Brutal with Bots

For speed reading, see bold.

Brutal is hard enough by itself. But it's even harder with bad team mates.

If you can't find decent allies, or you just want extra pain challenge, then you can settle for bots...

Introduction

From what I have heard, the Alien Swarm community considers bots to be really powerful in Reactive Drop. My experience has differed dramatically.

Firstly, yes, bots are really good at shooting. They can aim. And they can take orders.

But that's it. It doesn't nearly make up for all the stupid things they do.

Believe me, completing every campaign of Reactive Drop with only bots was no end of frustration. I had to learn every quirk of every map and every bot one by one. What's really annoying is when they change their pattern for no reason without any indication. As a rough estimate, it took me 40 hours to do all campaigns on Brutal with three bots.

This guide is adapted from my kind of diary of my experience playing through every campaign mission with bots (I commented on my own screenshots as I went through). It took many, many hours. Expect a lot of complaining about bots and some general repetition.

I originally started with the hope of doing every campaign mission on Brutal with three bots only and level one gear only. That idea quickly went out the window.

Perhaps the whole experience would have been different with seven bots. I have heard and somewhat observed that more than four marines causes twice as many enemies to spawn. Whether it is worth it to gain the four marines or not, I cannot tell.

It seems I used the terms 'panel', 'terminal', and 'computer' quite interchangeably on first draft of this guide. I have tried to separate them as I have done quality checks, but I may have missed some. To clarify:
when I say 'panel' I mean either a button on a wall, usually next to a door, that can be activated by anyone, or a button on a wall that activates when the Tech completes the wire minigame;
when I say 'terminal' I mean a chunky machine holding critical data which can be downloaded by anyone;
when I say 'computer' I mean a chunky machine or monitor display that holds the Tech-only computer (1s and 0s) minigame.

Your Own Skill

Right, this is Brutal we are talking about. It's no walk in the park. If you are seriously considering doing Brutal with bots only without any experience of Alien Swarm on Brutal difficulty, then make sure you are not going to just waste your own time.

As guidance, I would say that, before attempting Brutal with bots only, you should find yourself satisfying most of the following.

You are skilled
As you'd expect, there is a necessary skill requirement that if not met will make some missions impossible. Alien Swarm is a game with a high skill ceiling. This means that player skill both plays a heavy role in succeeding on missions, and, more particularly, that the game is constructed in such a way as to allow greater skill to have more influence on success up to a very high level of skill. Alien Swarm is also a game that furthers this accomodation of skill by providing proportional opposition in the form of difficulty that is befitting of those with high skill, for example Brutal. If there is not enough skill, then Brutal will not be possible. Fortunately, I believe that anyone, with sufficient time and effort, can improve their skill up to a level that is by far enough for completing Brutal with bots. Now, 'You are skilled' is not very measureable, so you can probably skip this point entirely, I just felt that it was worth mentioning on a general fan base level.

You have significant experience with each class
Bots generally can't do class specific tasks very well. You need to be better than the bots at those tasks. You will likely be switching to control other marines often so that you can fulfil said tasks either properly or more efficiently.

You have a good knowledge of the game mechanics
If you don't, then why are you reading this? For fun? Okay, fair enough. Understanding how the game works is essential for getting somewhere on any difficulty, but really knowing the game is a requirement for getting through Brutal. You need to know everything from quick reload, to ordered objective completion, to how much ammo box is used for different weapons resupplying, to aiming at targets at strange heights, to boulder removal, to the effectiveness of every weapon and utility item, to the subtleties of friendly fire, to ways of minimising friendly fire, to ammo efficiency. Most of these things are quite intuitive, but they are still absolutely required for Brutal. Fortunately, most of these come from experience, or just a tonne of reading on the Alien Swarm Wikia. Just be sure to hug the walls and control your fire, things that people tend to never do until someone informs them of the existence of such things.

You have played all the campaigns before
This is not strictly necessary, but it can save you hours of frustration on Brutal because you've already learned the silly gimick required to complete a certain objective or get round a particular corner without wasting four clips of ammo.

You can make decisions under pressure
This is often considered part of leadership. Honestly, I suck at this one, which is why I get so much benefit out of multiple attempts at something. And, you know, I've managed without it simply by learning the missions inside out. But it will be extremely helpful if you can make quick choices.

Perserverence
Now, the most important requirement is less to do with the game than to do with yourself. As with all challenges, it is up to you to see it through. If you are really going to do this, then you must find the willpower to overcome the temptation to give up. Brutal is difficult. You will at some point sit back after failing a mission for the tenth time and wonder if it's worth doing. Maybe it's not, but if you started you might as well finish. Keep trying and it will only be a matter of time until you succeed. All this motivation and advice and what-not only goes so far. Only you can make the difference. Lots of players find a difficult game that they want to complete and struggle with whether or not to give up. That's what Dark Souls is famous for. But other games have that, too. If you haven't had that experience, then you must learn to perservere. Determination, get-back-up-again-ness, perserverance, whatever you want to call it, is not a gift from the divines bestowed upon some people at birth. It is something that is learned just like any skill. It takes practise, patience, and the ability to calm yourself down. If you already have that, then good. If not, then prepare to discover a little part of yourself you may not have known was there.

In summary: Experience, skill, perserverance.

Learning the Bots

The bots are as finicky as the worst of missions. You have to do every single thing perfectly right, or they'll do something stupid and doom the mission.

The Good

Bots can aim
That is true. This is the one power that you have available to you to make progress in Brutal. You cannot do it alone. The success of each (non-easier) mission depends on you making the most of this power.

