Star Wars: Empire at War - Bothawui

Star Wars: Empire at War - Bothawui
This is a hint / walkthrough for a planet in Star Wars: Empire at War. The index of all our guides for Empire at War is here.

Rebellion Campaign

Land Battle

From your starting position, there are various barricades and Build Pads at which you can dig in. Inside the area Shield are Build Pads which you really need to secure before the Imperials put Turrets on them. If you fail to do this and you cannot take down the turrets, you may have to go the long way around to the northern base entrance while holding the Imperials off with a lot of Turrets at the south side.

Star Wars: Empire at War - Bestine

Star Wars: Empire at War - Bestine
This is a hint / walkthrough for a planet in Star Wars: Empire at War. The index of all our guides for Empire at War is here.

Imperial Campaign
Available in Mission 5 (Subjugating Geonosis) / Tech Level 1.

Space Battle
The map does not immediately make it apparent, but between your initial entry North-West-North of the space station, there is an asteroid field that Acclamators will have to avoid. This means that they will make a tight turn to face the space station at the very end. The ship that reaches the turn first will come under a lot of fire and could be lost.
Instead, first go far north, then east -- using the Move command so they won't stray to attack something that comes into range -- then start your attack run on the station once your Acclamators are close enough to stay together when they turn and head down.

Land Battle
Bestine has a lot of side-by-side Building Pads, which can either be very dangerous Turrets or very strong Vehicle Repair Stations. Since I use at lot of AT-STs, I chose Repair Stations.

What makes Bestine interesting are the narrow corridors. When you get to the second Reinforcement Point, you have just enough time to secure the Building Pads before a horde of infantry rush you.
Nearest to the Building Pads is a dugout (which heals infantry while they are in it). This dugout will typically accept only one unit at a time. If you move Vader out, the Pirates immediately try to secure it -- which could put them right in front of an AT-ST who can then rush forward and step on them. The initial wave has a lot of infantry, so you can actually charge your AT-STs forward a couple of times to quickly squash the infantry.

Once the vehicles appear after the infantry rush, try not to use your Bombing Run yet. Instead, once you advance forward and are near where the peninsula ends, there will be lots of vehicles and two dangerously positioned turrets. Wait a bit for the vehicles to converge, then move Vader ahead to locate the turrets and call down a Bombing Run. Pull Vader back, especially if he is quite hurt by this time. Wait for the bombs to drop, then quickly rush out of the narrow corridor and secure the Building Pads.

Rebellion Campaign

Space Battle
Land Battle

PLACEHOLDER
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
CONTENT COMING SOON

Star Wars: Empire at War - Atzerri

Star Wars: Empire at War - Atzerri
This is a hint / walkthrough for a planet in Star Wars: Empire at War. The index of all our guides for Empire at War is here.

Imperial Campaign
In Mission 9 (The Traitorous Moff), you first engage Moff Kalast over Atzerri.

Space Battle

The initial battle with Moff Kalast is straightforward. Afterwards, Moff Tarkin gives you an Interdictor at Coruscant.
It is vital that you grab this quickly and get ready for Moff Kalast to reappear over Atzerri. If you miss him, or if you fail to apprehend him there, he will appear elsewhere. He only appears over planets that have already been revealed/are accessible, so if you have conquered all planets, then he will appear over one of them.
The problem is, wherever he pops up, you lose everything in orbit, including a space station, regardless of how built up it is. The station is replaced by a level 2 Rebel space station, and Moff Kalast is accompanied by a small Rebel fleet. So the sooner you apprehend him, the less infrastructure you will lose.

Land Battle

You start with a small force and the enemy behind a shield, with no ready way to disable the shield.
Move forward your AT-AT along the diagonal path and park it at the Building Pad nearer the shielded Rebel base. When the initial wave of Rebels is over and your SPMA-Ts are moved up and in position to provide your AT-AT with covering fire, move your AT-AT into the base.
Here, Colonel Veer's special AT-AT ability to unleash a powerful barrage is useful for quickly taking down the Shield Generator so that your SPMA-Ts can continue to support your AT-AT with covering fire because there will be a lot of vehicles traffic-jammed around the AT-AT's legs, some of which are T4-B Heavy Tanks that even an AT-AT has trouble quickly destroying.

Atzerri has two lakes separated by a diagonal path. You can have Repulsor Tanks on the lakes, but we didn't find this very useful.

Star Wars: Empire at War - Alderaan

Star Wars: Empire at War - Alderaan
This is a hint / walkthrough for a planet in Star Wars: Empire at War. The index of all our guides for Empire at War is here.

Imperial Campaign

Prior to sending over the Death Star, it is possible to conquer Alderaan with a Smuggler. Sending the Smuggler into orbit, and then onto the planet allows you to take over Alderaan. You gain income and can build a Space Station and buildings on land. However, if you take over the planet in this way, it will become impossible to finish the Imperial Campaign.
Normally, to destroy a planet that you own, or where you control orbital space, you move the Death Star into orbit, then drag it into a special "Destroy Planet" slot. During the campaign, however, moving the Death Star to Alderaan triggers the special space combat. Even after the countdown expires, you will not be able to fire the Death Star -- presumably because you now own Alderaan.

Space Battle

A remarkably simple mission even on Hard Difficulty. You start with the Death Star in the background. It cannot be interacted with or destroyed; and a tiny fleet of 4 Tartans and 4 Victory Star Destroyers. Whatever fleet you brought with the Death Star is relegated to your reinforcement pool.

