============================= -SECTION TWO- TIPS AND TRICKS ============================= -------------------- CHAPTER [4] Cheating -------------------- [4-1] What are the cheat keys? ============================== Easy. There are none. The cheats were removed after beta testing and development. *4-2* How, then, can I cheat? ============================= You can cheat by using programs written by the kind folk on the Internet. See Chapter 15 for a listing of such programs. *4-2-1* GAME.DAT hack --------------------- Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) In C&C, you can stop your mone from decreasing by changing some bytes in the GAME.DAT file. Just search for: 29 B3 D6 00 00 00 EB 0A 89 C2 29 F2 and change it to: EB 04 D6 00 00 00 EB 0A 89 C2 90 90 (only the first two bytes and the last two bytes are different) For C&C v1.07, this string starts at offset 93CBF For C&C v1.20, this string starts at offset 739F0 For all other versions: FIND IT YOURSELF!!! I DON'T HAVE THEM! This cheat doesn't freeze your money, it will only make sure your money can only increase. So if you buy something, nothing happens, but if you Harvester unloads in the Refinery, you DO get money. [4-3] How does the computer cheat? ================================== Min He (he@mathp7.jussieu.fr) Eradicator (drwestco@mailhost.ecn.uoknor.edu) - The computer starts out with more funds than you do. - The computer can build a construction yard without needing a MCV. - The computer may rebuild destroyed buildings even if they are not adjacent to any other building. - The computer's Orcas may attack other helicopters in mid-flight. - The computer can use harvesters to run over Recon Bikes. (I succeeded in doing this too once, but that was pure luck) *4-4* What cheating programs are available? =========================================== See Chapter 15 for a listing of such programs. [4-5] What are some C&C quirks I can exploit? ============================================== [4-5-1] Tiberium harvesting without silos ----------------------------------------- Mike Means (means@bigdog.engr.arizona.edu) When your refinery storage is getting full, start constructing another building. The construction will use up the tiberium in your storage. When the construction is finished, cancel the building. You will get your money back, but the tiberium will not return. [4-5-2] Preventing the computer from rebuilding ----------------------------------------------- Richard Stone (rstone@news.infi.net) You can prevent the computer from rebuilding a structure by placing a unit on the same square. You can permanently prevent the computer from rebuilding a structure by sandbagging your way to the structure, destroying the structure and building a sandbag on one of the cells where the building was standing. Since one of the building's cells is occupied the computer can't rebuild the building that was standing there. [4-5-3] The Reservoir Dogs scenario ----------------------------------- Douglas McCreary (dark@ix.netcom.com) Unlike NATO, the computer does not choose to ignore friendly-fire incidents. Whenever one of the computer units hits another accidentally, the units go into full combat against each other. Once I discovered this bug, I started exploiting it by moving my units to the middle of enemy groups before attacking. [4-5-4] The silo money cheat ---------------------------- EDITOR'S NOTE: This cheat only works with versions of C&C prior to 1.18 Build a silo, and let it fill up with tiberium. When it is full, build another silo but do not place it. Sell the silo that is full of tiberium. Quickly place the built silo down before the silo sell animation is over. In return for this, you will get over a thousand credits for the tiberium in the silo you sold, and have the tiberium you just sold transferred over to the silo you just created. [4-5-5] The ultimate A-10 defense --------------------------------- See [5-3-8], AIRSTRIKES [4-5-6] Money making ala SimC&C ------------------------------- Oliver Schade (schade@mabuse.phil.uni-passau.de) If you have defeated the computer except one or two buildings and your are sure that you will win with your existing troops sell all your buildings and attack after that the remaining buildings. You will get lots of money and an 'efficiency-rate' of 100% which will results in many points. EDITOR'S NOTE: A variation on this is to leave an enemy building standing, and go into tiberium farm mode. With good harvester management, it is possible to rack up a near infinite amount of money without running out of harvestable tiberium. [4-5-7] Place buildings anywhere cheat -------------------------------------- EDITOR'S NOTE: This bug was corrected with version 1.19. Trying to abuse the radar map in this manner in versions 1.19 and beyond will have unpredictable results. You have been warned. Tim Brutton (tim@arcady.demon.co.uk) wrote: A working radar map is required for this cheat. Scroll your screen in such a way that a part of a building you own is cut in half by the menubar at the right. Select that building. Start construction on the building you want to build anywhere. When the construction is complete and the building is ready select a unit, click on the sidebar icon of the building you just built, and move your cursor over the building that is on the map. Drag the hash marks past the building as you move your cursor into your radar map. It is important that it leaves an area of white hashing - one white hashed square is enough. Move your cursor into the radar map. Your mouse curor should become a small move-cursor. Wherever you click your mouse button now will deploy your building on that spot in the map. *4-5-8* Infinite minigunner cheat --------------------------------- Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) A. Do this if you want a big minigunner army! 1. Build a defensive building (turret, SAM-site, guard tower, etc.) 2. Press SELL, press with your left mouse button on the building and then quickly press the right button and then the left button again (click on the building) and press "S". The building will stop selling, but you will keep the minigunners that come out. 3. Repeat this and you will have VERY MUCH minigunners! B. There is another thing you can do to get free minigunners: When you play with Nod, and you have a Temple with a Nuke ready to launch, sell the Temple, and while the selling animation is still running, launch the Nuke. The Temple will stop selling to launch the Nuke, and you will get the infantry that comes out. There will be 5 infantry units. Some of them could be technicians. I know, in a single player game this works only once, but it works. In multiplayer this means you get some free infantry with every missle you launch. (if you're dirty enough to cheat in multiplayer games) *4-5-9* Selling units with sandbags ----------------------------------- Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) Don't you HATE sending nearly dead people to combat? With this trick you can sell them. You can get money from "almost dead" guys! Infantry + Vehicles: 1. Build a wall of any kind (sandbag, chainlink, concrete). 2. Move the guy you want to sell beside, above or underneath the wall. 3. For infantry, make sure he is on one of the 3 "sub-places" close to the wall. (there are 5 infantry sub-places on each cell) 4. Select the 'Sell' option. 