Mission 5 - Hidden Truth HARDCORE

[Luftwaffles]

Does anyone know how one can beat this mission on hardcore? No matter how many defenses I build I always end up getting overwhelmed by the constant spam of large enemy waves followed by a constant stream of navy, ground and anti-air from an enemy with seemingly unlimited resources. Do I need to be more aggressive with killing their production?

It just seems impossible for me because of the required resource stream you need to attack is dependent on securing resources on the eastern island which requires a decent sized force. But if you divert your forces to secure them, you cant defend against the first attack waves from the north and from the sea? And by then their production and resources are vamped up to an impossible amount of units which always leads to me inevitably putting out constant fires until I lose.

[Tonyu]

Here's what I did:

First off get as much gold stars as possible from other missions then return to Mission 5. You'll need all the bonus units and structures that you can get from the other missions.

1) Immediately get your starting ground units plus 10 trained engineers and send them north to the small island beyond the bridge to get the 4 unit crates. Send them to the east enemy base beyond the bridge and destroy the mega power plant and other buildings near the shore especially the shipyard. If you're good enough you can destroy the 2nd mega power plant to the east.

2) While that is happening, you should be training about 25-30 gunboats, around 5-6 mobile HQ's, and a constant stream of tanks and armored cars and engineers. No need for barracks though building 1 or 2 won't hurt. You'll need the gunboats to defend the west shore and to destroy the rest of the enemy shipyards (I'll get to that later). You'll also need the next dozen of tanks and armored cars to defend the lower left of your base from early enemy attacks.

3) While all of that is happening you should be making more refineries and motor pools. I use the initial free mobile HQ so I could make a refinery at the resource point at the south east of the base. Also make a mega rocket turret at the upper right part of your shipyard, behind the rocky shore near the resource point. That way it can't get targeted by enemy naval units. This should help with the initial wave of enemy naval units.

4) Once you have around 25-30 gunboats, use them to destroy the two enemy shipyards at the enemy base at the furthest north of the map. One shipyard near the west mega power plant, and the other near the east mega power plant. Don't stop building gunboats BTW. After you destroy those two shipyards, there should be two shipyards remaining at the west enemy base. But by now your initial gunboats would be reduced drastically. So get them back to your shipyard to get repaired and use the other newly made gunboats to destroy the last two enemy shipyards. Now you no longer need to worry about naval attacks.

5) While all that is happening you should by then have a lot of ground units. Send some to the east island to deal with the aberations and portals. Also bring along the 5-6 mobile HQ's and build refineries in that island once you've cleared it of aberations.

6) Around this time you should be making air controls and MG helicopters. When you have around 40 helicopters you can use them to destroy the mega power plants at the far north base. Just the mega power plants, no need to destroy the whole base. Afterwards you can use those helicopters, plus more if needed, to get rid of the aberations and portals on the north west island so you'd have an easier time later on. 30 helicopters is usually enough to clear the island of aberations and portals.

7) By now the only thing you will have to worry about are attacks from the east base beyond the bridge which wouldn't really be a problem since you can deal with them at the bridge choke point. And also by then you should have enough ground units to make a second group and send them to destroy what remains of that base (remember you already did some damage to them at the start).

8) And now all that remains is the west enemy base which shouldn't have been a bother since you already destroyed it's shipyards early on, and all it could do is send a couple air units once in a while which your gunboats can easily deal with. Just make a couple naval transports, send some ground units along with a mobile HQ to that island and destroy the base.

[UnBlessed]

Well, Mission 5, the main problem is Sentinels's Drone Center, shipyard, when you destroy all of them, things will be easier.

Gun Boat, MG Heli is useful, to against AA drone, can set 2 MG heli team, when see AA Drone, let most MG heli move back, rest attack AA drone, even lost few MG heli, still better than lost more or all MG heli.

[Luftwaffles]

Originally posted by Tonyu:

Here's what I did:

First off get as much gold stars as possible from other missions then return to Mission 5. You'll need all the bonus units and structures that you can get from the other missions.

1) Immediately get your starting ground units plus 10 trained engineers and send them north to the small island beyond the bridge to get the 4 unit crates. Send them to the east enemy base beyond the bridge and destroy the mega power plant and other buildings near the shore especially the shipyard. If you're good enough you can destroy the 2nd mega power plant to the east.

i cant train engineers because i cant beat this specific mission too unlock them. ill keep trying and being aggressive

[Luftwaffles]

Im not sure if something changed in the AI recently but your strategy does work a bit, destroying their production they do not replace it. Killing their navy production is definetly the idea, but building up production to be able to do it is difficult.

[UnBlessed]

Well, I had videos for all campaign on hard, but hardcore need some adjust, I might try Hardcore when I have time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCElz_iEKak

Another way is use mod can build building in few second, but personally I don't like that.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3210615613

[Luftwaffles]

EDIT: I beat it, 3 stars.

1. Starting units attack power plant and shipyard, while pumping out as gunboats and defense turrets, as well as mobile HQs for refineries.

2. Then I just focused on armored cars/a few tanks for defense and spamming MG helicopters. Helicopters sole focus is to ignore enemy units and just target production facilities, starting with the shipyards. Once their navy is gone they cant land units on you or snipe your harvesters from max range. Then you can just pretty much keep building helicopters and refineries on the east island to target down the rest of their production and energy towers. Then its the same as the other difficulties.

you pretty much have to kill their shipyards in the first 10 minutes