Your First Game of Total Annihilation

Most first games of Total Annihilation are lost in the same few ways. The Commander stands idle, the energy bar sits at zero, and the army reaches the enemy one unit at a time. Avoid those and you can beat the computer within a few games.

The times on this page are at normal game speed, and the costs and build times come from the game data. The examples use Arm units; the Core has a matching unit for each one, with similar costs. The quick-reference card puts the keys and the main figures on one or two pages that you can print.

Set Up a Practice Game

From the main menu, choose Single, then Skirmish, and play against one computer opponent on Easy. The difficulty setting changes how much the computer earns. On Easy it gets half of the income its units and buildings produce, and on Medium it gets 70 per cent. On Hard it gets the full amount, as you always do.

Pick a small map for two players with plenty of land, such as Sherwood or Ashap Plateau. Each map's page marks its metal deposits and gives its wind speed and tidal strength. Set the starting metal and energy to 1000 each, the same as in the campaign. Your storage starts at the same amount: you can hold 1000 of each, plus whatever your buildings add. Anything you produce beyond that is lost.

The game starts with the left-click mouse interface. If you have played other strategy games, you may prefer the right-click interface, where the right button gives orders. You can switch in the Options menu, under Interface. The controls page explains both.

The First Two Minutes

You start with your Commander and nothing else. It is the best builder you will have all game. Its build power of 300 is the highest of any unit, and it builds a Solar Collector in 8.3 seconds. A Construction Vehicle needs 27.7 seconds for the same job, and a Construction KBot needs 41.6. Keep the Commander building from the first second.

Start with metal and energy, then a factory. Place each structure close to the last one, so that the Commander does not spend time walking.

Place each extractor right on top of the shiny rocks of a deposit. The game works out its output once, when it is built, from the metal in the ground under it. On a deposit it makes about 0.5 to 2.3 metal per second, depending on how rich the deposit is. On bare ground it makes almost nothing. Each extractor also uses 3 energy per second, and it produces no metal while your energy store is empty.

By the time the factory is under way, your energy store will be close to empty. This is normal. From then on the Commander can only build as fast as your income allows, so build more energy whenever the energy bar runs low.

On a windy map, a Wind Generator is cheaper than a solar collector: 52 metal and 509 energy, built in 5.4 seconds. It makes up to 30 energy per second, but only at a wind speed of 5000 or more, and the wind changes every 5 to 14 seconds. At a wind speed of 2500 it makes 15. A solar collector makes a steady 20.

Kbot Lab or Vehicle Plant

Either factory is a good first choice. These are the Arm figures:

Kbots climb slopes that stop vehicles: the Peewee's slope limit is 17, and the Flash's only 10. Vehicles move faster, and the Construction Vehicle builds faster than the Construction KBot. On a hilly map, take the Kbot Lab. On open ground, the Vehicle Plant is the easier start.

The Commander cannot build everything. Advanced factories, the Geothermal Powerplant and the Defender anti-air tower all need a construction unit, which is one more reason to make one early.

Minutes 2 to 5: Grow Your Economy

When the factory is finished, queue a construction unit first and then two or three fighting units. After that, keep the factory working. To queue units, click a unit's picture once for each unit you want, or Shift-click it to add 5.

Meanwhile, keep the Commander on the economy. Put an extractor on every deposit near your base, and add a solar collector or wind generator for every one or two extractors. When the construction unit is ready, send it to the deposits further out, so that the Commander can stay near home.

A factory that builds without a break needs a steady income. A Kbot Lab building Peewees one after another uses about 3.3 metal and 43 energy per second. That is two or three extractors and two solar collectors, on top of the Commander's own 25 energy. A second factory needs the same again, so build one only when your stores keep filling up.

Watch the resource bar at the top of the screen. It shows your production (+) and your usage (−) for each resource. When usage is higher, the store falls, and when it reaches zero, every builder slows down to what your income can pay for. Fix the resource that runs out first: more extractors for metal, more solar or wind for energy. A Metal Maker turns 60 energy into 1 metal, so it only helps when you have energy to spare. The economy page has the figures for every source of income.

Helping a Builder

Several builders can work on one job, and their build power adds up. Two builders finish a job in about half the time, but they also spend twice as fast. To help with a structure, select a builder and give it a Repair order on the structure while it is being built. To help a factory, give the builder a Guard order on the factory. A builder that guards a factory helps only while both of your stores are at least one fifth full, so it stops helping when you run short.

Scouting and Defence

Find the enemy before the enemy finds you. A Radar Tower costs 49 metal and 750 energy and takes the Commander 3.8 seconds. It shows enemy units as dots on the mini-map up to 1440 away. Build one at the edge of your base early. A fast scout such as the Jeffy can then go to look at what the dots are. Later, the Peeper from the Aircraft Plant scouts from the air, with a sight distance of 350.

