[DC] Or'es Tash'n (Tau Empire Stronghold)

[Akranadas]

Or'es Tash'n (Tau Empire Stronghold)

[anonymousMarine]

Primary Objective - Kill the Ethreal (he has 32,000 FYI and guarded by tonnes, and i mean tonnes of Tau armour :P)

Secondary Objectives - Destroy both the Kau'yon and Mont'ka HQs.



You have have had alot of honour guard, and the Forward Base ability if you want to survive the first 5 minutes. They Tau hit you with almost everything in their arsenal; from FWs to Hammerheads, from Kroot Warriors to Krootox. They have squads and squads of fully reinforced Stealth suits on every wall blasting away at your forces should you try to advance.


Best way to take down the 2 HQs --> Hit em FAST, hit me HARD. Forcing your way in isnt going to work that well since they have outposts all over the map that churn out troops to impede your advance and to harrass your base.

I can only give advice for Necrons and Eldar since i've done it with both.

Crons --> Equip your NL with Phylactary, Ressurect, Solar Pulse.

You'll have to rely on mass FO DS to get this over asap. Let your FOs die, and over-pop yourself with them. You should have 38/24 if done right with Ressurect. I needed 2 Lithes to hold the 9 FO squads i had. Just teleport the Lord into the HQ area, using SP to seal off potential ranged threats, and de-striking your FO squads in.

Eldar --> Key units : Warp Spider Exarch Honour Guard.

These guys will kill off the HQs with their nuclear Haywires. Jump in, bomb, jump out.

If done right you'll lose 2 guys from each squad most, and can reinforce them once they're in the clear.





As for the Etheral himself..... prepare to face hordes of Tau armour. (Skyways+Hammerheads+Broadsides) besides the masses of infantry that are guarding him.

Getting your uber-units is essential. Capture the Communications Tower in the center map will allow you a Scan ability so you'll be able to scout out the final stronghold before attacking.

Gd hunting :)

[FalseMyrmidon]

Primary Objective - Kill the Ethreal (he has 32,000 FYI and guarded by tonnes, and i mean tonnes of Tau armour :P)
He only had 4200 health for me on Hard.

[konfeta]

As Space Marines on Hard:

I found this to be the most difficult stronghold out of all of them because mostly of the initial rush and the incredible mass of units by the Ethereal.

Initial Rush
- Have maxed Forward Base. The Turrets will draw enemy fire and gun down infantry, Plasma Gens will provide the much needed economy boost and save a lot of time, Armory/ChapelRax should be churning enough Marines to stop the onslaught.
- Use your HG units to tank, but make sure your Chaplain, Librarian, and the 2 Terminators live. Those will be invaluable in clearing the streets and assaulting secondary bases.
- Make sure that your 3 HG Tac marines are upgraded to missles immediatly. Those will be your AV until you can get to Tier 2. They should be able to handle Hammerheads/Skyrays with ease, just make sure the other HG units keep the kroot away.
- Use the HG Chaplain/FC/Dreadnought to tank the Krootox, make sure the Chaplain doesn't die. Also, if you can get the Grey Knights fast enough, those guys will cut down the Krootox in seconds.

Aftermath of the Initial Rush
-Tech, tech, tech. Make sure you pump out the second Chaplain and Librarian, upgrade your heroes. Get Grey Knights if you still don't have them and attach the Force Commander to them. These guys will be the fist of your future attacks. Attach both of your Librarians to the Veteran Terminators. That way they have an incredible ranged damage body guard that ensures that they stay out of trouble. Your HG Librarian, even after upgrades, will have pitiful HP.
-Once your base is set up and you have sufficient forces defending it, continiue to doing the secondary objectives. Taking out the Tau bases will completely shut down their offensive and let you toy with the Etherereal in any way you please.

Taking out Kayuon and Mont'ka bases
-The ideal infantry force composition, in my opinion, is this:
Force Commander attached to Grey Knights
2 Chaplains
2 Librarians with Veteran Termies attached
1 Terminator Squad with Apocethary
1 Assault Terminator Squad with Apocethary

Now, this allows you to leave a decently sized infantry force back at home to defend your base while you mop the enemies up. You will have 2 Smites and Inquisition to obliterate enemy infantry at range in seconds, 2 Word of the Emperor to turn your forces into Invincible Gods of Doom for 30 seconds upon any major enagement, 2 Demoralizing Shouts to catch up to skirmishers in the streets, and Force Commander's Battlecry with Assault Termies to turn enemy Knarlocks into fishfood in *seconds*. All while the Chaplains keep your entire army nice and healthy. Orbital Bombardment will solve the question of demolition of any unit-producint clusters you will encounter.

-Stealth Suits hiding in buildings: Skulldrones > Stealthsuits. Smite > Stealthsuits. Inquisition > Stealthsuits. These guys really shouldn't pose a problem to you.

-Vehicles? Whatever you desire. 2 Predators will make any encounter with Tau armor a snoozy, I personally prefer Dreadnought Rain. Pretty much, I drop Dreadnoughts every where I went to absorb enemy fire and take out vehicles while my super squad of heroes, termies, and GK cleaned house. Don't be afraid to do the Attack-Move with your unique units. 30 seconds of invulnerability from your Librarians coupled with Chaplain/Apocethary healing will turn guarantee no infantry losses.

