You can't kill the Messiah... (Kane's Wrath)

[Darth Wong]

After playing the game for a short time, allow me to state that the marked of kane subfaction requires a serious nerfing.

Their cyborg shock troopers are ridiculously overpowered. If you don't have air units, you can't stop them, period.

I was playing a global conquest game against a marked army, and I got steamrolled in less than three minutes, against an EASY AI.

I don't see how that should happen. Their cyborg infantry is tough, but dug-in riflemen can stop them, and if you play as Steel Talons, Wolverines tear them right up.

[Chris OFarrell]

M.A.R.V

The Heavy Armor Brigade now has a new Interim Objective Light Resource Gathering Mobile Refinery.

I mean DAMN.

The first time I see the thing, it runs through a minefield kills two Avatars and two Stealth Tanks while ignoring two Obelisks and all of the above weapons firing at it.

I think I'm in love. I'm sure its absurdly expensive to make, but DAMN.

[Laughing Mechanicus]

I've only played the first few campaign missions so far plus some GDI skirmishes but I must say I like what they have done with the game.

For a start the "vanilla" sides now have enough weapons and upgrades that it feels like you have way more choice in how you play the game, where before it felt very restricted.

When I first heard they were only adding 2 sub factions per side rather than the 3 per side of the Zero Hour expansion for Generals I was disappointed, however after playing with them they seem to have added way more unique units and abilities to each of those sub factions than any of the Zero Hour ones had.

The only major downside for me is the art for the new units... all the ones I've seen are really uninspired and amateurishly executed. The GDI mechs especially look terrible, which is even more annoying as the original designs for the Titan and Wolverine from Tiberian Sun were (aside from being hated mecha filth!) very cool designs. The MARV, although very cool in concept, just looks like some of the worse examples of 40k kit-bashed tanks I've seen. I guess all the good artists were working on Red Alert 3.

Otherwise I do like it, though I haven't tried the inevitable global conquest mode yet - is it any good? And how does it compare to those in other games? If its just a repetitive skirmish fest I'll give it a miss.

[Vympel]

Is there a real sense of time passing as you play through the story campaign from Nod - i.e. clear harking back to the time of C&C2, or do the Nod sub factions just have variations of Nod's C&C3 units and it's all a big con?

[Darth Wong]

Frankly, the campaign is lame. And the Global Conquest mode is lame too.

The campaign is just like any other C&C campaign, despite the occasional lapse in time where decades supposedly pass. In the early period, you get "purifiers", which look just like avatars but can't be upgraded. In the late period, you get avatars. Ooooh.

The "Global Conquest" mode is lame too. It's EA's attempt to copy the style of hybrid turn-based and real-time games like the Total War series, but it's so half-assed that you have to wonder if it was made by high-school kids. You start with several bases across the world map, and you can upgrade each base in a turn-based manner. But the upgrades are extremely limited; you can hit the "add defenses" button once, the "add power" button once, or the "upgrade base" button twice, and that's pretty much it. After that, your only option is to add a "special building", like an ion control centre or an intelligence centre. There's only a half-dozen of these special buildings, so once you've got a half-dozen bases, you're just wasting your time by building more special buildings on bases.

Worse yet, you can't garrison your bases! All bases start empty, and you can create a "strike force" between turns but this strike force doesn't reside in the base. It has to be created out in the field for some reason. If an enemy attacks your base, you start with no defensive forces; just static defenses, which suck against a mobile and aggressive enemy.

Speaking of base defense, when you start a real-time base defense battle, it doesn't let you decide upon the configuration of your base or its defenses at all. You just get plopped into your pre-configured (and horribly designed) base with no mobile forces whatsoever, and the game timer is already running, so you have to rush around looking at the map to see where all of your buildings are, never mind where the enemy is. No planned defenses or strategies here; it's just speed demon clickfest city, as you try to frantically manufacture forces to defend your poorly designed base from the attack which begins in about a minute. Thanks, EA. Go fuck yourselves.

The way to play the campaign is to just get whatever paltry upgrades you can get for your bases, auto-resolve all base defense battles, and play out attacks yourself, especially because you can build a very powerful strike force which should be able to steamroll most bases. And then, after a few turns, you start to wonder why you bother playing Global Conquest at all.

