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When first starting, don't deploy the MCV immediately. Scout around for an area which is away from cliffs and has lots of tiberium. Deploy the MCV and scout around the map with a hum-vee, just enough so you can see lots of tiberium. Build a powerplant immediately, then a refinery as close to the tiberium as possible.
Build some barracks, and then a guard tower next to your refinery. As the money comes in, build a Comm. Center and a few more refineries, then as it become affordable, an Advanced Comm. Center. This will enable you to use the orbital Ion Cannon. Do not use it - you will need it later. You may need an Advanced powerplant, as Adv. Comm. Centers are rather power-hungry.
Once you have sustained an income, build a weapons factory and a repair bay. You will then be able to build Mammoth Tanks, handy for scouting round for more tiberium, should your supplies run low. You will need silos by this point, so build 4 or 6 together and surround them with a concrete wall. This will protect them from infantry attacks.
You may wish to build a few Adv. Guard towers near to your silos to stop Attack Helicopters. When you have 6000+, find a whole screenfull of grassland and build 10 helicopter pads, protected by 3 - 5 Adv. Guard towers. Once all your silos are full, you can sell parts of the concrete wall and build more.
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Once you have 10,000+, you can start building an army of 6 Mammoths with close quarter protection by 6 - 12 Chemical Warriors. This is a good combination because you can go anywhere, as Chem. Warriors can walk on tiberium without sustaining damage. Scout around until you find your opponents' base. Use 2 or 4 of your Chem. Warriors to weaken your opponent's defence barriers, if there are no defences then hunt for his tiberium silos. Once located, bring in the mammoths.
One warning when doing raids like this: If your opponent has built an Obelisk of Light (which is very likely), then you're in trouble! Get your troops back to base and get your mammoths repaired, if they got hit. Use an Ion Cannon on the obelisk. This should finish it off.
With the Obelisk out, send in your troop of mammoths and Chem. Warriors. Hit their silos and if you find no resistance, scout around their base until you find either the Refinery or the Construction Yard. Lay waste on whichever one you choose. My favourite is taking out the refinery, as wasting the constr. yard ends the game to soon. If you take out the refinery, the enemy's Harvester will stay put in the middle of whatever field it was harvesting, so scout around until you find it, then kill it. The Harvester is the most expensive part of the Refinery, so don't just take out the Refinery and go back to base, find the Harvester unless your troops encountered resistance, in which case head back to base.
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Sometime around now, if your opponent is doing well and has found either your silos or Orcas you will hear the dreaded "Nuclear warhead approaching" message. If your game speed is rather slow, then immediately get your Orcas and move them away from your base, and if you see the Nuke coming, sell the building it's heading for. If it's heading for the Refinery or Construction Yard, these structures have enough armor to withstand a Nuke. Be warned, though, and repair as soon as the nuke hits.
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It is likely your enemy will follow the Nuke with a full scale Attack Helicopter attack, so make sure you repair your powerplants and your adv. guard towers. About now your Ion Cannon should be ready. Use it to damage your opponent's airstrip (while scouting around their base you should have found it) and then bring in the Orcas to finish the job off.
Sooner or later your opponent will bring in Stealth Tanks to your base. These are especially dangerous, because your opponent can uncover your entire base without your knowing. However, if you make a one-way path to your constr. yard, then put guard towers at regular intervals along this path, then there is a chance he will lose the stealth tank, as if the stealth tank is one square away from any unit or structure, the unit or structure will 'see' the stealth tank and open fire on it.
Sometime you will want to take out the SAM sites. To do this, I use mammoths and bazookas. Your opponent will probably have rebuilt their Obelisk, so use the same technique as last time to take it out. The Temple of NOD or the whole base should be your next target.
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If you really want to show off to your opponent, build 2 - 3 Chinooks (Transport helicopters) and fill them with chem. warriors, commandos and grenadiers. Use a team of hum-vees to find their Temple and then take out a few more SAM sites with the mammoths. Bring in the chinooks ALL AT THE SAME TIME. If you take them in one by one, all your opponents bazooka men and SAM sites will have one target to concentrate on, instead of all the chinooks taking damage.
