KILL

Just finished the Soviet Campaign. There were a lot of close calls in the beginning. I'd say the last mission is equally as difficult as the final Allied mission, maybe even more so at the beginning. The pressure from the 3 beach landings and cruiser attacks is crazy. Once I took out the first naval yard, they stopped building cruisers, though 3 more came from the west side of the map, so I'm not sure if those were hidden or scripted to come at specific times. After I stopped the cruisers, it was just about protecting the beaches and then slowly working on my offensive attack. As for the rest of the Soviet campaign, it's way easier than the Allies. Mission 13 wasn't particularly difficult, but on hard, if you scout the chronosphere with a Spy plane, they will kill it and you lose. Also if you are too aggressive on their harvesters or with the bridges, they will kill it. Mission 11 was tough to get to their base because of the amount of ships and hidden mines. Mission 9 was insane at the start, but once you took out the brown Allied base it was easy. Soviet's have way better units and buildings in their arsenal... 3 Tesla coils can handle an infinite amount infantry. If you build walls around the Tesla's, they can handle an infinite amount of tanks. Turrets and pillboxes pale in comparison. For air defense, you only need 5 SAM sites to protect yourself from chopper attackers. Soviet's have way better tanks, way better air units, and the air drops + spy plane are great. I'm going to go back and do Covert Ops on Tiberian Dawn, then i'll play Counter-Strike and Aftermath.

How do you see in an .ini where they order units? Regardless, that mission was tough. A lot of pressure from the AI. Try to get any minerals and they will go for your harvester the moment they spot it. If you attack their harvester, they will send everything at you.

Single-player or multiplayer? If you look up a couple of threads, I have a discussion on the hardest game in the series. For single, on the hardest difficulty, Tiberian Sun was the easiest. It's expansion was a bit tougher and the last mission was difficult.

This isn't my first time playing the games. This is my second playthrough in 19 years. I have never played anything past RA2 or Firestorm. Never played Yuri's, RA3, C&C 3, or C&C 4. Going back on the discussion from the other page about the AI's intelligence... On Mission 8 of the Allied campaign on Red Alert, the Soviet AI used V2 rockets to destroy trees above my base, just so they could take another shot at my Chronosphere. Pretty smart AI for an ancient game. I don't know about the other difficulties, but on hard they always go for your harvesters, refineries, or other important buildings.

No question that the final Red Alert Allied mission is the hardest out of any I've played so far. By a good margin too. Compare it to Firestorm's final GDI/NOD mission? The AI is aggressive and constantly attacks you, but you have way more things at your disposal. Carryall a MK. II around the map to wipe out their bases or as NOD use subterranean APCs with engineers and cap/sell buildings. Once you deal with the cluster silos, then artillery, it's a breeze. Just takes a while to build up sufficient army. Compare it to Tiberian Dawn? You only need 2 guard towers or 2 obelisks to defend your base. The AI is aggressive, but doesn't send enough units to level your base. Resources are tighter in Dawn, but there is so much more you can do strategy wise. This mission was insane. Defense structures are utterly useless. I gave 2 attempts massing defense with tanks to assist, but I still failed hard. In the end, my strat was massing tanks to use as defense and offense. When I had enough I took out the lower base, but that made them mad and they sent tons of forces from the top, center, and bottom of the map. I then started building choppers and kamikazed them - taking out the construction yard first, then war factories, then 3 barracks. In total it took me 3.5 hours to win. There were a lot of close calls. Missions 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, and 15 were all challenging. AI is more aggressive then Dawn, they pump units just as fast, and they move faster. Crazy! I'll start Soviet campaign tomorrow.

Doesn't get more intense than this.

You do realize that the middle of the game speed slider is supposed to be the default game speed, right? I know, but I found the speed is different for every game. 4 (default speed) felt way too slow on Tiberian Dawn. So I put it to 6. For Tib Sun, default was like slow motion... I put it on 6 as well. On 7 (max) the game was unplayable it went so fast. 4 on Red Alert is not bad, but the infantry still seem too slow. I prefer 5. 6 is ok, 7 isn't hyperspeed like Tib Sun, but still too fast.

I'm only on mission 7 of the Red Alert Allied campaign but I'm already going to say this is the hardest game so far. AI is equally as aggressive as Tiberian Dawn on hard difficulty. I don't think they rebuild as fast, but they do keep up on repairs. Also the units in this game are way tougher. V2 rockets obliterate your base and the AI is smart enough to protect them with tanks. Then you got planes and paradrops going after your harvesters all the time. Mission #3 is where you really see how 'hard' hard difficulty is. Your objective is to destroy bridges with Tanya, but there are attack dogs scattered throughout the map, hidden in the fog of war. The minute they see you they are like lightning. They eat Tanya and the mission is failed. Only way to beat them is to turn the game speed down to 1/2 so you can pick them off. You can also use your 1 artillery unit, but there is so much infantry he will get wiped out by grenadiers. I complete forgot that lower power slows down the building of everything tremendously. Also engineers aren't really useful since you have to damage buildings quite low before you can capture them.