Assaulting Ethereal's Base
-Very daunting task. The immense concentration of Hammerheads, Entrenched Broadsides, Pathfinders, Crisis Suits, Elite Fire Warriors, and other stuff will obliterate a force three times their size with no sweat. Even the vaunted 30 seconds of invulnerability from the Librarians won't seriously dent their defense. So what is the solution you ask?

-Scouts! Yes, the lowliest SM troops are the key to turning the Last Stand of the Tau into an exciting no-loss shooting spree! Well, not exactly no loss, but whatever. Get 3-4 Scout Squads, with maxed out sniper rifles. Give them them a Skull Probe each to increase sight range. Send in a unit to enemy base to lure out the Crisis Suits. Watch how the Pride of the Tau explodes after a volley from your scouts. In order to take out the Pathfinders, drop 3 Dreds in the enemy base to draw away enemy attention and quickly wipe out the squad. Trade 3 dreads for every pathfinder squad you find, while the Scouts turn enemy Broadsides/Firewarriors/CrisisSuits into fine paste. Once the bulk of the enemy firepower is gone, the entire Tau Base is ripe for the picking by your hero squad.

[anonymousMarine]

He only had 4200 health for me on Hard.

i swear on my life i saw 32,000.

And no it wasnt a damn holo-clone thing o_O

was i experiencing a bug/glitch or something?

[BrianGeneral]

[As Crons]
You better get the Forward Base and Manpower ability before you get to here, and maybe a bunch of Honour Guards------you'll need them. A Tomb Spyder HG will be nice if you have one.

Initially you'll be rushed by EVERYTHING as mentioned above. Survive it (jump the Lord around to fight enemy in CC), spwan Scarabs if you have a Spyder, and build LP2 AND turrets around your base before enemy strikes.

Offensive: I'll suggest you to swing a sledgehammer at one place at a time since Tau units will rip your Crons real good. Prepare 2+ (probably 3 or even 4) fully-loaded, Attack Stance Flayed Ones and place them in the Monolith for Deep Strike.
In this mission I'll take up Massed out Warriors (48+) with some Heavy Destroyers and the Lord. Ignore the Stealthsuits if you can bear them.

You'll face hordes of units in each outposts and the Communication Array. That's why Flayed Ones are handy to kill Broadsides and Tanks. Wipe out everything and teleport them all back to the Base. Don't hestitate to summon NB if you're able to.

Main Base: I hope you have already get a Monolith at this stage since it's well-defended. Warriors at the front, DSing Flayed Ones, with Heavy Destroyers and Monolith as support. If you think you can't bear losses of Honour Guard then DON'T send them in since I have 3/4 of my Warriors, 3 Heavy Destroyers out of 4 and 3/4 of Flayed Ones died in the firefight. Or if you find that you can't fight your way to the Ethereal, just teleport Monoliith to that place and DS Flayed Ones to kill the Ethereal.

Mission Accomplished.;)

[Exhibit69]

Space Marines will find that sniper scouts paired with skull probes make short work of the stealth teams that are scattered all over.

[Fallen_star]

I finished this map on normal and hard with necron and eldar. As a side note whilst playing necrons i sent 2 full str squads to the ledge in the top left above the montka obj to kill a annoying skyray......checked up on them a while later and the skyray was going negative hp got to -4200 before i left it though it did seem immobile/unable to move.

Anyways;
Eldar....rangers have a field day against any base assaults when used with Lp2.
falcons full of banshees and guardians and the farseer ( for the warlocks mainly ) elimanted the outposts to stop mechs and kroot ppl. then rolled up the centre in a similar way with the addition of prisms and falcons.
with the 3 secondary bases gone more of a grinding process took the peak with nasty casualtys though falcons allowing you to cripple the req and pwr and topped the grey dude.

necrons...on both modes i ended up turtling and just whoring warrors on aggressive from the eventual 3 monliths
lord who can see stealths makes a mocker of the ambushes and the ress orb used at the last moment is priceless got to 38 pop with one use this and the damage reduction scarab swarm upgrade a must.

with either side gotta stop those hammerheads make a mockery of trying to do anything.

[Twopairs]

On hard. Last province too:

http://screenshot.xfire.com/screenshot/large/b5beea05fd58ec1e21ef8c4580ae521b58e48a18.png (http://screenshot.xfire.com/screenshot/natural/b5beea05fd58ec1e21ef8c4580ae521b58e48a18.png)
4,2k hp

[SirNick]

This advice comes from the perspective of Chaos and Imperial Guard on Hard difficulty, and Space Marines on Normal Difficulty.

Chaos:
Your friends will be Khorne Berzerkers and Rhino Transports.

Shooty CSMs will be outshot by Fire Warriors and Pathfinder'd even when cloaked. CSMs also don't take kindly to vehicles or Kroot.

Khorne Berzerkers have a nice habit of kicking the snot out of Fire Warriors and Kroot alike, along with having nice HP to keep them alive.

However, Berzerkers and the rest of your army has a bit of difficulty charging Fire Warrior lines without dying horribly. This is where Rhinos come into play. Use Rhinos to pop in Berzerker squads and attached heroes, use Smoke Grenades to cover approach, zoom in, pop out, have a smoke.

Because of the high casualty nature of Chaos and low ability to regenerate health, you will need to rebuild troops often. This is okay and highly amusing.

