CNC Generals

After you have practiced your "Force Fire Micro" over and over again it's time to leave the sandbox. So let me introduce you into the world of advanced Force Fire. I will show and tell you what is really important in tank battles.

But at first you should know every possible statistic about your tanks or at least you should have a feeling for them:

• fire rate
• damage output
• movement reaction
• indolence
• armor, etc.

GLA - FF with terrorists
GLA also profit from Force Fire in another way - Terrorists. They won't deal double damage but the Area of Effect of their explosion may hit (more) units than normally possible. It can very useful in desperate situations, for example your Technical got stopped by a Rockvee. Actually destiny of your precious Terrorists is sealed, they are doomed to death. But if the Rockvee is close enough you can just force fire your Terrorist(s) right next to it on the ground (because your Terrorist(s) doesn't have the time to hit the Rockvee itself). If you are lucky enough it will explode and your Terrorist will enter into history books as martyr.

CHINA - FF in Gatling Tank battles
Force Fire isn't only useful for ordinary tanks - there is also a nice special regarding Gatling Tanks. Often you will encounter 1on1 Gatling duels, the one that shoots first will prevail. And if the opponent's Gatling Tank isn't randomly distracted, then it just comes down to luck. You can avoid this stalemate situation with spinning up your Gatling gun by force firing on the ground before you encounter the other Gatling Tank.

Shooting over supplies
Another advantage of Force Fire is that tanks, and also rocket soldiers in this case, are capable of shooting over edges of Supply storages or even buildings. This is very useful when you are trying to catch up with a faster unit which is hiding behind buildings (e.g. a Paladin tank trying to catch a Gatling). This ability is only available in combination with Force Fire, further it mostly demands prediction and timing (since you will certainly have to kill a moving target).

So all you have to do is to force fire on the ground where the followed unit most likely will run through. Now your tank (or rocket soldier) will do one (single) shot through/ over the supply storage/ building and if you predicted well enough, even hit your opponents unit. But keep in mind your unit will only shoot once - so you will have to repeat this procedure over and over again till you are bored or the enemy unit killed.


Drive-by shooting
The most efficient way in order to get from A to B is drive-by shooting. Why? Because you keep moving and kill units! Additionally your tanks will be difficult targets to your opponent. If your opponent now makes the mistake that he just attacks your tank, you can easily outmicro him with a combination of moving and force firing. The craft is that you need timing and prediction. You shoot exactly in the moment when your opponent does which means (in case he is using FF) he will most likely miss your tank because he expected you to move on. Right after your tank shot, command it to move on and repeat the procedure (by this you follow a certain rhythm). If everything goes into your favor your tank will come out of this battle unharmed without being seriously slowed down. This works best if the opponent's tank and your destination target B is on one line and you move towards it, thereby the gun turret doesn't need to slew (or if necessary keep it to a minimum).


Drive-by scenario:


red marks possible force fire points (effective)

Situation analysis:

1. We have two groups of 3 Battlemasters each. Obviously there are two of purple's Battlemaster fleeing from the bunch of blue Battlemasters, till they found reinforcement. Blue's forces are concentrated whereas purple's forces are split up - you can hardly force fire between them to hit two at once.
2. Due to a superior formation, purple was able to force fire right between blue's tanks.
3. Blue's forces only concentrated on one Battlemaster. The movement order made it even harder to hit it while purple's Battlemasters still hit several targets at once. This leads us...
4. to an impressive 3-0 win in purple's favour.

Just to emphasize it once again, one of the key factors of tank battles is mobility! By following this tip you will have far more dynamic and pretentious games than ever before.