Bombardment

The Bombardment is a potentially game-changing event in Aground that is set in motion when The Old One sends a signal after fighting her. The player should not leave it at their leisure, as the longer it stays, the more will be destroyed.

Wave 1

The bombardment occurs as soon as the player accepts the quest Evolve Dragon Ship from the Elder Dragon (unlocked by talking to him after completing The Vine Copse and having produced an Evolution Gem), or defeating The Storm, and subsequently enters either the Starting Island or Sunset Haven zones. This will trigger a cutscene (as depicted in the image), and bombs will begin to fall.

An Alien Bomber, along with a few Alien Fighters, show up in orbit around the starting planet, Unoiks 428c, and begin bombing it. It ends after defeating the bomber. The main threat is the bombs that the bomber drops, which kill enemies and damage the player, as well as destroying objects and structures. The NPCs on Starting Island will hide in the Alchemist's cave. Once you visit them, the Alchemist will give you blueprints for the Laboratory and Wyrm Pen. All of the NPCs on Sunset Haven will hide in the colony ship's hold, clearing out the dirt and building a Power Plant, Bunker, Bunker Depot, Power Plant, and market all connected by cables. The Innkeeper will stay in the Inn and die (unless you place steel flooring over the Inn. All items in the Storehouse/Warehouse will be moved to underground storage if they are destroyed. The Starting Island market will be abandoned, while the Sunset Haven merchants will relocate to the colony ship with new stalls that run both day and night.

Wave 2

The second wave comes after accepting the quest To The Leader from the Exiled, and entering the orbit of the starting planet. A cutscene will also play, showing the allied Dragonships coming to help you.

The dangers are the same as the first wave, with the addition of two Alien Cruisers. All of the Enemy Dragonships that you have freed, up to a limit, will also appear and help you fight them off. They will not disappear after you win.

Note that if you have not entered Sunset Haven or the Starting Island since triggering the first bombardment, and therefore not fought it yet, both waves will show up at once.

Locations

The ships appear in orbit, but will only bomb the Starting Island and Sunset Haven, as they are the only ones with a settlement that the bombs can hit. They will also bomb these islands while you are in orbit, fighting them.

Strategies

Strategies for defeating the bomber and the cruiser are detailed on the Bosses page, with the best one being the boarding option. This one is the best because it will halt the bombardment immediately, limiting damage to your base(as the outside world is paused while you're in a ship's interior zone), and allow you to get alien hearts for killing the enemy crew, as well as looting the ship's cargo. In addition, this will allow you to take control of them or free them later, once the ability to talk to ships has been acquired.

You can free as many enemy ships as you wish to help you fight Wave 2 after obtaining a Book of Translation and before accepting the quest "To The Leader", including the ones in Enemy HQ orbit (to an extent; if you go there for the first time in the Mobile Lab and start boarding enemy ships, after you free a few the CaptAIn will take you out of there and to the Colony Planet). However, any ships freed during the second battle will not help you. If you want to have Bombers and Cruisers on your side, you can free the fleet in Wave 1 and then go to HQ provided Wave 2 has not yet been triggered.

Building Steel Walkways high above buildings you want to protect can act as a one-hit shield, buying time to stop the bombers from destroying everything.

As of Version 2.1.0, if playing the Hybrid Path, the Mirrows give the player a quest to build a Bombardment Shield using the combined strength of science and magic. You will have to build the shield on the summit of The Heights. The Bombardment Shield will protect the whole planet from incoming attacks from orbit. There are two possible outcomes depending on whether you build the shield before or after triggering Bombardment. You can bring the Mobile Lab from Earth to pick up all the surviving researchers with either outcome. The Mirrows will still give you the quest "End the Siege" either way, but be aware that if you talk to them again with the shield still not built they will attack the first bomber and lose their lives in the process. The Sea Witch will flee to the Fish Village so long as you have evolved a Dragonship, whether the Shield is up or not; her return to the village will prompt the Librarian to give you the quest "Their Secrets" and ultimately lead you to trigger Wave 2.

The cutscene that plays if Bombardment is triggered after the bombardment shield has already been crafted.

If bombardment begins first, the amount of damage to human settlements depends on how long you spend there. Once you build the shield and talk to the Starting Island NPCs, all of them except the Alchemist will return to the surface. The Alchemist will comment that with the shield up, the cave is now redundant, but he will continue his research. The merchants of the Starting Island will not return. The Sunset Haven NPCs will remain in the colony ship even with the shield up, leaving the surface town abandoned. The Ore Merchant will give you quests to bring him 10 Magnegems and 4 Exotic Matter in exchange for the full Bunker blueprint set and the Space Station blueprint set.

If the shield is built first and then bombardment is triggered, the cutscene will show the Bomber's first attack being blocked by the forcefield around the planet. The enemy ships will still attempt to attack you whenever you enter orbit. The human settlements will remain inhabited and the markets will keep running, although the Sunset Haven background image will still appear as if having been destroyed. All NPCs will act as though nothing is happening, apart from the Innkeeper who is grateful for the protection and states he would go down with his Inn if it were attacked, and the quests that normally come from the ore merchant when he is moved to the colony ship hold will be inaccessible. Even though no NPCs will move to the Colony Ship hold, the Stingers will stop respawning there; if you were relying on them for Refined Oil, it is still available in the Sunset Haven Market, AI Market, Vending Machines, and the Minotaur Maze.