Bots can shoot well
There is something else that the bots can do well. I struggle to find the perfect words to explain it, but basically it is the following. When there are only a few Drones trickling in, and no marines are facing them, then the single closest bot to the enemies will shoot them. Whereas, the moment when the number or strength of the incoming aliens ("swarm influx") will be enough to surpass the firepower of the one firing bot, then another bot will immediately turn and contribute firepower. Bots can instantaneously observe and react to balance firepower against swarm influx.

This too is a powerful ability, but one that is expected and natural. If bots did not do this, then each bot would have to be ordered to help each other every single time someone gets swarmed, something that would prove far too arbitrary and senseless to be fair to the commander (that is, the only player of the squad). My point is, the bots do this well. Players can find balancing firepower against swarm influx difficult when the screen gets crowded with colour, aliens stack on top of each other, or a lag spike hits when turning a corner. None of these things impede the ability of bots to detect the enemies, and so they do very well.

Bots get benefits
Oh, one more thing. Bots get some straight up stat boosts on Brutal. This, I believe, is ridiculous. It doesn't make sense, it isn't fair to the player, and it certainly doesn't make up for all the things the bots do wrong. But, I suppose it's not worth someone's time to program better AI considering playing with other people is much more fun. Anyway, it is worth noting that bots can tank better than you can. I think bot-controlled Sarge can survive a full Parasite infestation without dying. I even remember seeing Bastille heal-tank two Shieldbugs until out of Medical Gun ammo (I have a screenshot). If you ever get infested, then switch to a bot so that the bot can deal with the infestation, preserve more health, and preserve more heal ammunition.

The Bad (A)

There is a lot more bad than good. Where do I start?

Bots are dumb
They follow very simple rules that try to accomodate a specific play style that, from what I can tell, appears to be a futile balance between 'able to speedrun' and 'very effective at slow and steady'. Sometimes, it's like they suddenly switch modes and run off or sit there eating bullets.

Bots never dodge
Indeed, the first thing to note is that bots don't dodge projectiles. They will never roll, they will never weave around Ranger orbs, they will never step out of the explosion radius of a bomb from a Mortarbug or a Boomer (the tripod alien that inflates then explodes). For Rangers and Boomers, I try to go out by myself to attract the attention and dodge tank while killing them. Against Mortarbugs, I would try to be prepared and lure out as many other enemies as possible before setting them off and running in spamming the Go command and laying down lots of firepower to kill them fast.

Delayed in shooting, kind of
When bots aren't looking, they won't start shooting until they absolutely need to. This enables their ammo efficient 'firepower against swarm influx' mentioned above. However, it also means that, when a single enemy is charging at them, they will wait until the last second before turning and firing. This isn't so bad for the most part. It means they can keep their eyes on where you've (supposedly) ordered them to cover. But the big issue is that Parasites don't need the last second. A Parasite jumps for the face of a bot before it can turn around. This is of course a disaster. You have to either lead the bots everywhere while holding a Flamer out, or you have to memorise the position of every single Parasite in the mission you are doing and make sure at least one marine is facing it as it comes at the squad.

They don't cover you
Not opening fire until the last moment also means that they don't cover you. If a particular influx of swarm coming at you is deemed manageable according to the perfect aim of the bots, then they will not contribute firepower. From what I have seen, sometimes they will start helping if you take a couple of hits (often meaning you die first), or sometimes they will just sit there and watch as you dance around reloading and dying from a single Drone. They seem to have no 'cover the player' mechanics. They don't seem to care if you are busy healing, reloading, or activating something - if an enemy is neither in their line of sight nor an immediate threat to a bot, then that bot will not shoot it. This often means you have to give the Stop command and line up each bot manually ready for terminal interaction, and never be too far (that is, not even the other side of the room) from the bots. Specifically, take control of and set position and line of sight for each bot before you do any of the following: press a button (panel) to begin opening a door; interact with a terminal or computer to download critical data; switch to or command the Tech to complete either a wire minigame or a computer minigame.

Bots are really inefficient with ammo
Not neon green noob level of ammo waste, but certainly more wasteful than a player (when you'd think a robot would be precise and efficient). They stop firing as soon as enemies are dead, but the problem lies in the opening fire. When a bot decides to turn around and shoot an enemy, they often start firing when they are half way through the turning, rather than when they are aiming at the enemy. This isn't a problem with some of the lower rate of fire weapons, but it will cut through PDW ammo fast. I've noticed with PDWs as well that sometimes they lead the target too much (I don't think you need to lead targets at all, do you?), releasing tens of bullets straight past Drones and into walls. Furthermore, when facing a spawn point, a bot will open fire as soon as it detects an enemy, wasting two seconds worth of ammo during the enemy spawn animation when it is invincible. There is not much you can do about the other ammo inefficiency except make full use of the ammo found in each mission. But for spawn points, just don't let bots face them. Set up your squad around the corner before the spawn point, instead. Again, this does indeed require you to learn every spawn point in every mission. Yup, lots of re-runs and memorisation.

Bots don't find line of sight
What's even worse for their ammo use is firing into someone when they are in the way. If either you or another bot stands directly between the bot looking towards the incoming enemy and said enemy, then that bot will just waste clips in a pathetically stupid attempt to solve the issue. Thankfully, bots do not cause (but can still receive from the player) friendly fire. I have not listed 'cannot damage friendlies' as a point for 'The Good' of bots since, as this paragraph surely infers, such a feature is required. They'd just shoot each other to death before getting anything done otherwise. Of course, continuing to shoot even if there is an obstruction (not only other marines, but also some super confusing corners or mind bending crates) would not be a problem if the obstacle were to remove itself. If a bot is being shot by a friendly, then they will just stand there eating bullets. At least they can do so for breakfast. Still, it's annoying when neither the bot shooting nor the bot being shot figures to fix the issue by moving a little to the side. And when you need your line of sight to a particular hard to hit target and there is a bot standing in the way, it would be nice if a subtle hint like shooting it in the spine would be enough for it to figure to give you a little clearance.

