ZERO HOUR
WALKTHROUGH

China - Mission 4 'Halberstadt, Germany'

Background
China is continuing its liberation of Europe. In the latest Security Council meeting, the Premier humbly accepted the gratitude of the European nations. The Premier warns that the GLA is like a wounded animal, but it must not be able to hide so that it can recover its strength. Meanwhile, the USA decides to focus on its own borders, so it's up to China to continue the crackdown on the GLA. Your mission is to destroy all retreating GLA forces that pass through this area.

Mission
Well, the GLA is retreating, and the China is now catching and killing those enemies. You start with a pre built base, some Helices, some Overlords and some Nuke Cannons. Upgrade your Helices with Speaker Towers and Gattling Cannons, and transport your Overlords in them. After all, "Da Helix isun't dee only powerhaus!" I directly quote from those Overlord Tanks. Tee hee.

Very soon, you will be informed of the GLA retreating along the path shown on your radar. The GLA are coming from the western side of the map, and are moving northeast. Send in your Helices and tanks to stop them! While you are at it, send Red Guards to all the Artillery Platforms in the area to capture them, and you can see most of the battlefield.

When wave 1 of the GLA has been stopped, you will be notified. Continue to pump out Helix Helicopters and upgrade them with various peripherals for the task. Wave 2 will shortly come from the southern edge of the map, moving north, so send your Helices and Tanks there. When the GLA sends in their Quad Cannons, simply use your Overlords to deal with them. After some destruction, Wave 2 will be defeated. Now, build more Helices and brace for Wave 3.

Wave 3 comes from the far south west corner of the map. Be aware of it, the same methods apply. Wave 4 comes from the south east. Wave 5 comes from the south west.

As for Wave 6, things will get slightly harder. Our intel has been jammed, so we cannot predict which direction the GLA are going through. However, I have played this mission several times already, and have found that the GLA will be entering the region from the west and the south, so watch those 2 areas. You have to be more careful, as more units will enter the region at once, and sometimes, will be too much for your own units to handle.
When the final GLA unit has been destroyed, the mission is complete!

Submitter's Tip! Nat Ng's Tip
There are several "Keys" to beating this mission without even beginning to sweat. Here they are:
1. There are NO enemies on the map at the start. This means that you can send your forces just about anywhere and not worry about them being killed.
2. Capturing the artillery platforms gives you a very wide sight radius!
If you capture all the artillery platforms, you can see nearly the whole map. Needless to say, this is vital.
3. The enemy is using almost no infantry.
The only infantry I've actually noticed in this map was a group of Terrorists coming from the Southwest.

So here is my strategy: Train lots of rocket soldiers and a few Red Guards. Keep building Helices nonstop from your airfield. Upgrade the Helices in this order: For every 5 Helixes, have 1 prop tower, 1 gattling cannon, and 3 bunkers full of Rocket Soldiers. Always make sure at least one prop Helix travels with each squadron to heal it and detect stealth units.

Capture all the tech buildings on the map as and when you have the time.

Obviously, when you receive an alert that the enemy is coming from a particular point, send all your Helices there and blow them away. You don't even need to upgrade them with bombs! The only things that might give you trouble are Quad Cannons, but they won't be appearing in large groups until you have enough Helices to blast them away.

For the final "two way" part, split your Helixes into 2 groups and station them at the centre of the map... then just wait. The artillery platforms give you such great sight range that you can spot the GLA coming and crush them immediately.

I used this strategy on my first run through the mission. At the end, I had 20 Helixes and about $30,000 (if I recall correctly). Not one of my units was lost.