5. Move the dollar sign above the wall, then move it towards the unit so that it is still revolving, but you see the name of the unit. 6. Now click and you will sell the unit, getting one half of its price. Notes: * You can ONLY sell your own units, not enemies (or allies) * You can still sell burning/dying infantry that's next to a sandbag. * -=NEVER=- SELL A LOADED APC OR CHINOOK: you will only receive money for the APC or the Chinook, but the infantry will be gone too!!! * Also, never sell units you're suppposed to rescue, like Moebius or Delphi: you won't get any money for them, and you'll lose your ability to win. You won't lose, however. * -=ALWAYS=- SELL MOBILE HQ'S. People who put them in their missions as "objects to keep alive" are stupid. Note: You can also sell vehicles on a repair bay. (No cheat, the normal way) 1. Build a Repair Bay. 2. Move the vehicle onto the Repair Bay. 3. Select the 'Sell' option. 4. Move the dollar sign onto the vehicle until it becomes small and green, click on the vehicle and you get one half of the units cost. *4-5-10* Infinite money cheat ----------------------------- Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) Combining the sell-stop trick and the sandbag-sell trick, you can get money very easily: 1. Build this: ### ### #0# 0 : Obelisk / Adv. Grd Tower # : Wall of any kind (sandbag, chainlink, concrete) 2. Press SELL, press with your left mouse button on the guard tower, then quickly press the right button and then the left button again and press "S". The building will stop selling, and the minigunners that come out will stay on the sandbag before the guard tower. 3. Then press SELL and sell the minigunners just by clicking on them. You will get a "SELL" cursor because they are standing on the wall. 4. Repeat this and you will have VERY MUCH MONEY!!! ($250 every time you do this trick) Note: Only the wall directly above the guard tower really has to be your wall. (it has to be a wall you can sell) The others can be buildings, rock, tanks, etc. Anything you can't walk on is OK. *4-5-11* Detecting Stealth tanks -------------------------------- Neil Bradley (neil@tongue-tied.co.uk) Select any vehicle that can shoot. Move your cursor around in the radar map. When the cursor drifts over a square occupied by a stealth tank, the cursor will turn into an "attack" cursor. Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) There is a simple way to detect Stealth Tanks: When you have selected one of your units, you will get a "move" cursor instead of an "attack" cursor when you hold your mouse cursor above a cloaked Stealth Tank of a different team. This can work in your advantage: Helicopters can't land on the concrete slabs that are attached to most buildings. When you select a helicopter, you will see a "don't move" cursor appear when you hold your mouse cursor above such a slab. However, when you DO get a "move" cursor, this means there is a cloaked Stealth Tank on it. Basically, helicopters can only land on places where you can build. This means this trick works on all places where you can move vehicles, but where you can't build. These places are: -concrete slabs -tiberium (incredibly handy to secure large tiberium fields) -some beaches in the Temperate/Winter theaters Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) This is a cheat for multiplayer, to find Stealth spies in your base. I suppose it's quite obvious, but I'll put it here anyway. 1. Build a large building (Refinery is the largest, and quite fast to build) 2. When it's ready, click on the icon, and move the placement grid around your base. On clear terrain, any red spots in the grid are stealths. Mark Lockland (mark@lockland.demon.co.uk) If you ally yourself with an opponent, you will see your opponent's stealth tanks. [4-5-12] Transport helicopter denial ------------------------------------ Matthias Gutfeldt (matthias.gutfeldt@buemplizer.ch) If you place a unit on the exact landing spot of a computer transport helicopter, it will not land on top of your unit. It will not look for another landing site either. It just hovers there with infinite fuel. Get some bazooka guys, and blast away. Then wait for the next transport chopper, and do the same. [4-5-13] Safe Orca killing -------------------------- Colin Jacobs (coljac@pyromania.apana.org.au) Attack an Orca on its pad with a stealth tank. The Orca will lift off, but your tank will cloak, and the orca will land, allowing the next volley to be fired. [4-5-14] Longer ranged towers ----------------------------- Jeremy Gilbert (viper@mcn.net) The obelisks and advanced guard towers have a one square advantage when attacking units to the north because the origin of fire and the base of the structure are not the same. Enemies can only target the base of the structure. It is therefore possible for two obelisks or advanced guard towers to be built in such a way that the first can target the second, but the second can not target the first. *4-5-15* Speed up harvesting production --------------------------------------- Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) This trick can help you to speed up your harvesting production, but it is not very useful as you have to look after your harvester all the time. Anyway, here it goes: When your harvester starts entering a square of tiberium, press "S". The tiberium will disappear immediately, and will be stored in your harvester. Like this, the harvester doesn't waste any time at the actual harvesting. You will just need the time the harvester needs to go to the next square of tiberium. *4-5-16* How to stop Nukes -------------------------- Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) This is a cheat for single player games only. When a nuke is launched at your base, DO NOT PANIC. Just wait until it falls on your base. From the moment you see the nuclear explosion, SAVE your game (BEFORE the Big Flash), abort your mission, exit C&C, and then start C&C again and load your mission. You will see the "Nuke" animation disappear, and it will be as if the nuke had never been launched. Remember: if you play with Nod and you've launched a nuke at the enemy's base, DON'T SAVE YOUR GAME DURING THE NUKE EXPLOSION!!! (this is the way I discovered the trick. Funny, but I lost my Nuke...) *4-5-17* Move infantry units over walls --------------------------------------- Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) A trick to move infantry units over walls: (this trick also works with rock, buildings and even units) When you have a corner in a wall, you can move infantry over it. This cheat works with corners in all directions, but you have to be outside of the corner. 