The Helicopter Assault activities allow you to take to the skies to demonstrate to the Saints’ enemies that there is nowhere they can hide from the wrath of a street gang turned multimedia empire.

You’re introduced to the first set of three Helicopter Assaults in the Downtown area of Steelport, where Pierce intends to use information uncovered in a Morningstar vault to draw the rival gang out so that you can slaughter them. Another set is introduced after you recover former FBI agent Kinzie and get her settled into her own place, with the primary target being the Deckers. They will drive from stop to stop, attracting attention.

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All Heli Assault activities involve flying close air support for your homie on the ground, whether it is Pierce or Kinzie, and as you can expect, things get more tense the higher the difficulty is rated. If they are killed during your escort, you will fail. Early on, the gangs only send ground vehicles, and your biggest threat will be buildings close to the roads on which your homie drives.

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Eventually, the gangs step up their efforts to kill you and your comrades with air support of their own. They also send more persistent cars to chase down their targets, and they’ll be armed with rockets that tend to hit your homies on long straight roads. It then becomes imperative to take out the ground threats much earlier, before they are able to line up deadly shots.

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Typically, you want to remain relatively close to your friends on these missions. Keep an eye on your radar so you can down threats as they appear. The nice thing about the attack choppers is that you don’t have to face the whole craft to engage targets with the guns or the missiles, so you can literally post yourself in one place in the air at every stop, and swivel the camera around by itself to target the enemy with guns or rockets! As long as you position yourself in such a way that you are able to hit the enemy early enough, your homies should be able to survive all of their stops.

Helicopter Assault 1 (#9)

Location: Henry Steel Mills

Difficulty: Easy

Stops Required: 3

Vehicle: Tornado

Cash Earned: $2,000

Respect Earned: 200

Rewards: 3% Morningstar Gang District Control—$107 per hour

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You find this first Helicopter Assault activity in the Henry Steel Mills on the central island, near the northern tip of it on the map...