Extended Walkthrough

This file will walk you through the process of creating a large, polished mission. It assumes you've already read the Quick Start and the sections on Basic Concepts, The Toolbar, and Menu Commands. This may take a couple of hours, so pour yourself a beverage.

If you want to play the mission before we reveal the plot, run FreeSpace 2. Go into the Tech Room, select Mission Simulator and pick Single Missions. This is the mission "Shipyard (completed)". If you get confused about something in the walkthrough, you can open the file shipyard-completed.fs2 in FRED2.

The sections of this file are:

• Planning the Mission
• Stationary Objects
• Large Ship Movements
• Directives and Objectives
• Messages
• Background
• Fighters and Bombers
• Team Loadout and Mission Specs
• Debriefing
• Briefing

Before opening FRED2 to build a mission, it is worth spending some time with a pencil and paper planning the mission. What forces are involved, and what are they trying to accomplish? What events will happen over the course of the mission?

On the other hand, you will inevitably make some changes as you build the mission. Perhaps you will discover that it is unbalanced (the same side always wins), or that it takes too long. These things can usually be fixed by changing the exact number and type of ships involved.

In this mission, the (single) player is defending a GTVA shipyard. The shipyard consists of a GTI Arcadia and two GTI Ganymede installations. There is a GTD Orion destroyer docked in one of the rings. There are also some cargo containers and transports scattered about.

The shipyard is attacked by the Neo-Terran Front. There are two parts to the attack.

In the first part, a pair of cruisers (a GTC Leviathan and a GTC Aeolus) and some fighters come at the shipyard. They player and the other friendly fighters engage the enemy fighters, while a GVCv Sobek corvette meets the cruisers in beam combat.

This is just a diversion for the second part of the attack. Having drawn the GTVA forces to one end of the shipyard, the Neo-Terrans bring in some transports (GTT Argo) full of marines to steal the docked Orion-class destroyer. The transports have their own escort fighters, of course.

A very skillful player (or one who knows what's going to happen) might be able destroy the transports quickly. If this happens, the NTF abandons the attack.

If the NTF marines manage to take over the destroyer, they bring its engines on line and head for the local jump node. They player must disable and disarm it before it jumps out.

You'll begin by placing large, stationary objects like installations. Laying out the "terrain" for the mission will help you decide where to place other things later.

Before starting, read about the Objects Editor and the Ships Editor.

Now, open FRED2. The Arcadia installation is at the center of the action, to it makes sense to put this at location (0, 0, 0). You'll need to get the player away from that area, so drag the player's ship a few kilometers away, to someplace like (0, 0, -3000). While you're at it, form a wing containing that ship and call it Alpha.

Place the objects listed in the table below. Use the Objects Editor to make their positions exact.

Object	Class	Position	Notes
GTI Vulcan's Forge	GTI Arcadia	0, 0, 0	Escort ship, priority 80
Ring 1	GTI Ganymede	3000, 0, 0
Ring 2	GTI Ganymede	-3000, 0, 0	Protect ship
GTD Relentless	GTD Orion	-3000, 0, 0	Protect ship Escort ship, priority 80 Velocity: 0 Engine subsystem strength: 0 Initial orders: play dead, priority 50 Hotkey: F12

Ring 2 and the Relentless are protected so that the NTF won't shoot at them. (Shots at Ring 2 might hit the Relentless.) If the Relentless is taken over, GTVA ships shouldn't try to destroy it; the protection will be helpful there, too. Vulcan's Forge and the Relentless are both escort ships, so their hull strength will show up on the right side of the player's HUD. The Relentless is supposed to be off-line with just a skeleton crew, so it has velocity zero, disabled engines (and hence no engine glow), and orders to play dead. Finally, we let the player target the Relentless by pressing F12.

Depending on your camera angle, the shipyard should now look something like this:
This is a good time to save the mission and test it out in FreeSpace 2. Save early and often!

Read about the Waypoint Path Editor; you'll need it to rename a jump node in a moment.

