Operation Serpent

Deathsnake

Rear Admiral
Hi everyone. My Last Line of Defence Mod is still unhold (because I don't know what shipnames Saga used to avoid two ships with the same name in 2669.

Enigma is our primary objective and should be released first. In the meantime I worked on a storyline to use some WC4 Ships. I don't want to make a Remake from WC3+4 (I could do it - models are done, but then we have trouble with EA because I would use the Videos)

Operation Serpent is a storyline after Wing 4 and here you are a Confed Pilot and your job is to cut down the last of the Black Lance Forces. A few of them continued to fight against the Border Worlds and Confederation. After the destruction of the Axius Base another one is somewhere between the Confed and Border Worlds territory.

After the first attacks Confed send one of their newest Carrier to investigate the problem. You will be transfered to the TCS McKinley, a Vesuvius Class Supercarrier. Flying Craft will be the Hellcat, Excalibur and the Bearcat. Other ships will be the Southampton, Tallahassee, Concordia, Caernavon. The Border Worlds support with the same Capitalships, Durango Class Light Carrier, Banshee, Vindicator and Avanger. Black Lance have Thunderbolts, Hellcats, Arrows and Dragon. Capitalships are the Blacklance Carrier, Transport and a heavy destroyer ;) I have some speechfiles from different Wing Commander. I would use:
Naismith as the communication Officer of the TCS McKinley
Sosa for the BWS Princeton
Miner as a Wingman
Stingray as a Wingman (from the Enigma Files)
a few generic pilots (saga, enigma, wc4demo)
voices for black lance pilots (about 3 different)
voices for capships (about 3 different)

perhaps we can found some speechfiles for Hawk and Panther
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Should we use Maniac as a pilot? *vote* ^^

Music are four tracks from the WC4 Demo and a few from Armada
The first Pics:
screen0113j.jpg
The TCS McKinley
screen0117.jpg
Black Lance Fighters (perhaps I can change the black texture into a better one ._.)
screen0127.jpg
Border World Fleet Complete
Thx to Cybot78 he send me a few models:
confedfleet02.jpg
I want to use the 2 Black Lance Carrier (long deck/short deck - heavy and light Carrier) and the Transport. We are searching Axius Base and BWS Base. Another Model I want to use is a design from Czacen: his Exeter II model. I already ask Starman01 if he can create us a model like this for the Black Lance Force.

So what do you think about it? 10-15 Missions only, a short Campaign (Last Line will have 3x15 and Enigma a lot more) For the stealth effect of the Black Lance Capships I want to use the Build from Valathil (the same who build the shadow effects for SCP) here: http://www.youtube.com/user/damaista#p/u/14/ZH7uMFQBIw4
 
It is good to read, that you are so devoted to wing commander projects, but you should do one thing after another. I fear, that you loose the oversight about so many projects at once. Just my thoughts.

However, in my opinion enigma is a waste of time, since we already have wing commander 2. I understand, that enigma is meant to be a remake of wing commander 2, but i feel that there is no need for that, since the community likes the nostalgic wing commander 2. please don't feel offended now, this is just my opinion. Nevertheless I really respect your work here.

frankly spoken, I look forward to your "last line of defence" mod, this is truly a creative idea, to play a pilot who is desperateley fighting with his comrades for survival etc. :)

Operation Serpent sounds also pretty nice, but instead using the Mc Kinley, how about bringing in the Mount St. Helens? I think the Mc Kinley is built, quite a while after Wing Commander 4, but I am not sure about that.

Maniac is quite an option, but I would prefer some more uncommon pilots, such as panther or excell. Specially Excell, I believe she is an underestimated pilot and I like her aggressive style, she is somewhat like an female version of hawk
 
I have still the oversight ^^ Only 3 Projects. But right one thing after another. The problem is that we can't continued Last Line because the shipnames and Wingmans. And Enigma waits for someone who can texture for us a few stations. I'm only a FRED User and change in POF Files Turrets or Textures. But I cannot make models or textures itself. And FekLeyrTarg help he good he can. Starman01, CMDBob, Cybot078 and Kevin help us out with some things. But in the meantime when I have some time I start different missions and later its a idea for a campaign :D A simply mission to create are done in about 5 min. Build in Cutscenes or Scripts takes a lot more time :/

