Map:emp isle
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Commander Strategies
West Hills:
Control of the refinery in the hills at b5 is very important and gives it's controller a considerable advantage. This location puts you in very close striking distance of the adjacent refineries at b4 and a6. The refinery at b4 will soon fall under your control if you hold b5 because it is incredibly easy to destroy the beach-side ref from the upper ground. Furthermore, an assault from the south is very difficult because of the lack of cover and the narrow path. If your base is far enough north, you can strike at the refinery at b6 easily as well. Furthermore, whoever has a forward base at this location will quickly and easily be able to storm the hills to the enemy's original base in very short order. Simply put, control this location if at all possible. Although both BE and NF can reach this point at about the same time early in the game, the BE have an easier time defending it because of tree cover. The east hills are difficult for the NF to assault because of their one ladder access point, so if the NF fail to conquer the northwest, they will find themselves pinned down in the valleys of the map quickly and painfully.
Dragon's Teeth
There are three waterways along the edges of the map that any vehicle must pass through in order to move along the shoreline. In all three of these places, the lowest point in the 'stream' is enough to stall and kill most vehicles. A particularly clever commander tactic is to place small, short segments of wall in the deepest point of the rivers (or a continuous wall, but short segments are cheaper and almost as effective, if not more so)-- but do not have your infantry build them. Any fast moving tank will cruise into them at top speed, attempting to cross the damaging deep water as quickly as possible, only to get caught on the hidden segments. Even if he decons the segment, his tank will most certainly stall and die in the deep water after it's unstuck. There are drawbacks to this technique: it's possible for fast tanks (jeeps and LTs) to ride over these segments or slow tanks to see them in time. Furthermore, this is strictly a defensive maneuver as you're effectively limiting your assaults as well.
Infantry Strategies
Waterlogged Ninjas
The unique layout of this map can allow for very stealthy assaults. It's easy to use the water along the shoreline to conceal your approach to an enemy base, which means that infantry units can create some devastating ambush scenarios. Level 3 Fireworks are particularly deadly when the turret is placed below the shoreline, concealing most of the structure from view. Likewise, the grenadier can execute an effective assassination by hiding when appropriate. The drawback to this technique, of course, is that it takes forever. The map is huge and any such offensive maneuvers must be planned well in advance.
Hillside Cover
A very basic yet sometimes overlooked tactic when approaching an enemy turret on the hills is to walk up to it from the edge of the cliff, staying below it's line of sight but not falling off the edge. While you are vulnerable to fire from below, this method allows you to get within grenade range or bypass a turret easily and quickly.
Points of Interest
Middle Plain: The Middle has a Super Node that gives 2X the output of other resource nodes, but is incredibly hard to defend from enemy fire.
West Hills: The West Hills provide a direct route to the enemy base, while there are 7 resource nodes to grab and defend from it. As noted above, whoever controls these hills can attack the enemy base at their leisure.
East Hills: The East Hills are easily defensible and often ignored, while they house 3 resource nodes close to each other. If you have the lower right hill as BE, you can invade the NF base from the side and/or the hill. Furthermore, these hills are incredibly easy to reach as BE, but take farther to get to and are more difficult to assault from the NF position.