1. If you have a wall like this, move your men to one side of the corner: ######### # --> i # # # # : wall of any kind (sandbag, chainlink, concrete, wood...) i : Infantry unit(s) 2. Move the infantry unit(s) to the other side of the corner as shown. _/--> X /######### | # i # # # 3. When one of the units walks over the corner of the wall only a little bit, move your men inside the base. One of them will walk over the wall. _/--> /######### i #`\ # `\-> X # # You will have to repeat this trick several times before it works. I found the trick, and it's still difficult for me. *4-5-18* Blind Spots -------------------- Toni Ali-Mattila (toniam@aino.wakkanet.fi) It is possible to shoot enemies with a medium tank without them shooting back. I have blown away light tanks and rocket infantry. Ong Yang (yang@pacific.net.sg) This is a trick over the AI of computer. There seems to be a 'blind spot' to certain units (I've found it applies to turrets and advanced guard towers, haven't tried the rest). Sometimes, when a unit is within the AI controlled tower's range, they will not fire back, even when they're fired upon. I've found that it works in certain directions only. I've only discovered the Southwest. eg. Place your Nod turret (approximately) 7 squares west and 2(approximate) squares south of an advanced guard tower. You'll find that the tower is obviously to your turret's presence. Proceed with the order for the turret to attack the tower and it'll still be a sitting duck. (This strategy is EXTREMELY useful in one of the NOD covert ops mission .. Cloak and Dagger I think, where the construction yard is built right in the middle of the enemy base) *4-5-19* Long range bazookas ---------------------------- To take out a guard tower with bazooka units, place them four squares directly to the side or above or below the guard tower. They will attack on their own, out of reach of the guard tower machine guns. The same can be done using the bazookas mounted on recon bikes. *4-5-20* The engineer black hole -------------------------------- (szeming@interlog.com) This may sound cheap to some people, but probably most of you have had a base taken over by enemy engineers before and have been really ticked off by it. Here's a way to counteract that in an extremely cheap way: You've probably noticed that all enemy units aim for the top structure on the map. We can use this to our advantage. If you place a SAM site north of your base, the engineers will go for it. But, instead of taking it over, they enter and nothing happens! Of course, all your other enemy units will go for that too, but the SAM site can take lots of damage and you can place an Obelisk or two near it. *4-5-21* Wraparound radar ------------------------- Greg Long (h.slconsult@mailbox.uq.oz.au) The person I was playing against had all entrances to his base blocked and I could not see a thing inside it. His base was up against the left side of the map. When I moved an SSM all the way to the right of the map, a small segment of the left side could be seen on my radar. I used this to send my choppers out to destroy his poorly defended construction yard. *4-5-22* Confusing the enemy ---------------------------- Dave Mitton (dmitton@tiac.net) The computer AI tends to attack the last thing (perhaps of equal class) that attacked it. The way to attack a large enemy unit such as a harvester with bikes or infantry is to circle around it so that everyone gets a shot, and the harvester will spin around trying to take on the last one that hit it. *4-6* Are there any hidden game elements or easter eggs? ========================================================= [4-6-1] Visceroids ------------------ Andrew Griffin (buggy@adam.com.au) It regenerates when in a tiberium field, and unlike a mammoth tank, can regenerate to full strength from a low red condition. They are pretty slow and don't have many hit points, but their weapon is the chemical spray. *4-6-2* Hidden cutscenes ------------------------ Robert Whisler (cato@dcez.com) If you decide to completely liquidate the Temple with your Ion Cannon (after your forces reduce the place to wreckage and after you have destroyed all other Nod buildings so that only the temple remains), you will get a different ending sequence than if you destroyed the Temple using conventional forces alone. *4-6-3* Covert Operations Funpark --------------------------------- P. Habib (habibp@aol.com) When you start Covert Operations, type "c&c funpark". You will enter a special mode of play. If you start a new game, you will play a series of dinosaur missions. If you load a previously saved game, you will be able to build the units and buildings of both GDI and Nod. Nod players should take note. Building an advanced comms center will not give you the ion cannon. GDI players can only build chem troops or SSM launchers if they capture a hand of Nod or Nod airstrip. A new type of barrier called barbed wire, will be available for construction. Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) The funpark missions have names like the normal GDI and nod missions, but with "J" instead of "G" or "B". For example: SCJ01EA(.INI/.BIN) Like this, you CAN replace these missions *4-6-4* Dinosaurs ----------------- There are two ways to get the Dinosaurs in C&C. The easiest way, if you have the Covert Operations disk is to run C&C with the funpark option, and to select either GDI or Nod as your transmission. If you do not have the Covert Operations mission disk, you will need to visit Andrew Griffin's Internet webpage and download some hacking utilities. Andrew Griffin (buggy@adam.com.au) There are four dinosaur units: the Tyrannosaurus Rex, Velociraptor, Stegosaurus and Triceratops. There seems to have been a fourth team in multiplayer mode after GDI, Nod and civilians, called JP, obviously for Jurassic Park. Their bite is great against infantry, and they can squish all the soft targets, but they aren't that good against heavy tank armor. Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) The Velociraptor and T-rex heal when eating infantry. -------------------------- CHAPTER [5] Defensive tips -------------------------- [5-1] Sandbag defense ===================== Dave Smith (physics@computek.net) The computer does not know how to deal with sandbags. It treats all barriers as impassible terrain. It is possible to wall the enemy inside its own base. This is especially useful for keeping their harvesters out of your tiberium. Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) The enemy AI doesn't destroy barriers. Using this to your advantage, you can build a line of sandbags around your base to keep them away, and you can also actually surround the enemy base with sandbag walls, cutting off their resources and fencing in their armies. Better don't use concrete: If one of your units passes an enemy tank, that tank will destroy the wall by shooting at your unit. This can result in a destructing wave of attacking enemies. You better lose one unit than risking that. [5-2] Building base defenses ============================ Rune Fostervoll (runefo@ifi.uio.no) Always use your advantage on a level. Sun Tzu said, first become invincible, then destroy your opponent's invincibility. Do so. Make a base that can shrug off any (reasonable) attack, and assure a steady cash flow. Once this is done, a computer opponent is lost. On most levels, doing this is the problem, not destroying the opposing base. Against GDI, he can always attack your base with air strikes, and you will grow to loathe the A-10's, simply because making a base impervious to air strikes is so difficult it is inefficient, and so your opponent can always harm you. GDI does not have this problem, as long as they have enough guard turrets and walls. James Hindman (jhindman@ea.oac.uci.edu) As anyone who has used NOD knows, turrets suck against men. SO a very useful strategy is to take either Flame