Kalidor Crescent - Golden Wings

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Kalidor Crescent - Golden Wings

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Mark_Farlander
Rebel Alliance
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Joined: Tue Jan 16, 2018 10:47 pm

Post by Mark_Farlander » Sun Feb 11, 2018 11:12 am

Hello pilots. I'd like to know who is skilled and valorous enough to be awarded the Golden Wings for the Kalidor Crescent before the Battle of Endor playing X-Wing Alliance campaign at hard difficulty, even skipping 2 missions. 17500 bonus points are required for such a decoration.
I just made it and the mission where I earned the highest bonus is Battle 4, Mission 2: Reconnaissance of Imperial Convoy.
I destroyed more than 90% of the convoy and all the cargo freighters and tankers, so I got 2100 bonus points. Of course my favorite fighter is the everlasting A-Wing Blue 2.
On the other hand, the mission I skipped is Battle 4, Mission 6: Protect Imperial Computer for the reasons I have already explained in "XWA Campaigns" section.

What about you, pilots?
I would be honored to hear from your endeavors.
I don't judge tactics. The Battle is the best and only Judge.

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Phoenix Leader
Rebel Alliance
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Joined: Wed Aug 08, 2018 2:20 pm

Post by Phoenix Leader » Sun Aug 26, 2018 1:41 pm

I’m used to playing the single player campaign at Hard difficulty level, but I’ve never achieved the Kalidor Crescent - Golden Wings before fighting the Battle of Endor.
I need those 1000 bonus points for the destruction of the superlaser control node to reach 17500 total bonus points.
The only mission I skip is that infamous Battle 4, Mission 6: Protect Imperial Computer.
Prima’s Official Strategy Guide reports “This mission demands superlative dogfighting skills.”
I guess we have something in common.

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Jaeven
XWAU Member
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Post by Jaeven » Sun Aug 26, 2018 3:33 pm

It's been a while, but I don't really recall that mission being all that hard. The only mission I will always skip is the first training mission, where you have to fight Assault Shuttles in a Y-wing.

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Driftwood
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Post by Driftwood » Sun Aug 26, 2018 4:07 pm

The only way I've figured out how to beat the first rebel training mission (admittedly testing my hypothesis I was invulnerable and unlimited ammo) you have to dumbfire torpedoes at each assault shuttle initially at max range and immediately do a 180 and then loop back around, if done correctly once they get hit by your torpedoes they either are one hit killed, or otherwise easier to finish off by having your wingman attack them simultaneously. I did this and sustained no damage during the mission, on hard (with cheats enabled mind) I think one of the freighters took my shields down to 80%, so it's possible to do without unlimited ammo or invulnerability and I'm surprised it took me over a decade to come up with the hair brained idea in the first place.

Fun fact, you can take out both gunboats and skiprays in the previous regions using the same manner and one torpedo is enough to kill each one outright. The downside is you have to fly back and re-arm before going to region 3 if you're not using the cheater settings, which will cost you time on the final region if you aren't economical with your torpedo useage after reloading after region 2. Offhand, I think it takes two torpedoes to one shot the shuttles, but it may have been one.

The fun thing with the gunboats and skiprays, is if you line up the shot right and do a 180 towards the hyperbouy you can move to the next region as soon as the fighters are destroyed, increasing your mobility, decreasing your engagement time, and giving you precious seconds to minutes to re-arm between regions.

However, theoretically if you took out the two assault shuttles with no return fire, it isn't that hard even in a Y-Wing to finish off the convoy, minus the lancers. Which for the record, don't give you any bonus points (which you'd think at least 500+ each) So focus on disabling the cargo freighter engines first and torp whatever remaining single unit freighters there are, and ion the crap out of everything, let the lancers move on their course, and head back for reload if absolutely necessary and get your wingman to assist in destroying the convoy.

So for roughly 8 total torpedoes if done right, you can kill all fighter and shuttle hostiles and suffer zero return fire. Figure in one reload per region and you should be golden.

Your mileage may vary depending on how good you are at dumb firing the torpedoes. If you bork your shots at the carrack due to line of sight, that'll throw off my figures significantly for region 2.

Honestly, the multi fighter/region escalation mission is much harder in my opinion if you're playing on hard, simply due to the nature of target saturation. Though whoever thought it'd be fun to add two A/SHU with lasers galore against two Y/W in the first rebel mission, was a total jerk. I've only barely beaten the mission regularly, if at all (I tend to skip also if I haven't changed them out for something else challenging but more viable to destroy admittedly.

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Phoenix Leader
Rebel Alliance
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Joined: Wed Aug 08, 2018 2:20 pm

Post by Phoenix Leader » Sun Aug 26, 2018 6:41 pm

There is also another way to complete the first training mission playing at Hard, and that’s the method I use to get rid of it.
As far as I understand, there is only 1 problem in that mission: the assault shuttles in the last target area.
Y-W Gold Leader will attack the first shuttle by default, wasting all his proton torpedoes in a useless way, because the A/S can destroy all the warheads a long way before they can inflict any damage.
As soon as Y-W Gold Leader enters the area, order him to attack a container of the convoy.

There are 4 space trains in the convoy and blowing up 1 container for each of them is enough to stop them and to give you the chance to destroy more than 80% of the convoy.
You can manage the attack on the convoy by giving orders to Y-W Gold Leader, while you will take care of the assault shuttles.

You can fight against the A/S as if they were common fighters, but every time your shields are below 80% (this should be a safe value), just redirect both the shield and the cannon recharge to the engines, transfer all energy from cannons to shields, make evasive actions and escape.
When you are out of firing range, set the shield recharge at maximum rate while still keeping the cannon recharge fully redirected to engines. In this way, you are still moving at 80 MGLT, and that’s safe, but you are recharging your shields without wasting energy.
When your shields are at 200%, you are ready to engage the A/S again.

Taking them down might require 20 minutes, but no Imperial Star Destroyers are entering the area after all.

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