They charge for ammo
As if all that wasn't nooby enough, when a bot sees an ammo box (often not yet visible to you), and needs at least one clip of ammo, it charges off to grab some. A bot will run blindly into an alien horde just to top up on ammo, and even stand there eating claws while doing squats (picking up the ammo). I mean, not falling back while reloading so friendlies can help is tolerable, but running off to die just because a gun is not maxed on ammunition is ...frankly I'm running out of synonyms for stupid here. So, you also need to memorise the location of every single ammo crate each mission, just to be sure that you can tell the bots to stop and position them one by one as you approach the room with the ammo box just to avoid a bot doing a suicide run.

Don't let them run out of ammo
All this talk about ammo, what happens if a bot runs out of ammo? When out of ammo, a bot will stand there. That's not so bad, right? They'll even still provide an odd punch to deal with swarm coming at them. Well, it's still bad. Mostly, I have seen bots stop when out of ammo, probably because most of the time I've had with bots they have been following the Stop command and therefore they run out of ammo while under the standing order to specifically not go anywhere. Well, sometimes, and I assume only when under a Go command, sometimes when a bot runs out of ammo it will charge at the enemy as if their fists are worth using. I mean, maybe on Normal fair play to that bot for helping the squad, but at least pretend to trust your buddies enough to let them take a little more responsibility in the firepower department to cover your lack of bullets (including for following the Stop command), and especially on Brutal when -let's face it- melee is useless if the enemy is not on fire. Bots are about as bad as you'd expect with melee, anyway. It is a sad moment seeing the ammo icon appear over a bot (indicating a lack of ammunition) and then standing mouth agape to witness a heroic charge met with immediate death.

The Bad (B)

Save ammo for the Autogun
Another thing to note about bots and ammo is that bots will not lift a finger to accomodate each other in their ammo grabbing. They do have a rule which limits them to never grabbing ammo from an ammo crate if doing so would put them above the number of clips that the player marine has. However, it's every bot for itself if you have more ammo than them. The greatest problem with this is when everyone has full ammo except the Special Weapons bot. So, you deploy an Ammo Satchel and watch in horror as you didn't notice that one of the other bots is missing a clip and so runs over and plucks a single clip out of the ammo box, rendering it useless to the Special Weapons bot, and wasting four clips of ammo.

Moving on, let's talk about bots and healing.

I assume, purely for the common preference for it, and maybe to avoid extra micro management of the bots, that you will be equipping the Medic of the squad with the Medical Gun rather than Heal Beacons (which must be deployed using a command button, typically the '3' key). From what I have seen, a bot with a Medical Gun will do fine for the most part of odd scratches accumulated over a mission. However, as expected, you will need to accomodate the quirks of the bots for healing as well.

Medic bot
First, the Medic as controlled by a bot will only heal someone who is within range of the Medical Gun. Sometimes (yes, even after all my experience, I am still forced to make strong estimates), a bot will only heal someone who is within range and has less than a threshhold of health equal to about 60%. If you want a top up ready for the next horde you know is coming, or you are dancing with a Shieldbug in the middle of a room full of red barrels, then tough. For the first half of my Brutal run, I chose to play as the Medic out of habit. For the second half, I routinely switched to the Medic to top up everyone's health ready for the next combat.

Delayed on healing
Anyway, the next thing you need to know is that the bot controlling the Medic has a delay on healing. There must be between a one and two second interval of time in which either a marine loses health below the threshhold and the Medic provides healing, or a marine needing health enters the Medical Gun range and the Medic provides healing. This may sound quite decent on the face of it, but bare in mind that a Medic's sole job is to restore health to the marines of the squad, and that the delay -added to the delay already present between clicking using the Medical Gun and health actually being restored- is far longer than the time needed for a marine to die on Brutal difficulty. A good player of a Medic class will do far better. I know, because generally I will recognise when a player needs health before they lose it by taking a hit, and I will start restoring their health immediately after they have lost it... I'm getting distracted again by frustration. Bots are dumb. They are delayed in healing. The major thing to note here is that the delay is sometimes sufficient to enable a Parasite infestation to succeed. If someone gets infested, you should switch to the Medic and provide the healing yourself. If the Medic is the one who is infested, then you might be better off covering the Medic and leaving the bot to eventually decide to heal itself, though sometimes it might fail. It's all very tentative. If more than one marine gets infested at the same time, then you should be able to handle it, thanks only to the bots' infestation resistance. However, you would likely run out of heal ammo before the end of the mission, so on the harder missions it would already be a loss. Three infestations at the same time is simply too much for the Medical Gun to handle (I have never been able to save all three) - it's why I prefer Heal Beacons (just deploy three or four), as well as generally finding they have more ammo worth of healing. Obviously, avoiding infestation is preferable to curing it, so practise the avoiding part more than the curing part.

Plan for Heal Kits
Next, bots will waste heal ammo even if someone has a Personal Healing Kit on them. But Heal Kits are just for back up purposes, right? Yeah, well what if there are four of them on the floor right in front of you? I mean, bots are dumb, that's a given, so it might not be fair to complain here. It's just with players it would be easy to say "Save the meds, there are medikits round the next corner", or "Stop healing me! I have a health pack right here!" Brutal mission are long and taxing. You need to save all the health and healing ammunition you can in case someone takes one more hit than you are prepared for. Having a bot unnecessarily use up healing ammo when you have put the effort into planning for and making use of all the Healing Kits on the map is really annoying. So, yeah, memorise the locations of all the Health Kits so that you can order the Medic to Stop so you can get to the Health Kit without being healed.

