or behind the sandbags and the guards have to keep advancing, so Boris and Akim could clear the situation with the BTR.
Fortunately the first attack clearded that guardpost without alerting the other. As an alternativ tactic a nade could be used. Those mines between the two guardposts have appeared recently beside the few mines Boris planted earlier. Boris clears them all later. The other guardposts can be eliminated in the same way. The captured M 60 will be helpful.
Akim takes a closer look to get an impression about the remaining enemy forces.
The enemy force consists of a T 55, a BMP 1 and a Humvee and of course the Cayuse enforced by less than 10 soldiers. Some gangmembers are patroling around. As usual the land vehicles redeploy randomly. In this case they might redeploy even outside of the walls, which offers a great opportunity for capture. The heli remains on position. If the TFR detects any of our units inside of the walls, they will alert everyone. The heli will start and under no circumstances return to ground on its own device. The missiongoal covers only destroying the three targets, so a sneaky attempt could be taken into account.
In that case any remaining TFR- unit will leave the base and vanish rendering it unable to be captured, killed or destroyed whatsoever. The mission could have been designed in a way to reward that sneaky, clever kind of solution perhaps by making the TFR leaving their vehicles behind or some extra crates and extra enemies to compensate the loss of experience. So we are forced to annihilate the TFR completely just to "get our share and cover our expenses".
The guards on the gate moved out during the attack on the BMP 1 and remained exactly in the crater of the first HEAT our T 55 fired here. Fortunately a KPW can outreach a machinegun.
Unfortunately the picture quality makes it hard to spot that the 14,5 KPW uses tracer ammo. Victor and Anatoli deal with the other guard in a routine sneaky job. Those guys drop the RPK MG, which is plotted out slightly superior to the M 60 in the game and can be fed with the same ammo. Both weapons are gas operated, so it might be possible to adopt the RPK from the 7.62 x 39mm caliber to the more powerfull 7.62 x 51mm NATO. Most likely the barrels, which have always been the weak spot of the RPK, will wear out even faster. The next redeployment of the BMP 1 offers a good oppurtunity. For the capture one 125 mm HEAT and one 73 mm HESH could be used. We use a RPG 7 instead of the HEAT for monetary reasons. Trading those captured RPG will net 2000 nines no matter if a grenade (value 1000 nines) is loaded or not, unloading is not possible so we should empty it before selling.
Prof Petrow runs towards the wall, when the Grenade still is in flight and is obscured by the corner, before the BMP 1 can turn its turret. Another 73 mm HESH empties the BMP. Maybe a flame grenade or a molotow cocktail would also do the job. The captured BMP holds some usefull ammo. There is a sneaky entrance into the base only guarded by an unarmed (yes, really!) TFR- member. This guard can be shot from the outside, if a sneaky entrance is really nescessary.
If this guard detects any of our units outside, he will call for assistance forcing other TFR- units to leave the base and engage to the spot, where the guard has detected our unit for the last time. So this means perfect oportunuties for ambushes, especialy because the ways the enemy uses are fairly predictable. There is no use in capturing the TFR- Humvee, so Boris can use up some of his mines. Mines are really cheap.
To lure this car outside, Boris just steps near the wall, when the Humvee stands right on the other side. Near the entrance gate some more immaterial loot can be found.
Like before those items are physically not present but can be picked up, and like before we qietly accept this extra loot. Another appearance right in front of that little gate forces the guard to call for help. We alert that guy when the T 55 has deployed in the southern part of the base, closer to that little gate, so the T 55 joins the assistance, takes the way directly beside the wall as predicted and catches one mine. Unfortunately none of the three crewmembers was willing to leave the tank, so killing them without totally destroying the T 55 turned out to be hard work.
A combination of a 73 mm HESH, one 40 mm flame grenade and a molotov cocktail and finally some crossbow shots solved the problem though three facts have to be mentioned: The T 55 stayed outside the base after the impact of the 73 mm HESH (maybe because having lost the first crewmember). The 40 mm flame grenade killed the gunner. The molotov cocktail had to be placed in a way that alerted the tank, forcing it to flee and by this taking less heat damage. The patroling TFR- members werde killed one by one in a similar way. It is important not having been detected inside the TFR- base so far. To capture the Cayuse, we need a direct line of fire. So a part of the wall has to be demolished by MG shooting by using up the ammo in the two captured BMP 1, which are too damaged to be taken home. Prof Petrow and Helena have taken over the BMP 1 and serve the heli just one 73 mm HESH, which instantly eleminates the crew.
The two guards will concentrate on the BMP and should be lured away first and killed, because they could reoccupy the cayuse.
Now the base is ours. Some crates can be found near the bunker in the northern part and three crates with heavy ammo alltogether.
Now it is time to take care of the three targets. We will not waste our explosives but using up the ammo of one captured BTR 80. So capturing that vehicle pays a bit more as it saves 900 nines.
After firing 80 rounds the bunker blows up and (nice surprise) the second bunker blows up too. The bunkers of the second target behave the same way.
That scrubber only needs 5 rounds to explode. Obviously staying away from the target as it explodes seems to be a good idea. Right after the last blowup the seekers reappear at the supermarket and patrol the streets, so any forgotten mine should have been removed before. Prof. Petrow talks to Vladow to grab the T 55 and receive the information about NOAH. The seekers do not know their HQ but at least the position of a major lab.
That wasn't a real surprize to find the tank here, wasn't it. The official part of that mission ends here. Near the Claw- base in the court of the destillery a crate can be picked up. There is no easy way into that court (maybe they forgot that), so one wall has to be demolished.
We pick the vehicles worth to be taken home and leave 6 vehicles behind.
Unfortunately there is no way of clearing the gangs totally, even after having won the mission we are not allowed to attack the Claws. If they have any idea, that we have annihilated their chapter in New Boston? But there is a way of making the Claws "pay" a bit more for our service. Those two almost completely wrecked BMP 1 are parked directly beside the guards in the entrance of the Claw- base.
Even if it is forbidden to shoot my ally it is allowed to shoot an empty vehicle, which explodes. It wasn't me, it was an accident.
Strange enough, every guard carries an addidional (unloaded) M 60. More accidents unfortunately lead to a game over. Our ally tolerates only a certain number of casulties before he is pissed of, so if the TFR had not destroyed that Claw- Humvee (part 2), there could have been 2 accidents more.
So we grab our stuff and return home.
Each guardteam is armed with an M 60 and a RPG 7, fortunately sneaking up from behind is possible. So Ivan, Prof Petrow, Anatoli and Victor put on their sneakers. Though we only brought a M 60 and two shotguns (and lootet a single UZI), we can't engage into a longer shootout. The first voley should eleminate at least the RPG- gunner. The RPG from the opposite guardpost could reach our group but the direct line of fire is obscured by the sandbag barrier. So this RPG- gunner had to run around it. The M 60 is out of range. The enemy will shoot on the first target, he can see, ignoring other targets he detected later as long as the initial target is in sight. If that target is obscured, the enemy will advance. We plan to kill these guards before they detect our group. If the opposite guardpost is alerted, those guards should be forced to advance to find a line of fire, giving us some precious time. Our group will retrat instantly behind the top of the hill or behind the sandbags and the guards have to keep advancing, so Boris and Akim could clear the situation with the BTR.
Fortunately the first attack clearded that guardpost without alerting the other. As an alternativ tactic a nade could be used. Those mines between the two guardposts have appeared recently beside the few mines Boris planted earlier. Boris clears them all later. The other guardposts can be eliminated in the same way. The captured M 60 will be helpful.
Akim takes a closer look to get an impression about the remaining enemy forces.
The enemy force consists of a T 55, a BMP 1 and a Humvee and of course the Cayuse enforced by less than 10 soldiers. Some gangmembers are patroling around. As usual the land vehicles redeploy randomly. In this case they might redeploy even outside of the walls, which offers a great opportunity for capture. The heli remains on position. If the TFR detects any of our units inside of the walls, they will alert everyone. The heli will start and under no circumstances return to ground on its own device. The missiongoal covers only destroying the three targets, so a sneaky attempt could be taken into account.
In that case any remaining TFR- unit will leave the base and vanish rendering it unable to be captured, killed or destroyed whatsoever. The mission could have been designed in a way to reward that sneaky, clever kind of solution perhaps by making the TFR leaving their vehicles behind or some extra crates and extra enemies to compensate the loss of experience. So we are forced to annihilate the TFR completely just to "get our share and cover our expenses".
The guards on the gate moved out during the attack on the BMP 1 and remained exactly in the crater of the first HEAT our T 55 fired here. Fortunately a KPW can outreach a machinegun.
Unfortunately the picture quality makes it hard to spot that the 14,5 KPW uses tracer ammo. Victor and Anatoli deal with the other guard in a routine sneaky job. Those guys drop the RPK MG, which is plotted out slightly superior to the M 60 in the game and can be fed with the same ammo. Both weapons are gas operated, so it might be possible to adopt the RPK from the 7.62 x 39mm caliber to the more powerfull 7.62 x 51mm NATO. Most likely the barrels, which have always been the weak spot of the RPK, will wear out even faster. The next redeployment of the BMP 1 offers a good oppurtunity. For the capture one 125 mm HEAT and one 73 mm HESH could be used. We use a RPG 7 instead of the HEAT for monetary reasons. Trading those captured RPG will net 2000 nines no matter if a grenade (value 1000 nines) is loaded or not, unloading is not possible so we should empty it before selling.
Prof Petrow runs towards the wall, when the Grenade still is in flight and is obscured by the corner, before the BMP 1 can turn its turret. Another 73 mm HESH empties the BMP. Maybe a flame grenade or a molotow cocktail would also do the job. The captured BMP holds some usefull ammo. There is a sneaky entrance into the base only guarded by an unarmed (yes, really!) TFR- member. This guard can be shot from the outside, if a sneaky entrance is really nescessary.
If this guard detects any of our units outside, he will call for assistance forcing other TFR- units to leave the base and engage to the spot, where the guard has detected our unit for the last time. So this means perfect oportunuties for ambushes, especialy because the ways the enemy uses are fairly predictable. There is no use in capturing the TFR- Humvee, so Boris can use up some of his mines. Mines are really cheap.
To lure this car outside, Boris just steps near the wall, when the Humvee stands right on the other side. Near the entrance gate some more immaterial loot can be found.
Like before those items are physically not present but can be picked up, and like before we qietly accept this extra loot. Another appearance right in front of that little gate forces the guard to call for help. We alert that guy when the T 55 has deployed in the southern part of the base, closer to that little gate, so the T 55 joins the assistance, takes the way directly beside the wall as predicted and catches one mine. Unfortunately none of the three crewmembers was willing to leave the tank, so killing them without totally destroying the T 55 turned out to be hard work.
A combination of a 73 mm HESH, one 40 mm flame grenade and a molotov cocktail and finally some crossbow shots solved the problem though three facts have to be mentioned: The T 55 stayed outside the base after the impact of the 73 mm HESH (maybe because having lost the first crewmember). The 40 mm flame grenade killed the gunner. The molotov cocktail had to be placed in a way that alerted the tank, forcing it to flee and by this taking less heat damage. The patroling TFR- members werde killed one by one in a similar way. It is important not having been detected inside the TFR- base so far. To capture the Cayuse, we need a direct line of fire. So a part of the wall has to be demolished by MG shooting by using up the ammo in the two captured BMP 1, which are too damaged to be taken home. Prof Petrow and Helena have taken over the BMP 1 and serve the heli just one 73 mm HESH, which instantly eleminates the crew.
The two guards will concentrate on the BMP and should be lured away first and killed, because they could reoccupy the cayuse.
Now the base is ours. Some crates can be found near the bunker in the northern part and three crates with heavy ammo alltogether.
Now it is time to take care of the three targets. We will not waste our explosives but using up the ammo of one captured BTR 80. So capturing that vehicle pays a bit more as it saves 900 nines.
After firing 80 rounds the bunker blows up and (nice surprise) the second bunker blows up too. The bunkers of the second target behave the same way.
That scrubber only needs 5 rounds to explode. Obviously staying away from the target as it explodes seems to be a good idea. Right after the last blowup the seekers reappear at the supermarket and patrol the streets, so any forgotten mine should have been removed before. Prof. Petrow talks to Vladow to grab the T 55 and receive the information about NOAH. The seekers do not know their HQ but at least the position of a major lab.
That wasn't a real surprize to find the tank here, wasn't it. The official part of that mission ends here. Near the Claw- base in the court of the destillery a crate can be picked up. There is no easy way into that court (maybe they forgot that), so one wall has to be demolished.
We pick the vehicles worth to be taken home and leave 6 vehicles behind.
Unfortunately there is no way of clearing the gangs totally, even after having won the mission we are not allowed to attack the Claws. If they have any idea, that we have annihilated their chapter in New Boston? But there is a way of making the Claws "pay" a bit more for our service. Those two almost completely wrecked BMP 1 are parked directly beside the guards in the entrance of the Claw- base.
Even if it is forbidden to shoot my ally it is allowed to shoot an empty vehicle, which explodes. It wasn't me, it was an accident.
Strange enough, every guard carries an addidional (unloaded) M 60. More accidents unfortunately lead to a game over. Our ally tolerates only a certain number of casulties before he is pissed of, so if the TFR had not destroyed that Claw- Humvee (part 2), there could have been 2 accidents more.
So we grab our stuff and return home.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Between Missions
So we brought home three T 55, A chopper and other usefull stuff and got at least some information which might lead to a contact with NOAH. Must have been one of our even bearable days.
Helena and Boris gained enough levels to be trained. They both learn the athletic skill. Boris (as the second after David) has reached the maximum of two skills. Of course he can still advance, which slightly increases his abilities. In hospital Sorana and Feodor receive the hormone treatment.
Our preperation time of 28 h is filled with the production of 3 doses of fly and 2 medipacs. After unloading the vehicles we use the repair bay.
There is no combination of damaged vehicles, which fits into the timeframe, we can repair only one vehile. It's our choice to take the most damaged vehicle or to create as much value as possible. As a compromize one BMP 1 is repaired with a rest of 12 h. The engineers use that time to place additional armour on our valuable Ural.
Both MG of the T 55 we got from the Claws do not contain any ammo. Loading it could be a waste, because we might trade that T 55 away some time. So we mark it by renaming. The current ammo count of the Humvee is marked the same way. Now we use the hangar for the first time.
The chopper can be resupplied with several weapon systems. Unfortunately there are none of them available yet. The devs obviously did not take in mind, that someone could capture the Cayuse. Reloading those weapons is only possible here, not in the field. The ammo slot is greyed out, until a weapon is present. Only the apropiate ammo can be placed in that slot. The hangar got its own 28 h timeframe (independent from other facilities) and our Chopper can be repaired in 17 h. That generates a net income of 66,000 nines if we ever plan to trade it away.
That brings us to the next step. Vladi offers at least some usefull stuff, but almost nothing, we cannot get for free in the next mission. So we trade in some ammo for the Dragunov, which is extremely rare, and some 73 mm HEAT (turnover of 5,500 nines).
Having captured some AK 74 it seems to be a good idea to use them (instead of trading them away). Unfortunately our enemies use them very rarely, so the fives are also not very common. There are some new item- descriptions available.
As allready pointed out the use of "unified 7,62 mm caliber" for any MG (PKT, M 60, RPK) seems to be a very rude simplification. It would be more bearable, if the devs just would it call "MG- ammo" without trying to put any information in it, which turns out to be untrue. The pain doubles when a closer look into the game reveals, that the devs allready took the differences between the different calibers (even the fact, that the AA MG of the T 55 is chambered for 12,7 x 108 mm) into account. So it is not clear what causes those simplifications: ignorance, budget cuts, a tight schedule to meet the holliday shopping season or all of them. Even if assumed, that the weapons have been rechambered (to rescue the plot), we cannot say, which caliber has been chosen. As a rough estimation it seems to be easier to convert from 7,62 x 39 mm to 7,62 x 51 mm. In game the accuracy of the RPK is slightly superiour to the M 60, the price is also.
The description of that weapon holds more "fake news" than a comparable snippet of any article of the "Guardian" or the "Sun". Not the weapon has been invented over 100 years ago, as stated, but the ammo. Even though the word "Снайперская" indicates a sniper rifle, the term "marksmans rifle" would describe the role of that weapon more precisly. The corresponding ammo is described as 5,65 mm caliber instead of (7,62 x 54 mm R), which does not exist. Maybe they just "misspelled" the 5,56 x 45 mm caliber (the german term for mispelling numbers is "Zahlendreher"), but there cannot be seen any reason why. They also cut magazine capacity from 10 to 5. in game that weapon can be used by everyone, but the sharpshooter skill has to be trained to enable a single shot kill. The bullets cut even through vehicle cases and armour causing minimal structural and more organic damage, which can be usefull to capture the vehicle. The range have been cut to redicolous 200m which is very much compared to the other redicolous weapon ranges in the game.
As allready pointed out, that weapon could be very usefull, if they had not cut the range that much. Similar to the AT 2 those guided rockets rarely miss their target. The damage is comparable to a 125 mm HEAT. The launcher can only be mounted to the Humvee. The variant for heli can shoot much further but holds only a single rocket.
The devs chose the civil designation of the Huges OH- 6 Cayuse. Due to its size and the lack of armour the Cayuse counts as a "flying faberguee egg". This chopper can carry launchers for SA 7 or TOW or a double 14,5 mm MK on its two access points. The modular concept of multiple access points and different armament subsystems has been converted very well into that game. So helis can be equipped very flexible. As allready seen during the last mission, choppers cannot move freely but always remain in a certain hight above the ground (unless landed).
This APC consists of the chassis of an M 113 with a mounted 20 mm "Vulcan" gatling MK, which is also used to equip fighterplanes. Unfortunately it is impossible to dismount the Vulcan and mount other weapons like the TOW or the 40 mm MK 19. The high equipment flexibility is one of the major advantages of the M 113 in reality, overweighting its major drawbacks the low mine protection and the too high center of mass. In game the Vulcan has been rechambered to 14,5 mm, which would be possible but very dfficult and far from useful though any other (not too heavy) weapon, including the KPV, could be adopted to the chassis. In contrast to the real model this vehicle has a remarkable strong armour, which can take more damage than the BMP 1.
To get into touch with NOAH a visit at the main laboratory could be a good idea. Unfortunately some more obstacles crossed our way.
Moving out from "Bergstadt" the TFR occupied the township "Solensk", which is odd, because we allready annihilated any TFR in "Bergstadt". A battle group (from somewhere else) to reinforce the TFR in "Bergstadt" would be more convincing. For whatever reason, we have to defeat the TFR. This situation promises a lot of loot, so (according to the rule "never change a winning team") we take basicly the same team and equipment as for the last mission.
If we had chosen to side with the TFR against the Claws, we now had to face the Claws on the same map.
So we brought home three T 55, A chopper and other usefull stuff and got at least some information which might lead to a contact with NOAH. Must have been one of our even bearable days.
Helena and Boris gained enough levels to be trained. They both learn the athletic skill. Boris (as the second after David) has reached the maximum of two skills. Of course he can still advance, which slightly increases his abilities. In hospital Sorana and Feodor receive the hormone treatment.
Our preperation time of 28 h is filled with the production of 3 doses of fly and 2 medipacs. After unloading the vehicles we use the repair bay.
There is no combination of damaged vehicles, which fits into the timeframe, we can repair only one vehile. It's our choice to take the most damaged vehicle or to create as much value as possible. As a compromize one BMP 1 is repaired with a rest of 12 h. The engineers use that time to place additional armour on our valuable Ural.
Both MG of the T 55 we got from the Claws do not contain any ammo. Loading it could be a waste, because we might trade that T 55 away some time. So we mark it by renaming. The current ammo count of the Humvee is marked the same way. Now we use the hangar for the first time.
The chopper can be resupplied with several weapon systems. Unfortunately there are none of them available yet. The devs obviously did not take in mind, that someone could capture the Cayuse. Reloading those weapons is only possible here, not in the field. The ammo slot is greyed out, until a weapon is present. Only the apropiate ammo can be placed in that slot. The hangar got its own 28 h timeframe (independent from other facilities) and our Chopper can be repaired in 17 h. That generates a net income of 66,000 nines if we ever plan to trade it away.
That brings us to the next step. Vladi offers at least some usefull stuff, but almost nothing, we cannot get for free in the next mission. So we trade in some ammo for the Dragunov, which is extremely rare, and some 73 mm HEAT (turnover of 5,500 nines).
Having captured some AK 74 it seems to be a good idea to use them (instead of trading them away). Unfortunately our enemies use them very rarely, so the fives are also not very common. There are some new item- descriptions available.
As allready pointed out the use of "unified 7,62 mm caliber" for any MG (PKT, M 60, RPK) seems to be a very rude simplification. It would be more bearable, if the devs just would it call "MG- ammo" without trying to put any information in it, which turns out to be untrue. The pain doubles when a closer look into the game reveals, that the devs allready took the differences between the different calibers (even the fact, that the AA MG of the T 55 is chambered for 12,7 x 108 mm) into account. So it is not clear what causes those simplifications: ignorance, budget cuts, a tight schedule to meet the holliday shopping season or all of them. Even if assumed, that the weapons have been rechambered (to rescue the plot), we cannot say, which caliber has been chosen. As a rough estimation it seems to be easier to convert from 7,62 x 39 mm to 7,62 x 51 mm. In game the accuracy of the RPK is slightly superiour to the M 60, the price is also.
The description of that weapon holds more "fake news" than a comparable snippet of any article of the "Guardian" or the "Sun". Not the weapon has been invented over 100 years ago, as stated, but the ammo. Even though the word "Снайперская" indicates a sniper rifle, the term "marksmans rifle" would describe the role of that weapon more precisly. The corresponding ammo is described as 5,65 mm caliber instead of (7,62 x 54 mm R), which does not exist. Maybe they just "misspelled" the 5,56 x 45 mm caliber (the german term for mispelling numbers is "Zahlendreher"), but there cannot be seen any reason why. They also cut magazine capacity from 10 to 5. in game that weapon can be used by everyone, but the sharpshooter skill has to be trained to enable a single shot kill. The bullets cut even through vehicle cases and armour causing minimal structural and more organic damage, which can be usefull to capture the vehicle. The range have been cut to redicolous 200m which is very much compared to the other redicolous weapon ranges in the game.
As allready pointed out, that weapon could be very usefull, if they had not cut the range that much. Similar to the AT 2 those guided rockets rarely miss their target. The damage is comparable to a 125 mm HEAT. The launcher can only be mounted to the Humvee. The variant for heli can shoot much further but holds only a single rocket.
The devs chose the civil designation of the Huges OH- 6 Cayuse. Due to its size and the lack of armour the Cayuse counts as a "flying faberguee egg". This chopper can carry launchers for SA 7 or TOW or a double 14,5 mm MK on its two access points. The modular concept of multiple access points and different armament subsystems has been converted very well into that game. So helis can be equipped very flexible. As allready seen during the last mission, choppers cannot move freely but always remain in a certain hight above the ground (unless landed).
This APC consists of the chassis of an M 113 with a mounted 20 mm "Vulcan" gatling MK, which is also used to equip fighterplanes. Unfortunately it is impossible to dismount the Vulcan and mount other weapons like the TOW or the 40 mm MK 19. The high equipment flexibility is one of the major advantages of the M 113 in reality, overweighting its major drawbacks the low mine protection and the too high center of mass. In game the Vulcan has been rechambered to 14,5 mm, which would be possible but very dfficult and far from useful though any other (not too heavy) weapon, including the KPV, could be adopted to the chassis. In contrast to the real model this vehicle has a remarkable strong armour, which can take more damage than the BMP 1.
To get into touch with NOAH a visit at the main laboratory could be a good idea. Unfortunately some more obstacles crossed our way.
Moving out from "Bergstadt" the TFR occupied the township "Solensk", which is odd, because we allready annihilated any TFR in "Bergstadt". A battle group (from somewhere else) to reinforce the TFR in "Bergstadt" would be more convincing. For whatever reason, we have to defeat the TFR. This situation promises a lot of loot, so (according to the rule "never change a winning team") we take basicly the same team and equipment as for the last mission.
If we had chosen to side with the TFR against the Claws, we now had to face the Claws on the same map.
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Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 5: In The Eye of the Storm (Part 1)
If we had chosen in mission 4 the TFR to be our brothers in arms, the current mission would be named "Heroes Die Young" and the startpoint would be located on the opposite edge of the almost identical map. As before the TFR promises the more valuable loot. Our Cayuse might feel more comfortable if he could get some company (wink).
Similar to the last mission, we use the BMP 1 to capture and our Humvee for the killing jobs. That means a lot of improvisation, if we meet much stronger enemys like tanks. Right after start an incoming call from a guy named "Mc Nowel" catches our attention.
Mc Nowel is trapped in town and hiding somewhere from the TFR. Fortunately the TFR members are too dumb to use their radios, so they cannot trace Mc Nowel from his mayday call and we have plenty of time. The team follows the road until that church. Coming closer we can witness...
Those TFR- members (red berets) schoot on an unarmed civillian (yellow beret). This is mean, inhuman and (which counts even more) a waste of ammo. No matter how fast we can kill those "combat cherries" the "lemon" will always die (by script, so stop trying to proof me wrong!). Our Humvee can outreach those AK 74 so those "Cherries" never do any waste again. This rock looks interesting:
A look on the map of the last briefing reveals more of the appearance. That "something" which killed the priest in mission 4 looked very similar.
Mc Nowel proposed to take an unoccupied chopper, he had seen near the edge of town and fly him out. Well "unoccupied" does not mean "unguarded".
The foot patrol moves along the fence, roughly from the gate to the northern corner. One guard carrys a M 60, so our Humvee cannot outreach him. But it can alert those guys to run a bit away from the chopper and most likely get seperated. Victor managed to kill one of the guards the MG gunner continues his patrol allone. The enemy Humvee was also alerted but lost sight of our vehicle so it redeploys exactly at the position of our car, when it was detected by the patrol. So let's just imagine, that we captured the enemy car. That was easy, because the driver is willing to leave, if the gunner is killed:
One slot of the trunck is filled by a vehicle- M 60! Removing that gun or mounting it is not possible, what a waste of space. Placing that gun in that invertory slot works only in the game editor. If you really like to take that thing, it will automaticly unloaded after returning home. One inventory slot could be filled with 4 RPG 7 (8,000 nines) or 10 TOW- Rockets (15,000 nines) instead that M 60 (1,000 nines), so capturing that car is definitely NO option. Of course we take care of that patroling TFR- member, as seen in the lower picture. The M 60 of that guard comes handy to finish the enemy Humvee (which we have NOT captured!). From behind our group of four sneaks up close enough for a special treatment with two M 60 and two AK 74.
The trick is to wreck that car before the gunner can climb out of the roof, point his gun and fire. The other trick is not to sneak up too close and not to get hurt by the exploding car. However we won a nice freebee...
That OH 58 "Kiowa" may offer a lift to rescue that troubled guy on the radio. Both weapon stations are equipped, one with a TOW and one with a twin 14.5 mm MG. But as the hiding place of that Mc Nowel seems to about 100 m away, flying does not really make sense. So let's explore that townhouses, before running into an ambush.
There are several TFR- soldiers on patrol (dotted lines). Many of them are equipped with RPG 7, so flying in and hovering a while to find the right landing spot might become extremely unhealthy. Mc Nowel waits in the courtyard. We can demolish a part of the wall to enter or fust fly in. The gate in the house is only used for decoration. The guards patrol independently from each other. # 2 walks further away, leaving # 1 and # 3 more exposed. Every patrolway shows at least one point, where the patroling TFR- soldier can be ambushed, if the other guards are passing their patrolway at the most distant spot at the same time. Our most important weapon must be passion. To round it up, the TFR mined the whole area and deployed two Humvee, which do not care. Luring the TFR into their own minefield seems to be a good idea, but will not pay out, because only the one who placed the mine will get the credits for it. The guards on that checkpoint in the background remain on post. We deal with that enemy car first, especially as it deployed out of sight for the patrols.
Our guys literally became a wrecking crew. If those TFR- morons parked on the other side of the house, a nade would do the job, preferable thrown when one or two guards are close to the exploding car. The hunting of the four guards mean a lot of waiting and sneaking to the right place. This might take some time, so we allready prepared something in advance:
Killing of guard # 1 scares guard # 3. That guy must advance to get into throwing range, but he would rather move away. Victor prooves him later, that the M 60 shoots further than he can throw.
The elimination of guards # 2 and # 4 follow the old rule: kill that enemy, before he can turn around and fire his RPG. Both pics show, that the RPG- gunners also carry 9 mm sidearms. Actually the guard # 4 was killed after the other guards in front of the high building.
This time the Humvee catches a nade. Unfortunately the other TFR- members stand too far away to be killed by the explosion. They have to be lured and killed one after the other. Those guards tend to face differently from before when they redeploy after having chased an enemy. So Victor was able to place a lucky shot on a guard with a RPG 7.