I use the McKinley because Vesuvius is destroyed and St. Helens are badly damaged. The Princeton was captured by Border World Forces. A few names for another ships are taken from the WC4 Novel or Game. Enigma are not anymore a Remake. Story are know from WC2, right. But all Missions are different, simply patrol missions are complett redone. Cutscenes tells a few things we don't see in WC2. A lot more Capshipbattles are now ingame (love it when two capitalships takes out their fight :D) In Last Line of Defence are quite more big battles to make sure that the Kilrathi does not come from Enigma to Confederation Systems. And you get some "help" here :D
 
I am not sure if the Mc Kinley was even built shortly after wing commander 4 (2673). I believe it is way more easier and faster to repair a damaged St. Helens, than bringing in another vesuvius carrier in such a short time. You should reconsider.

So in Enigma, we will not play blair, but someone else? Enigma is so to say a "side story" to wing commander 2?
 
Timeline from O.S. is after WC4. We know from the Star Soldier that several Vesuvius are in Service. In Secret Ops are the Eisen and the St. Hellens. Enigma is still the storyline from WC2 with Blair. But the missions are different. Fighting two Sartha are in WC2 harder than in SCP. Destroy 2 ships can be done in less then 5 sec. Here you encounter more ships and have in some missions more wingman. That what I mean with not a Remake. The Gameplay in SCP is faster than in Wing Commander. So we need to change the missions, that it's not boring. ^^
 
I know that, but Secret Ops plays almost 10 years after WC4. It is realistic to build a vesuvius fleet in 10 years, but shortly after Wc4 you only had 2 vesuvius carriers, this is what I mean.
 
Good point. We don't know exactly how many Vesuvius Class are building.
Source are https://www.wcnews.com/wcpedia/Vesuvius-Class_Heavy_Carrier
I take the McKinley because in the old files I have from the Saga Team are 3 Names: Vesuvius 70, St. Hellens 71, and the McKinley 72. It can be that in another system are also two of the class are build ;) Everything after the Game is Fanbased ;)
 
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This all looks cool, but I would also echo the sentiment that running multiple projects at once has some risks. You might have the best intentions and may even be able to pull everything off, but history shows that many people have trouble getting even one project off the ground at a time.
 
Love the general idea. I've often thought a "hunt down the last of the Black Lance" would make a great storyline for a mod.
 
You don't belive it ^^ Cybot078 *THX!!!!!* send me a model I want use for Black Lance and in the End of Last Line of Defence:

WC4-BL-Czacen DD-Class 01.jpg
Czacen's design for a heavy WC3/4 destroyer, he called it Exeter II, I would call it Northampton :) So we have the Black Lance Capitals. Only textures and turrets are missing ;) Thx again, after present for my birthday ;)

PS: I written a story to the ship:
The Northhampton have 2 AMG, 7 Laser and 2 Missilelauncher. Build as a counterpart for the Ralaxath Class late in the Kilrathi / Terran war, the construction stopped after a few ships. Tolwyn take the ships and the planes and use it for the Black Lance Force. Here the construction are continued. About 500m long its bigger then the Southampton Class. The small hangar has 4 Arrows and 1 Shuttle. We would use the same textures as for the Southampton Class.
 
We've got all! Again thx to Cybot078 we have all models done for Operation Serpent: The Black Lance Base and Border Worlds Outpost are on disc:
Axs base 01.jpgBW outpost 01.jpg
Now we need help with the textures and turrets on the Capital Ships (BL Transport, BL Carrier (short, long deck) and the Northampton) Textures itself will be the same as the Saga's Prologue and the Turretdesign (to match with all other ships and stations)
 
It's a good design but I use for OS the other one. These here is in my opinion a model that match in the Prophecy Timeline ;) The two big turrets can be the same one the Plunkett cruiser. Anyway...Cybot078 send me a updatet model of the Black Lance Base (with thrusters, mobile Base):
mobile base 01.jpg
 
A big update: Cybot078 (big thx to him :)) has build Turrets on the Black Lance Ships:
plogturretblships.jpg