Bots like to heal-tank
Right, the next thing on bots and healing is that the Medic will heal instead of shoot. This is bad when one marine is 1% below the threshhold and an overwhelming horde is coming round the corner, but it is an absolute disaster when, say, the Medic falls below the threshhold while surrounded by swarm and so it sits there healing itself rather than dealing with what is causing it to lose health. They'll do this against a single Drone, or a pair of Shieldbugs while in a corner. I think I've already mentioned that I have a screenshot of a bot heal-tanking two Shieldbugs on Brutal until out of Medical Gun ammo. There's not much you can do to save a bot controlled Medic when aliens -especially Shieldbugs- are everywhere, but when it's just a small horde (as small as they get on Brutal) you can just be sure to keep a third eye out for the Medic and provide the bot extra covering fire (like a grenade to their face).

Poor pathfinding
The final thing to note about bot behaviour in general is navigation or pathfinding. Bots get stuck on railings, crates, corners, doors, steps, air, you name it. I've fround the most effective way of dealing with this to be memorising the locations of each of these obstacles one by one through trial and error and finding the correct kind of wiggle during Go spam that will get the bots through it. So, not only do you need to memorise the location of every single spawn point, Parasite, door, terminal, Shieldbug, Mortarbug, objective, ammo box, medikit, and whatever else I've already mentioned, you also need to memorise every obstacle of the environment. For crates, that simply means walking a wide berth. But for some of the worse ones, it means planning an entirely different route through the mission, or abusing the teleport power of bots. Yes, if they get stuck far enough away from you (or even if they aren't stuck), then they will pause for a moment then teleport to your position. Be aware that during this few second pause the bots don't shoot or move, so they are extremely vulnerable. But, the ability may be the only way on some missions, like Lana's Bridge. Also, bots don't like tight spaces. They perform terribly on catwalks (footways), and they like to pass through a doorway or short catwalk in a sudden move rather than the usual shoot until clear. Indeed, a poorly timed traversing of a short catwalk or staircase can cause all the bots to stop firing and charge to the other side to immediately be swarmed by Drones.

In summary: Bots can shoot, balance firepower against swarm influx, and get some stat bonuses. But they never dodge, need manual positioning and line of sight, are ammo inefficient, charge into swarm to get ammo, stop when out of ammo, ammo grab against each other, are delayed in healing, never think ahead, heal-tank, and can't navigate. Also, you must memorise everything.

Now does it look like bots are overpowered?

Mission Specific Guidance

The rest of this guide will provide help regarding each mission. The order here follows that of the campaigns as listed during in game selection.

The mission specific guidance is not meant to be a walkthrough. Not every detail is mentioned because that would be a waste of your reading time. The mission specific guidance is only supposed to be something you can refer to if you get stuck. If it doesn't help, then feel free to ask for more information, though I may have forgotten anything helpful since my experience of Brutal.

Play Normal first
If you haven't noted already, playing each campaign on Normal difficulty is highly recommended, even if you do forget most of the missions by the time you get round to them on Brutal.

I started my all campaigns Brutal run with the self-imposed challenge of only three bots, the 'top four' characters, and level one gear. The level one gear stipulation quickly disappeared, but I did manage to do all campaigns (except Jacob's Rest and Bonus Missions) with only Sarge, Wildcat, Faith, Crash, level one gear (default class weapons and lots of Ammo Satchels), Twin Pistols, the Flamer Unit, equipment available at level sixteen, and anything available in missions (never any Grenade Launchers). A Flamer is required on many missions, and sometimes equipping Sarge with Pistols instead of the Vindicator is the only way to get to the end of a mission while still holding onto a few bullets. Perhaps I could have figured things out without Incendiary Mines (and Tesla Sentry Coils in the final mission), and so only need equipment up to level ten, but that would have made a lot of missions a lot more difficult. No doubt someone handy with a Grenade Launcher could trivialise much of the opposition present in many missions, as well. (I am terrible with a Grenade Launcher because I have little experience with it. I always opt for more interesting, more fun to use weapons.)

If you feel so inclined, follow the link below to see the maps for all the missions of the Alien Swarm Reactive Drop campaigns. The 'Observations' section may prove useful, too.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1082949851

Jacob's Rest

Okay, I haven't really got anything for this one.

EDIT: Thought I'd copy and paste a reply I made in the comments, since it is relevant.

Jacob's Rest: Deima Surface Bridge: Specifically, the bridge part at the end: Make sure Special Weapons has a heavy weapon of some sort. Save offhand equipment for the bridge - things like Freeze Grenades, Incendiary Mines, maybe even Damage Amplifiers and Adrenaline. If you like to have a Flamer Unit, that can be helpful. If not, then give a bot a Tesla Cannon in their secondary slot, and at the bridge switch to control that bot, change weapon to the Tesla Cannon, then switch back to your preferred character (although, I have never tried giving a bot a Tesla Cannon on Brutal). If you're good with a Grenade Launcher, that can make a whole lot of swarm a whole lot mushier. If not, then multiple bots with PDWs can give some solid results.

As always, try different combinations of gear and techniques, and see what works for your play style, and maybe even what works for you particular taste of bot weirdness.

I have spent so much time on Jacob's Rest, having played the 2010 release of Alien Swarm for more than a hundred hours, that I learned the missions inside out. If you like, you could consider that I have become numb to the odditties of the missions. Playing it through on Brutal for the nth time really wasn't a big deal, and I hope it will be the same for everyone.

I am sure Jacob's Rest on Brutal must have been difficult for me when I first tried it. And so it goes to show how much of a difference learning the missions makes. It can be comforting to know that it is only a matter of time before a mission becomes achieveable... unless you have, like, amnesia, or something.

Do note that the final mission is more difficult than the rest. This is generally the case for the other campaigns, too.

