Mission 06 - False Flag

## 06 - False Flag

At first sight, it is what it looks like. But the more one looks into it...

### Aftermath

Strategic Sylon Collective Victory* Athrael Theocracy framed for attacks on Thorun Empire, Sylon forces not suspected of any involvement.
* Beginning of Thorun Retaliation phase of the First Galactic War.

## Belligerents

* Sylon Collective

* Thorun Empire

## Commanders

* Praetor (protagonist)

* Unknown Marquis *(KIA)*

## Forces

* Sylon-controlled Athrael spacecraft, including Warpgliders, Flankers, Clairvoyants, Rectors, Harbingers and Invaders.

* Predator interceptors.
* Marauder corvettes.
* Devastator cruisers.
* Defenses including Guard Stations.

## Objectives

* Destroy all Thorun mining facilities in the area with Athrael vessels.

* Defend mining facilities from unknown invaders.

## Casualties and losses

Minimal
Severe

## Involved Characters

* Praetor (protagonist)
* Cura

*False Flag* is the sixth mission of Chapter 02 - Ascension in the Five Nations campaign.

## Setting

Having acquired the plans for Athrael technologies, something that the Praetor could not comprehend, Cura informed that the Sylons were prepared to execute the next phase of the proposed strategy from the Renegade Praetor - called "deception" - by deploying remotely controlled manufactured copies of Athrael vessels against the aggressive Thorun Empire, with easily solvable coordinates left behind by the Sylons to allow the Thoruns to perform a counter-attack.

This strategy was planned by the Renegade Praetor after calculating that the Sylus' main strategy, based on continually manufacturing drones, attacking and reproducing, was anything but cost-effective, the numbers of lost drones accumulating until the odds of success shifted in favor of the Sylon Collective's opponents. Cura estimated that, with the Athrael Theocracy occupied against the Thorun forces, the United Federation would be vulnerable to attack once again.

When the Praetor asked Cura of the odds the Thoruns would identify the Sylons as the actual responsibles for the upcoming operation, Cura replied the odds were negligible - with the copied data from the Arcturus System's facilities, the Sylons could create perfect imitations of Athrael vessels. All that remained was to launch the false invasion.

## The Pictures Don't Lie

> Program executed. Known Athrael core world coordinates placed.
>
> Praetor (Protagonist)

The Sylon-controlled Athrael vessels launched an assault at the lightly defended Thorun mining facilities of the Obra Sector, on which the Athrael ships caused extensive damage to the local Thorun stations, especially the local Material Silos which provided the Thorun Empire with resources. Given the very light defenses of the Thorun stations, the heaviest ship to be found being only a pair of Devastator cruisers, the mining facilities did not stand a chance against the presumed "Athrael" invaders.

The facility was destroyed, and both the Praetor and Cura, having seen their plan was successful, left the Obra Sector while leaving the Athrael ships to carry out automatic operations. Within the ships, the Praetor left the coordinates to the Sedra System and the moon of Vemana - the Athrael homeworld.

## Walkthrough

The player will be commanding limited forces in this mission and thus will fail the mission if all attack forces are destroyed. The player will start the mission at the southwest corner with a Flanker, a Clairvoyant and four Warpgliders, and the first target is the Material Silo to the east of the starting position, guarded by only a few Predators. The player should move the Flanker forward while turning on the auto-cast for the Clairvoyant's Forced Shield ability. The Flanker will serve to distract the Predators as the Warpgliders move in to destroy them. From there, the player can move in and destroy the Material Silo, and then the local Extractors and Zoner for some leisure. The player should only be careful to not move to the north, by a stellar cloud, where there will be a Thorun checkpoint consisting of a couple of Guard Stations and a pair of Marauders the player's current units won't be able to handle, yet. Also, caution should be taken when destroying Zoners, as they detonate when destroyed, dealing explosive damage around them. As the Material Silo is destroyed, the player should leave this group alone as it will form into a battle fleet much later on.