Most likely that guy was allready injured by the explosion of the car, otherwise Victor would never succeed in killing him fast enough before he could fire his RPG on our Humvee. Clearing all those mines around can be considdered as a really good idea. Now it's time to free that cat in the courtyard.
There's rumors in the loading bay and anger in the town, somebody blew the whistle and the walls came down. Our "wistle" had 7.62 mm caliber. Mc Nowel can step out and join us. There's really anger in the town, the TFR sends some reinforcements.
That first Humvee carries a TOW (worth 4,000 nines). We will capture the car due to its value and its loading capacity. The other Humvee catches a nade, as usual. A quick run to our prey makes the gunner stick his head through the roof while Feodor plays a dunking with a molotov cocktail. The surviving driver leaves the vehicle on his own device, so its Vicors turn to catch the fly.
Our new comrade Mc Nowels can handle explosives and carries a bundle of dynamite. Otherwise he is unarmed, which turns out as a plothole as he claimed earlier having killed and disarmed a TFR- member. Obviously comrade Mc Nowel fits perfectly into our team as he is looking for some action.
To reach that farmstead, we have to cross the map to the northeast. We park our BMP 1 and the Humvee on a hill near our target and right next to a wineyard (even though the bushes do not really look like vitis vinifera).
The TFR attacks the farmstead with two Humvee and a BTR 80. Entering the scene (roughly sight distance) triggers the attack to start. At first the TFR demolishes the fences.
The farmers try to defend, but a few soldiers and one Humvee cannot stand longer than a few seconds. After having eliminated the resistance, the TFR gets some reinforcement.
The Shilka takes position in the middle of the valley, the other enemy vehicles stay outside, just out of detection range. We can deal with them without alerting the Shilka. Having captured at least 4 RPG 7, the BTR offers a good opportunity to emty one of those. Mc Nowel places some mines and takes the place of the 73 mm gunner. The BMP fires one HEAT into the BTR, which kills the crew. As planned the enemy cars explore the former shooting position which had been mined.
The remaining Humvee takes position next to the empty BTR 80. Destroying it would cause an explosion which also destroys the BTR. We will get an opportunity to deal with the remaining enemy car later. In the meantime Feodor practises mountain climbing to get into a perfect shooting position with another RPG.
Our BMP 1 has also found its way to the mountains an Mc Nowel serves one HEAT and one HESH to empty the Shilka.
This is our first ZSU 23-4. Despite its name the 23 mm guns have been replaced with 14.5 mm KPV. The remaining Humvee eventually redeploys a bit away from the empty BTR 80. So our guys can sneak up on it and kill it with their handguns (Next time they will kill the Humvees with their bare fists.). After the defeat of the TFR the surviving farmers crawl out of their hiding place and can be adressed. We will not get any reward for the rescue, the loot and a word has to be enough. Of course we will eliminate any TFR presence whatsoever and the farmers mention a bridge on the northern edge of town, the TFR was planning to demolish to prevent other forces from getting into town. We can argue about the tactical value of that step. According to our briefing the TFR was heading north, so destroying that bridge would cut of their own escape route. We can take the empty Rager (a "DIY"- offroad car), standing right beside our captured Shilka. It turns out, that the shooting with the RPG 7 has also slightly damaged the Rager. Mc Nowels, if present, offers a nice idea for defeating the TFR- forces at the railway station. Destroying a fuel tank nearby will force the TFR to send some units for exploration. We will take a look at this tractor as we leave and head for the bridge, which will be reached in the second part of that mission.
If we had chosen in mission 4 the TFR to be our brothers in arms, the current mission would be named "Heroes Die Young" and the startpoint would be located on the opposite edge of the almost identical map. As before the TFR promises the more valuable loot. Our Cayuse might feel more comfortable if he could get some company (wink).
Similar to the last mission, we use the BMP 1 to capture and our Humvee for the killing jobs. That means a lot of improvisation, if we meet much stronger enemys like tanks. Right after start an incoming call from a guy named "Mc Nowel" catches our attention.
Mc Nowel is trapped in town and hiding somewhere from the TFR. Fortunately the TFR members are too dumb to use their radios, so they cannot trace Mc Nowel from his mayday call and we have plenty of time. The team follows the road until that church. Coming closer we can witness...
Those TFR- members (red berets) schoot on an unarmed civillian (yellow beret). This is mean, inhuman and (which counts even more) a waste of ammo. No matter how fast we can kill those "combat cherries" the "lemon" will always die (by script, so stop trying to proof me wrong!). Our Humvee can outreach those AK 74 so those "Cherries" never do any waste again. This rock looks interesting:
A look on the map of the last briefing reveals more of the appearance. That "something" which killed the priest in mission 4 looked very similar.
Mc Nowel proposed to take an unoccupied chopper, he had seen near the edge of town and fly him out. Well "unoccupied" does not mean "unguarded".
The foot patrol moves along the fence, roughly from the gate to the northern corner. One guard carrys a M 60, so our Humvee cannot outreach him. But it can alert those guys to run a bit away from the chopper and most likely get seperated. Victor managed to kill one of the guards the MG gunner continues his patrol allone. The enemy Humvee was also alerted but lost sight of our vehicle so it redeploys exactly at the position of our car, when it was detected by the patrol. So let's just imagine, that we captured the enemy car. That was easy, because the driver is willing to leave, if the gunner is killed:
One slot of the trunck is filled by a vehicle- M 60! Removing that gun or mounting it is not possible, what a waste of space. Placing that gun in that invertory slot works only in the game editor. If you really like to take that thing, it will automaticly unloaded after returning home. One inventory slot could be filled with 4 RPG 7 (8,000 nines) or 10 TOW- Rockets (15,000 nines) instead that M 60 (1,000 nines), so capturing that car is definitely NO option. Of course we take care of that patroling TFR- member, as seen in the lower picture. The M 60 of that guard comes handy to finish the enemy Humvee (which we have NOT captured!). From behind our group of four sneaks up close enough for a special treatment with two M 60 and two AK 74.
The trick is to wreck that car before the gunner can climb out of the roof, point his gun and fire. The other trick is not to sneak up too close and not to get hurt by the exploding car. However we won a nice freebee...
That OH 58 "Kiowa" may offer a lift to rescue that troubled guy on the radio. Both weapon stations are equipped, one with a TOW and one with a twin 14.5 mm MG. But as the hiding place of that Mc Nowel seems to about 100 m away, flying does not really make sense. So let's explore that townhouses, before running into an ambush.
There are several TFR- soldiers on patrol (dotted lines). Many of them are equipped with RPG 7, so flying in and hovering a while to find the right landing spot might become extremely unhealthy. Mc Nowel waits in the courtyard. We can demolish a part of the wall to enter or fust fly in. The gate in the house is only used for decoration. The guards patrol independently from each other. # 2 walks further away, leaving # 1 and # 3 more exposed. Every patrolway shows at least one point, where the patroling TFR- soldier can be ambushed, if the other guards are passing their patrolway at the most distant spot at the same time. Our most important weapon must be passion. To round it up, the TFR mined the whole area and deployed two Humvee, which do not care. Luring the TFR into their own minefield seems to be a good idea, but will not pay out, because only the one who placed the mine will get the credits for it. The guards on that checkpoint in the background remain on post. We deal with that enemy car first, especially as it deployed out of sight for the patrols.
Our guys literally became a wrecking crew. If those TFR- morons parked on the other side of the house, a nade would do the job, preferable thrown when one or two guards are close to the exploding car. The hunting of the four guards mean a lot of waiting and sneaking to the right place. This might take some time, so we allready prepared something in advance:
Killing of guard # 1 scares guard # 3. That guy must advance to get into throwing range, but he would rather move away. Victor prooves him later, that the M 60 shoots further than he can throw.
The elimination of guards # 2 and # 4 follow the old rule: kill that enemy, before he can turn around and fire his RPG. Both pics show, that the RPG- gunners also carry 9 mm sidearms. Actually the guard # 4 was killed after the other guards in front of the high building.
This time the Humvee catches a nade. Unfortunately the other TFR- members stand too far away to be killed by the explosion. They have to be lured and killed one after the other. Those guards tend to face differently from before when they redeploy after having chased an enemy. So Victor was able to place a lucky shot on a guard with a RPG 7.
Most likely that guy was allready injured by the explosion of the car, otherwise Victor would never succeed in killing him fast enough before he could fire his RPG on our Humvee. Clearing all those mines around can be considdered as a really good idea. Now it's time to free that cat in the courtyard.
There's rumors in the loading bay and anger in the town, somebody blew the whistle and the walls came down. Our "wistle" had 7.62 mm caliber. Mc Nowel can step out and join us. There's really anger in the town, the TFR sends some reinforcements.
That first Humvee carries a TOW (worth 4,000 nines). We will capture the car due to its value and its loading capacity. The other Humvee catches a nade, as usual. A quick run to our prey makes the gunner stick his head through the roof while Feodor plays a dunking with a molotov cocktail. The surviving driver leaves the vehicle on his own device, so its Vicors turn to catch the fly.
Our new comrade Mc Nowels can handle explosives and carries a bundle of dynamite. Otherwise he is unarmed, which turns out as a plothole as he claimed earlier having killed and disarmed a TFR- member. Obviously comrade Mc Nowel fits perfectly into our team as he is looking for some action.
To reach that farmstead, we have to cross the map to the northeast. We park our BMP 1 and the Humvee on a hill near our target and right next to a wineyard (even though the bushes do not really look like vitis vinifera).
The TFR attacks the farmstead with two Humvee and a BTR 80. Entering the scene (roughly sight distance) triggers the attack to start. At first the TFR demolishes the fences.
The farmers try to defend, but a few soldiers and one Humvee cannot stand longer than a few seconds. After having eliminated the resistance, the TFR gets some reinforcement.
The Shilka takes position in the middle of the valley, the other enemy vehicles stay outside, just out of detection range. We can deal with them without alerting the Shilka. Having captured at least 4 RPG 7, the BTR offers a good opportunity to emty one of those. Mc Nowel places some mines and takes the place of the 73 mm gunner. The BMP fires one HEAT into the BTR, which kills the crew. As planned the enemy cars explore the former shooting position which had been mined.
The remaining Humvee takes position next to the empty BTR 80. Destroying it would cause an explosion which also destroys the BTR. We will get an opportunity to deal with the remaining enemy car later. In the meantime Feodor practises mountain climbing to get into a perfect shooting position with another RPG.
Our BMP 1 has also found its way to the mountains an Mc Nowel serves one HEAT and one HESH to empty the Shilka.
This is our first ZSU 23-4. Despite its name the 23 mm guns have been replaced with 14.5 mm KPV. The remaining Humvee eventually redeploys a bit away from the empty BTR 80. So our guys can sneak up on it and kill it with their handguns (Next time they will kill the Humvees with their bare fists.). After the defeat of the TFR the surviving farmers crawl out of their hiding place and can be adressed. We will not get any reward for the rescue, the loot and a word has to be enough. Of course we will eliminate any TFR presence whatsoever and the farmers mention a bridge on the northern edge of town, the TFR was planning to demolish to prevent other forces from getting into town. We can argue about the tactical value of that step. According to our briefing the TFR was heading north, so destroying that bridge would cut of their own escape route. We can take the empty Rager (a "DIY"- offroad car), standing right beside our captured Shilka. It turns out, that the shooting with the RPG 7 has also slightly damaged the Rager. Mc Nowels, if present, offers a nice idea for defeating the TFR- forces at the railway station. Destroying a fuel tank nearby will force the TFR to send some units for exploration. We will take a look at this tractor as we leave and head for the bridge, which will be reached in the second part of that mission.
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Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 5: In The Eye of the Storm (Part 2)
So far that mission contains some subquests, which are loosely connected. The order, in which those subquests are completed can be changed. Each battle theatre activates itself, when the particular area is entered and the quest log just updates. Some dialogues also change according to the quests allready done or still to come (e.g. Mc Nowel will not mention the farm quest, if that is allready done), but nothing else i.e. NO MORE loot. So we hang on the storyline.
So far that mission contains some subquests, which are loosely connected. The order, in which those subquests are completed can be changed. Each battle theatre activates itself, when the particular area is entered and the quest log just updates. Some dialogues also change according to the quests allready done or still to come (e.g. Mc Nowel will not mention the farm quest, if that is allready done), but nothing else i.e. NO MORE loot. So we hang on the storyline.
The bridge was scheduled to be blown up. It is a good bridge and it will be there, so just put your positive waves on it...
But...
That's all because of your negative waves! Three guys ran away from the explosion and take a break near the bunkers.
The two posts in the hills are equipped with M 60 and RPG 7. Those three guys stand almost between the posts, so attacking one post will most likely alert the post, the "Three Stooges" and, like a chain reaction, the other post. So Prof Petrow and Mc Nowel deliver some "pineapples" to the TFR.
Startling, must have been the wrong diet. Well, that demonstrates the value of knowing how to defend against fresh fruits! Right after that Victor (in our Humvee) takes care of Larry, Curly and Moe, the three comedians with their Berettas. Eleminating those three enemys in a single attack reveals one major weaknes of our Humvee: After killing the first aim, the gunner climbs back into the car, climbs out again, remans the gun, redirects and continues shooting instead of just turning the barrel on the new aim. This behavior wastes more than one second, which could be the difference between a handgun and some nades for us to loot and a peace of scrapmetal. Between the concrete bunkers a crate with heavy ammo waits to be looted.
Let's take a look at the railroad station.
Two M 163, two Cayuse and a BMP 1 are deployed stationary and two Humvee and some soldiers are on patrol. Attacking any of them in the wrong moment would alert the rest of the TFR- forces. We have to find the weak spots. That turntable looks interesting, even though the devs had the wrong idea, what that device is intended to be used for. The TFR- soldier next to the factory building could cause greater problems. Akim bolts him down.
That sniper is equipped with binoculars, so it's even difficult to get into range for a crossbow shoot, which in addition must be lethal at once. Even though noone would place a sniper in front of a building, that position covers his back. There are two other weak spots and two jobs for Mc Nowel.
Crouching behind that tree our man stays just out of sight for the enemy Humvee, which reaches one endpoint of its patrolway right at the end of that fence. One loop of patrol opens a time frame to rush to that point, plant a mine and return to the cover behind the tree. Of course the M 163 nearby must face in the opposite direction. The other enemy Humvee loops on a much longer patrolway with a much bigger timeframe. Unfortunately, the best area for a minetrap is guarded by the BMP 1 and two TFR- soldiers cross that point on their patrolway. So this bit desires even more patience to work.
BTW: If someone would like to perform a masterpiece: destroying that gastank in the right moment could kill the Humvee and the soldiers on patrol and even cause a slight damage on the BMP. To trigger that controlled destroying a bundle of explosives or a RPG would be needed. A mine (100 nines) is much cheaper (300 nines or 1000 nines).
The gastank we will use as a decoy can be found in the south of the railroad station just by following the tracks or the road. That mountain nearby looks suspicios. We allready eliminated one sniper and that mountain seems to be the right position to place another. So we move around the end of the tracks, head to the west and climb on the mountain.
Bingo! A sniper with a Strela (maybe he is called "Strelok") waits for a special treatment. The two guards of the gastank carry machineguns.
That fences and the coach offer a bit of cover, so the guards cannot shoot at once if the attacker comes from behind. Both guards also carry binoculars. They surely will detect a vehicle, before it comes into range of their handguns and will be forced to follow it. So the luring action starts.
What does this mean? One guard is really pissed off (red marker) and follows our Humvee the other one starts a chicken run (yellow marker) into the opposite direction. So separated Victor deals with the guards one after another.
A closer inspection of the remains of the second catch reveals the reason for that chicken behaviour:
That moron carried the WRONG ammo! We allready met the three Stooges, maybee that's Shemp. We await at least one or two vehicles to come over here, when the gastank blows up. A few mines can give them a few bruises in advance, so the killing (or better emptying) shots will be easier. A place most likely to be visited by an enemy vehicle should be next to the tank. After clearing the place and posting Feodor on the mountain. Akim empties the three captured Berettas in the gastank. That flame effect shows the damage of the tank.
Just a few bullets from a KPV (from a secure distance) make the tank blow up. Shortly after this one M 163 arrives and catches a mine. I love it when a plan comes together. In the background the advancing BMP can be seen.
Finally the TFR also send one of their choppers for investigation.
Those vehicles will return to the railway station after 9 minutes, if the crew still exists at that time. So our fist target will be the Cayuse. There is no way to capture it in air, because the pilot will not leave it, if the gunner is killed. We have captured that Strela and I know you all want to se it in use:
A few 73 mm shells later the two APC can be picked up.
The BMP 1 seems to be in a good shape (just a bit smoke), the M 136 caught more than 75 % damage (the little flame). This M 113 derivate combines high firepower with decent speed.
Coming back to the railroad station, a third Humvee catches our eye. Maybe we have just missed it before or that comrades activated after the "gastank plot". This car drives on a patrolway from the railroad station into town. Mc Nowel still owe us something for having been rescued, so he plants e few mines.
The patroling guards move into a relatively great distance from the remaining TFR- units. So they can be eleminated without alerting the rest. One patrol marches next to the gastank, where the BMP 1 stood before. Those soldiers are equipped with a shotgun and a Uzi. Victor performs a simple drive by shooting.
The second patrol causes more problems, because one of them carries a RPG. They walk in a distance, so shooting one of them might be ignored of the other one, especially if faced backwards (upper pic). BTW: compared to the tracks (1520 mm) the man must be around 140 cm tall. The second guard with the RPG should be eliminated first. There are several possible solutions including luring and ambushing, sniping or using a nade or overwhelming firepower. We choose a combination of luring and ambushing to empty some of our captured guns.
After luring that RPG shooter away, a team of three overwhelms him with M 60, AK 74 and shotgun, enough to secure an instant kill (middle pic). This guard carries a shotgun as sidearm. The remaining guard offers an opportunity for Akim and Ivan to practise shooting with the KPV (lower pic). The tracer bullets, used by machineguns can be seen. Let's take a look on the rest:
One M 163 a cayuse and three soldiers guard the place. Attacking one unit must alert all the others. If the cayuse is alerted, it will rise and cannot be captured anymore, so the first shot must empty the chopper. The three soldiers occupy any empty vehicle, they see unless they are occupied by chasing an attacker. Our BMP will shoot on the cayuse, will be detected by the three soldiers, which chase after him moving to the east. Anatoli fires his RPG just one second later, so the M 163 will notice the impact as a new attack and moves out to the north instead of following our BMP. The APC will surely return to his position next to the turntable but the three soldiers must not return. The guards chased after our BMP as planned. In fact, it turned out to be a problem to keep them on the track until they moved out far enough. One guy behaves really cooperative and stays on his new position, the others walk back to the turntable.
Ivan Feodor and Prof Petrow take care of one guy. The other one was lured away to the south by Victor, so he took another way back and Victor also took a turn back for another drive by shooting.
A team of four eliminates the third guard afterwards. The M 163 crew turns out to be tougher than expected. Anatoli hit him rather in the flank instead of in the back. Mc Nowel mixes him a molotov.
It takes another 73 mm shell to empty the APC completely, fortunately it remained less damaged than the one we captured before.
Another chopper fits perfectly into our vehicle park. One crate of heavy ammo seems to be the only remarkable item in that railroad station.
That crate delivers 4 40mm grenades, which can be carried by soldiers, so they are consequently dropped. There are two other crates, which might be a bit hard to find. One can be found next to some woodpiles in the middle between the starting point and the assaulted village (wineyard). The second one stands next to some containers on a sidetrack in a valley directly east of the town.
This time there is only one vehicle more than drivers are available, so the heaviely damaged BTR stays behind.
We brought three vehicles into the mission, found two and captured six. Our Cayuse at home found a bigger brother and also a twin brother.
Here is an example for the Mission loot screen.
The game chooses the vehicles depending from their damage percentage from any vehicle, which has been occupied by our team members, even though the team might have currently occupied other vehicles. The characters displayed behind the vehicles in this menu do not nescessarily sit in that particular vehicle. In this mission the BTR was chosen and the Cayuse was meant to stay behind by the game and they had to be exchanged manually. The right column shows the heavy ammo, we found. The four 40mm grenades, which allready dropped out, are not included in that list. So we can press the right button and return to our home base.
But...
That's all because of your negative waves! Three guys ran away from the explosion and take a break near the bunkers.
The two posts in the hills are equipped with M 60 and RPG 7. Those three guys stand almost between the posts, so attacking one post will most likely alert the post, the "Three Stooges" and, like a chain reaction, the other post. So Prof Petrow and Mc Nowel deliver some "pineapples" to the TFR.
Startling, must have been the wrong diet. Well, that demonstrates the value of knowing how to defend against fresh fruits! Right after that Victor (in our Humvee) takes care of Larry, Curly and Moe, the three comedians with their Berettas. Eleminating those three enemys in a single attack reveals one major weaknes of our Humvee: After killing the first aim, the gunner climbs back into the car, climbs out again, remans the gun, redirects and continues shooting instead of just turning the barrel on the new aim. This behavior wastes more than one second, which could be the difference between a handgun and some nades for us to loot and a peace of scrapmetal. Between the concrete bunkers a crate with heavy ammo waits to be looted.
Let's take a look at the railroad station.
Two M 163, two Cayuse and a BMP 1 are deployed stationary and two Humvee and some soldiers are on patrol. Attacking any of them in the wrong moment would alert the rest of the TFR- forces. We have to find the weak spots. That turntable looks interesting, even though the devs had the wrong idea, what that device is intended to be used for. The TFR- soldier next to the factory building could cause greater problems. Akim bolts him down.
That sniper is equipped with binoculars, so it's even difficult to get into range for a crossbow shoot, which in addition must be lethal at once. Even though noone would place a sniper in front of a building, that position covers his back. There are two other weak spots and two jobs for Mc Nowel.
Crouching behind that tree our man stays just out of sight for the enemy Humvee, which reaches one endpoint of its patrolway right at the end of that fence. One loop of patrol opens a time frame to rush to that point, plant a mine and return to the cover behind the tree. Of course the M 163 nearby must face in the opposite direction. The other enemy Humvee loops on a much longer patrolway with a much bigger timeframe. Unfortunately, the best area for a minetrap is guarded by the BMP 1 and two TFR- soldiers cross that point on their patrolway. So this bit desires even more patience to work.
BTW: If someone would like to perform a masterpiece: destroying that gastank in the right moment could kill the Humvee and the soldiers on patrol and even cause a slight damage on the BMP. To trigger that controlled destroying a bundle of explosives or a RPG would be needed. A mine (100 nines) is much cheaper (300 nines or 1000 nines).
The gastank we will use as a decoy can be found in the south of the railroad station just by following the tracks or the road. That mountain nearby looks suspicios. We allready eliminated one sniper and that mountain seems to be the right position to place another. So we move around the end of the tracks, head to the west and climb on the mountain.
Bingo! A sniper with a Strela (maybe he is called "Strelok") waits for a special treatment. The two guards of the gastank carry machineguns.
That fences and the coach offer a bit of cover, so the guards cannot shoot at once if the attacker comes from behind. Both guards also carry binoculars. They surely will detect a vehicle, before it comes into range of their handguns and will be forced to follow it. So the luring action starts.
What does this mean? One guard is really pissed off (red marker) and follows our Humvee the other one starts a chicken run (yellow marker) into the opposite direction. So separated Victor deals with the guards one after another.
A closer inspection of the remains of the second catch reveals the reason for that chicken behaviour:
That moron carried the WRONG ammo! We allready met the three Stooges, maybee that's Shemp. We await at least one or two vehicles to come over here, when the gastank blows up. A few mines can give them a few bruises in advance, so the killing (or better emptying) shots will be easier. A place most likely to be visited by an enemy vehicle should be next to the tank. After clearing the place and posting Feodor on the mountain. Akim empties the three captured Berettas in the gastank. That flame effect shows the damage of the tank.
Just a few bullets from a KPV (from a secure distance) make the tank blow up. Shortly after this one M 163 arrives and catches a mine. I love it when a plan comes together. In the background the advancing BMP can be seen.
Finally the TFR also send one of their choppers for investigation.
Those vehicles will return to the railway station after 9 minutes, if the crew still exists at that time. So our fist target will be the Cayuse. There is no way to capture it in air, because the pilot will not leave it, if the gunner is killed. We have captured that Strela and I know you all want to se it in use:
A few 73 mm shells later the two APC can be picked up.
The BMP 1 seems to be in a good shape (just a bit smoke), the M 136 caught more than 75 % damage (the little flame). This M 113 derivate combines high firepower with decent speed.
Coming back to the railroad station, a third Humvee catches our eye. Maybe we have just missed it before or that comrades activated after the "gastank plot". This car drives on a patrolway from the railroad station into town. Mc Nowel still owe us something for having been rescued, so he plants e few mines.
The patroling guards move into a relatively great distance from the remaining TFR- units. So they can be eleminated without alerting the rest. One patrol marches next to the gastank, where the BMP 1 stood before. Those soldiers are equipped with a shotgun and a Uzi. Victor performs a simple drive by shooting.
The second patrol causes more problems, because one of them carries a RPG. They walk in a distance, so shooting one of them might be ignored of the other one, especially if faced backwards (upper pic). BTW: compared to the tracks (1520 mm) the man must be around 140 cm tall. The second guard with the RPG should be eliminated first. There are several possible solutions including luring and ambushing, sniping or using a nade or overwhelming firepower. We choose a combination of luring and ambushing to empty some of our captured guns.
After luring that RPG shooter away, a team of three overwhelms him with M 60, AK 74 and shotgun, enough to secure an instant kill (middle pic). This guard carries a shotgun as sidearm. The remaining guard offers an opportunity for Akim and Ivan to practise shooting with the KPV (lower pic). The tracer bullets, used by machineguns can be seen. Let's take a look on the rest:
One M 163 a cayuse and three soldiers guard the place. Attacking one unit must alert all the others. If the cayuse is alerted, it will rise and cannot be captured anymore, so the first shot must empty the chopper. The three soldiers occupy any empty vehicle, they see unless they are occupied by chasing an attacker. Our BMP will shoot on the cayuse, will be detected by the three soldiers, which chase after him moving to the east. Anatoli fires his RPG just one second later, so the M 163 will notice the impact as a new attack and moves out to the north instead of following our BMP. The APC will surely return to his position next to the turntable but the three soldiers must not return. The guards chased after our BMP as planned. In fact, it turned out to be a problem to keep them on the track until they moved out far enough. One guy behaves really cooperative and stays on his new position, the others walk back to the turntable.
Ivan Feodor and Prof Petrow take care of one guy. The other one was lured away to the south by Victor, so he took another way back and Victor also took a turn back for another drive by shooting.
A team of four eliminates the third guard afterwards. The M 163 crew turns out to be tougher than expected. Anatoli hit him rather in the flank instead of in the back. Mc Nowel mixes him a molotov.
It takes another 73 mm shell to empty the APC completely, fortunately it remained less damaged than the one we captured before.
Another chopper fits perfectly into our vehicle park. One crate of heavy ammo seems to be the only remarkable item in that railroad station.
That crate delivers 4 40mm grenades, which can be carried by soldiers, so they are consequently dropped. There are two other crates, which might be a bit hard to find. One can be found next to some woodpiles in the middle between the starting point and the assaulted village (wineyard). The second one stands next to some containers on a sidetrack in a valley directly east of the town.
This time there is only one vehicle more than drivers are available, so the heaviely damaged BTR stays behind.
We brought three vehicles into the mission, found two and captured six. Our Cayuse at home found a bigger brother and also a twin brother.
Here is an example for the Mission loot screen.
The game chooses the vehicles depending from their damage percentage from any vehicle, which has been occupied by our team members, even though the team might have currently occupied other vehicles. The characters displayed behind the vehicles in this menu do not nescessarily sit in that particular vehicle. In this mission the BTR was chosen and the Cayuse was meant to stay behind by the game and they had to be exchanged manually. The right column shows the heavy ammo, we found. The four 40mm grenades, which allready dropped out, are not included in that list. So we can press the right button and return to our home base.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Between Missions
The path to the NOAH labs is free. Instead of proceding further (didn't we found it nescessary to conquer that town ONLY for a quick and direct way?) our heroes return to their homebase. They should repair that demolished bridge to cross all the plotholes...
The path to the NOAH labs is free. Instead of proceding further (didn't we found it nescessary to conquer that town ONLY for a quick and direct way?) our heroes return to their homebase. They should repair that demolished bridge to cross all the plotholes...
None of our team received a special ability this time. Victor rose several levels so far and should have got his first ability. Obviously this system bugs and ONLY Victor NEVER got any special ability in earlier playthroughs. Maybe this bug is connected to the name of that char. Victors family name is Romanov but they wrote Romanova which is a spelling error or transmutes Victor into a ladyboy... Maybe renaming the char (which is possible between missions) might resolve that bug. At least a hint in Mission 3 will be added.
