Rawen's Musings

Time for another slightly nostalgic gaming adventure from the woof. This time partly fuelled by EA’s act of open-sourcing some of the Command and Conquer titles. Yes, EA has some bright moments from time to time. That doesn’t mean I’ll forgive them for murdering Westwood >:3 With the micro-rant away, let’s dive into a game from the mentioned series which was my gateway into RTS and part of my childhood, Tiberian Sun.

I can’t really remember when I stumbled upon the demo of the game but for some reason it immediately stuck with me. I spent quite a lot of time in the demo just toying with it and eventually managed to get one of the campaigns, namely the GDI one (the good side in the story). Yes, I didn’t get it the “right way” but in 90’s this scene was a bit of a wild west in my country. It took months before I managed to get the second disc with the Brotherhood of Nod campaign. How much this game influenced my childhood? You’d have to ask my parents for that one :P Anyway, I spent a lot of time in game, playing it back and forth. I even got the Firestorm expansion later but only managed to properly play through that one now.

And I’m about to take you on this journey in multiple parts. I wasn’t challenging myself with high difficulty but I also tried playing every single mission, including optionals that I normal don’t play. I’ll split the story into four parts, one for each campaign, starting with GDI: Evolutionary Response.

Missions 1 and 2

I’ll combine the first missions together since they serve as a form of tutorial. In first mission you basically get to learn how to control your units, basic building and unit training and then you just do a sweep of the map to clear out all enemies. In the second mission you’re supposed to secure the place for civilian evacuation by removing SAM sites scattered around the map and taking out a small NOD camp. You’re provided an MCV with an escort and as mentioned, the mission serves as a full base-building tutorial so you know how to make your own fortress from scratch. Overall, both missions are super easy and don’t need much of a dive into.

Mission 3a

The first optional mission in the mix. In this one we’re to capture a train station that NOD is using to ferry cargo from a recently crashed alien ship and also transport reinforcements. Taking the station cuts NOD away from this strategic point, making the next mission easier. This is also the first mission in which you don’t get a base at all and only play with a strike team. This poses a bit of a challenge since you have to make sure to preserve your units and frankly, there are some you have to babysit a little, be it non-combatants like engineers and medics or grenadiers who have the tendency for rather explosive deaths. That said, you’ll stumble upon few communication buildings which you can capture and get some reinforcements.

There are two ways to reach the station. You can either go directly towards it but then you have to “punch through” the main entrance which is a little bit too well protected for your small group. You can make your job easier by going along the shore once before you cross the river where you’ll spot the small camp that’s guarding the station. The game tells you to destroy the power plants powering the the defences and provides with two Titans (main battle-walkers of GDI) which have sufficient range to reach the buildings. Once you take the power plants out, entering the base becomes easy.

The other way is to get to a higher ground and follow the multiple bridges until you reach a small petrol station with an enemy engineer next to it. You have to take this engineer out before he crosses the bridge ahead of you or he’ll destroy it. When you do so, you’ll reach a small village occupied by NOD. Clear the occupiers and the residents will show you a secret path that leads directly to the station behind enemy’s defences. Then you just need to clear out the camp, capture the train station and mission’s finished. Either way, it’s not a really challenging mission as long as you keep an eye on your units.

Mission 3b

The main mission for securing the crash site. NOD is extracting the valuable technology from the crashed ship and is studying it in a tech centre nearby. Our task is to secure the ship and capture the tech centre. Don’t be like me and destroy it like I did when I played the mission for the first time. You’ll get to build a base so the mission is quite easy as resources are abundant and there’s no time limit. Build up a strike force and head east to the crash site first. Remember to use Titans to break through defences since they outrange the laser turrets. NOD will counter with tanks of their own but building a strong enough army shouldn’t be an issue. Once you reach the crash site, NOD will try to destroy the ship so take out the units stationed around. Once done, you can focus on the tech centre which is inside the NOD base.

To reach the tech centre, you can either do it the “hard way” and just ram your army in through the main entrance which shouldn’t be too difficult, or you can go through the back door. The latter is a tunnel on the north which is guarded by laser turrets but you have Titans for the job. Then you just need to get into the base, “disarm” your opponent (aka destroy production buildings so no units/structures can be built) and just waltz an engineer right into the tech centre. In the end, the mission isn’t super difficult due to abundant resources and you can take all the time in the world to finish it.