Area 9800

My advice may not be that helpful for the first few missions considering I tried them with level one gear. And at the time I didn't know I would be writing I guide about them, so I didn't write anything about them until much later.

Area 9800 as a whole I think is a good starting campaign to show you what to expect in Brutal. It has a little bit of everything, from tough but fair, to nice and easy, to surprise baloney, to straight up glitch nonsense. Compared to the others, I would say that Area 9800 is just a bit more difficult than average.

Area 9800: Landing Zone: This is one of the missions I did while still trying to keep to level one gear. It was tough. The first one is always tough. Clearing out the hangar (the very first room!) will be a nightmare, with infinitely spawning Drones, two Shieldbugs, and bots running into the middle to grab ammo without covering fire. The equipment in the bottom left of the hangar, accessible only by Assault Jets from the outside, I found somewhat helpful. Note that you'll be doing this mission twice, since it also appears in the Tilarus-5 campaign (though somewhat changed).

Area 9800: Power Plant Cooling Pump: The surprise Shieldbugs will inevitably get you the first few times. It take practise to deal with more than one at a time, or maybe just lots of firepower. At level one, the horde at the end of the mission was really tough, but no doubt higher gear, such as a few Incendiary Mines or Damage Amplifiers, will make it far more manageable.

Area 9800: Power Plant Generator: The opening shouldn't be too hard. Just take it slow and blast the Eggs as soon as you can. In the middle of the map are a pair of heavy blast doors that you have to do some Teching to open, but activates a really big horde. For me, holding off the swarm while opening the doors required at least half my Trip Mines, and was much easier slow (one terminal and horde at a time) than fast. The very end door, however, I think is likely to have an infinite spawn, and so I recommend trying to rush the final terminal. Expect bots to die left right and centre while you spam Freeze Grenades or firepower to get yourself through the doorway.

Area 9800: Wastelands: This is when I gave up on the level one gear limitation. Watch out for Parasites (Flamer advised). There is a flood gate type door that you have to Tech to open, and just before it a step and a tight winding staircase. Hundreds of Drones get stuck on that step and will slaughter everyone as soon as a bot passes the step. Area of effect damage is the only way through it (or, for me, Freeze Grenade and Incendiary Mine spam). At the very end of the mission, there is a solid wall of swarm filling the entire width of the corridor. With bots, I found it impossible to defeat during the infinite spawning of Drones from behind. Perhaps you could destroy the swarm (Shieldbugs, Boomers, the works) with a couple of Grenade Launchers, but what I did was sacrifice the bots (standing with them at first, then ditching them) to divert the swarm to one side of the runway, creating a gap on the other side, then Freeze Grenade and Stun Grenade it all and slip past.

Hopefully this guide will provide you with enough inventive solutions so that you won't have to struggle with finding or creating them yourself.

Lana's Escape

Okay, onto the next one. Lana's Escape has quite a few of the more unfair difficulty elements, and holds a decent amount of fair difficulty, as well. Compared to Area 9800, Lana's Escape is probably harder overall, but I think the increased difficulty is still somewhat manageable, so I will not claim that Lana's Escape is the hardest or the second hardest of all the campaigns on Brutal. Maybe the third hardest.

Lana's Escape: Lana's Bridge: A scout run (or refresher) on Normal may be helpful. This one is tough. First of all, that plank crossing is baloney since bots just fall off if one breaks. You may have to force the bots to Stop then teleport to you (I did). Then, after surprise Parasites and infinite Drones, there is a part where you must hold off hordes coming from three directions while waiting for a door to open incredibly slowly. Since the bots don't dodge projectiles (from Boomers and Rangers), I had to do the most incredibly efficient healing to survive through it, though you may want to try Heal Beacon spam instead. Sentry Turrets are useless here, as they will only be overwhelmed by projectiles and then explode, taking a chunk out of everyone's health. Matcha (in the comments below) mentioned that setting up shop south of the door, back through the glass corridor, provides greater room for projectile dodging, so might be a better spot to hold out at. When the door is open, the step may appear impassable when it is actually passable. Then, inside, there is a Shieldbug and an infinite spawn of Drones to deal with while having to use a Mining Laser to open a door while the room is being crushed. After several attempts, I decided to have Sarge grab the Chainsaw from the start of the mission (far north-west of mines), Freeze Grenade the Shieldbug, dump a Damage Amplifier down, Chainsaw it to death, then amp'd Chainsaw the door down, too. Again, you might find that Grenade Launcher spam solves all the problems.

Lana's Escape: Lana's Sewer: Be very careful about the giant spinning turbine blades... or whatever they are. Bots appear surprisingly resilient to them. In the arena type area, the two Shieldbugs will take forever to kill if you don't close the tunnels that spawn the healing type swarm ("Shaman", plural Shamans) by getting the Tech on the two terminals and shooting the green barrels at the other two tunnels. The Shieldbugs must be killed before you can use the terminal at the top-right to get out. The path then splits into two. Each path has a button at the end that opens the door on the other side, and immediately activates hordes of infinite Drones. This end rush will require practise. But, compared to the rest of this campaign, Lana's Sewer isn't so bad.

Lana's Escape: Lana's Maintenance: I managed this mission on my first try. The maintenance terminals are really easy to do simply because there are so few aliens to worry about. Just be sure you know what you are looking for (check your map!). The end requires you to go back and forth between a generator and the gate you need to open. Honestly, I must have passed this with sheer equipment spam on my first go, because it was real close. Still, one of the nicest missions to do on Brutal.