The comfortable timeframe of 32h allows to treat our new member Mc Nowel and Victor and to produce 4 medpacks and 2 doses of fly.
Repairing the captured Cayuse seems to be like a déja vu. Our chopper family represents a nice value or tactical advance, depending from the players preferences. Because of our impressing collection of damaged vehicles finding an optimal combination for repairs to fill the timeframe becomes more an more easy.
This time one T 55 and the captured Shilka recieve a facelift. The menu decoration for the damaged Shilka looks really strange. Let's see, if Vladi offers something interesting.
He does. There are still no decent rocket launchers for helis available, but two other items have to be mentioned:
Vladi offers two rounds of 125 mm APDSFS. This ammo for the T 55 and other tanks fires a thin metal dart (mostly tungsten or depleted uranium), which gains extreme high velocity (due to the overmeasured propellant) and simply pierces the armour of the target faster than any reactive armour can detonate. To fit the dart into the 125mm barrel it is packed into wooden sabots, which fall of after the projectile has left the muzzle. The dart stabilizes its flight by fins, so the cannon can be build smoothbored, which increases the velocity (so technical 125mm tankguns are shotguns and not rifles, like the 105mm royal ordonance). The HESH and HEAT rounds have to be built with fins (self unfolding or/ and covered by small sabots) to give them the nescessary spin. In the game the APDSFs offers a high lethal effect with low structural or armour damage. One shot can kill the crew of a T 55 damaging the vehicle less than 20 %. We buy the rounds even though Vladi charges an arm and a leg for it, 5,000 nines for each round!
The other most interesting item is the M 79 launcher for 40mm nades. This tool will come very handy and Vladi offers it just once!
The bottom line of this trade covers 16,000 nines.
There are some new items.
Our new flying taxi can be (later) equipped with two weapons of a slightly wider variety than the Cayuse. The devs included some weapons of russian/ soviet production. Unlike the real model, that hely can carry only two crewmembers.
Unlike the real ZSU 23-4 the devs exchanged the four 23 mm AA smg against four 14,5 KPV. Not to mention that an exchange of the guns would surely overstress a postapocalyptic infrastructure the configuration change would limit the use to mere ground combat. So the described modification might be possible but not very likely and surely not very abundand. Unlike the real thing the crew is limited to three soldiers, but the armour can almost compete to that of the T 55.
The game describes this DIY vehicle as the hybride of GAZ 69, Opel Rekord and the chassis of a monstertruck. Even though I could not find any trace of a real model for that vehicle, any kind of improved car was common during soviet era and should be very common in a post apocalyptic world. Presumebly the chassis could have been taken from the rather abundand Unimog. This car is really fast, even faster than the Humvee but holds only three inventory slots and cannot carry any weapon.
This handy tool enables all tactical advances of the 40mm nades without the risky and complicated use of the Humvee mounted Mk 19 launcher. A single soldier can sneak in range unseen, fire and get away before the nade hits the target, no more alerting the enemy prematurely, no more having only one chance to hit or being killed and no more hiding the Humvee behind some building before the enemy fires back.
The briefing for the next mission fills a bit from the plot hole above. Obviously some scouts allready advanced into the vicinity of the NOAH lab while our heroes geared up. Not very surprising the TFR allready occupied the area and established five strongpoints around the lab. Our task is obvious. Unlike previous missions, this time the combat takes place during nighttime. That means the visual range is halved unless the char is equipped with a NVG. This counts also for the enemy, so we will use this feature as an advantage.
Our preperations include close quarter combat and sparse use of vehicles. We take the BMP 1, the Humvee (with still 600 rounds of ammo), the Ural and one Wolf. Our choice focuses on storage capacity. As an additional (spoiler) hint the BMP 1 CAN be equipped with at least 2 AT 2 rockets.
The team remains the same as last mission, except Mc Nowel who took the place of Boris. For demonstration purpose Akim and Ivan carry the weapons of all groupmembers. Of course we did not forget some 40 mm nades. Other additional ammo is not nescessary.
The comfortable timeframe of 32h allows to treat our new member Mc Nowel and Victor and to produce 4 medpacks and 2 doses of fly.
Repairing the captured Cayuse seems to be like a déja vu. Our chopper family represents a nice value or tactical advance, depending from the players preferences. Because of our impressing collection of damaged vehicles finding an optimal combination for repairs to fill the timeframe becomes more an more easy.
This time one T 55 and the captured Shilka recieve a facelift. The menu decoration for the damaged Shilka looks really strange. Let's see, if Vladi offers something interesting.
He does. There are still no decent rocket launchers for helis available, but two other items have to be mentioned:
Vladi offers two rounds of 125 mm APDSFS. This ammo for the T 55 and other tanks fires a thin metal dart (mostly tungsten or depleted uranium), which gains extreme high velocity (due to the overmeasured propellant) and simply pierces the armour of the target faster than any reactive armour can detonate. To fit the dart into the 125mm barrel it is packed into wooden sabots, which fall of after the projectile has left the muzzle. The dart stabilizes its flight by fins, so the cannon can be build smoothbored, which increases the velocity (so technical 125mm tankguns are shotguns and not rifles, like the 105mm royal ordonance). The HESH and HEAT rounds have to be built with fins (self unfolding or/ and covered by small sabots) to give them the nescessary spin. In the game the APDSFs offers a high lethal effect with low structural or armour damage. One shot can kill the crew of a T 55 damaging the vehicle less than 20 %. We buy the rounds even though Vladi charges an arm and a leg for it, 5,000 nines for each round!
The other most interesting item is the M 79 launcher for 40mm nades. This tool will come very handy and Vladi offers it just once!
The bottom line of this trade covers 16,000 nines.
There are some new items.
Our new flying taxi can be (later) equipped with two weapons of a slightly wider variety than the Cayuse. The devs included some weapons of russian/ soviet production. Unlike the real model, that hely can carry only two crewmembers.
Unlike the real ZSU 23-4 the devs exchanged the four 23 mm AA smg against four 14,5 KPV. Not to mention that an exchange of the guns would surely overstress a postapocalyptic infrastructure the configuration change would limit the use to mere ground combat. So the described modification might be possible but not very likely and surely not very abundand. Unlike the real thing the crew is limited to three soldiers, but the armour can almost compete to that of the T 55.
The game describes this DIY vehicle as the hybride of GAZ 69, Opel Rekord and the chassis of a monstertruck. Even though I could not find any trace of a real model for that vehicle, any kind of improved car was common during soviet era and should be very common in a post apocalyptic world. Presumebly the chassis could have been taken from the rather abundand Unimog. This car is really fast, even faster than the Humvee but holds only three inventory slots and cannot carry any weapon.
This handy tool enables all tactical advances of the 40mm nades without the risky and complicated use of the Humvee mounted Mk 19 launcher. A single soldier can sneak in range unseen, fire and get away before the nade hits the target, no more alerting the enemy prematurely, no more having only one chance to hit or being killed and no more hiding the Humvee behind some building before the enemy fires back.
The briefing for the next mission fills a bit from the plot hole above. Obviously some scouts allready advanced into the vicinity of the NOAH lab while our heroes geared up. Not very surprising the TFR allready occupied the area and established five strongpoints around the lab. Our task is obvious. Unlike previous missions, this time the combat takes place during nighttime. That means the visual range is halved unless the char is equipped with a NVG. This counts also for the enemy, so we will use this feature as an advantage.
Our preperations include close quarter combat and sparse use of vehicles. We take the BMP 1, the Humvee (with still 600 rounds of ammo), the Ural and one Wolf. Our choice focuses on storage capacity. As an additional (spoiler) hint the BMP 1 CAN be equipped with at least 2 AT 2 rockets.
The team remains the same as last mission, except Mc Nowel who took the place of Boris. For demonstration purpose Akim and Ivan carry the weapons of all groupmembers. Of course we did not forget some 40 mm nades. Other additional ammo is not nescessary.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 6: They Came in the Dawn (Part 1)
The alternate Mission (ganged up with the TFR in Mission 4) was "The Snare". Both maps differ only in two details (location of one building and one additional chest) and the number and quality of the enemy units. The whole structure (5 strongpoints, starting location, plot) would be the same.
The mission can be devided into two phases. The second phase is triggered by breaking the encirclement of the NOAH base. Before that, the base MUST NOT be entered! NOAH opens the gate to show, when visitors are welcome. If any of our units enters the base (even flying over it!) as long as the gates are closed and is detected by NOAH the mission is lost. Apart from that there are no restrictions of entering any region. The enemy strongpoints can be defeated in any order.
The alternate Mission (ganged up with the TFR in Mission 4) was "The Snare". Both maps differ only in two details (location of one building and one additional chest) and the number and quality of the enemy units. The whole structure (5 strongpoints, starting location, plot) would be the same.
The mission can be devided into two phases. The second phase is triggered by breaking the encirclement of the NOAH base. Before that, the base MUST NOT be entered! NOAH opens the gate to show, when visitors are welcome. If any of our units enters the base (even flying over it!) as long as the gates are closed and is detected by NOAH the mission is lost. Apart from that there are no restrictions of entering any region. The enemy strongpoints can be defeated in any order.
Our starting position in the southwest corner of the map can be considdered as a safe place far from any enemy position.
The devs tried to catch the atmosphere of a moonlit night in summer. The long shadows seem to be very authentic, also the position of the full moon.
The brightness of the full moon normally outlights even the bright stars in its vicinity rendering them invisible. That insignificant little flaw is mentioned to distract from the greater one: in contrast to the real sky the moon and stars do not move an inch as time literelally does not exists in the game and this night lasts eternally. The stars seem to be mapped. Some constellations can be vagely recognized at the position they are meant to be.
This seems to be the northern circumpolar region with Ursa Minor, parts of Ursa Major and Cassiopaia, otherwise this constellation could also be totally coincidental. At least it's good to know, that my soldiers could find their way even if I switch of the map. For game purposes "night" means that the total sight radius of any unit is halved no matter if there is any moonlight or not.
The NOAH lab turns out to be a real fortress. Those scientists seem to have some more practical experiences in chemistry, metallurgy, ballistics, electronics, rocket propulsion and aerodynamics. As allready mentioned: Keep off that area until the gate opens!
The strongpoint in the southeast lies a bit apart from the others and far away from the NOAH fortress, so that point could have a special function. Exploring that gap north of the southeastern strongpoint Akim discovers a sixth strongpoint.
Obviously the TFR keeps their heavier units in reserve. There is no infantry around to help out for the low detection range of the vehicles and the night makes them even blinder than blind. So Helena fires one RPG on an BMP 1.
The soldier has to retreat, when the RPG projectile is still in flight to avoid detection. Those two BMP are armed with one AT 2 each. Two BMP and one T 55 move out to the position, from which Helena fired, and stay there. Time for a repeat, this time on the other BMP 1.
The three vehicles patrol to the shooting position and Ivan can try out his new M 79, which means shooting and hiding behind the next hill. The black mark on the position, where Helena stood before, shows the impact of the fist 40mm burning nade. Of course the three enemy vehicles came over to Ivans direction (as the trackmarks show) but Ivan hides behind another hill and can even sneak up close enough to the retreating vehicles to fire a second nade on the BMP, killing the gunner. That manouver would be almost impossible with a Humvee- mounted launcher. The driver of the BMP shows cooperation and leaves his vehicle. After taking that unarmed driver out, the first vehicle is captured.
We will surely find better vehicles to capture, but it would be a pitty to loose this ammo. There is no way of getting the AT 2 ot of the BMP unless we brought at least 2 AT 2 into the mission, so we better use it. That lone T 55 is an ideal target for it.
It turns out to be a hard nut to crack, we neded several rounds of 73mm HESH and two 40mm nades to empty that tank remaining it in one piece.
Meanwhile Akim performs a recon on that southern strongpoint.
The antenna in the background seems to be interesting. McNowel and Akim sneak right in the middle of the enemy position and open the crate.
That NVG come very handy for Akim restoring his sight radius to normal, which is more than the halved sight radius even if it is enhanced by binoculars. We take care of that strongpoint a bit later, back to the tanks. The remaining enemy BMP can be emptied by a single 73mm HESH round. Unfortunately the T 55 holds position beside the empty vehicle. Mc Nowel found some mines lately, so Prof Petrof can perform our famous trick: Shooting a few rounds on the tank and luring it on the mine.
Another 125mm HEAT round is needed to weak that tank a bit more.
The 73mm HESH that follows empties the tank completely, leaving it in a rather good condition. So our work is done here.
Some heavy ammo rounds up our loot. So lets head back to the southern strongpoint. A wolfpack and four wild horses in the area are to mention. Those wild animals even though not really threatening might disturb our operations a bit. Two soldiers patrol in the eastern part of the strongpoint. The entrances are guarded, but as allready experienced, entering the strongpoint unseen is easy. The guardposts are not visually connectet, so alerting one guard does not nescessarily alert any other guard. After clearing the western entrance our Humvee can drive next to the factory building which alerts some guards and the patroling soldiers, forcing them to seperate, making them easier to kill. After two or three luring runs the strongpoint is thinned out enough to get the remaining guards more directly.
In order to get rid of those two guards near the antenna, they have to be alerted and lured without alerting that enemy Humvee. Our Humvee takes another cruising near the factory. This manouver would not be possible during daytime. We ensure to lure the two guards really far away from the antenna and eleminate them.
Taking out that enemy Humvee turns out to be a bit complicated. Ivan can sneak up unseen into fire range with the M 79, but the 40mm nade should hit the vehicle EXACTLY when the gunner mans the weapon in order to take effect during the time, when the gunner turns the weapon. So there must be a visible target for the enemy, otherwise the Humvee simply drives away. If the nade impacts to early the gunner will not take enough damage. The timeframe to kill the gunner even grows smaller when this gunner wears a protective vest. In addition to that the enemy TOW can fire much furter than any human can run in the time the gunner needs to turn the weapon. To solve the syncronisation problem, Ivan has to find the right shooting distance and our Humvee takes care of the alert. Alternatively some sniping might help. Fortunately this driver is not that stubborn and comes out of his vehicle volunteerely.
The captured Humvee contains 4 missiles for its TOW. So lets take a look at the antenna. It does not take much ammo to bring it down (we will find plenty of loaded weapons, so there is absolutely NO need to spare ammo!).
Obviously that antenna had some communicative function as a plot element (not in the game mechanics). There is no direct hint for it, but other playthroughs and a further look into the mission files reveals that entering and attacking any of the five marked strongpoints will trigger a reinforcement call to the four tanks, we allready have captured. Those vehicles would stay in an alert state and they would continue to patrol near their reserve position. Destroying the antenna simply switches that trigger off. The first strongpoint is conquered.
Our next objective is the strongpoint directly north of our starting position. There are a lot of enemys in that little village.
Three soldiers and one BTR 80 are on patrol two Humvees and 10 soldiers guard the area. The two backdoor guards in the south are armed with 9mm weapons, so our Humvee can take them out, when the BTR is temporarely not present. Right after that Our T 55 shoots a 125mm HEAT into the BTR as it reaches the southern endpoint of its patrolway. At this point the BTR turns around and can be hit more easily.
Of course the BTR moves out to the point where the shooting comes from. We let him retreat and fire a 125mm HESH, when the APC turns on its patrolway for the next time. Actually the pic above allready shows the shooting of the HESH (there is allready one impact behind the BTR), obviously I messed up the pics... The pic above and this below are only 2/10 sec apart from each other.
It is crucial to empty that APC away from the other soldiers because those tend to occupy empty vehicles. The three patroling soldiers should be seperated from each other. The western perimeter of the strongpoint offers the best opportunity for that. The third soldier seperated from his comrades for some reason. So Victor iniciates a drive-by-shooting without alerting the other two TFR- members.
The other two patroling guards are alerted (on purpose) on their next turn. We succeded in luring only one of them away for a single kill. The last one is taken out by a gang of four to ensure that guy has no chance to shoot back. Some alerting action of our Humvee caused some emberassement and some enemy units running around. Though the three soldiers near the tents and the two doorguards returned to their posts, one Humvee redeployed a bit away from the other units. Feodor takes care of it with a handgrenade.
Those three TFR- members next to the tents carry 9mm weapons or shotguns. Unfortunately any unit, that tries to lure them away to the west will be in reach of the second Humvee, so someone has to use a nade for that three clowns. To empty the remaining Humvee those doorguards have to be dealt with, otherwise they would reoccupy the emptied vehicle. There might be other solutions for that situation, maybe the Humvee eventually redeploys (what it will do randomly) and faces in a different direction, but I do not want to wait that long. The plan is to kill the gunner of the Humvee, which will force the driver to leave and lure those doorguards far away so we can grab the Humvee. The whole plan contains the allready known synchronisation problem. The alert is delivered by a MG volley from Feodor (left) to the ground while Ivan (right) shoots a 40mm nade from the hill on the Humvee and both spectadors have to leave the scene ASAP to evade shooting from the doorguards.
The two doorguards seperate while charging on Feodor and Ivan, one of them steps even through the burning nade, taking another damage. One doorguard gets eliminated while charging Feodor. The other one returns to the gate while the car has allready been taken away. The whole thing worked out as planned, but not exactly at the first try as I have to admit. The remaining doorguard is handled in the usual way.
Now the second strongpoint is conquered. This seems to be a good point to take a break.
The devs tried to catch the atmosphere of a moonlit night in summer. The long shadows seem to be very authentic, also the position of the full moon.
The brightness of the full moon normally outlights even the bright stars in its vicinity rendering them invisible. That insignificant little flaw is mentioned to distract from the greater one: in contrast to the real sky the moon and stars do not move an inch as time literelally does not exists in the game and this night lasts eternally. The stars seem to be mapped. Some constellations can be vagely recognized at the position they are meant to be.
This seems to be the northern circumpolar region with Ursa Minor, parts of Ursa Major and Cassiopaia, otherwise this constellation could also be totally coincidental. At least it's good to know, that my soldiers could find their way even if I switch of the map. For game purposes "night" means that the total sight radius of any unit is halved no matter if there is any moonlight or not.
The NOAH lab turns out to be a real fortress. Those scientists seem to have some more practical experiences in chemistry, metallurgy, ballistics, electronics, rocket propulsion and aerodynamics. As allready mentioned: Keep off that area until the gate opens!
The strongpoint in the southeast lies a bit apart from the others and far away from the NOAH fortress, so that point could have a special function. Exploring that gap north of the southeastern strongpoint Akim discovers a sixth strongpoint.
Obviously the TFR keeps their heavier units in reserve. There is no infantry around to help out for the low detection range of the vehicles and the night makes them even blinder than blind. So Helena fires one RPG on an BMP 1.
The soldier has to retreat, when the RPG projectile is still in flight to avoid detection. Those two BMP are armed with one AT 2 each. Two BMP and one T 55 move out to the position, from which Helena fired, and stay there. Time for a repeat, this time on the other BMP 1.
The three vehicles patrol to the shooting position and Ivan can try out his new M 79, which means shooting and hiding behind the next hill. The black mark on the position, where Helena stood before, shows the impact of the fist 40mm burning nade. Of course the three enemy vehicles came over to Ivans direction (as the trackmarks show) but Ivan hides behind another hill and can even sneak up close enough to the retreating vehicles to fire a second nade on the BMP, killing the gunner. That manouver would be almost impossible with a Humvee- mounted launcher. The driver of the BMP shows cooperation and leaves his vehicle. After taking that unarmed driver out, the first vehicle is captured.
We will surely find better vehicles to capture, but it would be a pitty to loose this ammo. There is no way of getting the AT 2 ot of the BMP unless we brought at least 2 AT 2 into the mission, so we better use it. That lone T 55 is an ideal target for it.
It turns out to be a hard nut to crack, we neded several rounds of 73mm HESH and two 40mm nades to empty that tank remaining it in one piece.
Meanwhile Akim performs a recon on that southern strongpoint.
The antenna in the background seems to be interesting. McNowel and Akim sneak right in the middle of the enemy position and open the crate.
That NVG come very handy for Akim restoring his sight radius to normal, which is more than the halved sight radius even if it is enhanced by binoculars. We take care of that strongpoint a bit later, back to the tanks. The remaining enemy BMP can be emptied by a single 73mm HESH round. Unfortunately the T 55 holds position beside the empty vehicle. Mc Nowel found some mines lately, so Prof Petrof can perform our famous trick: Shooting a few rounds on the tank and luring it on the mine.
Another 125mm HEAT round is needed to weak that tank a bit more.
The 73mm HESH that follows empties the tank completely, leaving it in a rather good condition. So our work is done here.
Some heavy ammo rounds up our loot. So lets head back to the southern strongpoint. A wolfpack and four wild horses in the area are to mention. Those wild animals even though not really threatening might disturb our operations a bit. Two soldiers patrol in the eastern part of the strongpoint. The entrances are guarded, but as allready experienced, entering the strongpoint unseen is easy. The guardposts are not visually connectet, so alerting one guard does not nescessarily alert any other guard. After clearing the western entrance our Humvee can drive next to the factory building which alerts some guards and the patroling soldiers, forcing them to seperate, making them easier to kill. After two or three luring runs the strongpoint is thinned out enough to get the remaining guards more directly.
In order to get rid of those two guards near the antenna, they have to be alerted and lured without alerting that enemy Humvee. Our Humvee takes another cruising near the factory. This manouver would not be possible during daytime. We ensure to lure the two guards really far away from the antenna and eleminate them.
Taking out that enemy Humvee turns out to be a bit complicated. Ivan can sneak up unseen into fire range with the M 79, but the 40mm nade should hit the vehicle EXACTLY when the gunner mans the weapon in order to take effect during the time, when the gunner turns the weapon. So there must be a visible target for the enemy, otherwise the Humvee simply drives away. If the nade impacts to early the gunner will not take enough damage. The timeframe to kill the gunner even grows smaller when this gunner wears a protective vest. In addition to that the enemy TOW can fire much furter than any human can run in the time the gunner needs to turn the weapon. To solve the syncronisation problem, Ivan has to find the right shooting distance and our Humvee takes care of the alert. Alternatively some sniping might help. Fortunately this driver is not that stubborn and comes out of his vehicle volunteerely.
The captured Humvee contains 4 missiles for its TOW. So lets take a look at the antenna. It does not take much ammo to bring it down (we will find plenty of loaded weapons, so there is absolutely NO need to spare ammo!).
Obviously that antenna had some communicative function as a plot element (not in the game mechanics). There is no direct hint for it, but other playthroughs and a further look into the mission files reveals that entering and attacking any of the five marked strongpoints will trigger a reinforcement call to the four tanks, we allready have captured. Those vehicles would stay in an alert state and they would continue to patrol near their reserve position. Destroying the antenna simply switches that trigger off. The first strongpoint is conquered.
Our next objective is the strongpoint directly north of our starting position. There are a lot of enemys in that little village.
Three soldiers and one BTR 80 are on patrol two Humvees and 10 soldiers guard the area. The two backdoor guards in the south are armed with 9mm weapons, so our Humvee can take them out, when the BTR is temporarely not present. Right after that Our T 55 shoots a 125mm HEAT into the BTR as it reaches the southern endpoint of its patrolway. At this point the BTR turns around and can be hit more easily.
Of course the BTR moves out to the point where the shooting comes from. We let him retreat and fire a 125mm HESH, when the APC turns on its patrolway for the next time. Actually the pic above allready shows the shooting of the HESH (there is allready one impact behind the BTR), obviously I messed up the pics... The pic above and this below are only 2/10 sec apart from each other.
It is crucial to empty that APC away from the other soldiers because those tend to occupy empty vehicles. The three patroling soldiers should be seperated from each other. The western perimeter of the strongpoint offers the best opportunity for that. The third soldier seperated from his comrades for some reason. So Victor iniciates a drive-by-shooting without alerting the other two TFR- members.
The other two patroling guards are alerted (on purpose) on their next turn. We succeded in luring only one of them away for a single kill. The last one is taken out by a gang of four to ensure that guy has no chance to shoot back. Some alerting action of our Humvee caused some emberassement and some enemy units running around. Though the three soldiers near the tents and the two doorguards returned to their posts, one Humvee redeployed a bit away from the other units. Feodor takes care of it with a handgrenade.
Those three TFR- members next to the tents carry 9mm weapons or shotguns. Unfortunately any unit, that tries to lure them away to the west will be in reach of the second Humvee, so someone has to use a nade for that three clowns. To empty the remaining Humvee those doorguards have to be dealt with, otherwise they would reoccupy the emptied vehicle. There might be other solutions for that situation, maybe the Humvee eventually redeploys (what it will do randomly) and faces in a different direction, but I do not want to wait that long. The plan is to kill the gunner of the Humvee, which will force the driver to leave and lure those doorguards far away so we can grab the Humvee. The whole plan contains the allready known synchronisation problem. The alert is delivered by a MG volley from Feodor (left) to the ground while Ivan (right) shoots a 40mm nade from the hill on the Humvee and both spectadors have to leave the scene ASAP to evade shooting from the doorguards.
The two doorguards seperate while charging on Feodor and Ivan, one of them steps even through the burning nade, taking another damage. One doorguard gets eliminated while charging Feodor. The other one returns to the gate while the car has allready been taken away. The whole thing worked out as planned, but not exactly at the first try as I have to admit. The remaining doorguard is handled in the usual way.
Now the second strongpoint is conquered. This seems to be a good point to take a break.
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Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 6: They Came in the Dawn (Part 2)
Now 3 enemy positions are down, the remaining 3 positions follow. roughly in the center of the map, near the intersection of the road our heroes almost stumble over the next TFR strongpoint.
These 6 soldiers cannot be considdered as real threat, especially as they carry MP 5, Uzi and Shotguns. They form groups of two, so most likely we have to deal with only two at a time. The Humvee is armed with a MG. There is only a little complication up on the hill next to that watchtower. In the alternate mission against the Claws that particular watchtower and the strongpoint would be placed a bit more north next to the entrance gate of the NOAH base.
Those two seem to be a spotter and a sniper. Well, those terms are only names and it turns out the spotter does not really spot and the sniper does not really snipe. Under daylight conditions the two TFR soldiers could detect enemy units on the plains between the hill and the position, where we captured the tanks in the first part of the mission. By this, our capture operations would have been rendered significantly more difficult. The devs could at least have equipped them with NVG instead of binoculars. It takes a sniper to take another one down, so Akim shoots an arrow.
Prof Petrow and two comrads eleminate the spotter in the good old fashioned way. Now the hill is ours. Prof Petrow continues his warm up round and throws a nade on the Humvee. Timing seems to be perfect, one soldier stood just a bit too close to the vehicle (hard to spot in that crappy jpg quality). Most likely the two other enemies took at least some damage.
After that our Humvee lures the remaining 5 TFR members one after another away. Prof Petrow scores another few hits during those manouvers, which can be seen by comparing the two pics especially the promotion he achieves and the collected 9mm ammopacks. A team of four takes care of the last soldier. Right in the middle of the now conquered strongpoint a crate can be taken.
"Nuc-u-lar"! It's pronounced "Nuc-u-lar".
Taking the crate does not really trigger anything except an additional dialogue in a later conversation. At least the instantly triggered dialog works for the plot of that mission as we will see later.
For our convenience and to avoid long movements, our vehicles (fresh and captured ones) redeploy to the intersection north of the village and directly south of the NOAH base. That position can be considdered as safe.
To conquer the next TFR strongpoint northwest of the NOAH base it takes a bit more than a few buckshots and a nade. Some of the six guards carry M 60 and the T 55 and a BMP 1 refer a bit more to the term "strongpoint" than the Humvees we had to deal before.
The enemy T 55 stands in a perfect position for a tailshot wit a HEAT round. Though it has been deployed a bit away from the enemy position, most likely the T 55 will move out allone after it has been hit.
The lower pic shows the final state of the manouver. Those three black craters indicate the three hits it took to empty the enemy vehicle. After the first shot (crater 1 in background) our T 55 retreated on a nearby hill and placed the next shot on the enemy T 55 (crater 2 in the middle). Our BMP finished the enemy crew with a 73mm HESH (crater 3). The inventory of that tank turns out to be very interesting.
Three of those 125mm APDSFS rounds and 2 foggrenades. The condition of the T 55 is also acceptable. Just for demonstational purpose (and of course later reverted by hitting the reload button) Victor fires one foggrenade producing a real nice cloud.
The BMP 1 should be the next target. Prof Petrow drives our T 55 on the hill directly behind the enemy APC, Anatoli fires a HEAT round and Prof Petrow hits the gas.
One of the TFR soldiers joins the BMP on its lookout on the hill. So our team of four use the opportunity to catch this fly. We found lots of those 40mm nades, which come very handy to empty the BMP. The enemy APC has turned meanwhile, so Ivan has to walk around the whole strongpoint to find a good shooting position after climbing up on "solsbury hill". For a quick and safe retreat it is recommended to kill the two bears before firing on the BMP.
