Err, avoid the patrols? you can see the route in your map.

You can buy torpedoes...

Learn to fly better?

Life: No one gets out alive.

Use a bigger stick with a bigger nail in it...

Seriously, the best way to avoid death is to be where your opponents crosshairs aren't.

Just my $0.02, but it could just be the cardamine talking.
Nil Mortifi Sine Lucre
aka Shaman - gameArena Server

Just use short bursts of your afterfurners to vary your speed, it makes you very very hard to be hit. Make sure you have good weapons for their types of shields also.

...you...were killed...by a patrol.....

hmhm...hehehehe.....HAHAHAHHAHAH
Sorry, but, I attack every person that has a bad rep with me and I just blast through them and my shield rarely fails. and when It comes to artifact smugling...they never get to me.

If you mean that you are stuck at Tekagi's Arch (thread title) then just enter the base from the bottom like you were told to.
To beat Tekagi's Arch, I had the Barracuda with some Kusari weapons at the Battleships. Sunfrenzy, Sunfury (i forgot exactly what I had, oh well)
For those of you that are Freelancing and still have the Anubis with Flamecurse then read further, otherwise, do not.

---------------
use this setup
for the ship
Get a good Corsair rep at Freeport 9. then go to Leon Base or Crete and see your surprise for a great sum of money.
or
Go to Freeport 9 and get something not as good, but still good for a lot cheaper.
or
Get a good rep with Outcasts at Freeport 10 and go to Malta and get your surprise there.
or
Go to Freistadt and get your surprise.

for the weapon
Search around Yanagi Depot for Hidden wrecks and get 2 nice weapons that can only fit on ships with class 10 weapon slots.
or
Destroy Outcasts nearby Freeport 10 and get thier weapons.

For the shield
Go to Crete or Malta and get your shield.

(you said no spoilers, so i did not say what systems these are in and what you'll get)

-------
I live on the outskirts of the Sirius Sector near a Nomad Nebula...Planet Crete, Omicron Gamma.

sounds more like Takeshi's Castle to me!

Make sure you have played the game long enough to have a decent ship. First time I tried it, I was getting furious at failing repeatedly -- in part because I used up my shield batteries before I even got to the arch. Then I went back to an earlier save and took the time to get a Barracuda and long range Outcast weapons. With those guns, I could blast away without getting hit much myself. Failing on missions like as not means you haven't got the right equipment for the job. Don't rush the game.

p.s. With the Outcast guns I never once got hit by the battleship (which sort of buggers off or something when the shield generators go). Without them, I got blasted by the battleship every time I tried to get in range of the shield generators.
The Outcast guns give you an extra 100 meters to work with -- which is longer than an American football field.

Hmm. I managed to do pretty well in a Hawk with the Kusari Photon Blasters.

Just try to avoid fire on the first partol if you can't kill them. Ozu&crew will handle them.

Once you get to the Arch itself, don't attack the fighters, instead, concentrate all your fire on the shield generators.

The three other generators are easy, but the one next to the battleship is tough B-)

Also, when you've destroyed the shield generators, don't click on the Arch and dock. You'll be dead halfway before you got there. Fly extremely close to it and then press dock.

Also, let your shield recharge a bit (at least half for high-level shields, full for low-level ones) before you try to dock. There is a lot of ordnance flying about, and you cannot launch flares or apply nanos/batts while docking. Murphy's Law pretty much guarantees that you will get hit by several missiles if you dock with your shield low ...

Believe me, I learned this the hard way. The first time I tried to beat this mission with a Starflier I initiated docking with only about 20% shield left; I was almost into the docking bay when I turned into a nice fireball ... The second and third times I died while taking out the gennies (ran out of flares one time, the other I was too slow to get out of the blast radius before the missile hit the flare) but the fourth time I let the shield recharge to the max before docking, believe you me.

The most important thing about dealing with the first patrol is not to take it head on - fly towards them in a wavy line or corkscrew or whatever but do not fly a straight line. Also, try to approach them from the side or from the rear, and let their formation break up before you dive in. It must be almost 50 guns that are trained on you during the initial approach - enough to roast even a Dragon or Barracuda within fractions of a second. During the skirmish it is better to choose enemies near the edge of the battle zone rather than right in the middle, at least if you fly one of the lighter ships. You could also try to pick your fights in the asteroid field (or nebula, whatever it is) rather than in open space, if the battle conditions permit.

Thanks for the tip ... Im using a Dragon heavy fighter with with 6 skyrails along with my missiles and torpedos.
Should that do the trick ?

Definitely. The Dragon is a powerful ship, though not quite as manoeuverable as the light fighters and the Barracuda. But if you use the strafe keys and occasional taps of the afterburner then you can dodge enemy fire pretty well, and the 'X' key helps you tracking enemies better/longer in tight turns.

The powerplant of the Dragon has enough juice to dispatch the targets quickly with guns alone, so you don't have to use missiles unless you want to. The advantage of using guns is that the 'ammo' regenerates but missiles don't. On the other hand, missiles and torpedos can be fired from far away - which is a big advantage in this mission - and the Dragon has enough hardpoints so that you can mount two missile launchers and still have enough guns for dogfighting.

And don't worry if you get your wings shot off - this makes you a smaller target and the shields last longer as a result. My Starflier lost both wings during this mission but I repaired them because I was not clever. When it lost both wings again during mission 11 I did not repair them; I only put them back on just before the last mission, because I wanted the ship to look good on the game-beaten screenie.

I used the Cavalier and manged to beat the patrols with fairly strong guns and misslies as well. I also used my after burners to help me avoid enemy shots.

Hey Sherlog, isn't that radiation in the experimental shipyard in mission 10 a bit fatal?

It forces even a Hawk to use nanobots at least two times, and then you've got that battleship to destroy too...