Mission 4

The first mission which may become a bit of a bump. NOD is obviously not happy about the loss of the ship and they don’t want you to have it. So they intend to destroy it. Your task is to defend the crash site for five minutes. You get provided a defence force and a small camp with barracks so you can train more troops. However, you can’t build any structures since you don’t have the construction yard. Furthermore, you get no refineries so your resources are limited. And as a cherry on top, the entire mission is played during an ion storm which disables your radar (not a big deal since the map is small and you can easily scroll around). The ship itself also isn’t in your control so you can’t repair it directly. You can, however, use engineers for this task so have some on standby for emergencies.

First things first, sell the radar and two power plants since you won’t need them at all. As mentioned, your radar is disabled because of the storm so it’s no use to have one. The barracks can operate without power just fine. The only penalty is that the production will be a little slower. NOD will try to attack you from two directions, north and south so have the units ready at the entrances and keep the provided vulcan cannon turrets repaired. Around half of the remaining time, NOD will try one of their trademark tactics, using subterrainian transports to emerge right next their target and attacking it. There will be group of three which will dig out right next to the ship so have some units ready. Once the timer runs out, the storm passes and you’ll be provided with reinforcements to repel one final push from NOD.

This mission can get rough on higher difficulties due to the need to watch multiple places at once and if you lose the static defences it can get a bit nasty. But overall, it’s not an extremely hard mission.

Mission 5a

Whoo boy, this one was a bit of a brick wall for me as a kid. Mainly due to my lack of skills but also due to the order I’ve chosen to tackle the objectives in. During our research of the ship we’ve encountered the Forgotten; humans mutated by the substance, Tiberium, which we also use as our source of income. They’ve tasked you with rescuing their leader who’s been captured for experiments. However, the prison hospital is being protected by a sensor array which would detected us the moment we’d enter the area. This would lead to an execution order on the leader. So, in this mission, we’re tasked with destroying the array first.

The mission again a non-building one and so we’ll be relying on a strike team and reinforcements again. This time however the enemy’s forces are stronger and have some nasty ambushes ready. Not to mention, the reinforcements will only arrive once we destroy parts of the array which consists of three relay stations and the array itself. Each relay station is defended in its own manner; One is seemingly unprotected but remember, they can come from the ground >:3, another one is behind a Tiberium vein field which significantly damages any mechanical unit, so you need to preserve some infantry. It’s also close to a NOD base so they can easily send reinforcements. The final relay is then close to the array which is well defended on its own and is also protected by a solid amount of static defences.

Once you take out each relay, you’ll get some extra units. If you’re careful you should accumulate a decent enough army so the final attack on the array is relatively easy. But if you lose too many, the mission will prove quite difficult. And remember, grenadiers like to turn your army into an involuntary failed fireworks show so keep them safe and in good health.

Mission 5b

Alright, let’s save the Forgotten leader. This mission can be split into two parts; the rescue and the elimination. In the first part, you’ll be controlling a small commando of two elite units, Ghost Stalker and Umagon and a hijacker who can capture enemy vehicles. Umagon is a Forgotten sniper and Ghost is essentially a heavy weapons/demolition expert. With just these three you have to save the leader. First, capture yourself a tank which will attack you early after the beginning. Next, let Umagon scout a bit and snipe any infantry she comes across so you won’t get attacked by more enemy units. Once this is done, keep moving until you reach a tiberium field where you can rescue a beast called “Tiberium Fiend”; a dog-like creature which can throw shards of tiberium at enemies. When you save it, it’ll follow one of your units, usually Ghost. After this, move towards the cliff and use the tank to take out the defences from the checkpoint right across. You could use Ghost for the task but he’d get injured quite a bit in the process. On the bright side, Forgotten can heal in tiberium due to their mutations (normally, tiberium harms humans). Once the defences are removed, take out the rest of th check point with Ghost and move towards the prison.

Here, get ready for a quick action. Use Umagon to blow up some ammo crate which creates a hole in the wall then just run in right towards the hospital building. It’ll explode, releasing the prisoner. You have to do this part within around two minutes. When that happens, select all your units and start running back the way you came towards the extraction zone. Don’t bother fighting back any enemies that go after you. Just make sure you don’t lose any of your units because then you’d fail the mission. Once the leader is extracted, the second part begins.