tanks, or flame men and tell them to guard the turrets. This will prevent grenadiers from getting close and thrashing your turrets, and the turrets protect the Flame units against tanks and other large units. Of course for any base defense you should build flame infantry, because they are your best infantry defense. Build turrets, lots of turrets. They are great against tanks and other large vehicles, don't bother with obelisks unless you have A LOT of extra power, in case your enemy takes out one of your power plants, it may still function. [5-3] Help! I'm being attacked by enemy... ========================================== *5-3-1* Nukes ------------- David Tong (davet@skaro.eng.sun.com) When choosing warhead targets, the computer will pick advanced guard towers, and, lacking that, your refineries for termination. Ong Yang (yang@pacific.net.sg) In Covert Ops, the computer will aim its nuke at the first advanced guard tower you've built. Raymond Lee (rks11@leicester.ac.uk) NOD airstrips and the Temple of Nod are the only buildings that can withstand a direct nuclear attack. The computer Nod player will always fire its nuclear missiles at the GDI advanced communications center. It is best to build it in an out of the way area. Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) I actually found a cheat to STOP NUKES!!!! It only works in single player games, but it ROCKS!! (See *4-5-16* How to stop Nukes) Craig Kazial (kaizal@cedar.buffalo.edu) Spread your base out through the use of sandbagging, all structures must touch each other but sandbags count. You can sell them afterwards if in the way. Have excess power. Your power plants will go down in a nuclear blast if near impact almost all the time. Building is outrageously slow when your power is low. If stuck in this situation perhaps sell off some of your structures. Two weapon factories don't hurt. Unfortunately this thing usually also bites it in one shot. Yes it's expensive, but it's slow to build and if your enemy follows up a nuke with a conventional attack you may want units churning out. If you can, right from the start bottle up all entrances to your territory. Obviously some scenarios make this more or less difficult. Avoid putting your structures in the extreme corners.. if I was shooting a nuke blind that's where I would go. Ideally get some concrete walls and advanced guard towers going before your enemy has more than scouts to check out your situation. Stealth tanks and recon bikes aren't going to make keeping your base hidden easy, but I don't imagine you thought you were signing up for a picnic. Stanley Hu (hu@valisys.com) If you play GDI and hear "Nuclear Warhead Approaching", hurry back to your base (hit "H" if you still have a Construction Yard or use map bookmarks), and be ready to sell your Weapons Factory. Most intelligent NOD players will go after it because it is a sure target. You'll get 1000 credits back if you sell it. But you have to be FAST--sometimes you just won't get the opportunity. Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) Using the sandbag-sell trick, you can still sell burning infantry that's next to a sandbag when you didn't have time to move them away before the Nuke exploded. [5-3-2] Orcas ------------- Build bazooka or recon bike units. Unlike SAM sites, these are mobile, and can be deployed anywhere. Scatter them around a bit. Lay a bunch of them around your harvester routes. If you are Nod, follow your harvesters around with stealth tanks or recon bikes. If you are GDI, you can use rocket launchers, but they are too easy to kill, and a smart opponent will target the escorts before attacking the harvester. Casper Lund (ccc4708@vip.cybercity.dk) A trick: If the enemy (computer or human) sends Orcas against one of your (fast) vehicles, and you have bazooka's/adv. guard towers/SAMs available. Simply drive your vehicle towards one of them and circle it manually. The Orca will follow, circling around trying to get a shot off (they fire slowly on fast moving objects), and your SAM/tower/bazooka's will bash away at it, usually killing it. Actually, if the opponent hasn't put his Orca under "CTRL-control", you can tie his Orcas up pretty much by simply driving around the map like crazy with the Orca(s) in pursuit, but this only works if your "bait" vehicle is pretty fast! :) [5-3-3] SSMs ------------ These have very few hit points. Three choppers can take this out in one and a half volleys, as can three stealth tanks. [5-3-4] Advanced guard towers ----------------------------- Don't send infantry against them. Use armored vehicles instead. *5-3-5* Transports loaded with engineers ---------------------------------------- Sandbag your base. Do not leave any openings where a helicopter or APC can land. Block entrances to your base. Kjetil Svendsberget (kjetilsv@ifi.uio.no) As soon as you have build the weapon factory churn out 4 Humvees and scatter them around your CY. Assign them to a high number, one which you rarely use; I use '9'. Now when the hated APC keeps rolling in just press '9', or your own number and blast away at anything that churns out of it. Any men will die almost instant death, and will only be able to crawl a couple of nanocentimeters! Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) For GDI: Spread small Guard Towers all over your base, especially around the Construction Yard, Refinery, Weapons Factory and Barracks. Any unloading engineer will be shot in pieces. Put a few Adv. Guard Towers IN your base too, to make sure no chinooks can sneek in. For Nod: Flamers and Flame tanks. Not as easy as guard towers, but much more efficient. [5-3-6] Apache Attack helicopters --------------------------------- If you are Nod, use SAM sites against these. Bazookamen die too easily unless they are deployed in groups of six or more, and are spread out. You shouldn't use recon bikes as anti-attack chopper escorts. Recon bikes have a particular weakness to the Apache's machine-gun. If you are GDI, you can send an Orca or two and destroy the attack helicopter while it is on the pad. Even if the attack helicopter takes off, it will still die, because the Orca has air to air capability, and will chase the attack helicopter and keep pumping rockets up its backside. Ossi Mantylahti (manty@online.tietokone.fi) Follow your harvesters around with two APCs packed with bazooka dudes. When your opponent attacks your harvesters with his Apache's, quickly unload the APCs, and watch his helicopters go BOOM! *5-3-7* Recon bike gangs ------------------------ Ola Olsson (oo@df.lth.se) A group of Humvees packs about the same punch as a group of recon bikes. If you don't believe me, try it. Jeff Montondon (jml7741@swt.edu) I'd suggest using Orcas as a kill/distraction. When a human player stops his bikes to attack the Orcas, run 'em over with the tanks. When the bikes move in to kill the tanks, shoot 'em with the Orcas. Come to think of it, I'd say use infantry and APCs. The APCs would have to have cover by the infantry to keep the bikes off their back, but when the bikes stop to attack one target, run 'em over with the APC. Jason West (jason@jove.acs.unt.edu) Get a GDI APC, maybe a "pack" of equal cost to his wolf pack. And just run those wimpy little bikes over. Have fun. Richard Wesson (wesson@cse.ogi.edu) Throw a couple of