[TC] Balance of Power Plot Walkthrough

[zazie]

I have not read all 18 pages but as it is not mentioned in the first post I think this hasn't been posted before :
In stage one of the plot it is NOT necessary to fight against the Terran fleet that tries to kill the prison transport. You mustn't even be in the same sector !

How come ?
When I first tried this mission recently (without having read any walkthrough, as Extreme in both ranks in my 54d-save) I was really surprised about the Terran fleet: Two Yokohamas and dozens of M3, M4 and M5 - the sector was red. I was dead in no time. So I thought I would continue the mission later, with my fleet and some M7Ms to cap the bigships. Reload a save where I had already triggered the prison ship. Then I jumped to the Xenon Sector where my presence was urgently needed.
To my surprise the mission continued in US, some guy announced that they start to take over the ship. On the sector map I saw another huge Terran fleet attacking the prison transport that remained on his track, at 92% hull. After a while it left the radius of my satellites in that sector. Some minutes later, the guy from the prison transport announced that they have built up the Installation.

At that point I jumped to Neptun bacause I wanted to see what the hell was happening in the US. When I arrived IS, the Terran Fleet was still there (out in the NE-corner of the map), so I prepared to start a looong fight. But when I contacted the station (blue book-symbol) the Terran fleet vanished instantly and completely.

In other words: the mission continued without one single shot from one of my ships against the Terrans and without even my presence IS during this part of the plot.

[TTD]

There are a number of missions within various plots that continue without your intervention.

Some generic missions also continue and you are rewarded for them

[MarvinTheMartian]

Having real trouble capping those last two fighters, their morale is only 20 but striping the shields and dropping the hull to 20% of the Mjollnir within 30secs with a PBE hasn't worked, and the Fenrir is no better having pounded it with 4x ISR (or 4x GIG) still not convincing the pilot to go for an EVA
This is my attempt at the go-for-the-kill approach which has worked in the past and have tried the whittling-the-hull approach too, any other suggestions? I'd really like the Thor and Valkyrie blueprints.

these Tyrs will persue you wherever you go until you, or they, are dead. Whenever you jump into a new Sector, these Tyrs will jump in around you, so you really don't have an obvious escape.

This, however, is great news. No. Really. Being the final plot for me, my end-game comes into effect which involves severing diplomatic ties with the Paranid and these four will be following me around from Emperor Mines to Heaven's Assertion visiting all sectors in between like 4 pit bulls destroying all stations I chose to "hide" behind
More on this later in its own topic

[vr01]

I used the following technique for both (it's documented somewhere here on the forum, I forget who by):

I used a fighter with mass drivers to bring the hull down to 2% whilst the shields stayed at 100%. Then I used PBE's to bring the shields down to 0 and they bailed.

[TTD]

The BoP plot was the final mission of TC.

My game stayed vanilla all the way through until I reached this plot.
Did a good chunk of it before I went modded and used All Plots Financial to pay for the completion of this plot.

[MarvinTheMartian]

I used the following technique for both (it's documented somewhere here on the forum, I forget who by):

I used a fighter with mass drivers to bring the hull down to 2% whilst the shields stayed at 100%. Then I used PBE's to bring the shields down to 0 and they bailed.

I've heard that somewhere too, perhaps I'll give it a go and jump back in the HV to finish the job.

My game stayed vanilla all the way through until I reached this plot.
Did a good chunk of it before I went modded and used All Plots Financial to pay for the completion of this plot.

I, for no good reason really, have remained vanilla until I completed the plots, this could be the trigger to go modified (still want to take the pit bulls for a walk though ), reckoned I'd need it for fleet combat anyway.

Cheers,

[DrBullwinkle]

their morale is only 20 but striping the shields and dropping the hull to 20% of the Mjollnir within 30secs with a PBE hasn't worked

Morale of 20 is fairly high; you have to be lucky in order to get a bail. That means save and reload. I rarely do save-and-reload in the game -- preferring to take my luck as it comes -- but this mission for Balance of Power requires it.

As for babying the ships with PBE's for 30 seconds... that's far too long.

Use stronger weapons. Drop the shields and 20% of the hull with a single volley, or within about a second. Not "drop the hull to 20% but drop the hull by 20% (to 80% hull or less in your first volley).

Or, really, just shoot them the way you feel like. The larger factor is your luck in that specific reload. It matters more than the way that you shoot them.

[MarvinTheMartian]

As for babying the ships with PBE's for 30 seconds... that's far too long.

Well, I wouldn't say babying I lay into him like I was going to kill him, anything more than a single PBE and I'd have destroyed it in one volley.

If 20 is high then that explains why I can't cap LXs with 26 morale the save I have is after they've spawned so it won't change, might have to go back a bit but not looking forward to locating the pirate base again though.

[DrBullwinkle]

Where's the kaboom? There was supposed to be an earth-shattering kaboom!

Awesome, Marvin.

Morale is only one piece of the puzzle. There is still "luck" (a.k.a. the random number generator). How many times have you tried?

If you cannot get the bails after 10 or 20 attempts, and you do not have an earlier save (why not?!) then consider using the Cheat Package to "Reduce pilot morale".

[MarvinTheMartian]

Thankfully I do have a save after finding the pirate base but before the ships spawn. after 10 reloads, each time, they spawn with morale of 20, I have a feeling this is fixed.

I now have a save where I am 600m behind the Mjollnir and can wipe his shields and rip 75% out of the hull in a single volley of CIG fire (4 guns) and no deal! Now, I have had the issue before where I'm so friendly with pirates that they won't even attack me even if red, so I've fired a couple of mossies to get his attention before firing, no dice.

Off to by a MD and try that approach. Not happy about this at all, reloading 30 times is not my idea of fun, and that's just the first ship!