For the second part, you’ll be provided with an MCV so you can build your base in the top right corner of the map. This part is then straightforward since you just need to destroy the NOD presence in the area. You’ll also get access to the first air unit of GDI but you don’t have to use them and I personally recommend waiting a bit before toying with an airforce. The bombers are better >:3

Now, what happens if you skip the optional mission? Well, your commando in the first part gets immediately detected, triggering a time limit for the rescue operation. Don’t worry, you’ll get ~25 minutes which is honestly quite generous. The harder part is that you can’t go through the entrance from before because the bridge behind the check point is destroyed. You have to take the long way around which leads close to the main base you’ll be fighting later. However, it’s not that much difficult compared to the easier variant. You mainly need to be more careful during the escape to make sure you don’t accidentally run into the base itself. Once the rescue is done, the mission plays out the same.

Mission 6a

With the leader safe and in a reasonable health, our mission shifts towards recovering an important artefact that was found in the ship, the Tacitus. This one is supposed to in a possession of NOD general, Vega. His base is on an island and it’s using a nearby dam to generate power. Our task in this mission, which is optional, is to destroy the dam.

I won’t beat around the bush, I HATE this mission with a burning passion. It’s easily the most difficult mission in the entire campaign, which is weird because I don’t remember having so much trouble with it as a kid. It’s again a non-building mission and the strike team you’re provided is quite small. It doesn’t help that NOD starts using flame tanks (which can move underground too, just like their APCs) which can basically delete your entire infantry contingent. And especially in this mission, every unit lost is a massive blow since you’ll get very little in terms of reinforcements.

Your task is to navigate through a small city towards two control stations. Along the way you’ll encounter quite a lot of ambushes so be careful and frankly, save often and don’t hesitate to re-do the mission from the start if you get into too much trouble. Reaching the first station is super difficult, especially the final stretch where you have to go along an extremely well-defended cliff. Remember, every unit counts so muster up your micro-managing skills. Once you manage to take out the first control station, the second one should be much easier despite being inside a NOD base. It’s luckily right behind the entry gate so you just need to get in and go for it immediately. Once both are down, the power plant gets overloaded resulting in a self-destruction. If you can’t do that, make sure to at least save some Titans to destroy the dam directly. They have just enough attack range and the dams are considered ordinary structures. And the end-result? Well …

Mission 6b

Here we go, time to strike Vega’s base. As mentioned before, the it’s on an island, there’s only one bridge that connects to it which can be used to your benefit too and the island is covered in SAM sites so getting in from air is a no-go. And to make matters even more difficult, the entry point has quite a bit of air defences too so you can’t get in easily. Unless … you took out the dam in the previous mission which disables the air defences. That’s right, finishing the optional mission disables the air defences in the area for 20 minutes which allows you to get the MCV delivered immediately and start building your base. Otherwise, you’d have to use the initial strike team to run around the starting area and take out the SAMs yourself. So as much as the optional mission drives me insane, it’s actually quite beneficial.

Now, as for the rest of the mission, get your defences up quick because Vega isn’t going to go easy. He strikes hard with a lot of units, he’ll try sending APCs into your bases filled with engineers to capture your buildings so pave your base to prevent this from happening and he’ll also go with siege tactics with artillery. Luckily, you’ll get an EMP cannon which you can use to slow down any attack and deal with it on your own terms. For artillery, have a small air force ready to clean them up.

Alright, now that you’re safe and capable of building up a strike force, how do we get into Vega’s base? Like I mentioned, there’s only one bridge which is quite well protected. It’s also easy to destroy it which can halt your progress and cost you some units if you’re not careful. The abundance of SAM sites also makes air support difficult but this can be dealt with using a little trick GDI has in their sleeve. Because just like NOD has APCs that can dig under ground, GDI has units that can traverse water. And the island where Vega’s base is built on has a shore that’s accessible. This means that you can train an infantry squad which you can drop onto the island and use it to take out a good portion of the air defences, making air strikes a bit more viable (still no bombers but better than nothing). With some luck, you might even be able to put a small dent into the base itself making the actual attack easier. Once you’re confident you can do it, go in hard and take out everything EXCEPT the temple which is right in the middle of the base. The temple is shaped like an Aztec or Mayan pyramid and it’s the actual Vega’s hideout. The game will tell you to keep it and capture it once you find it. After capturing the temple and eliminating every single enemy unit (yes, it’s this type of mission), you’ve succeeded in the task and got through the first half of the campaign.