An Obliterator squad will go a long way too, as will Defilers against vehicles. These are obvious things.

Because of the high casualties and low building damage, you'll want to storm through the level as quickly as possible with massive blitzkriegs against the main entrenched positions of the Mont'Ka, Kauyon, and relic'd Sensor Post Courtyard locations. This will mean that the production buildings in the middle of the map won't be touched for a while and will spawn massive strike teams with Hammerheads and Gnarlocs that will say "Hello."

Combined with Smokes, Obliterators, and a smidgen of PSM / CSM Plasma, there will be grand carnage. A Bloodthirster only makes things more amusing.

Because Chaos has nothing that will poke and prod at the outskirts of an entrenched position, like IG's Vindicare Assassin or Space Marine Whirlwinds, they'll just need to charge into the main Ethereal courtyard in the Rhinos and disgorge in grand, massive bloodbath. Using a Bloodthirster to charge in first is recommended and highly stylish.

Chains of Torment will greatly assist in killing the mobile Ethereal.

Enjoy.

Imperial Guard:

IG has a much less stressful approach because they can outrange and outshoot and outgarrison the Tau. Heavy Weapons Teams, Basilisks, the Vindicare Assassin, and lots of dead Guardsmen will be what leads you to victory.

The opening rush will absolutely need, at the minimum, an Honor Guard with a Sentinel, a Sanctioned Psyker, a Regimental Commisar, and one or both Veteran Kasrkin squads. Having Regimental Guardsmen are very nice too.

Your priority at the beginning is to crank out as many Guardsmen as you can and reinforce like crazy. When the crush hits, you will start to Execute Guardsmen like crazy for the damage and morale boost, use the Sentinel to hunt the Skyrays that will show up, and use the Sanctioned Psyker for Curse of the Machine Spirits on any Hammerhead that says "Hello." Kasrkins will be the lynchpin because their Frag Grenades will murder massed Kroot as well as break them, or disrupt Fire Warrior lines.

Don't be afraid to send your Guardsmen into melee against Fire Warriors -- they'll suffer far less losses in a bayonet charge than in a straight shootout.

All said and done, your priority is to preserve that Pskyer, that Commisar, and those Kasrkins. Anything else is secondary. Kasrkin Frag Grenades cannot be replaced, and the Commisar and Psyker are invaluable for their special abilities.

When the rush is repelled, capture those points, tech, and build that economy.

Your first assault should be on the courtyard to the west of your starting position, and should occur shortly after Tier 2 begins, so as to pre-empt any strikes from that direction. You can accomplish the assault with a purely infantry force as long as you bring Psykers along for Curse of the Machine Spirits and detection as well as Priests for damage boosts. Use Chimeras to close distance, Execute for massive damage, and use those Frag Grenades liberally -- they recharge in 30 seconds apiece.

Sentinels and Basilisks will ease the pain of the first assault, but aren't necessary if you're impatient.

Once you establish a beachhead in that courtyard, get two or three Heavy Weapons Teams garrisoned around the narrow streets leading into the northwest corner of the courtyard, and keep several Guardsmen and a Basilisk there. Inbetween them, a Psyker, and some gumption, you can leave them there and they'll repel any strikes there with little to no losses and without even needing to be managed.

From there you can begin to creep around the map with your Command Squad (with Psykers for detection and Curse of the Machine Spirits) and a Vindicare Assassin for massive Line of Sight and massive damage with his Assassination Scope to everything big that moves.

Bring in Heavy Weapons Teams behind them, and they'll poke and prod along the right side and slaughter the garrisoned Tau long enough to build up to Tier 4 and begin rolling out the big toys.

From there it's academic -- poke ahead with Assassin, snipe anything big, charge in with Lemans, assert dominance with HWTs, repeat. Creep and sweep.

The Assassination of the Ethereal is simpler than with any other race -- just use the Assassin and his Assassination Scope and you'll be able to kill the Ethereal in about three shots outside of detection range. Easy as pie.

Apply Earthshaker Rounds liberally as you sweep the city, and you'll have no reason to stop the Hammer of the Emperor.

Space Marines:

I really didn't have much trouble with them at all with a decent Honor Guard.

Veteran Terminators get Assault Cannons. First Company Marines get Missile Launchers. Heroes use special abilities liberally. Make sure that your Force Commander has a Melta Gun to do massive damage to LPs and infantry. Skull Probes stun vehicles. Dreadnoughts tank.

Your Honor Guard alone can quite nearly take on the entire level by themselves as a result, massively outranging and outdamaging the Tau.

Remember to use Rhinos where you can if you want to use Tactical Marines with Heavy Weapons in the level so that they don't get shot up.

The final push against the Ethereal is greatly aided by a Whirlwind. Use that to bombard the Pathfinders and Battlesuits up there before you push in with Predators, Rhinos, and deep-struck Dreadnoughts, Terminators, and Marines.

Use Demoralizing Shout on the Ethereal, shoot away, and Mission Accomplished.

Enjoy. :)

[Calax]

also with the marines, if your having problems with Krootox or Knarlocs get yourself some grey knights.

[Grov]

I found 3 squads of fully upgraded Scouts with sniper rifles, can do some serious ownage if Mircro'd.

The enemy only uses pathfinders, and only 1 squad in an attack at most, and usually at the front. Kill them, and your free to own.