Orcas into the melee. He can't target them while they're in the air, he can only stop attacking and let the bikes fire on their own, which he'll be loath to do while they're being shot at and run over by APCs and things. In the meantime, send an APC full of bazookas tagging along with your harvester. After you do this a few times, he'll avoid attacking any harvester that has an APC around it. So you can save money sometimes by using an empty APC. Like Dirty Harry says, "Do you feel lucky, punk?" Ola Olsson (d91oo@efd.lth.se) Pound for pound, a group of humvees are better than a bike gang. Try it! [5-3-8] Airstrikes ------------------ Joachim Rijsdam (jrijsdam@wi.leidenuniv.nl) One can draw away enemy a10's with only one minigunner. The AI only attacks from left to right and from top to bottom when 'paving'; like reading a page, really. So you just move one minigunner a little to the northwest of your base, and voila, damage is restricted to 100 credits. [5-4] Suppressive fire ====================== There is no reason to wait for the enemy to come to you before firing. Use the CTRL key to force your units into continuous fire mode. This works well with area effect weapons such as artillery, flame-throwers, rocket launchers, and grenadiers. This will intimidate a human opponent into thinking twice before attacking, and will utterly decimate any AI opponent who will walk blindly into the killing field. This is also useful to preserve the integrity of your choke points. Build a concrete wall one square thick across the river crossing. Build two turrets in front of this wall. Place a couple artillery units behind the walls, and concentrate their fire at a point two squares in front of the turrets. Because of their inaccuracy, you will end up laying a large area of suppressive fire that will rip to shreds any infantry trying to destroy the turrets. Back up with bazookamen as AA support, and nothing but a very determined attack will breakthrough. -------------------------- CHAPTER:[6] Offensive tips -------------------------- [6-1] How do I destroy? ======================= [6-1-1] Obelisks of light ------------------------- Lynda Myer (lyndamyer@aol.com) Nod obelisks use much power. If you can take out a power center with an Ion Blast, the entire base usually goes down, and you can walk right in! Mike Mulligan (mulligan@netcom18.netcom.com) An ever better way to take out the Obelisks are the SSM units! There range is greater then the Obelisks. They can just keep lobbing rockets on it without being hit! Try it, it works! The only thing though is you have to protect them! It doesn't take much to kill and SSM, one recon bike can end the bombardment really fast! So have 2 or 3 SSM and 2 light tanks as guards....works great! Douglas William Cole (dougc@umd.umich.edu) (1) Air raid it if there are no SAM sites around (fat chance). (2) Overwhelm it with minigunners. (It can only pick off one at a time... so just swamp it with guys and you'll come out on top with minimal casualties) (3) Take out the power supply. Whatever you do, DON'T bring any kind of armor in there. You'll get nowhere fast. [6-1-2] Flame-throwers ---------------------- Lee Beng Hai (benghai@iss.nus.sg) Use minigunners, but do not send them together... keep them separated, usually 2 or 3 minigunners from different direction can take out a flame thrower easily. Send them one at a time will work but you'll have more casualties. [6-1-3] Gun turrets using Orcas ------------------------------- Casey Robinson (ogiswise@rahul.net) First, attack the turret with just one Orca, it will damage the turret, but not so much that the computer repairs it. Then hit it with both Orcas, leaving it a pile of rubble. *6-1-4* Temple of Nod --------------------- Stanley Hu (hu@valisys.com) Don't even think about sending Orcas against a Temple of Nod. It takes 15 Orcas to destroy a Temple in one sortie. You're better off taking out something else or building a Commando. [6-1-5] Tanks in general ------------------------ Stephan Lau (skip@yoda.bsd.uchicago.edu) (1) Don't take on tanks head on, use the APCs to lure them into your killing zone; (2) In the kill zone, place mini-gunners up front for use the described single attack, place grenadiers behind as a main line of defense, and have three or four bazooka guys behind to take on the tanks; (3) Once the tanks gets into the zone and enemy infantry have been mostly eliminated, surround the tanks with your grenadiers in the "circle of death" [6-1-6] Flame Tanks ------------------- Stephan Lau (skip@yoda.bsd.uchicago.edu) Use your Orcas against these guys to soften them up. Assign a very expensive medium tank or two take them on; send the tank back to your repair shop for immediate reconditioning. [6-1-7] Mammoth Tanks --------------------- Douglas William Cole (dougc@umd.umich.edu) (1) Air strikes are always nice. (2) 5+ infantry guys should take a single one out easily. DON'T forget to keep hitting the 'X' key to scatter your troops when it gets too close for comfort. (3) Stealth tanks. I've seen 3 do it, but use 4 or 5 to be safe. Mammoths actually aren't that great, they just have a lot of hit points. Use infantry on it if you can rather than armor, though... [6-1-8] SAM-Sites ----------------- Thenardier (isc40562@leonis.nus.sg) Beside the Obelisk of light, the other structures which people would most possibly like to destroy are SAM sites. SAM sites have really strong armor and long bar of health. One strategy of taking down SAM sites is to fly an Orca close to it. When you see the cover open, blast it with the ION CANNON. Zeff Yusof (zeff@triop.pc.my) Try taking out the SAMs with 4 Orcas at once, all 4 will survive. If there are two sites within striking distance use two waves, one for each - you'll get back unscathed. [6-1-9] Strong bases -------------------- Rune Fostervoll (runefo@ifi.uio.no) Three tactics work.(At least.). One is to attack him through his harvesters. He will usually have more than one working, and can usually get more even if you attack all you find, so it could take some while. But eventually this will cripple him. Then you can pick him off at leisure. But, especially early, destroying a harvester can bring an all-out attack. Be prepared for it. The other tactic is to attack with an attack not designed to destroy his base, but to cripple part of it. Stealth tanks are good at this. The construction center is usually the first priority, then the refinery, then the unit builders. Thirdly.. no base is perfect. It has a weakness. Find it, and exploit it. A back entrance, a cliff overhang, something should be there. [6-1-10] Harvesters ------------------- Tucson Luke Loh (tlloh@zip.com.au) While its true that when you attack a harvester the enemy sends a huge force after you, they comprise mostly infantry so an adequate defense will easily mop them up and pay huge dividends i.e. lots of troops lost on the enemy side vs. few (if any) of your own. Of course, please make sure you have adequate defenses first. Strategy works best if you are NOD (with an Obelisk and a turret or two). [6-1-11] Gunboats ----------------- Gunboats seem to have a one track mind. To destroy them easily, move a minigunner towards the gunboat as close as you can without the gunboat firing at you. Even though the gunboat can not hit your minigunner