Here are some more objects to place:

Object	Class	Position	Notes
TC-TRI 5	TC-TRI	1000, -1500, 3000	Cargo: Hull Plating
TC-TRI 6	TC-TRI	1500, -1500, 3000	Cargo: Beam Weapons
TC-TRI 7	TC-TRI	2000, -1500, 3000	Cargo: Warp Coils
TC-TRI 8	TC-TRI	2500, -1500, 3000	Cargo: Scrap Metal
TC-TRI 9	TC-TRI	3000, -1500, 3000	Cargo: Missiles
TAC 1 10	TAC 1	4000, 0, -1000	Cargo: Inertial Dampeners
TAC 1 11	TAC 1	4000, 250, -1000	Cargo: Subach HL-99
TAC 1 12	TAC 1	4000, 500, -1000	Cargo: Cables
GTD Triumphant (1)	TC-TRI	3000, 0, -500	Alt name: (under construction)
GTD Triumphant (2)	TC-TRI	3000, 0, 0	Alt name: (under construction)
GTD Triumphant (3)	TC-TRI	3000, 0, 500	Alt name: (under construction)
GTD Triumphant (4)	TC-TRI	3000, 0, 1000	Alt name: (under construction)
GVCv Pomotep	GVCv Sobek	Approximately -2000, 2000, 4000, pointing toward GTI Vulcan's Forge	Escort ship, priority 80 Player orders: none
Jump Node	Jump Node	-3000, 0, 10000

Save the mission again, and try it out if you wish.

While FreeSpace 2 is really about fighters and bombers, it would just be a series of isolated dogfights if it were not for transports and capital ships. These larger ships provide obstacles, visual variety, and plot points. With FRED2, you can make these ships behave intelligently (or at least appear to do so).

The shipyard mission will have four sequences of large ship movement. They are described below, in order of increasing complexity.

Orbiting Transport

The first scripted sequence is a transport repeatedly flying around a series of waypoints.

Place the objects listed below. Remember that, to add a waypoint to a path, the previous waypoint in the path has to be selected.

Object	Class	Position	Notes
Waypoint 1:1	Waypoint	Approximately 500, 0, -1000
Waypoint 1:2	Waypoint	Approximately 1500, 1000, -1000
Waypoint 1:3	Waypoint	Approximately 2500, 0, -1000
Waypoint 1:4	Waypoint	Approximately 1500, -1000, -1000
GVT Amazonia	GVT Isis	Approximately -300, 0, -1500, pointing to Waypoint 1:1	Initial orders: waypoints, Waypoint path 1, priority 50

Save the mission and go watch the transport do its thing. Notice that it will keep travelling around the waypoints over and over; this is the difference between waypoints and waypoints-once.

If you get impatient while watching the GVT Amazonia, remember that you can change the time scale during the mission; the default keys for this are < and > (don't forget to hold down Shift). This is very useful when scripting large ship movements.

Freighter Grabbing Cargo and Jumping Out

The next bit of traffic in the shipyard is a freighter that docks with one of the cargo containers and then jumps out. Here is the freighter:

Object	Class	Position	Notes
GTFR Pelican	GTFR Triton	Approximately 2000, -1000, 200, pointing toward TC-TRI 9	Initial orders: dock, TC-TRI 9, cargo dock 01, cargo dockpoint, 50

We also need to tell the Pelican to warp out after it picks up the cargo container. To do this, we'll need a SEXP. Go read about SEXPs now.

Use this SEXP for the Pelican's Departure Cue:
Save the mission and go experience the unbridled excitement of interstellar commerce.

NTF Attack: Part 1

You're probably about ready for some combat now. Never fear, you're about to bring in the big guns.

Two NTF cruisers are going to warp in and attack Ring 1. First, just place these ships and give them attack orders. (FRED2 may incorrectly claim that you're telling them to attack their own team. Ignore this; it happens because some details don't get updated until you close the Ships Editor.)

Object	Class	Position	Notes
NTC Hugin	GTC Leviathan	5100, 2900, 4600	Hostile Initial orders: attack Ring 1, priority 50 Escort ship, priority 50 Hotkey: F9
NTC Munin	GTC Aeolus	5100, 2800, 4200	Hostile Initial orders: attack Ring 1, priority 50 Escort ship, priority 50 Hotkey: F10

Save the mission. If you try it out, you will notice several things wrong:

• The attacking ships are present right at the beginning of the mission.
• They don't stay together; the Munin moves much faster than the Hugin.
• They don't use their beam weapons.