Mission 7

Alright, time for the campaign to enter a new theatre. This time we’re going to look into Europe, specifically the Norwegian town of Hammerfest which in the game is a “home” to one of the strongest GDI bases. The base also houses an experimental piece of technology, the Firestorm Wall, which creates an impenetrable shield for any object. However, NOD managed to break through the defences and capture the base. And of course they’re using the wall to make the base completely impossible to access. But every safe can be broken into when you know how. In our case, we’ll use the water trick again.

So, the first part of the mission is to capture our base back. To do so you’re give a tiny strike team consisting of three Hover MRLS (basically a floating HIMARS, or later referred to as hover tank) and an APC with a group of engineers. You’ll also get a nice demonstration of the firepower of the hover tanks by destroying a bridge, cutting reinforcements to the NOD base you’ll be fighting later. After the show, load up the APC and protect it at all costs. Same goes for the hover tanks since you won’t get any reinforcements. Navigate the frozen river further until you reach a ground access. Keep the APC safely back and enter with the hover tanks until you go back into the water and spot a radar on a small island. Take it out including the turrets around. You don’t have to worry too much about safety since missiles have a lot of range. Once dealt with, move a bit further until you find a destructible cliff which you can later use to go back to ground. You’ll spot power plants across a cliff which are in range. Take these out as well since otherwise you wouldn’t be able to progress safely, if at all.

Once you regroup with the APC, move your strike team forward through the river and after a while you’ll see the reason why you took out the power plants; a fully powered NOD Obelisk of Light, ready to completely annihilate your strike team. Trust me, there’s no way to get past it unharmed if it stayed online. But because you took the power out, you’re safe to move forward until you get on the ground again. Once you do, just head straight north, ignoring any fights until you yet again return to water, right at the edge of the map. Now head west and keep going until you find another destructible cliff. Turn it into an entrance and move up the hill and after heading south for a while you’ll find a battered GDI wall. Well, welcome home. Almost. The base defences are offline so you don’t have to worry about those (and believe me, punching through an RPG turret that’s near the central section where you need to would be a nightmare) but the firestorm wall is online so you can’t reach the construction yard that you have to capture. Most of the power plants are also located behind the wall but luckily some are in the outer perimeter. You have to destroy at least one and severely damage another for the wall to come down. Once this happens, destroy a section of a wall to enter the inner perimeter, drive in with the APC, unload the engineers and capture the construction yard.

Here we go, now we have a base! With defences that are turned off and many buildings that are heavily damaged. So first, start repairing basically everything important; refinery, production facilities, con-yard if it gets damaged. Next up, power up some of the defences to remove any enemy units. At the same time, start producing a harvester or two to restart your economy. You can basically sell the firestorm generator because you won’t need the shield wall. That will be useful in later missions. Once you’re stabilised, start building up an army to fight the NOD base down south. It’s quite well defended since NOD has artillery placed around the entrances and not only they’re really strong but they’re also pin-point accurate (this was removed in the expansion). Resources are abundant so you can go big with production and build up a bit of a steamroller army to deal with the base. You can either try and “ram” through the main door or you can try to go around and attack the southern entrance which is a bit less protected although artilleries will make the task a bit rough. Remember to hunt down all enemy units to finish the mission

Mission 8

This is a mission which can either take you a lot of time or you can finish it in 5 minutes. NOD has managed to steal a train with a shipment of disruptor crystals which GDI uses in their sonic tanks (hello, House Atreides from Dune). The train is coming through this area and has been stopped at a checkpoint in front of a bridge that needs to be repaired. This is your time to strike. You’ll get a neat little force including some amphibious units, few Titans and infantry. Your task is to “catch the train” and recapture the shipment.