Put your first defence next to the extractors that face the enemy. The L.L.T. light laser tower costs 262 metal and 2546 energy and takes the Commander 15.6 seconds. It has 750 hit points and a range of 300. Each shot uses 10 energy, so it stops firing when your energy runs out.

As soon as you see enemy aircraft, build anti-air. A construction unit can build the Defender missile tower for only 79 metal and 843 energy, and it fires at aircraft up to 700 away. Its missiles do about twice their normal damage to aircraft. The Jethro Kbot and the Samson vehicle carry similar missiles.

Do not build too many towers. A tower cannot move, and one L.L.T. costs as much metal as five Peewees.

Your First Attack

Somewhere between the sixth and the tenth minute, you should have 10 to 15 fighting units. Gather them at a point between your base and the enemy's. Select them all and press Ctrl+1 to make them squad 1. Alt+1 selects them again from anywhere on the map.

Move the squad together and stop short of the enemy base, so that the slower units can catch up. Then pick one target at a time and attack it with every unit. The 1997 manual gives this advice for the first mission: units that fire together destroy each target faster and take less damage. Start with the defence towers, then go for the extractors and the solar collectors. A Metal Extractor has only 170 hit points, and every one you destroy lowers the enemy's income.

Some units can hit towers from outside the towers' reach. On level ground, the Rocko (range 400) and the Hammer (range 320) can both fire at an L.L.T. (range 300) without being hit. The manual also warns that shooting at a tower on higher ground works badly, so climb the ridge before you attack.

Send a construction unit behind the army on a Patrol order. On patrol, it repairs every friendly unit it meets. Repairing costs energy and no metal: about 30 hit points for 30 energy per second, whichever builder does it. Keep the factory producing, and give it a Move order to a point near the front, so that new units walk there by themselves.

After a battle, have your construction units reclaim the wrecks (the E key). Wrecks give metal, and trees give energy. A reclaim gives nothing until it is complete, so let it finish.

Essential Keys and Mouse

These keys cover almost everything in a first game. The controls page lists all of them.

Common Mistakes

The Commander Stands Still

For the first few minutes, every second the Commander is not building is lost. Queue its next jobs with Shift so that it never waits for you. If you look away to manage the army, press Ctrl+C to find it again.

The Commander Leads the Attack

The Commander is strong, with 3000 hit points and a D-gun that destroys almost anything in one shot. But in most games, losing it means losing the game. When it dies, its explosion does 9999 damage across an area of 950, so it also destroys whatever stands near it. Keep it at home, building, and let it defend the base with its D-gun. Each D-gun shot costs 400 energy, and it will not fire without it.

Energy Runs Out

When the energy store is empty, everything slows down at once. Builders and factories slow to what your income can pay for, extractors stop making metal, and laser towers stop firing. Watch the energy bar, and add solar or wind before you start an expensive job.

Resources Pile Up Unused

Full stores are also a problem: anything you produce beyond your storage is lost. If both bars stay full, build a second factory or another construction unit. Before a big project, Energy Storage adds 3000 and Metal Storage adds 1000.

Extractors Built Off the Deposit

An extractor counts only the metal under its own footprint, and it never checks again after it is built. Built beside a deposit, it makes a fraction of what it could. Place it so that it covers the shiny rocks.

Metal Makers Too Early

Each metal maker uses 60 energy for 1 metal. That is three solar collectors' worth of energy for each metal maker. Build them only when you have more energy than you can use. They also switch themselves off when your stored energy is no more than twice your stored metal.

Units Sent One at a Time

Units that arrive one by one are destroyed one by one. Gather a group, make it a squad, and attack together.

No Anti-Air

The computer builds aircraft too, and bombers like the Thunder and the Shadow can wreck a base with no anti-air. A few Defender towers near the factory and the solar collectors are cheap protection.

Ctrl+D Instead of D

D fires the D-gun, but Ctrl+D starts the self-destruct countdown of the selected units. If you press it by mistake, press Ctrl+D again at once to cancel.

Where to Go Next

The 1997 manual suggests that newcomers to strategy games start with the Arm campaign, which begins with A Hero Returns and adds new units a few at a time. The economy and combat pages explain the rules behind this page in more detail, and the build trees show what each builder can make. To try a different opening before you play it, time it in the Build Planner, and the mechanics pages give the exact rules behind income, building and aim. When you are ready for people instead of the computer, you can play online with Open Annihilation.

Sources

• Total Annihilation manual (1997): starting a game, the difficulty levels, the tutorial strategy for the first Arm missions, and the note on attacking up a hill.
• Total Annihilation manual (2000 re-release): resources, orders and the mouse interfaces.
• Game data from the GOG release of version 3.1c: unit costs, build times, build power, hit points, weapons and map settings, as shown on the unit pages and the map pages.
• Core Prime's analysis of the Total Annihilation game engine: build times at normal speed, extractor output, wind output, storage, repair, assisting and the computer's income at each difficulty.