Total Annihilation/The Gate to Thalassean

Mission Briefing
Objective: Locate the Galactic Gate. Eliminate the Core base. Destroy all other Core units and capture the Galactic Gate.

Special Priority Critical Destruction of the Core base will eliminate their foul presence from Empyrrean once and for all. The Galactic Gate through which Core entered our homeworld is in the area. Find that Gate and capture it. The Gate will be used to take the fight off-world!

Info Feed Immediate construction of a secure base is critical. Core deployment is massive, and their patrols are frequent. Core's weapon technology has advanced. You are advised to build advanced units also. You will have a limited number of units on loan from the Empyrrean Navy at your disposal. You will find the new Triton class amphibious tank useful on this mission.

END

Details
Starting Units: Commander and a group of Bulldogs, Fidos, Jeffys, Lurkers, Skeeters, Tritons, Zeus, and Zippers.

The Gate you need to capture is near the southwest corner of the map on a small peninsula. You'll have to wait until the end of the mission to mount an amphibious assault on the peninsula.

The Core base is south of your starting position, and they have spread through much of the eastern half of the map (in other words, they've got a pretty good hold of most of the land on this map).

Your sea units won't be doing much for a while, just assign them to a group and keep an eye on them. Once your base is established they may help in defense until you've secured the map for the amphibious assault.

Find a good position to build your base slightly north of your starting position. Here you'll want to take advantage of the wind with some Wind Generators in addition to the usual resource gathering (ie. build Metal Extractors, Wind Generators, and Solar Collectors). Establish a southern perimeter with your units while establishing the base and building your KBot Lab. Small waves of Core units will come after you before long, so be prepared to maintain your defensive perimeter. Once the KBot Lab is ready, build a Vehicle Lab and start building PeeWees, Rockos, and Hammers to reinforce your defenses, followed by Flash tanks and Jeffys when the Vehicle Lab is ready.

Build a Construction KBot and Construction Vehicle as soon as you can and start building an Advanced KBot Lab and Advanced Vehicle Plant. As you have time, arrange your base defense according to the range of your units' attacks. Place your short range KBots at the outer perimeter, with short range vehicles just inside that, and longer range units closest to your buildings and Construction units. New units can fill in gaps created by lost defenders, or fill out the rings you've created, until you're comfortable with your defenses.

Once your defenses are built up and you have a small group of units you can spare for roaming, start clearing the northern half of the map (make sure to clear any space between your base and the northern edge of the map, and between the base and the sea, before starting to head for the eastern edge of the map). Eventually you'll start moving your forces south, until you clear enough area to start building an attack group near the two hills to the south (near the center of the map). There will probably be Storm rocket launchers guarding the hills when you first arrive, so approach carefully and take them out swiftly if possible.

When your Advanced KBot Lab is ready, build Fido, Zeus, and Zipper bots for the assault on the enemy base. When the Advanced Vehicle Plant is ready, build Tritons in preparation for the later amphibious assault. When you've secured the area around the central hills, move your Construction KBot or Construction Vehicle to the hills to build a Guardian plasma cannon on the western hill. Keep your troops patrolling south of the hills to keep the enemy from targetting your construction unit while building (or the cannon itself once it's built). After the cannon and your units on the hills have drained the enemy's resources and reduced their forces, you may be able to capture the enemy KBot Lab and Vehicle Plant near the southeast corner of the map with your Commander, or you can just destroy their base.

While you're cleaning up the Core remnants, start organizing your water units into groups in preparation for an attack on the peninsula. You'll want your subs to clear out enemies in the water, your Skeeters to take the initial fire, and your Tritons to start the real assault on the peninsula. You'll probably want your Tritons to attack in 2 or 3 groups from different angles. Space them out and make sure they all start attacking as close to simultaneously as possible, as there isn't a lot of space here and they won't do well if all of the enemies target them one at a time. Keep your Commander underwater nearby, waiting for the majority of the defenders to be destroyed. Target the Pulverizers and Gaat Guns first, dealing with the Crashers and Thuds when the bigger targets are taken care of. Make sure not to harm the Gate, and move the Commander in to help clean up and capture the Gate.