How to damage weapon subsystems? (question on final mission)

I have a question about taking on the dreadnought's weapons subsystem in the final mission.

I played through the whole game on medium and got by just fine without targeting any subsystems. As I was wrapping up the final mission I was told to target the Wrathgar's weapons targeting system. I decided to try it out and looked through the controls on how to do it. Once I'd cycled through the navigation system and engines (SO MANY ENGINES! O_O), I found the "weapons" subsystem which I assume is what I was supposed to be targeting.

My computer locked on to a featureless area at the dreadnought's midsection. There didn't appear to be anything there, but I seemed to be locked onto something inside the ship. The weird thing was my targeting didn't have that telltale X on it that tells me when the thing I am locked on to is not visible from the current angle. So, I decided to fly inside the Wrathgar and take a look.

However, once I was inside, lo and behold there was that X. And what was I targeting? Absolutely nothing. Nothing was there. I was locked on to an empty piece of space inside the Wrathgar's launch bay. So, I flew back outside and just circled the ship, firing at its surface where I was still being told the weapons system was, and doing no damage to what I was allegedly targeting. It didn't really matter what I did at that point since I was probably hurting the ship anyway and the mission was pretty much over.

This being my first and only try at actually targeting a subsystem, I'm a little confused. Since I hadn't tried it on any other capships, this may have just been an isolated incident. But even so, I have to wonder what the point of it all was. What does a weapons subsystem even look like and how can I damage it when it's not there? Has anyone else run into this quirk or was it just me? Is it just the Wrathgar or do the other capships also have nonexistent weapons targeting subsystems?

EDIT: I should mention that the weapons system WAS taking damage, but it didn't seem to have anything to do with me shooting at it. It was just general damage from the pounding the whole ship was taking. I didn't see any evidence that I was the one hurting it.

Wrathgar can take a lot of damage, and that goes for its individual subsystems as well, been a while since I have played that mission but I am pretty sure the weapons subsystem is on the outside of the ship, and that it may have been a fairly large section of the ship compared with the ones on smaller ships.

The benefit of taking out the weapons subsystems on capital ships (most of them do have them), is that it reduces the accuracy of all of the weapons on the ship, ideally you want want to take it out early on if possible, it makes life easier overall.

The wepon system is inside the hull, and I think the dreadnoughts hull is just to tuff for you to dammage it with fighter guns, how ever the lontg bows should be abel to with there torpidos

Except that, according to the chatter, there aren't any more torpedoes.

I guess pack lots, and lots, of dumbfires.

If you had listened to ALL chatter, you would have heard that the Marines on the ground are targeting the subsystem with their surface to space missiles.

KeldorKatarn wrote: If you had listened to ALL chatter, you would have heard that the Marines on the ground are targeting the subsystem with their surface to space missiles.

Wait, then what's the point of even participating in the mission if I can't personally harm the Wrathghar? I've played through the mission twice and no matter what I do the outcome is the same. I feel like the whole last part of the mission is one long "you win" scripted event. The first time, I wasted most of my time firing at its invulnerable hull, trying to take down the targeting system which apparently can't be destroyed before the whole ship explodes. The second time, I just shot at the turrets, but was unable to damage the heavy ones until near the end of the mission. Both times I either mostly, or entirely ignored the fighters (after its shields when down), yet the Wrathghar was destroyed anyway.

This wouldn't bug me so much if I wasn't sure the Wrathghar's hull was vulnerable to my weapons. At least, it was in an earlier mission when it was chasing down the Hermes. I flew inside its launch bay and got it down to 27% damage where it locked and became invulnerable and I failed the mission. I understand that I wasn't supposed to destroy it during that mission, but in the final mission where the goal is to destroy it, I couldn't harm it at all except to take out a few turrets, which is pointless because I know the outcome doesn't change if I don't attack them.

Basically, I feel like the third wheel. Next time I try the mission I'm just going to park myself away from the battle and watch to see if I'm even necessary.

Silk_Sk wrote: Basically, I feel like the third wheel. Next time I try the mission I'm just going to park myself away from the battle and watch to see if I'm even necessary.

That's exactly what I did after taking a lot of damage. Worked like a charm.

I guess the level of scripting in the final mission doesn't bother me as much as you, but then I had been playing Skyrim right before - a game where guardsman kill a dragon and the player gets all the credit for being in the general vicinity. Those three heroes didn't even need me for the final battle, I might as well have stayed home and banged Lydia.

Guys, we simply cannot make a battle in which several squadrons, mostly bombers, capships and ground forces attack a Dreadnaught and then let the player feel like he did everything by himself.

The entire game is about being part of the greater fleet and not doing everything yourself and killing fleets in a 2-man flight like in regular WC because we thought that was the worst part of those games and the only thing WCP got right.

You are flying a space superiority fighter in the last mission. And just like in all the other missions, the job of a fighter is not to kill big capital ships, but to provide space superiority so that your allies can do that job. Welcome to realistic military operations.

Your job in the mission is not to destroy the dreadnaught but to first hammer its remaining shields since your in an Excalibur can do hit and run attacks very well, then get rid of the remaining fighter screen and turrets so the bombers can start their attack. Then keep them safe from the additionally launched fighter wings and later to clear a path for the ground-to-space missiles so they are not getting shot down before hitting their target.

And all of those objectives are told to you by the game.

KeldorKatarn wrote:
Your job in the mission is not to destroy the dreadnaught but to first hammer its remaining shields since your in an Excalibur can do hit and run attacks very well, then get rid of the remaining fighter screen and turrets so the bombers can start their attack. Then keep them safe from the additionally launched fighter wings and later to clear a path for the ground-to-space missiles so they are not getting shot down before hitting their target.

And all of those objectives are told to you by the game.

I just replayed the mission and did none of those things. I just burn-glided to a respectable distance and watched, and I still failed to fail the mission. None of my allies were even shot down. I could see this happening on easy difficulty, but medium? In fact, I doubt the result would be different on hard either. No matter what you say, it's abundantly clear that nothing I do has any effect on the outcome on the mission. The objectives do not mean anything. After all of your ranting about how challenging you wanted the game to be, this is pretty disappointing.

Since the objectives are all smoke and mirrors anyway, could it possibly be patched so that the player can hurt the dreadnought and have the events trigger based on how much damage the player does? Then at least the mission could be progressed forward by the player and be something that resembles fun. Or, if you want to do it the hard way, find a way to make the objectives mean something. I'd take either one, just so long as it feels like a game and not a glorified cutscene.

is there anything you don't complain about?


also have you ever heard of a kill count? how about you take advantage of the bomber free time the devs finally give you to rack that up instead of picking everything apart to find something new to argue with keldor about

one more thing this fly away and watch exploit could be considered acceptable considering there are exploits for the final wc3 mission that make it super easy if you want it to be