Coral Nebula

Mission:	Coral Nebula
Location:	Inside the Coral Nebula, outskirts of the Zagan system.
Date:	153.8.12
The world of Mazalot, locus of power in the Zagan system, was a weak link in the independent-minded Persean League's great arc of loosely allied polities across the Sector. The Luddic demographic majority was long relegated to the status of second class citizens; churches were raided, religious leaders harassed, and laws discriminatorily enforced. The Persean League was founded upon the principle of non-intervention in internal affairs of member-polities. So while the old regime of Mazalot was corrupt and coarse in its exploitation, earning itself few true friends in the League, it staggered onward. All the League demands of each world is for its due be paid in ships, credits, or recruits. The collapse of one or another economic bubble saw the Mazalotian regime draw from its most plentiful - and freely spent - resource by enacting a sweeping conscription program. Those who could afford the bribes or were otherwise attached to the ruling party could avoid conscription. The Luddic faithful, meanwhile, saw the cream of their youth used as fodder in the long-simmering conflict with the Hegemony, returning home broken, bitter, or never at all. The inevitable upsurge in Luddic Path activity provoked a crackdown, and that was the end of what the faithful would allow: revolution exploded from the plantation provinces and the ghetto-arcologies and orbiting factories, out across the entire Zagan system, toppling the old regime like a rotten stump. The newly installed Luddic theocracy, an uneasy collection of guerilla fighters and Church authorities, refused to pay the League's bloody due. The League threatened intervention -- and to this the Knights of Ludd responded. The Knights are the sworn defenders of the Luddic faith, and though it stretched them to their limit, they sent a fleet to defend the new dawning on Mazalot. The Persean League world of Kazeron always pays its dues in warships and highly trained officers to command them. Navarch Mars Kato is one such officer who leads the task force sent to deal with the renegation of Mazalot. In all other matters, the League does not intervene, but one does not simply abandon the League without the League's permission. Navarch Kato's fleet is small, if nimble, for he is expected to maintain a loose blockade to pressure the Knight's resupply fleets until additional League forces can be assigned from Hegemony-threatened space. Glory, however, is not seized by the meek: Weeks of taunting raids have drawn the Knights of Ludd into a trap set in the Coral Nebula, at edge of the Zagan system. There the strength and pride of Kato's task force, the Astral-class carrier "Sirocco" with a full complement of fighters, has lain quietly in wait. Although the Knights' fleet has much greater firepower, most craft are large and the League advantage in strike fighters should be decisive.
Tactical Briefing
-Using your torpedo bombers is key to victory -Keep the Astral carrier "Sirocco" on the field to repair and rearm them -Defeat all enemy forces
Your Flagship
Name:	PLS Sirocco
Type:	Astral-class

Order of Battle
Attacking	1x Astral 2x Medusa 2x Tempest 2x Xyphos 3x Wasp 3x Trident 3x Dagger 2x Longbow	Attacking	1x Onslaught 2x Dominator 2x Enforcer 1x Condor 3x Lasher 3x Hound 2x Kite 2x Piranha
Persean League task force led by Navarch Kato		Detachment from the 3rd Holy Armada and Pather irregulars

Tactics

The important thing to remember about the Astral is: you are not a battleship. You won't do well going toe to toe with the Dominators, let alone the Onslaught. Stay at a distance and use your missiles, leaving the close-in work to the bombers.

Although the mission is described as taking place deep inside a nebula, depending on the random generation the actual fighting may take place in a patch of open space. There are six capturables, three on each side of the map: one Nav Buoy, one Comm Relay and one Sensor Array.

If you need to create an opening for the bombers against a hard target like the Onslaught, you can issue an Engage or Eliminate order using your smaller ships.