Your Name:
	Your E-Mail Address:
	Subject:
	Message: : : : Tempus Irae 19 You Got Me in a Vendetta Kinda Mood : Last time on Tour of Duty we were guided through a rather mad secret level, : under fire from Juggernauts, grey Fighters, Hunters, you name it! We then : got to deposit our second-to-last manuscript, and received copious amounts : of instruction for the coming levels, suggesting that we might be quite a : while without more in now. Hmmm, and apparently I skimmed Viking’s ToD and : never responded, possibly a first, and then just carried on enjoying the : summer break. : Back to it now I had completely forgotten those Repository Nine instructions, : and decided that to save time I would instead scratchstart on the next : level for this writeup. Conveniently the first few rooms do replenish our : arsenal somewhat! But I soon had to go back to read the last ToD for : context … and not just because Vendetta is a bitch – oh yes I even died on : kindergarten, to an invisible Enforcer behind a door, rude. : The instructions basically told us they were going to send us into the : K’alima basically to blow it up, because we don’t want to pollute this : timeline – apparently we haven’t already, so that’s handy, however : unlikely it may seem. We start, as planned, in the living quarters of the : Enforcers … wow, that’s rather intimate – conveniently they are not home! : And also as promised, there are several terminals in this early part of : the level. First: : : : At first I thought it was a message to us, but that was before I read those : instructions again. I guess this is basically Enforcer gossip. There are : four rooms like this in the area, so we might as well cover them first. : Each one has a weapon and/or some ammo – this first one has a second : Magnum and ammo. Out the door and to the right we get an Alien Weapon – : apparently one of them forgot to take it with them! – and if we stand by : the light part of the wall, also an Assault Rifle and some ammo. The : terminal here contains a response to the invitation in the first. : : : : : Right, so I guess the Enforcers are not all the best of friends. A simple : ‘no’ could have sufficed? Still, ‘theories’ sound concerning, maybe : they’re onto us? : Back out in the hallway, I will actually go around to the left next, because : otherwise we would miss it – we have a room with a path between three goo : pits. Some Shotgun ammo appears, as does a 2x recharge canister in the : entrance. The path branches, one way to a door that doesn’t open, and the : other to another room with goo, and paths leading around the outside, and : thankfully looping around in a small room just beyond – not much more to : explore here. : There is quite a blatant ‘secret’ here with a staircase of sorts in the goo. : Footing is a little tricky, but we’ve done worse, and the reward is quite : nice – we open a door at the top to a bit more ammo, a 3x recharge panel, : and an oxygen recharger. My goodness it has been ages since we had panels : rather than canisters! Okay the Repo levels have 1x but they’re not : usually worth mentioning. : Back in the three goo pool room, we note on the map a submerged switch in one : of them … but it doesn’t work in this state – I tried. Back into the : living quarters and further left, the next room has SMG ammo and of course : another terminal. : : : : : : Well now I’m confused, as I first read the earlier terminals like a script, : but I think I got it around the wrong way who was speaking in each – I : thought it was S’gar’br who was being a dick, but it was actually : Ia’ala’kau, seriously these names! Anyway, the latter was apparently : actually the one with something to hide, and now it’s official. He (?) has : something ‘unit-portable’ that might come in handy in the fight against … : us, oh damn, so they are onto us! : And then the fourth such room has a Fusion Pistol and ammo, and one more : message. : : : : : And they know about Ha’rar as well, the Pfhor who we were told wanted to : defect to our side. Well I guess one bit of good news is that he’s being : held above drive engineering, which is exactly where we’re headed! : To complete the loop in this area, another room back out in the hallway and : to the left has goo pools and platforms beyond them on both sides – : looking suspiciously like they could be teleporters or something. Instead, : one has an Alien Weapon, and jumping to it reveals a SPNKR and some ammo : on the opposite one – better than a teleporter! And the last room in this : area, just across from here in the hallway, has three switches. These : drain each of the three goo pools in the room from earlier, and then we : are free to hit that submerged switch and get out of here – it does seem a : bit inconvenient to have to do that every time you want to leave your : living quarters though. Let’s have a look at the map for the level before : we hit the road. : : : Interestingly, if we jump into one of the two emptied goo pools that don’t : have switches, they refill! A fascinating mechanic to avoid a deathtrap, : or at least the need to rocket back out, and something I don’t think I’ve : seen before. The one with the switch doesn’t do that, and the switch opens : a door just to its right. We move forward and see a rather large lift : ahead, but also an alternative path. The first time I took that lift and : went through the corridor with Invisible Enforcers on ledges – that : corridor was one I still remembered from years ago when I last played the : scenario, including the somewhat hidden stairs and the 2x recharge panel, : along with bits and pieces of the rest of this level. It is a little : healthier to go the other way though, not least because we get a Pattern : Buffer, which I was rather lacking when I went the other way. : There’s a spiral staircase, some more goo, and another lift that drops us : down to some Drones guarding smashable panels, a Pattern Buffer, and : another terminal. This one starts out as a fragmented one from our friends : – I guess the one that they told us they would instruct us further from, : but I thought that would be somewhat further into the level than this. It : confirms that we are supposed to smash those panels nearby, and that we : need to move quickly, and then it just gets too hard again, except somehow : the translation suggestion words, which remain completely intact! And then : things take on a much more sinister tone as the terminal is taken over by : the Tycho-Us command mecha type thing. : : : : : : He refers to the vengeance Hunter from Polygonium Opus, and also references : our old efforts on the Marathon, and our time working for Durandal, whom : he says has been somewhat duped by the S’pht liars. I guess it’s all a : matter of perspective! : Anyway, we smash the panels and move