To do this, you can try three approaches. First one, take the strike team and try to punch through the defences. I strongly don’t recommend this idea because of course NOD is ready and the path to the checkpoint is well defended. If you want to finish the mission quickly, you just need to use the mentioned amphibious units. Load up the APCs and together with hover tanks, head directly south. Don’t delay yourself with enemy patrols and keep going until you reach a river. Guess where the river leads >:3 Yup, right under the currently destroyed bridge. So, keep going along the river until you reach the bridge. Here we can use the long range of the hover tanks to destroy the locomotive of the train to make sure it won’t go anywhere. Now we just need to reach the train and the southern entrance to the checkpoint is easier to break through. You just need to go a bit further down the river until you can get back to ground. Once you do, you just need to take out the defences and the gate, head into the checkpoint and destroy the cargo carriage and then just grab the crate which appears. There we go, mission finished quickly and efficiently :3

But what if you fail or you’re too slow and the bridge gets repaired? Well, the train moves onward into a NOD base and the mission changes into building one. Yes, you’ll be provided with a bit more units and an MCV to be able to build a base. To do so, you’ll need to head west first so you can have access to resources. You’ll be a bit close to the checkpoint but you should be equipped with enough units to keep you safe until you get the base going. The resources are a bit tight so you have to act a bit quick. Remember, you just need to get the cargo so you need enough units to be able to get into the NOD base and take out the train. It’ll be a bit more difficult since the base is much better defended but at the same time, you’ll be provided with the ability to build bombers which are really good at taking out tough units/buildings. Once you manage to break in, the task is the same as before.

Before I dive into the next mission, well, a lot of missions, we’re going need a bit of a longer briefing on how this plays out. Story-wise, NOD has acquired a technology to create missiles enriched with tiberium which leave toxic clouds on impact. Our task is to take the facility out to prevent further use. Moreover, there are Forgotten being held in a prison for experiments and Umagon wants your assistance to save them. As if the situation couldn’t be worse, the facility is well-defended and supplied from another place. How does the game translate this into gameplay? By optional missions, of course. So, there are now four related missions.

• 9a: Rescuing the Forgotten prisoners
• 9b: Destroy the supply facility
• 9c: Take out the power grid to weaken the main facility’s defences
• 9d: Destroy the missile production base

And to make the situation funnier, there are many ways to play the missions out

a) Play the main mission directly; my go-to way because I’ve got an approach which requires going the “hard way”. It’s not that hard, don’t worry

b) Play all the missions in order (be careful with 9c because you can easily skip it by accident)

c) Play just the 9a mission; Not really good because the reward isn’t that powerful.

d) Play just the 9b mission; Not recommended because it actually makes your job in the main mission harder

e) Play 9a and 9b, skipping the 9c; See above

Now that we know the set-up, let's get into the fray. I'll be following the scenario B and add the bit about the scenario A.

Mission 9a

Alright, time to be good guys and help the Forgotten. In this mission, our task is to liberate a prison camp where NOD holds Forgotten for experiments. Saving them will give us their infantry reinforcements for the following missions. Sounds neat, right? Ehh ... I frankly don't really like this one. First, it's a “raid” mission so no base. Second, infantry reinforcements at this phase of your campaign aren't really useful. Third, you have your Forgotten commando which you have to babysit ... with artillery already in the field. Artillery which is still perfectly accurate and can take out any infantry in one shell. Doesn't help that you won't get any reinforcements in the mission so you have to do with what you get.

Anyway, let's start the mission. First, we head up north to pick up the rest of the team, Ghost and hijacker. Keep in mind that if any member of the commando dies the mission fails so find a vehicle, preferably a tank, to “stash” your hijacker somewhere. And of course, keep the firing line between Ghost and his target clear because the railgun doesn't discriminate. Keep moving east until you reach the city. In here, you can try and find one hotel building which spawns cyborg patrols to stall your progress. Just be careful about the artillery placed roughly in the middle of the map so you don't get shelled into oblivion. Either way, you have to move through the city further east until you reach a cliff and a river. Once you do, move a bit south until you reach a bridge leading to our target. Be careful when crossing it because the bridge is made in one piece and if it gets destroyed you can easily lose good portion of your strike team. Once in the camp, clean it up, take out the air defences (you can do that with just the Ghost if you know the “forced attack trick” aka make him shoot behind his target instead of trying to bomb the target — don't ask me how I got the experience :P). Make sure you don't lose any of the prisoners because you can “soft fail” the mission; the mission won't fail but the transporter won't leave unless everyone has boarded. And you can't really board when you're one with the pavement. Yay, infantry reinforcements unlocked!

