Advance Wars 2 Hard Campaign - Orange Star

• Border Skirmish
• Orange Dawn
• Andy's Time
• Mountain Ops
• Sea For All
• P.O.W. Rescue
• Test of Time
• Liberation

Border Skirmish

COs: Sami V Flak
Terms: Defeat all enemy units OR capture HQ!
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The only thing making this level difficult is the FoW. Save after every turn Flak has if you felt the day went well. Be prepared to try the mission several times as you get used to his units positions. Start by capturing the nearby cities with mechs, using your apc to get to the one by the bridge, simultaneously using the APC to block the gap works well. You will have to keep the bridge blocked to win, using your mid-tank after the apc has been most likely destroyed. Arrange your indirect combat units behind it and use them to destroy as many units as you can. Place your recon and any idle mechs in strategic places to enhance your LoS. Remember, mechs can cross the river so use that to your advantage as well as making sure Flak's don't surprise you. Keep your tank and AA close by to help kill his mechs. Your b-copters are very important. He has two AA so you until you destroy those you must be cautious with them. On your second turn one of them can help out your mid-tank in the block successfully but once his AA come into sight then they should retreat to a safe location until they're destroyed. Once their gone however they have a free reign as none of his units can beat them in a fair fight and they can scan the woods for hidden enemies with ease. He has some indirect combat units of his own in the upper map, so be sure to fire on them with your own before they can make your blockade collapse.The level normally ends with the ritualistic hunting of his apc, enjoy it. You should get an S rank of some description.

Orange Dawn

COs: Max V Flak
Terms: Defeat all enemy units OR capture HQ!
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This is a fairly simple mission, the only thing stopping it from being a walkover is that laser. So your starting aim has to be to destroy it. As it is not attached to the mainland that means indirect combat units and yes, you are Max. I use a battleship from the nearby port that you should aim to be building at around day 9. Check your funds and income to ensure an efficient build.

Start by building a few infantry and apc's to capture available cities that are free of laser fire. Also a tank can be useful to help protect yourself whilst you are still disadvantaged. I found it a clever idea to use an apc and couple of infantry once they've captured the easy cities, to block off the top bridge and cheekily capture the two cities in the top right corner. Once the laser is destroyed, capture the city and factory you couldn't before hand and start building units from your new factory. From here on you should be winning. Build tanks and mid-tanks on land and another battleship or so is very useful for fighting his rockets, artilleries or when your units are stuck in single file. Remember, Flak's rockets can fire right over from near his base, to your side, so be careful not to leave an unsuspecting unit in the wrong place. If you time things correctly you don't have to lose a single unit and get a nice 300pts S rank.

Andy's Time

COs: Andy V Flak
Terms: Destroy the Black Cannon!
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This isn't much harder than the first time round on Normal Campaign apart from two small cannons near your starting location. Start as normal by capturing the 5 available cities nearby by building 4 infantry. There is no doubt many ways of destroying the two cannons, but I firstly save for a bomber. Then I move it just out of range of the cannons and build a b-copter and tank. The next day the bomber can fly behind the left cannon and leave it at 5hp and the b-copter and tank can move just out of their range. This allows you to destroy both of the cannons on the next day, the first one with your copter and the second with your bomber and tank. Now you have some strong units and are ready to advance on Flak's area. You should be able to outnumber and defeat his units fairly easily, bring some infantry along in a transport to capture cities as you go. Make sure to capture the rightmost city in the top right hand corner for your lab map. With your bombers high movement you can quickly advance on the black cannon and destroy it. Use your CO power to help any injured units you might have but his mission is really quite simple. Again, a 300pt S rank should be achievable.

Mountain Ops

COs: Sami V Lash
Terms: Defeat all enemy units OR capture HQ!
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As usual start by capturing the nearby city with an infantry. I then use a fairly constant stream of mechs from the right hand factory, who all trek across the mountains to the east. Create an infantry and apc and transport your infantry up the map to the two unclaimed factories. Your infantry should capture both of them; he should beat Lash's units to it. From there deploy rockets and other reinforcements to advance and destroy the Black Cannon. Whilst doing this I keep a fairly constant stream of mechs being built at your starting, right-hand factory. The mechs can then trek over the mountains to their east. Keep them out of the Black Cannons firing range and they should be able to get the upper hand over Lash's mechs that generally are sent to meet them, despite their terrain bonuses. Once the Black Cannon is destroyed your units can meet up and secure and capture the factory in the center of the map. Remember that your infantry and mechs can take a shortcut over the mountains in front of the destroyed Black Cannon and in conjunction with one of your co powers you can often shorten the mission with a HQ capture. Failing that just keep building units, you should have an income and territory advantage so through time you should just overwhelm Lash. Another easy 300pt S rank.

Sea For All

COs: Andy V Hawke
Terms: Defeat all enemy units!
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This is a slightly different mission as you can only build sea and air units, but it's still quite easy. I recommend that you only build air units as they really beat the sea units in most, if not all ways. Normally in this sort of situation you might try to cover his ports and airports with your own units to block them, but here there is no point. Hawke only builds on average one unit per turn so once you're on top you can easily destroy all his units. You should build mostly b-copters, as they are cheapest and able to fight cruisers, battleships and other b-copters with success. The unit you should build the second most of are fighters. Hawke always builds a few of these himself so to destroy his, plus any bombers or b-copters he builds fighters are by far the best option. You can build a bomber if you want; they are the best at destroying his sea units but b-copters can do the job ok. Make sure you measure attack distances in these cases as whoever attacks first wins. Hawke does have a 1000 advantage in income, but this isn't really important so don't worry about it. Also your CO power is best used directly after his to negate the damage done to your units by his. This mission is quite short and you can aim to complete it in about 11 days. Should be another 300pt S rank.

