Finished the campaign … at last!

[SandJ]

Well, it has taken me at least three years (probably more), but I've finally finished the campaign!

Much of that time was the "incoming enemy transport" level which held me up for a year or two until I finally gave in and looked online for the solution.

While looking for help on how to complete that mission I saw some spoilers and discovered you can recycle units.

Discovering you can recycle units meant I found out how you get the drivers to survive long enough to get promoted. It would have helped if that was in the tutorial.

To complete the campaign I also had to work out:

- stop trying to use commanders. They are in the employ of the enemy and their prime purpose is to get their troops under the enemy's towers. They are useless, no, worse than useless.

- give up using armed units and use artillery, sensors and builders to win the game. A creeping wall of sensors and artillery + air defence is unstoppable.

- flying vehicles are useless until right toward the end of the campaign when the Scourge is available.

My method for cheating:

- saving the game just before a mission is due to end, then playing ahead to see what the next mission needs at the start, then re-load the saved game and creating that starting environment for the next mission. Certainly finish research and upgrade units and build the maximum number of research & factories.

- on away missions, de-construct as much of the buildings as you can to get the credits back.


Also, I sense a change happened in the most recent version which allowed me to continue the campaign. One good change seems to be that obsolete equipment is no longer offered to be built.


As for the campaign end-movie - is that it? That wasn't worth waiting 3 years for.

[NoQ]

Hmm. I think i've shown it quite clearly in my video walkthrough that these two points are completely wrong:

- stop trying to use commanders...

Commanders give a direct buff to the units they control, in accuracy, evasion, damage, and movement speed, which amounts to multiple times powerup when they reach high experience levels. Most importantly, through evasion and movement speed buff, your tanks have much higher chance of not-dying and reaching the repair facility faster and thus saving your money (and experience, but the latter no longer matters when you have commanders).

- give up using armed units and use artillery, sensors and builders to win the game...

No, this is too slow. Tanks have much higher damage per second, so you can win a lot faster with them, like taking <1/4 time on most levels.

[SandJ]

Well, I found it easier to stop using commanders. The only non-combat turrets I could find use for were scanners and trucks. Attaching combat vehicles to scanners, CB turrets or commanders just gets them killed, in my experience.

[montetank]

My method for cheating:
- saving the game just before a mission is due to end, then playing ahead to see what the next mission needs at the start, then re-load the saved game and creating that starting environment for the next mission. Certainly finish research and upgrade units and build the maximum number of research & factories.

- on away missions, de-construct as much of the buildings as you can to get the credits back.

At first: Congratulations. You have solved the campaign without help. second: With the commanders-sorry, you are not right. The commanders are very usefull. And last: Thats no cheating you did. That was very intelligent to see, what the next mission needs. To prepare for the next mission is 50% to solve the campaign Welcome to the club.
If you want to continue-Cam 4 is in work-try it out
viewtopic.php?f=49&t=10665&start=330

[Tzeentch]

"Discovering you can recycle units meant I found out how you get the drivers to survive long enough to get promoted. It would have helped if that was in the tutorial."

lol I like the deeper thought process of a man getting out a tank inside the factory to get into a new one.

yeah back on the PS1 thats how I beat the game just see next mission and keep a few saves. That memory card's 8MB got alot used by WZ.

[t4ngld]

Hmm. I think i've shown it quite clearly in my video walkthrough that these two points are completely wrong:Commanders give a direct buff to the units they control, in accuracy, evasion, damage, and movement speed, which amounts to multiple times powerup when they reach high experience levels. Most importantly, through evasion and movement speed buff, your tanks have much higher chance of not-dying and reaching the repair facility faster and thus saving your money (and experience, but the latter no longer matters when you have commanders).

Hard to believe, is it the same as in MechCommander, where lesser skilled units had less chances of hitting the higher skilled ones? That's actually awesome!

Also, according to

viewtopic.php?f=30&t=4774

it's at best 45%, which is not exactly "multiple times powerup" - did you maybe mean to say that the sum of the bonuses, even though they only constitute a fraction of the original value, makes the unit many times more efficient? (in quality, not quantity)

[NoQ]

It's 45% bonus on not just one stat, but on multiple aspects. 1.45 × 1.45 × 1.45 ... something like that.

