I'm no good at planetary battles

[DRNewcomb]

Thanks for the tips. Can you name particular maps/scenarios I should start with to get more comfortable with playing the RTS?

[Silverman]

Hard to say.
Agro-Intestinal Complex would be a fun one. This, because you have only one way to defend at the beginning. Also you can practice fighting with a robot. Tips for this:
Never ever get in range of the enemy robots, as they'll blast you. Normally they should be many more than you (Xv1). Instead use the range of the Rocket Launchers and walk backwards while shooting them.
Conquering factories is easy as well. Just go near enough to a turret to get a red reticle and shoot as hell. The enemy turret won't shoot, so is an easy kill. Still watch out for enemy robots.

EDIT: Try doing the test-mission building only one robot. This is to train yourself fighting with a robot. I'd take the bot with 4 rockets and the other stuff. Some tips:
Before you attack, be sure, you can run backwards shooting like hell. This is to avoid getting hit by the bots. Also be sure, you don't get too near to the enemies. Because they are walking, you don't need the red recticle but can shoot when it's near to the red area. Always run backwards when attacking the bots, and of course don't try running through the whole mission at once, take short breaks and plan the next attack.

[i_am_memory]

Silverman's advice is almost identical to my strategy. I too use full stack and anti-grav exclusively (except on one very hard map; the one with the automated four lasers in the middle). Rocketbots are the mainstay, with repairer.

I too usually engage the robots in 1st person combat mode and move backwards while firing, while the robots slowly walk into range fo the missiles. Occasionally an antigrav robot enemy must be led as they are fast, but usually you can just aim right where they are. The range of the missiles is greater than any turret, too, so just inch close until the reticule goes red.

Sometimes I trade out a rocket launcher for a stasis gun (the one that freezes a robot for a few seconds). Then I have a rocketbot with three missile launchers and one stasis gun. I find that three of these robots are very reliable defensively. But I only take over and control directly the fourstack rocketbot for quick kills.

Usually I take a single rocketbot and weaken the enemy defenses, taking out turrets and bots. Then I usually take several bots and send them to the location I want to capture. You do not have to click on the capture icon, you can simply have them stand around near each other and then have one of them stand on the factory for capturing. Leaving them in a tight group is a bit better defensively because they all will defend intstead of only a few spread out over a distance.

Remember: higher ground really matters in these games as the robots take a long time to climb a hill. They also go slower in water, so use both of these to weaken an army coming towards you.

If you position your defensive rocketbots just a little behind your turret, the enemy robots will focus fire on the turret. This is preferable because robots are more expensive to build and can take fewer hits. Generally use rocket turrets as they do the most damage. However the heavy gun can take the most hits, so I sometimes put it at the nearest front to soak up damage.

The key to winning all the planetary battles is economic. You must have more resources than the computer. So defend and play conservative, slowly capturing a factory here, a factory there. When you see the computer mostly builds walking robots (because it is out of money and cannot afford anti-gravs) then you know you have the economic advantage and can press.

[DRNewcomb]

I took Silverman's suggestions for the training mission and lost fewer robots than any previous attempt. I may try a real RTS mission now.