Ivan has to fire more than once, significantly more than once, to take out the enemy crew. Akim even had to help out with the captured Dragunow. Those 17 captured 73mm HESH rounds makes that worth. There are still 5 TFR soldiers to deal with, which alert each other because of their relatively dense deployment. Akim snipes away the patroling MG gunner unnoticed.
The remaining soldiers carry 9mm weapons and shotguns so our MG gunners can outreach them. Two crates wait for us at the conquered strongpoint, one of them containing some nice heavy ammo.
What is this nuclear powerstation about? That fenced area can be found in the eastern part of the map almost in an opposing position to the NOAH base. Obviously NOAH uses that station as a power source. Their scientific background enables them to operate the reactor. A look over the area reveals that the devs had a good eye to copy some typical soviet russian buildings which houses boiling water reactors but do not really understand the nescessary technical conditions to proceed a nuclear power station.
Usually there would be at least one water basin to store the burnt out fuel elements. The two cooling towers could not operate at all because there is no scource of water (river or lake). Those railroad tracks come from the north. There was another track coming from the south and ended at the first strongpoint, leaving a gap of only 500m between the tracks. Another two details should be shown. First a blue camero (unfortunately just a prop).
And second a few TFR buggers guarding the entrance. Feodor turns that Humvee into a bunch of scrapmetal.
And our Humvee lures the two soldiers into an ambush. The last TFR strongpoint is located on a hill in the north.
That Humvee drives around in a very long loop between the last strongpoint and the one we conquered before. We have not yet met that car patrol, because the TFR units remain unactivated until our units enter the vicinity of a corresponding strongpoint (the smart reader might have allready guessed that). The four armoured vehicles, we captured in the beginning can also be activated if a strongpoint calls for assistance in case of attack (we disabled that ability by destroying the antenna). Driving around during nighttime includes the risk of driving over a mine. Mc Nowel places a firecracker.
To take down the remaining infantery we use our well develloped luring-ambush-tactic. This time I managed to get a few pics of those manouvers. Our Humvee drives near the enemy position and retreats after alerting some TFR soldiers. The tents prevent the alerted enemy from directly shooting our car.
Those two TFR soldiers follow the car and run directly into our ambush. Its crucial to retreat the car slow enough that the enemy soldiers keep sight of it but not too close to keep them out of firerange. The ratio between sight radius and weapon range renders this tactics impossible if the enemy carries the wrong gun. The next luring action draws another soldier away from the strongpoint and Anatoli, Ivan and Feodor get more shooting practice.
The soldier we took down was part of a patrol with a MG gunner. Mc Nowel and Akim have to help out with the captured BTR.
This stunt might be a bit dangerous, because our BTR is in real bad condition and a single volley of that enemy M 60 might finish it. So don't try this at home (at least use a BTR in better condition). The remaining enemy group of two include another MG gunner. We managed to draw them away seperately by several alerts. As they both walk back to the strongpoint, Anatoli, Feodor and Ivan deal with the MG gunner first and with the last soldier afterwards.
If you are not that patient use a nade instead, there are plenty of them to find in this mission. After killing the last TFR soldier a cutscene announces the opening of the gate of the NOAH base. During cutscenes the game switches of the interface bars. That's why the lower pic shows no interface bars, the game allready switched them off but has not yet moved the camera to the cutscene position. Now the NOAH base can be freely entered and the contact can be established. This will trigger the second phase of the mission. We will cover that in the final part.
These 6 soldiers cannot be considdered as real threat, especially as they carry MP 5, Uzi and Shotguns. They form groups of two, so most likely we have to deal with only two at a time. The Humvee is armed with a MG. There is only a little complication up on the hill next to that watchtower. In the alternate mission against the Claws that particular watchtower and the strongpoint would be placed a bit more north next to the entrance gate of the NOAH base.
Those two seem to be a spotter and a sniper. Well, those terms are only names and it turns out the spotter does not really spot and the sniper does not really snipe. Under daylight conditions the two TFR soldiers could detect enemy units on the plains between the hill and the position, where we captured the tanks in the first part of the mission. By this, our capture operations would have been rendered significantly more difficult. The devs could at least have equipped them with NVG instead of binoculars. It takes a sniper to take another one down, so Akim shoots an arrow.
Prof Petrow and two comrads eleminate the spotter in the good old fashioned way. Now the hill is ours. Prof Petrow continues his warm up round and throws a nade on the Humvee. Timing seems to be perfect, one soldier stood just a bit too close to the vehicle (hard to spot in that crappy jpg quality). Most likely the two other enemies took at least some damage.
After that our Humvee lures the remaining 5 TFR members one after another away. Prof Petrow scores another few hits during those manouvers, which can be seen by comparing the two pics especially the promotion he achieves and the collected 9mm ammopacks. A team of four takes care of the last soldier. Right in the middle of the now conquered strongpoint a crate can be taken.
"Nuc-u-lar"! It's pronounced "Nuc-u-lar".
Taking the crate does not really trigger anything except an additional dialogue in a later conversation. At least the instantly triggered dialog works for the plot of that mission as we will see later.
For our convenience and to avoid long movements, our vehicles (fresh and captured ones) redeploy to the intersection north of the village and directly south of the NOAH base. That position can be considdered as safe.
To conquer the next TFR strongpoint northwest of the NOAH base it takes a bit more than a few buckshots and a nade. Some of the six guards carry M 60 and the T 55 and a BMP 1 refer a bit more to the term "strongpoint" than the Humvees we had to deal before.
The enemy T 55 stands in a perfect position for a tailshot wit a HEAT round. Though it has been deployed a bit away from the enemy position, most likely the T 55 will move out allone after it has been hit.
The lower pic shows the final state of the manouver. Those three black craters indicate the three hits it took to empty the enemy vehicle. After the first shot (crater 1 in background) our T 55 retreated on a nearby hill and placed the next shot on the enemy T 55 (crater 2 in the middle). Our BMP finished the enemy crew with a 73mm HESH (crater 3). The inventory of that tank turns out to be very interesting.
Three of those 125mm APDSFS rounds and 2 foggrenades. The condition of the T 55 is also acceptable. Just for demonstational purpose (and of course later reverted by hitting the reload button) Victor fires one foggrenade producing a real nice cloud.
The BMP 1 should be the next target. Prof Petrow drives our T 55 on the hill directly behind the enemy APC, Anatoli fires a HEAT round and Prof Petrow hits the gas.
One of the TFR soldiers joins the BMP on its lookout on the hill. So our team of four use the opportunity to catch this fly. We found lots of those 40mm nades, which come very handy to empty the BMP. The enemy APC has turned meanwhile, so Ivan has to walk around the whole strongpoint to find a good shooting position after climbing up on "solsbury hill". For a quick and safe retreat it is recommended to kill the two bears before firing on the BMP.
Ivan has to fire more than once, significantly more than once, to take out the enemy crew. Akim even had to help out with the captured Dragunow. Those 17 captured 73mm HESH rounds makes that worth. There are still 5 TFR soldiers to deal with, which alert each other because of their relatively dense deployment. Akim snipes away the patroling MG gunner unnoticed.
The remaining soldiers carry 9mm weapons and shotguns so our MG gunners can outreach them. Two crates wait for us at the conquered strongpoint, one of them containing some nice heavy ammo.
What is this nuclear powerstation about? That fenced area can be found in the eastern part of the map almost in an opposing position to the NOAH base. Obviously NOAH uses that station as a power source. Their scientific background enables them to operate the reactor. A look over the area reveals that the devs had a good eye to copy some typical soviet russian buildings which houses boiling water reactors but do not really understand the nescessary technical conditions to proceed a nuclear power station.
Usually there would be at least one water basin to store the burnt out fuel elements. The two cooling towers could not operate at all because there is no scource of water (river or lake). Those railroad tracks come from the north. There was another track coming from the south and ended at the first strongpoint, leaving a gap of only 500m between the tracks. Another two details should be shown. First a blue camero (unfortunately just a prop).
And second a few TFR buggers guarding the entrance. Feodor turns that Humvee into a bunch of scrapmetal.
And our Humvee lures the two soldiers into an ambush. The last TFR strongpoint is located on a hill in the north.
That Humvee drives around in a very long loop between the last strongpoint and the one we conquered before. We have not yet met that car patrol, because the TFR units remain unactivated until our units enter the vicinity of a corresponding strongpoint (the smart reader might have allready guessed that). The four armoured vehicles, we captured in the beginning can also be activated if a strongpoint calls for assistance in case of attack (we disabled that ability by destroying the antenna). Driving around during nighttime includes the risk of driving over a mine. Mc Nowel places a firecracker.
To take down the remaining infantery we use our well develloped luring-ambush-tactic. This time I managed to get a few pics of those manouvers. Our Humvee drives near the enemy position and retreats after alerting some TFR soldiers. The tents prevent the alerted enemy from directly shooting our car.
Those two TFR soldiers follow the car and run directly into our ambush. Its crucial to retreat the car slow enough that the enemy soldiers keep sight of it but not too close to keep them out of firerange. The ratio between sight radius and weapon range renders this tactics impossible if the enemy carries the wrong gun. The next luring action draws another soldier away from the strongpoint and Anatoli, Ivan and Feodor get more shooting practice.
The soldier we took down was part of a patrol with a MG gunner. Mc Nowel and Akim have to help out with the captured BTR.
This stunt might be a bit dangerous, because our BTR is in real bad condition and a single volley of that enemy M 60 might finish it. So don't try this at home (at least use a BTR in better condition). The remaining enemy group of two include another MG gunner. We managed to draw them away seperately by several alerts. As they both walk back to the strongpoint, Anatoli, Feodor and Ivan deal with the MG gunner first and with the last soldier afterwards.
If you are not that patient use a nade instead, there are plenty of them to find in this mission. After killing the last TFR soldier a cutscene announces the opening of the gate of the NOAH base. During cutscenes the game switches of the interface bars. That's why the lower pic shows no interface bars, the game allready switched them off but has not yet moved the camera to the cutscene position. Now the NOAH base can be freely entered and the contact can be established. This will trigger the second phase of the mission. We will cover that in the final part.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 6: They Came in the Dark (Part 3)
This part of the mission will see some more action. Promised!
This part of the mission will see some more action. Promised!
The combination of the terms "nuclear power" and "TFR" does not exactly seem to be suitable to indicate complete security. So it might just be a good idea to deploy some units not that far away from the powerstation. A single mine is placed in the entrance.
Our T 55 waits on the road. As far as we allready experienced surprize attacks, the enemy will just pop out of the air directly next to the target (there are no spawnpoints). Ivan pays NOAH a visit and adresses the scientist.
NOAH has watched our fight but claim to need no help at all.
"A bunch of TFR- soldiers with armoured vehicles - Null Problemo! We eat them for breakfast. NOAH? Never heared of them. We are dealing with olive oil. Those guys call me Godfather er Professor because of mere respect. There is no NOAH."
A few seconds later his capo brings in some bad news:
Nuclear reactors cannot be simply shut down. The core has to be cooled continiously. Normally there are some APU to deliver the necessary power, but under the current circumstances noone would imagine those APU to be in working condition. From now on we have 30 min left to throw the TFR out of the power plant to prevent the core melt. That's what I call an offer we can't refuse. At least NOAH admits its existance and spoils two soldiers and an APC. I need those two to carry loot.
This 30 min deadline really means a tight schedule and forces some parallel work with several teams. We use two T 55 and two BMP 1. It's fairly possible to beat the enemy in that timeframe but it's hard to do so without destroying all the vehicles. Most obviously the buildings must not be destroyed. And also most obviously we will hit the pause- button significantly more than once or twice. Directly behind the entrance two T 55 pop out of the air and begin to charge. Actually there is no script in the missionfile that make them charge, but they will, even though they cannot detect any enemy. Normally the enemy behaviour is scripted. We will pick up that issue in a future update. My guess is, that those two tanks are meant to go straight to the NOAH base, where NOAH defeats them. NOAH has enough firepower for that. One of the T 55 catches the mine. Strangly enough that particular T 55 charges Mc Knowel, the one, who has planted the mine, and he knows exactly where to find him.
Mc Nowel fires one APDSFS round against the enemy, which kills the whole crew. The second T 55 is not yet weakened by a mine, so our second T 55 has to do that job. Both tanks fire almost simultaniously one HEAT and one APDSFS. Ivan grabs one of the emptied T 55 just for the curiousity. There are 18 rouns of APDSFS in it, another 18 in the second one. In words THIRTY- SIX rounds! That makes 180,000 nines, enough to buy 3 brandnew T 55. Unfortunately there is no time to celebrate. Mc Nowel leaves the T 55 and finds an opportunity to place his last mine. There are three enemy vehicles on patrol.
The two cars take much longer for one turn than the BTR, so its a bit time to enter the area and place the mine directly next to the fence.
The explosion opens up a shortcut. Akim takes care of the second car by throwing a nade. Meanwhile our second BMP takes position next to the entrance gate and waits for the BTR to return. Our APC still carries the AT 2 and we unloaded any 73mm ammo to make shure that only the AT 2 is fired. Unfortunately there is no (screen-)shot of that shot. As planned, the enemy BTR 80 comes after our BMP and catches a 73mm HESH from our other, which kills the crew (theirs of course not ours).
Pulled away from the powerstation there is no enemy soldier, who can regrab the empty BTR. Two TFR soldiers left their guardposts next to the building. The stand next to the crater caused by the impact of the AT 2.
Another three TFR soldiers are patrolling around the main building. A group of four stands in the open area. Those four could be lured one after another and our most experienced team of four can sneak up the remaining soldiers from behind. It turns out that Akim was not that patient:
Note the number of nades in his inventory. The patrol has to be taken out one by one. Our group of three attacks the last one every time the patrol walks on the left side of the building, so there are no enemy forces which could interfere.
The countdown shows a slight discontunity. Each round of the patrol takes several minutes and our heroes took care of the heavy guardposts, which still stand next to the impact crater in the meantime. Akim shots a bolt on the RPG shooter and the group clears the other one.
Now a bit more than half of the time is left and we can take a look around the building. There is another heavy guardpost (with RPG), a BTR 80, a group of three, the remaining patrol and just outside the picture a Shilka. The BTR is covered from direct fire by those boxes, containers and the carport. The building is also too close.
Akim looses his patience for another time and darts away the guard with the RPG.
Now he has to wait until the patrol walkes around the building, so he grabs the dropped RPG in the meantime. Our group of three heads to the little gate over the railroad tracks and takes out a lone guard.
Unfortunately there is no way to treat that shilka yet, because we need one of our T 55 on the other side of the building. Right in the Moment, when the remaining patrol steps right through the group of three TFR- soldiers, Akim throws another nade (actually he throws a bit before). That kills all four soldiers and pisses the BTR off, which follows Akim around the building, right at the place, where we want it to be.
Mc Nowel serves a HEAT for breakfast and Prof Petrov gets the T 55 the hell out of here, around the whole building to the left side, where the rest of our tank force eagerly waits for the reinforcement, needed to take out the shilka. The enemy BTR returns to his post behind the building. Two minutes later the shilka redeployed to an ideal position (in fact not ideal for the enemy crew). Two T 55 shoot almost simultaniously one HEAT and one APDSFS. The latter ones are real problem solvers. Ivan solves another problem with his M 79.
Sorana and Victor drive their T 55 quickly to the right side of the building. Next to the cooling towers we found another surprize.
The lone soldier is patrolling around the towers and all TFR- members would reoccupy any empty vehicle they find. So they have to be taken care first. Feodor shoots directly on the patrol as the TFR- soldier turns around the tower just out of sight to the two other soldiers. A single APDSFS will empty the BMP. Normally the two soldiers would charge the T 55, if they could see it. To make sure those two will run away from the empty BMP, Feodor shoots a few round toward them.
It turned ot, that these two enemies did not realize the attack on the BMP (and its result) at all. So Feodor waited a few seconds for our T 55 to retreat and proceeds as planned.
Having almost 6 Minutes left our hunters take them one by one to empty some more captured guns. Meanwhile Akim takes position near the entrance gate and switches to the RPG. Any other unit leaves the area.
OK, noone can forsee that. If someone wants to play that mission straight realistic, there is a M 163 and a captured shilka, but it's extremely likely to catch a TOW missile from the heli before it can be shot down. In a realistic game our soldiers would carry at least one Strela, because the realistic cargo capacities would allow to take it home along with the loot. In our case Akim has 25 seconds to react until the enemy heli arrives. Next to the lightpost it remains a few seconds in position. Anyone, who wants to be safe can delegate the task to more shooters.
The OH 58 has to be destroyed to win, even though capturing is possible by killing just one crewman. All enemy units have to be killed or driven from the powerstation including the OH 58. The game needs a few seconds to swich off the countdown, so one could loose in spite of having cleared the area in the last few seconds. If this happens or if the buildings are destroyed the result will look like this:
Hey this is "Soldiers of Anarchy" and not "STALKER"!
This condition will remain active even if the mission is allready won. Behind the building a crate with heavyammo can be found.
Now it's time to grab the shilka and the bmp and collect every dropped item in the area.
NOAH will send a few guards here, which tend to collect items from the floor. Another visit at the NOAH base and another talk to their leader opens the next story arc.
There is a kind of religious community which established a position of military power after the pandemy. This community was founded before SGDS but remained mostly unharmed by the catastrophy and gained a lot of power afterwards. They even invented (or scavanged) advanced technology. Our soldiers allready met one of their cyborg units and those stories about "demons" can be easily connected with them. NOAH holds them responsible for SGDS. Independent from the truth behind that, the combination between religion and military force is always dangerous enough to be dealt with. The combination of the terms "advanced weapon technology" and "religious fanatics" does not exactly seem to be suitable to indicate complete security (Yes, I used copy'n'paste, why do you ask?).
Before we go, there is still something to loot. It's a pitty, how many vehicles have to be left behind.
There is still some use for them. Those NOAH- soldiers in the powerstation should not stand so close to that damaged BMP 1. What will happen, if my men accidently put a few bullets in that wreck?
I told you: It is dangerous! OK, you won't need that Strela anymore, aren't you? The next incident seems to be odd. Some NOAH- soldiers walk past some empty vehicles, which misteriously just explode right in that moment.
There is a fixed number of casulties, which NOAH accepts until they get pissed off. Until then they do not charge but investigate, where the firing comes from. This allows us to get a few shots from the HIP on the ground and in air.
In the same unexplictable way as in Mission 4, in the NOAH base some additional loot can be found on the ground, without anything actually lying on the ground.
So we return to our base after having stuffed the loot in almost every corner of our inventory slots. There is hardly room for more.
Our T 55 waits on the road. As far as we allready experienced surprize attacks, the enemy will just pop out of the air directly next to the target (there are no spawnpoints). Ivan pays NOAH a visit and adresses the scientist.
NOAH has watched our fight but claim to need no help at all.
"A bunch of TFR- soldiers with armoured vehicles - Null Problemo! We eat them for breakfast. NOAH? Never heared of them. We are dealing with olive oil. Those guys call me Godfather er Professor because of mere respect. There is no NOAH."
A few seconds later his capo brings in some bad news:
Nuclear reactors cannot be simply shut down. The core has to be cooled continiously. Normally there are some APU to deliver the necessary power, but under the current circumstances noone would imagine those APU to be in working condition. From now on we have 30 min left to throw the TFR out of the power plant to prevent the core melt. That's what I call an offer we can't refuse. At least NOAH admits its existance and spoils two soldiers and an APC. I need those two to carry loot.
This 30 min deadline really means a tight schedule and forces some parallel work with several teams. We use two T 55 and two BMP 1. It's fairly possible to beat the enemy in that timeframe but it's hard to do so without destroying all the vehicles. Most obviously the buildings must not be destroyed. And also most obviously we will hit the pause- button significantly more than once or twice. Directly behind the entrance two T 55 pop out of the air and begin to charge. Actually there is no script in the missionfile that make them charge, but they will, even though they cannot detect any enemy. Normally the enemy behaviour is scripted. We will pick up that issue in a future update. My guess is, that those two tanks are meant to go straight to the NOAH base, where NOAH defeats them. NOAH has enough firepower for that. One of the T 55 catches the mine. Strangly enough that particular T 55 charges Mc Knowel, the one, who has planted the mine, and he knows exactly where to find him.
Mc Nowel fires one APDSFS round against the enemy, which kills the whole crew. The second T 55 is not yet weakened by a mine, so our second T 55 has to do that job. Both tanks fire almost simultaniously one HEAT and one APDSFS. Ivan grabs one of the emptied T 55 just for the curiousity. There are 18 rouns of APDSFS in it, another 18 in the second one. In words THIRTY- SIX rounds! That makes 180,000 nines, enough to buy 3 brandnew T 55. Unfortunately there is no time to celebrate. Mc Nowel leaves the T 55 and finds an opportunity to place his last mine. There are three enemy vehicles on patrol.
The two cars take much longer for one turn than the BTR, so its a bit time to enter the area and place the mine directly next to the fence.
The explosion opens up a shortcut. Akim takes care of the second car by throwing a nade. Meanwhile our second BMP takes position next to the entrance gate and waits for the BTR to return. Our APC still carries the AT 2 and we unloaded any 73mm ammo to make shure that only the AT 2 is fired. Unfortunately there is no (screen-)shot of that shot. As planned, the enemy BTR 80 comes after our BMP and catches a 73mm HESH from our other, which kills the crew (theirs of course not ours).
Pulled away from the powerstation there is no enemy soldier, who can regrab the empty BTR. Two TFR soldiers left their guardposts next to the building. The stand next to the crater caused by the impact of the AT 2.
Another three TFR soldiers are patrolling around the main building. A group of four stands in the open area. Those four could be lured one after another and our most experienced team of four can sneak up the remaining soldiers from behind. It turns out that Akim was not that patient:
Note the number of nades in his inventory. The patrol has to be taken out one by one. Our group of three attacks the last one every time the patrol walks on the left side of the building, so there are no enemy forces which could interfere.
The countdown shows a slight discontunity. Each round of the patrol takes several minutes and our heroes took care of the heavy guardposts, which still stand next to the impact crater in the meantime. Akim shots a bolt on the RPG shooter and the group clears the other one.
Now a bit more than half of the time is left and we can take a look around the building. There is another heavy guardpost (with RPG), a BTR 80, a group of three, the remaining patrol and just outside the picture a Shilka. The BTR is covered from direct fire by those boxes, containers and the carport. The building is also too close.
Akim looses his patience for another time and darts away the guard with the RPG.
Now he has to wait until the patrol walkes around the building, so he grabs the dropped RPG in the meantime. Our group of three heads to the little gate over the railroad tracks and takes out a lone guard.
Unfortunately there is no way to treat that shilka yet, because we need one of our T 55 on the other side of the building. Right in the Moment, when the remaining patrol steps right through the group of three TFR- soldiers, Akim throws another nade (actually he throws a bit before). That kills all four soldiers and pisses the BTR off, which follows Akim around the building, right at the place, where we want it to be.
Mc Nowel serves a HEAT for breakfast and Prof Petrov gets the T 55 the hell out of here, around the whole building to the left side, where the rest of our tank force eagerly waits for the reinforcement, needed to take out the shilka. The enemy BTR returns to his post behind the building. Two minutes later the shilka redeployed to an ideal position (in fact not ideal for the enemy crew). Two T 55 shoot almost simultaniously one HEAT and one APDSFS. The latter ones are real problem solvers. Ivan solves another problem with his M 79.
Sorana and Victor drive their T 55 quickly to the right side of the building. Next to the cooling towers we found another surprize.
The lone soldier is patrolling around the towers and all TFR- members would reoccupy any empty vehicle they find. So they have to be taken care first. Feodor shoots directly on the patrol as the TFR- soldier turns around the tower just out of sight to the two other soldiers. A single APDSFS will empty the BMP. Normally the two soldiers would charge the T 55, if they could see it. To make sure those two will run away from the empty BMP, Feodor shoots a few round toward them.
It turned ot, that these two enemies did not realize the attack on the BMP (and its result) at all. So Feodor waited a few seconds for our T 55 to retreat and proceeds as planned.
Having almost 6 Minutes left our hunters take them one by one to empty some more captured guns. Meanwhile Akim takes position near the entrance gate and switches to the RPG. Any other unit leaves the area.
OK, noone can forsee that. If someone wants to play that mission straight realistic, there is a M 163 and a captured shilka, but it's extremely likely to catch a TOW missile from the heli before it can be shot down. In a realistic game our soldiers would carry at least one Strela, because the realistic cargo capacities would allow to take it home along with the loot. In our case Akim has 25 seconds to react until the enemy heli arrives. Next to the lightpost it remains a few seconds in position. Anyone, who wants to be safe can delegate the task to more shooters.
The OH 58 has to be destroyed to win, even though capturing is possible by killing just one crewman. All enemy units have to be killed or driven from the powerstation including the OH 58. The game needs a few seconds to swich off the countdown, so one could loose in spite of having cleared the area in the last few seconds. If this happens or if the buildings are destroyed the result will look like this:
Hey this is "Soldiers of Anarchy" and not "STALKER"!
This condition will remain active even if the mission is allready won. Behind the building a crate with heavyammo can be found.
Now it's time to grab the shilka and the bmp and collect every dropped item in the area.
NOAH will send a few guards here, which tend to collect items from the floor. Another visit at the NOAH base and another talk to their leader opens the next story arc.
There is a kind of religious community which established a position of military power after the pandemy. This community was founded before SGDS but remained mostly unharmed by the catastrophy and gained a lot of power afterwards. They even invented (or scavanged) advanced technology. Our soldiers allready met one of their cyborg units and those stories about "demons" can be easily connected with them. NOAH holds them responsible for SGDS. Independent from the truth behind that, the combination between religion and military force is always dangerous enough to be dealt with. The combination of the terms "advanced weapon technology" and "religious fanatics" does not exactly seem to be suitable to indicate complete security (Yes, I used copy'n'paste, why do you ask?).
Before we go, there is still something to loot. It's a pitty, how many vehicles have to be left behind.
There is still some use for them. Those NOAH- soldiers in the powerstation should not stand so close to that damaged BMP 1. What will happen, if my men accidently put a few bullets in that wreck?
I told you: It is dangerous! OK, you won't need that Strela anymore, aren't you? The next incident seems to be odd. Some NOAH- soldiers walk past some empty vehicles, which misteriously just explode right in that moment.
There is a fixed number of casulties, which NOAH accepts until they get pissed off. Until then they do not charge but investigate, where the firing comes from. This allows us to get a few shots from the HIP on the ground and in air.
In the same unexplictable way as in Mission 4, in the NOAH base some additional loot can be found on the ground, without anything actually lying on the ground.
So we return to our base after having stuffed the loot in almost every corner of our inventory slots. There is hardly room for more.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Between Missions
Home, Home again, I like to be here when I can...
Home, Home again, I like to be here when I can...
No matter which gang was supported in Mission 4, the two devided plots merge after mission 6. Prof Petrow and Mc Nowel earned a promotion. Prof Petrow will serv as a sniper and Mc Nowel receives the athletic skill.
Our two new soldiers, Ivan and Nadya don't bring any skills.
Unloading the vehicles might take a bit longer, this time. The lack of transport capacity forced our heroes to mix loaded and empty weapons into the same inventory slot. The function to empty all inventories should be replaced by a function to empty the inventory of the selected unit. Having 38h preperation time means a rather comfortable schedule until the next match.
Three soldiers can be treated with hormon enhacements. Anatoli, Prof Petrow and Helena will benefit this time. There are still 2h left in case Akim wants his blisters to be cured. Right now more than ten soldiers have been treated so far. The laboratory crew produces 3 doses of fly and 4 medipacks to prevent them from getting bored.
Our workshop can fill the timeframe perfectly by repairing two T 55 and a BTR 80, which has been captured in the 3rd mission (the one with 1000 rounds 14,5mm ammo and missing fogthrower).
Vladimir offers some interesting items. We take the two 125mm APDSFS rounds, several rockets (AT 2, AT 6, 57mm), 2 clips for Dragunov and the only molotov cocktail vladi has. Our trade has a botom line of 18,700 nines.
There are some decent weapons for our choppers available. Right now, there is no use for it. Some proposed solutions for the following mission include bringing in a chopper. But that is not necessary and simply wastes transport capacity, cause choppers cannot be loaded in the field.
The briefing concludes the informations, NOAH gave us. This sect, they mentioned is called the "Church of the Undying Child" (COTUC). They have develloped some impressing new technology. We allready met the so called "Unborn Knights". Those cyborgs carry Miniguns, firing high rates of bullets in rifle caliber. NOAH warned us from so called "Crawler Mines", which patrol beneath the surface and attack any enemy they can detect. The whole idea shows a great similarity to the 1995 B movie "Screamers".
NOAH delivered the location of a COTUC cloister on a hill. The white texture on the map was chosen on purpose, but I will not totally spoil the surprize.
The briefing mentions thumper to be used against the crawler mines. Those are available from the trader.
