Description
The Hope has been captured by the HOL. You go on a daring plan to deactivate the Hope's new INVULNERABLILITY then to destroy it. VERY IMPORTANT: This mission uses modified .tbl files. Read the Readme for instructions. Please keep the ship you start with (GTF Hercules) to test the TBL. FS says that my ship, the GTF Viper is a Hercules.

Storyline:
Not a bad storyline, but once again, there are virtually no in-game messages to support it, and the debriefing doesn't do much more than congratulate you on destroying the Hope, or reprimand you for failing to destroy it. Overall, it's functional, but nothing above average. There are a few other niggly things that I have to mention, though. The HOL seems to be taking over, since they seem to have more resources than the legit Vasudan government. This isn't just something from this mission, it seems to be one of the biggest trends in user-made missions. For a splinter group, they sure are powerful... Also, how the heck did the HOL get their hands on a Lucifer shield? This isn't explained at all, and it makes the story a little hard to swallow.

Balance:
Truly the low point of the mission, balance is way off in both directions. First of all, the new ship you are flying, the GTF Viper (a modified hercules) is just WAY too powerful. It's at least as maneuverable as a Ulysses, has a top speed of over 200, has a better missile capacity than an Ursa, and can carry Harbingers. I can appreciate trying to give the player an edge over superior numbers, but this is ridiculous, especially when the majority of the enemy fighters aren't equipped with anything worse than an avenger and MX-50's. They are relentless, and will pound you, but their weapons are virtually harmless to your Ubership. <p> At the other end of the spectrum, it's absolutely impossible to defend the Pluto. It's not too difficult until it gets in range of the Hope's turrets. Since the Hope is invulnerable until the Pluto docks with it, you are unable to destroy its turrets or weapons system, so the Pluto is invariably vaporized by the Hope, and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it. At first I thought I had just been careless, but after several attempts, I managed to keep the Pluto's hull around 90% until it got near the Hope, then I watched helplessly as it was summarily blown apart by the indestructable turrets. This is a severe flaw in the balance of this mission, and the only real way to fix it would be to make the Hope vulnerable, which would pretty much destroy the "gimmick" of the mission. Perhaps editing the ships.tbl file to give the Pluto a stronger hull would make the mission possible. As it stands now, I was never able to successfully complete the mission.

Design:
Though the design of this mission is sparse, simplicity lends itself to elegance. I only have a few nitpicks with the design, mainly that there are only 4 events, three of which are short messages telling you that the Pluto has arrived, it has docked, or it was destroyed. Not bad, but it really could use some extra stuff to spice it up some. As it is now, everything is pretty straightforward, and there are no surprises. Another nitpick is that the Pluto's cargo is listed as "none." Not really a problem, but something like "Command Password Delivery System" or something like that would help the immersion. All other problems are associated with the balancing issues, the biggest being the underpowered enemy ships. An additional twist in the story and balancing out all ships (they all need some sort of balancing) would help this simple mission out immensely. It's really too bad, because the only major error in an otherwise well-done mission really drags it down horribly.

Gameplay:
Not much fun at all, since enemy ships are virtually harmless to you, but the mission is impossible to complete. The fact that your ship is so powerful just makes it more frustrating when you can't save the Pluto.

Other Thoughts:
So close! This could have been a good mission with some balancing and a more interesting story.