Conquest Mode Guide

Project Wingman’s Conquest Mode is considered the game’s end-game, where players are treated to a challenging and thrilling single-player experience outside the game’s engaging campaign mode. With the procedurally-generated missions, rewards, and permadeath mechanic, only the toughest and skilled players are expected to retake back occupied Cascadia in 43 increasingly difficult missions with just one life. In this page, we will discuss Conquest Mode in detail to help you adjust your strategies as necessary and increase your chances of completing this grueling game mode.

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Conquest Mode Basics

Conquest mode doesn’t need to be unlocked. However, even if the mode is available from the start, we strongly recommend completing the campaign at least once to avoid spoilers. Conquest is a separate mode from the campaign so the aircraft you have unlocked and the funds you’ve earned in the campaign will not be available in this mode.

As mentioned before, Conquest mode has a permadeath mechanic. That means you have to complete all 43 missions with one life. Your plane still has a health bar that gets fully repaired after each mission. However, if you crash (regardless of the reason), you’ll have to start from the beginning, losing all the allied pilots you’ve hired and airships you’ve purchased. Thankfully, the prestige and aircraft you have unlocked will be retained. That said, it’s possible to farm prestige through multiple playthroughs using a low-tier aircraft until you’ve earned enough prestige to buy the top tier aircrafts in the game. (Saving up for the PW.MK1 is usually the ideal course)

Completing Conquest missions will allow you to earn Prestige Points and (conquest-exclusive) credits. To unlock new aircraft, you have to earn and spend Prestige Points while credits are used for hiring additional pilots and airships to help you, as well as upgrading your airships to add more armaments to them and increase their combat efficiency. As mentioned above, your prestige points and unlocked aircraft remain intact even if your progress gets reset after dying in a Conquest run.

Similar to the Campaign mode, Conquest mode has three difficulties: Easy, Normal, Hard, and Mercenary; however playing at higher difficulty will allow you to earn more Credits and Prestige.

Alert Level

Alert Level represents the level of response the Federation will throw at you. At alert level 1, you’ll encounter low-tier aircraft like MG.21s and F/E-4s but by Alert LV15, you’ll start encountering prototypes like the VX.23 as common enemies. You’ll always start off at Alert Level 1 for every run and the Alert gauge will continuously climb up until the level is increased.

Since Alert level is time-based, focus on completing the missions as quickly as you can to avoid raising the alert level too high and get left behind in terms of your own combat capability versus the threats the Federation will send on your way. If you exited the mission, the exact alert level will be retained but your mission objective will restart.

Conquest Mode Aircraft

All aircraft available in the campaign are available in Conquest, including three Conquest-exclusive ones (Cr.105 MK.2, MG-21 MK.2, Accpiter MK.2) As mentioned above, you’ll need to complete missions to earn Prestige then use that Prestige to purchase aircraft. Since you can’t sell any aircraft you have already purchased, carefully choosing which aircraft to buy is highly recommended to save time. You’ll start off with a trainer aircraft but that can only get you so far. You’ll have to do several missions or playthroughs to earn more prestige to get a higher tier plane, then use that plane to progress further until you’re able to earn more prestige for the top tier planes. You should aim for the PW-Mk1 as it is the best plane in the game, and will help make the later missions more manageable.

Hiring Den

The Hiring Den in Conquest Mode is where you can use credits to recruit allied pilots and purchase airships to provide support for you during missions. No matter how skilled you are, you’ll still appreciate the presence of allied fighters even just to keep the enemies occupied and give you some breathing space. They can’t be shot down and will remain active for the entirety of your run.

Pilots come with different ranks and their own corresponding aircraft. You can only recruit a maximum number of pilots depending on their rank. For example, you can only recruit up to two War Heroes compared to six Rookie Pilots. Please check our dedicated page for the list of all available pilots and airships you can get from the Hiring Den.

Mission Types

There are different types of missions in Conquest mode but they'll be assigned to you randomly. Conquest Mode missions. will always have two phases: the main mission objective and the boss fight against a random enemy ace squadron. The difficulty of your missions will depend on the alert level. The different mission types are the following:

* Score Attack

* Fleet Hunt

* Experimental Unit Sabotage

* Anti-Air Defense Suppression

* Most Wanted

* Transport Hunt

For more information about these mission types as well as the strategies on clearing them, please refer to our dedicated guide page.

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