To fix these problems, you'll have to use events. Go read about the Events Editor now.

First, you want the enemy ships to arrive a short while after the mission starts. You could do this by directly adjusting their Arrival Cues in the Ships Editor. It is a better idea to create an event for the arrival of the NTF, and have the ships arrive when this event occurs. This way, if you decide to change the arrival time, you can do it in one place, rather than editing a bunch of different ships. Also, you can have the event happen almost immediately when you're testing things out, then later move it back to a more reasonable time.

Create this event:
Use this SEXP for the Arrival Cue on each of the NTF cruisers:
Now for the speed problem. You can limit a capital ship's speed when it is flying waypoints.

Create a couple of waypoints, making sure they're on different paths.

Object	Class	Position	Notes
Waypoint 2:1	Waypoint	3100, 900, 600
Waypoint 3:1	Waypoint	3100, 800, 200

Change the Hugin's initial orders to waypoints-once, Waypoint path 2, priority 50. Similarly, have the Munin head for Waypoint path 3. For good measure, use the Objects Editor to point each of these ships at the waypoint to which it's going.

Now, you can create an event that will slow down the Munin and free the beam weapons on both cruisers. (Beam weapons are locked off by default.) You'll need to use Add Operator to do it:
Save the mission and test it.

This is a good time to make Alpha 1 Invulnerable, so you can watch the action without fear of being destroyed.

A one-sided capital ship battle isn't very interesting, so it's time to bring the GVCv Pomotep into the action. Since the cruisers are faster, we can't just order the corvette to attack them. However, we can have it head for a waypoint near theirs, which will look just as good to the player.

Object	Class	Position	Notes
Waypoint 4:1	Waypoint	3500, 500, 800

Add this event:
Now the Pomotep will move the "intercept" the cruisers 30 seconds after they arrive.

To make the story more interesting, let's say the Pomotep has recently returned from battle. In the Ships Editor, set its hull strength to 82. You could go through and damage each of the various subsystems, but there's a better way. Insert this event at the beginning of the event list:
This will randomly set the strength of each of the Pomotep's subsystems to somewhere between 25 and 100 percent.

Save the mission and go enjoy the fireworks.

NTF Attack: Part 2

The last (and most complicated) scripted sequence in this mission is the NTF transports responsible for capturing the GTD Relentless.

These transports will be in a wing, so you'll need to read about the Wings Editor.

Place four GTT Argo transports around position (-2000, -2000, 1000) and group them into Sleipner wing. You can set some things, such as the Hotkey, in the Wings Editor. For other things, like cargo, you'll have to mark all four ships and then use the Ships Editor.

Object	Class	Position	Notes
Sleipner wing	GTT Argo (x4)	Approximately -2000, -2000, 1000, pointing to GTD Relentless	Hostile Hotkey: F11 Cargo: Marines Cargo not known

Create an event called "NTF force 2 arrival cue". Make the SEXP identical to "NTF force 1 arrival cue" by using Copy and Paste. (We'll change the time on this event later.) Set the Arrival Cue for Sleipner wing so that they arrive when this event becomes true. Be sure to do this in the Wings Editor, not in the Ships Editor.

Give Sleipner 1 (but not the other Sleipner ships) initial orders to dock with the GTD Relentless. Only one ship can dock with the Relentless at a time, so the others will have to take their turns.

The next bit of SEXP wrangling is a little complicated, so this is a good time to save the mission.

Suppose it takes two transports full of marines to take over the Relentless. If this happens, there's no way to know in advance which two transports will be responsible; perhaps the player will destroyer Sleipner 2, but Sleipner 1 and Sleipner 3 will successfully dock. You need a way to keep track of how many transports have docked.

Fortunately, FRED2 lets you store values like this in variables. Right click on any event in the Events Editor and select Add Variable. Call the new variable DockCount, and give it a default value of 0.

