XTA strategy guide

Lindir The Green · Post by **Lindir The Green** » 04 May 2005, 20:45

Clicking on the SY messageboard redirected me to here so:

Are there any XTA strategy guides? XTA seems like a great game, but it is different from TA, so TA strategies won't work. I found this out while trying to kill my opponent in Spring with a massive slasher swarm, that died to 4 levellers.

Redfish · Post by **Redfish** » 05 May 2005, 00:28

Well XTA is very different. I've played it a lot and could tell a lot about some strategies.

The most important things however are:

L2 kills Level 1 easily(so it is really a level 2). Your story that 100 slashers died to 4 levelers is plausible :)

Upgrade to moho metal mines. Yes they now make sense. They cost 300 energy though to mine the patch(doesn't matter where you build it, doesn't have to be centered(but hey we don't have patches anymore now do we)), so be sure to have that.

Mines are useful too. Maybe even a bit too useful. It's quite easy to have your base guarded by mines and porc, while your enemy's troops just die walking over the mines. Fart mines are used for clearing trees and other mines(build 3 or 4 close together and Self D). Mini mines are good against Level 1. Marshmellows are good against L2 and anything besides that i just insane. However in spring mines tend to blow up everything around them, including other mines, which isn't useful. Or send 1 roach to clear mines, try to harras your enemy as much as possible with roaches they are faster now and good.

Get your energy income steady by building mobile fusions(arm, it's in the adv veh fac) or light fusions(core it's built by advanced units). After that go cloackable fusions. And in a long game you build normal fusions which give like 3000 energy(but they cost a lot).

Units that rock in XTA(not spring), in order or how much they rock. Ak's(yes they are not longer pure crap). Crashers/Jethros, Pyros/Zeus, Panthers. Gimps, Penetrators. Sumos, Goliaths(they rule). Krogoth(The uber of everything Uber, very tough, will only get killed by like 100 adv bombers in 2 or 3 runs and of course dgun but that's the standard thing to do if someone has a kroggy).
Adv Bombers are great in XTA but i doubt they are in spring.

Build DT around your defenses(not that useful in spring because they don't block a lot because of terrain deform)

XTA is more tactical. It's also quite subtle. Defenders are quite useless so you'll need better defenses like HLT and annihilators to keep your base from being overrun by L2 units. If you get punished by a punisher go for merls. They outrange it.

Well yeah, that's about everything I can think of. There's just so much about it. Just remember that XTA games are usually long. 200+ metal is common in XTA games. Vulcans are common in XTA games as are krogoths.

Frog · Post by **Frog** » 05 May 2005, 03:27

Go here: http://www.clan-sy.com/frame.html and then go on XTA. At least some of the changes are explained there, although it definitly is not a strategy guide.
I would be very happy to see some more info about the mod as well though :) .

Rayden · Post by **Rayden** » 05 May 2005, 10:16

Ok, my strategy guide (not always in time order):

- Build as fast as possible masses of lvl 1.
- Send out Construction vehicles to find ressource spots
- tech to lvl 2 as soon as you have enough ressources
- never let you energy go zero / never let your metal be full (=wasted)
- even if you can produce masses of lvl2 dont stop building lvl1

- try to get up some fusion reactors for moho exctators and energ-metal converters
- Build heavy defense at strategic positions and cover it with dragon teeth
- Spam the map with rocket towers

Redfish · Post by **Redfish** » 05 May 2005, 11:31

Rayden wrote:Ok, my strategy guide (not always in time order):

- even if you can produce masses of lvl2 dont stop building lvl1
- Spam the map with rocket towers

I wouldn't recommend these two strategies to someone playing XTA. L2 always beat L1. Just as soon as the other guy starts producing L2 your L1 units are worthless, so if you can't build L2 soon you'll probably lose.

Rocket towers are also worthless after 10 minutes in the game against any units. They are only good for providing air defense against aircraft that might reach your base.

Rayden · Post by **Rayden** » 05 May 2005, 12:28

I agree to you with level 1 units. But i say keep producing them if you have enough ressources. It always depends on how much ress you have available. I wouldn't waste my limited ressources on weak lvl1 tanks if i can build heavy siege tanks.

Thanks for your comment about rocket towers, that's exactly what i mean. If you place them everywhere you have a relatively good protection against air attack. Against ground attacks they are useless.

I am glad that i started a discussion here, because that is what readers of this thread want.

PS: And about the pm'er i was pretty good in OTA some years ago, so don't tell me i'm talking bullshit.