Once they have landed, deploy your men IMMEDIATELY, put them in guard mode (select them all and hit 'G' ) and take the chinooks out of their base. Your men should defend themselves, should they encounter any resistance. Take the commandos and plant a time bomb on the Temple (you should have found that earlier using the hum-vees) and if you can see them, trash all their power plants. Take your chem. warriors and position them outside their hand of nod. This stops your opponent making any more men, because as soon as a unit come out, he will be killed.
Position the grenadiers on the opposite side of the airstrip to which the vehicles land. This will hopefully destroy any vehicles that may arrive. Use your commandos to blow their airstrip first, then the hand of nod. Then you can just wander round their base blowing up whatever you fancy.
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Once you have destroyed their constr. yard(s), silos and refinery you have basically won! (Unless they have lots of Obelisks up their sleeves) Don't forget, in multiplayer you will get crates - use a hum-vee to scout the whole map every 10 minutes or so.
Anyway, I think that's enough for GDI. Time to move on to...
When first starting, don't deploy the MCV immediately. Scout around for an area which is away from cliffs and has lots of tiberium. Deploy the MCV and scout around the map with a recon bike, just enough so you can see lots of tiberium. Build a powerplant immediately, then a refinery as close to the tiberium as possible. Get an airstrip ASAP.
Build the hand of nod, and then some silos next to your refinery. As the money comes in, build a Comm. Center, then as it become affordable, an Obelisk of Light AND an Advanced powerplant. Remember, you need excess power to operate the Obelisk safely. This will defend your base against any GDI unit (except air ones)
Build SAM sites around the Obelisk, so GDI can't use Orcas to take it out. Build an airstrip as soon as possible and get a stealth tank. Use it to scout the whole map and uncover your enemy's base. Save your pennies for the Temple of NOD. It is rather power hungry, so another Adv. powerplant should do the trick. This enables nuclear strikes.
Early in the game is a good time for harvester raids. After uncovering the entire map using the stealth tank, grab a group of recon bikes (6-8) and send them after his harvester. They should take it out in no time.
Concentrate on your air force next. Build a screenfull of helicopter pads. Attack choppers are very useful against infantry! Build SAM sites randomly about your base, preferably in groups of two. A repair bay will come in handy, so make that your next expenditure. You may wish to surround your base with a concrete wall. Do so, and build gun turrets at regular intervals along it. Keep in mind for expansion, so don't build it too tightly around all your structures.
Don't forget to keep a check on your power. The Obelisk won't like it if you don't have enough. Also keep checking the Obelisks's status. You never know when it might of been hit by an Ion Cannon. If you have the money, build more Obelisks at key points (eg, refinery, constr. yard) around your base.
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Build lots of flamethrowers and bazookas. Use them as close-quarter protection for your army of artillery which you are about to make. Take this little group towards your opponent's base and let rip on their refinery (you should have uncovered the entire map and opponent's base with the stealth tank) If you encounter guard towers and/or Adv. Guard towers, retreat to a safe distance.
Guard towers are easily dispatched with a few attack choppers and SSM launchers, but Adv. guard towers are a different matter, as they can take down air units. Take a few flame tanks with chem. warriors in case of vehicle attacks to despatch of the Adv. guard towers. Flame tanks work wonders against Adv. guard towers! Your Nuke should be ready by now. Select your building (my favourite is their team of Orcas) and aim straight for the building. If the nuke doesn't destroy the building, don't worry, if your opponent doesn't return to his base in time to repair the building, the fires caused by the nuke may burn it down. Fire isn't just for decoration, you know...
Every 10 minutes, take out a recon bike to hunt for crates. If you find an airstrike, don't use it immediately. The same applies to the Ion Cannon. If you have enough money, build 2 - 3 more refineries. This will enable much greater income. To stop your opponent's source of income,
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take your harvesters and harvest the field nearest to his base. Then harvest whichever field his harvester goes to next, until his harvester come to YOUR field. Take your army of artillery to destroy it. Your opponent should build another harvester, just repeat the process to destroy it.
This will encourage your opponent to do the same to yours, so with your army of artillery, select them all, find your harvester and hold CTRL + ALT and click on your harvester. This will cause your artillery to follow the harvester around, opening fire on any enemy. I can't say much on the raids for NOD, as they don't have many or even hardly any heavy vehicles.
When your nuke is ready, fire it near your opponents constr. yard and if you found the ion cannon or airstrike, blast it with them as well. This should finish him off, and you can bring in attack choppers to take it out if it withstands the nuke and stuff. And thus ends NOD multiplayer hints.