Now, when Sleipner 1 finishes its work (say, 10 seconds after it has docked), it should do the following:

• Transfer its cargo to the GTD Relentless
• Get new orders to undock and warp out
• Add 1 to the value of DockCount

Here's the event to do all that:

Sleipner 2 should move in as soon as Sleipner 1 either is destroyed or finishes its job:

Create two more events, "Sleipner 3 going in" and "Sleipner 4 going in". These must appear right after "Sleipner 2 going in", and be Chained so that they will happen in order. (Without chaining, Sleipner 4 would head in as soon as Sleipner 3 was destroyed, regardless of whether one of the other two transports was already docked with the GTD Relentless.) Make liberal use of Copy and Paste, but don't forget to edit the SEXPs so that each one refers to the correct ships within Sleipner wing.

Create three more events: "Sleipner 2 done", "Sleipner 3 done", and "Sleipner 4 done". These are basically identical to "Sleipner 1 done", except that each refers to a different transport in the has-docked-delay, transfer-cargo, and add-goal sub-SEXPs.

Save the mission and test it. You may want to fly a bomber so that you can blow up one of the transports and watch the next one go in. You might also try scanning one, and noticing that its cargo changes just before it undocks from the Relentless.

Okay: the transports are doing their little dance now, but it's not having any effect on the GTD Relentless. Time to change that.

After the first transport is done, the Relentless should change from Friendly to Unknown. This will make it appear purple rather than green on the player's radar. After a second load of marines, the destroyer should become Hostile. Also, its play dead order should be cleared; the NTF marines are using the Relentless' weapons to help with the space battle. The Relentless' beams will stay locked; the story is that they haven't been installed yet.

Two events will take care of all this:

After another 45 seconds, the marines get the Relentless' engines back on line and head for the jump node. To make the destroyer appear to jump out in the jump node, you'll need to add a waypoint on the near side. (For a smaller ship, you could put the waypoint inside the jump node.)

Object	Class	Position	Notes
Waypoint 5:1	Waypoint	-3000, 0, 7000

Here's the event:

Change the Relentless' Departure Cue to:

Save the mission and try it out again. Target the GTD Relentless and use 'S' to cycle through subsystems until the engines are targeted. Watch the Relentless change from Friendly to Unknown to Hostile. If you're behind it, you'll be able to see the destroyer's engines fire up as it heads for the jump node.

Have a few GTVA personnel get off the Relentless in an escape pod:

Object	Class	Position	Notes
GTEP Escape Pod	GTEP Hermes	(anywhere)	Arrival cue: Docking bay of GTD Relentless, 10 seconds after event "Relentless captured" becomes true Initial orders: warp, priority 50 Escort ship, priority 100

The escape pod will probably be shot down by the relentless, but it might escape if there are friendly fighters in the area distracting the destroyer.

Sleipner wing has no reason to stick around once the GTD Relentless is captured. Change the Departure Cue for Sleipner wing to that they'll leave as soon as the event "Relentless pulling out" becomes true. (This event is used, instead of "Relentless captured", so that none of the transports are docked with the destroyer when they jump out. Otherwise, they'd carry the destroyer with them into hyperspace! While the NTF might like this outcome, it's not realistic.)

There are several possible outcomes to the mission:

• Sleipner wing might lose so many ships that they can't take over the Relentless
• The Relentless might be destroyed
• The Relentless might be successfully stolen
• The Relentless might be taken over, but then disabled and disarmed

As soon as any of these things happens, any other NTF ships should leave.

Here are events for the first three possibilities:

For reasons that will become clear when you add directives, the last case should be handled by two separate, chained events. Use Insert Event to add these two events right after "Relentless pulling out", and make sure they are Chained:

Add one more event, "Relentless out of picture", which becomes true as soon as any of "Sleipner thwarted", "Relentless destroyed", "Relentless escaped", or "Relentless disarmed" becomes true. (Hint: you'll need to use an or with four arguments.) Make this the Departure Cue SEXP for each of the NTF cruisers.

Save and test the mission. Notice that the cruisers jump out as soon as fate of the Relentless is decided.

