Mission 07 - Siege Breakers

## 07 - Siege Breakers

Sky Marshall Komarov's defenses hold the line against the Sylon onslaught.

## Belligerents

* 12th Fleet Remnants

* Tereshkova Station

* Sylon Collective

## Commanders

* Benjamin Colburne

* Victor Komarov

* Unknown Praetor

## Forces

* Rest of 12th Fleet, including St. George-class carriers.
* UFN Trinity and UFN Ulysses.

* Defense fleet including Avenger-class ships.
* Station defenses, including a Defense Platform.
* UFN October.

* Majority of Sylon arsenal except Plasma Raids and Assmiliators.
* Major manufacturing complexes dependant on Installation Primes.

## Objectives

* Relief the Tereshkova station.
* Neutralize all Sylon forces.

* Defend the station at all costs.

* Eliminate all Human forces.

## Casualties and losses

Severe
Minimal
Extensive

## Involved Characters

* Benjamin Colburne
* Greg Leskovski
* Victor Komarov

*Siege Breakers* is the seventh mission in Chapter 01 - Hostile Visitors in the Five Nations campaign.

## Setting

Having escaped from the Caribou System thanks to the assistance of the Black Swan, Benjamin Colburne, Greg Leskovski and the remainders of the 12th Fleet arrived at the Sol System, having parted their ways with the pardoned Black Swan whom kept their word and delivered information on the Sylon invaders which had overrun the Caribou System. While on their way to Earth, the UFN Trinity's (or Ulysses') AIDA received an emergency transmission from the Federation High Command, in particular Sky Marshall Victor Komarov - the Tereshkova Station was under siege from Sylon forces, the grim realization that Sterling Buckner's efforts in preventing the Sylons from reaching the Sol System in vain.

While Leskovski had a brief sense of *deja vu*, fearing the Sylons would decimate the Federation on Sol just as they had in Caribou, Colburne decided to take immediate action, rallying the fleet and setting off to lift the siege at Tereshkova, regardless of cost.

## Lifting the Siege

The remnants of the 12th Fleet arrived at the edge of the sieged perimeter of the Tereshkova Station, under continuous pressure from two major Sylon manufacturing complexes, and commandeered an abandoned mining complex to use as a foothold. As Colburne prepared the defenses, AIDA informed that, based on the collected information from the Black Swan, the Sylons observed by the EIRA Institute were in fact remote-piloted drones which received energy from central facilities known as Installation Primes - If they were to be destroyed, the Sylons in their majority would become inert.

Even though being tactically threatened in it's front and rear, the local Sylon forces deployed large quantities of the attack drones seen in the Caribou system, plus new ones capable of generating cloaking fields and even carriers with stealth technology. In order to compensate for their numbers, Colburne resorted to deploying St. George carriers, whose thick hulls and fighter assembly capacity proved invaluable. Meanwhile, while defenses were holding firm, led by Komarov within the UFN October, it was but a matter of time before the Sylons' combined numbers and firepower would manage to overcome them.

Colburne's forces, through employing the carriers and strategic foresight, managed to destroy one of the Sylon Installation Primes, rendering a segment of the Sylon forces inoperant, allowing Colburne to shore up forces and time to organize the second assault, which eventually happened and was as equally guarded as the first segment, and thus fought through and destroyed the second Installation Prime. This deactivated half of the sieging Sylon forces, and the remaining Sylon drones started to retreat.

As the Sylon forces pulled away from Tereshkova, Komarov contacted Colburne, thanking him for breaking the siege and considering Colburne's and the 12th Fleet remnants' survival a godsend.

## Walkthrough

The player will start with a lightly defended base, a few Hurricanes, a couple of Orcas, the UFN Trinity and the UFN Ulysses, as well as a lightly-defended Metal and Helium-3 asteroid field to the north. The player, aside from assigning the Engineer Shuttles to the asteroids and the Icarus to the Mining Station, should build a Kutuzov as soon as resources allow and deploy the Command Station close to this mining station to minimize travel distance and allow a better defense of the northern entrance behind the asteroids which is exposed to attack, especially to Spears, Twinblades and Absorbers. The player can build KEIKO Sentries to barricade assault attempts, but will later be outranged by Arsons, so the player should have a mobile force to reach and destroy these threats. The player should also deploy a third Command Station as close as possible to the Metal and Tachyon asteroid field to the left, to cover it as well with a construction radius for defenses - Though no attacks from cruisers will come from the left - as they must access the northwestern entrance - it is still exposed to Spear assaults, so a couple of Barricade Sats will be required to protect the workers. Further to the west, past a stellar cloud, is a rich Metal asteroid field that can be expanded on and is also safe from cruiser assaults. The player will be limited in regards to Helium-3 abundance, and though there's an asteroid field to the northwest that can be found, it's too exposed to enemy attacks. Hence, the player should be cautious in the construction of Hailstorms and Orcas and have a separate wing of Pasteurs, which should be kept from harm before all others, for repairs.

The Tachyon asteroids should be taken as to allow building a Dockyard and St. George carriers - at least three or four, filled to the brim with Hurricanes - which will be mainstay of the player's fleet. Not only the St. George allows to build and house Hurricanes and repairing them after damaged, while also granting them a protection bonus, the St. George itself also has an impressive hull account that will allow it to move ahead and tank most of the damage from the numerous Sylon defenders and heavy defenses, which include Arsons, Glooms and Eclipses filled with Spears. The Sylons themselves will employ, for their assault, initial waves of Spears, Absorbers and Twinblades and later on use Arsons, Glooms, Shades and Eclipses with Masks. The Eclipse is particularly dangerous as, much like St. George delivers the protection bonus to the Hurricanes, so does the Eclipse to Spears, hence they should be targeted with heavy firepower above all things. While the Tereshkova Station (white Federation player) and the UFN October won't be as much attacked as the player, they'll still suffer some assaults and will need some watch, once in a while. The player should especially watch out if the UFN October goes too aggressive and into the red Sylon base - if it is destroyed, the mission ends in failure.

When attacking the Sylons, the player should target first the purple Sylon base - Not only is it's Installation Prime exposed right by it's left entrance, just behind a visible Drone Facility and can be targeted once it's defenders are dealt with, but to the northwest is a stellar cloud path that leads directly to the weakest entrance of the red Sylon base, recognized by it's present Quantum Core, where the player can move in, after replenishing it's losses, and destroy the second Installation Prime. Destroying each Installation Prime causes the ***entire*** owning Sylon player to be defeated, no longer sending attack waves or defending itself, so the player should use this to clear off the opulent resource asteroid fields (especially by the purple base) and exploiting them with a nearby Kutuzov deployed to establish defenses.

When both Installation Primes are destroyed, the mission is finished in victory.

## Notes

Throughout the whole mission, the orange Sylon player, which represents defenders and blockades, has no Installation Primes, and thus will defend itself from attacks regardless until the end of the mission.