After the first Mining Silo is destroyed, the camera will shift to the southeast where the player will receive a couple of Invaders that will soon be attacked by a group of Marauders. As the Marauders' weapons are more dangerous against Hull than shields, the player should micromanage the Invaders, retreating them if the shields get too low. The Marauders, however, will be grouped up for the Invaders' attacks to deal splash damage, so a few Invader shots can destroy this group. From there, the player can move in with the Invaders and bombard the two Guard Stations from maximum range, to avoid retaliation, and then move in and destroy the second Material Silo. As with the first group, the player should avoid moving far to the north, as there will be another stellar cloud which will contain Predators guarding it, and Invaders are unable to target fighters. Thus, the Invaders should be left alone after this Material Silo is destroyed.

As the second Material Silo is demolished, the camera will once again shift, this time to the west corner of the map, and the player will receive a pair of Rectors which the player should move eastward and deploy to destroy the guarding wing of Predators. As the Predators are destroyed and the player moves in the Rectors to attack the Material Silo, allied Martyrprobes will move in to assist in destroying the station. If the Martyrprobes cannot destroy the Material Silo, the Rectors can do so, but it will take a considerable amount of time due to the very low damage of the Rector attacks.

After the third Material Silo is destroyed, the camera will shift to the eastern corner where the player will receive six Harbingers, which the player should use to bombard the Thorun Guard Stations, barricaded by Habitats and Power Plants, from afar as the Harbingers have a better firing range than Invaders, but require Power to fire. From there, the player just needs to move the Harbingers to the north and destroy the fourth Material Silo.

After the fourth Material Silo is destroyed, the player will be tasked with destroying the final Material Silo, in the Thorun base by the northwestern corner, with all forces still left. This involves a small puzzle game of reuniting all the player's forces, scattered in the areas they started, into a group. For starters, the player should first take the Harbingers and move to the west of the recently-destroyed Mining Silo, keeping as most to the north as possible as to avoid fire from a guarding trio of Guard Stations that can't be easily targeted due to an asteroid at corner blocking vision. When crossing that asteroid, the player should use one Harbinger to acquire vision of a Guard Station each and let the remaining Harbingers pick them off, retreating as necessary to avoid losing the Harbingers.

After this, the player should take the Rectors to the west and move them up north to a path where, while it may seem apparently blocked by small destructible asteroids, the player can move the Rectors past this obstacle at the bottom of the asteroids and then move eastward, to where the Invaders are. The Rectors will come across a stellar cloud previously guarded by the Guard Stations that the Harbingers destroyed. The player should deploy the Rectors close to where the Predators are blocking the route of the Invaders, destroying the fighters. From there, the player then should backtrack to the small destructible asteroids with all reunited forces, using the Invaders and Harbingers to destroy the blockade north of the first group, clearing the way for the Flanker, Clairvoyant and Warpgliders.

With all forces reunited, the player can now return to the stellar cloud close to the harbingers and then head northwest, but will encounter a pair of Devastators at that exit of the stellar cloud. The player should use the Invaders and Harbingers to out-range the Devastators and destroy them, as they are extremely dangerous at close range. From there, the player should move westward, bombarding the enemy Guard Stations and deploying the Rectors to deal with the Predators as the Warpgliders help finish them off. This will clear the way for the player to the Material Silo, only obstructed by the present Capitol that the player's units can destroy to clear a line of fire to demolish the Silo.

When the fifth and final Material Silo is destroyed, the mission ends in victory for the "Athraels".

## History and Background

The notion of Sylon forces using remotely controlled vessels of their oppositions was foreshadowed in *Shadows of the Past* in Chapter 01 - Hostile Visitors, when the United Federation's expedition under Benjamin Colburne engaged Federation vessels belonging to a former EIRA expedition in the Hathor-4 System.

The whole nature of the scheme would only be revealed much later by Cura in *Jigsaw* in Chapter 04 - Endgame, but by then the extensive damages caused by the Praetor's deception would've long been fulfilled, with the Sedra System having fallen to the Thorun Empire and the Athrael forces pushed to the desperate act of releasing the Children of the Izlar into the Milky Way Galaxy as an attempted controllable weapon, triggering the Zhogarn Onslaught phase of the First Galactic War.

## Trivia

* In military terminology, *false flag* refers to an act committed purposefully with the intent of disguising the actual source of responsibility and pinning blame on another party, which is exactly what occurs in this mission, but a more common legal term would be a *"frame-up"*, *"stitch up"*, or *"set-up"*.