R.U.S.E.

This is an annoying trophy to obtain on Hard because you don't always have the ability to meet your objective and secondary objective at the same time. My advice is to play through on Hard and keep track of which missions you missed an objective for, then lower the difficulty and come back to them. It is possible to come back to each mission later. You will need to complete the mission for it to count however - thanks Jjos -. I've put together a long list of each objective and the suggested strategy for it.

Mission 1 (Colditz Castle) – All 3 of your tanks survive the level.

They can start to run - as long as they are not destroyed it’s fine.

Mission 2 (Taking Command) – Reach Kasserine in 3 minutes.

This is easily done in about 2 minutes. As soon as you take Sbeitla start rushing forward with your units. You only have to cross the bridge to make it. Ensure you’ve got your anti tank units in a position where they can quickly take out the approaching tanks blocking your way or your infantry will be annihilated.

Mission 3 (Kasserine Pass) – Make sure no anti tank guns are destroyed.

You are given 5 anti tank guns. Place one covering the west road, one looking north towards the bridge, one looking south and one looking east. Put the final one wherever you feel back up is needed but don’t move the others about once they are in position. You will be warned when new waves are moving in and you can easily determine if infantry are moving in as they are called “light unit” when you hover over them. As soon as you see them approaching, get your infantry over there to take them out before they take out any of the anti tank guns.

Mission 4 (The Wild Bunch) – Fall Back without losing a tank.

When you are almost at Sidi Aich after taking out 1 medium tank you will come towards 2. Move until you are just in range for them to show up then immediately order your Stuart tanks backwards to where you will have been given 4 medium tanks. Send them ahead to take out the 2 enemy medium tanks.

Mission 5 (Digging out the Fox) – There are two secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Activate Spy Ruse.

As soon as the level starts, simply use the Spy Ruse on one of the sectors to complete this objective.

(2) Destroy the Tiger tank.

This one is really tricky and took me a good few hours to figure a method out. When you get to the point where you are told to destroy the base DON’T. Instead, work your way towards the left side of the map where your ally Wetherby is fighting the tank destroyers and other stuff. Keep your tanks in front and snipe the stuff with your anti tank guns. For some reason the units take ages to die but they do eventually. After you do this, go back to Sibi Bou Zid and put all your troops just south of it and east of the hill and your tanks and anti tank guns south of the entire town. Send in a Stuart tank to destroy the base. You now have to hold off for 4 minutes and this is not a problem as the anti tank guns rip the Germans apart. Keep your tanks in front to deal with the infantry.

After you manage this, you will now find that your ally will be able to advance on the flank. Take up a defensive position between the two hills to the left of Sibi Bou Zid (tanks in front, anti tank guns just behind and troops at the back). Now let your AI friend work his stuff. He has 3 powerful artillery pieces that he will happily use and take out the various anti tank guns that the German defence consisted of. You will be getting attacked constantly but just keep repelling the attack.

Once your ally is no longer hitting anything of use (or if you see you have less than 200 points until you win), rush the Tiger tank with everything you have (you should have not lost a single unit in the first parts of the mission). Although you will take a lot of casualties, the Tiger will be overwhelmed by 5 Medium tanks, 4 Stuarts, 4 anti tank guns and the 8 infantry. When you take him out you’ll get a bonus of 200-250 points which puts you above 1000 and completes the level as well as this secondary objective.

Mission 6 (From Bait to Prey) – There are two secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Find and neutralise hidden infantry.

There are 3 in total. Driving your recon unit about you will come across them pretty easily. If you are looking north along the road from your starting base, move your recon into the forest directly north. You’ll find that there is one infantry to your left above the lake closest to your base, one is southeast of Sparanise below the lake and one southwest of Sparanise.

(2) Use the Spy Ruse.

After repelling a couple of Italian tanks, a large force of German tanks will start moving in from the left. Use a spy ruse on the sector they enter.

Mission 7 (Hide and Seek) – Preserve your M3 Lee tanks.

You are given 2 Lee tanks after capturing the supply base. To preserve them just keep them far back out of harm's way and let your infantry clear the way by ambushing other tanks.

Mission 8 (Tangling with Barbara) – Capture the 3 enemy field bases.

As you are working your way towards crossing the river, clear out all the Italian units in the way and then send an infantry in to capture each of the buildings. Don’t accidently destroy the base or you will have to restart.