12 scouts all with sniper kill a krootox in less than 15 seconds.

[Unsung Duck]

With Marines on normal I focussed on defending my base and tireing up before I attack the comand posts. I then spilt my force into two: Davian, Grey Knights, Predator, Termies, Librarien attached to Tactiacal marines, Assult Marines, Dreadnaught and Scouts with Skull Probe headed in the dircetion of the Mont'ka comand post while the Chaplin, Assult Termies, Tactical Marines, Dreadnaught, Assult Marines, Whirlwind, Predator and Scouts with Skull Probe headed towards the Kauykon comand post.

After the two posts where gone, both forces attacked the centre of the map coming from the front and back to take out the Greyskins guarding the Comand Tower.

When it came to taking out The Etheral my force was almost whipped out by all the Battle suits, Honour Guard and Sky Rays, but my Grey Knights and Land Raider saved the day.

[PikachuMarine]

Finished this mission with Marines this evening.

-Make sure you have the 3 access routes into your base defended with turrets/troops. Don't let a stray Greater Knarloc have a rampage.
-Stealth detectors. Need I say more? If you're in a pickle, try firing some artillery at the spot you see the stealth teams firing from, but can't hit em.
-Keep a unit stationed at the comm tower, even if it's just a land speeder or scout. Otherwise, the Tau take command of it again.
-Stay mobile. If you're pushing towards a command post, don't stop in an alleyway. Keep moving or the fire warriors will rape you.
-The ethereal has 1200 HP on easy
-Take note of O'Kais' messages to his troups. Any "Strike Teams, attack!" messages should be treated with caution. Prepare for assault at such times.
-Focus fire on the command posts and bother with the infantry afterwards or when you go for a 2nd run.
-Smite and Orbital Bombardment work wonders against Tau firing lines.
-Counter FW long range with your own - SM HeavyBolters/Missile Launchers.
-Have some assault-orientated squads for dealing with the Kroot attackers, eg GK's.
-Set units to assault stance against a FW mass, so as to neutralise their long raneg firepower. Even SM tactical squads own them in melee, and make sure you get any fire teams into melee.
-Focus fire on hammerheads/krootoxes/knarlocs, then mop up infantry
-Inidirect artillery fire helps on the final assault against the Ethereal, as does deep-striking/teleport/jump-packs etc.

[fuggles]

Eldar... don't know. This was the hardest stronghold for me as they were all lined up and entrenched in their base at the end. Whatever, be it 9 dreads, prisms, vypers, shees, council...bonesingers, everything got mulched in about a pikasecond. Rangers on their steps did seem to work VERY slowly but sporadically their pathfinders would charge forward (no doubt using the IG uncloaking logic) and then instadeath for you.

Was just a slog TBH. Oh for a whirlwind!

[Kerath]

I usually have a tougher time with this stronghold than any of the other six. I've yet to beat it with Eldar, but it's coming up, and I can't say I'm looking forward to it. Anyway, I found that with strongholds in general, turtling up and teching up is often highly advantageous. Rushing loses a lot of its charm because the enemy is already fully entrenched and fully teched up, so all you're doing is throwing inferior low-tier troops to their death. However, while I don't advocate a true initial rush per se, it can pay to not sit idle in your base too long in this one.

The reason for this is that the Tau, unlike most other races, like to send -big- rushes against you even after the first one, rather than a wimpy trickle. This can and will include Knarlocs and Hammerheads. The massive range of units like Skyrays also means you can't leave your defenses fully unattended. One thing I found was that if you can put together a decent strike force early on, and take out one or more of the numerous outposts set up around the map, you can alleviate the strain of these constant assaults. Every outpost defeated seems to lessen the quantity of rushes somewhat, which can make life a whole lot easier. I'm also a fan of setting up a second base in the central plaza with the relic once the Tau position there is history. It makes waging the assault on the final base considerably easier, as reinforcements are always nearby.

[fuggles]

Actually it was hammerheads I had most trouble with as nothing eldar has can scratch them

[TheEmperor]

Firedragons, haywire grenades?

[Fannin]

Eldar is very fun, the way I did it.

My honor guard was two ranger teams, and that's it. Stealth your base as quickly as possible (can generally be done right as the first wave hits) and pick off the pathfinders with your rangers.

Make sure to watch their incoming attacks, as there will generally be detectors that need taken out. But, it's easy to do, and this keeps your base stealthed. With turrets and LP's, you won't have any problems.

Now, here, I teleported bonesingers from rooftop to rooftop, moving my base along as I did. You can get the webways up before the stealth teams kill your bonesingers, and the rooftop positions allow for very good locations to fire upon the command posts.

The culmination of the battle, the ethereal's plaza, is easily handled by jumping two prisms and three spiders directly into one of the corners of the area. The havok these three units will cause gives you enough time to plant a stealthed webway gate. Bring your rangers through, pick off the detectors from outside detection range, and then use them to assasinate the Ethereal.

Very Eldar, I think. :)

[your_neighbour]

Level Hard
The patient prey hunts the hunter. You cannot win by rushing on this map.

With Orks, it's rather difficult if you don't have all of the upgrades, elite guards and buff-ups at the Tau stronghold as you will be encountering heavy attack on the start. If you have get all of the upgrades (Most important of all- foward base), you should be uber close to T3, all you need is some more power.