[Darth Wong]

M.A.R.V

The Heavy Armor Brigade now has a new Interim Objective Light Resource Gathering Mobile Refinery.

I mean DAMN.

The first time I see the thing, it runs through a minefield kills two Avatars and two Stealth Tanks while ignoring two Obelisks and all of the above weapons firing at it.

I think I'm in love. I'm sure its absurdly expensive to make, but DAMN.

The MARV is awesome. Basically, I consider any GDI battle to be a race to build the MARV. Once the MARV is built, victory is assured. Its most important characteristic is not even its battle prowess (although that is tremendous, particularly once you upgrade it by putting in the right personnel), but its ability to rapidly vacuum up tiberium.

For those who haven't played, the MARV is a giant super-heavy tank which has a tiberium harvester/refinery built into it. Simply drive over tiberium, and you get instant money. Your finances become virtually unlimited once you get a MARV, and it can obviously defend itself in the field so you can run out and get those contested tiberium fields without difficulty. It can consume an entire tiberium field in less than a minute, filling your coffers to overflowing and allowing you to build vast armies at a rate which is normally impossible, while simultaneously denying that tiberium to the enemy.

[Darksider]

I don't see how that should happen. Their cyborg infantry is tough, but dug-in riflemen can stop them, and if you play as Steel Talons, Wolverines tear them right up.

Yeah, after playing them again, it looks like my strike force was just vastly outnumbered (I had a hussar squadron against 5-9 squads of marked infantry, mostly the vehicle killing cyborgs) they took out my wolverines before they could kill them. The marked are also effectively useless against air. GDI skirmishes and conquest games usually involve me rushing to get the new attack helicopters garrisoned with rocket squads. It's like a faster, more powerful version of the APC combo.

also, with the MARV, what garrison combos do you use? I usually do an engineer for self-repair, and 3 rocket squads for anti air capability.

[Darth Wong]

Yeah, after playing them again, it looks like my strike force was just vastly outnumbered (I had a hussar squadron against 5-9 squads of marked infantry, mostly the vehicle killing cyborgs) they took out my wolverines before they could kill them. The marked are also effectively useless against air. GDI skirmishes and conquest games usually involve me rushing to get the new attack helicopters garrisoned with rocket squads. It's like a faster, more powerful version of the APC combo.

I find the Conquest game annoying for the reasons I outlined earlier, but yeah, C&C has always been a bit of a "rock, paper, scissors" sort of game, so it's usually just a matter of finding the right combo.

also, with the MARV, what garrison combos do you use? I usually do an engineer for self-repair, and 3 rocket squads for anti air capability.

An engineer, two rocket squads, and a grenadier squad if I can get one. This allows the MARV to take on aircraft, vehicles, infantry, and clear buildings with aplomb. Sometimes I'll put in a rifle squad instead of the second rocket squad.

[Chris OFarrell]

The Global Conquest mode does indeed suck.

Dawn of War; Dark Crusade did the global conquest thing WAY better.

You could upgrade your force with a core unit of bodyguards and elite forces, but had to build your army from scratch. You also only had a limited preset base, but you could upgrade it with secondary buildings and defenses.

At least on the ATTACK, so when you dropped in, you had just the basic -but defended and ready to go- base.

AFTER you conquer the area though, all the buildings and defenses you've built remain, so you could easily smacketh down any attack into your territory as your resource gathering is already in place and so are your factories...

It can make it a little too easy, but it really reduces the annoyance in your grand campaign of having to go back and defend somewhere you've taken.

[Nephtys]

MARV is insane. It really is. It makes your mammoth stream endless. Then again, nothing really could beat a tide of railgun mammoths in stock anyway. It sorta looks stupid though. It'd have looked better with a Juggernaut-style turret on it.

ZOCOM for GDI is pretty lame. Shatterers are cool, but Zone Raiders are actually a downgrade from normal troopers. they seem to do the same damage (somewhat more vs buildings), are a tad faster... but actually can miss a moving mammoth. Rifle squads rip them apart like no tomorrow too, which is sad. The GDI spammable Helicopter APC is pretty good though. A counter to Venom/Stormrider spam, plus every side's dedicated AA vehicle.

