- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
Sorry to double post, but on to idea 2!
2. Optional objectives --
*Setting: Chief is the middle of a battallion of two manned scorpion tanks, three full APCs (I'll get into that later), and five manned warthogs. You're in a temperate forest setting, travelling along a main road to recapture one of the Orbiting MAC Spacestation powerplants (they transmit the energy from the ground, to the MAC cannon).
"Chief, this is Cortana. Recon tells me that, along with the captured powerplant, the Covenant have fortified what I believe used to be a human armory depot. From the chatter, it sounds as if that's their main base of operations for the area. The armory is just two klicks west of your current position. You might want to take them out before you head to the powerplant; if they come up behind you with fliers and wraiths, that could be a real pain. But I have to warn you, the area is heavely fortified. If you manage to get rid of their fliers, I could probably send a few pelicans to help you."
So you have two choices, attack the powerplant, and risk being flanked, or attack the depot, and risk suffering heavy casualties in the process. If you manage to take down the depot, and stop the Covenant pilots from taking off, Cortana will send some Pelican's full of troops (but probably not ebough to fill the gap suffered by attacking the depot in the first place). At the depot you discover that the Covenant had been stockpiling powerful weapons and vehicles, including banshees, that you can stick your marines in. So, if you manage to effectively take down the depot, your losses will be replenished by the reinforcements and weapon boost. However, taking down the base, without killing most of your troops, is incredibly difficult. You don't know how much damage you'll sustain if you're flanked, so taking on the optional mission is a toss that could either help, or destroy you. To prevent linear gameplay, everytime you play the level, the flanking force will be a different size and composition that is randomly generated; this way, you never really know which action is the right choice, and you have to weigh your own abilities.