Rebels start with a few Mon Calamari capital ships (that you can initially see), and several others in the fog of war, including the Admiral Akbar's supposedly gigantic Home One (in Empire at War, it is not in canon proportionate scale with regular Mon Calamari capital ships). The Rebels also start in the middle of the battle map, so it's not like you can engage them cautiously the way you can with space station sieges with the space station generally placed a bit further into one corner.

If you read the Mission Objective very carefully, you will realize that you don't need to win anything or destroy anything. You just have to have at least one ship limping at the end of the countdown, at which time if you have no ship selected, your console will show a pull-down lever to fire the Death Star.

At Hard Difficulty, you need 75 seconds. Just select all the free ships and set them to stop moving, then wait for the countdown. None of the surviving ships will be added to your fleet afterwards.

After Alderaan, your Death Star and fleet automatically retreat. Bring any ship back to Alderaan to secure orbital space. There is no planet left, but you can still get 1 Credit/day of income and you can build a level 5 Space Station there.



Land Battle

Alderaan is reduced to rubble in space, later known as The Graveyard.

Star Wars: Empire at War - Aeten 2

Star Wars: Empire at War - Aeten 2
This is a hint / walkthrough for a planet in Star Wars: Empire at War. The index of all our guides for Empire at War is here.

Imperial Campaign

Space Battle

Nothing special.

Land Battle

When you first reach this map, it will probably be pretty tricky to get through without any losses. You may wish to leave it until you get Colonel Veers and his AT-AT. Even then, the many places where you have to turn can make moving Walkers of any kind around pretty annoying. With an AT-AT to soak artillery fire, this mission is surprisingly straightforward.

There are two Abandoned Mining Facilities, but you receive credits only for one. Hold off on destroying one Rebel mining facility until you can secure the Abandoned Mining Facility (although in our game this was sometimes bugged and we did not get any credits for securing the facility -- just as we sometimes did not get acknowledgment or bonus credits for destroying all native home structures).

Rebellion Campaign

Space Battle
Land Battle

PLACEHOLDER
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
CONTENT COMING SOON

Star Wars: Empire at War - Rebel Buildings

Star Wars: Empire at War - Rebellion Buildings
This is a hint / guide for Star Wars: Empire at War. The index of all our guides for Empire at War is here.

The general strategy for the Galactic Map is similar to that for the Imperial Campaign -- blockade planets. Once you have blockaded all the Empire-controlled planets, you are essentially safe to take your time on the Galactic Map. Finish grabbing all available technologies with C3PO and R2D2 (you can get to the end of Tech Level 3) before conquering the last Empire-controlled planet.

There are not many difficult space combats unless you face a Level 5 space station (e.g., Naboo) and its garrison, in which case a Raid Fleet to take the planet first makes things easier. You get only three units (plus any number of heroes) and no Bombing Run, but if you can do it, the space station and its garrison are destroyed.

While you are conquering planets, invasions by the Empire are typically rare as long as you don't dally. Even on Hard difficulty, our game into mid-campaign saw only had one Imperial Star Destroyer and no reinforcements attack Eriadu. So, you are largely safe to build Mining Facilities everywhere you don't need Factories. Choose one large planet (8 building slots) to put up to 7 Heavy Factories and thereby speed production of those slow-to-build tanks.

You don't need many Fleet Commanders or Field Commanders, so you probably won't need more than one facility for that. Unlike the Imperials, Field Commanders can be built quite quickly. However, you cannot build any without having both Barracks and Officer Academy on the same planet. Rebel Infiltrators also build quickly, so only one building is required.

Star Wars: Empire at War - Imperial Buildings

Star Wars: Empire at War - Imperial Buildings
This is a hint / guide for Star Wars: Empire at War. The index of all our guides for Empire at War is here.

During Tech Level 2 / Mission 4 (Subjugating Geonosis), many planets will be available for conquest, although only three (Eriadu, Geonosis, and Sullust) are initially under Rebel control.
At this time you may want to capture and fully develop the planets. Alternatively, you can blitz through the Rebel-controlled planets including Geonosis (ending the mission) and continue on to Mission 5 (Attack on Mon Calamari), which also opens up Tech Level 3.

Whether you quickly take Rebel space (it is not so important to secure the planet itself, just control space for each planet) makes a big difference to how you approach buildings on planets.

You can build fleets and large stations to protect planets, but this is irrelevant to the Rebellion as they can launch Raid Fleets. They small attack forces bypass a space blockade to try to take a planet directly. If they succeed, you lose your space station.
Therefore, if you end up on the defensive, you will be overstretched trying to garrison every planet against both space and ground invasion.

Instead, if you seize Rebel space quickly at the start of each mission, you can stop them from making Raid Fleets and later do ground assaults at your leisure. You only need a few strong fleets to make multiple space sieges quickly, and one large ground force with a diverse unit mix to choose from at your first Reinforcement Point.

In such a case, you need only two types of planets: Production and Credits.
For Production, choose planets with 7 or 8 building slots, and concentrate on one type of factory. Build multiple copies of the factory, as the final production time is divided by the number of appropriate factories you have (e.g., If you have 7 Advanced Factories, an AT-AT will take only 1/7th of the usual building time).

Once you have completed a building, it's prerequisite building can be destroyed. So, if you have eight slots, you can have 7 Advanced Factories -- Your build queue is Light Factory, Heavy Factory, sell Light Factory, Advanced Factory x 7.

Every other building slot on every other planet can be devoted to Mining Facilities. Having an excessive bank account means that when a new Tech Level is available, you can (hopefully) immediately queue space stations everywhere, allowing you to build better space units.

As a precaution, the key shipyards (those that can build Capital Ships) could be more heavily defended with full garrisons in space and on land, Shield Generators, Turbolasers, Hypervelocity Guns, and Magnapulse Cannons.