Every thumper needs the same cargospace as the M 60 and costs twice as much: 2,000 nines! In addition to that, every thumper can disable just ONE crawlermine by detonating it. The thumper is destroyed in the process. So thumpers are not needed, there are other ways to deal with the crawler mines.
Our next task force will focus on transport capacity, so we only take one T 55 and three cars.
Feodor takes a bunch of 40 mm nades <edit>and McNowel takes a few mines (sorry I forgot)</edit>, otherwise our soldiers travel with easy luggage.
Our two new soldiers, Ivan and Nadya don't bring any skills.
Unloading the vehicles might take a bit longer, this time. The lack of transport capacity forced our heroes to mix loaded and empty weapons into the same inventory slot. The function to empty all inventories should be replaced by a function to empty the inventory of the selected unit. Having 38h preperation time means a rather comfortable schedule until the next match.
Three soldiers can be treated with hormon enhacements. Anatoli, Prof Petrow and Helena will benefit this time. There are still 2h left in case Akim wants his blisters to be cured. Right now more than ten soldiers have been treated so far. The laboratory crew produces 3 doses of fly and 4 medipacks to prevent them from getting bored.
Our workshop can fill the timeframe perfectly by repairing two T 55 and a BTR 80, which has been captured in the 3rd mission (the one with 1000 rounds 14,5mm ammo and missing fogthrower).
Vladimir offers some interesting items. We take the two 125mm APDSFS rounds, several rockets (AT 2, AT 6, 57mm), 2 clips for Dragunov and the only molotov cocktail vladi has. Our trade has a botom line of 18,700 nines.
There are some decent weapons for our choppers available. Right now, there is no use for it. Some proposed solutions for the following mission include bringing in a chopper. But that is not necessary and simply wastes transport capacity, cause choppers cannot be loaded in the field.
The briefing concludes the informations, NOAH gave us. This sect, they mentioned is called the "Church of the Undying Child" (COTUC). They have develloped some impressing new technology. We allready met the so called "Unborn Knights". Those cyborgs carry Miniguns, firing high rates of bullets in rifle caliber. NOAH warned us from so called "Crawler Mines", which patrol beneath the surface and attack any enemy they can detect. The whole idea shows a great similarity to the 1995 B movie "Screamers".
NOAH delivered the location of a COTUC cloister on a hill. The white texture on the map was chosen on purpose, but I will not totally spoil the surprize.
The briefing mentions thumper to be used against the crawler mines. Those are available from the trader.
Every thumper needs the same cargospace as the M 60 and costs twice as much: 2,000 nines! In addition to that, every thumper can disable just ONE crawlermine by detonating it. The thumper is destroyed in the process. So thumpers are not needed, there are other ways to deal with the crawler mines.
Our next task force will focus on transport capacity, so we only take one T 55 and three cars.
Feodor takes a bunch of 40 mm nades <edit>and McNowel takes a few mines (sorry I forgot)</edit>, otherwise our soldiers travel with easy luggage.
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Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 7: And Follow Your Destiny (Part 1)
This Mission will fit perfectly into the season...
This Mission will fit perfectly into the season...
We start near the northwest corner of the map, the COTUC cloister, our objective, lies at the opposite corner. Our startpoint can be considdered as a safeplace to store captured and currently unused vehicles.
A beautiful sight, we're happy tonight, Walking in a Winterwonderland!
Victor starts to build a snowman, Helena and Feodor pull out some pots to prepare mulled wine and Mc Nowel looks for a suitable hill for sled race. "We have some work to do! Quit this, or Santa won't bring you any gifts!"
So far the positions of the crawler mines are totally uncertain, so keeping our first moves low profile seems to be a good idea. Our vehicles stay behind and a group of three starts to advance along the northern edge of the map. Very soon Prof Petrow discovers an enemy strongpoint and reports home.
Our homebase is right, there are other outposts and a lot of enemy forces. But if we do not fight them, why are we here? Those enemy soldiers look much more professional than the gangmembers we have fought before and they look more fanatic.
Fortunately they don't wear explosive belts and the don't hide behind "human shields". Further up north our scouts discover the first crawler mines.
Picking them up or disarming them is not possible, even for our explosive specialist. They are only neutralized if they attack something by exploding. Fortunately the detection radius of a mine is not very high. The lower pic shows, what happens if our soldier moves in closer than the safe distance. The incoming mine produces a characteristic dust cloud and can be outran. This method can be used to lure some crawler mines away opening up a pathway to move in. For unknown reasons those crawler mines know exactly, whom to attack, they dont attack COTUC units or wild animals. Maybe those mines are equipped with a highly sophisticated AI (better than anything WE could build!) or COTUC uses IFF transponders (which would allow us to capture them) or the mines just smell the enemy.
After some reconissance along the edges of the map the locations of the greater crawler minefields can be spotted along with the three enemy outposts.
COTUC also runs an airport directly south of the cloister. There is only one road leading to the cloister on top of the hill. Any other way is simply not passable. Evading some mines our scouts reach the plateau on the hill. Two monks wait there in front of the main building, one of them can be adressed.
If any of our units is spotted inside the cloister, the game is over. So taking a chopper, as other solutions of that mission proposed, would help to evade the mines but except the financial disadvantage of occupying a valuable vehicle slot (there are only 10 in this mission) with an otherwise unnecessary chopper without any cargo capacity, there is a serious danger as flying over means entering. Talking to the monks will end this threat. Obviously this mission was meant to be solved in that "normal way", but we will not go the normal way.
Prof Petrov sneaks into the cloister. There is no normal way in, but he can climb over the fences. Inside next to a smaller building a terminal can be used. To get there, he evades the patrolling (meditating) monks to stay undetected.
What a nice toy, this will make things much easier. Back to the minefield Prof Petrow finds out that it worked: the mines are gone.
So we bring in our Humvee to eliminate the wolfpack in the background. It is possible to solve this mission without sneaky deactivating the mines, but things will go much smoother now.
Some soldiers and three vehicles guard the nearest outpost around a small settlement (#1 on the map above). The enemy Humvee drives in circles and four soldiers walking on patrol.
The guardpost next to the watchtower looks promizing. Unfortunately this guard carries binoculars and spots Feodor and his brother just one second too early.
Even though the guard dies too fast to shoot back, half of the outpost is alerted and our men have to perform a really quick tactical redeployment.
This exposed position can be very dangerous for an APC. Helena uses the oppurtunity to fire on it with the RPG (unfortunately there is no pic of it). The rolling terrain next to the outpost helps alot for our retreat manouvers. The other single guard on the low hill has volunteerly left his post before to assist the alerted BMP and got allready killed. Now Anatoli can take out the enemy car with a nade without interference.
The BMP and the remaining COTUC soldiers returned to their former positions. Ivan fires a 40 mm flame grenade. Normally 3 or 4 of those will take out the crew of the BMP. We need this APC in one piece.
The enemy soldiers standing relativly close to the BMP, so they might have suffered some damage by the 40 mm, especially as they run directly through the still burning fire. Feodor, Anatoli and Ivan form a hunting team and lure some COTUC soldiers away from the outpost without alerting the two remaining vehicles.
Most of the enemy soldiers carry AK 74 and some RPK there is one guard with a RPG, who fortunately burned himself to death earlier.
After thinning out the enemy outpost, Ivan scores a final hit on the BMP to empty it.
This BMP contains only 5 HESH rounds, not much but enough for our next moves. Now it's time for the M 163 to be captured. Mc Nowel performs our famous mine trap.
Getting into cover turned out to be harder than thought. Fortunately even those tiny gardenfence obscures fire, even though the M 163 could (in reality) easily fire over it (or just through it or more precisely through its remains). On the other hand this tiny garden fence cannot be climbed over, either. Fair enough one single 73mm HESH round takes out the crew of the M 163.
Our captured BMP had to advance as close as possible without detection to get the crew with a single hit. Mc Nowel finds some heavy ammo in a crate next to the blockhouse.
Our heroes return to the starting position and leave the BMP on the parking lot. For the next step we head to the outpost next to the airport (# 3).
This area is guarded by some very interesting units. This MRLS looks really "delicious" and there is another empty one near the tents. The lone guardpost on the hill carries a Dragunov and binoculars. Akim takes care of him.
As usual the Humvee drives in circles. Victor takes his turn with a nade.
A team of four takes out the other lonely guardpost on the opposite hill. Again this time our group is detected by the dying enemy. Fortunately none of the alerted enemies (red marks) can directly return fire, so our group of four retreats over the hill. Looking close the BM 21 MRLS flees (yellow mark), when alerted due to its minimal shooting range. When the MRLS reaches a suitable firing position and our soldiers are still in sight of COTUC units it will fire. Most of the alerted COTUC soldiers can be eliminated seperately on their way over the hills back to the outpost.
This way the enemy strongpoint can be thinned out. Two COTUC soldiers carry RPG, one of them drops his for us to grab. He won't need it anymore.
Ivan will use this captured RPG for a shot on the enemy BTR. The RPG can outreach the KPV and firing from the hill Ivan can vanish behind the hilltop. The BTR will leave the outpost, which opens the opportunity for a shot with the M 79, which will automaticly swich into Ivans hand to be loaded (the game prefers to take automaticly an unloaded weapon and load it instead of switching to a loaded one, if the weapon in hand runs dry!).
The BTR moved to the hilltop as planned, but Ivan could not get a good shooting position, so he lured the BTR a bit away and scored a hit, which eliminated the gunner. The driver left his vehicle. Mc Nowels and Victor allready waited for this. So the BTR changes hands.
Our Humvee still contains 400 rounds of ammo. The last remaining guard can be sneaked up from behind.
As seen before the BM 21 cannot directly engage, so our soldiers can attack it without danger. Ivan fires a 40 mm flame grenades and another one shortly afterwards. Akim fires one bolt on the MRLS and kills one of the crewmembers, which can be seen by the headlights of the vehicle turning on.
Unfortunately the second crewmember does not leave the vehicle. It took another 3 bolts to take him out. Beside the one we just captured there is another empty BM 21 to get.
Our new toy contains 20 122mm rockets, the captured MRLS spoils another 8 rockets, which can be directly transfered from vehicle to vehicle. The empty BM 21 will deactivate after the location of the COTUC HQ is revealed unless it is not grabbed before, while putting a permanent crew in it is not necessary. Akim also finds some more heavy ammo.
After that we will take a short brake, warm up a little with a nice cup of mulled wine until the next update.
A beautiful sight, we're happy tonight, Walking in a Winterwonderland!
Victor starts to build a snowman, Helena and Feodor pull out some pots to prepare mulled wine and Mc Nowel looks for a suitable hill for sled race. "We have some work to do! Quit this, or Santa won't bring you any gifts!"
So far the positions of the crawler mines are totally uncertain, so keeping our first moves low profile seems to be a good idea. Our vehicles stay behind and a group of three starts to advance along the northern edge of the map. Very soon Prof Petrow discovers an enemy strongpoint and reports home.
Our homebase is right, there are other outposts and a lot of enemy forces. But if we do not fight them, why are we here? Those enemy soldiers look much more professional than the gangmembers we have fought before and they look more fanatic.
Fortunately they don't wear explosive belts and the don't hide behind "human shields". Further up north our scouts discover the first crawler mines.
Picking them up or disarming them is not possible, even for our explosive specialist. They are only neutralized if they attack something by exploding. Fortunately the detection radius of a mine is not very high. The lower pic shows, what happens if our soldier moves in closer than the safe distance. The incoming mine produces a characteristic dust cloud and can be outran. This method can be used to lure some crawler mines away opening up a pathway to move in. For unknown reasons those crawler mines know exactly, whom to attack, they dont attack COTUC units or wild animals. Maybe those mines are equipped with a highly sophisticated AI (better than anything WE could build!) or COTUC uses IFF transponders (which would allow us to capture them) or the mines just smell the enemy.
After some reconissance along the edges of the map the locations of the greater crawler minefields can be spotted along with the three enemy outposts.
COTUC also runs an airport directly south of the cloister. There is only one road leading to the cloister on top of the hill. Any other way is simply not passable. Evading some mines our scouts reach the plateau on the hill. Two monks wait there in front of the main building, one of them can be adressed.
If any of our units is spotted inside the cloister, the game is over. So taking a chopper, as other solutions of that mission proposed, would help to evade the mines but except the financial disadvantage of occupying a valuable vehicle slot (there are only 10 in this mission) with an otherwise unnecessary chopper without any cargo capacity, there is a serious danger as flying over means entering. Talking to the monks will end this threat. Obviously this mission was meant to be solved in that "normal way", but we will not go the normal way.
Prof Petrov sneaks into the cloister. There is no normal way in, but he can climb over the fences. Inside next to a smaller building a terminal can be used. To get there, he evades the patrolling (meditating) monks to stay undetected.
What a nice toy, this will make things much easier. Back to the minefield Prof Petrow finds out that it worked: the mines are gone.
So we bring in our Humvee to eliminate the wolfpack in the background. It is possible to solve this mission without sneaky deactivating the mines, but things will go much smoother now.
Some soldiers and three vehicles guard the nearest outpost around a small settlement (#1 on the map above). The enemy Humvee drives in circles and four soldiers walking on patrol.
The guardpost next to the watchtower looks promizing. Unfortunately this guard carries binoculars and spots Feodor and his brother just one second too early.
Even though the guard dies too fast to shoot back, half of the outpost is alerted and our men have to perform a really quick tactical redeployment.
This exposed position can be very dangerous for an APC. Helena uses the oppurtunity to fire on it with the RPG (unfortunately there is no pic of it). The rolling terrain next to the outpost helps alot for our retreat manouvers. The other single guard on the low hill has volunteerly left his post before to assist the alerted BMP and got allready killed. Now Anatoli can take out the enemy car with a nade without interference.
The BMP and the remaining COTUC soldiers returned to their former positions. Ivan fires a 40 mm flame grenade. Normally 3 or 4 of those will take out the crew of the BMP. We need this APC in one piece.
The enemy soldiers standing relativly close to the BMP, so they might have suffered some damage by the 40 mm, especially as they run directly through the still burning fire. Feodor, Anatoli and Ivan form a hunting team and lure some COTUC soldiers away from the outpost without alerting the two remaining vehicles.
Most of the enemy soldiers carry AK 74 and some RPK there is one guard with a RPG, who fortunately burned himself to death earlier.
After thinning out the enemy outpost, Ivan scores a final hit on the BMP to empty it.
This BMP contains only 5 HESH rounds, not much but enough for our next moves. Now it's time for the M 163 to be captured. Mc Nowel performs our famous mine trap.
Getting into cover turned out to be harder than thought. Fortunately even those tiny gardenfence obscures fire, even though the M 163 could (in reality) easily fire over it (or just through it or more precisely through its remains). On the other hand this tiny garden fence cannot be climbed over, either. Fair enough one single 73mm HESH round takes out the crew of the M 163.
Our captured BMP had to advance as close as possible without detection to get the crew with a single hit. Mc Nowel finds some heavy ammo in a crate next to the blockhouse.
Our heroes return to the starting position and leave the BMP on the parking lot. For the next step we head to the outpost next to the airport (# 3).
This area is guarded by some very interesting units. This MRLS looks really "delicious" and there is another empty one near the tents. The lone guardpost on the hill carries a Dragunov and binoculars. Akim takes care of him.
As usual the Humvee drives in circles. Victor takes his turn with a nade.
A team of four takes out the other lonely guardpost on the opposite hill. Again this time our group is detected by the dying enemy. Fortunately none of the alerted enemies (red marks) can directly return fire, so our group of four retreats over the hill. Looking close the BM 21 MRLS flees (yellow mark), when alerted due to its minimal shooting range. When the MRLS reaches a suitable firing position and our soldiers are still in sight of COTUC units it will fire. Most of the alerted COTUC soldiers can be eliminated seperately on their way over the hills back to the outpost.
This way the enemy strongpoint can be thinned out. Two COTUC soldiers carry RPG, one of them drops his for us to grab. He won't need it anymore.
Ivan will use this captured RPG for a shot on the enemy BTR. The RPG can outreach the KPV and firing from the hill Ivan can vanish behind the hilltop. The BTR will leave the outpost, which opens the opportunity for a shot with the M 79, which will automaticly swich into Ivans hand to be loaded (the game prefers to take automaticly an unloaded weapon and load it instead of switching to a loaded one, if the weapon in hand runs dry!).
The BTR moved to the hilltop as planned, but Ivan could not get a good shooting position, so he lured the BTR a bit away and scored a hit, which eliminated the gunner. The driver left his vehicle. Mc Nowels and Victor allready waited for this. So the BTR changes hands.
Our Humvee still contains 400 rounds of ammo. The last remaining guard can be sneaked up from behind.
As seen before the BM 21 cannot directly engage, so our soldiers can attack it without danger. Ivan fires a 40 mm flame grenades and another one shortly afterwards. Akim fires one bolt on the MRLS and kills one of the crewmembers, which can be seen by the headlights of the vehicle turning on.
Unfortunately the second crewmember does not leave the vehicle. It took another 3 bolts to take him out. Beside the one we just captured there is another empty BM 21 to get.
Our new toy contains 20 122mm rockets, the captured MRLS spoils another 8 rockets, which can be directly transfered from vehicle to vehicle. The empty BM 21 will deactivate after the location of the COTUC HQ is revealed unless it is not grabbed before, while putting a permanent crew in it is not necessary. Akim also finds some more heavy ammo.
After that we will take a short brake, warm up a little with a nice cup of mulled wine until the next update.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 7: And Follow Your Destiny (Part 2)
Maybe we should throw some snowballs on the COTUC soldiers instead of shooting them...
Maybe we should throw some snowballs on the COTUC soldiers instead of shooting them...
There are only a few actions, which could break this mission (like being detected in the cloister too early) and most of them are pretty obvious. Some decissions will lead to the appearance or dissapearance of certain enemy units, which (in consequence) can or cannot be taken out and looted. The three outposts can be conquered in any order and before or after having talked to the COTUC monks (in the cloister) but they all have to be conquered at least once. Because of the MRLS in the last outpost we conquered (#3) and its ability to deliver long range support fire, conquering that particular outpost first might be a good strategy. Alternatively our squad can just stay away from that outpost and prevent the enemy units there from activating, even though one might considder this strategy not realistic enough.
There is one outpost left next to our starting point (#2 on the map above).
One Humvee, three armoured vehicles and a bunch of soldiers guard a Kolkhoz. Clearing that place starts with some routine work. Akim throws a grenade on that patrolling Humvee.
Our Humvee shoots on a patrolling COTUC soldier and retreats. That luring action will pull out some enemy guards, which can be eliminated one by one.
Repeated several times this action thins out the outpost (maybe that's why it is called "outpost"?) significantly. Our group of four sneaks up to the one remaining guard next to the big silo.
Almost from the same spot Feodor empties one RPG on the BTR 80. And as usual his brother Anatoli combines this delivery with a 40mm grenade.
Obviously all BTR driver behave similar in this mission, so this one also leaves his vehicle after the gunner has been killed. This BTR is the second one and not the last. So it seems to be routine so far. Mc Nowel also performs some repetive task and lures the M 163 on a mine and Anatoli shoots a 40 mm grenade on it.
The crew of the M 163 survives, so a 73mm HESH has to clear the situation.
Now there is only the T 55 left. This one is manned with three crewmen, so it takes some efforts to capture it. Mc Nowel starts with his famous mine trick. This time he does not shoot directly on the T 55 but on the ground behind it.
While Mc Nowel hides behind the farmhouse, Anatoli prepares for firing a 40 mm HESH grenade.
This impact hits the gunner on the open turret really hard, but it takes another 40 mm flame grenade to take the turret gunner completely out. Anatoli had to run behind the farmhouse to get a grenade from Mc Nowel. There must be some kind of driver exchange because the headlight of the tank swiches on (maybe there were even four crewmen inside?). A final duell with our BMP finishes the remaining crew. Between the houses there is enough cover to fire one HESH round and another one.
The captured tank seems to be mere scrapmetal but contains some usefull ammo. Of course there is a heavy ammo crate on this outpost.
To reach it, Helena has to climb over that open gate. The wings open far enough to let any human pass but the game measures distances in "tiles" and not in meters. Both wings of the gate occupy an adjected tile (no matter in which orientation they are), so for the game the area is tight. The effort works out and Helena can enrich our inventory significantly.
There is another crate, which activates in the last remaining outpost, when the other two are conquered. Taking it will trigger some new story, so it is better to leave it for now. The airfield deserves a closer look before.
The whole area streches over several hundred meters. A Shilka and a BMP guard the field and several COTUC soldiers walk their patrolways. A closer look reveals another T 55 and a Humvee.
This time the Humvee remains on its position whereas the T 55 drives around. Well, Victor can also hit stationary targets with a nade.
This kill boosts Victor to the rank of colonel (the highest rank in the group so far), but there will be no skill available for him, even though I changed his name (deleted the terminal "a"). This feature seems to be really buggy. Helena and Ivan take care of the COTUC soldiers with some of the usual luring and killing action.
We could use one of the captured BTR or M 163 to outreach their AK 74, but this individual treatment will empty some of our captured guns. It is important to eleminate any COTUC soldier first, because they usually grab empty vehicles.
After clearing the airfield from any infantery presence, we bring in our T 55. We will bring home at least one BMP and this one has deployed in a perfect position for a clean shot.
A single APDSFS round eliminates the crew with minimal damage. The (random) deployment outside the fence enables us to pick it up easiely. But we will not pick it up yet because of a certain flaw of the game, which will be explained later. Meanwhile Mc Nowel places another mine in the patrolway of the T 55.
There are also three crewmembers in it. The most predictable patrolway enables another clean APDSFS shot (sorry no pic), leaving the empty but mostly intact T 55 ready for pick up. Again we will leave this empty tank until later. We have one round 125mm APDSFS left and the shilka seems to be a most valuable target. But let's first sidetrack for a moment with a little experiment: What if we alter the storyline to test one of our new toys. Of course we will reload the game, as if nothing has happened, so anyone who does not believe in alternate reality is strongly suggested NOT to open up the spoiler button!
Now we hit the reload button and all sceptics to the many-worlds interpretation can safely uncover their eyes
Our normal way to cope with the shilka includes anothe one of Mc Nowels mine tricks. This time the trick includes finding the right cover in the mostly flat terrain.
our T 55 finishes the crew with our last APDSFS round. Like the other two vehicles we will grab it later. In the hills behind the airport a special wild animal can be found.
This sibirian tiger will be encountered only once. The devs succeeded in animating it in a realistic way (compared to the game devellopement of that time). Its really a pity to kill it.
It's worth to mention that the succesor game "The Fall - Last Days of Gaia" rewards the killing of wild animals with animal pelts.
Now back to the crate in the last outpost. Anatoli takes a walk and picks it up.
Anatoli picks it up and Victor communicates with the HQ because of the newly triggered events (Pretty weird, isn't it?). The crate uncovers a document to provide enforcements to the airfield for the arrival of a high member of COTUC. This might offer an opportunity to find out the position of the COTUC HQ, which is one of our major missiongoals. In fact there are exactly two possible solutions for this, which will be explained in the third part.
There is one outpost left next to our starting point (#2 on the map above).
One Humvee, three armoured vehicles and a bunch of soldiers guard a Kolkhoz. Clearing that place starts with some routine work. Akim throws a grenade on that patrolling Humvee.
Our Humvee shoots on a patrolling COTUC soldier and retreats. That luring action will pull out some enemy guards, which can be eliminated one by one.
Repeated several times this action thins out the outpost (maybe that's why it is called "outpost"?) significantly. Our group of four sneaks up to the one remaining guard next to the big silo.
Almost from the same spot Feodor empties one RPG on the BTR 80. And as usual his brother Anatoli combines this delivery with a 40mm grenade.
Obviously all BTR driver behave similar in this mission, so this one also leaves his vehicle after the gunner has been killed. This BTR is the second one and not the last. So it seems to be routine so far. Mc Nowel also performs some repetive task and lures the M 163 on a mine and Anatoli shoots a 40 mm grenade on it.
The crew of the M 163 survives, so a 73mm HESH has to clear the situation.
Now there is only the T 55 left. This one is manned with three crewmen, so it takes some efforts to capture it. Mc Nowel starts with his famous mine trick. This time he does not shoot directly on the T 55 but on the ground behind it.
While Mc Nowel hides behind the farmhouse, Anatoli prepares for firing a 40 mm HESH grenade.
This impact hits the gunner on the open turret really hard, but it takes another 40 mm flame grenade to take the turret gunner completely out. Anatoli had to run behind the farmhouse to get a grenade from Mc Nowel. There must be some kind of driver exchange because the headlight of the tank swiches on (maybe there were even four crewmen inside?). A final duell with our BMP finishes the remaining crew. Between the houses there is enough cover to fire one HESH round and another one.
The captured tank seems to be mere scrapmetal but contains some usefull ammo. Of course there is a heavy ammo crate on this outpost.
To reach it, Helena has to climb over that open gate. The wings open far enough to let any human pass but the game measures distances in "tiles" and not in meters. Both wings of the gate occupy an adjected tile (no matter in which orientation they are), so for the game the area is tight. The effort works out and Helena can enrich our inventory significantly.
There is another crate, which activates in the last remaining outpost, when the other two are conquered. Taking it will trigger some new story, so it is better to leave it for now. The airfield deserves a closer look before.
The whole area streches over several hundred meters. A Shilka and a BMP guard the field and several COTUC soldiers walk their patrolways. A closer look reveals another T 55 and a Humvee.
This time the Humvee remains on its position whereas the T 55 drives around. Well, Victor can also hit stationary targets with a nade.
This kill boosts Victor to the rank of colonel (the highest rank in the group so far), but there will be no skill available for him, even though I changed his name (deleted the terminal "a"). This feature seems to be really buggy. Helena and Ivan take care of the COTUC soldiers with some of the usual luring and killing action.
We could use one of the captured BTR or M 163 to outreach their AK 74, but this individual treatment will empty some of our captured guns. It is important to eleminate any COTUC soldier first, because they usually grab empty vehicles.
After clearing the airfield from any infantery presence, we bring in our T 55. We will bring home at least one BMP and this one has deployed in a perfect position for a clean shot.
A single APDSFS round eliminates the crew with minimal damage. The (random) deployment outside the fence enables us to pick it up easiely. But we will not pick it up yet because of a certain flaw of the game, which will be explained later. Meanwhile Mc Nowel places another mine in the patrolway of the T 55.
There are also three crewmembers in it. The most predictable patrolway enables another clean APDSFS shot (sorry no pic), leaving the empty but mostly intact T 55 ready for pick up. Again we will leave this empty tank until later. We have one round 125mm APDSFS left and the shilka seems to be a most valuable target. But let's first sidetrack for a moment with a little experiment: What if we alter the storyline to test one of our new toys. Of course we will reload the game, as if nothing has happened, so anyone who does not believe in alternate reality is strongly suggested NOT to open up the spoiler button!
Our BM 21 can fire almost over the whole map and so can reach the shilka on the airfield. The extendable stanchions of the real thing have been omitted (even though they planned them). We put 5 122mm rockets into it and fire a volley.
The impact of the last three of it is not less impressing.
Rocket three allready finishes the shilka before it has the chance to move away, four and fife hit the scrap. Unlike the original MRLS the game version hits the target very precisely.
The impact of the last three of it is not less impressing.
Rocket three allready finishes the shilka before it has the chance to move away, four and fife hit the scrap. Unlike the original MRLS the game version hits the target very precisely.
Now we hit the reload button and all sceptics to the many-worlds interpretation can safely uncover their eyes
Our normal way to cope with the shilka includes anothe one of Mc Nowels mine tricks. This time the trick includes finding the right cover in the mostly flat terrain.
our T 55 finishes the crew with our last APDSFS round. Like the other two vehicles we will grab it later. In the hills behind the airport a special wild animal can be found.
This sibirian tiger will be encountered only once. The devs succeeded in animating it in a realistic way (compared to the game devellopement of that time). Its really a pity to kill it.
It's worth to mention that the succesor game "The Fall - Last Days of Gaia" rewards the killing of wild animals with animal pelts.
Now back to the crate in the last outpost. Anatoli takes a walk and picks it up.
Anatoli picks it up and Victor communicates with the HQ because of the newly triggered events (Pretty weird, isn't it?). The crate uncovers a document to provide enforcements to the airfield for the arrival of a high member of COTUC. This might offer an opportunity to find out the position of the COTUC HQ, which is one of our major missiongoals. In fact there are exactly two possible solutions for this, which will be explained in the third part.
Last edited:
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 7: And Follow Your Destiny (Part 3)
This mission is about a mission on a hill...
This mission is about a mission on a hill...
Someone has to check out the airport for that COTUC VIP. It's good to know in advance that they deployed additional guards. This area has allready been cleared from COTUC presence. The scenery has changed somehow.