Mission 9 (Battle of Monte Cassino) – There are four secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Activate the blitz ruse.

Self explanatory, you will get this option after taking out the artillery.

(2) Clear the way for the French.

After you have had to take out the anti aircraft guns the French will request assistance. Send 3 bombers and take out the two bunkers blocking their advance.

(3) Clear the way for the British.

The Germans at the point where they are attacking have a lot of anti aircraft guns so you’ll need to help them out with tanks rather than your bombers.

(4) Don’t let your allies lose more than 50 units.

This one is fairly tough if you’ve not already done all 3 other objectives. You simply need to finish the mission as fast as possible before your allies lose too many units. Make sure you build 8 bombers and send them straight for the HQ using blitz.

Mission 10 (Utah Beach) – There are two secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Relieve the 101st Airborne division.

Work your way to Sainte-Come-du-Mont and provide assistance to the paratroopers. You just need to put one unit into the town.

(2) Relieve the 82 Airborne division.

This objective comes up at the same time as the first. It is closest to where your base is, so send a recon unit to scout out the woods towards Sainte-Mere-Eglise for ambushing infantry and when you have cleared any send in infantry to support them.

Mission 11 (The Hedgerow War) – There are two secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Destroy all German AA units.

There are a total of 3 of these. You can either storm them with bombers/fighter bombers or move at them with tanks. As you need to clear the German defences in order to occupy Valognes it’s not really out of the way.

(2) Destroy the Heavy Bunkers.

There are two of these and again they are around Valognes, so should be taken out anyway as you carry out the level. Taking them out with bombers from the air after removing the AA threat is the easiest option.

Mission 12 (The Battle of Cherbourg) – There are two secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Neutralize the German Airfield.

As soon as you start the level start building 8 fighter bombers. Once they are done, send them over to the German airfield to the right of Cherbourg to take it out. Ignore the AA guns. You will lose some planes but this means you will face no air units. You can do this before the secondary objective is even active and it still counts.

(2) Launch a decoy army.

On the map you will see a marker showing where you need to activate a fake offensive ruse. Do this to complete the objective.

Mission 13 (Screaming Eagles) – Recon all 7 city squares before dropping.

At the start of the mission build an Anson recon plane. You will now have to recon each town before you drop into it. To start with you can only recon Valkenswaard (2/7). After taking Valkenswaard and the AA gun outside Eindhoven fly your Anson over Eindhoven (5/7). Lastly after taking Eindhoven and repelling the attacks send your Anson over Son for the final two parts of the objective (7/7).

Mission 14 (Death from Above) – There are two secondary objectives to this level. The order they appear depends on how you approach the mission.

(1) Capture the German Secondary HQ.

Build 6-7 airborne units and drop them in the woods close to the Secondary HQ so you can ambush the tanks and then take the HQ.

(2) Capture the Barracks.

It is tucked away at the edge of the map on the left side. Follow the river in front of you and you’ll find the barracks on a peninsula on the left of the map. There are no AA units protecting the base so again drop 6-7 airborne units, surprise attack his infantry then capture the barracks.

Mission 15 (A Bridge too Far) – There are three secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Preserve all 15 allied tanks.

Air support is the easiest way to protect the tanks but it still is really tricky. Research the Typhoon fighter and then build an Anson. Build 2 supply bases that are close to where you linked up with your ally before. Move 4 airborne from the town and put them across the bridge in the forest to the left. Move 2 or 3 others from the town and put them in the forest that is before the bridge on the right side. Now start building typhoons whenever you have money. Use your Typhoons to take out the machine gun outpost and Tiger tank that is to the left of the bridge crossing. Now move your 4 airborne units and capture the buildings. While doing this, use the Typhoons to take out the other machine gun post and Tiger tank. Now you’ll have completely neutralised all attacks on your left flank.

You will want to have the Anson flying over so you can see to attack. You now need to reinforce the right flank with air defence. Build a couple of AA guns and put them in the forests around the town on the right side. Keep using your Typhoons to attack the artillery pieces and tanks he sends. If you have money to spare, drop 4 airborne into the forest just south of the bridge. Towards the end you will be told that your ally is running low on supplies. At this point the Germans will drop infantry in the forests to the south of the bridge and destroy the tank that is crossing instantly. You have to make sure as soon as you hear the warning that you send your Typhoons to take out the planes before they can make the drop. There are only 3,but if 1 makes it you’ll have the airborne infantry to take them out. This is probably the biggest threat in the entire level as once they are on the ground and you have nothing to kill them and it’s bye-bye tank.

