I've settled that this seems to be the best way to solve this one. I must say the most important idea come from the Japanese EDF wiki blog, and that was to use 2 Tempests instead of 1, as I had tried with 1 and it did not work at all and I had dismissed the Tempest as useful here. I successfully did the mission with a weird range of weapons, from ZEX Launcher, ZEXR, various gunships, artillery, bulge lasers, and mostly the Nix ZC but it was 1 success in 20 or so tries. It was partially fun... The main problem is always surviving the start, so it was usually a pretty fast end, and it will be on most occasions.
EDIT
Once I had the highest gunship attacks all almost fully upgraded it becomes viable and more reliable to do this with them. Details below.
This is the last approachable mission of DLC 2. Missions 12, 13, and 14 are peachy, even though they can be done they take time and care, lots of it.
Tempests run
Essential weapons:
- Tempest AT, it must be on the first slot, mine has 9 stars damage
- Tempest ATS, it must be on the second slot, mine has 9 stars damage. The reason that the Tempest should be in the first and 2nd slot in this order is that you should immediately at the start summon both, and the ATS seems to be faster than the AT. If you change the order you call both missiles it will be unlikely the 2nd will hit more than 1 Erginus. This can probably be sill successful with lower damages specs on both weapons, I had them with these the first time I tried so can't be sure. Other variable specs, range, and reload points are not crucial for the plan, but the higher the better of course. Although it's weird I do think different star ratings can give small but different speeds to Tempest missiles (not mentioned in the stats and neither damage, reload points or beacon distance would imply this).
- Vulcan Cannon M2, to do "small" damage when you don't have Tempest or it's not smart to use them. The Vulcan has the advantage that it seldom kills your NPCs, unlike the 105mm Rapid-fire Cannon Z as an example. You should not use multiple shots gunships either (I did but not on this strategy)
- Nix Red Guard, mainly the speed for crates collection, but amazingly its 2 weapons do work pretty well with Erginus and Archelus, Nix ZC is also an excellent choice and much more powerful, just very slow
Armor: 1000+
you can be one-shot with less than 5000 armor in this mission in a blink. In one run one Archelus did 60k+ damage in one attack to my Nix ZC, beats me how but it did happen. Basically expect to die in one hit if it's direct contact with one of the enemies. People claim it's easy to do this mission with WD and Phalanx ZAT, but I assume they have a gazillion armor, as with the 1500ish I have it's death after death no matter how far I go for the most unseeingly reasons, as the Erginus and Archelus have huge hit areas of their own and just a small movement of them, not even an attack, it's immediate death
Plan:
Immediately look to the ground and call in the Tempest AT, followed immediately by the Tempest ATS. Yes summoning Tempests by using the ground under you is the fastest way to start the process. Remember you can drive later the Tempests to its goal. While using the Vulcan preferably on the Erginus fighting with the NPC Barga, change to both Tempest and aim them to the Barga or the most convenient Erginus, the one in the middle of the fight. Keep rolling / moving right from start. Hoping that the Barga doesn't get destroyed before the first Tempest arrives, unfortunately common, hit the Erginus that is in the middle of the 3 or at least 2. Your Barga will be history at this point if it was still up (actually in one run the Barga survived the first Tempest, I thought I stored the video but didn't). The Erginus will be stunned for just a sec, which hopefully will be enough for the ATS to arrive (you switched to that one didn't you...). Curiously on 2 or 3 occasions one of the Erginus died from the first Tempest, which means that the NPC Barga did kick his ass for a while. Pity, it's so seldom this happens, which also explains why mission 100 is ultimately an RNG bore, and although this one is not as bad as 100 yes it's still highly RNG related.
If you're very lucky all Erginus will die. Erginus hit by both Tempests will die, if hit by just ATS are almost dead, and 2 to 4 Vulcan hits will finish them, if just hit by the Tempest AT not even half their armor is gone.
Each dead Erginus / Archelus will replenish both Tempests. It will also likely give enough points to summon a new Nix.