Two T 55, two M 163, one BMP 1, one BM 21 and some soldiers... I didn't know that COTUC pal was THAT important. In the background the chopper is allready coming in. The following arrival procedure should be enjoyed carefully. So get some drinks and popcorn before. The devs produced a really interesting scene, which our heroes are able to witness, if they stay in sight. Otherwise they will only get the dialogues. This VIP, the holy Georgis, comes to inspect the cloister. The devs blessed him with a very special ductus (more precisely prosody), which indicates some very special interest. Georgis might like to get some Bacardy and Coke in the cloister. I am not sure, if the english version has conserved that characteristic.
The chopper lands, Georgis exits and the prior awaits him. The moment Georgis arrives he starts complaining, first about the smell of the kerosene, then about the decreasing number of followers and last but not least about the ignorance of the COTUC armed forces about the latest military occurances (literally mission 1 to 6).
Come on... this guy is a bitch!
Having spoken Georgis and the prior enter the Humvee and drive to the cloister. Two of the four undead knights follow the car as personal escort.
One possible way to get the position of the COTUC HQ includes planting a transponder into the chopper. Georgis will return to his OH 58 and leave as soon the transponder is planted if
It is possible to sneak on the airport next to the chopper and plant the transponder by drag and drop it on the vehicle (without entering it). It is not necessary to conquer the airport, but it helps. The problem to get a suitable transponder will be reflecter a bit later. Meanwhile Helena shoots the pilot.
The elimination of case #1 renders the transponder plan impossible, so we hang on the alternative. The two remaining undead knights, who guard the heliport, unfortunately have noticed something going on. Helena could
Wisely enough Helena chose #1 and returns in a sneaky way together with Anatoli for a simultanious nade attack. Handgrenades are the most efficient way to get rid of those undead knights. Those two stay in a semi stealth mode, which mean they become translucent and the marker vanishes.
As allready seen in mission 4, the explosion of the kybernetic implants causes some colateral damage, in this case the burning barrel (third explosion).
Which common soldier will never be respected? Private property. Which officers will always be respected? Major case and major problem. The BM 21 will cause major problems. This time we put a bit more pressure on the case. Our BMP puts a 73mm HESH in it.
The crew of the BM 21 survives that impact and the vehicle flees (as usual). Other COTUC units are alerted and will charge. Most surprizing one T 55 also puts in the reverse gear (yellow marking), so this unit is unable to fight. Lacking crewmembers would have been replaced by other soldiers, so this tank must have a lack of ammo. We retreat from the charging units and let them return. Unfortunately the BM 21 stands too close to the four soldiers, so grabbing it will be detected. We need to eliminate the four COTUC soldiers first. Anatoli fires some rounds into the unarmed T 55, which will lure most of the COTUC units away.
The infantry comes in first, so Anatoli stays in sight radius to lure them further away...
... followed by some shooting practice.
After that Akim takes care of the MRLS with some close quarter sniper shots.
The second shot kills one crewmember (headlights turn on) and the remaining COTUC soldier leaves the vehicle. This MRLS was the reason, why we left the emptied BMP 1, T 55 and Shilka. Grabbing any empty unit on the airport will trigger that BM 21 to shoot some missiles directly on the empty vehicle as if the ghosts of the crewmen could call for arty support. Even if the empty vehicles are allready grabbed the BM 21 will shoot on their last known positions, as soon as the MRLS is activated. This behaviour is absolutely strange.
There is another BTR 80 behind the runway. The Wostow Brothers take care of it in the most usual way: one RPG and a 40 mm burning nade.
After grabbing the empty vehicles it's time to take care of the T 55. This time we do not waste ammo, we simply scare the unarmed T 55 away, forcing the other tank to come for assistance.
One 125 mm HEAT will give a clear statement.
This T 55 is also manned by three crewmembers, so capturing might need some more efforts. We need the empty BMP 1 (especially its ammo), unfortunately one M 163 stands much too close to it. One 125 mm HEAT will force those APC to charge, while someone will grab the BMP meanwhile.
Our next attack will weaken the T 55 even more: one more 125 mm HEAT followed by RPG fire. Feodor already waits in position.
The second impact hits the tank on the (better armoured) side and while the turret gunner looks out of the tank. A single 73 mm HESH ends the crisis, leaving that tank in a remarkable good condition.
The enemy BMP 1 near the end of the runway will be next. Mc Nowel performs another mine trick. Helena has to score some more hits, so Anatoli hands her over the M 79.
The surviving driver shows at least some cooperation and leaves his vehicle.
The other M 163 is treated with a 125 mm HEAT to even the score between those two APC. It takes another three 73 mm HESH to empty them.
Exploring the rear end of the Airfield, there is a surprize.
Those two guards soon find out, that any 14,5 mm autocannon can outreach an M 60.
There is no way to enter the F 15 but that Eagle is captured, as soon as the guards are eliminated. The heavy ammo box next to the hangar holds some more items.
The other crate delivers three target transponders used for air bombardment. We will explain this feature later. Our two APC can just roll on a few meters and take care of the remaining unarmed T 55.
So we can go up to the mission on the hill for the last part of the mission.
Two T 55, two M 163, one BMP 1, one BM 21 and some soldiers... I didn't know that COTUC pal was THAT important. In the background the chopper is allready coming in. The following arrival procedure should be enjoyed carefully. So get some drinks and popcorn before. The devs produced a really interesting scene, which our heroes are able to witness, if they stay in sight. Otherwise they will only get the dialogues. This VIP, the holy Georgis, comes to inspect the cloister. The devs blessed him with a very special ductus (more precisely prosody), which indicates some very special interest. Georgis might like to get some Bacardy and Coke in the cloister. I am not sure, if the english version has conserved that characteristic.
The chopper lands, Georgis exits and the prior awaits him. The moment Georgis arrives he starts complaining, first about the smell of the kerosene, then about the decreasing number of followers and last but not least about the ignorance of the COTUC armed forces about the latest military occurances (literally mission 1 to 6).
Come on... this guy is a bitch!
Having spoken Georgis and the prior enter the Humvee and drive to the cloister. Two of the four undead knights follow the car as personal escort.
One possible way to get the position of the COTUC HQ includes planting a transponder into the chopper. Georgis will return to his OH 58 and leave as soon the transponder is planted if
- the chopper still exists,
- the pilot still exists and
- the Humvee still exist (Georgis has flat feet.)
It is possible to sneak on the airport next to the chopper and plant the transponder by drag and drop it on the vehicle (without entering it). It is not necessary to conquer the airport, but it helps. The problem to get a suitable transponder will be reflecter a bit later. Meanwhile Helena shoots the pilot.
The elimination of case #1 renders the transponder plan impossible, so we hang on the alternative. The two remaining undead knights, who guard the heliport, unfortunately have noticed something going on. Helena could
- move out or
- stay and tell them, that the pilot is not dead but he is resting.
Wisely enough Helena chose #1 and returns in a sneaky way together with Anatoli for a simultanious nade attack. Handgrenades are the most efficient way to get rid of those undead knights. Those two stay in a semi stealth mode, which mean they become translucent and the marker vanishes.
As allready seen in mission 4, the explosion of the kybernetic implants causes some colateral damage, in this case the burning barrel (third explosion).
Which common soldier will never be respected? Private property. Which officers will always be respected? Major case and major problem. The BM 21 will cause major problems. This time we put a bit more pressure on the case. Our BMP puts a 73mm HESH in it.
The crew of the BM 21 survives that impact and the vehicle flees (as usual). Other COTUC units are alerted and will charge. Most surprizing one T 55 also puts in the reverse gear (yellow marking), so this unit is unable to fight. Lacking crewmembers would have been replaced by other soldiers, so this tank must have a lack of ammo. We retreat from the charging units and let them return. Unfortunately the BM 21 stands too close to the four soldiers, so grabbing it will be detected. We need to eliminate the four COTUC soldiers first. Anatoli fires some rounds into the unarmed T 55, which will lure most of the COTUC units away.
The infantry comes in first, so Anatoli stays in sight radius to lure them further away...
... followed by some shooting practice.
After that Akim takes care of the MRLS with some close quarter sniper shots.
The second shot kills one crewmember (headlights turn on) and the remaining COTUC soldier leaves the vehicle. This MRLS was the reason, why we left the emptied BMP 1, T 55 and Shilka. Grabbing any empty unit on the airport will trigger that BM 21 to shoot some missiles directly on the empty vehicle as if the ghosts of the crewmen could call for arty support. Even if the empty vehicles are allready grabbed the BM 21 will shoot on their last known positions, as soon as the MRLS is activated. This behaviour is absolutely strange.
There is another BTR 80 behind the runway. The Wostow Brothers take care of it in the most usual way: one RPG and a 40 mm burning nade.
After grabbing the empty vehicles it's time to take care of the T 55. This time we do not waste ammo, we simply scare the unarmed T 55 away, forcing the other tank to come for assistance.
One 125 mm HEAT will give a clear statement.
This T 55 is also manned by three crewmembers, so capturing might need some more efforts. We need the empty BMP 1 (especially its ammo), unfortunately one M 163 stands much too close to it. One 125 mm HEAT will force those APC to charge, while someone will grab the BMP meanwhile.
Our next attack will weaken the T 55 even more: one more 125 mm HEAT followed by RPG fire. Feodor already waits in position.
The second impact hits the tank on the (better armoured) side and while the turret gunner looks out of the tank. A single 73 mm HESH ends the crisis, leaving that tank in a remarkable good condition.
The enemy BMP 1 near the end of the runway will be next. Mc Nowel performs another mine trick. Helena has to score some more hits, so Anatoli hands her over the M 79.
The surviving driver shows at least some cooperation and leaves his vehicle.
The other M 163 is treated with a 125 mm HEAT to even the score between those two APC. It takes another three 73 mm HESH to empty them.
Exploring the rear end of the Airfield, there is a surprize.
Those two guards soon find out, that any 14,5 mm autocannon can outreach an M 60.
There is no way to enter the F 15 but that Eagle is captured, as soon as the guards are eliminated. The heavy ammo box next to the hangar holds some more items.
The other crate delivers three target transponders used for air bombardment. We will explain this feature later. Our two APC can just roll on a few meters and take care of the remaining unarmed T 55.
So we can go up to the mission on the hill for the last part of the mission.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 7: And Follow Your Destiny (Part 4)
Time to bring this mission to an end, I'm getting cold.
Time to bring this mission to an end, I'm getting cold.
Our only source of information about the COTUC HQ must be somewhere on top of that hill. Strange enough, the monks haven't realized or just simply ignore the loss of three outposts and the disfunctioning of the crawler mines. Knowing about the rather negative attitude of that COTUC VIP it can be fairly assumed, that the monks do not want to give him even more reason to bother.
Georgis and the prior stand next to the cloister building (together with the other two monks), the Humvee waits in the distance. The two undead knights walk back and forth on their patrolway. The wide plateau enables to deal with them all seperately. Those two knights walk straight behind each other (a bit hard to spot in stealth mode) and must pass by next to each endpoint of the patrolway after the leading knight has allready changed the direction. Helena sneaks towards them and throws a nade, which hits them when they are in minimal distance.
The trick is not to hit the middle between them (to spread the blast equally between the two) but to hit one of them a bit more for a secure destruction. The secondary blast of the exploding undead knight will kill the other one. If you are not that patient, you might let someone assist to the attack. The remaining crater is really impressive, but we will produce a bigger one.
Feodor and Helena use the firepower of the captured M 163, to take down the Humvee. Georgis can't leave without his pilot, so he won't need the Humvee as well.
Before taking care of Georgis, we will ask his subordinates (they were waiting for a talk since the beginning).
They are not exactly cooperative nor talkative. In fact they refuse any further dialogue and vanish. This might be logic after the conquering of the outposts, but the outcome of the first dialogue would be the same, if it was started before conquering the outposts. The two monks vanish after having spoken (Georgis and the prior stay on their places).
Solving the mission in the "normal" way, the team would have talked to the monks before finding the crate which triggered the appearance of Georgis. So our HQ orders toconquer "investigate" the three outposts. They forgot to adopt the script to the condition, that this allready has happend. The script for the VIP visit triggers another dialoge to take care of the helicopter. They forgot to adopt the script to the condition, that the VIP has allready arrived and cannot leave anymore. So those dialogues (triggered by three scripts) could be a bit confusing.
So our team (confused or not) will just leave the hill for a little regroup. Let's say we want to take a lunchbreak on our starting position. On our way back Mc Nowel has a bad feeling that something is going on.
That monk has threatned us with calling his "armed brothers" and two Humvee and some men come in, so the situation seems to be similar to any tough neighbourhood, except the COTUC soldiers do not wear golden chains and NIKE boots.
This opportunity fits perfect to empty those two BTR, which will have to be left behind. Simultanious fire shred the two Humvee (one after another) faster the crew can even say "ammobox". The four soldiers can be easily outreached by the KPV. The best way to handle them is fire one at maximum range, retreat, fire the next one, retreat and so on, while the soldiers (in decreasing number) are advancing.
So after lunch our heroes return to the hill. After the first talk to the monks, a detection of our soldiers inside the cloister would not lead to a gameover any more, but will result in a different effect. Even though we eliminated the solution of simply bugging Georgis' chopper to trace the position of the COTUC HQ. The question of a suitable transponder is still unsolved. There are two crates next to the large building behind the chapel. Taking those delivers two thumpers and a strange object.
This crawlerbug, which Feodor has in his lowest inventory slot (lower pic), presumably serves as a tracking device for those crawler mines. This thingy has no function at all, it is a simple MacGuffin. Beeing detected by the monks, the cloister turned hostile and some additional guards appear.
Four more guards wait in front of the complex. Georgis remains neutral. The monks become legal targets, so killing them will not result in a gameover, but killing at least one monk eliminates a following mission path. To make things even more complicated the unarmed monks pick up, whatever they find. As long as they are anarmed, they flee.
The four outer guards can be lured away and get their special KPV- treatment. After having cleared the cloister, it is time for some informative talk to Georgis (note the orange marks of the monks).
This VIP refuses to deliver the information, so we need some kind of motivation to cooperate. Our first idea was making him listen to "Last Christmas" for two hours, but we chose a less cruel method and Georgis tweets like a fink.
Right after that the two monks reappear with a strange message.
If there were any guards left they would dissapear and the monks turn neutral again. So COTUC wants to work with us and all this unholy, unworthy liar mumbo jumbo was nothing more than a test, kicking their butts and killing at least 60 COTUC soldiers, nothing more than a test. The monk claims, that COTUC will provide the truth about the SGDS pandemy if we chose to support them in a joint venture mission. Our HQ cannot provide any guidance and redeligates the decission to our heroes.
So the player has two options:
If any other monk has been killed before, option #1 is allready eliminated. As I remember this crummy script, the player can talk to the monks but is has no effect. After taking his decission, all monks can be killed without further consequences.
So the talk will lead to further dialogue (don't call us, we call you).
So far COTUC has nor claimed nor denied to be responsible for the SGDS pandemy their behavior AFTER the apocalypse can be seen at least questionable. They obviously support slavery, they bought the slaves, the Slingers used to sell in new boston (Mission 3). COTUC seem to considder their own armed forces as unvaluable, even though they have to rely on them to keep their power. If we choose to work with them they might considder our team also as "disposable". Those undead knights state another mistery. Noone knows, if the human bodies for those units are taken from volunteers or at least mortally wounded poeple (like Robocop) or if poeple are pressed into the transformation (which opens the problem of controlling these units). So there are good reasons to work against COTUC. Helena needs to score some more hits, so INSTEAD OF talking to the monks (as shown above) she empties some captured handguns on the monks.
The mission ends, when the two monks are killed. Any remaining monk turns hostile, if one monk is attacked, Georgis stays neutral.
As another "What If..." sidetracking the thumper can be tested. As before we will reload after that test, so puristic players close your eyes!
A look on all these vehicle, we cannot take with us can cause a major depression.
Counting the less damaged vehicles with 1/3 of their value and the more damaged (burning effect) vehicles with none, the total can be estimated to 120,000 nines, which would be enough to buy two new T 55. Just to demonstrade some more scripted event someone enters the allready conquered outposts.
Now there are four vehicles missing (still there but deactivated). This happens after the first talk to the monks. The enemy forces on the outposts are meant to be reduced. Maybe they reflected the additional forces for the arrival of the COTUC VIP and considdered them to be moved over from the outposts, but they forgot to recheck if the outposts are allready conquered. Any disappearing vehicle takes its crew and inventory with it! The vehicle (if allready captured) could be accessed in the game end menu but acessing its inventory or its crew is impossible.
The gas station next to the starting point looks like a good target for some shooting practice.
Well, THIS really is a crater!
There are two empty vehicles on the airport. One Rager seems to be unnoticed.
And Georgis' OH 58 has no more pilot.
We have to choose between those two. The chopper (even though unarmed) is valuable and in top condition, the Rager offers three inventory slots to carry more loot.
As another "What if..." situation the devs included a nice security measure to keep the player from grabbing the chopper and using it against COTUC during the mission.
It can be fairly assumed, that an explosive specialist like Mc Nowel can disarm a booby trap especially without the pressure of an ongoing battle. So we will take this chopper with a trick: the 3 seconds between entering and exploding are long enough to hit [ESC] and end the game. But the chopper cannot be included in the end picture.
The F 15, even though noone can enter it, has to have a pilot to be taken home. It turns out, that we could have taken the Rager, if we had chosen to leave our Wolf at home.
Georgis and the prior stand next to the cloister building (together with the other two monks), the Humvee waits in the distance. The two undead knights walk back and forth on their patrolway. The wide plateau enables to deal with them all seperately. Those two knights walk straight behind each other (a bit hard to spot in stealth mode) and must pass by next to each endpoint of the patrolway after the leading knight has allready changed the direction. Helena sneaks towards them and throws a nade, which hits them when they are in minimal distance.
The trick is not to hit the middle between them (to spread the blast equally between the two) but to hit one of them a bit more for a secure destruction. The secondary blast of the exploding undead knight will kill the other one. If you are not that patient, you might let someone assist to the attack. The remaining crater is really impressive, but we will produce a bigger one.
Feodor and Helena use the firepower of the captured M 163, to take down the Humvee. Georgis can't leave without his pilot, so he won't need the Humvee as well.
Before taking care of Georgis, we will ask his subordinates (they were waiting for a talk since the beginning).
They are not exactly cooperative nor talkative. In fact they refuse any further dialogue and vanish. This might be logic after the conquering of the outposts, but the outcome of the first dialogue would be the same, if it was started before conquering the outposts. The two monks vanish after having spoken (Georgis and the prior stay on their places).
Solving the mission in the "normal" way, the team would have talked to the monks before finding the crate which triggered the appearance of Georgis. So our HQ orders to
So our team (confused or not) will just leave the hill for a little regroup. Let's say we want to take a lunchbreak on our starting position. On our way back Mc Nowel has a bad feeling that something is going on.
That monk has threatned us with calling his "armed brothers" and two Humvee and some men come in, so the situation seems to be similar to any tough neighbourhood, except the COTUC soldiers do not wear golden chains and NIKE boots.
This opportunity fits perfect to empty those two BTR, which will have to be left behind. Simultanious fire shred the two Humvee (one after another) faster the crew can even say "ammobox". The four soldiers can be easily outreached by the KPV. The best way to handle them is fire one at maximum range, retreat, fire the next one, retreat and so on, while the soldiers (in decreasing number) are advancing.
So after lunch our heroes return to the hill. After the first talk to the monks, a detection of our soldiers inside the cloister would not lead to a gameover any more, but will result in a different effect. Even though we eliminated the solution of simply bugging Georgis' chopper to trace the position of the COTUC HQ. The question of a suitable transponder is still unsolved. There are two crates next to the large building behind the chapel. Taking those delivers two thumpers and a strange object.
This crawlerbug, which Feodor has in his lowest inventory slot (lower pic), presumably serves as a tracking device for those crawler mines. This thingy has no function at all, it is a simple MacGuffin. Beeing detected by the monks, the cloister turned hostile and some additional guards appear.
Four more guards wait in front of the complex. Georgis remains neutral. The monks become legal targets, so killing them will not result in a gameover, but killing at least one monk eliminates a following mission path. To make things even more complicated the unarmed monks pick up, whatever they find. As long as they are anarmed, they flee.
The four outer guards can be lured away and get their special KPV- treatment. After having cleared the cloister, it is time for some informative talk to Georgis (note the orange marks of the monks).
This VIP refuses to deliver the information, so we need some kind of motivation to cooperate. Our first idea was making him listen to "Last Christmas" for two hours, but we chose a less cruel method and Georgis tweets like a fink.
Right after that the two monks reappear with a strange message.
If there were any guards left they would dissapear and the monks turn neutral again. So COTUC wants to work with us and all this unholy, unworthy liar mumbo jumbo was nothing more than a test, kicking their butts and killing at least 60 COTUC soldiers, nothing more than a test. The monk claims, that COTUC will provide the truth about the SGDS pandemy if we chose to support them in a joint venture mission. Our HQ cannot provide any guidance and redeligates the decission to our heroes.
So the player has two options:
- Talk again to the monks and choose to work with COTUC in the next two missions.
- Kill at least the two monks (and any other, if wanted) to work against COTUC in the next two missions.
If any other monk has been killed before, option #1 is allready eliminated. As I remember this crummy script, the player can talk to the monks but is has no effect. After taking his decission, all monks can be killed without further consequences.
So the talk will lead to further dialogue (don't call us, we call you).
So far COTUC has nor claimed nor denied to be responsible for the SGDS pandemy their behavior AFTER the apocalypse can be seen at least questionable. They obviously support slavery, they bought the slaves, the Slingers used to sell in new boston (Mission 3). COTUC seem to considder their own armed forces as unvaluable, even though they have to rely on them to keep their power. If we choose to work with them they might considder our team also as "disposable". Those undead knights state another mistery. Noone knows, if the human bodies for those units are taken from volunteers or at least mortally wounded poeple (like Robocop) or if poeple are pressed into the transformation (which opens the problem of controlling these units). So there are good reasons to work against COTUC. Helena needs to score some more hits, so INSTEAD OF talking to the monks (as shown above) she empties some captured handguns on the monks.
The mission ends, when the two monks are killed. Any remaining monk turns hostile, if one monk is attacked, Georgis stays neutral.
As another "What If..." sidetracking the thumper can be tested. As before we will reload after that test, so puristic players close your eyes!
We reactivate the crawlermines on the terminal in the cloister, put the thumper on the ground and wait for shai h'ulud.
WORMSIGN!!
WORMSIGN!!
A look on all these vehicle, we cannot take with us can cause a major depression.
Counting the less damaged vehicles with 1/3 of their value and the more damaged (burning effect) vehicles with none, the total can be estimated to 120,000 nines, which would be enough to buy two new T 55. Just to demonstrade some more scripted event someone enters the allready conquered outposts.
Now there are four vehicles missing (still there but deactivated). This happens after the first talk to the monks. The enemy forces on the outposts are meant to be reduced. Maybe they reflected the additional forces for the arrival of the COTUC VIP and considdered them to be moved over from the outposts, but they forgot to recheck if the outposts are allready conquered. Any disappearing vehicle takes its crew and inventory with it! The vehicle (if allready captured) could be accessed in the game end menu but acessing its inventory or its crew is impossible.
The gas station next to the starting point looks like a good target for some shooting practice.
Well, THIS really is a crater!
There are two empty vehicles on the airport. One Rager seems to be unnoticed.
And Georgis' OH 58 has no more pilot.
We have to choose between those two. The chopper (even though unarmed) is valuable and in top condition, the Rager offers three inventory slots to carry more loot.
As another "What if..." situation the devs included a nice security measure to keep the player from grabbing the chopper and using it against COTUC during the mission.
It can be fairly assumed, that an explosive specialist like Mc Nowel can disarm a booby trap especially without the pressure of an ongoing battle. So we will take this chopper with a trick: the 3 seconds between entering and exploding are long enough to hit [ESC] and end the game. But the chopper cannot be included in the end picture.
The F 15, even though noone can enter it, has to have a pilot to be taken home. It turns out, that we could have taken the Rager, if we had chosen to leave our Wolf at home.
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Gordon Shumway
Literate
Between Missions
... When I come home cold and tired
it's good to warm my bones beside the fire.
... When I come home cold and tired
it's good to warm my bones beside the fire.
Half of our team earned enough new promotions to aquire additional talents.
Feodor, Anatoliy (the Wostow Brothers) and Ivan will be the first ones to lern the heavy weapons talent, symbolized by the bullet shaped icon. This ability enhances the damage done by both MG, any grenade launcher and the AK 74. Other handheld 9mm weapons are considdered as a light weapons, enhanced with the light weapon talent (symbolized by the revolver icon). The shotgun has been regrouped from one category to the other by the last patch, but they forgot to change the text. Actually I did not try in which group the shotgun is in, I only read it somewhere. I will provide a way for an experimental test in a later update. Akim and Sorana get the athletic skill.
Some bad news: there is only 20h time for preperation! The preperation times increased constantly, now there is a discontinuity. If we had chosen the other path (working together with COTUC) the time would be equal. So Natasha is the only one to get a hormon treatment and only four medipacks are produced.
Our workshop can handle about two vehicles in that time. Our vehicle park contains lots of items in every state of damage to choose from. That combination of one BMP 1 and a Shilka fits perfectly into the timeframe and maximizes the profit.
We brought home a jetfighter, so let's take a look in the hangar.
Like other air units the jetplanes can be accessed, repaired and equipped in the hangar. They have up to 6 hardspoints which can be only equipped with bombs (only one type in two sizes available), no rockets, no guns! The concept works as follows:
As a bottom line, any airstrike costs one radio transmitter and a bomb which sums to 8,500 nines (with the 250 kg bomb). To call the strike the target has to be accessable, so the soldier could place some explosives instead and you could buy a lot of explosives for 8,500 nines. And last but not least, any airstrike includes the risk of loosing the attacking plane. This concept seems to be a bit out of balance. So there must be very strong arguments to choose this option.
The next encounter with seeker Vladi provides the next surprizes:
To give an impression the values of one M 60 (1,000 nines) and one round of 125 mm APDSFS (5,000 nines) should be demontrated.
The value of our new F 15 turns out to be redicolous, 10,000 nines!
On the other hand this electronic part of the crawler mines could earn 6,000 nines, not bad for a Mc Guffin!
Obviously the value of the F 15 has been mistranslated (the devs forgot a 0). A value of 100,000 would fit to the other vehicles. Unfortunately this misconception concerns all three jetplanes in the game. They included three jetplanes but none of them is really usefull, what a joke!
Vladi offers some more usefull stuff. We buy the only two 125 mm APDSFS, different rockets, any ammo for Dragunov and some multi rocket launchers for choppers.
This single trade has a bottom line of 78,900 nines, enough to buy two BMP 1. There are some new items:
We have allready seen that MRLS in action (those who opened the spoiler...). The 40 rocket tubes cannot be reloaded in the field (except from other BM 21) and there is no way to reconstruct the vehicle to a normal Ural. Due to its range and firepower this unit is extremely usefull, if the ammo is available. There are three kinds of 122 mm rockets available but only the HE variant actually occurs in the campain game, the mine and smoke variant never turns up.
The use of this jetplane is discussed above. At least the devs used a rather convincing model for the plane. The text mentions 6 hardpoints for bombs while we can only count 5 of them.
Of course the Abrams had to be included. Someone managed to bring over some 60t tanks to russia and feed them with gas the whole way (any M 1 needs a private gas- truck to supply the 14 l gas/ km!). For absolutely unknown reasons they exchanged the excellent 120 mm Rheinmetall M 256 cannon into a 125 mm D 81. Another interesting idea is the mount of a 40 mm launcher on the tank. Unfortunately the devs forgot to include that weapon (there is no mesh for it), the tank can only hold 40 mm nades in its inventory.
We have seen that chopper in use in mission 6. The Mil Mi 8 can carry 12 crewmembers an holds 6 hardpoints for different weapons (except bombs). Unlike the real thing (and the damaged model we have seen in mission 2) the Hip cannot load vehicles or other goods.
This UV 32 multi launcher can be attached on the Mi 8. As the name suggests it holds up to 32 57 mm HE rockets (just one type available). Our OH 53 cannot carry this weapon but its little Brother the UV 7. For unknown reasons the UV 7 fires its rockets almost twice as far as the UV 32.
Following the strategy "The bigger, the better." the next logical step leads to the UB 20. Only 20 rockets but in 80 mm size can offer the right enhancement. As usual those rather usefull items are rarely available.
So it's time to get ready for the next mission.
This time our HQ has develloped some infiltration strategy. Our team will go undercover and without any equipment. To be precise, the team can only carry radio transmitters. Any additional equipment or vehicles will be removed (and hopefully returned to our inventory... actually I haven't tested it). So if anyone cannot help to use the airstrike option, the F 15 should be equipped.
What do we expect from COTUC so far?