Frog · Post by **Frog** » 05 May 2005, 12:51

Look, maybe I was a bit unfriendly, but I never said that what you posted isn├é┬┤t true! What I did say, is that every single point you made is valid in OTA, and that they are all very basic knowlege. I mean, anybody thats been playing for say 40 hours doesn├é┬┤t even have to think about those things, its just the basic way you do it. Therefore in my opinion it isn├é┬┤t much of a strategy guide. More of a beginners / newb guide.
And as for saying you didn├é┬┤t know what you were talking about, I was refering to MT forests you proposed, which, as you have now stated, are worthless against ground units.
Anyway no hard feelings, and lets try to get back to the topic.

I have to admit that I haven├é┬┤t played too much XTA, and therefore can├é┬┤t give much advice on how to play it.
I├é┬┤m just realizing Rayden, that what I think annoyed me about your post, was that what you were saying was so obvious to me. But on the other hand, I can├é┬┤t think of anything that isn├é┬┤t obvious either. I mean everybody should know things like:
- Use a mix of Heavy short ranged units ( e.g. Bulldog) and longer ranged Artillery (Luger).
- always build anti air units (although they├é┬┤re weak against ground), even if your enemy doesn├é┬┤t have air : you never know when he├é┬┤s going to start building it.

This on the other hand seems to me to be a sign that XTA is quite intuitive, which is very good :) .

Rayden · Post by **Rayden** » 05 May 2005, 13:12

I have removed the unfriendly

.

I have to say that in most games i have played here, i saw that many people don't even know the basics, so i felt justified to post this. And if you don't even know basics, advanced strategies are useless for a player. Anyway most of my points are still valid for XTA.

Here some more hints a little bit more detailed:

Early game:
Try to harrass enemy extractors with fast scouting vehicles, extractors have very low health, so this can be devasting for your enemy. Keep always a big bunch of lvl1 tanks. Build many rocket towers against early aircraft attacks.

Mixture of army:
It's always important you keep a good mixture in your unit variety. You will need anti air (rocket) vehicles to get down enemy support aircrafts. Artillery (balistic) tanks are very important to shoot over wreckages (missiles won't help you there). Laser tanks do often a decent damage and good fire rate, but they will be blocked by wreckage too.

Scouting on engaging enemy armies:
Some cheap scout planes flying over enemy army can improve the effectiveness of you base defense considerably as you don't rely on imprecise radar blips targeting.

Support:
use Artillery behind your army to give fire support. Helicopters (= planes who fly like helicopters) will give great air support and can take a decent amount of damage before going down.

Moho extractors:
There is a big difference with Moho extractors compared to OTA. They will suck 300 energy which can suck down your energy ressources pretty fast. But as you have a small fusion generator in XTA you can compensate this with this unit. Always keep an eye on energy bar.

Ressource Management:
Build 2-3 storage facilities for metal, so you never waste overproduction of metal. Also build some energy storages especially in case you use many energy weapon tanks. While fighting you can run low on energy and your tanks will be useless otherwise. If you run low on metal but you did everything to get a high income -> well done, you're wasting nothing

. Anyway keep increasing your metal income.

Lindir The Green · Post by **Lindir The Green** » 05 May 2005, 16:31

I know all of that because I play OTA.

What I need is a guide of ALL the units, their use and how they differ from the OTA version of them. For example: I found myself against flamethrowing levelers. In OTA, the levelers have an artillaryish gun.

Rayden · Post by **Rayden** » 05 May 2005, 16:53

Then ask for that next time. You don't want a strategy guide, you wanna have a detailed unit statistic for OTA and XTA with differences.

Redfish · Post by **Redfish** » 05 May 2005, 21:19

The list of changes from ota to xta is just too large. I've asked for it once and was told it would take longer to make it than to learn to play xta. Almost every units is changed. Ballistic units(like stumpies) fire over DT, which is handy.

Sheekel · Post by **Sheekel** » 06 May 2005, 03:59

im a very defensive player, and i find that with xta it is much more difficult to maintain a decent defnece using only lasers. Make sure you mike up your defencive (and offencive, too) units to create a nice mix. It works far better than building 50 on one unit (unless those 50 are kroggies, or goliaths

Speaking of defensive playing, am i the only one who prefers no-rush games? I enjoy long, drawn-out games with massive bases, and massive assaults. I think its much better than ending the game in 10 minutes with a couple of peewees and flash-tanks. BRING ON THE KROGGIES! My Vulcans can take em!