Don't worry about the elite guards that died during the first Tau assult, but the more you kept, the more advantage you have. If you have conquered all other provinces, you should have two kanz and a squad of 1337 bustaz, try to save them at all cost before you get to T3.

The most troublesome enemy at the start will be the krootox, engage it with your kanz while all other boyz are busy with FWs and other stuffs. The skyray gunship is a glass cannon, send your MANZ to destroy it. The AI tend to shoot the units that are closer to them, hence, the MANZ will become their prime target. Send your boyz out and kill all of the fire warriors. If you feel like that the Tau FWs may outshoot your boyz, let commander CC them, and send the shoota boyz after them (Even CC them if you want, because FW has awful low CC)

Use your Kan wisely because they can stuff everything that comes to you at the first wave. Elimimate all other threats first, then the krootox. If a kan is going down, withdraw it and let your grots repair it. The Warboss himselve can do very great damage to the krootox as well.

After you elimimated the first assult, you should be on your way to T3. Try to upgrade the LPs as soon as possible, after you get to T3, traditional tactic. Slugga spam, but don't forget to support yourself with other different units. Hammerhead gunship can knock kanz out like toy, but your bustaz can bust them easy too.

Always keep the boss in the base, use mek for detection. The boss can be used to counter the dino (Grand Knalock, or whatever that is). If you can, send the mek to squad the dino too.

Don't let your sluggaz go for a free death (although they are free). Combine them with Kanz and other units. Remember to use the kanz from Mek shop, not the free ones you get at the start. The free ones can sit at home and help you guard the base. Every wave you send should destroy one structure at least.

Upgrade the banners to rokkit bannerz, they do good damage to krootoxes and dinos.

Build some settlements on the way to your objective, guard it well and create another foward base.

[fuggles]

It's funny Fannin, but that's what I did, although not with my honour guard as they got mugged previously.

Fragons vs HH? Nice in theory, however by the time they are there then they will have ben slaughted by the 5 crisis suits, 3 skyrays, joblot of fw and fw honourguards, Kroot. WS nades are good, but not numerous enough.

[ssj4nappa]

As IG I managed to sneak my Assasin to where he could snipe the Ethereal as he jogged around with out being seen. Took about three passes, but meant that I didn't have to fight my way past masses of Tau.

[RaaR]

As Imperial Guard on Hard, get as much honor guard to help defend against the beginning rush, and just use the 3 assassins you get (2HG and 1 built) to be all sneaky and straight snipe the pathfinders on your way to the Ethereal. I maxed out my defense with HWTs and whatever vehicles i believed to be necessary.

[Firepike]

i found it quite easy with eldar......it was the first stronghold i went for.

having the extra requisition territory helps heaps....i go for space port, fury and extra req, move back to spaceport and attack tau stronghold.

honor guard was 2 rangers and one warp spider. not sure if i had fire dragons or not

key is to get up LPs and turrets fast to survive the first wave......warp spiders will take care of the hammerheads and skyrays. dark reapers are good units to build up. which u take (montka or kauyon) first is not important just make sure u take them out. warp spiders are the key to this map. shroud also helps a lot.

take ur time to tech up....i took the montka first with full reapers and warp spiders with 2 wraithlords.

use one haywire on any vehicle........2 is a waste......one haywire knocks a hammerhead to low yellow (possibly red also i don't remember) and a skyray to red.

when u attack i suggest u leave ur honor guard behind, they will still attack u when u go to take out they're outposts and ur towers and turrets won't b able to handle the long range of the skyray i think it is. when skyrays attack ur base just jump the spider exarch, haywire it, attack till it dies then jump back. if they need heal just put them in a webway with the heal researched and they'll b good to go for the next wave.

along the way they have stealthsuits and vehicles taking potshots at ur down on the streets from building rooftops.......just jump ur spiders up instead of walking ur army around.......make sure u have detectors in the street below so that ur spiders have sight.

once u take out the 2 outposts take the centre and the relic......get ur avatar and build up to max cap then just rush the tau base. i just walked in the front door blazing away till i got to jump range of the ethereal then jumped my 2 FPs and my warp spiders and got all my reapers to focus on their ethereal ignoring everything else........i let my WLs take out the vehicles.

i just went for WLs and FPs the whole time and warp spider and reaper squads........maxxed out cap of those and ur laughing. theyre vehicles can't handle WLs in melee and once u focus on the ethereal with FPs, WSs, DRs and mindwar he dies before the tau defence can take out ur army......use eldritch storm to take out buildings and vehicles........WLs will clean up whats left :P

edit: this is hard mode that i'm basing it on

[konfeta]

Fragons vs HH? Nice in theory, however by the time they are there then they will have ben slaughted by the 5 crisis suits, 3 skyrays, joblot of fw and fw honourguards, Kroot. WS nades are good, but not numerous enough.

Theory? Don't send them out on suicide missions. My single HG squad of Firedragons FoF-ing around enemy infantry mass turned AV defense into a snoosefest. Two Seer Councils with liberal spam of Eldrich Storm can tank anything they send at you; those things are freaking INVINCIBLE with the Farseer Healing Aura Wargear. 5 Squads of Warp Spiders can effortlessly clean up the enemy infantry while they are being bounced around like toys with your uber melee. Krootox get insta-gibbed by Harlequins, the Greater Knarlock gets chewed up as it can't killing anything fast enough. And this was on Hard against a level 15 strength.