Lana's Escape: Lana's Vents: What can I say? Of course a maze is going to be difficult. The bots routinely get lost, take the long route round to your position, return the hug to Parasites, whatever. Learn the route first to save yourself some frustration, something like five repeats on Normal. I advise you shoot the red barrels to stop the mashing machine when you are just in the gap east of the barrels, rather than when you reach the mashing machine, because it can easily catch you out and crush you instantly, and the bots get very confused by the machine. After the vents, the wait for the door to open (the three metal bars to retract) is tough but manageable. And finally, activating the bomb may turn out to be surprisingly easy, but the run (not walk!) at the end will need a bit of practise.

Lana's Escape: Lana's Complex: This final mission is only achieveable with practise, since the time limit requires you to execute the objectives efficiently. It feels like you are doing a speedrun on Brutal. So, again with the multiple practise runs on Normal. But, honestly, it wasn't too hard from my experience. The end run was still a close call, as always, where all three bots died to projectiles and Shieldbugs and I was the only one to jump on the ship, but nothing that Grenade Launcher or Freeze Grenade spam can't make manageable.

Operation Cleansweep

With a name like that, you'd think that this campaign will be easy. And you'd be right. I am confident in giving Operation Cleansweep the award for being the easiest campaign to complete on Brutal. That being said, it's still Brutal difficulty, so don't expect a walk in the park. Still, with a considerable amount of carefulness, I did complete this entire campaign in one go, first try.

Operation Cleansweep: Storage Facility: Nothing significant about this one, excepting for how easy it is, I suppose. I don't remember the experience at all, even after looking at a video playthrough of the mission.

Operation Cleansweep: Landing Bay 7: I do remember this one. My usual carefulness and efficiency was enough to get me through the final horde and cram a couple of marines into the tiny vehicle while the other two died. In hindsight, I recommend taking the whole mission slow and careful (as always), then stopping to set up good and ready before interacting with the final terminal.

Operation Cleansweep: USC Medusa: The finale is always a challenge. There is a Shieldbug here, which will require appropriate dedicated time. And you may need a little bit of improvisation skill amongst the sudden spawns.

Nice! Operation Cleansweep is a well deserved relief after two campaigns of solid difficulty. Just keep in mind that this campaign is an exception. You must be prepared for going back to extreme difficulty, or frustration will appear due to the change.

Orion's Threat

This campaign as a whole seems a lot harder than Operation Cleansweep. It's only two missions, but they are tough. Learn the particular niches of each mission one by one.

Orion's Threat: Niosa Refinery: This first mission should be alright after a few tries. The bots are still idiots though for running away from the squad to grab ammo, among other things. And, as usual, the end part is tight. Not much for detailed advice. That's because you just need to settle back into the Brutal methodology of slow and steady, careful, efficient, comfortable with needing multiple attempts before success.

Orion's Threat: First Anomaly: This mission is hard. I think only just within my top ten, though. Practise, ammo efficiency, and picking the right spots to hold off the next wave are the key elements. Nevertheless, the final objective requires a great deal of preparation and improvisation. Just remember that the end is on the north elevator, not sitting in the armoury waiting for the hordes to stop.

Two missions only is a welcome feature.

Paranoia

Prepare for a campaign of dramatic switching between relatively easy and a massive pain in the neck. Most of the missions are really nice, but one will stick out like a sore thumb, and maybe give you a sore thumb, too.

I have heard that the ubiquitous darkness present in Paranoia can be a large issue. I personally did not find it a serious bother, only the rare Drone catching me off guard. But, if you have trouble seeing in the dark, then be smart about it and come prepared. I wouldn't recommend Nightvision Goggles, but a Flamer in tandem with an itchy trigger finger could be all you need. There are plenty of Combat Flares and Flashlights littered about the campaign.

Paranoia: Unexpected Encounter: The first mission of Paranoia is easy enough. The only thing note worthy is a surprise Shieldbug amid infinite swarm. Paranoia likes its surprises.

Paranoia: Hostile Places: I remember this mission being fair enough. Just the right amount of difficulty, perhaps. The constant pressure is demanding and keeps it tense, and the surprise Antlion is painful, but easy enough to slip past.

Paranoia: Close Contact: Another nice mission. All I remember is having issues grabbing the first document because the bots were confused by the angle and so provided no covering fire. Be on the lookout for Parasites. The final door brings the usual alien assault, so be ready before activating.

Paranoia: High Tension: Now we are getting somewhere. This mission is super frustrating. Between bots getting stuck on things, Shieldbugs during infinite swarm, and running out of ammo just before the end, I think High Tension might be in the top five hardest. A gimicky method for taking out Shieldbugs could prove effective. To cope with the ammo problem, I had to give Sarge Pistols (previously Sarge always had his Officer shotgun), since bots are so wasteful, especially the Vindicator. The trick I finally figured out for the final part of the mission is leaving the cart in the corridor so that you can prepare for the final attack. Pushing it along all the time is what the mission trains you to do so that you can minimise the impact of the infinitely spawning Drones, but you absolutely have to leave it after the Buzzers, slip past and prepare for the next part. I found success after maybe ten tries.

Paranoia: Crucial Point: I am forced to recommend that you take the time to go through the welded door and deactivate the lights for this one. I completed Crucial Point first try, so I have no idea how much difference the lights make. Other than that, the finale is the only difficulty. And, as usual, it is real tough. Incendiary Mines are a requirement, as well as a method for tackling Shieldbugs. There is a wall-mounted turret at the end, but it did not look like a good option to me, since there is Mortarbug fire that must be dodged constantly.

Research 7

One of the easier campaigns, and so very little guidance.

Research 7: Transport Facility: Not much to say. Just take it slow and be careful.

Research 7: Research 7: Same principle as last mission. I succeeded on this mission and the last mission first try.

Research 7: Illyn Forest: Be careful, take it slow. If you, like me, did not already know, the 'biomass bridge' can be burned down to make a ramp out of the left tower. There is a Shieldbug on the narrow bridge which proves deadly if you take a hit. Running past the Shieldbug then dealing with it somewhere safer is probably the best way to handle it.