Both C&C 3 and 4 are on Steam, so i'll get them eventually, because I would like to finish the series. I've read many times that EA ruined the gameplay and ending of C&C 4 which is a damn shame.

Yeah I figured it was buggy. I just finished NOD 'Core of the Problem,' so I am done with Firestorm. I would say the beginning of that last mission is on par with any of the difficult missions from Tiberian Dawn. Once you get the missile silos destroyed, it's easier, but you still have to watch for air attacks which will wreck your construction yard. Now even though it's the same mission, the NOD version is very different. GDI I was constantly pounded by artillery, but not once when I played as NOD. When you play NOD, the computer has way more air units and more well defended bases. They had like 5 mini bases spread across the map with obelisks, juggernauts, banshees, cyborgs, tick tanks, and artillery. The defense for one of the control stations was 15 artillery + bombers! Really enjoyed Tib Sun + Firestorm, but as far as difficulty goes, Tiberian Dawn is harder overall. Only the last mission of Firestorm with so much going on at the beginning is a challenge. Since I don't have C&C 3 or C&C 4, I'm going to start Red Alert.

Oh yeah I was going to ask... How is the mission efficiency calculated in Tib Sun? When I completed the 3rd to last Tib Sun NOD mission a while back (Jake Mcneil), my efficiency was 24%! I completed it in 4:13, none of my units died, and I was never detected in, or on the way out. I just did the 3rd to last NOD Firestorm mission and I got 170% efficiency. I ended with 21k credits, but I lost 20 structures and 33 units.

Fun little fact: you don't need to face the Defender at all. Disruptors can shoot through Firestorm wall, and can be used to simply destroy the core inside its "protected" area XD I used Mammoth mk 2 and shoot the core through the CABAL's firestorm. I didn't expect that mission can be done just like that without needing to fight the Core Defender. The defender was hard when I played as Nod,he's a real badasss, I destroyed him by blowing a bridge he was standing on(actually my intention was to lure him to the south-eastarn island and destroy the bridge,trapping him there). Yeah, that mission was tough. CABAL's attack was relentless, thankfully the EMP canon helps a lot. Trapping him is genius! I was more worried about the constant attacks on my base, so I hadn't fully explored the massive map. I figured the CABAL core was up in the top corner somewhere and was just protected by the firestorm wall and some defenses. How wrong I was... I'm going to do the NOD missions now and I'll have a different strategy for him when I get there.

Just finished Core of the Problem, the final GDI Firestorm mission. To put it simply, it was insane! I don't know about easy or normal difficulties, but on hard, it was. It's like every minute you were getting hit by missiles, then artillery showed up, devil's tongue come out of the ground, bombarded by aircraft, mass groups of bikes and cyborgs, etc. What made it even more difficult, it that the missiles and artillery ripped up the ground in my base. It was pretty much impossible to expand. I had to build everything so close because of terrain, so there was constant friendly fire, and more missile attacks would take out multiple structures. Once I took out the silo's it was easier. Thankfully they didn't rebuild those. The artillery still hurt, but eventually they stopped coming after I wiped out the banshees and a mini NOD base. The ending was just epic, with the giant CABAL cyborg. I complete forgot about him. I definitely didn't complete it the most efficient way. I used orca bombers to take out the giant Obelisk, then used a Mk. II to attack the main CABAL building. Mk. II didn't do much damage and it kept repairing, so I took my bombers and got it to half hp, but the other Obelisk wiped them all out. I had the CABAL build at 1 block of health and the cyborg was wiping out my entire base. In the end, I just barely won. Firestorm, while short, is just as good as I remember. Found the AI better than Tib Sun. More aggressive for sure. Though they still don't mass build infantry like Tiberian.

Well it was my second playthrough of both games in 19 years. So perhaps in another 20 years I'll play the campaigns again. I am definitely going to leave them installed for the multiplayer though. It's so cool that people are actually interested in these classics!

I just completed the NOD campaign. It was just as fun as the GDI campaign and cutscenes were hilariously cheesy. No difference in difficulty though. I'd say GDI has the better tanks. Not a fan of the Tick Tank's and I found stealth tanks are only good for scouting. The best strat for me was just going mass artillery to wipe out their base. I never had a problem with air units, not even on the last mission. Another strat I employed was massing the Subterranean APC and engineers. I just scouted the GDI base, then went in and sold all their buildings. Firestorm next!