Heave a sigh of relief that the hard part is over. Take a break, give your eyes and hands a rest, and talk to another human if one is available. When you're ready, come back and finish the walkthrough.

Directives are the instructions that appear on the left side of the player's HUD. Objectives are the things that have to be accomplished for the mission to count as a success.

Directives are added in the Events Editor. First, add some Directive Text to events you've already built:

Event	Directive Text
Relentless disabled	Disable GTD Relentless (F12)
Relentless disarmed	Disarm GTD Relentless (F12)

Because of the chained events, the first directive won't appear until the Relentless pulls out, and the second won't appear until the Relentless is disabled. (If the player Relentless is disarmed and then disabled, the second directive will be completed as soon as it appears.)

Add a new chained event "Player returned to base" right after "Relentless out of picture". It should become true when Alpha 1 departs. Give the directive "Return to base".

Add these two events, chained after "NTF force 2 arrival cue":

The first one should have the directive "Inspect any Sleipner (F11)", and the second one "Destroy Sleipner (F11)".

Go read about the Mission Objectives Editor.

Create two objectives. The first is a primary goal to protect the shipyard; this is accomplished if either Sleipner is thwarted or the Relentless is disabled and disarmed. It's worth 1000 points, and it should get a completion sound.

The second objective is a bonus goal, "Protect escape pod". It should have the text "Protect GTEP Escape Pod", and become true when that pod has departed. Make it worth 50 points, and have a completion sound.

Save and test the mission.

In the heat of combat, it's very hard to tell what's going on without radio messages. It's time to put those in.

Before adding the messages, this is a good time to make the NTF forces show up when they should. Have the first NTF force arrive 23 seconds into the mission, and the second one 137 seconds in.

The first message is the scramble order when the first NTF force arrives. Create a message called "Incoming!", with the text "Incoming ... Neo-Terran Front! Two cruisers and some fighters. Alpha and Beta wings, engage enemy." Use the ANI File Head-CM1 and the Persona Terran Command.

For now, use the Wave File emptymsg.wav. (You'll have to click on Browse to find this.) If you have a microphone, you can record your own voice file later.

To actually send the message, change the do-nothing operator in the event "NTF force 1 arrival cue" to send-message. It should now look like this:

Save and test the mission.

In general, it will sometimes be necessary to create events just for sending messages. As it happens, all of the messages for this mission will be attached to existing events. (For each one, replace a do-nothing operator or use Add Operator.) A couple of the messages can be triggered by any of several events.

Here are the messages:

Message	Text	Source	Event(s)	Files & Persona
Pomotep intercepting	GVCv Pomotep moving to intercept. All fighters, stand clear of the enemy cruisers.	GVCv Pomotep	Pomotep intercepting	Head-VC vasudantalk.wav Large Ship Vasudan
Inspect Sleipner	What are they up to? Alpha 1, inspect one of those Sleipner transports that just jumped in.	#Command	NTF force 2 arrival cue	Head-CM1 emptymsg.wav Terran Command
Marines?	Marines? They're trying to steal the Relentless! Alpha, stop those transports!	#Command	Sleipner inspected	Head-CM1 emptymsg.wav Terran Command
Being boarded	We're being boarded!	GTD Relentless	Relentless boarded	Head-CM1 emptymsg.wav Large Ship
Too many of them	There's too many of them! We're going to try to make it to the escape pods.	GTD Relentless	Relentless captured	Head-CM1 emptymsg.wav Large Ship
Relentless pulling out	The Relentless is pulling out! Alpha, disable it before it gets to the jump node.	#Command	Relentless pulling out	Head-CM1 emptymsg.wav Terran Command
Disarm it	Good work, pilots. Now disable it and we can send in our own marines later.	#Command	Relentless disabled	Head-CM1 emptymsg.wav Terran Command
We won	That did the trick! The Neo-Terrans are bugging out. Good work, pilots. Return to base.	#Command	Sleipner thwarted, Relentless disarmed	Head-CM1 emptymsg.wav Terran Command
Lost Relentless	I can't believe we lots a destroyer. Damn! Okay, return to base.	#Command	Relentless escaped, Relentless destroyed	Head-CM1 emptymsg.wav Terran Command

Guess what: it's time to save and test the mission.