on, and there really are two ways into : the rest of the level! In fact there are two ways even from here – up the : stairs into the main area, and straight ahead through the teleporter that : is in front of the blue electric fence texture. It takes us just to the : other side of that fence, where we make friends with a Juggernaut and some : Fighters. On kindergarten it is definitely a good trade-off for the ammo : that spawns in the middle of this room, and I guess on higher levels one : could just run straight through here, blocked off on both sides by those : teleporters as it is. : Out the other end there are more Fighters waiting for us, and a Trooper. It : is useful to note there is a 2x recharge panel in a pillar up the stairs : and to the left a bit – I didn’t note it and instead backtracked to the : one in the Invisible Enforcer corridor, although that’s not necessarily a : good name for it as they appear everywhere around here! : Anyway, as we have done an outline route so far, let’s keep that up – we meet : a few Drones and get more ammo, and then come to a large obstacle on the : right with a couple of narrow alleys through it: one with two terminals, : the other with a Pattern Buffer and a switch. The terminals are rather : verbose orders to various Pfhor units, probably tactical manoeuvres : specifically designed to take -us- out so we’re still on our toes, and we : do indeed get cut off with a spurious interrupt, ohhh it had been too : long! : : : : : : : : The switch in the other alley sets a lift just off to the right on a once : down, once back up run, so we have to run to get on it at its lowest : point. It takes us to a ledge with an Invisible Enforcer, some Drones, and : a completely new perspective on the level – this is Bob-B-Q like in its : profundity. We can wander around much of the level so far for new angles : on things, and for the way I’ve taken us, we get our first look at much of : the ‘main’ middle area. : Therein are a few interesting things: Drones that jump us from a goo pit; : Fighters in a pit that ascends to the level as we approach; Drones hiding : around corners; Invisible Enforcers … just being invisible. But we can : just miss much of that. There’s even a teleporter up on our new level to : the earlier Juggernaut room, and back. And we can completely circle the : most important room in the place, which is as close as Marathon gets to a : circle :). It’s a really big one too, and filled with a Juggernaut, : Hunters, Fighters, and Drones. From ground level it has a raised area we : -could- rocket up to, but up here we’re more interested in the accessible : lift shaft in the top-right corner. Oh, and the switch and terminal in the : ‘inner circle’ we can access. : : : : Oh it’s on now! I do like Pfhor justice – if you don’t drop what you’re doing : and go kill this guy, we’ll “review” you, yeah. Kill or be killed – I : guess it leaves them all with nothing to lose! The switch drops the floor : out of the middle of the big room, and we can go down there and fall into : another ring, which leads us to a couple of lifts – one goes back up and : turns out to be the one we could have rocketed up to; the other goes : further down, to a big room below, with more Hunters and Drones, and : another raised ring. We can access a room off to the side that hides a 2x : recharge panel, and another that has a terminal and two sections of wall : that look like they should hide switches or similar. : The terminal is one of those amusing stories of Pfhor bureaucracy, with a : twist. An engineer complains about parts missing for the job of fixing an : antenna – I’m guessing the S’pht might have damaged that in infiltrating : the Pfhor network. It’s a fun read anyway. : : : : : : : Back out in the lower big room we can see a switch up on the raised ring, and : hitting it does in fact reveal one of those panels by the terminal to be a : switch! And the switch reveals the other panel to be a door. And the door : leads down to a long corridor. A switch right in front of us ‘closes’ the : stairs we just came down, for some reason, while one on the opposite side : of the structure in this room allows us to continue down a -very- long : corridor, as well as triggering some staggered Juggernaut death flashes in : our face. The end of the corridor is the end of the level, with a Pattern : Buffer and a terminal, but: : : : Oh. Hey! Those would be the three firewall circuits they told us to smash in : the instructions on Repository Nine. They even told us we would need to : get to the smaller core room directly beneath the main one – wow, if only : we could have remembered all that! Yeah, instructions in advance that you : can’t go back to are hard going. At least we are explorers first and : foremost, so it’s not a major issue :). : So, the firewall circuits. Well remember that one lift shaft back up the top? : Conveniently we can climb back up by way of the little lift shafts, and : then head back out to our tricky lift to get to the top level again, and : then go down to find ourselves in that raised ring where we need to be! : Around it, three switches on the inner wall reveal the smashable panels in : the smaller core room. We could have gone there earlier, and in fact I : did, and the effect is interesting, as it is less obvious that you are in : a room beneath the main core room. We would also have missed the : incomplete text on the final terminal! : The map is fairly useless by now, so we just have to remember the way back : out and back down to the lower core room, and back out through that really : long corridor. Now the terminal is happier, but it doesn’t let us leave. : Instead it has more convoluted instructions-in-advance for the next level! : Which is really only a new level because of polygon limits, but it also : works really well for not keeping this writeup going any longer. We just : step towards the electric fence texture and teleport seamlessly to … evil : so singularly personified …. : : : : : : But wait, lhowon.org says that's not all! The very first terminal has a : 'success' message as well, in the form of a hidden 'thanks' message that : also congratulates us on our efforts in getting back up to read it. I went : too quickly on my actual final run with saves, and didn't get the SPNKR, : so I'll just report the contents here and take it on trust :). : : : : : : The first URL gives me a 403 and the second one makes me concerned about what : BTFC is, with all that money in the background ... dodgy. I'm just going : to leave the third one be, on the strength of that.
	If you'd like to include a link to another page with your message, please provide both the URL address and the title of the page:
	Optional Link URL:
	Optional Link Title:
	If necessary, enter your password below:
	Password: