GDI sucks in multiplayer, or maybe it's just me...

[RC1985]

I've had far more success stories with nod than GDI in vs human matches. GDI vs GDI isn't too bad but vs Nod, eww.

 

Hope the pros here can advise if I'm wrong (and I really hope I am) cos I'd love to play both sides.

 

Why I think GDI sucks:

- weak factory, I followed the tip of putting nades near it but if the number of enemy bikes is about 4-5 that wouldn't make much difference. In maps with large tiberium fields the harvester tends to wander far away (harv fixing doesn't work 100% accurately on TD for some reason) and the bikes could easily distract your med tanks by attacking the harvs; once your tanks are near the harv they simply rush to your factory and kill it. The meds are too slow to follow up!

 

- since meds and mammies move very slowly, shifting them doesn't give much advantage, and bringing them to an enemy base to attack is a disadvantage. This is cos the enemy can simply build more barracks (you're after all at his base) and churn out rockets to wipe out your tanks. Furthermore, assuming that both players shift tanks, the attacked enemy obviously has the advantage cos new units travel a much smaller distance to the battlefield while yours have to move in from far far away. I noticed this in my first match with jacko. It tempted me to conclude that the best strategy for GDI is to base walk with barracks and rockets, or wait for the enemy to attack, or make early orcas and air rush.

 

- base trade. This is based on the first two points. If GDI and nod decide to take out each other's bases then nod has the advantage. The bikes can blaze through and kill the factory easy, so gdi's tank production will be halted faster. This further means that gdi's building production will also be stopped earlier since the bikes can move on to the cy earlier.

 

If you're nod then shifting the bikes is a huge advantage since they're so fast and can reach the battlefield in a jiffy. If it's a tank fight with GDI, the superior med/mammies might even lose cos their newly shifted tanks take too long to arrive!

 

Anyone care to share your experiences with both sides?  And do you think that Nod is the superior side?

[MattAttack]

Well, I suck at multiplayer these days no matter what side I choose but I remember the general consensus back in the day (lol 2012 for me) being that pros played as gdi and newbs played as nod.  I agree with a lot of your points but then I remember playing Lovehandles who would utterly rout me as GDI without even building a WF.  Inf & orcas, how humiliating.  An Ion cannon if I was lucky enough lo last that long.... And other than him (and later WeaveR) nobody beat me.  But that's what I like about c&c.... you think you hit a wall and there's no more strategies out there but there's always something more to glean off of this old ass game!  XD 

[cn2mc]

The general consensus on who is better has been shifting from one side to the other since people started playing C&C online 20 years ago. My opinion is that balance is quite map-based - the more open the map, the more of an advantage Nod will have, because they can cover more ground with less units. Also, Nod are, arguably, a bit more micro-intensive, their effectivness comes from that, while GDI is a more macro-intensive faction. To illustrate my point, if two roughly even players played GDI vs. Nod, Nod will have the initial advantage with hit and run with bikes and cheap buggies, but if the game does not end there and goes on long enough, Nod's power starts to wane and the odds swing in GDI's favour. There's a point in the game, where if GDI has kept their factory running, they can just steamroll over Nod, while Nod is already incapable of mounting a conventional offensive and must rely on base-busters (nuke, apache, stealth). Now, imagine if the WF wasn't weak! So I really don't believe in one side being superior, it's more of an ebb and flow kind of thing.

 

About tank shifting, I'm not sure it's a good idea vs. Nod. When there are bikes on the map, tanks should travel in packs and with infantry support, otherwise the bikes will pick tem off one by one. That's the classic bike vs. tank action - bikes engage, let a salvo off and retreat (hopefully without losses), and then hope that the tanks break formation so they can pick one off. If the enemy is doing it for you, that's godsend.

 

 

[MattAttack]

Jesus, we could write a book about how fucking perfect this game is... too bad only 2 people would buy it... heh heh! I think you're definitely right about the short game vs. the long game vs. the map though.....

[RC1985]

Matt - yes I've heard of the mighty lovehandles and will certainly request a 1v1 when I see him and it's true that we're tempted to think we've reached the peak, thing is a very competitive environment is needed to bring out the best strategies, we'll need more players (maybe 10 ppl of jacko/lovehandles level) for TD to reach its peak..P.S. Since only 2 guys could beat you, we should have a match soon hehe, i don't mind getting my ass whooped as long as I can learn and improve

 

- cn2mc: interesting cos I saw a thread about nod having to beat gdi early else it gets crushed. I haven't had long games with nod yet so I can't really comment at this time. About your point on GDI shifting...the bikes attacking tanks bit by bit is something I've never observed anyone doing actually. All I've had is the enemy bikes confronting my main group of tanks while leaving my shifted tanks untouched. I suppose it makes sense though since bikes move so fast they could just run off to that lone tank, and it'll work if the battlefield is far from the nod base of course. But then again if we don't shift tanks we'd be grossly outnumbered...if we shift in packs the main group might be destroyed by nod if it shifts every bike..

[Jacko]

If you're playing the game in a red-alert style manner then you would probably suit playing as Nod simply for the speed and control about them, but theres a heck of a lot more risk about blindly rushing in than a RA-style light tank rush.

And on the note of shifting tanks, in GDI vs GDI this is a very useful idea, but vs Nod exposing/isolating armoured units is asking for trouble.

 

My early experiences of Tiberian Dawn online are almost exactly the same, I found GDI a bit deficient and awkward to play as. Mostly for the reasons you specified.

 

But now I massively prefer GDI because I prefer the comfort of being able to take bad guys on in a head-on-fight, whereas with the flimsyness of bikes I don't enjoy that comfort (thats mostly down to my playstyle).

Its also related to why I build an unusually large amount of light tanks (compared to most players) in Nod vs Nod

 

 

in GDI vs Nod, here are a few things I do related to the points you have mentioned.

A decent mix of tanks and grens (maybe a few rockets and hummers) is vastly superior to anything basic Nod can throw at you, even if they have a much higher number of vehicles. Use this to your advantage and start picking off their vehicles and harvesters.

 

To deal with hit-and-run bikers I suggest sticking a small tank+gren team around the tib, and/or having a squad of hummers run around to scare them off

Also, Target units first! When it comes to bases I have a simple order for which I target stuff: Obelisks >  Bikes > Turrets and Rocket Soldiers > Everything else

Any bikes that drop off the airstrip while you're in their base you can blast immediately.

 

Watch out for typical Light unit swarm tactics like sneak attacks and group splitting.

 

Also defend your Weapons factory with its own stationed units (I go a little bit further maybe, my typical squad would include 7 or 8 grens, a few rockets and maybe even a Guard Tower). Killing like 8 or 9 bikes at the cost of a weapons factory earlygame is not that bad of a tradeoff. If you have a small group of tanks of your own a steady counterattack is very powerful.

Even going down to only being able to build infantry is not so bad if you still have some armoured units lying around.

 

This is all down to personal playstyle and experiences of course, feel free to pick it apart and comment.

[Killa57]

it sucks cause the planes drop of bikes real fast which it sucks

 

[AchromicWhite]

RC1985, I love what you've written here, because there was a time, when I thought the same. It means you're starting to understand certain aspects of the game.

 

You specifically mentioned the WF being attacked by bikes. Start with buiding humvees instead, and surround your WF with the grens. When you see Nod dart in to take it out, follow with your humvees (which can actually keep up, unlike tanks), so back up the grens and start repairing the WF at the moment it gets hit (make sure you hotkey both your humvees to a number button and use the hotkey for repair also (it's much quicker and less of a panik trying to push that tiny little repair button).

 

A pure humvee build, can actually take on a pure bike build and win... now, add some grens to the mix and you can melt any bikes that try to attack them. When they try to go for more buggies, you can then start to change over to building tanks, which obviously hit really hard counter against buggies...

 

Now, at this point, it means you now have a 3 prong army: Hummers, Grens, Tanks.

Before you push out, you want to be more defended at home, so as you start to change to building tanks, also start making a comm center, so that you can be setting up Adv Guard towers (make sure you also get 1 or 2 extra power plants, so that they can't just take them offline). Place these near your con yard and WF, keep the grens, you made for defense, nearby the buildings still.

 

With your army, use the grens to protect the tanks from bike hit and runs, the humvees to protect the grens from flamers and the tanks for sniping lfame tanks etc... AND because they're probably gonna be the last thing standing when the dust settles (if you're facing someone really good).

 

Important notes:

HOTKEY YOUR UNIT TYPES!!!

Put your tanks on 1

Put your grens on 2

Put your humvees on 3

(or whatever you're comfortable with)

 

Use the X button on your grens to scatter them, so they don't get crushed OR if you didn't bring them away from an incoming flame troop, and snipe it with hummers, fast enough. Ideally, yeah, just bring them away from flame weapons and with snipe flame tanks with Meds. If they get out SSM and Obs, you can actually look at making Orca. (obs can be easily dealt to by grens, though, so sometimes is good just to rush strait in with troops and knock it out). 2 Orca should kill an SSM and 4 to kill an OB.

 

Obviously, the biggest things you were missing were the grens and Humvees. Against Nod, I always open with a lot of humvees. For the grens, it's really important that you have more than one barracks. You can open with just one, but as the game goes on, get more, and place them in different areas of your base. This way, as soon as an area gets attacked, you can select a nearby barracks, make it primary and pump out grens from it. I've said before, for it's price, barracks is the best defense structure!

 

If you have anymore questions, feel free to ask. Or hit me up online, I'll give you a game and show you it all in action!!

 

  -Liam

[Chimas]

So, this is the thread where all the active Tiberian Dawn supporters are gathering ehehehehhe ...

[AchromicWhite]

The guy asked about tactics... why WOULDN'T we reply!!!

Love growing our player base. I'm always looking for new challengers!

  -Liam

[Beta]

yeah man GDI is def a little tougher in multiplayer. Im starting to record some classis gameplays of the missions if your interested man. I missed this game!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NGma6Mo8CY

[MattAttack]

yeah man GDI is def a little tougher in multiplayer. Im starting to record some classis gameplays of the missions if your interested man. I missed this game!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NGma6Mo8CY

nice vids, but you know that's not the game we're talking about, right?

this is:

https://youtu.be/7anjOJRsoHE

[RC1985]

Thanks guys and sorry I replied late. Thought I'd do a few games using your advice before commenting.

 

And White - your tip on making 4-5 hummers before meds worked very well! In GDI vs GDI it enabled me to kill an opponent's war factory early. They should be very useful against Nod's rushes too like you said. And I thoroughly enjoyed our very close nod vs nod match. It's on my channel and now everyone will know you whooped my butt (but not for long )

 

Jacko - very interesting that both you and White mentioned that shifting tank by tank in GDI vs Nod is a bad idea, so I'll take it that it's true. The tips that you gave about WF defence plus White's hummers tip drastically change the gameplay (since I was initially talking about building meds all the way), and the 'order of destruction' against Nod is also something I'll need to ponder about since I sometimes ignore enemy units while going straight at the airstrip/ref. With these tips I guess some faith in GDI is now restored lol

 

And Benocide - I just KNEW you'd come here and cause trouble even though you appear so meek recently hahahaha. It seems that punishing you severely on RA isn't enough - now I'll punish you on TD too

[Nyerguds]

yeah man GDI is def a little tougher in multiplayer. Im starting to record some classis gameplays of the missions if your interested man. I missed this game!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NGma6Mo8CY

Assume that whenever "C&C" is mentioned on this forum, it is actually about the game called "Command & Conquer". The first one 

[Nyerguds]

Git off mah lawn Dawn forum, you damn kid! 

[pichorra]

Alright, I don't play this game for decades, but I will try to add some more information.

 

Firstly, yes, GDI Weapon's Factory may be the main target from Nod players. What i used to do is spam four, five barracks arround the Construction Yard, produce a lot of minigunners and place'em arround it, so if a bike rush try to get my CY earlier, it would be crushed by those Minigunners. Then I expand the base to reach as much Tiberium Fields as I can, building more and more barracks to protect it. Then build a Weapons Factory.

 

Finally, I would place the War Factory near the Construction Yard and jump straight to Medium Tanks, and build another Weapons Factory, and do a Tank spam.

 

That usually worked becuse most players didn't manage units very well at the point of infiltrating a massive infantry barrier. If the player came with Apaches, I could spam some rocket soldiers and take it down. If the player came with Flame Tanks, if I have a good amount of Bazookas, I would destroy it before reaching me, and if they hunt my Harvesters, My base would be near it, so any small enemy error I could wipe the bikes out.