Plus, your base gets attacked from narrow streets on large intervals. This just begs for minefields.

Eldar get what is easily the most powerful single HG unit a player can have in any of the 7 campaigns with the Seer Council. A tier three squad that can be headed by a disruption goddess with a healing aura? YES PLEASE!

[frickenmoron]

Is it just me or does the initial rush come too quickly usualy to build up anything? anyways... HARD as eldar:

After surviving the initial rush i kept turtling for a bit and building up a big energy supply (3 webway assemblys :P) and kept pumpint out wraithlords for my base defense. my seer council+ farseer was busy clearing out plateaus, and my bonesingers kept building webway forward bases on them. I eventualy cleared out the gnarloc at the first righthand base with my rangers (takes a bit of time but works)

I leveled that base with my fragon/shee+2council force and made some cloaked turrets on both sides of that trench after i capped that SP, it magicaly attracts lots of enemy units once you cap it, so they ran right into the trap :D

after that i massed up units on the plateau next to the kauyon base and let my warp spiders +WS HG jump in and haywire that parked hammerhead to hell and jump back out, after that i poured in my melee troops and fragons and used the warp spiders again to level that base. after that i moved onto the next plateau southeast of the etherals hideout. I only left my farseer/council, my rangers and my warp spiders there, the others were on base protection duty.

I cleared out the parked vehicles outside of the base with the gren tactic again for the hammerhead and just used plain force/eldritch storm on the others. My rangers made mincemeat out of parked units near the stairs and my farseer kept running in and out and spamming eldritch storm at buildings/vehicles all the time , from time to time my warp spiders (guided by farseer) would jump in too and pop 1-2 suits and jump out again.

This approach took a bit of time but it was very safe and sound :P after around 10 minutes the ethereals base was only at half strenght and i built a webway gate inside and poured in all my troops which TOTALY overwhelmed him by then. This was the quickest approach I could do for this base yet

[Hiro Protagonist]

(Note: some of the orientation may be switched around. I'm not sure if and how it randomizes, but consider East and South the main strongholds.)

For the Greater Good!

Suggestions for Defending Or'es Tash'n on Normal by an amateur:

Ok, if you managed to dominate the north of the map your biggest worries are necrons, orks, and eldar.

I personally got slammed by Orks. That means Storm Boyz, a Big Mek or 2, and a few wartracks in a few seconds.

You'll start off, confused, disoriented, and somewhat relieved that you've got your basic tier 1 layout up with 3 gens, IIRC. Its smart to reinforce your base as often as possible.

Broadsides close to your HQ will help to keep those

That SP down-center of your base which overlooks that little road must be taken, capped, and fortified as soon as possible.

You need vespids and krootkrootkrootkrootkrootkrootkroot. 4 Teams of Fire Warriors for backup, and maybe a pathfinder team later on to start pushing for more points. Bodyguards work wonders.

One of the first things you should do is push across to the westmost edge to the map. Send a krootox or two, and take a drone harbringer to backup their assault. After that chunk is cleared out, set up shop and prepare to push to the southmost corner. You'll find a neat little alley around back with which to send some forces towards the east or come around and have the south corner in a pincer.

Krootox are your friend here, as they draw most of the fire on those damn Ork buildings (while it smashes em too!) from your soft, squishy fire warriors and let your Kroot stay alive a bit longer. Great damage too. the Greater Knarloc works even better.

Gun drones + Krootox + a Knarloc + Bodyguards = A victory for the greater good.

[Energizer Bunny]

As IG just run your assassin in and PWN the Etherial. Stupidly easy. You'll have to dodge pathfinders a few times, but after that it's fine. I had 2 assassins in my honour guard + the one I built when I did this, so 3 took care of him mighty fast. Just set up on the last set of steps to the main base and wait for the etherial to jog into range then activate scope. mmmmmmmmmMonsterKill!

[Aedimus]

As IG just run your assassin in and PWN the Etherial. Stupidly easy. You'll have to dodge pathfinders a few times, but after that it's fine. I had 2 assassins in my honour guard + the one I built when I did this, so 3 took care of him mighty fast. Just set up on the last set of steps to the main base and wait for the etherial to jog into range then activate scope. mmmmmmmmmMonsterKill!


This is essentially what I did with IG as well. Also, with Eldar, the same strategy. With either HG Rangers, or standard issue, I setup three teams, under numbers 5,6,7. HG Rangers were 5 and 6, with the standard group being 7. I had to knock off a few stantionary pathfinders though. In fact...there are only two groups of pathfinders you need to kill, then the PF's and vespid in the main base. Afterward, your rangers are free to snipe the ethereal. The only time I ever used my main eldar force was to destroy the small base to my immediate right. I also teleported my BS to rooftops where I cloaked in some turrets to hammer on attack forces. It was ridiculously simple. Even more so with IG. Three bassies = Move outta dah way dummie!

[Avatar of Wotan]

You can wait long enough for Gorgutz to stomp the stronghold.

If you dont disturb him (and kill some Tau in other provinces). He will come (it shouldda). Because I m Chaos its very hard to pass this mission and so I used trickery.

Hope you dont :bricks: me.