[t4ngld]

I see now, that makes sense, indeed.

Since this topic is directly related to commanders: Is there a way to specify a retreat point for your units in the campaign on the "retreat-at-medium/heavy damage" event, for example, with a beacon? I'd like to have the units return to the nearest mobile repair turret, or, if that's impossible by game design, at least have them retreat to a specific location on those events, as opposed to the default "return to HQ / LZ" behavior. Would anyone be interested in developing such a feature / accepting a patch for it? The rationale is that in the first couple missions, until you get commanders, such an addition might be very welcome.

[vexed]

Well, nothing is impossible, since all the source code is there...
Once you build the Repair Facility, that is basically what you are looking for I think...
viewforum.php?f=30 is for ideas & suggestions.

[t4ngld]

Sure, however in the campaign in the first few missions you have neither a commander nor a repair facility, and in multiplayer, I honestly know very little about when people research and build repair facilities, but maybe it could be useful to have units come back to the nearest repair turret or facility rather than only facility. So basically what we need is to add repair turrets to the list and figure out the priority somehow.

[montetank]

Sure, however in the campaign in the first few missions you have neither a commander nor a repair facility

You can build repair units instead of repair facilities. Give them the "hold position" command near your command center. So-in other words-you have repair facs

[t4ngld]

Sure, however in the campaign in the first few missions you have neither a commander nor a repair facility

You can build repair units instead of repair facilities. Give them the "hold position" command near your command center. So-in other words-you have repair facs

That's smart, you sir are good at combinations! I've noticed that damaged units retreat to the HQ building in the absence of repair bays, but, well, haven't yet arrived at combining that with mobile repair vehicles put on hold position. Probably, the reason is that I consider that to be too slow and thus try to intercept damaged units before they run away to the HQ. Or, resort to tricks: in the first New Paradigm mission, I simply put the repair turrets by the cliff next to the first cannon hardpoint, and have the retreating tanks stumble into them xD

[Bethrezen]

well I'm sorry to say this but all your points are completely wrong

Commanders are actually quite useful due to the bonuses they confair on attached units, yes the command and control is a little more difficult but you get used to it after a while but that is more an issue with pathing rather then a problem with the commander

second artillery is useful yes especially for breaching heavily entrench defences where I direct assault would be suicide, but they are very slow until you get hellstorm howitzers which will crush anything in seconds, so a much better approach in most cases is a units of lances attached to a commander they will make short work of all units and structures

as for VTOLs I'm afraid this is the most wrong statement of all VTOLs are so overpowered its not even funny clearly you are using them wrong try putting them on patrol over an area that way when they expend there ordnance they will return to base rearm and then return to continue fighting automatically what I like to do is put them on patrol over the enemies base to support of my ground units phosphor bombers are good for this since most units are not set up to resist fire damage thermite is more powerful but to slow for my taste, bunker buster vtols are good for quickly demolishing enemy defences although these are best controlled by the player as bunker busters have no effect on units, and lancer VTOLs are a real nightmare for ground units a squad of lancer VTOLs on patrol will have ground units for breakfast these are grate when attached to a VTOL tower which will make your VTOLs take off and attack automatically when the enemy gets detected, that combo is VERY VERY nasty and makes for a very effective defence as long as they don't have AAA

the VTOL CB tower / VTOL combo is interesting as that will make attached VTOLs automatically attack your opponents artillery when they fire on you in the same way the the stranded CB tower causes your artillery to fire on the enemies artillery if fired on although this is only advisable with unranked units as this will likely result in them flying in to enemy AAA and getting killed with if far from ideal

like with anything in this game for VTOLs to be truly effective you need to use quiet a lot of them, minimum you want is 20 that is enough that they will actually cause some serious damage just make sure to knock out there AAA first though that way your VTOLs wont get shot down and will eat the enemy alive in no time flat as only AAA and machine gun units can fire at VTOLs