Mission 9b

Second optional mission, intended to weaken the enemy position in the main mission. You can consider this mission a practice for the main one since it's rather similar in terms of what you'll be dealing with. By which I mean missile strikes. And to make the matters more interesting, you're in a spot that's a bit crammed so you can't really spread out your base, making the incoming missiles more effective. Luckily, you can build the firestorm wall to shield yourself from the attacks. Just keep an eye on your power so you don't have to recharge it at the bad time. To make the mission even more interesting, there's a massive field of the tiberium veins creeping towards you, ready to eat anything that's armoured in any way, shape or form.

Ok, it's not that horrible. First, there's only one access to your base which is requires crossing the field so you're kind of protected. Second, you don't need a really large base so you can nicely squeeze in the small spot left by the ruins of the supply facility you find early in the game. You also get to play with a new toy, the Disruptor (remember sonic tanks from Dune?), which will probably quickly become your go-to unit. This, combined with a small bomber fleet should make taking out rest of the supply facility and the surrounding base an easy task. However, I recommend not being too hasty with removal of NOD presence and scout the map a bit.

The reason for scouting is a train station located in the northwestern corner, which will result in a visit from Ghost. This triggers a small side objective which is transporting Ghost to the station so he can board the train waiting there. Getting him there should be rather easy since you've probably disarmed the enemy at this point. Furthermore, you can load Ghost in a APC and deliver it to the station using a carryall. Once Ghost has boarded the train, the third and final optional mission will be unlocked. Otherwise, you'll go right into the main mission. However, you have to do the rescue mission. Otherwise, Ghost won't arrive. Once you have everything finished, the reward will be a lowered presence of NOD in the main mission. Good if you play all the optionals, less good if you don't.

Mission 9c

Third and final optional mission before the main course. Quick, easy and quite fun. Remember the train from the previous mission? This is where it's headed; a power station of NOD that's used to fuel the outer defence perimeter of the main base. In this mission, we'll get the chance to destroy it which will result in the defences being shut down, allowing for a much easier entry into the base.

But of course it's not going to be free because the moment we'll get close to the base, NOD figures out something is off and starts attacking the train. Grab all the mutant soldiers and just run north, away from the train. Don't bother fighting the enemy defenders because it'd be a waste of time and resources. Not to mention you have your commando squad to keep alive. Once you're safe, you just need to head west, taking out patrols along the way. Once close to the edge of the map, you head south, entering the base. Here ... you just let Ghost have his fun with few bundles of C4 >:3. Of course, be careful about the guards present there. Once you turn all the power plants to rubble, mission is finished. This is honestly the easiest mission from all the optionals and possibly the most useful one. Shame it's locked behind both of the previous optional missions.

Mission 9d

Alright, finally we can get into the main battle of this four mission ordeal. We have the reinforcements, the supply of the resources for the enemy are cut and the power grid has been crippled, lowering the defences of the main base. Or, to provide an immersion of the mission 9c happening simultaneously with the attack, the outer perimeter will be disabled after 30 minutes. The mission itself plays out very similarly to the mission 9b since the principle is the same. The main difference is that you have much more space and there's no harmful environment around. But you'll still be bombarded by missiles, so build-up your protections. One tip I suggest is to move your base a bit more to the east, close to the bridge leading to the enemy base. The place is in a city which means there will already be some pavement to prevent underground attacks and making the terrain hard to build on after missile strikes.

To beat the enemy, all you need to do is to build up a strike force of distruptors and just let them have their day behind enemy lines. Bring a mobile radar with because NOD will start doing their final trick, cloaking the entire base. This makes the fight a bit annoying since you have to “inch” forward to reveal bits of the base to destroy instead of just rolling in. To make the job a bit easier, try to work towards the power plants and take them out to reveal all the parts. The stealth generators take massive amounts of energy so revealing the base will go quickly although it's better to take out all the power plants to prevent the defences from kicking in once you start taking the base out. You have to destroy everything so you'll be hunting for units a bit but it should be an easy task since you already weakened NOD's position.