EDIT: Just as I was about to give up, that last reload had the RNG on my side, now have both ships and hopefully soon to be bonus blueprints too! It was a combination of droppping the shields quickly with CIG then pecking away with PBE. but... will have had more to do with the RNG than weapons. maybe there's a reload counter or something

[DrBullwinkle]

had more to do with the RNG than weapons.

Yep.

I do not think that a reload counter is possible. It is just low probability. I only had to reload four or five times, but you got "lucky" .

As for your "Earth-shattering kaboom", that comes next... (Now all you have to do is survive the best chase in the game!).

[MarvinTheMartian]

I wasn't being serious about the reload counter just a bit of a dig about the over-use of the RNG in this game at times, i've ranted enough about that before though so I'll say no more on the subject

As for your "Earth-shattering kaboom", that comes next... (Now all you have to do is survive the best chase in the game!).

I'm aware of the "chase" - I intend to drag that out as long as possible across as many Paranid sectors as possible and if there're any left at the end of it I might have a go at capping one

Cheers,

[Katpagan]

Please forgive me if this is not the right place to post this but this is the first topic on this particular plot that I've found, without spending the next millenium searching every other topic

I've just completed the final mission (via Khaak sectors for me - the Tyr's cleared a couple out quite nicely, thank you ) however I seem to be having a problem with the Terrans.

Before starting the plot I had an Adv Sat in each Terran Sector but over the course of the plot the Terrans destroyed every one of them and would occasionaly go after my UT's. Not really a big deal at the time. Once plot is complete you get that message about 'nobody knows' so I thought it might now be safe in the Terran Sectors. After a scout around there were no more Red Terrans so I started to put Adv Sats back. However after only putting a couple up I get the Adv Sat Destroyed messages followed very quickly by a UT getting killed. I jumped into the sector where my UT died but still no Red Terrans. However there are still fleets of Terrans near where my old Sats used to be in some of the sectors but the ships are all blue.

I am now confused. Is this supposed to happened. Nobody else has mentioned that they have had this problem so I'm wondering if I've done something to cause this. My ATF rank is still at Command Access although I did see it at AGI Nemesis for a brief moment earlier before it went back to CA. My Terran rank is Hero of Sol so based on these they shouldn't have a problem.

Could someone please tell me if it is me or if this is normal and anything own by me should now avoid the Terran Sectors for all time. If this is the case then I wish I could go back to just before starting the plot and not bother, however I would really rather not do that as on one occasion when saving during a particular mission my hand twitched at the wrong moment when saving and it saved over the save I did just prior to starting plot. The next save I have before that one would take me back to just before start of Hub plot and considering I am now almost halfway thru getting the silicon wafers I'm sure you can imagine the heartbreak of having to go back that far

Thank you for any help or advice you can offer.

[MarvinTheMartian]

Hi,

It's not normal but it's not too bad either. I say that because you still have max rep with ATF and Terran so should be able to fix it.

Do you have "show as enemy to me" set to yes at the bottom of the command console for the ship you are flying? It's possible there's a Terran/ATF ship or two that don't like you for some reason and that's the only way to spot them.

What does the log say about who killed your sats and UTs?

[Katpagan]

Thank you so much for your quick reply.

I have just had a peek to see about the FOF settings. I found 1 UT with Terrans set as Foe so have changed that but the rest of us are all set to Friend. As to the destroyed messages it says they are destroyed by 'various' Terrans ships, i.e. your adv sat was destroyed in sector Saturn by Terran Scimitar.

I'm now wondering if I have a script installed that might be causing the problem. If you think this could be the case, especially as no one else seems to have this problem then I will of course take this to the S&M section as requested by author.

Thank you.

[MarvinTheMartian]

It's quite possible it's scripts so always worth checking there if there's nothing obvious wrong.

Are you arming your UTs? if one has terran as enemy then that would explain a lot

[Snafu_X3]

I have just had a peek to see about the FOF settings. I found 1 UT with Terrans set as Foe so have changed that but the rest of us are all set to Friend. As to the destroyed messages it says they are destroyed by 'various' Terrans ships, i.e. your adv sat was destroyed in sector Saturn by Terran Scimitar.

I'm now wondering if I have a script installed that might be causing the problem.

First thing: this particular forum is for vanilla (including bonus pack) gameplay; if you have any other scripts/mods installed they're likely to change gameplay (whether or not you recognise this) & therefore you should ask in the S&M forum

Second: as odd as it seems (compared to other online sites I've seen), if you can't find a subject to attach your post to within about 4-6 weeks, it's best to start a new post

Third: mention which version (R, TC or AP) of the game in your post title so we know which idiosyncrasies to encounter - each game (& they are separate) has differences

(Sorry if that came across as harsh, but it's difficult enough to answer questions with the vanilla (including bonus pack) game, let alone after people have fiddled with it)

WRT your problem with sats: are you placing them a looong way away from the trade lanes (ie above/below ecliptic)? This is especially important in Terran sectors as their stations are huuuge compared to Commonwealth ones, & therefore may be subject to random colisions while you're IS

[Hank001]

Okay those Tyr's at the finale ended up comedy relief. Yeah my first thought was jump into the Khak sector, dock with the outpost. Not enough Khak when you need them and had reload and rethink.

Hey I know of a place that's LOADED with M1's! And I've got a great rep with! Had enough cells to jump in and introduce those Tyr's to my Final Fury friends. Fun to watch what happened. Almost made the Finale Battle of Heritic's End in Reunion look tame. Not a bad payoff right there! .

Edit: Realoded again just to nuke a bag of popcorn and watch the show! Wish I still had a vid capture card. Great show!