3rd campain really hard..(Spoilers)

[spacerat]

has anyone beaten the 3rd campain's first mission yet? Whenever I play I "fail to stop the invasion" and the campain fails. It sends like 2 destroyer squads and a carrier up against 10 or so destroyers and cruisers. Theres just so many broadswords you get pummeled to bits without even hitting any targets. For some reason the enemy seems to have much better point defenses than you do and can bring their shields up faster.

[Headgehog]

The first few missions of Shining Fortress can be quite difficult at first. It took me 3 tries before I was satisfied enough with the health of my ship and those in my group before I continued past mission three.

I think the major problem for me was learning how to command the cruisers. I was so used to the 5 mission mentality of the demo, that I had to relearn how to fight and preserve my ship and those in my group for an entire campaign. Once I did that, Shining Fortress was a cake walk.

I found that with cruisers, you need to really command your fellows as to who to attack. Never attack alone against more then one cruiser. Destroyers and frigates are punks for a cruiser, much like how a fighters are a mere annoyance for a destroyer. So going up against a destroyer group solo isn't that difficult... if you know what you're doing. Don't forget to start bombarding your enemy as soon as possible, before he can start to shoot at you in return! Toggle your ship targets for maximum effectiveness. Depending on the ship, you may want to go for fusion, thrusters, quantum, etc.

Another thing I noticed in this campaign is that unlike Highland, if you want something done you need to take command and do it yourself. The AI seems to have forgotten how to fight in this part of space. I had to take out most of the Hegemony fleets myself, because my fellows in other cruiser, destroyer and carrier groups seemed to have forgotten how.

BTW I successfully completed the campaign, opened up the Firestorm campaign, but the Shining Fortress campaign metal has yet to appear in my log book. Any one else have this problem?

[ceyan]

I haven't gotten a medal for any of the campaigns yet and I'm on Firestorm as well.

[Deathifier]

One option is to pick a destroyer/cruiser group that is off on its own facing only one enemy group in a system - rather than the huge furball(s).
That way you can wipe out parts of the enemy, and if you're lucky the rest of the fleet will do some work as well

I actually failed my first attempt at it, was flying 5th Fleet and I'd kinda wasted the two destroyer groups in it (couldn't command cruisers) and, uh, well an enemy unit snuck past and command wisely redeployed one of the wrecked destroyer groups to stop them

Tried again and didn't get so many ships trashed, worked much better!

As for medals, I remember I got one for Highland, then it went away and I got one for Firestorm when I failed it (time ran out or something? Enemy fleets were almost totally annihilated and mine were in good shape!). Still have the firestorm one and I just finished Nightfall (final battles are very cool!).

- Deathifier

[Mehrunes]

Try to gain the upper hand early. If you can take out a couple of enemy ships without losing any yourself then disengage and end the mission.