Part 49: Japan

I have Internet again at my house! Get comfy and grab the snack/drink of your choice folks, this is going to be a long one.



General Fedorov is in a bit of a bind. The LC has fortified themselves on the Japanese islands. Unless we eliminate those positions our holdings in China will be vulnerable. This mission is going to require expert planning and execution to a degree we've not seen.



And why is that? Because two of the three LC bases are inaccessible by a conventional ground attack. Yikes. At least we've got a good mineral field right by the LZ.



The game also gives you a Shipyard for free. Those of you who have been waiting to see naval units, this is your mission. We're going to be doing a lot of naval research and construction.



The Irkutsk is the base naval unit of the Eurasian Dynasty. Not all that impressive but it can mount lasers which should help us clear out any LC hovercraft.



We'll construct another tight base near the LZ. I tried a version of the Taiga trick here with my Mine/Refinery placement.



Upgrades to the Irkutsk will be our first focus. We don't want to send a weak navy against the bulk of the LC army. Remember, LC units can travel on land and sea.



Our scout has managed to find the one LC base that is accessible via land. We need to destroy this base extremely quickly or we'll be overrun. The LC here are still in the building stage, but once they can field a credible army taking the base out becomes much more difficult. For that reason I'll be blitzing the base as soon as I get all my units transferred from HQ.



The LC send a scout force of their own, but it's easy to drive off.



Just to make sure though I build a matrix of Large Towers with a Power Plant to the west to power the one tower that needs more juice.



The first Irkutsk upgrade done, let's do the second.



4 speed and 75 HP from a single upgrade. The Irkutsk is now just as fast as our Pamirs. It's still slower than every combat unit the LC has though.



Our army is ready, time to engage these Moon...ers? Moonies? What do you call someone from the Moon anyway?

I've got video of the attack against the LC army here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdGWl6I1Kgk



Our lasers wipe away the LC ground forces and sustained chaingun/rocket fire will neuter the Meteors as well.

The base lacks any Defender or Guardian turrets so there's nothing preventing a total sack of the base.



We need to get access to those resources. Charge at the Mines my peasants!



The Irkutsk is fully upgraded. Armor is doubled and speed now exceeds any unit in the ED army.



The Caspian is our next chassis. I'll talk more about it when we've finished researching it.



Things are going quite well in the LC base. You'll notice they've dropped in a Guardian, but with the power out it's utterly useless.



They do manage to wound the base a little. One Large Tower for an entire LC base seems fair though.



1 base down, 2 to go. That wasn't so bad.

Shame the rest of this mission is going to be a complete dick to you.



Since we'll need an armada to take on these bases I get to work building a fleet.



The Caspian is complete and it's going to form the backbone of our strategy in this mission. The Caspian (and another unit we've not seen yet) are the only land units in the game that are amphibious. It's one advantage the ED have over the UCS. If this mission was a UCS rather than ED mission it would, for all practical purposes, be impossible. Since the ED have the Caspian it's difficult but still doable if you plan right.



Just like the Irkutsk, we need to fully upgrade before we begin construction.



Aw isn't that cute? The LC are trying to destroy the naval base with a single Meteor.



Meanwhile, the army has found an LC strike squad trying to sneak onto the mainland. We can't allow that.



Good job army!



Um...okay this is a lot less cute. I managed to kill one of the Moons with my Irkutsk but they now can destroy the naval base with ease. This is bad.



Making matters worse, the LC have made note of my weak anti-air defenses and responded with an all-out aerial assault. Fortunately, nothing mission critical is lost but it forces me to re-align my defenses. It looks like the LC will focus on an aerial strike the cripple the base and then use a conventional Moon/Lunar army to wipe us out.



The Moons succeed in taking the Shipyard off line. God damn it.



And they get the Shipyard, right before I'm able to kill them off. This will set production back a great deal



The navy won't let themselves be humiliated like this. Attack the LC base now! I don't care that the fleet is one Irkutsk R against dozens of Moons, you're fighting Eurasian men, you can handle it.



Can't seem the handle Guardians though. On the upside, we have succeeded in finding the second LC base. If you recall from the UCS version of this mission, this base is where we found NEO's HQ. Obviously in this timeline the LC's presence have prevented NEO from setting up shop here. This base will be just as tough to crack as NEO's was.

