[quote name='ArmyOfFun']Yea, anyone have any tips for the final hard challenge? I played that almost until the timer ran out but one of the teams snagged their 3rd city (or is it 4th?) with just a few seconds to spare.[/QUOTE]
Took about 60 tries but I did finally beat that last challenge. For a long time, it looked like trying to win with 3 towns and running out the clock was the best strategy. But I lost in the last 15 seconds many times with this (a controller throwing moment, to be sure). But here is how I ultimately ended up doing it and what I would recommend to others:
- In terms of upgrading your ship, put a star each into speed and cannons. From there, put next two into speed, then max cannons, THEN worry about hull strength.
- DIE AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE. Early on, you need all the resources you can get to upgrade, and you can't afford to be losing them by dying in pointless fights. Just focus on picking up the random crate drops, sinking item ships (for resource stealing items), and accumulating resources from your first town (see below). If someone tries to take your town(s), especially when you only have one or two stars on them, let 'em. You can easily take those one-star towns back when they sail away. TIP: When taking towns or fighting other ships, keep moving constantly. Decreases the number of hits they're able to land on you.
- Claim the town immediately below your starting point (forget the name) and upgrade it to three stars as soon as possible. Once you get it to three stars and full health, the AI pirates will leave it alone most of the time, especially if you're anywhere close. That plus your early maxed speed will give you time to get back and defend it if someone does try anything.
- As early as possible (basically, when you feel like you're fast enough or your first town's strong enough) go get the double-gold town in the center of the map. You need gold to upgrade town defenses, and this is one of the only places to get it quickly and consistently. Hang out down there until it's upgraded enough for you to venture elsewhere. While you're doing so, pick off the random gold villages that pop up in that area to further pad your coffers. Keep in mind, even with three stars, this town will still be highly contested, and you may lose it a couple times. But it's easy to take back when it's one star. Just watch out for enemies that have maxed out their cannons.
- Once you have those two towns shored up, you'll find that there are two or three one-star towns farther out (I favored the one directly to the south that no one had even tried to take 2/3 through the match and an enemy one-star town to the right of that). If you time it right, you can grab both of those real quick and take the match.
For the double bomb I waited until two CPU ships were attacking the same target (or capturing a city) and set a bomb behind them. This is probably easiest on those maps where there's a central city that gets beat up on a lot.
This was the last achievement I got. I think I got it on the level where the item ships only drop bombs. You have to get it right at the beginning of that match, otherwise the enemy ships upgrade their hulls and cannot be sunk with one bomb.