with missiles, it will have selected it as a target, and will ignore all other units from then on. You can now move something heavy into range and blast the boat without fearing retaliation. *6-1-12* Advanced Guard Towers ------------------------------ Stanley Hu (hu@valisys.com) Any armored vehicle can make short work of the advanced guard tower. The guard towers have horrible aim and find it difficult to attack targets that are at point blank range. One flame tank can creep up to an AGT and destroy it without becoming badly damaged. Assuming, of course, that no other units are attacking it. [6-2] The spiderbase strategy ----------------------------- Jim Varner (jvarner@nr.infi.net) I developed a strategy for Dune2 I call the spider base, and it works just fine in C&C. The concept is simple, build a sandbag wall from your base to your opponents. Then start building turrets right in the middle of their base. It is tedious and expensive, but it is sometimes the only way to destroy the enemy in those SERIOUS wars of attrition. You can also use your wall to block off choke points. You see, the AI doesn't recognize walls as targets so you can build a sandbag fort right in the middle of their base, just have plenty of $$$ for replacement turrets though. All's fair in love and war... Exploit your enemies weakness... I am NOT cheating!!!! OK, It is cheating. [6-3] How do I drain the computer's funds? ========================================== Drone (jdw@cris.com) I just send a few units to bomb or shoot at the SAM sites. Not enough to ever destroy them but enough so the computer just repairs them until its broke. I'm sure a human would never fall for this. Andre Pang (ozone@zip.com.au) If playing against the computer, you take over a base and he still has another construction site somewhere, sell the tiberium silos which he had (or make sure that spot is vacant so he can build there again). Occasionally the AI will build another one there, usually full of money. Send an engineer to capture it. Repeat process. This will only work if the silos are surrounded by his own structures, so it might be an idea not to capture the buildings around them, if possible. ------------------------------- CHAPTER [7] Miscellaneous tips ------------------------------- [7-1] How do I sell my infantry/vehicles? ========================================= David Hulet (d.hulet@ix.netcom.com) A Westwood bug that turned into a feature for us. You can sell infantry, vehicles and even civilians! Build a sand bag and move the unit as close to the sand bag as you can. Click on the sell button. Move the cursor over to the sand bag. Move the twirling dollar sign as far away from the sand bag (toward the unit) as you can without it loosing its rotating property. while its spinning near the unit click and sell him down the river!!!! This is a great way to make money if you are seriously down and out and about to get your butt kicked. It takes a little practice to figure out, but once you have done it the first time its simple. Frank Wen-heh Lee (lefrankw@umich.edu) If you put the unit in the repair bay (no infantry, of course), click sell, and move the cursor over the unit, a little green $ will appear. You can sell the unit for half-price. Kenneth Chen (lore@vval.com) I find this useful when my units are injured. Usually, I will bring back a vehicle that is almost dead and sell it away to build a new one. It's better to gain some money then none at all. [7-2] How do I control Orcas in mid-flight? =========================================== Group the Orcas with [CTRL]+#. You can then select the Orcas using the group keys and give them orders, even when they are in flight. [7-3] Why should I destroy villages? ==================================== reznor@netcom.com Because you can find crates full of money under churches. Don't attack friendly civilians (when you have to press [CTRL] to be able to attack them): when they are allies, there won't be any crates anyway. [7-4] How do I make a convoy? ============================= Seth Hutchins (seth.hutchins@sunrisebbs.com) When you've got a group of units, and want them to follow one another in a "single-file" style grouping, make use of the CONTROL+ALT key combination like this... 1. Send the leader towards destination. 2. Control+Alt Click on the next unit to follow him 3. Repeat 2 until you have your group This tactic can be altered to get an interesting "circling patrol" effect out of Hummers, Buggies, and Tanks. 1. Select a "lead" unit. 2. Control+Alt Click the next unit. 3. Repeat 2 until you have all but one of the units in your group. 4. Control+Alt Click the leader on the LAST unit. This can annoy your opponent on the modem, and is a decent way to patrol an area. It works well (for me) in closed spaces. EDITOR'S NOTE: This technique can also be used to keep faster units from traveling too quickly. Make all the faster units 'guard' the slowest unit in the group (e.g.- mammoth tank) and wherever you move the unit, the faster units will follow at the same speed. [7-5] How do I get rid of trees? ================================ Craig M. Kazial (kazial@acsu.buffalo.edu) You can destroy trees. However it has to be just one lone tree. In other words, you can not destroy a clump of trees. It is not really useful except if you need to place port of a base at a location that the tree is at. Usually grenadiers and rocket launchers are the best to destroy trees. NEVER use flame units: once a tree is burned, it becomes invincible. Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) The Ion cannon can destroy a tree in one shot. [7-6] How do I hide under trees? ================================ Richard Lio (ez022609@boris.ucdavis.edu) Well, you can do it. Select your unit to move past the tree. When your unit is under cover, hit 's' to stop the unit. Your unit will be behind the tree and invisible to other human eyes. :) My friend does that often in multi-player games. [7-7] How do I stop the computer from rebuilding? ================================================= Michael Stango (phillymjs@aol.com) Park a vehicle on the spot where an enemy building or turret was, so it can't be rebuilt there. [7-8] How do I keep my harvesters from gathering all the tiberium? ================================================================== Put a vehicle on a patch of tiberium. The harvester won't be able to get to it. The tiberium patch will then regrow around it. If you have a blossom tree, parking a vehicle is not necessary because tiberium will begin to sprout around the tree. [7-9] How do I get nukes in the last Nod mission? ================================================= VT (VirtualTed@westwood.com) To use nukes, building the Temple of Nod is not enough. You'll need to get the crates in missions 6, 8, and 12. You may have to capture or destroy some of the buildings to get at the crates. Jon Osborn (josborn@quapaw.astate.edu) On level 8, the crate is by an Orca pad. On level 12, the crate is underneath the GDI construction yard. Brian Albers (albers@cs.utexas.edu) I didn't get the nukes after installing the 1.18 patch halfway through the game. So I went back and replayed _all_ the missions and made damn sure I had gotten all three crates using that version. No nukes. So I loaded 1.19 and restarted the last mission, as they