One tactic you could use on this mission is helicopters + tunnels like I did back in the UCS campaign. That's probably easier than trying an amphibious approach, however I've already showed that off and we've not seen how navies work. So consider me a sailor this mission.



The Caspian upgrade is great. We get 150 HP and 4 speed.



One more upgrade left.



A Boyar scout has found the final LC base. It's on an island which makes it even more inaccessible than the one to the west of the LZ.



The Caspian is now fully upgraded. If you notice it has the exact same health as the Siberia now as well as the same mount options. Once you have the TK 111 Caspian you should build it rather than Siberias until you get shields.



And here's our first one, fresh off the assembly line.



No time to marvel though, the LC are coming from the north.



Fighting is fierce but we manage to run them off. Based on this, I'm going to say it's still too early for us to be rebuilding our Shipyard. I've got another idea though.



Alright we've already got 3 Caspians let's keep goin...



...oh. Units limit.



You guys will have to take on an entire LC base by your lonesome. You're cool with that right? If you can kill a few Meteors it should be a walk in the park.



See there isn't even anyone here. Dunno why you guys were so scare...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgRc7-MqLrY



Oh. Nevermind then.



Based on that (and the fact we're at the units cap) my new strategy is "turtle until the LC run out of money."



It's a very boring strategy.



But it works. Imagine me fending off raids like in the last few screenshots this for the next 30 minutes and you've got the idea.



May as well get some research done while we wait.



The Caspians are rebuilt...sort of. We still probably need more but thrice as many Caspians is a good start.



Shields.

They have shields.

How the fuck do they have shields!? They should be out of money by now!



I forgot to build a mining base here after I took out the original LC base. Since the LC can just drop some mines down they... well, did and now I'm paying for it.





There. That looks better. _{Axeil you're a huge idiot I can't believe you forgot that...}



With the LC now starved out, it's time to go over the walls and finish our siege.



This time I work on drawing units out instead of charging in. It works out a lot better.



I'm still pissed about those shields though







Kill the power, kill the base.



Our last upgrade for this mission (because it's literally the only thing left)



With the island base nearly annihilated it's finally time to rebuild our naval yards. Only took an hour.



And now we're going to have boats. We're going to have so many fucking boats.



Our Groznys now have upgraded rocket launchers. The citizens of the ED shrug.

Er I mean they rejoice wildly in the streets!





One base to go.



I have no idea why there is a laser wall literally in the middle of the LC base. That makes no goddamn sense. I guess it's an impediment if you use tunnels but then why bother putting your Aerial Supply Depot on the outside?





9 Caspians and 5 Irkutsks. Lets do this.



After we wait for the Caspians to get in the water of course.





Once again the LC airforce engages us at long range, and once again they are shot out of the sky because seriously why would you put your fragile fighters over all my anti-air units?



That's a lot of rockets. The laser units are focusing on the Moons that come into the sea. I've got mad micro skills folks, you better believe it. Targeting 2 separate units at once. Revolutionary stuff here.



The first tower is down. Sadly we're still being bombarded from the other one.



Not anymore though!



Looks like this LC commander learned how to make a compact base. We're under fire literally everywhere in the base but the northern corners.



If we can destroy the power we can win the mission right here. If we can't destroy the power, well then we'll have to rebuild and I'll be very annoyed because this mission has already gone on way too long.



Come on, why are half of you not shooting at anything!?



YES We did it! Good job Eurasians! Now to clean up.

Still it's a bit odd that only a single Caspian was shooting there at the end.



Oh. Always make sure you have supply helicopters unless you want to look foolish like I just did.





Cleanup is as exciting as it usually is.



Why thank you General Fedorov, I'm not much of a golfer but I'll take a villa. I think General Axeil has a dozen properties throughout the Dynasty now.



Sadly this brave little Irkutsk can't come with us. The unfortunate downside of building a navy: you can't take it back to HQ with you.



But we can take nearly 25,000 credits back with us!





These are not really the stats of a turtle-y match. 200 destroyed units and 47 lost units. This has probably been the bloodiest battle we've seen yet in the game.



This mission. This fucking mission. I've already played it and it makes what happened in Japan look easy. God damn this fucking mission