Sheekel · Post by **Sheekel** » 06 May 2005, 04:01

im a very defensive player, and i find that with xta it is much more difficult to maintain a decent defnece using only lasers. Make sure you mike up your defencive (and offencive, too) units to create a nice mix. It works far better than building 50 on one unit (unless those 50 are kroggies, or goliaths

Speaking of defensive playing, am i the only one who prefers no-rush games? I enjoy long, drawn-out games with massive bases, and massive assaults. I think its much better than ending the game in 10 minutes with a couple of peewees and flash-tanks. BRING ON THE KROGGIES! My Vulcans can take em!

Zoombie · Post by **Zoombie** » 06 May 2005, 04:33

Not realy an XTA specific stratagim, but it works for me. I call it....

The Fortrees

Start with radar radar radar. BUild a redundent, far reaching radar net the blankets your whole area. It allowes you to see the enemy's attacks (and in spring, allowes your defence to fire sooner

).
Then continue to artillery and air defences. Early game air ships are easy to defeat, so concentrait more on the artillery. The reson for hte artillery is simple. THEY KICK ASS! They blow up enemy units at long range, create craters to slow down tanks and can fire over walls and mountans. However they are inacurate and are practicaly useless in close quarters. Once you have a artillery screen up (and have gotten 2lv units) put up Anhillators and Doomse Day machines, and RADAR JAMMERS! because just as much you want to whatch the enemy with radar, you want to stop them from whatching YOU. So use radar jammers liberaly. Also if you think "i might need nuke defences soon" then its wayyyyyy to late. Same with flack. Build tons of flack and redundent anti missles systems. Your screen sould look like this by now.

DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT
DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT

DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT
DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT

DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT
DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT DT

Sentinal Sentinal Sentinal Sentinal Sentinal Sentinal Sentinal
Anhillator Anhillator
HillhillhillhillhillhillHillhillhillhillhillhillHillhillhillhillhillhillHillhillhillhillhillh
Gaurdian Gaurdian Gaurdian Radar Gaurdian Gaurdian Gaurdian
HillhillhillhillHillhillhillhillHillhillhillhillHillhillhillhillHillhillhillhillHillhillhillhill

Nuke Defence Nuke Defence Nuke Defence, Radar jammer, BB, BB,BB
FusionFusionFusionFusionFusion MohoMohoMohoMohoMohoMohoMohoMoho
Vulcan Vulcan Vulcan

Factories Factories Factories Factories Factories Factories Factories

Your comander sipping tea and commandinizing his army

I hope the visual aids helped

AF · Post by AF » 06 May 2005, 12:38

Your strategem works not because of your superior fortress planning, which seems to show little innovation save lines, but rather because you use one or two sun tzu tactics, namely the See the enemy but dont elt them see you tactic you employed.

http://www.sonshi.com

Follow Sun Tzu meticulously and you will win every game in every strategy game with every mod that you play. It is not lack fo experience, it is arrogance and stuborn-ness of mind combined with deviations from sun tzu.

btw the map is your base, you should treat ti as such rather than focusing on a single area or seperate bases, expand expand expand!

Sheekel · Post by **Sheekel** » 06 May 2005, 16:08

nice, im gonna try that defencive pattern!

Redfish · Post by **Redfish** » 07 May 2005, 00:13

I really don't understand how ppl can think: If I build this huge base inside this corner of the map and wait it out, maybe my enemy will die before I will and I win...

Get out there and do some killing. Yes you can build a solid defense in XTA(in ota anything other than MT and BB's were pretty useless) but they are more important to get them up in tactical places. Like a guardian in OTA. If someone gets a HLT up in the path where the enemy is sending units then he has to think of something else. Maybe build a pop up. But if his enemy already went for advanced and has merls to kill it, he'll have to go for a guardian or maybe even a bb.

zwzsg · Post by **zwzsg** » 07 May 2005, 11:27

Zoombie: Then one lone weasel come into your corner in the first minutes of the game and ruins all your plans. Your plan is doomed to fail if you play against anything else that the current spring AI (the one that does not exist). In case you haven't understood, usually in RTS people attack each others. And they don't neccessarly wait 3 hours before attacking. Otherwise yes radar and jammer are important, they were important in TA too but only between good players that madly microed to fire at the radar dot, while in Spring everybody fire at radar dots.

Spring RTS Engine

XTA strategy guide

XTA strategy guide