This mission needs a little scenery. Go read about the Background Editor to see how to add it. While this mission won't involve any asteroids, this is as good a time as any to read about the Asteroid Field Editor.

Crank the number of stars up to 2000, and add the following background elements:

EDITOR'S NOTE: The background angle system was patched in recent versions of FreeSpace Open. Choose one of the following two tables according to the version you are using.

Retail and FSO versions before 22.2

Item	Pitch	Bank	Heading	Scale
Bitmap planetf	325	0	25	5
Bitmap neb04	0	0	180	2
Bitmap neb05	0	100	160	3
Bitmap neb06	20	200	200	3
Sun SunRed	0	60	90	2
Sun SunGold	0	65	95	0.3

FSO versions 22.2 and later

Item	Pitch	Bank	Heading	Scale
Bitmap planetf	31	344	330	5
Bitmap neb04	0	0	180	2
Bitmap neb05	0	260	200	3
Bitmap neb06	19	153	159	3
Sun SunRed	300	0	270	2
Sun SunGold	296	0	259	0.3

Save the mission and enjoy the view.

Fighters and bombers are added at this late stage for two reasons:

• It's important to make sure that any capital ship combat is well-balanced first; the fighters and bombers should be the deciding factor.
• It's very difficult to test other aspects of the mission while dogfighting.

The first wing to consider, of course, is Alpha wing. Before placing the rest of them, move Alpha 1 to about (3400, 1600, -2000) and point it toward GTI Vulcan's Forge. Using Current Ship viewpoint (in the View Menu), see what the shipyard looks like from Alpha 1's point of view. Move the ship around a bit to set up a nice picture.

Now break up Alpha wing and add three more fighters behind it. Select them all and change them to GTF Erinyes. Here's the full story on Alpha wing:

Object	Class	Position	Notes
Alpha wing	GTF Erinyes (x4)	Approximately 3400, 1600, -2000	Initial orders: guard Alpha 1, priority 50 Hotkey: F5 Trebuchets in missile bank 2

The initial orders will make the other ships in Alpha wing stay near the player, provide protection, and attack any targets of opportunity. Of course, the player can give other orders.

Read about the Reinforcements Editor.

It doesn't matter where you put the other two friendly wings, because their Arrival Cues will determine where they appear.

Object	Class	Position	Notes
Beta wing	GVF Serapis (x4)	(anywhere)	Arrival: Near Ship GTD Relentless, distance 2450 Initial orders: guard GTI Vulcan's Forge, priority 10; attack any ship, priority 50 Hotkey: F6
Epsilon wing	GTB Artemis (x4)	(anywhere)	Arrival: Docking bay, GTI Vulcan's Forge Initial orders: attack any ship, priority 50 Hotkey: F7 Stiletto IIs in missile banks 2 and 3 Reinforcement

Save and test the mission. Don't forget to call in the reinforcements!

Now for the bad guys:

Object	Class	Position	Notes
Scorpio wing	GTF Hercules (x4)	(anywhere)	Hostile Arrival: In front of ship NTC Munin, distance 312, when event "NTF force 1 arrival cue" is true Departure: When event "Relentless out of picture" is true Initial orders: attack any ship, priority 50 Waves: 3, 15-30 second delay between waves
Pisces wing	GTF Ulysses (x3)	(anywhere)	Hosile Arrival: Near Ship GTD Relentless, distance 2450, when event "NTF force 2 arrival cue" is true Departure: When event "Relentless out of picture" is true Initial orders: guard Sleipner wing, priority 50 Waves: 2, 15-60 second delay between waves

Add an event "Scorpio destroyed" which becomes true when Scorpio wing is destroyed, with directive "Destroy Scorpio". Make a similar event for Pisces wing. Finally, modify the event "Relentless captured" so that it also adds a priority 60 order for Pisces wing to guard the Relentless.

Save and test the mission.