Turrets have gotten nerfed. You can only build them from the Con yard, and not the cranes.


All in all, CNC Generals Shockwave is still superior to the new stuff this one seems to have added. Where each of the 4 subfactions has completely different gear/styles than the main faction.

[Andrew_Fireborn]

On Global Conquest: You also forgot that the only victory condition enabled on any real-time fight is total annihilation.

Destroying ALL of the enemy units. Alot of my battles ended with me steamrolling the main base... then scouring the map for the one or two infantry that got away. (The one that killed if for me was a single sabotuer on the other side of the map from ANYTHING. Also the map selection for the game is severely limited...)

Though, a scrin task force made up of 10 carriers can auto-resolve and never loose a single unit on any level/enemy base. Dunno about the others... I'd venture a similar mammoth task force could do likewise...

Not to mention the utter imbalance in "alternate victory" paths... Scrin need 7 to 9 bases to level 3 with a tower special structure... while GDI needs to own 33% of the global territory and Nod needs to have a base near 28(?) cities.

The whole thing seems tacked on as an after thought to the popularity of DoW...

[Vympel]

The campaign is just like any other C&C campaign, despite the occasional lapse in time where decades supposedly pass. In the early period, you get "purifiers", which look just like avatars but can't be upgraded. In the late period, you get avatars. Ooooh.

That's exactly the kind of cheap-ass, unimaginative shit ploy I was hoping they wouldn't try.

[Laughing Mechanicus]

The campaign is just like any other C&C campaign, despite the occasional lapse in time where decades supposedly pass. In the early period, you get "purifiers", which look just like avatars but can't be upgraded. In the late period, you get avatars. Ooooh.

That's exactly the kind of cheap-ass, unimaginative shit ploy I was hoping they wouldn't try.

Even the Purifiers are, I think, just the special type of Avatar one of the new Nod sub-factions gets. The only thing they actually specifically for the campaign to try and show that it is taking place just after the Second Tiberium War is to change the icon and skin for the Nod Militia so they look like Nod soldiers from Tiberian Sun. Seriously, nothing else.

Also Kane's half-helmet look stupid. Not only that, but it looks like it doesn't even fit Joe Kucan properly - he just sort of has it balanced on top of his shiny head at an awkward angle.

[Ford Prefect]

The campaign is just like any other C&C campaign, despite the occasional lapse in time where decades supposedly pass. In the early period, you get "purifiers", which look just like avatars but can't be upgraded. In the late period, you get avatars. Ooooh.

That's exactly the kind of cheap-ass, unimaginative shit ploy I was hoping they wouldn't try.

Well that's a severe disappointment. I really enjoyed Tiberium Wars and thought they might actually strike gold with Kane's Wrath - it sounded really promising. And now it is not.

[Zor]

Turrets have gotten nerfed. You can only build them from the Con yard, and not the cranes. .

That is something they did in Tib Wars with one of the Early Pacthes, its not something new to Kane's Wrath.

Zor

[Nephtys]

Global War mode is... huh. The computer can outbuild the everliving crap out of you if you let them.

It seems the best way to win (as GDI) is with the Helicopters + Rocket Men + Engineer airlift squad, to raid and destroy NOD groups lacking air defense, or land engineers to do sabotage on enemy construction yards.

The 'commando strike' strategic power is ungodly. You'll be surprised how useful just 4 squads of zones, Commando, 2 Snipers and 2 firehawks can be in taking out a small sized base. I used zones and commando to suicide attack the enemy con yard at the start, and their factory... then slowly pick their base apart with firehawks

[defanatic]

I dunno. I personally prefer the Kane's Wrath global conquest over the Dark Crusade one. The AI doesn't cheat nearly as mercilessly (where are they getting all their honour guard? I have every territory but the strongholds!).

Also, I found the best counter to the command strike was to field forces that consisted entirely of 25 venoms. Loading times longer than battles? Hoorah!

[Darth Wong]

The Global Conquest mode also has the worst victory payoff ever. You simply get dumped back out to the main screen. It doesn't even tell you that you won.

[Darksider]

The Global Conquest mode also has the worst victory payoff ever. You simply get dumped back out to the main screen. It doesn't even tell you that you won.

what???

