Almost as important as building your base and forces is scouting. What exactly is scouting though? Successful scouting is keeping a constant eye on your enemy and excellent map awareness. These are very important because the more you know about your enemy the better prepared you will be. Let’s say your enemy decides to build up a large force early in the game while you try to expand early with an outpost and neglected to scout. In just a few moments he can move that force on your door step but because you poured in resources into your expansion you have most likely already lost the battle. These kinds of unexpected surprises can happen in any match up of factions, during any tier or any time of the game. Being aware of what is going on around the map and what your enemy is doing becomes very important the better you get and smarter opponents you play so lets find out how to do it!

First thing's First      Here my build order was simply a refinery, then it was powered down until my power plant was placed and finally I put down a war factory. This isn’t an unusual order to do things and I typically prefer this kind of build order unless there are close by spikes which I can capture easily. The first thing you should make out of your war factory is a buggy or a bike and get them scouting for you as soon as possible. I like to queue up 4 bikes so if I find a vulnerable target with the first one the others can catch up and try to take it out. Often times I’m able to destroy an enemy harvester or something similar and give me an early advantage.

Raider Buggies make excellent scouts with their large vision radius, speed, medium armor and if you are playing as Marked of Kane or Black Hand they also can detect stealth!

You can tell by the mini-map which direction my forces went from my base. I garrisoned two buildings very close to my enemy to let him know I mean business! The other two groups are standing guard in case something comes by. They aren’t there to kill whatever comes by necessarily because I only have one squad. Their object is more to let me know if my enemy is coming that way or not. Knowing ahead of time is very important and gives you time to prepare. If in a few moments I see some attack bikes coming from the right side and upwards towards my base I will know where to move my forces to intercept them. Also remember garrisoning civilian buildings gives your infantry extra cover and a larger sight radius. If he moves even a little bit out of his base I should be able to see what’s going on. If he kills my infantry or pushes them out I know he is doing something and I need to investiage further. Also keep in mind all of this will happen very fast. Your enemy will zip past with bikes or take out your infantry with an APC so you can’t see what he is doing. You will find him making moves quickly and you have to be equally fast if you want to keep an eye on him. If you are not used to this sort of thing all you need to do is practice it and you will find yourself getting better. Scouting like this is important all game long so keep it up even when you think you have the win under your belt.

     Here is a picture of one of my not-nearly-trademarked 4 bike runs. I set the Bikes on aggressive stance so they will auto-fire on anything, even buildings, that they run by so I am always damaging targets if I come across an enemy or their base. I often will set multiple groups in these 4 bikes so I can micromanage them in different directions against my enemy to maximize my damage and his confusion. At times you may want to build like the first build order mentioned and and get 4 bikes out as soon as possible. Perhaps you can catch your opponent off guard and do some damage? This time, after I sent those 4 groups of infantry, I quickly queued up 4 bikes and was able to take out a harvester and a power plant. These sorts of runs can give you an edge in early game and perhaps give you the win if played out swiftly and effeciently. As the game progresses and the your opponent seems to lock himself down nice and tight then don’t waste resources and time trying to crack him. Keep and eye on him and see if he tries to expand. Hit his expansions or any unguarded outposts/MCVs he may send out unattended. If he still is keeping in his base expand and take other fields of tiberium and gain a cash advantage.

Mid game possibilities

     A lot of times Nod players will cloak flame tanks or reckoners for a lethal and invisible attack. Why not throw a few buggies in that extra space? Keep them hidden around your enemy and put them on hold fire stance so they will not give away their location. You would be surprised how often you can even keep one directly in your enemy’s base without them knowing about it! All the while you are gaining valuable intel on them and seeing their build order and what they are making.

Shadow Teams can place a beacon which allow Specters to fire across the map and take out strategic targets. In addition to these beacons being cloacked, did you know they also reveal the fog of war? Even if you don’t have access to Specters you can drop these things where ever you want giving you temporary eyes in that location. If an enemy finds one and kills it then it cost you nothing! The ability is free and you mearly have to wait for the recharge to come back. If you are doing things with 4 or 5 squads of Shadow Teams in someone’s base and they chase you off they probably will not think to clean up beacons left behind in their base. The cool thing is Shadow Teams can drop the beacons while flying to so you don’t have to slow down.

GDI teams are blessed with an easy to use eye in the sky. The radar scan allows you to immediately spy on your enemy whenever you want! It costs $300 but can be well worth the price if you see something important like someone fast teching or massing a large group of Scorpion tanks.

     However, just because you have access to a click power that allows you to spy on your enemy doesn’t mean you shouldn’t still use traditional scouting. You don’t get this until tier 2, the power costs money and has a signficantly long recharge time. I tend to only use this power in an emergencies such as if I need immediate stealth detection as it also can reveal cloaked units or I simply must know what my enemy is doing when I can’t get in any other way. GDI players still should use infantry or quick Pitbulls to find out what their opponent is up to early in the game and keep an eye on them mid and late game. The radar scan is just there to help ease this task.

Quick air units such as a Venom or a Stormrider can be excellent in getting close to your enemy and back safely showing you what he may be doing. Stormrider are $1,500 a piece but provide enough speed and armor that if you don’t get yourself in too large of a pickle he can be safely returned. Even just making one may may be enough to stumble upon one of your opponents secrets. If you decide to make a larger group of them then they will not only turn into an efficient scouting group but can double as harrassment when you find a relatively unprotected target.

Reaper 17 is able to use the tiberium vibration scan which shows all items across the map that use tiberium including harvesters, spikes, refineries, upgraded Nod power plants, etc... with no cost attached! Use this ability as often as you like and you can find out if your opponent is trying to estabolish an strong economy without your knowing. Find him trying to quickly set up something like that and you can move in.

High Tech and High Risk
     In the last of the game many times a group of Tripods or large attack force can come bursting in on the side of your base if you don’t have anything there to stop it and take you out in a less than a minute. If you aren’t dead it may put you down enough so you can’t come back quick enough in time for their next wave. Locating large threats that late game technology can conjure up and know where they are heading is key. The stakes are higher as everything revolves around who can do a combination of out maneuver, out firepower and out micro each other with the wisest uses of powers to assist them in winning.
     It’s important to make sure you still know what your enemy is doing. If you run by his base and find their Epic’s production center then you know he is trying to produce their Epic. Take it out if you can without losing more than it’s worth. Scrin may be trying to camp and feed off their growth Generators. Try to take those out too. Use GDI’s scan ability to find out what they are up to. If you see a lot of air strength then you know to prepare your air defenses and anti-air units.

     Sometimes finding your opponent and seeing where he is is not enough. He may just simply overwhelm you with brute strength even if you spot him. Scouting is indeed very important but responding properly to what you have found should be the next step in successful scouting in any stage of the game.

     Scouting is a very important aspect of any RTS and will be come second nature the more you put it into practice. The best RTS players in the world could not accomplish what they do if they stayed in their base all game long. Scouting is also very fun! Out maneuvering your opponent and getting a glace or even taking out a target (harassment) is all part of the game and an important one at that. Hopefully you have learned a few things about scouting and hopefully this guide will help improve your game! Keep an eye on your enemy and the battle field commander!

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