[Joe Bob Joe]

I just let someone else take over tau stronghold then killed them. (not really sure if this counts as a strategy.)


edit: this was as chaos

[Pandakickmyleg]

I finished this level with IG and reading this topic i think i went through it the hard way; no heavy weapon teams, no basilisks or bb, just 2 chimeras full of guards, one chimera with tekpriests for repair, some hellhounds and lemans and thats it. Man it took hours, and i think i lost at least 1k men there :) . I had to attack and retreat several times, each time advancing a little further, very IG style.

[DeadorK]

Tank Bustaz are your friend.

[Joe Bob Joe]

I used assault termies and reg termies w/ skull probes and 2 dreds to secure Mont'Ka post. I used 2 preds w/ autocannon and HB with 5 squads of marines (all with 5 plasma guns), commander with all upgrades, and two vet termies to secure Kauyon. To kill etheral i sent in 4 dreds 2 squads of marines w/ rockets to probe the defenses and kill some guards. Then had 3 of the 5 squads at Kauyon with apothecaries, one with chappy, and 1 with librarian. Land Raider held squad of reg terms and three rhinos carried my troops. assault termies and my two vet termies were ready to teleport in. Assaulted and dominated. :):):)

[Dan Ball]

I have a way to do it with Crons.

Get your NL the Resurrection Artifact, get 2 or 3 squads of Necron Warriors and then press the Del button on each one.

They will resurrect into separate teams instead of 1 team, so you kill a 8 group you get 8 new teams.

Then just reinforce them and charge in with your enormous army.

[some_guy]

Better still, just keep letting your necron crypt warriors, crypt flayed ones and crypt immortals die and res orb them back, reinforce. I did it this way, until I had an army of 12 crypt warriors squad, 5 crypt immortals squad and 10 flayed one squad. Best of all, I didn't even need to spend squad caps!

[windfrog]

i did it with orks on hard:

i started with a maxed forwardbase, good HG and the req bonus.

so i started by getting orky fort as fast as possible, then researching free sluggas

i used the slugga's to get shot to shreds, i pumped out 2 maxed, powerclawed nob sqauds, 2 maxed flash gits and~20 tankbusta's whilst using my BM and a sqaud of shoota's to clear the ss everywhere.

i put the sluggs rally's on the closest outpost, demolished it and build an orky fort+4 boyz huts there. then wen't to the northern outpost, capped it, build fort and lotsa huts, then the northern command post, build a fort there to, build a wall of banners( turned out that wasn't nescecary) and did the same routine to the kroot outpost:D

the streets where filled with dead slugga's,

after having the entire map except for the citadel i was floating about 80K(200 income with free units on rally whilst having lunch XD) so i spammed stormboys, made them gather outside the citadel and put every sqaud on overwatch:D i build my squigoth, 2 lenans and overwatched wartraks. then i send everything in.

about 100 stormboys jumping in with a new boy appearing for every death i slaugthered all non vehichle stuff, after repeatring this about 9 times.
then i spammed mass tankbusta's, about 60 and send those in they destroyed every tank and stuff.

in the end he didn't have any units and i decided to end it in style, killed all buildings and send in gorgutz to finish the ethereal

[Aussiemoo]

windfrog how did you cope with that bloody ion cannon?

[rb2610]

After reading a walkthrough on GameFAQ's for a rough idea on how tough each base battle will be I expected the Tau Stronghold to be near impossible.

But playing as SMs I found it surprisingly easy. I started off by getting a couple of SM squads to hold off attacks, then I got about 6 squads of scouts, with 2 snipers and a plasma gun per squad plus inf and an inf probe for 4 of the squads. I led these guys around the map, wiping out all the stealthsuits and pathfinders, meanwhile I was building up a standard force at the base (some Marines, Termies and Assault Termies, Grey Knights to play on the Tau's melee weakness and 2 Predators with AV turrets and the standard AI sidearms plus a Land Raider and a few dreads (with no weapon upgrades to keep them melee orientated)

I then sent out this force behind the scouts to wipe out any vehicles and buildings that were too much for scouts to handle (although while I was building up forces they did manage to take out a couple of Hammerheads with their snipers)

The 3 secondary objectives were pretty easy with this force, I only had to reinforce a couple of times. Each time, I sent the scouts in slowly to check out the surroundings and once I had sorted any stealthsuits I sent in everything else to annihilate the bases.

Killing the Ethereal was a little tricky, after taking out a couple of enemy squads with my snipers I got bored and decided to just send everything in, I lost a heck of a lot of units in the fight but I just focused everyone on taking down the Ethereal.

So when you do the mission with SM remember scouts are the way to go. :)

[Joe Bob Joe]

I prefer GK's/tanks/commanders. Really helps if commander has teleport, get some assault squads and give termies personal teleporters so that stealthsuits on roof cant stay up there fine and dandy and u have to move around on streets. If only the orbital relay hadnt been nerfed, the SM could have owned this stronghold. (Chaos still can). With the satellite reveal thing, drop pods/ tele termies into the plaza can own ethereal. However, in WA, orb relay could send 6 squads in 3 pods, which would have rocked. 30 heavy bolters vs. 1 ethereal

[Sarpadeon]

Okay, just wanted to say, I officially despise this map as of now.

