6. Kaiser Wilhelm: Tycho Base

Level Medal 1: Destroy 20 Air Units with Aircraft

Level Medal 2: Upgrade 2 Turrets Completely

This level is a mixture of old and new in the sense that you are defending as The Kaiser against the modern weaponry of the space age! That said, it is still easily doable.

Before you start to think about your defenses you need to bear in mind that there are TWO Toyboxes you must defend for this level, NOT one.

The basic strategy for this level is simple enough. When the level starts you use the existing MG Turret to do two things - take out the first wave, and destroy as many of the crystals as you can.

The crystals basically serve as impediments to attacking and some of them actually block placements for your turrets. So you want to clean the zone of crystal as fast and efficiently as you can manage it.

Now place two MG Turrets - one nearest each Toybox, and do at least the Level 2 upgrades for them all the way around.

Next you want to place two Flak Guns on the left and right squares.

With that done, it is time to place a few Anti-Armor Turrets close into the road, and then you want to start upgrading all of the turrets as soon as you can.

Basically you want to uniformly upgrade them, and try to use them to quickly take out each wave, the idea being so that you are constantly moving around and do not lose any turrets since losing a turret you have already started upgrading can get expensive quick.

That is the basic strategy, but as our normal approach to a new level is to first focus upon the medal challenges and then the score, we should take a look at those now!

Level Medal 1: Destroy 20 Air Units with Aircraft

This one does require you to pay attention to the waves - and learn where the batteries are for recharging your copter!

When an air wave spawns you want to jump in the Helo Drone that is sitting on the small airstrip to the right of the center Square Turret Placement, and use that to take down as many of the OTHER Helo Drones that are attacking as you can.

Bear in mind that while only a few of the waves are actually flagged with the Air Icon, in fact there are others that while flagged with Infantry Icons do in fact have Air elements to them. That being the case, you should not have too much trouble in unlocking this.

But if you do....

If you do find that you are having trouble unlocking this challenge, you may find that it goes easier for you if you only place a single Flak Gun - and generally on the Left-hand Square Turret Placement - which should leave sufficient air units for you to kill while at the same time providing the minimal protection your turrets and toybox require at the same time. Just saying...

Once you kill your 20th Air Unit, this challenge unlocks!

Level Medal 2: Upgrade 2 Turrets Completely

The easiest path towards unlocking this challenge - and the most obvious - is to upgrade the two primary MG Turrets that you are constantly using as your go-to defense turrets. As soon as you add the last upgrade to the second turret, this challenge is completed.

Playing for Score

Getting through the level for score - your third (or possibly second) play-through - is just a matter of building and maintaining your Turrets, skipping the timers, and ensuring that your toyboxes do not lose health. Simple enough, right?

Well, no... Not right. You see getting the best score you can means learning which of the turrets makes the most strategic sense to man, and which make the most sense to fully or nearly-fully upgrade.

Obviously when you play for score you are going to want at least one of each so that you can get your kills in across the range of unit types. That said, remember that you can use right and left D-Pad to switch between turrets quickly.

When you complete this level you will unlock the next level as well as the GI Joe Survival Level. Now we opted for the purposes of this guide to ignore the Survival Levels until we have completed all of the main levels - you can do that too, or you can try to complete them now.

If you opt to go after them immediately and you need guidance you will need to skip ahead to their sections of the guide.

Hero: Phantom

All things being equal you should have already unlocked both of the Challenges / Medals for this level when you played through on The Kaiser Campaign. That said though, if you have decided that Phantom is the Hero you want to do all of the Challenges on, then you have these to do again.

Which in the case of the second one is nothing, but the first? Yeah, that may be frustrating. If your experience was anything like ours, taking out the required number with an air unit was a real pain. It required more than just a few replays in other words.

That being the case, and that also applies to the other grind-based Challenges / Medals, it might be an idea to simply ignore them until you decide which Hero you intend to use to unlock them all for the Achievement. In fact we seriously recommend you do that.

As for the Score Run, the strategy used during The Kaiser Campaign pretty much applies here. There should be no real surprises in that respect.

Hero: Star Bright

Thanks in no small part to the combination of the MG Turret splash-damage and the powerful beams of the Anti-Armor this level is a pleasure to play with Star Bright. It feels like the level was literally made for her! Add in a trio of upgraded Flak Cannon and even the air attack portion is of little consequence!

In fact by the time you reach the final level the threat is so trivial for Star Bright that you do not even need to man a single turret assuming you have spread out the variety sufficiently enough to allow them to handle the threat on their own!

Hero: Darklord

You will be using the same strategy that we used for The Kaiser for this hero.

His weapons are not as robust in terms of dishing damage overall as that of Star Bright, but they are as strong and maybe - at least in the case of the Anti-Armor - a little bit stronger.

You may find that this hero is particularly challenged for doing the challenges / medals - which is why we don't recommend it. This one, specifically, is what you might call an acquired taste.

Hero: GI Joe Duke

This hero is basically a new and improved version of The Kaiser - which means you can follow the strategy from The Kaiser run-thru pretty much to the letter, though Duke will be a bit more effective both in damage dealing and defense.

Hero: GI Joe Cobra Enemy

The Cobra Hero uses the same strategy that you used for The Kaiser, having similar weapon platforms (though more modern).

If you are looking for the perfect hero to do the medal challenges, this is very likely the one. It certainly has an edge over all of the other Heroes, that is for sure. Particularly in terms of its anti-armor, which is Stinger Missile based.

Simply follow the strategy from The Kaiser section to complete the level.

Hero: He-Man

This hero is basically an energy-based version of The Kaiser - which means you can follow the strategy from The Kaiser run-thru pretty much to the letter, though He-Man will be a bit less effective both in damage dealing and defense.

Of course if you just want to play He-Man - you know, you have He-Man fantasies and such - well nobody is stopping you! Go for it!

Hero: Ezio

For the Ezio Hero you follow the standard strategy that is used by The Kaiser. Bear in mind though that the weaker attack and damage powers of Ezio's turrets means you will need to begin your attacks earlier and pay closer attention to how close you allow the enemy to get to your toybox.