Everything going fine and provided you managed to almost reach the end of the map to the right, surviving Erginus will focus on the 2 squads of NPCs that were at the start (yes, you can't capture them...). Actually, it's very important to reach the end of the map and stay there before calling the Tempests again, because if you don't it's highly probable that at least 1 of the Erginus of wave 3 will spawn really near you. If any of the first 3 Erginus goes to you it's likely game over unless you manage to survive until the Nix arrive, which is not impossible, but hard.
If necessary, and you're able to handle the enemy near you (use Nix cannons and burners to make it go back even if it's not much, exit Nix, aim Vulcan on the enemy, enter Nix again, rinse and repeat until he's dead) deal with him. After or if it wasn't necessary, the next 2 Erginus will spawn to the end of the map from your position, that is the far left from start (that's the reason for not going left at the start). They will all aggro around the 3 squads of NPC rangers that were near you at the start. They can be wiped out in a snap, it's not uncommon.
Do the same with both Tempests and try to hit the biggest number of Erginus possible, with both missiles. At some point, another 4 will spawn, 2 near the initial NPCs, and 2 in the far back, that will usually stay around a squad of fencers that will spawn in the far left front from start or they'll usually also crush the 4 NPC EMCs that spawn in that area.
Keep rinsing and repeating the 2 Tempests thing, using the Vulcan on the deadest Erginus if you missed and did not score a kill. The best Erginus to hit will be the one more violet, and with less vibrant light blue. Archelus will seem rotten and diffuse, the green tones will all disappear and will be all brownish as they're dying. Not easy to see from very far. Yes, Archelus and Erginus move too fast and like to party together making it hard to follow a specific one.
2 Archelus will show up. Continue with the same action, focusing on the ones you prefer. Archelus don't die with 2 Tempests, at least with the level 9 ones, so deal a few more Vulcan shots to finish them, or let the hopefully alive EMC's and tanks do that.
Do this until there are 2 enemies left. If you have a few tanks and EMC NPCs alive, pick crates. If not at least try to soften both enemies or kill one of them, to make things easier. EMCs are quite powerful and can wipe out either beast quickly so don't waste much time. In my experience, EMC's are alive at the end on roughly 1/3 of the runs.
Unfortunately, Erginus and even Archelus corpses take a looooonnnnnnng time to vanish, so this is sometimes annoying. Also, you can be stuck under an enemy corpse, and not unlikely that you'll have to wait for it to vanish before being able to move.
Hope you're lucky and also can manage this. It's not very hard, and easier for the AR than mission 8, and also a reasonably higher mission in drops quality. There's also a crucial difference in that 8 will likely give problems at the end, in this one they will likely be at the beginning.
Gunships run
Essential weapons:
- 3 best gunships you have in damage, range, and reload time, all must be nearly fully upgraded. Vulcan Cannon M2 and 105mm Rapid-fire Cannon Z are the most effective, 150mm Cannon D and T2 Rocket Cannon as the third option. Combat Bomber KM6 Plan X18 if you have it can work nicely too, especially with the first 3 Erginus
- Nix Red Guard, mainly the speed for crates collection, but amazingly its 2 weapons do work pretty well with Erginus and Archelus, Nix ZC is also an excellent choice and much more powerful, just very slow
Plan:
Almost the same plan as the Tempest version. Go right until the map border, while delivering attacks to preferably the same Erginus. You'll still be hitting the NPC Barga due to the large blast area. Keep recycling and shooting all gunship attacks, it's sometimes difficult to be on the same enemy, just use them on another.
If you manage to not get much attention once the Barga is destroyed just follow the same process, hit preferably the same enemy but don't be picky. Don't think you can keep Erginus and Archelus at a distance, they can still attack you even if you're continuously shelling them.
When there are 2 enemies left and they have already had a few shots, or more depending on how many EMCs are still alive, hop in a Nix and pick crates.
Which one is best, this or Tempests? Depends mostly on the weapons you have and how upgraded they're. They have almost the same issues, you'll probably have a slightly bigger chance of surviving this way if attacked by an Erginus if it's not at the start and you're not stuck as it's the case if the Tempests fail. But the start is still a lucky game with the Tempests clearly having a huge advantage if you get a triple kill with them at the start.