The remaining changes to the mission will not affect balance. Now is the time to make sure it's not too hard or too easy. You might try setting the difficulty one notch higher than you normally do; after all, you have the unfair advantage of knowing what's going to happen. Also, don't forget to turn off Alpha 1's invulnerability!

If the mission seems out of balance, try adding or removing some fighters.

Read about the Team Loadout Editor and the Mission Specs Editor.

In the Team Loadout Editor, uncheck the Myrmidon fighter, making it unavailable for this mission.

In the Mission Specs Editor, entitle the mission "Shipyard". Choose "Genesis" for the music. Enter any Mission Description and Designer's Notes you feel are appropriate.

Save and test the mission.

Read about the Briefing Editor and the Debriefing Editor. If you do the debriefing first, you won't have to sit through the briefing to test it.

The debriefing has 5 stages:

Stage	Usage	Text	Recommendation Text
1	event "Sleipner thwarted" true	Your reaction to the Neo-Terran marine transports was amazingly quick and effective. We shudder to imagine what might have happened had the NTF taken over the GTD Relentless.
2	event "Relentless disarmed" true	GTVA marines were able to board the GTD Relentless and capture the NTF terrorists. We commend you on your quick work disabling and disarming the destroyer.
3	event "Relentless destroyed" true	The loss of the GTD Relentless will cost the alliance a great deal. We can take some solace in the fact that the NTF did not get ahold of the destroyer.	Use 'S' to target the Relentless' engines. After it is disabled, use 'K' to cycle through individual turrets. Don't forget about your reinforcements!
4	event "Relentless escaped" true	Not only do we have one less destroyer today, the NTF has one more. This is a crushing blow to the alliance.	Rush over to Sleipner wing as soon as it arrives. Also, consider giving orders to some of the armed transports in the area.
5	event "Protect escape pod" true	Fortunately, some of our people on board the GTD Relentless got away. Without your efforts, that escape pod probably would not have made it.

Save and test the mission. If you wish, you can record .wav files for the debriefing stages.

The last step is the construction of the briefing. Before doing this, read about the remaining editors: Shield System, Command Briefing, and Campaign.

The briefing will use music Brief1 and have 5 stages. Enter the text for each stage:

Stage	Text
1	Today you're on patrol near the $f Vulcan's $f Forge shipyard.
2	In addition to the main installation, there are two docking rings. In Ring 1, we've just begun construction on the $f GTD $f Triumphant.
3	In Ring 2, we've nearly completed work on the $f GTD $f Relentless. The $f GVCv $f Pomotep, which has taken some heavy damage recently, is next in line.
4	The largest thread is currently the $h Neo-Terran $h Front. Raiders may come from in-system or through the local jump node.
5	If we get hit by something big, you can call on $f Epsilon $f wing for reinforcement.

Before installing the pictures, it may help to watch the briefing from the completed version of this mission.

Go back to stage 1. In the main view, move the camera so that you can see GTI Vulcan's Forge and both docking rings. Zoom in so that you can just see the center installation. Create an icon for it (making sure it has Icon Image Installation), highlight the icon, and save the view.

In stage 2, zoom out until both docking rings are in view. Create an icon for Ring 1. Change the Label to "GTD Triumphant" and the Ship Type to GTD Orion. Highlight the icon and save the view.

In stage 3, create an icon for the GTD Relentless and highlight it. Also, create an icon for the GVCv Pomotep. (It may be easier to create an icon for some other object, then modify its Label, Icon Image, and so forth to correspond to the Pomotep.) Place the Pomotep icon near the icon for the Relentless. Save the view.

For stage 4, move the camera so that you can see the jump node. Create an icon for it. Create another icon nearby, labeled "Neo-Terran Front", with Icon Image Unknown Wing and Team Hostile. Save the view.

For stage 5, move back to where you can see GTI Vulcan's Forge. If necessary, delete any other icons. Place an icon for Epsilon wing nearby ("Epsilon", Bomber Wing, GTB Artemis). Mark both icons (by shift clicking) and check Draw Lines Between Marked Icons. Save the view.

Save and test the mission. Record .wav files if you wish.

Congratulations, you're done! Check out the Internet Links, then start writing up your plans for the greatest FreeSpace 2 missions ever....