As pointed out, COTUC nor claims neither denies to have caused the SGDS pandemie. But they haven't suffered from it like other fractions, states governments or organisations. There must be a reason for it. The inner structure of COTUC seems to correspond with other totalitary systems. The inner circle of functionarys (leaders, ideologists) enjoys some privileges and treats the followers and servants with contempt. The institutional hirarchy seems to be more important than any religious cause. Actually there is no hint for any spiritual or theological background, no god or any kind of diety, which is admired. The monks capes seem to indicate some roman catholic origin but simply adopting elements like liturgy from existing religions has always been a good move to establish a new one (that's why we celebrated christmas these days and easter in a few month). Georgis mentioned the leader of COTUC, which was named simply HIM.
Sending a recon team in the COTUC HQ seems to be a good idea, but doing so without backup seems to be absolutely stupid. Of course the recon team inside the COTUC HQ cannot carry equipment, but there is no need to enter the complex with 10 soldiers. Four soldiers could recon, 6 can wait outside with the guns. This mission concept might deserve some logical overhaul. Unfortunately this part of the following mission seems to be hardcoded.
Feodor, Anatoliy (the Wostow Brothers) and Ivan will be the first ones to lern the heavy weapons talent, symbolized by the bullet shaped icon. This ability enhances the damage done by both MG, any grenade launcher and the AK 74. Other handheld 9mm weapons are considdered as a light weapons, enhanced with the light weapon talent (symbolized by the revolver icon). The shotgun has been regrouped from one category to the other by the last patch, but they forgot to change the text. Actually I did not try in which group the shotgun is in, I only read it somewhere. I will provide a way for an experimental test in a later update. Akim and Sorana get the athletic skill.
Some bad news: there is only 20h time for preperation! The preperation times increased constantly, now there is a discontinuity. If we had chosen the other path (working together with COTUC) the time would be equal. So Natasha is the only one to get a hormon treatment and only four medipacks are produced.
Our workshop can handle about two vehicles in that time. Our vehicle park contains lots of items in every state of damage to choose from. That combination of one BMP 1 and a Shilka fits perfectly into the timeframe and maximizes the profit.
We brought home a jetfighter, so let's take a look in the hangar.
Like other air units the jetplanes can be accessed, repaired and equipped in the hangar. They have up to 6 hardspoints which can be only equipped with bombs (only one type in two sizes available), no rockets, no guns! The concept works as follows:
- The jetfighter has to be equipped before missionstart.
- During missions the team can call airstrikes for every loaded hardpoint. I am not sure about the order the bombs are used (depending from size, position of hardpoint, order of loading... whatsoever).
- There is no designated pilot, it is not clear if the jetplane uses any pilot (from our soldiers) at all
- To call an airstike, a soldier places a radio transmitter (we found three of them) next to the target. The transmitter is lost.
- The jetplane can only attack ground targets, attacking other planes or flying choppers is not possible.
- Any M 163, ZSU Shilka or a soldier with a Strela can potentially shoot down the jetfighter.
As a bottom line, any airstrike costs one radio transmitter and a bomb which sums to 8,500 nines (with the 250 kg bomb). To call the strike the target has to be accessable, so the soldier could place some explosives instead and you could buy a lot of explosives for 8,500 nines. And last but not least, any airstrike includes the risk of loosing the attacking plane. This concept seems to be a bit out of balance. So there must be very strong arguments to choose this option.
The next encounter with seeker Vladi provides the next surprizes:
To give an impression the values of one M 60 (1,000 nines) and one round of 125 mm APDSFS (5,000 nines) should be demontrated.
The value of our new F 15 turns out to be redicolous, 10,000 nines!
On the other hand this electronic part of the crawler mines could earn 6,000 nines, not bad for a Mc Guffin!
Obviously the value of the F 15 has been mistranslated (the devs forgot a 0). A value of 100,000 would fit to the other vehicles. Unfortunately this misconception concerns all three jetplanes in the game. They included three jetplanes but none of them is really usefull, what a joke!
Vladi offers some more usefull stuff. We buy the only two 125 mm APDSFS, different rockets, any ammo for Dragunov and some multi rocket launchers for choppers.
This single trade has a bottom line of 78,900 nines, enough to buy two BMP 1. There are some new items:
We have allready seen that MRLS in action (those who opened the spoiler...). The 40 rocket tubes cannot be reloaded in the field (except from other BM 21) and there is no way to reconstruct the vehicle to a normal Ural. Due to its range and firepower this unit is extremely usefull, if the ammo is available. There are three kinds of 122 mm rockets available but only the HE variant actually occurs in the campain game, the mine and smoke variant never turns up.
The use of this jetplane is discussed above. At least the devs used a rather convincing model for the plane. The text mentions 6 hardpoints for bombs while we can only count 5 of them.
Of course the Abrams had to be included. Someone managed to bring over some 60t tanks to russia and feed them with gas the whole way (any M 1 needs a private gas- truck to supply the 14 l gas/ km!). For absolutely unknown reasons they exchanged the excellent 120 mm Rheinmetall M 256 cannon into a 125 mm D 81. Another interesting idea is the mount of a 40 mm launcher on the tank. Unfortunately the devs forgot to include that weapon (there is no mesh for it), the tank can only hold 40 mm nades in its inventory.
We have seen that chopper in use in mission 6. The Mil Mi 8 can carry 12 crewmembers an holds 6 hardpoints for different weapons (except bombs). Unlike the real thing (and the damaged model we have seen in mission 2) the Hip cannot load vehicles or other goods.
This UV 32 multi launcher can be attached on the Mi 8. As the name suggests it holds up to 32 57 mm HE rockets (just one type available). Our OH 53 cannot carry this weapon but its little Brother the UV 7. For unknown reasons the UV 7 fires its rockets almost twice as far as the UV 32.
Following the strategy "The bigger, the better." the next logical step leads to the UB 20. Only 20 rockets but in 80 mm size can offer the right enhancement. As usual those rather usefull items are rarely available.
So it's time to get ready for the next mission.
This time our HQ has develloped some infiltration strategy. Our team will go undercover and without any equipment. To be precise, the team can only carry radio transmitters. Any additional equipment or vehicles will be removed (and hopefully returned to our inventory... actually I haven't tested it). So if anyone cannot help to use the airstrike option, the F 15 should be equipped.
What do we expect from COTUC so far?
As pointed out, COTUC nor claims neither denies to have caused the SGDS pandemie. But they haven't suffered from it like other fractions, states governments or organisations. There must be a reason for it. The inner structure of COTUC seems to correspond with other totalitary systems. The inner circle of functionarys (leaders, ideologists) enjoys some privileges and treats the followers and servants with contempt. The institutional hirarchy seems to be more important than any religious cause. Actually there is no hint for any spiritual or theological background, no god or any kind of diety, which is admired. The monks capes seem to indicate some roman catholic origin but simply adopting elements like liturgy from existing religions has always been a good move to establish a new one (that's why we celebrated christmas these days and easter in a few month). Georgis mentioned the leader of COTUC, which was named simply HIM.
Sending a recon team in the COTUC HQ seems to be a good idea, but doing so without backup seems to be absolutely stupid. Of course the recon team inside the COTUC HQ cannot carry equipment, but there is no need to enter the complex with 10 soldiers. Four soldiers could recon, 6 can wait outside with the guns. This mission concept might deserve some logical overhaul. Unfortunately this part of the following mission seems to be hardcoded.
Gordon Shumway
Literate
I think we will end this year with a cliffhanger...
Mission 8: Inside the Rathole (Part 1)
This and the following mission will lead to one of three possible endings. If we had chosen the alternate path (by colaborating with COTUC) the 8th mission would be named "The Sign"
Mission 8: Inside the Rathole (Part 1)
This and the following mission will lead to one of three possible endings. If we had chosen the alternate path (by colaborating with COTUC) the 8th mission would be named "The Sign"
As pointed out in the briefing, our team will sneak into the COTUC HQ, so any equipment was automatically removed by the gameengine (except radio transmitters, if we had brought some). At least we all brought or towels. As another surprize the gameengine has transformed our camoflaged heroes into "brownfriars romans". Finally, as another surprize, the COTUC HQ is located in a desert area, noone will freeze.
Our HQ gives the order to behave unsuspicious and recon the COTUC complex. Perhaps this is what they had in mind:
BTW, a monk carrying a big radio and talking with it to a far away HQ, wouldn't that look suspicious? OK we will just jump over that plothole and procede to the gate. There are three of them to the COTUC HQ, each one guarded by some soldiers and one undead knight, which blocks the pathway. It doesn't matter which gate is used but that guarding knight has to be adressed. We will use the nearest gate to enter.
A suspicious knight, that will not let us pass, I 've seen that somewhere:
Even though Anatoli almost screwed up our disguise, the guards let us in. Actually there is no way to influence the conversation, so they always let us in. In fact the knights of all three gates give way.
COUTUC keep their tanks in field shelters. The outer barriers are real ground elevations and therefore indestructable. The wooden grates on top are normal objects. Another remarkable observation concerns the outer wall of the COTUC HQ. Even though these walls are built of normal objects, they turn out to be indestructible (not only HARD to destruct!). So bombing a way into the HQ is not an option. The solution, how the devs made that, is given in a future update. There is in fact one alternative way into the complex. There is a gap in the wall- ring in the south.
COTUC planted some crawler mines near the guardtowers flanking that gap but not in a complete line. This backentrance could be usefull, if the guards on the gates turn hostile. The mission will also work, if our team skips the entering dialogue at all and enters the complex through the gap. There is no further suspicion level if the team enters "illegaly". This pic also gives an impression about the size of the complex. Another shot over the northern gate (we used the western) confirms this.
A few seconds after entering the COTUC HQ our team reports back and requests further instructions. There are eight locations on the map, which have to be visited. The nearest target turns out as a complex of several storebuildings behind an outer wall and guarded by two COTUC soldiers.
If we just ignore that warning (for a demonstration) the following will happen:
So everyone would turn hostile, which will not necessarily end the mission, but renders it extremely more difficult. In fact the devs even included the alternative that COTUC would turn hostile prematurely. So until our team is equipped with some gear, taking the warnings of the guards serious might be a wise option.
After reloading the game, some traders can be watched.
So, trader Nick will spoil us with some explosives, which is a very nice move. Nick stores our gifts in the traders area, ready for us to be picked up.
Mc Nowel finds a spot to climb over the wall. Unfortunately Nicks companion guards the crate. Right now, there is no chance to pick it up unnoticed. Mc Nowel simply stays behind the containers and waits for a good opportunity.
Meanwhile Ivan has reached the next target.
"They did it, the Army of Twelve Monkeys, they did it...."
Still there is no claim that COTUC invented the SGDS virus or spread it. Posing any pandemy as a "wrath of god" has always been a mean of religious fanatics. It can be suspected, that COTUC had some information about SGDS, which enabled them to take precautious measures. The obelisk itself seem to be egyptian origin.
Akim encounters a couple and adresses the woman.
This woman obviously blames COTUC for the loss of her son. It is not totally clear, how old the son was and what happened to him. A further complaint can be understood, that COTUC transformed the son somewhat, maybe brainwashed him to become a monk or turned him into an undead knight. Before Akim could ask further questions, two knights appear and eliminate all trouble.
Those knights excuse for their late interferance and leave their PID, in case Akim would state a complaint. It is not necessary to trigger that scene, but that PID will come handy later.
As the knight explained, the townguard can be found on the opposite of the great field in the eastern half of the complex. David checks out this area, as it is also a target on the map. Like most of the other targeted areas the townguard is surrounded by walls and guarded. Entering the vicinity of the townguard for the first time, David can witness ten undead knights entering the complex, fife of them using one of the two gates. Those knights deploy on the parking area inside the townguard.
At the gate David triggers a warning dialogue similar to the one at the traders area. The entering of the knights also triggers a dialogue of the guards worshipping the knights. Having the knowledge of the PID David automatically claims his will to complaint.
So there are three dialogues triggered almost at the same time, which might mess up a little bit. The guards invite David to enter, so our teammembers can enter the townguard freely. There are some spots to climb over the walls, if someone would like to enter unnoticed. There are some crates here. Only two of them can be picked up safely, the one marked and the one in the pic below.
Picking up any of the other crates will turn COTUC hostile as soon, as any of our teammembers is detected by them. Some other articles about this game propose to pick up the crates, unnoticed by the guards or let our soldiers hide the weapons in the inventory instead of carrying them open. Those proposals are COMPLETELY BULLSHIT! Taking any crate here, except the two mentioned above, means war! There are four vests and a binocular to pick and some 40mm nades, which come handy much later. There is another surprize next to the northern gate of the townguard.
This empty M 1 Abrams can be accessed freely, but MUST NOT be moved one inch, unless you want to start war prematurely. If the tank is posessed and left, COTUC will reposess it and the crew will stay in it. Otherwise COTUC will leave the tank empty. So if the player want's to grab the M 1 early, the tank has to be manned and at the beginning of hostilites anyone will start shooting at our tank, even though the COTUC soldiers will not survive that shooting for long. But those shotties can cause an awfull lot of (unnecessary) damage. In addition to that, COTUC uses three T 55, which will patrol, when hostilities start, they might show up right at the wrong time. So we leave that empty M 1 to be picked up later.
Next to the townguard the gate to the airport is another target for our sightseeing tour.
This area covers the whole eastern edge of the COTUC HQ and is seperated by a rampart and some fences. The guards won't let our team in but there are some sneaky entrances. The rampart is mostly rendered as inaccessable except two narrow passages.
The gap between the outer wall and the rampart (at both ends of the runway) is filled by two lines of crawler mines, which could be carefully lured away to open up another passage. The alert observer might have allready spotted the Mig 29 on the airport and the empty chopper, Yes, it is a Mi 24 Hind! Grabbing that chopper will also trigger hostilities, so we leave it as COTUC does not use it as well.
Now we take a look at the central field. Right in the middle the residence of the COTUC leader is guarded by some undead knights. This building looks a bit like the "Palais de Louvre" if watched through the glass pyramid.
Next to the residence Akim discovers a stage (basicly it is the same as seen in Mission 3). COTUC calls it the "place of questions" Obviously this place is used for certain demonstrations, maybe even executions.
The open area behind the stage can be used as a refuge.
Everyone except Akim and Mc Nowel (who waits in the traders area) will stay here. Almost beside the stage Akim can adress a single monk in grey habit.
This candidate, named Kolja, admits a personal crisis and reveals some interesting details.
Kolja has sneaked into the lab area and watched some lethal tests on human probands with something he called "Rat Essence". Kolja also mentiones some "Tao of Life" which prevents the lethal effect of the Rat Essence, if the believe is strong enough. This procedure is called a "Test of Faith". Kolja doubts if his faith will be strong enough. So Akim proposes him to travel around until he is sure about his faith. Kolja takes him by the word and leaves right away.
Obviously the "Rat Essence" is some form of SGDS but highly and instantaniously lethal but not cantagious. The "Tao of Life" seems to be a vaccine and the "Test of Faith" must be a COTUC style execution. The condemned simply gets a placebo instead of the vaccine and is declared to have weak faith. COTUC may be not responsible for the SGDS pandemy but they reworked the virus into a perfect biological weapon. Maybe they had the vaccine before, so they could survive the pandemy. For everyone, who was not that fast, Akim concludes those theories. Meanwhile at the western gate Kolja intends to leave the COTUC HQ on his travel to himself.
Maybe there is only one way out of the COTUC HQ: Feet first!
The lab complex nearby is fenced in two times and heavily guarded. There is no sneaky entrance.
There is only one point left to visit. Having visited all targets, there will be new objectives and a hidden countdown of 8 minutes will be triggered, which ends with the beginning of hostilities, so any time consuming deployments should be made now. Finishing his tour Akim visits the factory. There also is no sneaky entrance.
The next phase of the mission will be subject of the next update.
Our HQ gives the order to behave unsuspicious and recon the COTUC complex. Perhaps this is what they had in mind:
BTW, a monk carrying a big radio and talking with it to a far away HQ, wouldn't that look suspicious? OK we will just jump over that plothole and procede to the gate. There are three of them to the COTUC HQ, each one guarded by some soldiers and one undead knight, which blocks the pathway. It doesn't matter which gate is used but that guarding knight has to be adressed. We will use the nearest gate to enter.
A suspicious knight, that will not let us pass, I 've seen that somewhere:
Even though Anatoli almost screwed up our disguise, the guards let us in. Actually there is no way to influence the conversation, so they always let us in. In fact the knights of all three gates give way.
COUTUC keep their tanks in field shelters. The outer barriers are real ground elevations and therefore indestructable. The wooden grates on top are normal objects. Another remarkable observation concerns the outer wall of the COTUC HQ. Even though these walls are built of normal objects, they turn out to be indestructible (not only HARD to destruct!). So bombing a way into the HQ is not an option. The solution, how the devs made that, is given in a future update. There is in fact one alternative way into the complex. There is a gap in the wall- ring in the south.
COTUC planted some crawler mines near the guardtowers flanking that gap but not in a complete line. This backentrance could be usefull, if the guards on the gates turn hostile. The mission will also work, if our team skips the entering dialogue at all and enters the complex through the gap. There is no further suspicion level if the team enters "illegaly". This pic also gives an impression about the size of the complex. Another shot over the northern gate (we used the western) confirms this.
A few seconds after entering the COTUC HQ our team reports back and requests further instructions. There are eight locations on the map, which have to be visited. The nearest target turns out as a complex of several storebuildings behind an outer wall and guarded by two COTUC soldiers.
If we just ignore that warning (for a demonstration) the following will happen:
So everyone would turn hostile, which will not necessarily end the mission, but renders it extremely more difficult. In fact the devs even included the alternative that COTUC would turn hostile prematurely. So until our team is equipped with some gear, taking the warnings of the guards serious might be a wise option.
After reloading the game, some traders can be watched.
So, trader Nick will spoil us with some explosives, which is a very nice move. Nick stores our gifts in the traders area, ready for us to be picked up.
Mc Nowel finds a spot to climb over the wall. Unfortunately Nicks companion guards the crate. Right now, there is no chance to pick it up unnoticed. Mc Nowel simply stays behind the containers and waits for a good opportunity.
Meanwhile Ivan has reached the next target.
"They did it, the Army of Twelve Monkeys, they did it...."
Still there is no claim that COTUC invented the SGDS virus or spread it. Posing any pandemy as a "wrath of god" has always been a mean of religious fanatics. It can be suspected, that COTUC had some information about SGDS, which enabled them to take precautious measures. The obelisk itself seem to be egyptian origin.
Akim encounters a couple and adresses the woman.
This woman obviously blames COTUC for the loss of her son. It is not totally clear, how old the son was and what happened to him. A further complaint can be understood, that COTUC transformed the son somewhat, maybe brainwashed him to become a monk or turned him into an undead knight. Before Akim could ask further questions, two knights appear and eliminate all trouble.
Those knights excuse for their late interferance and leave their PID, in case Akim would state a complaint. It is not necessary to trigger that scene, but that PID will come handy later.
As the knight explained, the townguard can be found on the opposite of the great field in the eastern half of the complex. David checks out this area, as it is also a target on the map. Like most of the other targeted areas the townguard is surrounded by walls and guarded. Entering the vicinity of the townguard for the first time, David can witness ten undead knights entering the complex, fife of them using one of the two gates. Those knights deploy on the parking area inside the townguard.
At the gate David triggers a warning dialogue similar to the one at the traders area. The entering of the knights also triggers a dialogue of the guards worshipping the knights. Having the knowledge of the PID David automatically claims his will to complaint.
So there are three dialogues triggered almost at the same time, which might mess up a little bit. The guards invite David to enter, so our teammembers can enter the townguard freely. There are some spots to climb over the walls, if someone would like to enter unnoticed. There are some crates here. Only two of them can be picked up safely, the one marked and the one in the pic below.
Picking up any of the other crates will turn COTUC hostile as soon, as any of our teammembers is detected by them. Some other articles about this game propose to pick up the crates, unnoticed by the guards or let our soldiers hide the weapons in the inventory instead of carrying them open. Those proposals are COMPLETELY BULLSHIT! Taking any crate here, except the two mentioned above, means war! There are four vests and a binocular to pick and some 40mm nades, which come handy much later. There is another surprize next to the northern gate of the townguard.
This empty M 1 Abrams can be accessed freely, but MUST NOT be moved one inch, unless you want to start war prematurely. If the tank is posessed and left, COTUC will reposess it and the crew will stay in it. Otherwise COTUC will leave the tank empty. So if the player want's to grab the M 1 early, the tank has to be manned and at the beginning of hostilites anyone will start shooting at our tank, even though the COTUC soldiers will not survive that shooting for long. But those shotties can cause an awfull lot of (unnecessary) damage. In addition to that, COTUC uses three T 55, which will patrol, when hostilities start, they might show up right at the wrong time. So we leave that empty M 1 to be picked up later.
Next to the townguard the gate to the airport is another target for our sightseeing tour.
This area covers the whole eastern edge of the COTUC HQ and is seperated by a rampart and some fences. The guards won't let our team in but there are some sneaky entrances. The rampart is mostly rendered as inaccessable except two narrow passages.
The gap between the outer wall and the rampart (at both ends of the runway) is filled by two lines of crawler mines, which could be carefully lured away to open up another passage. The alert observer might have allready spotted the Mig 29 on the airport and the empty chopper, Yes, it is a Mi 24 Hind! Grabbing that chopper will also trigger hostilities, so we leave it as COTUC does not use it as well.
Now we take a look at the central field. Right in the middle the residence of the COTUC leader is guarded by some undead knights. This building looks a bit like the "Palais de Louvre" if watched through the glass pyramid.
Next to the residence Akim discovers a stage (basicly it is the same as seen in Mission 3). COTUC calls it the "place of questions" Obviously this place is used for certain demonstrations, maybe even executions.
The open area behind the stage can be used as a refuge.
Everyone except Akim and Mc Nowel (who waits in the traders area) will stay here. Almost beside the stage Akim can adress a single monk in grey habit.
This candidate, named Kolja, admits a personal crisis and reveals some interesting details.
Kolja has sneaked into the lab area and watched some lethal tests on human probands with something he called "Rat Essence". Kolja also mentiones some "Tao of Life" which prevents the lethal effect of the Rat Essence, if the believe is strong enough. This procedure is called a "Test of Faith". Kolja doubts if his faith will be strong enough. So Akim proposes him to travel around until he is sure about his faith. Kolja takes him by the word and leaves right away.
Obviously the "Rat Essence" is some form of SGDS but highly and instantaniously lethal but not cantagious. The "Tao of Life" seems to be a vaccine and the "Test of Faith" must be a COTUC style execution. The condemned simply gets a placebo instead of the vaccine and is declared to have weak faith. COTUC may be not responsible for the SGDS pandemy but they reworked the virus into a perfect biological weapon. Maybe they had the vaccine before, so they could survive the pandemy. For everyone, who was not that fast, Akim concludes those theories. Meanwhile at the western gate Kolja intends to leave the COTUC HQ on his travel to himself.
Maybe there is only one way out of the COTUC HQ: Feet first!
The lab complex nearby is fenced in two times and heavily guarded. There is no sneaky entrance.
There is only one point left to visit. Having visited all targets, there will be new objectives and a hidden countdown of 8 minutes will be triggered, which ends with the beginning of hostilities, so any time consuming deployments should be made now. Finishing his tour Akim visits the factory. There also is no sneaky entrance.
The next phase of the mission will be subject of the next update.
Last edited:
Gordon Shumway
Literate
A happy new year to everybody...
Last edited:
Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 8: Inside the Rathole (Part 2)
Right after visiting the last of the eight targets our objectives are changed, our team is supposed to destroy two targets and to conquer and hold the labs. Taking into account, that this most probably means killing every single COTUC unit and our team has no weapons so far, this task appears very optimistic.
Some guarding units are also assigned to new tasks. The trader, who guarded the crate with the explosives takes a walk, so Mc Nowel can do what he waited for and grabs three loads of explosives. He leaves the area quickly and unnoticed because we have only 8 minutes to place them. While crouching back there are some announcments over the PA- system. We will encounter several of those announcments (Maybe the devs liked to watch M.A.S.H. on TV.). This one will only trigger, if noone of our team stays in the area around the COTUC residence and the stage.
The first announcment informs about a mass delivered by the holy Amelius. The speaker calls Amelius "the esteemed leader" but he is not identical with the COTUC leader only called HIM. The so called "temple" is in fact the obelisk. The second announcment informs about an execution at the stage. So anyone who is bored by the mass can attend the execution ("That's boring, let's go to the stoning.").
We hit the pause button for a short reflection about our tactics. It seems also a good opportunity to write a safegame. Those three bundles of explosives correspond with our three targets. If something has to be destroyed the devs spoil a bundle of explosives (like in Missions 1, 3, 4 and 5). If the player manages to destroy the target otherwise, the bundle can be taken home. This time we have to use at least one bomb to kill some COTUC guards and get their weapons. So the placement should cover as many (human) guards as possible. In addition to that, that place has to be freely accessable now, which limits our choices to:
The empty M 1, the Hind and the crates in the townguard can be taken into accound. So our soldiers could just grab those things and shoot their way out. We do not know the content of the crates and fighting ten undead knights with a Beretta seems to be not much fun. The player might rely on a sneaky way to enter the townguard an grab something, which is very unlikely. In another sneaky approach one bundle of explosives could be used to destroy some wall or fence to get access to an otherwise sealed area. There are some crates in the factory and on the airport, which could be grabbed unnoticed. Otherwise some patrolling soldiers might be blown up if the trigger of our bombs could be syncronised (This needs patience!).
Of course one might argue that calling in an airstrike might solve our problem. Let's just imagine we brought a radio transmitter and would like to try it out. So in this alternate reality David places one transmitter next to one of those T 55 behind the western gate, just for the curiousity, and calls in the jetfighter (rightclicking on the transmitter on the ground and choosing the jet- symbol). Of course David should run away quickly.
We will solve this mission without air support. Let's reload our safegame from above and proceed.
Mc Nowel takes a run across the complex to the townguard. Thus he passes along the obelisk and can witness the speech of Amelius.
This speech reveals a bit more about COTUC. Obviously they believe in an "afterlife". This entity "HIM" is still unrevealed but must be more than a mere prophet though Amelius claims HIM to bring sanctuary. This might refer to Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple. Maybe they also believe in the FSM or the IPU. In the meantime Akim checks out the stage. COTUC allready brought two condemned to the place. According to the announcment and some more speech of the monk, the condemned were captured spys.
I wonder how COTUC managed to catch them, those two used such a clever disguise.
Akim adresses the monk and convinces him to hand him over the prisoners for a "final interogation". The monk suspects something and will check the plot within three minutes. After that time our disguise will fail and COTUC turns hostile. If the prisoners are not rescued, COTUC will execute them two minutes after Akim entered the vicinity of the stage. Our new members join the waiting team in the safe area. Both are experienced soldiers, Daniel Miller can handle explosives and Judy Jackson has medical skills.
In the same time Mc Nowel has reached the townguard and places two of his explosives. Those ten undead knights will cause troubles. As long as they stand clustered they could be easily destroyed with two nades (one for each cluster). One knight exploding will bring the others down in a chain reaction. But we cannot foresee, when the team will capture enough nades. Alternatively we could use the M 1 and shoot a 125mm HEAT into the group of knights, which will work the same way. But the knights will surely notice the grabbing of the M 1 from their position and so it is likely that they spread instead of remaining that clustered. So Mc Nowel eliminates those opponents prematurely.
We can set several timers simultaniously. As long as the dropped bomb is in sight of the chosen unit, the timer can be set. We choose a two minutes countdown and hit the two green checkbox marks, when Akim has freed the prisoners. Mc Nowels then runs over to the stage and places the third bomb with a countdown so it will blow off a few seconds before the other two bombs. Those two guards will deliver our first weapons.
One minute and 55 seconds later:
From that moment COTUC turns hostile. While Mc Nowel grabs the MP 5 and the shotty at the place formerly known as the "Place of Questions", COTUC updates their schedule by an announcement.
The mass and the execution are cancelled, all remaining participants of those two events will deactivate when COTUC turns hostile. So eliminating the two guards and the monk at the stage would be impossible now.
Our heroes have a shotty and a MP 5 - not much, but we will get some more at the townguard. The knights are allready gone (those craters are really impressive.). The M 1 is still empty but most of the guards run around on patrol.
Prof Petrow climbs over the wall at the southeastern corner. Two guards on patrol detect him so Prow Petrow climbs back before those two guards can shoot on him. Stupid enough the guards leave the townguard to check the outside of the wall, while David and Prof Petrow retreat.
Outside, the two guards can be isolated from each other and convinced to leave COTUC.
Now the team owns three shottys and a MP 5. Feodor, Anatoli and Ivan ambush the next patrolling guard inside the townguard complex. He drops another MP 5 and a nade.
The next patrol spoils our team with two AKS 74.
Our luring actions provoke two guards from the western gate of the townguard complex to redeploy in the middle faced away from the gate. The remaining guard can be sneakily eliminated. Uuups... this moment seems to be not favorable.