But what if you haven't done it? What if you jumped into the mission directly? Well, let's make the battle a bit more interesting. You'll be setting up your base at a similar location but this time you have to be more mindful and make sure to not put anything in the middle of the area. Why? Because after few minutes an MCV from NOD will arrive there to start a forward operation base. But you're already there. And you probably already have a barracks. Which means ... you can train an engineer >:3 Are you following the idea? Let's make a combined army! Oh yes, we'll be capturing the NOD construction yard and using their own weapons against them. Specifically, we'll utilise their artillery to break through the defence perimeter which will now be fully active. And of course it'll be cloaked so you have to bring a mobile radar. Once you're through, the rest of the mission plays the same. In my opinion, this way the mission is a bit more fun while not being that much more difficult. The main difficulty stems from having to punch through the defences and maintaining a large base since you're working with two tech trees.

Mission 10

Phew, what an ordeal of the previous mission. Let's get into something more straightforward although even now you'll be given options. However, this time it's mainly about what kind of map you want to play. In this mission we'll be taking out an experimental facility for producing mechanical units. In game, this is mainly done by all the units being produced there having their veterancy level maxed out, giving them some extra abilities.

The mission is again in two parts. First, we have to find the facility. And who do we call for the task? That's right, our favourite commando. And this time we'll get a bit more than just the trio depending on the variant you'll be playing. Either way, you'll be looking for some transportation first because you need to be able to move more covertly. And soon you'll encounter a small compound which has just the thing, a NOD APC. But it's quite well defended and you don't really have a way to handle the defences easily. Or have you? Remember the trick with shooting behind the target with Ghost? This time we'll use it to make sure he survives an encounter with a laser turret. Sure, you can do the C4 thing but then you're very much risking Ghost's life (I'm quite sure he'd be dead on hard difficulty). Once you have the defences out of the way, run in with the hijacker, steal the APC, load up the commando and as many units as you can (in one of the variants you get more units that can fit the APC) and hide for a while to de-aggro the defenders. You'll also get a notification that the facility has cloaked so you have to wait for a bit before it reveals again. Once you take the heat off, you can start looking for the base. The facility can be discovered without having to enter enemy base if you're careful. Depending on the variant, you either have to get roughly at the centre of the map and bit to the east or you'll be going quite far west.

Once you reveal the facility, you'll be provided with an MCV so you can build up the army to take it out. Moreover, you'll be provided with a new toy yourself, the Mammoth Mk. II; the heaviest unit in your arsenal. Basically a Ghost in mechanical form which can attack both ground and air units and with a stronger railgun (you know the drill, don't stand in the line of fire). You'll be a little restricted in terms of available units (back to mission 7 level) so you'll have to be a bit resourceful. Another difficulty is coming from the fact that you have to keep an eye on your commando from the first part because this time around it's not “removed” from the game after you're done with the first task. In the end however, levelling the base should prove easy.

Mission 11

The pen-ultimate mission of the campaign. And whoo boy does it make sure you feel it. The GDI command ship, Kodiak, is grounded due to an ion storm and is also unable to communicate with any other base. And to make matters worse, it's in a middle of NOD territory. And to make matters even worse, NOD has found out. And they want you dead. So you're basically defenceless, incapable of running if needed and you're basically surrounded. Perfect recipe for disaster, right? Nah, not so fast.

As you've probably figured out, our task here is to protect Kodiak and show NOD that you don't need massive resources to take them down. But to do that, you have to survive the first attack. You should be able to do so with all the provided units while starting to build up the base. Good idea is to “hug” the Kodiak with the buildings so it's not easily accessible. You can also repair Kodiak as if it was your building. But be careful with the building part because your resources are limited.

And this right here is one of the main reasons you might have to restart the mission. There are three fields in the near area but remember that you're deep in the NOD territory. This means that the fields are well guarded, artillery included. One of these fields is also quite close to the enemy base (funnily enough, it's the easiest and the best field to conquer). So if you lost a bit too many units during the first round of defence, you'll be in a LOT of trouble because you need to liberate one of the fields. And good luck running through artillery fire with their pinpoint accuracy.

