Command & Conquer: Generals - Zero Hour/China Infantry General vs. USA Laser General

This level is initially extremely intimidating. You start out with a Command Center and bulldozer – while the Laser General begins with three Particle Cannons ready to blast away.

The land assault starts slowly and this will give you a chance to form rudimentary defensive positions by garrisoning the buildings centered between your base and the Laser General’s base.

Build a solid defense, create Internet hackers and accumulate enough funds to build two Nuclear Missiles at once. This way, they are less susceptible to destruction while being built.

Build two Gattling Cannons to the northeast of your base to defend against persistent Comanche helicopter attacks. An enemy Colonel Burton will also be attacking your base. Detection units are a must.

Defensive strategy
Basic start: Build a Reactor, an extra dozer, a Barracks, Supply Center. Build a second Supply Truck. Purchase Radar to activate the radar map.

Don’t forget to choose one of your General’s Powers.

Be sure that all buildings are placed far enough apart so that the Particle Cannons cannot destroy two buildings at once.

Sometimes enemy infantry occupy one of the five civilian buildings right in front of your base – and sometimes they don’t. If they have, you will need to build a War Factory and a Dragon Tank to clear the building before you capture the region.

If there are no buildings previously occupied, immediately build five Tank Hunters and garrison one in each of the buildings. After this, add Mini Gunners to each of the buildings to help protect the area from infantry.

Build the War Factory (if you haven’t done so already), and then the Propaganda Center immediately so that you can create an Inferno Cannon to park in the center of the garrisoned buildings. This is necessary to destroy the Laser Tanks that will target the buildings.

Build a Speaker Tower in the middle of the buildings. Have a bulldozer in the area to keep the buildings repaired.

By now, the Particle Cannons will start attacking your base. If you are lucky enough “just” to have your Barracks destroyed, rebuild it, and keep rebuilding at as many times as necessary. It takes only 500 credits to rebuild and will keep the ion blasts away from your other structures.

If it targets your Command Center, repair immediately or it will be lost on a subsequent blast.

Beef up your garrisoned buildings with five more Tank Hunters and five more Mini Gunners. This mission is “blessed” with a great bottleneck to protect your base. Take advantage of it. Add more units to these buildings as opportunity arises.

Build two Gattling Cannons to the northeast of your base, separated by a safe distance. You must keep these here to protect your base from Comanche attacks. They will be destroyed by PC blasts now, instead of your Barracks, but that’s okay. Just continue to rebuild them. The west side of your base will not be bothered by these attacks.

Add a Nuke Cannon to the area of your garrisoned buildings to beef up defenses.

It is also necessary to be wary of Colonel Burton slipping onto your base and detonating your buildings. It is possible to mine your buildings, but you can totally alleviate this threat by blocking the three entrances to your base. Put a Gattling Cannon on the ramp leading down from the bridge to the east of the garrisoned buildings. Position Assault Outposts on both sides of the garrisoned buildings for their detection abilities (slightly back in a safe position) and your base should be protected from the elusive Colonel.

A lot of this mission is two steps forward and one back with the constant repairing, but you will make slow but steady progress.

Keep building Hackers and position them in different areas at the back of your base until you are happy with your cash flow.

After you have over 10,000 credits saved, build two Nuclear Missiles simultaneously. This may prevent the PC’s from targeting your Nuclear Missile two times in a row before it can repair and destroying 5,000 worth of infrastructure.

Once the Nuclear Missiles are completely built, attacks from enemy Particle blasts will not entirely destroy them and they can be repaired after each attack.

After the countdown, you can destroy the three enemy PC’s with either a double nuclear blast or a single nuclear blast and a hit with a level three Artillery Barrage.

Wait for your Nuclear Missiles to charge back up and you can then destroy the Command Center. When a bulldozer comes back to rebuild it, destroy it with an Artillery Barrage. As soon as all dozers are destroyed, no new structures can be built and you can slowly start taking the base apart.

Destroy first all Airfields, War Factories and Barracks.

Use your General’s Powers and armored units of your choice to destroy defenses at the very front of their base in case you decide to launch a ground assault. Or you can just use multiple nuclear strikes to finish the job.