 

Buggies was a problem, indeed. But most players didn't use'em back there. If it were alone, I used to build a orca or rush the weapons factory anyway, then get an Advanced Guard Tower. This was slow and panfull and I usually lost when a bikes and buggies were correctly mixed.

 

Of course, in my opinion, adapting to enemy is the best strategy. So as much information you have, more chances you have to success.

[cn2mc]

Well, Nod's early-game priorities vs. GDI are as follows: WF, if none -> CY, if well defended (as usual) -> power OR better - harvs, if GDI is macroing early as pichorra suggested. At this point, the biggest challenge for GDI is keeping the harvs in check and alive so you have the cash to pump out those men, because they're gonna die in awful ways, cut down, torched, crushed, poisoned by tiberium. AGTs can work well on maps with dense resources, but you're usually better with a mobile force, because you can use it to threaten enemy positions and force his bikes back that way. Having AGTs is nice though. A few orcas can also tie up a lot of bikes for defence if microed well.

[AchromicWhite]

Indeed. Although, I usually go for AGT anyway. Even 2 or 3 can completely change the situation.

I make orca when the bike count drops and especially when there's a lot of turrets and or obs. Else I bascally stay away from them in GDI vs Nod. I also favor AGT over a second WF... as making troops and tanks is pretty resource heavy, anyway.

 

 

Yes, Hummers are good in GDI vs GDI at the start... they seem to become less helpful as the game goes on. But in GDI vs Nod, so long as there are bikes, they will continue to be helpful.

  -Liam

[ore_truck]

The main problem I had with GDI against NOD is that they can attack very early before you're ready. I mean if the battle reaches late stages of the game, I can still have a 50:50 chance (or maybe more) to win and me and my enemy can go all out with our tanks and use all resources and have a good game, but if they attacked early and wreck my base in the first 2 minutes, I may just look like a noob since I didn't have a chance to do anything. The buggies, if built 10+ can clean a base of infantry and deplete a medium tank's health at a surprisingly alarming rate. While the enemy is busy killing your infantry and disturb you a lot early in the game with superior numbers of buggies, they are probably queing recon bikes so even if you survived the nod buggy attack, another wave of bikes will finish off what's left.

 

I always have infantry scattered in my base, particularly around my construction yard and weapons factory. By the time my weapons factory is ready, I have enough soldiers to put around it, my construction yard and other undefended parts of my base. By the time I constructed my third medium tank, I saw 20+ buggies in front of my base..HELLLLPPPPP!!!!!!!!!!

[cn2mc]

Scout early and try to match their build, then. If you see Nod doing a buggy rush you can have 7-8 medium tanks ready by the time they have 20 buggies. You can even do a base trade with that and still win.

[AchromicWhite]

You should always scout the enemy base. Even just to know if they went for 1 or 2 refs before strip.

MAKE HUMMERS FROM YOUR WF FIRST!!!

You'll have more units and they can move a lot faster. Then transition into tanks.

Once you have your WF down, buildings wise, move onto a 3rd ref and a second barracks. Place your second barracks in a different location from the first so that you can produce from 2 areas by changing primary building.

If the map is really open, you're also going to have trouble. Try my maps called "Iron Valley" and "Canyon Pursuit". Find them in the Multiplayer maps area of this forum.

 

  -Liam

[RC1985]

Thanks for the further input and agree that early base scouting is critical. From my games with lovehandles in which he raped me hard, I noticed that he scouts super early and creates his tactics based on what he sees on my base.

 

Also, although most of us agree on GDI's weaknesses, my mindset has changed somewhat from the time I made this thread. At that time I was thinking of a battalion vs battalion scenario, but I found that in most of my games, people seldom bring whole armies into head on confrontation. Sneaking and rushing seems to be the norm and in fact it's probably more effective..

[cn2mc]

It certainly is more effective for Nod, it's basically the thing that makes them be able to compete with GDI at all - hit and run to keep them from tanking.

[AchromicWhite]

That and apaches -.- haha

[cn2mc]

Apaches only work well when GDI built wrong, that's either undefendable expansions (read, not enough barracks there to guard the ref and harv), not enough powerplants, or an exposed WF. In the late game, the proximity of the CY and WF may become an issue if Nod has the Bomb, because it can take out the WF, kill the defending rocketmen, and bring down the CY to red for the apaches to pick apart. Of course, that shouldn't be your only WF by then, but it's still a bad idea to bunch them.