instructed. Still no nukes. For Chrissakes, Westwood, I hope that in the 1.20 patch you will quit screwing around with event flags that don't work and just GIVE EVERYONE WITH THE TEMPLE NUKES, NO QUESTIONS ASKED!!! Sheesh. *7-10* How do I squish things? ============================== Some objects and vehicles can be run over by tracked vehicles and dinosaurs (NOT the Velociraptor: the Raptor can only BE squished). Tracked vehicles are harvesters, tanks, and APCs. Use ALT-click to do a forced move to a location with the object/unit directly in its path of movement. Infantry can be squished easily. Recon bikes can only be crushed if they are hit side on. Sandbags, fences, and walls can not be crushed or driven over by any unit. Stanley Hu (hu@valisys.com) In multiplayer games, it's often risky to try squashing Recon Bikes. There seems to be a bug in C&C that makes it very difficult to do this even with the fast-moving APCs. *7-11* How do I destroy patches of tiberium? ============================================ The only weapons that can directly target a tiberium field are airstrikes, ion cannons, and nuclear warheads. Normal units can destroy tiberium only if they are armed with inaccurate weapons such as bazooka rockets, missiles, artillery shells, or flamethrowers. To destroy tiberium with these units, force attack on a clear square adjacent to the patch of tiberium you wish to destroy. The inaccuracy of these weapon will mean that a few hits will stray into the tiberium patch you want to destroy. Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) You can also take one of your tanks and put it on the tiberium field, on the square you want to destroy. Then, make a minigunner or a commando attack that tank using [CTRL] (force attack). The minigunner will need a few shots to destroy the Tiberium, the commando will get rid of it in one shot. Anyway, your tank won't be damaged a lot. Depending on the maturity of the patch, it may take more than a single hit to destroy. --------------------------------- CHAPTER[8] Single player tactics --------------------------------- [8-1] Blue Aardvark's Anti-Crummy AI Tactics ============================================ Phil Sykes (phil@sykic.demon.co.uk) Punch a hole in their wall where they aren't expecting it. They won't react unless you attack buildings, and you can waltz through, and they still won't react until you open fire (N.B. Turrets will!) Go up on a hill behind or beside the enemy base (every other enemy base has one that isn't guarded very well) APC engineer assaults Load up your APC, and have two Hummers ready. Select a safe forward staging post to meet the squad up. If you haven't got recon on their perimeter defenses, do that now, but DON'T attract enemy attention to the massed armor, cos they'll die. Group all of the units together, and send the APC in AFTER the Hummers, straight through the main gate, or a hole in the wall (much preferred) if you made one. Don't worry about: Light tanks, troops (except flame-throwers and minigunners close to the engineers final objective - run them over if you can) Do worry a bit about: Gun turrets, obelisk tips - the Hummers are there as a sacrifice, and the APC can (just) survive one Obelisk hit! Hopefully if and when your APC dies, you'll have got close enough so they can't fire again on the engineers. Do worry a lot about: Flame tanks and artillery, and I suppose stealth tanks (never faced them defensively), near the objective. All of these eat APCs and engineers for breakfast. If possible, go for another objective, or abort the mission until you can draw them out or confuse them. Targets: (1) VITAL to take out the construction yard, first, or any captured buildings can just be rebuilt. He will *NOT* be running out of money at this stage (if he is, why aren't you doing a mass assault??) He ISN'T restrained by building coherency rules. (2) Vehicle factory (he's still got money, remember, so not much use in removing his refinery just yet, because he'll have enough for loads of vehicles. (3) Refinery (hurt him bad, but remember he's got a huge strategic reserve of cash). This is good for money, especially if there's a harvester in it at the time (4) Hand of Nod. These are VERY difficult to actually get an engineer close to, but worth it. Capture it and churn out a couple of flame-throwers to hold it for a bit. (5) Power Plants / Spice silos / whatever else Take 'em for money. Easier and cheaper to blow em up, but shutting down obelisk power can be useful. Interesting things to try: Draw 'em out: Send a recon unit inside the base, shoot someone and run out. He will follow you to his doom. Lead enemy troopers across tiberium field, they will follow in droves and die. The Nod base, on every level has at least one tactical weak point. Things to look out for: (1) Wide entrances - unguarded or with no turret guards. (2) Hills to the side or rear of the base that can be used for assaults without being directly hit with base defenses. (3) Weak spots where there are no defenses round a wall (4) Having two bases, one big and well defended the other not. Take over the one that isn't well defended, and built some advanced guard towers to defend. This will really annoy them (5) Harvesters going a long way from home - blow them up, and more will be built. If you can get them every time, then they will continue to waste their money! Retaliation: Sometimes after a successful engineer raid or limited attack, they will retaliate by going after your harvester. Make sure they don't get this chance by keeping the harvester in the base following a limited attack, or light tanks will hunt it down. Tiberium field guarding: Often, the enemy will send rocket troops or tanks to guard tiberium fields. Sometimes, the troops will keep dying trying to get to the tiberium field, and they will be replaced indefinitely. ---------------------------- CHAPTER *9* Confucious says ---------------------------- Confucious says: "Bird in hand worth two in bush." I have dropped this section from my FAQ. I will, however, add Murphy's Laws of Combat and Sun Tzu's 'The Art of War' to my C&C Field Manuals webpage: http://kublai.pacificrim.net/~solaris/cnc/cnc.html ------------------------------ CHAPTER [10] Technical Issues ------------------------------ [10-1] What determines my score? ================================ Craig M. Kazial (kazial@acsu.buffalo.edu) Leadership is based on the number of units killed. Efficiency is 100% if you end with the same amount of credits or with more credits than you started with. This is always 100% in misions without money. Time taken does NOT enter into final score and is only for your information. GDI scores the above two [L+E] higher when determining final score. Nod emphasizes simply accomplishing the mission (in other words, the L+E do not factor in much)... Terrorist style "who cares about the cost". Final score ONLY impacts how much cash is brought forward as a percentage ranging from the credits you started with to a maximum allowable, so players can't become an unstoppable cash machine. Some scenarios zero-out score and all past cash allocation info is lost. Raymond Lee (rks11@leicester.ac.uk) Destroyed civilian buildings will go under GDI structure loss. Also, when I have no casualties, my leadership rating under Nod is 