It is not necessary to destroy the Laser Turrets, Fire Bases, garrisoned civilian buildings, infantry or vehicles to win the mission.

Once the frontal defenses are destroyed, a small ground force can perform mop-up duties of any structures left standing.

Mission accomplished!

Offensive strategy
First, build a very basic base structure and garrison troops in the relevant buildings so as to defend your base. You should fill the building next to the rig with the maximum amount of men and protect with gat on other side.

Your basic base should consist of:
 * 1) Command Center
 * 2) Barracks
 * 3) Power
 * 4) Supply Dock
 * 5) War Factory

A few gats if you really want, but don't waste too much money on this base - its only purpose is to defend your Command Center and Oil Rig.

Take your second Dozer with a few men and build a second barracks to the east of your base, which should be to the south of the enemy base, just beyond the bridge. As soon as the barracks is complete, start pumping out men. Garrison the buildings to the south of the enemy base.

Once your second barracks is built, build your Propaganda Center in the same little cluster of buildings, but a good distance away from the barracks.

Your first barracks will now be used to create some hackers. The second will keep making men, which will then garrison buildings. If you garrison a building right opposite an entrance to the enemy base, it's worth adding a gat. Its also worth having a Dragon Tank close by, because the enemy will attempt to garrison the buildings, and you may well need it later!

The general tactic is to skirt around the south of the enemy base, because if you manage to capture the industrial zone to the east of his base you have won!

You will notice, however, that in order to get to the industrial zone you have to cross the "bridge of death". You need to get men, a lotus, a dozer and a dragon tank across this bridge safely. The bridge is covered by a full battery of Laser defenses, and your enemy will also call in air support when necessary.

You have two options here, the second being faster:
 * 1) Build inferno/nukes and take out the laser turrets, then once the coast is clear calmly cross the bridge.
 * 2) Use your second supply dock to build some extra supply trucks, build some troop crawlers, an extra dozer, a few extra dragon tanks, some loose infantry, and just run across the bridge. There will be heavy losses, but as long as you get the dozer, a lotus, and a dragon tank across the bridge, you can call it a success. In fact, even if you get just one dozer across it's not a fail!

Once across the bridge, use the dragon tank to wipe out any garrisoned infantry. Build a barracks straight away, and start pumping out men from it. Once you have cleared the industrial area of men, build a War Factory (and obviously capture all the rigs and refineries). Garrison all the buildings with the maximum amount of men.

This new base is now your main priority, so don't waste any more energy or money defending your first base. If you really want, do a last little repair of your Command Center and build a couple more men to guard your rig. Now using your new War Factory, start building Infernos, Gatling Tanks, and whatever you want to use for your final assault.

With the eastern industrial zone in your ownership, you will quickly be able to build an overwhelming force. Once you are in the enemy base, use Black Lotus to capture power and other buildings. If your primary base is still around, use the War Factory to build extra units. As soon as you have taken out the enemy power, attack from the west and victory will be yours.

Alternative Strategy
Start as usual, garrisoning buildings with minigunners and tank hunters and building surplus barracks for PC bait.

Quickly build a airfield and a helix, the airfield will probably take a PC strike but that's okay.

Load the Helix up with about 5 infantry, at least some of which are minigunners. Send the helix up the east side of the map, then across to the top corner, make sure to stay as far from the turrets as possible. Once there capture the derricks and refinery, and then load the minigunners back into the helix and station it in front of the refinery. It should successfully destroy all attacking units throughout the entire game - although without a dozer for repairs some of the tech buildings may eventually be destroyed.

Now the money is rolling in proceed to get two nuclear silos - the second one is mainly redundancy.

Once the Nuke is ready, destroy the 3 Particle Cannons with a nuclear strike and artillery barrage. You could possibly skip this step and proceed to the next one!

With the next nuke break open the defenses - a single nuclear blast can destroy the defenses on the west side.

Now the defenses are open and ideally before the nuclear fallout clears, send 2-3 helixes through the hole, the helixes should have bunkers and full loads of infantry. The interior of the factory is essentially undefended so the helixes should be able to hollow it out from the inside, it is possible they'll be shot down by avengers so if you see avengers unload the infantry. It may take a couple of assaults and/or some extra nuking to destroy the base but it should go down pretty easily.