::::Deletes global conquest saves:::::


also, something interesting I saw pointed out on SB.com, the game file is called C&CEp1.

Perhaps they're coming out with another expansion pack with a GDI campaign?

It's just the sort of thing EA would do, releasing what should be a single expansion pack in two volumes to make more money.

[Vertigo1]

Turrets have gotten nerfed. You can only build them from the Con yard, and not the cranes. .

That is something they did in Tib Wars with one of the Early Pacthes, its not something new to Kane's Wrath.

Zor

Specifically the 1.05 patch, which is why when I played I did not go past 1.04. Fuck you EA for radically changing the gameplay to suit the Generals fanboys with every fucking patch!

I just hope they don't pull shit shit again with Red Alert 3.

[Nephtys]

Rocketroopers need some nerfing. I did some testing, and Black Hand rocket guys with a flame soldier add-on can out-fight nod rifle soldiers and any anti-personel vehicle. The rockets just do craploads of blast to crap infantry. Even GDI's trades 2:3 in cost against Nod militia when in a huge mob. Just spamming those'll basically take out anything except sniper mobs.

Also: Did anyone see the video of Kane removing the mask? Hilarious.

[Typhonis 1]

Were any new defenses added? Like say Walls and maybe those nice towers you can put 3 squads of infantry in so you can conserve power?

[ray245]

Frankly, the campaign is lame. And the Global Conquest mode is lame too.

The campaign is just like any other C&C campaign, despite the occasional lapse in time where decades supposedly pass. In the early period, you get "purifiers", which look just like avatars but can't be upgraded. In the late period, you get avatars. Ooooh.

The "Global Conquest" mode is lame too. It's EA's attempt to copy the style of hybrid turn-based and real-time games like the Total War series, but it's so half-assed that you have to wonder if it was made by high-school kids. You start with several bases across the world map, and you can upgrade each base in a turn-based manner. But the upgrades are extremely limited; you can hit the "add defenses" button once, the "add power" button once, or the "upgrade base" button twice, and that's pretty much it. After that, your only option is to add a "special building", like an ion control centre or an intelligence centre. There's only a half-dozen of these special buildings, so once you've got a half-dozen bases, you're just wasting your time by building more special buildings on bases.

Worse yet, you can't garrison your bases! All bases start empty, and you can create a "strike force" between turns but this strike force doesn't reside in the base. It has to be created out in the field for some reason. If an enemy attacks your base, you start with no defensive forces; just static defenses, which suck against a mobile and aggressive enemy.

Speaking of base defense, when you start a real-time base defense battle, it doesn't let you decide upon the configuration of your base or its defenses at all. You just get plopped into your pre-configured (and horribly designed) base with no mobile forces whatsoever, and the game timer is already running, so you have to rush around looking at the map to see where all of your buildings are, never mind where the enemy is. No planned defenses or strategies here; it's just speed demon clickfest city, as you try to frantically manufacture forces to defend your poorly designed base from the attack which begins in about a minute. Thanks, EA. Go fuck yourselves.

The way to play the campaign is to just get whatever paltry upgrades you can get for your bases, auto-resolve all base defense battles, and play out attacks yourself, especially because you can build a very powerful strike force which should be able to steamroll most bases. And then, after a few turns, you start to wonder why you bother playing Global Conquest at all.

Agreed. C&C isn't total war, where units routs, flanking manauver actaully works and etc.

[Darth Wong]

Were any new defenses added? Like say Walls and maybe those nice towers you can put 3 squads of infantry in so you can conserve power?

No new defenses, just some new units.

C&C's rejection of walls (or even barbed-wire fences) and watchtowers is really annoying. They want NOD to be able to sneak stealthed units into your base without anyone knowing, so you're supposed to build anti-stealth structures or place anti-stealth units all throughout your base in order to stop them. As if GDI has somehow lost barbed-wire technology.

[SirNitram]

What's really galling is that the missions include walls.

Walls worked in TibSun, at least when they made t hem auto-link together. So did pavement. It was a balancing act of devouting time to that, to fend off stealth, or defenses and economy, to fight normally. But EA apparently only wants laser fences as a temporary 'power'.