75% where as GDI, it is 100% [10-2] What is the CONQUER.INI file? ==================================== The CONQUER.INI file sits on your hard disk in your C&C directory, and supplies C&C with startup values for various configuration items. Most of these startup values can be changed within C&C, but there are some that are only available by editing the file directly using a text editor. Robert J. Trembley (bob@cyrcle.com) deathannounce Default = 0 If set to 1, each time a GDI or NOD unit is lost, the female computer voice will state "GDI (or NOD) unit lost". It gets old kinda fast, and I rather prefer the screams... (No, you don't lose them, but EVA speaks louder than they scream) Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) In the GAME.DAT, I found these options for CONQUER.INI. They come in the [Options] part, but I don't know what they do, or if they even work. MCV= Bibs= TreeTarget= TrueNames= Combat= Scores= CombatIQ= Helipad= Rotation= Players= SlowPalette= Overrun= Sounds= Scrolling= Alan Schneider (alschnei@starlink.com) Last night we found a new feature (?) in C&C. Editing the CONQUER.INI file .... and under the multiplayer section, change side=1 to side=3. What this apparently does, is allow both GDI and NOD to build EQUALLY, i.e.- NOD can build medium tanks (by first building a GDI Factory) and GDI can build NOD bikes (by first building an Airport) *10-3* KALI related issues ========================== see also [15-3] KALI C&C SERVERS Kali is a TSR program that emulates an IPX network through a PPP or SLIP connection. Connect to a Kali server, exit the control program, and load the game. Its usage is completely transparent. As far as your computer is concerned, you are simply connected to a local area network that has a few dozen people playing computer games. If you have Windows 95, use Kali95 instead of DOS Kali. It will solve most of your connection and memory related problems. You can find out more about KALI at www.axxis.com.Please do not E-Mail me for help regarding Kali related issues. Nemesh (jcn8387@osfmail.isc.rit.edu) If you are planning on playing a lot of C&C over the net, you should try to get the latest copy of KALI. At this point, kali1.2e is out, and is an INCREDIBLE improvement over 1.1g. Everything is much faster, and the game almost never locks up. Check it out if you can (talk to someone on one of the servers...the kali.exe is around.) Stephen Vakil (smvakil@students.wisc.edu) I finally got C&C and KALI to work. I'd like to say that when people were asking why it wasn't working, it wasn't very informative for people to say "it's a known bug.." without saying _what_ is a known bug. Basically, from what I can see, using any sort of slip tsr derived from the 16550 one will not work. It would cause frequent crashes on C&C, sometimes a reboot. I got pppshare from kali.jedi.net and got that to work, and that worked through 3 games of C&C and 1/2 hour of descent. Stanley Hu (hu@valisys.com) I have compiled a brief checklist of things to do to check to get Kali C&C games to work. The most important rule after following all this: START GAMES AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. Don't send messages in the Network Game Setup. I've found that the chances of getting games working are significantly reduced the longer you talk and wait. Don't talk in the first five minutes of the game. C&C seems to speed up later in the game--probably because it is trying to verify that all players have the same map, unit specifications, and so on. 1) Ping times should be very low among all the users. Try to hit sub 600 ms consistently. 2) Don't use a busy server that is handling a lot of traffic. Playing over @central is not always a good idea if you're trying to aim for speed and reliability. 3) Make sure everybody is connected at least with a 28.8k modem. I played a three-player game that was sluggish because some idiot didn't tell us that he was using 14.4k. 4) If a lot of C&C games are going, use a different IPX socket by entering "-socketnn" as an argument (where nn is a digit). 5) Under Windows 95, try setting "Idle Sensitivity" all the way down to low. 6) The person with the fastest connection should start the game. 7) Playing during off-hours, when your provider is usually the fastest, is a good idea. 8) Keep trying to start the game a few times. The first time often doesn't work. 9) Use a provider that has a fast connection to the Internet. T1/T3 accounts work nicely. 10) Pray until the next technological revolution comes when everybody will have at least a T1. Jet (jet@aloha.com) If you want to run DOS Kali and C&C under Windows 95, look on my Internet webpage for a step-by-step guide. http://www.aloha.com/~jet *10-4* How can run C&C off my hard disk? ======================================== If your CDROM device drivers take up too much memory to run a program such as Kali, or if you have a laptop that does not have a CDROM drive, you can play C&C completely from your hard disk. Running C&C off the HD: step 1: install C&C like normal step 2: copy all the files from the root directory of the CD-ROM into the directory you just installed C&C into. You can skip four files: SCORES.MIX, MOVIES.MIX, ZOUNDS.MIX and SETUP.MIX. This way you won't hear the music and you won't see the great videos but it saves some 500 MB harddisk space! (ZOUNDS.MIX and SETUP.MIX are not used by C&C, so skip them too) step 3: now copy the general.mix file from the other CD-ROM into this directory as well (rename the first one before doing this). step 4: before playing C&C, make sure you have the general.mix file representing which side you want to play (I use gdignrl.mix and nodgnrl.mix as the filenames and rename one to general.mix depending on which side I want to play). ** step 5: ** Instead of typing C&C to start, type in C&C -cd where is the full path to the C&C directory. ie. If you installed C&C to c:\games\c&c, start the program by typing in: c&c -cdc:\games\c&c\ Notice that there is no space between the "-cd" and the path. Though the trailing backslash is optional for DOS 6.xx users and below, Windows 95 users *must* include it. You no longer have to have the CD-ROM loaded to play c&c. Your C&C will take up a little under 30M if you omit the video and music files. *10-4-1* Making a batch file to run C&C from hard disk ===================================================== Nyerguds (nyerguds@tiscalinet.be) First of all, follow the instructions of part 10-4. Once you have installed C&C like that and copied a gdignrl.mix and nodgnrl.mix to your hard drive, we are ready to go. Practically, you can make a batch file that checks parameters and runs C&C normally when no special parameters are found. The parameters should send you to the labels":gdi" and ":nod". Under those labels, rename the correct general.mix and start C&C as shown in step 5. Don't forget to end the labels with "goto end" and make an ":end" label at the end of your batch file. The batch file should look something like this: @echo off if "%1" == "/g" goto gdi if "%1" == "/n" goto nod c&c.exe %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9 goto end :gdi ren gdignrl.mix general.mix c&c -cdc:\games\c&c\ ren general.mix gdignrl.mix goto end :nod ren nodgnrl.mix general.mix c&c -cdc:\games\c&c\ ren general.mix nodgnrl.mix goto end :end