Advanced Engineer

Advanced Engineer Hotwire (GDI) Technician (Nod)
Function	Support/Defense Infantry
Health	100
Armor	125 (Recruit) 150 (Veteran) 175 (Elite) 200 (Heroic)
Armor Type	Flak
Primary Weapon	Advanced Repair Gun
Sidearm	Heavy Pistol
Speed	100
Explosives	Remote C4 x2 Timed C4 x2 Proximity C4 x3
Cost	$350

Function

Advanced Engineers are improved Engineers, possessing Advanced Repair Guns and enough explosives to bring down a single building by themselves.

Appearance

Hotwire

Technician

Primary Weapon

Having the appearance of Repair Gun, it is twice as powerful, taking 15 seconds to repair full shield when shooting at MCT. The Range remains the same as the standard Repair Tool.

Strategy

Usage

Advanced Engineer is a necessity against any enemy team rushes and infiltration. Being the only unit to possess Advanced Repair Gun, it is marginally more useful against enemy Vehicle rushes than free Engineers. A group of 3 or 4 Advanced Engineers can keep a building alive against most vehicle rushes.

Advanced Engineer is also the only class capable of planting mines. However it is unadvised for new players to place mines as they are higly likely to be unfamiliar with correct, optimal way to do so, getting in the way of the team. Doing so at the beginning of the game as soon as the Advanced Engineer classes become affordable and base is still very much vulnerable to enemy rushes, as time is of the essence at this phase of the game is not only detrimental to your team, but is also very likely to earn you a mining ban preventing you from placing further mines and making all other ones disarmable to your team.

Common rushes

Solo Adv. Engineer

• MCT C4/ Sneaking: Advanced Engineer must get to enemy Buildings MCT without being discovered by enemy player or Automated Base Defences, and throw both his timeds and Remotes onto the MCT. Then he should hide in wait for timeds to detonate, and then blow the Remote C4. This destroys a building with an extra 14 points damage over the Buildings maximum health capacity, which are a safeguard against late enemy Adv.Engineers from repairing the building between the detonation of both timeds enough to let the building survive. Although highly unreliable and greatly dependent on luck, sneaking is one of most heavily used rushes in game thanks to its low cost, no risk of other rush participants ruining it, or need to depend or work with your team at all. A wise Adv. Engineer will weaken the encountered Mines as much as possible before demining them all in rapid succesion, delaying opposing team reaction to decline in mine count.
  • Harvy Walking: sneaking is usually difficult on maps with Automated Base Defences due to heavily limited safe entry points into enemy base, as well as campers occupying points mentioned above. Formerly forbidden to perform, Harvy Walking is a tactic abusing the fact Automated base defences can't attack enemy hiding behind friendly target and Harvester doesn't drive over enemy "hugged" to it's back. When Harvester finishes collecting Tiberium outside the base, Adv. Engineer can follow it, "hugging" it from behind, thus creating an artificial safe entry point allowing for sneaking. Usual target of Harvy Walkers are Automated Base Defences.

Group Adv. Engineer

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Counters

Any strategy against Engineer will work against Advanced Engineer. However, possesing more C4s in total, it is much more lethal to your Buildings. It is also more lethal against Infantry in comparison to its free counterpart as it's sidearm is Heavy Pistol. Mines do not serve as a good counter against this class, as it's primary weapon disarms those rather quickly. The only warning you will get if Hotwire infiltrates a building is the decrement of mines in the counter. A good Hotwire detonates all their C4s in rapid succesion, causing the building to die in roughly 3 seconds even with full health and armor.

Vehicles should be wary of Advanced Engineers as their C4 supply is enough to destroy any Vehicle if given enough time, however most of the time it is worth taking the risk to drive it over, as usually Advanced Engineer will not be able to plant more than one Timed C4 before dying under your wheels, given there is no infantry-only zone nearby.

When dispersing a Vehicle siege, Advanced Engineers need to be taken out first, since they can support Vehicles with Repair Guns, rendering any damage dealt against them meaningless. Most tanks are piloted by Advanced Engineers for their potent repair capabilities.

Trivia

• Together with Engineer it is the only class elligible for correct APC rush.
• This class becomes priceless after losing infantry production building, as it is impossible to acquire from crates while being the only unit capable of laying Proximity C4, the only means to stop enemy sneakers and mass infantry rushes to get into buildings unnoticed. The (un)lucky player posessing an Adv. Engineer after losing such structure rarely comes out of his's base as basically the only mean for his team to win is for him to spend the rest of the game hiding in the buildings, and remining mines lost on potential sneakers.