Last hints and info:
- if you don't kill any Erginus with the 2 initial Tempests, and fail the ATS on all 3, forget it, it's almost impossible
- I would advise against leaving both Archelus alive at the end, especially if most NPCs are dead, as they will team together against you and it's really hard to deal, and all the full ammo of a Nix Red Guard will probably not do much beyond 50% damage to the armor of one
- unfortunately, you'll be wiping out many NPCs while using Tempests, as you can't ask the Erginus and Archelus to stay away from them when the Tempests are arriving. Dumb idiotic beasts could be more cooperative...🤣
- if you blast a Tempest near you, you will survive if you're inside the Nix, however Nix no more and unless the enemy is gone, all other Nix's you had around were wiped out too, so there's a "slight" chance you're still in real trouble 😋
- you'll be able to do this mission successfully 5 times in a row, then fail 10 or 15, endure it's worth it
- I keep reading on Reddit, Gamefaqs and Steam how awesome the EMCs are and that they fry Erginus and Archelus, It's so surprising the number of these missions in that all 4 EMCs are wiped out in a snap by 1 or 2 of them... 😂
- one of the major drags of the layout if you don't choose the Nix ZC is that you have no simple way to bring down buildings and they can be in the line of sight for Tempests. Well, it could be done with Tempest but that would be overkill and they wouldn't give points to replenish them 😋. Changing the Vulcan for a 150mm can help but you'll usually be doing damage to NPCs too. They're already being crushed by the Erginus and Archelus, don't need more help for that
- there's a large RNG factor in this mission, generally, most NPC vehicles and squads will be wiped out, but on some games, it's the opposite. Anyway, when you see the WD blue dots coming up and down from the front slightly right of the map from start, it's a bad sign or wrap up time as it's the last NPC squad that can spawn and means most if not all of the others were wiped out.
- remember you can play the mission split screen with 2 controllers with the AR and another class, just ignoring the second, and the game will spread the majority of the weapon boxes between these 2 classes.
- my record of simultaneous Erginus kills stands at 4 (2 from the first wave, 2 from second). Sadly only did this once and forgot to save the video. This requires a ton of luck.
- you can only get weapons 91+ in this mission, so it's almost only DLC weapons that will drop
Solving this mission with Ranger or WD
Well according to what you'll read elsewhere, including in the Japanese wiki, doing this mission is a piece of cake with either the Ranger or Wind Diver.
I must be one of the worst EDF 5 players as for me it's absolutely not. Ranger will need an almost upgraded level 103 Buster Shot and the WD either the level 107 Phalanx ZAT (preferably) or level 101 Rapier Super Nova. Yes, it can be done with base armor, because until you have a large pool (2.5k+) it's a one-hit death.
The problem is the weapons of both classes have little range, so you must be near the Erginus and Archelus. This is where the problem starts. The hitbox of them is not only huge, it's unreliable. They just need to move, walk or run near you it's a gamble if you'll be alive or not.
The most difficult part is surviving the first 3 Erginus. Many of the runs the NPC Barga will die as soon or very close to when you're arriving within the action (remember your weapons have little range...). There's no time to kill one, let alone 3.
There's also mention that while hitting them they will retreat. It's a lie, it will approximately half the time, as in the other half it will still charge on you (yes, you're dead).
Now include that one Erginus can jump almost half the map and kill you instantly while you're trying to kill another, that until you get the tanks which is sometime after there's 5 Erginus around and that until then all you have for distraction is the 2 initial ranger squads that a single Erginus can wipe all out in one attack, that I've been hit by stray bombs from an Archelus that is half the map away, you get the idea. This is just the cherry on top. If I survive the first 3 by killing 2, there's a 50% chance of finishing it after that. But surviving and killing a few of the first 5 is dreadfully difficult as it's so easy to just die.
I succeed once every 20 or 25 runs.
The giant difference with the AR is that you're able to 2 shot Erginus with some luck but more importantly from a distance. And there's always the chance you'll have a 70k+ armored exoskeleton to hide with good firepower.
Either I'm playing the wrong game or the comments are from people with 10 or 20k+ armor...
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