Foundry:The Longing (ST-HS8U72BBD)

In The Longing the player investigates a colony facing the imminent threat of assimilation by the Borg Collective.

Synopsis


The player is sent to the Noro System in the Gamma Orionis Sector as a relief for the. The ship has been badly damaged by a series of Borg scouts, trying to invade the planet. The Mayweather has successfully prevented Borg to land on the planet, where Federation settlers have established the. The motivation for the Borg to come after the colony seem to be silicon-based life signs originating from the vicinity of the colony. Since the Mayweather is in no condition to engage another wave of Borg, Captain takes her ship back to Battle Group Omega.

The player beams down to the colony with an Away Team in order to prepare the colonists for evacuation. However, Governor is not willing to give up the colony and formally requests the player to assist the colonists to defeat the Borg invasion. Unable to provide sufficient firepower to effectively protect the colony, the player's Bridge Officers devise an alternative plan: Hiding the unusual life signs from the Borg sensors, thus rendering the planet uninteresting to the collective.

McGruph agrees, and the player confers with the colony's chief technician to construct a sensor screen from parts of the colony's environmental control system. Velligan informs the player that the necessary phase discriminators were destroyed when the system was struck by an ion storm, hence the sensor shield cannot be constructed. Interestingly, the Away Team's tricorders pick up what appears to be a phase discriminator close to one of the silicon life signs.

When the Away Team reaches the signal, it turns out the phase discriminators of the environmental control system are in working condition, and in fact are responsible for generating fake readings of silicon life forms in the first place. The player deactivates several of the devices, which are scattered in the woods close to the colony.

When confronting Velligan about the fake signals, he confesses to have setup the devices intentionally for the Borg to come and assimilate him. He reveals to be an El Aurian refugee who seeks reunification with his assimilated wife. With the fake signals deactivated and Velligan exposed, the colony is relatively safe again. McGruph promises to take care of the troubled technician.

The Away Team is called back to the ship because of new Borg presence in the system. The Borg have managed to board the ship and are trying to assimilate Main Engineering. The away team materializes on the engineering deck, clearing a way to Main Engineering. There, the Borg have erected a force field, isolating it from the rest of the ship. The only means to deactivate the force field is from inside Main Engineering. The away team comes up with a plan to deactivate the force field by implanting a command in the Borg hive mind, ordering the drones inside to lower it.

The player interfaces with the subspace-interlink of a fallen Borg drone, but the command path is protected by a series of lockouts. To find the correct command path sequence, the Away Team searches for other fallen drones and extracts their latest orders from the collective from their neural processors. After the sequence has been entered correctly, the drones disable the force field and the away team reclaims Main Engineering. That is, when bridge duty officer Lt. asks for help. The Bridge is under siege by Borg boarding parties.

Using the turbolift, the Away Team reaches the Bridge in time to repel the Borg. Using a disruption field, the ship is temporary safe from being boarded. The remaining Borg are beamed off the ship using the transporters. The player retakes the bridge.

In the mean time, a sizable force of Borg ships has reached the Noro System. Governor McGruph sends an emergency signal to the player's ship, explaining that Velligan had managed to reactivate one phase discriminators, resulting in the Borg invading the planet. Realizing that the Borg cannot be defeated, he agrees to the evacuation of the colony. The colonists are transported off the surface, but Velligan is missing, obviously abducted by the Borg.

The ship is too close to the planet's atmosphere to engage Warp drive and must fight through the Borg armada. Finally, the ship is hailed by a Borg Cube. A drone, identifying itself as is demanding the ship to stand down and lower shields for assimilation. It is Velligan. The player has no choice, but destroy Velligan's Cube and leave the system before even more Borg ships arrive.

Objectives

 * Keen Interest
 * Protect U.S.S. Mayflower
 * Enter Orbit
 * Missing Interest
 * Talk with Colony Governor
 * Scan Rock Formation
 * Obtain List of Colony Equipment
 * Offer Help to McGruph
 * Find Chief Technician
 * Find Source of Tricorder Readings
 * Examine Control System
 * Shut Down Phase Discriminators (4)
 * Talk to Velligan
 * Report to McGruph
 * Standing Ground
 * Defeat Borg Boarding Party (4)
 * Secure Main Engineering
 * Upload Command to Hive Mind
 * Reach Turbolift
 * Displacement
 * Secure the Bridge (2)
 * Beam Borg Into Space
 * Desperate Measures
 * Defeat Borg Armada (3)
 * Defeat Hastatus


 * Sphere
 * Probe
 * Cube