Race: Space Marines
Honor Guard: First Company Assault Veteran, Senior Librarian, Land Speeder, Dreadnaught, Hellfire Dreadnaught, 2 First Company Terminators, 2 First Company Veterans, Reclusiarch
Planetary Gains (relevant ones): Increased Manpower, Increased Requisition, Forward Base.
Time Spent as Of Now: 1.5 Hours.
Enemy Bases Destroyed: 6. Not kidding. 6.
Status of Bases (Excluding the Posts) Vehicle Beacon, Kroot Shaping Center (often in pairs), Tau Barracks (often in pairs), 4-6 Plasma Generators, and Cadre Headquarters.
Enemy Units Encountered in the Bases: Mass of Hammerheads, Fire Warriors, Kroot Hounds, Skyrays, Kroot Shapers, Pathfinders, Kroot Carnivores, at least One Greater Knarloc. 3 bases also had Broadside Battlesuits and Crisis Battlesuits.

I'm halfway through (hopefully) the level as of now, so I'll just write the rest when I finish it. Starting out, I had a pretty decent force to hold off the first rush. I built up my forces and teched, got a nice economy going. The rushes after the first, with two to eight minute gaps in between them didn't get any easier, in fact, the Tau just upped the ante with every rush. They even got not one, not two, but THREE simultaneous Greater Knarlocs in, two consecutive times! For those of you who think I am joking, no. For, as I was going to the Mont'ka Command Post on the western side with infiltrated scouts, I found that even as I fought off the rushes to my base, the Mont'ka Post had three Greater Knarlocs there as well!

Now, if you think that's ridiculous, try taking out not one, not two, not three, but FOUR full-fledged bases (EXCLUDING the command posts) just to get to Mont'ka Post and back. After I demolished the Mont'ka Post, the rushes from that side didn't get any easier. In fact, with the Post gone, all I started to get were Hammerheads, Fire Warriors and Kroot Hounds. Doesn't make my life easier as I have to leave more than half my army at my base to barely hold the hordes and hordes of Tau back!

Having killed the Mont'ka Post, I spent some time eliminating pathfinders to get to the Kauyon Post. Well, two more full-fledged bases in, and with ubiquitous resistance along the way, I managed to sacrifice 2 Predator Annhilators, 4 Dreadnaughts, Grey Knights, Reclusiarch, 2 Full Space Marine Squads, 1 Assault Terminator Squad, 1 Terminator Squad (not to mention a ridiculous amount of time and requisition) just to get there, much less take it out. As of now, both Command Posts are taken out, and I am wondering where all these attacks are coming from... seems to me that there are even more bases of the abovementioned variety along the way... wish me luck.

PART 2

After dinner, I returned to the battle, as it was now personal. To my surprise, the fog of war that I had previously uncovered, hard returned... this silly bug took a good fifteen minutes away, as I uncovered the areas I had previously done and swept away the remnants.

And... guess what... ANOTHER F******* TAU BASE!

Now, here is my problem with this map. The Tau have both overwhelming amounts of Kroot and Battlesuits. This makes Tau proficient in both melee AND long-range. Some of their vehicles are outside the normal range of any of my units. Therefore, they out-range, out-number and out-match me at every turn. To top that off, there were EIGHT TOTAL BASES on the entire map, I mean, is that enough!? To top THAT off, the game places you where you are the MOST open to attack: there are three points of entry to where your base is located. It doesn't stop there - the eight bases constantly produce Tau units: their minimum Greater Knarloc level (although it isn't tough, why can't "I" produce about a thousand Land Raiders!?) is three (one for their base, one for the initial attack and one for the reinforcements of that attack).

Anyway. I attached the Librarian to Terminator Squad, took the Force Commander attached to Grey Knights, Chaplain and Reclusiarch out to sweep the rooftops. When done with that, I proceeded to build a forward base to the Karuyon Command Post while 2 Predator Annhilators, 4 Dreadnaughts and 2 Space Marine Squads (rocket launcher and plasma) went to the Relic, to destroy the seventh Tau base (thus far). To my surprise, they did destroy it. But, I lost every single one of them. In the meantime, my forward base was built, thus, I produced the missing units and led a two-pronged assault onto the Relic point, demolishing every single Tau unit around the general area. After quadruple-checking, I garrisoned my forces there. Without giving a second thought, I decided that now was the time I returned the favor of overwhelming attacks.

I took ALL my troops (1 Land Raider, 2 Predators, as much Dreads as possible, Force Commander, remaining Honor Guard, Termies, Assault Termies, as many space marines as possible with Apothecaries, Chaplain and Grey Knigts) and then simply exterminated the f****** lot of them. The Tau ran, and I watched as they ran, and laughed as they ran. Mission accomplished, though at a terrible price.

NOTE: Immediately afterwards, the Eldar (the only remaining race at present) attacked my army at the Tau Stronghold. The Tau and Eldar had been constantly fighting as I was busy laying siege on the Imperial Guard or demolishing Gorgutz. Thus, that wasn't a surprise. What WAS a surprise, however, is that my full-fledged base at the southeastern section wasn't where I started - my commander and remaining honor guard started at the location of the Ethereal.

[serban277]

I have a question. As far as i remember the ethereal remains light-up all game. Just drop some orbital stuff on him if you are sp marine or any other race that can drop. I remember i did it with flayed ones and after many tries and even more resurrections i made it.If it isn't light-up you just run in there with some spotter or smth ( a fast/jumping unit)