P.O.W. Rescue

COs: Max V Adder
Terms: Defeat all enemy units!
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Well, this is the first mission that lives up to the name 'hard campaign' really. No more really easy missions from here on. It's fog of war with plenty of forests, mountains and cannons. You should take the level really slowly, don't advance too far forward at once and try to keep the majority of your units in a close formation. As before on fog of war levels, save after every successful day, this means that when next turn a key unit gets fired on by a unit out of site, you can try repositioning it etc etc. Expect to have to take turns again a few times to get this right. As always use your recons to scout as well as infantry or mechs in mountains. When you come to destroying the cannons, try and do it in a single turn so that they have no opportunity to fire on your units. Try to keep your apc alive as your b-copters will need refueling and they are your most useful units. The ai is always random, but I noticed that more than ever on this mission so you can't always expect the same formation to work.

When you start the first tricky unit is a rocket in the top right hand corner of the first large grassy area below the first cannon. It can often be obscured by the fog of war, so make sure you scout it, check its range and destroy it quite quickly. You should meet quite a few of his units in this area so take your time to make sure you get them all before attacking the cannon. Your copters make good shielding units as long as there is no AA around as his indirect units can't fire on them and his tanks are unwilling to. Your mid-tanks are best suited to destroying the cannons with you being Max, then your b-copters. You can capture the two cities if you want, although there are cities you already own a bit further on you can repair units on. Skim through the woods to check for any artillery that may have retreated there. The next problem comes at the next cannon; artillery is hidden directly behind it, protected by the cannon. You will have to line your units up in a way that will enable you to destroy the cannon and spot and damage the artillery. Once you have cleared up this area its downhill all the way. On this next southward stretch of road you might come under rocket fire from a hidden rocket in the next section, just keep to the left of the path and you will be fine. There is often another hidden artillery at the bottom in the woods to the far left of the section your in. Once you've destroyed the last cannon search the large patch of woods to the north in the last section to find that hidden rocket that fired across to us earlier. He only has a few units left by this time so just attack with all you have left to finish this long, annoying mission. It's more unlikely that you will get 300pts, but an S rank is still easily achievable.

Test of Time

COs: Any Orange Star CO V Adder
Terms: Annihilate all opposition or capture the lab within 7 days!
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This is the secret lab map mission that you unlocked by capturing that city on Andy's Time. Now you're Andy fighting Flak again. The important bit in the terms for this fight is the 7 days. That is what makes this mission difficult. I personally find that capturing their HQ is easier to do than defeat all Flak's units within the time limit.

Place a mech and an infantry in the mountains and you should be able to see most of his powerful units, two mid-tanks, a rocket and a battleship. I generally set up a block at the T-junction, with more emphasis being put on the eastern route, as we want to burst through to his HQ and be able to capture it fairly quickly. Destroy his rocket and severely weaken his battleship as soon as you can manage. Your own rockets are best against the battleship, they also have good use along with your artillery for attacking his mid-tanks and clearing the path to the east of annoying units that are blocking it. Put a mech in your starting apc and protect it, as you should use this to capture the HQ. There is a rocket hidden 2 spaces right and 1 down from the HQ that you should take into account and destroy before starting to capture the HQ.

If you decide that you would rather defeat all enemy units instead, then take a more balanced approach to your block. Be aware of a lander hidden in the upper reef and two artillery hidden next to each other in woods 2 squares north of a city and 1 east of the mountain. The artillery in particular are hard to beat quickly as their firing ranges cross over and you have to be next to them in order to see them, I struggle much less for time when capturing the HQ.

Liberation

COs: Any Orange Star CO V Flak
Terms: Destroy the seam in the factory pipeline!
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The first thing to do is choose your CO. I would recommend you choose Max as his power bonus means that once you get the chance to attack the pipe, you are going to do enough damage. Sami is ok for her added capturing ability but lacks in doing quick damage which is fairly essential and Andy is his usual average self, ok for his CO power which your only going to use once at the most. You are never going to have the advantage on this mission, you're not going to be able to capture cities or fight back Flak's troops, so it's important not to even try and save your funds. Nell's hint is to target the factory directly beneath the pipe joint, however units are often being produced there and as AI targets infantry more than any other unit, it's a bit silly to hang around there waiting for an opportunity.

Instead aim to capture the factory on the very right hand side, about mid way up the map on the single file path. This is a good spot to build your powerful units that can then easily travel up to by the joint. An infantry in an apc seems to reach this factory quickest so aim to get them there as quick as you can, you need to defeat this level quickly. Following that up with a few more infantry who can operate the missiles can be a good idea as it helps to slow Flak down a bit. You can normally also spare enough funds to build a unit such as AA or a tank to stop units by your base being completely terrorized. If it is necessary use these units as bait to stop some of Flak's factory units charging directly to your key infantry capturer and powerful units. The AI randomness comes into play here, sometimes his bomber moves about 3 spaces and then stops, other times it heads directly where you don't want it, so if you have problems sometimes you've just been unlucky. Once you have captured that factory you should deploy a mid-tank and a few other tanks to follow it. The mid-tank should take the first opportunity it can to park on the factory and fire at the joint, the other tanks are to help it defeat units being built if Flak doesn't leave a turns break in there somewhere for you to take advantage of.

As soon as you have got any spare funds from those purchases you should build as many infantry as you can from your factories by your HQ to boost your technique, hide them in mountains and on cities and many will survive. Your mid-tank should destroy the pipe in 2 turns, or maybe 1 with your CO power. An A rank of any description is a good achievement for this mission. You finished Orange Star!