Descent 1 Level 11, Insane

[Firewheel]

Man, you guys were kidding when you said this one was tough.

I've been playing through the whole game with a cold start, no save play through each level, and I just cannot beat this one. I don't have too much trouble with the initial area's robots (+ the two medium hulks at the bottom of the first and second lava shafts) but after that it's a real pain.

If I get lucky and swipe a cloaking device from one of the cloaked bots, it makes things easier. I usually kill the first red hulk by sniping him, blasting the lava with vulcan fire to get rid of him. The tricky part is knowing where to go after that.

I'm usually low on energy if I haven't died at this point. So I try to clear the room with the energy center, which is insanely difficult if I don't have a cloaking device and smart missiles. I really have no idea what the best way to deal with these hulks is. I usually save my mega missile to blow up the red hulk in the shaft leading to the red door.

The area leading to the hostages is a massive pain because the cloaked medium hulk kills me 90% of the time. He fires too many shots, my shields are low by now, and my weapons don't do enough damage to take him out quickly.

The really big problems are the blue key and yellow key rooms. I have no idea how to get to these keys without losing a life in the process. In the blue key room, it's too dangerous to snipe the robots because there's a cloaked medium hulk that will murder me with concussion missiles if I stay in the mine shaft. What's the best strategy here?

In the yellow key room, I can't get to the cloak to grab the yellow key before the red hulks fire dozens of missiles at me. Ideas?

If I could just get the two keys then the rest of the level should be pretty easy. I'm just having a major amount of pain getting that far. What are some strategies you guys have used to beat this nearly-impossible challenge?

[AlphaDoG]

Dude, play multiplayer and forget all that.

[Lothar]

If you get a cloak drop early, use it to go immediately to the blue key. That room is so much easier if you're cloaked...

Then work your way to the energy, and try not to let the red hulks out of the vertical mineshaft. If they start wandering, you're in trouble.

You can snipe into the room with the yellow key from near the hostage area. It turns out the red hulk AI is kind of strange -- if you fire a line of shots a little away from them, they'll fly into it. So you can take them out from down the hallway near the hostages, at very little risk.

[Avder]

Dude, play multiplayer and forget all that.

Dude, this is the singleplayer forum. Stop trolling.

And level 11 gave me fits in my last runthrough, even tho I was on Ace. I had a fusion cannon from previous levels, I don't know if you do.

If you do, you can try coming into the hostage area from the side nearest the energy center. Charge fusion and move fast, and if you fire it just as you're coming into the right position, you should nail him. Ditto with the vulcan bots nearby. If you're chording right and fire on the run, your fusion has a chance of nailing both while their vulcan should hopefully miss you by millimeters.

If I remember right there's a way to be cloaked as you enter the yellow key room. If you are, nail the cloaked missile hulks in there first, and then do the red hulks.

The red key shaft is another nightmare, but if you are patient you might be able to lure the hulks out so you can give them a face full of mega missile.

Hope some of this helps, but remember I was on Ace, not insane.

[vision]

Level 11 gave me fits in my last runthrough, even tho I was on Ace. I had a fusion cannon from previous levels, I don't know if you do.

I've been playing through the whole game with a cold start...

I can sympathize. It took me a few hours to beat Level-11 cold on Ace. I can't seem to beat it on Insane. I'll give it a try again later and post if I find any tricks. I usually have the hardest time going for the red key. The generator at the top of the shaft is brutal.

[DarkFlameWolf]

not to derail the topic or anything, because I love cold starts myself. It brings an element of strategy in combating a specific level. But I was wondering if anyone has attempted to cold start user-made missions, or more specifically my most recent one for Descent 1: Descent Vignettes.

[Firewheel]

Hmm, I forgot there was another red hulk in the last shaft. I thought there was just that one floating out in the open. Guess I need to be more careful. I find it pretty effective to lure the robots out of that shaft and then blast the lava under them from around the corner. I'll try the other strategies mentioned here.

[Glowhyena]

He fires too many shots

Because of Insane.

[Firewheel]

Finally beat it today. The deciding factor is the blue key room - it turns out that it can be cleared more easily than I thought, and if I get lucky and the cloaked hulk doesn't move I can blast the lava and blow him up from an angle where he can't shoot at me. By grabbing the plasma cannon, things get a lot easier after that.

[vision]

Ok I beat it today, but I had to save a bunch of times. I'm a little confused about how to get through the first part of it.

The very beginning is easy, just clear out the top two levels. After that fly down to the bottom of the first shaft and take out the class-1 drones and the cloaked lifters. Hopefully one will drop cloak, if not things get hard fast.

After that, I go for the hostage area because there is a level 2 laser there. I shoot down the hall and kill the medium hulk and the 2 class-1 drones. If I'm fast enough I can take out the cloaked hulk here. After I kill the drillers and get the laser and hostages, I go for the other cloaked driller and heavy hulk.

But then I get confused. I usually go for the blue key right away even though I'm low on energy. If I go for the energy center first, mechs from the blue key room creep up and kill me. I really don't know what's best.

After I finally reach the energy center, I go back to the hostage area and enter the room with the spiders. I try to take out the heavy hulks through the grate because I can't beat them in the yellow key room (I die instantly). Killing them through the grate takes forever and it's a total game-killer.

The only other place I have a problem is the red key shaft. The generator at the top is easy if it only spits out class-1 drones. But sometimes it throws out mostly spiders and spider spawn and it's hard to get them all.

One thing that bothers me about the AI is, the faster you go through the level, the more the bots creep. It's hard to find the perfect pace.

[vision]

Geez, finally got it without saving but it took all three lives. It's damn near impossible if one of those lifters doesn't drop a cloak (if they both drop it's really easy!).

I kept losing the game at the top of the Red Key shaft because I would try to blow away all the mechs as the generated, but the spiders would always get me. So I decided to race to the bottom of the shaft instead and take my chances with the Heavy Hulk, which worked out fine.

[Firewheel]

The deciding factor seems to be clearing the blue key room as soon as possible. If you can get that plasma cannon, it makes things MUCH easier. After that you'd probably want to go for the energy center.

[Avder]

I would NOT want to do this level without a fusion cannon, there are just too many bots that need to be one-shotted for it to be reasonably possible under my standard of doing everything in one life, at least not without saving every 15 seconds, which is super cheap.