The Armament of the Carrier are 2 AMG (CVA Carrier) and 22 Laser Turrets. The size are about 890m (I changed it perhaps when the model is ingame to short). Fighterwings would be about 72 (short flightdeck) and 108 (long flightdeck). The Northampton Class heavy Destroyer has 13 Laser Turrets and 3 AMG Turrets. And a short hangar with 6 Hellcats and 1 Shuttle.
But here is another one concept by him (all ships needs textures then we can use it in Saga :)):
heavyarmedtransports01.jpg

It replaces the Clarkson Class shortly after the Border Worlds Conflict. To cut down Transportloses from Pirates or remaining renegade Kilrathis, the Transport gets a lot more turrets to defence themselves (difference in size, 8-13 Laser Turrets). He build also a short Hangar in the back for Shuttles or a few light fighters (about 4). For the Cargo he builds three different container: Cargo, Supply and Fuel. Uses by Confed, Black Lance and Border World.

What did you think?
 
I like the design very much, but...
8-13 Laser Turrets? That's a bit too much IMO. This thing could kill a corvette easily, and even a frigate or a destroyer could be toast after attacking this thing.
It is a freighter after all, so its focus should be on cargo. Imagine the huge reactors you would need to supply all those turrets.

A Clarkson has 2 Turrets. I admit that's a bit weak.
So if I look at that nice ship of your's I would say six turrets maximum. Two on the bottom side, two on the top and maybe two on the sides.
So regardless of the direction it is attacked from it has more than double the firepower of a Clarkson, which quite often can only fire at you with one turret. So for me six turrets makes sense. 8-13 is way too much. If it ever happens that pirates get a hold of it, how is the militia supposed to stop them?
 
I agree with 6 on the smaller one (the size of the smaller one is about 400m - more than double the size of the clarkson) the big one is about 700m. Cybot send me this message for the heavy ones: This the idea http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armed_merchantmen that I was go with Heavy Military Transport design or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacramento_class_fast_combat_support_ship and http://www.fas.org/programs/ssp/man/uswpns/navy/auxiliary/aoe1.html
This what I was think I adding turret and why this class ship would appeal the Black Lance.
"East Indiamen of various European countries were heavily armed for their long journeys to the Far East. In particularly dangerous times, such as when the home countries were at war, a convoy system would be used whereby the ships were escorted by a warship. However, many East Indiamen also travelled on their own, and therefore were armed to the same standard as a ship of the line in order to defend themselves against pirates and privateers."

The Transports have a hangar with 4-8 fighters. The one above has also an hangar in the front for transfer Fighters to the Carriers. In this case it can transport over 60-80 planes ;)
 
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60-80??? So it is a carrier! EDIT: Ah, ok, I understand. It doesn't launch them, it just transports them. Nevermind.

Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of armed merchants. I could easily live with a ship that big which has a lot of guns.
I just wondered whether it wouldn't be too strong from a gameplay/economic perspective.
Imagine two corvettes and six fighters attacking that thing and getting their butt kicked. A transport of this class has to be ridiculously expensive, otherwise everybody would use it instead of warships. :D
But if it is that expensive it doesn't amortize ever, except you would transport huge amounts of valuable material.
 
Yes, remember in the End Run Novel after Baer talks with O'Brian that Transports carry Material for Fighters. Here this Transport can carry fighters to the Carriers. It's better to build one big transport with good armament as building ten or more cheapter transports and perhaps lose some of them. The Amadeus shows how useless the two turrets was against the five Dragons. And in the time of WC4 not only Border Worlds or Black Lance are dangerous. There are still a few Kilrathi Warlords who still fight against any terran ships :) I speak already to Cybot to cut down the lasers on the heavy ones to about 8-6 and the short 4. I search in the last time anything about Black Lance to get more information. Here on the CIC I found the concept for that transport:
https://cdn.wcnews.com/newestshots/full/bltrans.bmp
The smallest are then about 240m - the Clarkson is 160. Bigger I would now say about 500m.
 
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That thing is actually "in" WC4 and can be extracted from the game... it just never shows up in any missions! Here's a picture: https://cdn.wcnews.com/newshots/full/blcarrier.jpg

It has four turrets, IIRC.

We do see a fighter transport in action on Wing Commander Academy, the TCS Morgan in "Walking Wounded."
 
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