Research 7: Jericho Mines: Bots are idiots. They walk onto lava as if it's a sensible way to move past their friend, as well as having no clue when the lava is flooding the area during the finale. A solid practise run on a lower difficulty is highly recommended, but otherwise this final mission shouldn't be too hard.

Tears for Tarnor, Ch.1: Insertion

The penultimate campaign. Only three missions, but they are harder than what has just been covered, with the final mission being one of the hardest of all the campaigns.

Tears for Tarnor Ch1 Insertion: Insertion Point: This one is tough on the Tech objectives. Take it slow and careful for the most part. Then, at the terminals prepare some Incendiary Mines and be ready to plant down some Damage Amplifiers.

Tears for Tarnor Ch1 Insertion: Abandoned Maintenance Tunnels: I recommend you bring a Hand Welder, a Flamer Unit, and to stay away from the big blue laser. Wait and go out the door on the right instead of under the laser machine. Maybe bring a couple of Damage Amplifiers for the final stretch.

Tears for Tarnor Ch1 Insertion: Oasis Colony Spaceport: I had ammo problems, so I gave Sarge Pistols again. Learning to deal with Shieldbugs is a must, either by Freeze Grenade and Chainsaw, or sitting three bots in a firing line and dancing the figure of eight with the Shieldbug in front of them. The air pressure doors are useful because they will lock out the swarm when you press the button (so everyone has to be in). I found the ceiling turrets useless. Incendiary Mines and Damage Amplifiers are essential. The finale is waiting for the train. For this accursed part, sufficient ammo, spare utility items, and every single deployable Sentry Turrent on the map are your only hope. I set up shop north of the tracks, west of the top-most escalator. Even with lots of practise it is tough. I have had a glitch where the train leaves before everyone can get on board, so only some marines pass through the objective area, the train despawns and the mission continues but another train never comes. Avoiding this would require more control than you have over the bots, so better hope your luck is with you. Baloney that a Brutal mission comes down to luck, but there's not much you can do about it.

Tilarus-5

The final campaign you have to do on Brutal, and definitely the hardest. Remember, also, that Tilarus-5 is the longest campaign, at ten nine missions (I can count I swear). Everything you have learned will be tested to the maximum, and broken difficulty will riddle some missions. However, I would not say 'If you can do this campaign, you can do any of them' because one example of gimicky difficulty may cause you far different pain compared to another.

Tilarus-5: Midnight Port: I had to do this mission incredibly slowly, learning every horde trigger point and every location of every enemy, and position every bot manually. That armoury behind the welded door is essential - even with it I experienced ammo issues; a Hand Welder is available just up the stairs from it. Incendiary Mines are highly recommended. Shieldbug elimination must be efficient and without losing much health, since there are three in total, I think. After the well-lit horizontal bridge, it might be a good idea to charge to the end. Expect lots of deaths in the final two rooms either way. Midnight Port must have taken me about fifteen attempts.

Tilarus-5: Road to Dawn: Behold! The hardest mission of them all! I must have accumulated twelve hours on this mission alone, about twenty-five tries. Horde trigger locations must be learned. Ammo is a massive issue. Equip the squad with level one weapons to make use of the ammo available in the mission and learn their positions too. Place every bot manually. Get used to switching between bots fast. Your Shieldbug algorithm must be perfect by now: there are five of them on the ground and an infinite spawn of them during the door opening. That last stand is horrific in difficulty. I had to try different combinations of utility items to see what would work a miracle, and settled on Incendiary Mines, Tesla Sentry Coils, Freeze Grenades, and Adrenaline. Move from south to north to make use of the Incendiary Mines' damage over time, then move to the door when the objective box ticks itself. There is a last Shieldbug waiting just behind it, which you will have to slip past and run to the exit. Be patient and know when to put it on the virtual shelf for the night. (This means to understand your own abilities and recognise when there is no point in continuing to waste time in desperate retries when you would do better to switch to something else and come back to it with a clear mind.)

Tilarus-5: Arctic Infiltration: Don't worry, it's easier from here! Ammo was the only issue I had on this one. Keep with the usual slow and careful, and be ready for lots of the extra large type Drones. Maybe choose to veto venturing the south door in an effort to conserve ammo. The only Shieldbug is at the end, so just run past it.

Tilarus-5: Area 9800 Landingzone: As it turns out, doing a mission on Brutal the second time round is way easier. Several Shieldbugs still prove a serious danger, but I did manage to do this one first try. Note that there are some significant differences between this version of the mission and the version appearing in the Area 9800 campaign. The only one I remember is the lack of the Assault Jets and corresponding catwalk/footway and bonus cache.

Tilarus-5: Cold Catwalks: I recommend a refresher on Normal. This mission has it all, but is fair. A Flamer deals with the early Parasites. Level one weapons make use of the plentiful ammo on the ground. Learning the locations of the Mortarbugs is helpful so you can focus firepower to bring them down and so preserve health. Prepare your Shieldbug-annihilation firing line before crossing the recently enabled bridge (west of the two surprise Mortarbugs). Plant down the three Sentry Turrets before doing the computer, then blast out all the Adrenaline, Freeze Grenades, and Incendiary Mines you have on the charge to the end and the wait for extraction.

Tilarus-5: Yanaurus Mine: One of the nicer missions. Again, slow, careful, ammo efficient. Manual bot placement is recommended for the most part. Watch out for Parasites, and surprise door hordes. After blasting the mine, run to the end as a team. Many Shieldbugs are present, but not a single one needs to be killed.

Tilarus-5: The Factory: Surprise Parasites are the biggest threat here. A Flamer is very useful, and is needed for the Biomass anyway. A couple of Shieldbugs should be easy enough to handle by now.