(2) Revert your frequencies.

You will be given a new ruse in this mission. Use it when prompted.

(3) Capture the Armor Base.

You will have completed this while working on objective (1).

Mission 16 (Wacht Am Rhein) – Destroy Skorzeny’s Commandos.

Ignore the objective when it first pops up. The commandos will work around to come from behind you. Put two machine gun nests and a recon south of the bridge south of your base and when the commandos try to sneak around the back you’ll take them out and complete the objective.

Mission 17 (The Siege of Bastogne) – Play ‘Fanaticism’ Ruse.

When you have only a few minutes left to defend you will be given this ruse for the first time and be told to use it. Doing this will complete the objective.

Mission 18 (Blood’N Guts) – There are three secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Use the camouflage ruse.

You will be asked to do this during the mission after escorting your allies a bit first.

(2) Destroy enemy bombers.

There are only 3 bombers that are sent at you and they come one at a time so send all your planes to take them down (make sure they are shot down and not just fleeing).

(3) Protect the priests.

Your ally will have 8 priest artillery pieces that you must protect. There are tanks that will be send from his base to take out the priests. Take out all tanks with your planes to complete this objective. You can lose some units it does not fail the objective.

Mission 19 (West Meets East) – There are four secondary objectives to this level. They come in different orders depending on which path you take. Because you have a 15 minute timer to complete the level, it is likely you will need to do this more than once to complete all objectives.

(1) Activate ‘Terror’ ruse.

You will be advised to activate this during the mission.

(2) Destroy the Eastern Flak Positions.

At the start of the level, go right and go past the lake on the north side. Shortly after this to your right you will come to 4 AA positions. They are easily taken out from range with the Calliope rocket artillery as the AA is not armored.

(3) Down the ME 262 Jet-Fighter.

Make sure both your AA units are still alive at this point and you will down it with ease.

(4) Destroy the Wirbelwinds.

When redoing this mission start by going left and clearing the 2 barracks and the mg nest. Now send in your infantry and take out the 2 anti tank guns in the forest ahead and keep moving until you reach the Wirbelwinds and take them out with the infantry to.

Mission 20 (Riding with the Devil) – Destroy all the maus.

There are three maus tanks. They are really powerful and also have a lot of armor so you’ll want to either over run them with units or take them out from range with the sturmtigers. The sturmtigers are extremely weak against armor so this does take a long time. Make sure you firstly take out all recon so the maus are blind then bring in infantry to the forests close by. When the maus starts to run blitz the infantry and get them in to finish the tank off with ease.

Mission 21 (Secret Weapons) – There are three secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Clear the way for the flammpanzers.

There will be some units to the right of your base that you need to take out. This objective will appear last.

(2) Play ‘Decoy Building’ Ruse.

Simply use the Ruse on the map as indicated by the yellow marker after you have been defending for a few minutes when this option shows up.

(3) Clear the way for the panzerjagers.

There is a bunker in the south end of the map that needs taking out to allow them to pass. Just send one of your rocket artillery pieces to destroy it from range. You can build and send the rocket artillery to destroy the bunker during the time you have to build up defences so you get the panzerjagers right away.

Mission 22 (Into the Bears Jaws) – There are three secondary objectives to this level.

(1) Capture the Abandoned Base Camp

This is in the middle of the map on the right side to the right of the base you have to capture for the main objective. A paratrooper drop will do the trick as long as you keep them away from his main base AA units. Alternatively right at the start of the level build 2 infantry units and walk them over and take the HQ and the barracks.

(2) Capture the Infantry Base Camp

This is in the northwest of the map, there are two barracks that need to be taken. The Russian’s have no AA defence so drop a lot of paratroopers and you’ll easily take control of this entire area.

(3) Capture the Armor Base Camp

This is at the bottom left of the map. You can drop a paratrooper on there before this objective even appears as he has no anti tank stuff in the area.

Mission 23 (The Grand Finale!) - Hold the Secondary Line

This is extremely easy. Towards the end of the 16 minutes you have to defend you will be given control of some units to the left at a new base. You have to stop the enemy from taking it. You get tank destroyers and super tanks so this does not present a problem. You need to keep it protected until you complete the level so keep an eye on it always.