Once you do, the economy war comes into play. It'll take a while to build up your army so the best thing to do is to starve your opponent. If you took the field that's close to the entry to the main base, you should be able to begin starving your opponent by hunting their harvesters. Of course they won't let you have them for cheap so make sure you protect your own. Remember, you're still at a disadvantage so any loss on your end hurts quite a bit. However, once you manage to stabilise, you can try to ramp up the pressure by sending a small strike team along the northern edge of the map to try and cripple enemy's power grid. This will both speed up the “bleeding” process as well as help you take out the rest of the base later. When you notice the intensity of enemy pressure has lowered a lot, you're pretty much done and all that remains is to clean up the mess. One perk of this mission being played during an ongoing ion storm is not having to worry about air units so you don't have to haul anti-air with you (not that you can because your hover tanks are grounded too). Downside is not having radar coverage, so no mini-map. Mobile radars do work so you can spot stealth and underground units. To finish the mission, you have to yet again clean up everything so remember to search the map for stragglers. Most likely they will be the patrols defending the other fields.

Mission 12

It is time; time to kick NOD in the teeth once and for all. And just in time too because they got eyes on your orbital command station and have their ultimate weapon ready to fire as “bonus”. The task is easy; take out the missile launchers that are targeting the station and the main temple containing the weapon.

This mission is pretty much no holds barred as it should be. You have everything at your disposal to take out the enemy including the access to the ion cannon defence grid so you can give NOD taste of some superweapons of your own. But first things first, we have to clean up a landing zone and the spot for our first base. Once you start settling in, a timer starts for the first launcher. Don't worry, the game is quite generous and gives you one hour to take it out and get the same time limit for each launcher. Not that you can do it super quick since the launcher is tucked inside the enemy base; one of the three bases you'll have to take out. It's not a good idea to rush the mission either because once you take one out, the map expands and so does the enemy pressure which can easily overwhelm you if you're not prepared.

Alright, let's deal with the first launcher and use the opportunity to expand our forces. Because nothing humiliates your enemy more than being able to do the “stop hitting yourself” thing >:3 But first we need to conquer the base. To do so, you can either do it the sneaky way by driving an APC along the northern edge of the map to the northwestern corner and then sneaking behind the refinery to capture few silos and building a barracks of your own to begin your “hostile takeover”. You'll also get help from few good old mammoth tanks which you'll discover in an old base from the first war with NOD. And trust me, you'll need them for this approach because that obelisk at the back entrance is hungry for kills. The other way is to do it the “hard way” and just punch through the main entrance, disarm the enemy and capture everything that's nailed down. Just remember to keep the launcher alive for the time being because you'll be hunting the next one right after destroying it. Also, you have to cross a bridge if you're going to just steamroll the main entrance so be careful that your army doesn't become a fleet of decommissioned submarines. Once you're starting to settle in your “new home” clear our the defences around the place and prepare a firestorm wall on the southern side of the base. Because of course you'll be given a “housewarming gift” once you take out the launcher.

Ok, one down, two more to go. This one's in the southeastern corner and of course tucked in the enemy base again. The missile strikes complicate the situation further, either by bombing your strike team or splitting your attention by having to tend to the damage to your base. On the other hand, you have access to NOD tech so getting through the defence perimeter should be easier. And the combined might of artillery and disruptors is really hard to contest. Once in, you might spot a bridge heading east. You don't have to pay attention to it now because it leads to the main temple but you can save that for the last. Just mow down the base and again, keep the launcher alive for a bit so you can prepare for the final one. Of course, don't forget to take it out once ready.

Now for the third and the final launcher. This one is hidden, quite literally because of stealth generators, inside a NOD air staging base in the middle of the map. Good news, the base is the smallest. Bad news, it's on an island and there's only one accessible shore which is of course covered by an obelisk. The anti-air is quite significant too so bombing runs can get expensive fast and you can't really scout the base well. That said, you have control over the majority of the map so you can “throw” some units away. And once you spot the place where the launcher should be, you can do a “suicide” bombing run to take it out. This one you can do quickly because once it's been destroyed, there's no more time limit. The only remaining thing is to clean up all the mess.

Now, only one last thing remains, the main temple which is on the other side of the bridge you skipped earlier. This one is a total cakewalk because if you saved it for last, then there's nothing keeping the defences up (though the turrets still work due to how they're designed). So just walk in and remove the last bits of NOD presence, the main temple, which is shaped like a pyramid, included.

Congratulations, you just saved the world ... well, not really because the story continues in an expansion and a following game. But this is a story for another time.

R.R.A.

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