Tilarus-5: Communication Center: This mission is another tough one, with a baloney ending. Certainly not as bad as Road to Dawn, though. As it turned out, all I needed was firepower and equipment spam. Do a scout run on Normal. Take it slow and careful (lots of Parasites!) until you get near the end. Ammo isn't a major issue, but be sure to stay on top of how quickly it disappears. Use the provided Hand Welder to access the armoury and grab lots of PDWs, the Tesla Cannon, Incendiary Mines, and Grenades. Personally, I had Crash bring Tesla Coils from the start, as well. As soon as the Mortarbug attacks, that is when the finale activates. Combine all the offhand items with focussed firepower when all the Shieldbugs are crammed into the north-west with the Biomass to enable you to make the most of the area of effect damage and actually deal with them. Then, focus a Flamer on the Eggs and then the Biomass to get out. I don't know if the Blink Pack allows you to skip past the Biomass, but don't forget the Eggs, because destroying them all is an objective.

Tilarus-5: SynTek Hosptial: Well, I've just done another quality check of my guide and, would you look at that, I completely missed making notes on the final mission of Tilarus-5. I'm sure you can figure things out yourself ;)

Bonus Missions

The Bonus Missions campaign has no achievements tied to it. Still, I felt the need to complete them on Brutal with three bots only.

Bonus Missions: Bonus Mission 1: Yeah, the bots just get lost and confused by all the platforms, and quickly die. Doing this mission with bots is equivalent to completing it solo, which I felt was not worth the effort on Brutal.

I haven't tried the other two missions. I like to do things in the right order.


Update 2017.07.18

Well, I did it.

Bonus Missions: Bonus Mission 1: I don't know what advice to give you other than what I managed to do. I completed this mission solo (on Brutal, with a touchpad and 1.5GHz CPU), with Faith, a Flamer, Healing Beacons, and Electric Charged Armour. Agonising practise enabled me to move all the way to the satellite (required objective on Brutal) without taking damage, then it's down to timing reloads and spamming Electric Charged Armour to get through the caves full of Parasites. At the Outpost, I made sure to collect ammunition from the box on the ground behind the building before moving to the top and activating the finale, as well as activating the drone/ship/aircraft thing. I just sat on top of the ammo crate on the Outpost, holding down the fire button, switching to deploy a conservative Healing Beacon every now and then. The hardest part of the mission is when the Drones stop coming, and instead appear hordes of Harvester Spawn (the red siders). I spammed Healing Beacons in the few seconds it took them to get to the steps, then Flamed them until the Assault Jets spawned. Perhaps Freeze Grenades would have made grabbing the Assault Jets from the Harvester Spawn easier, but I felt I needed Electric Charged Armour for the caves (since stopping to cure an infestation is suicide, even with the Medical Gun). At least you can stand on the top of the Outpost and still grab the Assault Jets; there is no need to drop down. Aligning the jump is incredibly tense, so much so that it caused me to fail the mission another couple of times. So, practise. And I must say that personally I feel the Healing Beacons were essential, the way I did it.

Bonus Missions: Bonus Mission 2: Easy enough. As much as I criticise the bots, they do make Brutal a lot easier than when playing solo. I completed this one first try, taking things at a casual pace. The only issue was that, when I was burning the Biomass, the bots kept running off (their usual confused pathfinding), so be prepared to give a Stop command.

Bonus Missions: Bonus Mission 3: Similarly achieveable. Another successful first attempt for me. Keeping together is essential for completing this one on Brutal, but bots do that just fine. I will mention that it is a good idea to plant down a couple of Incendiary Mines to the north when you are about to pick up the blueprints. The Mines will soften up the Shieldbug nicely, and hold off the horde which activates when you do complete the first objective.

I'm glad the other two bonus missions are not as much of a pain as the first one.

[Rtma Eros Paragon]

Thanks for the acknowledgement, I completed Insane runs a while back and thought I felt like this one last hurdle, some frustration ensued but I checked for Luna's escape video and it helped me on what to do, I pulled it off. (Finally)

[ZaidusRecon]

You did the whole thing in two weeks!? That's determination right there

[Rtma Eros Paragon]

Finally completed all Official Brutal missions. yaaaay. *Slinks off*

[Rtma Eros Paragon]

Who's bright idea was it to demand perfectionism with the finale on Luna's Escape? it's beyond insufferable.

[ZaidusRecon]

Yes. 'Tis a shame the AI must be stronkified in order to be useful on Brutal when they could instead be intelligified. I've very rarely played with the grenade launcher, it's not really my style of weapon.
It has occurred to me that the reason players often argue over whether Brutal is easier or harder to do with bots than with players is because different people mean different things when they say 'players': Brutal with bots is easier than Brutal with randoms, but harder than Brutal with friends.

[Rtma Eros Paragon]

You do realise that without the bots (damage reduction?) on higher difficulties they would be overrun and rendered useless, as for the grenade launcher, I've had Crash and Jaegar blow themselves up with it. :I

[Rtma Eros Paragon]

And then I manage to pass it, lost Crash, Rest in peace dead buddy, onward to, everything else.

[Rtma Eros Paragon]

Still stuck on Jacob's Rest, Deima surface bridge, after all these years, f**king annoying when you you lose ANYONE, especially the medic, game over.

[ZaidusRecon]

Matcha, good advice. I remember trying it and failing, then completely forgetting it was an option. I might pop it into the guide.

Lawlzer, yeah... I know the feeling. You'll get there eventually ^^

[Lawlzer]

Oh my god. Tears of Tarnor. GODDD SO MUCH ANGERRRRRRR
I WILL BEAT THIS STUPID MISSION WITH BOOOOOTSSSS