After the T 55 passed by that guard leaves another shotty behind. Now the team has enough weapons for a group ambush on the two guards standing in the middle of nowhere. Those two survived long enough to turn around but not long enough to shoot.
The remaining three guards will not cause any major problem.
Some of the guards dropped nades, one of the crates deliver some more, so our heroes can face the undead knights. If we manage to ambush the human guards in a constant rate, we can simply exchange the emptied weapons by captured ones, so reloading is not necessary. Those COTUC guards are a bit hard to kill. Most of them wear vests. We leave the empty M 1 for now. As long as we don't grab it, COTUC won't grab it either. We will grab it and use it later. The crate next to that tank delivers a Dragunov, which comes really handy.
As allready seen COTUC established armoured patrols. Two T 55 driving in circles around the central field, one clockwise the other counter clockwise. It is important to stay alert in order to prevent running into any of those tanks. So our heroes will focus on the outskirts of the complex - in the next update.
Some guarding units are also assigned to new tasks. The trader, who guarded the crate with the explosives takes a walk, so Mc Nowel can do what he waited for and grabs three loads of explosives. He leaves the area quickly and unnoticed because we have only 8 minutes to place them. While crouching back there are some announcments over the PA- system. We will encounter several of those announcments (Maybe the devs liked to watch M.A.S.H. on TV.). This one will only trigger, if noone of our team stays in the area around the COTUC residence and the stage.
The first announcment informs about a mass delivered by the holy Amelius. The speaker calls Amelius "the esteemed leader" but he is not identical with the COTUC leader only called HIM. The so called "temple" is in fact the obelisk. The second announcment informs about an execution at the stage. So anyone who is bored by the mass can attend the execution ("That's boring, let's go to the stoning.").
We hit the pause button for a short reflection about our tactics. It seems also a good opportunity to write a safegame. Those three bundles of explosives correspond with our three targets. If something has to be destroyed the devs spoil a bundle of explosives (like in Missions 1, 3, 4 and 5). If the player manages to destroy the target otherwise, the bundle can be taken home. This time we have to use at least one bomb to kill some COTUC guards and get their weapons. So the placement should cover as many (human) guards as possible. In addition to that, that place has to be freely accessable now, which limits our choices to:
- the townguard
- the three gates
- the area near the entrances of the airport, the traders area, the lab and the factory
The empty M 1, the Hind and the crates in the townguard can be taken into accound. So our soldiers could just grab those things and shoot their way out. We do not know the content of the crates and fighting ten undead knights with a Beretta seems to be not much fun. The player might rely on a sneaky way to enter the townguard an grab something, which is very unlikely. In another sneaky approach one bundle of explosives could be used to destroy some wall or fence to get access to an otherwise sealed area. There are some crates in the factory and on the airport, which could be grabbed unnoticed. Otherwise some patrolling soldiers might be blown up if the trigger of our bombs could be syncronised (This needs patience!).
Of course one might argue that calling in an airstrike might solve our problem. Let's just imagine we brought a radio transmitter and would like to try it out. So in this alternate reality David places one transmitter next to one of those T 55 behind the western gate, just for the curiousity, and calls in the jetfighter (rightclicking on the transmitter on the ground and choosing the jet- symbol). Of course David should run away quickly.
After a few seconds our F 15 comes in.
It drops its 250 kg bomb rather precisely.
The T 55 is still in one piece and the crew is still alive. So the (visually impressive) effect is definitely not worth 8,500 nines.
It drops its 250 kg bomb rather precisely.
The T 55 is still in one piece and the crew is still alive. So the (visually impressive) effect is definitely not worth 8,500 nines.
We will solve this mission without air support. Let's reload our safegame from above and proceed.
Mc Nowel takes a run across the complex to the townguard. Thus he passes along the obelisk and can witness the speech of Amelius.
This speech reveals a bit more about COTUC. Obviously they believe in an "afterlife". This entity "HIM" is still unrevealed but must be more than a mere prophet though Amelius claims HIM to bring sanctuary. This might refer to Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple. Maybe they also believe in the FSM or the IPU. In the meantime Akim checks out the stage. COTUC allready brought two condemned to the place. According to the announcment and some more speech of the monk, the condemned were captured spys.
I wonder how COTUC managed to catch them, those two used such a clever disguise.
Akim adresses the monk and convinces him to hand him over the prisoners for a "final interogation". The monk suspects something and will check the plot within three minutes. After that time our disguise will fail and COTUC turns hostile. If the prisoners are not rescued, COTUC will execute them two minutes after Akim entered the vicinity of the stage. Our new members join the waiting team in the safe area. Both are experienced soldiers, Daniel Miller can handle explosives and Judy Jackson has medical skills.
In the same time Mc Nowel has reached the townguard and places two of his explosives. Those ten undead knights will cause troubles. As long as they stand clustered they could be easily destroyed with two nades (one for each cluster). One knight exploding will bring the others down in a chain reaction. But we cannot foresee, when the team will capture enough nades. Alternatively we could use the M 1 and shoot a 125mm HEAT into the group of knights, which will work the same way. But the knights will surely notice the grabbing of the M 1 from their position and so it is likely that they spread instead of remaining that clustered. So Mc Nowel eliminates those opponents prematurely.
We can set several timers simultaniously. As long as the dropped bomb is in sight of the chosen unit, the timer can be set. We choose a two minutes countdown and hit the two green checkbox marks, when Akim has freed the prisoners. Mc Nowels then runs over to the stage and places the third bomb with a countdown so it will blow off a few seconds before the other two bombs. Those two guards will deliver our first weapons.
One minute and 55 seconds later:
From that moment COTUC turns hostile. While Mc Nowel grabs the MP 5 and the shotty at the place formerly known as the "Place of Questions", COTUC updates their schedule by an announcement.
The mass and the execution are cancelled, all remaining participants of those two events will deactivate when COTUC turns hostile. So eliminating the two guards and the monk at the stage would be impossible now.
Our heroes have a shotty and a MP 5 - not much, but we will get some more at the townguard. The knights are allready gone (those craters are really impressive.). The M 1 is still empty but most of the guards run around on patrol.
Prof Petrow climbs over the wall at the southeastern corner. Two guards on patrol detect him so Prow Petrow climbs back before those two guards can shoot on him. Stupid enough the guards leave the townguard to check the outside of the wall, while David and Prof Petrow retreat.
Outside, the two guards can be isolated from each other and convinced to leave COTUC.
Now the team owns three shottys and a MP 5. Feodor, Anatoli and Ivan ambush the next patrolling guard inside the townguard complex. He drops another MP 5 and a nade.
The next patrol spoils our team with two AKS 74.
Our luring actions provoke two guards from the western gate of the townguard complex to redeploy in the middle faced away from the gate. The remaining guard can be sneakily eliminated. Uuups... this moment seems to be not favorable.
After the T 55 passed by that guard leaves another shotty behind. Now the team has enough weapons for a group ambush on the two guards standing in the middle of nowhere. Those two survived long enough to turn around but not long enough to shoot.
The remaining three guards will not cause any major problem.
Some of the guards dropped nades, one of the crates deliver some more, so our heroes can face the undead knights. If we manage to ambush the human guards in a constant rate, we can simply exchange the emptied weapons by captured ones, so reloading is not necessary. Those COTUC guards are a bit hard to kill. Most of them wear vests. We leave the empty M 1 for now. As long as we don't grab it, COTUC won't grab it either. We will grab it and use it later. The crate next to that tank delivers a Dragunov, which comes really handy.
As allready seen COTUC established armoured patrols. Two T 55 driving in circles around the central field, one clockwise the other counter clockwise. It is important to stay alert in order to prevent running into any of those tanks. So our heroes will focus on the outskirts of the complex - in the next update.
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Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 8: Inside the Rathole (Part 3)
This map is really huge... it's time to get some vehicles.
This map is really huge... it's time to get some vehicles.
Our two new members, Daniel and Judy, allready complain about the great distances in the COTUC HQ. Let's start with a Humvee so our team can put some loots into it. It's a hell to find a parking space for a T 55. COTUC deployed three Humvee at the gates. The car at the nearest, eastern gate carries a MK 19 launcher, so we will take that first.
Helena, David, Ivan, Feodor and Wassili left the complex through the back entrance and had to walk around the whole airport (outside the walls). The geometry of the walls offers the oppurtunity to throw a nade over the wall directly on the undead knight. There is no comparable throwing position inside the walls.
The explosion of that knight must have hurt one of the two guards. The confusion afterwards lured both outside the gate and seperated them. Our team finishes both jobs almost at the same place.
Akim eliminates the gunner of the Humvee. He advances until the gunner mans the launcher and shoots with his Dragunov. It took even two shots, but the Humvee still is in top condition. The driver leaves the car, in fact he parks it outside the wall, right in front of our killer team.
Things are more favourable at the next gate. The guards stand a bit closer to the undead knight and some objects offer more cover to sneak up for a throw.
One nade clears the whole situation.
Our latest aquisition will come handy now. Those houses offer some cover, the normal detection range for a Humvee is almost exactly as long as the shooting range of the MK 19 launcher and the time to pop out of the roof, man the mounted weapon of the Humvee and turn it 180 degrees corresponds very good to the time of a 40mm burning nade to reach its target and a Humvee gunner to die. It has to be admitted, that most Humvee gunners in the game are capable of multi tasking, they can turn the mounted gun and die at the same time. So this job is rather routine. The driver parks his car and leaves, again outside the walls.
Also to mention next to the gate an empty T 55 waits in the entrenchments. Grabbing that tank would turn COTUC hostile (if not allready) and all remaining guards from the three gates would come over for a raid.
At the western gate (we entered here) the situation also develloped favourable for us.
One nade kills the undead knight and one guard. The other guard seems to be totally unimpressed. A few minutes later he might get the right impression.
Capturing that remaining Humvee turns into a routine.
The traders area right behind the western gate should be cleared next. Except the two guards at the gate noone carries any arms.
So we just lure the guards a bit away and eliminate them.
The unarmed traders will not cause major problems except that they run away. The devs might have designed that mission in a way to spare the unarmed traiders their lifes, but they had chosen not to do so.
Our next stop is the airport. Unfortunately there is no panorama picture. The guards at the gate will surely respond to one of the captured Humvees driving close to the gate but in a death angle from the rampart. Even one patrolling COTUC soldier joins the party. The old technique of keeping the car in the right distance to the enemy forcing him to follow and ignoring any other enemy lures those three guards one by one ito the trap.
We repeat that exercise two times.
The remaining guard at the gate has turned to face the inside of the airport, so it is not really complicated to clear that gate.
The two guards next to the Mig 29 had a better idea. Everyone watches the other ones back. We have to lure at least one of them away so our team of three takes care of the other.
After eliminating the guards the Mig is officially captured. The heavy ammo crate on the western wall of the control building is empty. Obviously the devs simply forgot it. One undead knight guards the eastern wall of that building. Daniel could try to throw a nade over the roof. I am not sure if it is possible at all, even though I vaguely remember having done that, I could not reproduce that performance this time. So Daniel walks around the corner for a throw.
On the heliport we find the most exiting bounty of this mission.
Obviously the devs designed the Mi 28 Hind at the beginning of the project, when they had plenty of time and enthusiasm. Even though the edgy wheels give it a weird look, there are a lot of details. The first one who enters the Hind is placed correctly on the pilots seat.
The second one takes the gunners seat and the rest of the crew enters into the freight compartment.
Unfortunately COTUC equipped this hind rather sparely. But it is OK, COTUC might have used an Aérospatial SA 330 Puma (like in Red Dawn/ Rambo III) or even a Sikosky S-62 (like in Red Skorpion) instead and simply disguise it as a Hind. The airport offers a lot of space to deploy our own captured vehicles. Some loot, especially MG ammo, will not propperly fit into the many inventory slots, so it can be temporarely dropped here.
The residence of the COTUC leader in the center of the whole complex has to be destroyed. Unfortunately six undead knights will use deadly force to prevent this.
Four of them are guarding the main passges and two are patrolling near the building. It is possible to walk through the several gaps of the hedge, even a Humvee can drive through them, but doing so unnoticed by the undead knights could be considdered impossible. Fortunately there are almost death angles outside the hedges. Daniel Miller can croutch near enough to get one of the knights into throwing range.
Of course, Daniel has to retreat when the nade is still in flight. To spice things up the two T 55 on patrol pass by really close, so timing is crucial. The third T 55 is deployed between the residence and the obelisk. Eliminating the first guard opens up the death angle of the other guards making every attack easier.
The two patroling knights move back and forth on the eastern and western side of the building. Daniel takes care of the eastern knight first.
These throws take a bit patience to hit the moving targets. The other patrolling knight also catches a nade. Those two undead knights exploding close to the residence cause some collateral damage.
Maybe they are not building any more the way they used to, back in the old days. The remaining two undead knights are taken out in the same way. Daniel should not move more to the north to avoid any encounter with the third T 55, so the last knight is blown up from inside the hedged circle.
One more missiongoals is completed. The obelisk is still to destroy and the labs have to be cleared and secured. If we owned those three T 55 (together with the M 1 and the T 55 we allready have) instead of COUTUC owning them, we could significantly increase security. This will be the first task of the next update.
Helena, David, Ivan, Feodor and Wassili left the complex through the back entrance and had to walk around the whole airport (outside the walls). The geometry of the walls offers the oppurtunity to throw a nade over the wall directly on the undead knight. There is no comparable throwing position inside the walls.
The explosion of that knight must have hurt one of the two guards. The confusion afterwards lured both outside the gate and seperated them. Our team finishes both jobs almost at the same place.
Akim eliminates the gunner of the Humvee. He advances until the gunner mans the launcher and shoots with his Dragunov. It took even two shots, but the Humvee still is in top condition. The driver leaves the car, in fact he parks it outside the wall, right in front of our killer team.
Things are more favourable at the next gate. The guards stand a bit closer to the undead knight and some objects offer more cover to sneak up for a throw.
One nade clears the whole situation.
Our latest aquisition will come handy now. Those houses offer some cover, the normal detection range for a Humvee is almost exactly as long as the shooting range of the MK 19 launcher and the time to pop out of the roof, man the mounted weapon of the Humvee and turn it 180 degrees corresponds very good to the time of a 40mm burning nade to reach its target and a Humvee gunner to die. It has to be admitted, that most Humvee gunners in the game are capable of multi tasking, they can turn the mounted gun and die at the same time. So this job is rather routine. The driver parks his car and leaves, again outside the walls.
Also to mention next to the gate an empty T 55 waits in the entrenchments. Grabbing that tank would turn COTUC hostile (if not allready) and all remaining guards from the three gates would come over for a raid.
At the western gate (we entered here) the situation also develloped favourable for us.
One nade kills the undead knight and one guard. The other guard seems to be totally unimpressed. A few minutes later he might get the right impression.
Capturing that remaining Humvee turns into a routine.
The traders area right behind the western gate should be cleared next. Except the two guards at the gate noone carries any arms.
So we just lure the guards a bit away and eliminate them.
The unarmed traders will not cause major problems except that they run away. The devs might have designed that mission in a way to spare the unarmed traiders their lifes, but they had chosen not to do so.
Our next stop is the airport. Unfortunately there is no panorama picture. The guards at the gate will surely respond to one of the captured Humvees driving close to the gate but in a death angle from the rampart. Even one patrolling COTUC soldier joins the party. The old technique of keeping the car in the right distance to the enemy forcing him to follow and ignoring any other enemy lures those three guards one by one ito the trap.
We repeat that exercise two times.
The remaining guard at the gate has turned to face the inside of the airport, so it is not really complicated to clear that gate.
The two guards next to the Mig 29 had a better idea. Everyone watches the other ones back. We have to lure at least one of them away so our team of three takes care of the other.
After eliminating the guards the Mig is officially captured. The heavy ammo crate on the western wall of the control building is empty. Obviously the devs simply forgot it. One undead knight guards the eastern wall of that building. Daniel could try to throw a nade over the roof. I am not sure if it is possible at all, even though I vaguely remember having done that, I could not reproduce that performance this time. So Daniel walks around the corner for a throw.
On the heliport we find the most exiting bounty of this mission.
Obviously the devs designed the Mi 28 Hind at the beginning of the project, when they had plenty of time and enthusiasm. Even though the edgy wheels give it a weird look, there are a lot of details. The first one who enters the Hind is placed correctly on the pilots seat.
The second one takes the gunners seat and the rest of the crew enters into the freight compartment.
Unfortunately COTUC equipped this hind rather sparely. But it is OK, COTUC might have used an Aérospatial SA 330 Puma (like in Red Dawn/ Rambo III) or even a Sikosky S-62 (like in Red Skorpion) instead and simply disguise it as a Hind. The airport offers a lot of space to deploy our own captured vehicles. Some loot, especially MG ammo, will not propperly fit into the many inventory slots, so it can be temporarely dropped here.
The residence of the COTUC leader in the center of the whole complex has to be destroyed. Unfortunately six undead knights will use deadly force to prevent this.
Four of them are guarding the main passges and two are patrolling near the building. It is possible to walk through the several gaps of the hedge, even a Humvee can drive through them, but doing so unnoticed by the undead knights could be considdered impossible. Fortunately there are almost death angles outside the hedges. Daniel Miller can croutch near enough to get one of the knights into throwing range.
Of course, Daniel has to retreat when the nade is still in flight. To spice things up the two T 55 on patrol pass by really close, so timing is crucial. The third T 55 is deployed between the residence and the obelisk. Eliminating the first guard opens up the death angle of the other guards making every attack easier.
The two patroling knights move back and forth on the eastern and western side of the building. Daniel takes care of the eastern knight first.
These throws take a bit patience to hit the moving targets. The other patrolling knight also catches a nade. Those two undead knights exploding close to the residence cause some collateral damage.
Maybe they are not building any more the way they used to, back in the old days. The remaining two undead knights are taken out in the same way. Daniel should not move more to the north to avoid any encounter with the third T 55, so the last knight is blown up from inside the hedged circle.
One more missiongoals is completed. The obelisk is still to destroy and the labs have to be cleared and secured. If we owned those three T 55 (together with the M 1 and the T 55 we allready have) instead of COUTUC owning them, we could significantly increase security. This will be the first task of the next update.
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Gordon Shumway
Literate
Mission 8: Inside the Rathole (Part 4)
Our team owns one M 1 and a Humvee with grenade launcher, enough to capture enemy tanks, but maybe we could get some more tools. The factory area looks promising.
There are three crates behind the factory building (where the two guards are patrolling). The the two gastanks, the building and the pipeline between them is also connected by a chain reaction script (like in Mission 3), so destroying one part will destroy the rest. Even though the fence in the foreground is almost completely burried, noone can walk or climb over it. Daniel takes care of the guards at the gate, while the patrol is still behind the block.
The rest is routine work. Of course the patrolling guards come near the two gastanks, so it is possible to use the cascading effect by destroying only one part of the pipeline, but that method does not provide a secure elimination. We use a more direct approach.
Taking the crates some mines can be found, those will be very usefull. Those crates were the last to find in this mission, there are none in the lab.
Roughly estimated we need one mine, one 125 mm HEAT and one or two 40 mm flame grenades for each tank. The two patrolling T 55 hit one mine each automatically.
The street corner next to the townguard offers a good opportunity for an ambush because both moving tanks turn there and wait for two or three seconds and our M 1 can retreat behind the wall of the townguard. Our first victim comes counter clockwise.
Actually both enemy tanks take several halts during their courses around the central area. On the next round that particular T 55 halts directly in front of the entrance to the townguard. Victor and Daniel give that tank another "heat" (but not HEAT) treatment. To avoid detection, they have to stay behind the buildings and start the assault, when the T 55 turns and starts moving away, so the 40 mm nade usually misses but the tank drives through the burning spot, when it follows our humvee.
Akim has to help out with one shot to kill the gunner. Fortunately the crew consists of only two COTUC soldiers. Obviously all drivers behave cooperative in this mission, so this particular one leaves the T 55.
The other, clockwise cruizing T 55 also becomes a target for "catshooting" (CAT - Canadian Army Trophy). We will treat every enemy tank eaqually, so Daniel has to deliver a 40 mm. A bit north of the townguard some houses offer enough cover for a perfect shot.
Even though the target was directly hit, the crew survives. Maybe this crew is tougher than the other or the preluding impacts (mine, 125 mm HEAT) were a bit lesser than normal. Daniel has to give an encore directly in front of the townguard but, like a miracle, the crew survives once more, so Akim has to help out.
Again the driver leaves and Daniel grabs the next goodie.
The last T 55 next to the place, where the COTUC residence used to stand before our interference to urban design, turns out to be even more persistent. The first steps to even the score work out fine. Daniel places a mine and lures the tank on it.
One 125 mm HEAT round "rounds" it up and the 40 mm nade can be delivered, while the hedges offer good ways to cover our humvee from counterattacks.
Of course one 40 mm nade does not kill the COTUC gunner, so Daniel has to fire again...
... and again, and again...
The last two shots have been placed on the ground next to the target in order to keep that T 55 in one piece. Finally the driver leaves after the gunner has been killed. This T 55 is in a really bad condition but good enough to put all the MG ammo into it. After eliminating all enemy heavy units our heroes take the next objective.
The labs have to be cleared from enemy presence and MUST not be destroyed. Several guards patrol in the outer or inner perimeter. One appearance of our Humvee makes the whole bunch of guards panic.
Some of the guards charge, others run in the other direction. It is very likely to pull out only one or two COTUC soldiers, at least they come seperately and not in a single bunch. So our plan includes luring a single guard far away from the lab towards the recently demolished residence building. Our execution department has been redeployed behind the hedges.
When the client passes by the hedges (still the Humvee in sight) our employees will take care of him.
And our execution department is famous for the fact, that there is no customer applying any complaint whatsoever, at least no customer capable of giving any testimony.
To cut it short, the next screenshots will only cover the results:
As an interesting observation, the shooters in the last pic partially point their guns AWAY from the target. The COTUC guard keeps on moving while beeing shot. The devs did not include a function to autocorrect the direction of weapons, but the shots are considdered as hits. Obviously the in game physic does not differ between "hit" and "not hit" but only between "damage" and "not (for whatever reason) damage". Consequently the bullets fly in an edgy trajectory. A very close look on Feodor (left with AK) reveals the tracer spur of the bullets (over his arm), which turn 135 deg. left after leaving the muzzle.
Those two scientists next to the main lab do not carry arms, but they would pic up anything they could.
Our last task covers the obelisk, which has to be destroyed. There are unarmed civilists on the plaza next to it. Those are legal targets and count for kill statistics but (unlike the scientists) winning the mission is possible if they survive.
Detonating a bunch of explosives exceeds the needs for the destruction of the Obelisk. Another "stylish" way may include our Hind.
But our own greedyness makes Anatoli to finish the job with a captured M 60.
Unfortunately COTUC seem to be a sore looser. They announce to start an assault on the labs to set their improved variant of SGDS free. Unfortunately it is not possible to kill this PA speaker.
Obviously they don't care about collateral damage. The six undead knights at the residence would join the attack, if they were still present. Other COTUC forces would remain on their positions. Two undead knights appear next to the factory. Maybe those should impose the two units, which executed the couple before, but technicall those are different ones.
Two nades end this episode quickly. Anyone who insists on realism can wait at the frontgate of the lab and kill them from here. As allready said: the lab must not be destroyed. Eliminating the last COTUC forces turns the mission to win. This time our loot forms a most impressive picture.
Unfortunately HE did not bless the residence with HIS presence while our heroes blowed the place to bits, so the hunt is still open. Our HQ orders us to come home ASAP to react to a very new devellopement. Maybe they found HIM with a long beard and hiding in a small pit next to a stable, we will see.
There are three crates behind the factory building (where the two guards are patrolling). The the two gastanks, the building and the pipeline between them is also connected by a chain reaction script (like in Mission 3), so destroying one part will destroy the rest. Even though the fence in the foreground is almost completely burried, noone can walk or climb over it. Daniel takes care of the guards at the gate, while the patrol is still behind the block.
The rest is routine work. Of course the patrolling guards come near the two gastanks, so it is possible to use the cascading effect by destroying only one part of the pipeline, but that method does not provide a secure elimination. We use a more direct approach.
Taking the crates some mines can be found, those will be very usefull. Those crates were the last to find in this mission, there are none in the lab.
Roughly estimated we need one mine, one 125 mm HEAT and one or two 40 mm flame grenades for each tank. The two patrolling T 55 hit one mine each automatically.
The street corner next to the townguard offers a good opportunity for an ambush because both moving tanks turn there and wait for two or three seconds and our M 1 can retreat behind the wall of the townguard. Our first victim comes counter clockwise.
Actually both enemy tanks take several halts during their courses around the central area. On the next round that particular T 55 halts directly in front of the entrance to the townguard. Victor and Daniel give that tank another "heat" (but not HEAT) treatment. To avoid detection, they have to stay behind the buildings and start the assault, when the T 55 turns and starts moving away, so the 40 mm nade usually misses but the tank drives through the burning spot, when it follows our humvee.
Akim has to help out with one shot to kill the gunner. Fortunately the crew consists of only two COTUC soldiers. Obviously all drivers behave cooperative in this mission, so this particular one leaves the T 55.
The other, clockwise cruizing T 55 also becomes a target for "catshooting" (CAT - Canadian Army Trophy). We will treat every enemy tank eaqually, so Daniel has to deliver a 40 mm. A bit north of the townguard some houses offer enough cover for a perfect shot.
Even though the target was directly hit, the crew survives. Maybe this crew is tougher than the other or the preluding impacts (mine, 125 mm HEAT) were a bit lesser than normal. Daniel has to give an encore directly in front of the townguard but, like a miracle, the crew survives once more, so Akim has to help out.
Again the driver leaves and Daniel grabs the next goodie.
The last T 55 next to the place, where the COTUC residence used to stand before our interference to urban design, turns out to be even more persistent. The first steps to even the score work out fine. Daniel places a mine and lures the tank on it.
One 125 mm HEAT round "rounds" it up and the 40 mm nade can be delivered, while the hedges offer good ways to cover our humvee from counterattacks.
Of course one 40 mm nade does not kill the COTUC gunner, so Daniel has to fire again...
... and again, and again...
The last two shots have been placed on the ground next to the target in order to keep that T 55 in one piece. Finally the driver leaves after the gunner has been killed. This T 55 is in a really bad condition but good enough to put all the MG ammo into it. After eliminating all enemy heavy units our heroes take the next objective.
The labs have to be cleared from enemy presence and MUST not be destroyed. Several guards patrol in the outer or inner perimeter. One appearance of our Humvee makes the whole bunch of guards panic.
Some of the guards charge, others run in the other direction. It is very likely to pull out only one or two COTUC soldiers, at least they come seperately and not in a single bunch. So our plan includes luring a single guard far away from the lab towards the recently demolished residence building. Our execution department has been redeployed behind the hedges.
When the client passes by the hedges (still the Humvee in sight) our employees will take care of him.
And our execution department is famous for the fact, that there is no customer applying any complaint whatsoever, at least no customer capable of giving any testimony.
To cut it short, the next screenshots will only cover the results:
As an interesting observation, the shooters in the last pic partially point their guns AWAY from the target. The COTUC guard keeps on moving while beeing shot. The devs did not include a function to autocorrect the direction of weapons, but the shots are considdered as hits. Obviously the in game physic does not differ between "hit" and "not hit" but only between "damage" and "not (for whatever reason) damage". Consequently the bullets fly in an edgy trajectory. A very close look on Feodor (left with AK) reveals the tracer spur of the bullets (over his arm), which turn 135 deg. left after leaving the muzzle.
Those two scientists next to the main lab do not carry arms, but they would pic up anything they could.
Our last task covers the obelisk, which has to be destroyed. There are unarmed civilists on the plaza next to it. Those are legal targets and count for kill statistics but (unlike the scientists) winning the mission is possible if they survive.
Detonating a bunch of explosives exceeds the needs for the destruction of the Obelisk. Another "stylish" way may include our Hind.
But our own greedyness makes Anatoli to finish the job with a captured M 60.
Unfortunately COTUC seem to be a sore looser. They announce to start an assault on the labs to set their improved variant of SGDS free. Unfortunately it is not possible to kill this PA speaker.
Obviously they don't care about collateral damage. The six undead knights at the residence would join the attack, if they were still present. Other COTUC forces would remain on their positions. Two undead knights appear next to the factory. Maybe those should impose the two units, which executed the couple before, but technicall those are different ones.
Two nades end this episode quickly. Anyone who insists on realism can wait at the frontgate of the lab and kill them from here. As allready said: the lab must not be destroyed. Eliminating the last COTUC forces turns the mission to win. This time our loot forms a most impressive picture.
Unfortunately HE did not bless the residence with HIS presence while our heroes blowed the place to bits, so the hunt is still open. Our HQ orders us to come home ASAP to react to a very new devellopement. Maybe they found HIM with a long beard and hiding in a small pit next to a stable, we will see.
KickAss
Augur
Is it dead? 
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