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(More customer reviews)The kind of review I like to read tends to be full of all sorts of info on new units and how they do in the game. I guess we will find out if anyone agrees.
So far in my Dark Crusade career I have beaten the game with the new T'au race and the Space Marines. This is what I have learned.
First the new style of campaign play. Many have equated it to the board game Risk not unreasonably. But it's both simpler and more complex. The "board" is the planet of Kronus blocked into about 15 "provinces," each with a unique property/special ability. However, unlike Risk, the only unit that moves is your commander. And although some provinces provide units you can buy to take in with the commander for each attack/defense, essentially each time you attack a province it is a skirmish game. You must destroy the other's command building to win.
Pros: Because of this style, players can actually pick which race they want to fight against and how hard it is likely to be. Most provinces allow players to buy "honor guards" who start the mission with the commander and give an early advantage. The maps are universally fun, ranging in size from tiny to massive. A few other provinces come with "special abilities" that enhance your game, like the star port that allows attacks anywhere (almost) and the industrial section which starts you with more money. These special maps, as well as the race specific "strongholds" or starting points, are more than simple skirmishes. Various objectives are given, like having to kill 140 enemy units to gain the "rage" special ability. These maps tend to be a good escape from the simpler head on matches and require skillful unit management.
Cons: It's great to run amok on the Risk style board but so does everyone else. Having taken a Chaos province early in the game, I was forced to defend it against an attack every turn until I finally took their stronghold. This meant essentially replaying the same map at least 6 times. Since buildings built while taking the province or defending it stay on afterwards, I could field top tier units immediately while my enemy had only its honor guard. With little effort I could "usually" rush their base and just kill the main building. Still, it grew boring.
Furthermore, the special missions one goes through to win unique abilities, while fun, were questionable. If I had been Orcs fighting Space Marines, could I have achieved the kill ratio necessary to get 140 guys before the computer? In another mission one side gets only units and the other gets only its buildings. The attacker has to kill all buildings but can't get more men. Fine... except the attacker gets a VERY powerful line up. Playing as Space Marines I got 3 Predators, 6 Dreadnoughts and 2 Land Raiders. Plus a bunch of infantry. That's pretty overwhelming.
Finally, while the strongholds are the FUNNEST mission to play, they are also decidedly easy compared to most others. By this I mean besides an initial rush of units, players are given plenty of breathing room to slowly develop a base, gather units, and overwhelm sections of the enemy defense. Rarely does one have to face the overwhelming sorts of attacks that can be found in regular skirmishes.
The New Races:
So now that that is covered, time to move on. The two new races in Dawn of War are both visually stunning and tastefully different from everyone else. Having now played the Necron, I can speak about playing them.
Necrons(REVISED): By and large the advantage of the Necrons is in their infantry. These tough little units take a pounding and keep going. The base Necron Warriors alone can stand up against a determined attack. Added to that the ability to be revived by other units and a Necron player can literally storm through anything. As a plus, the Flayed Ones, the Necron close fighter units, can be dropped anywhere on the map. This means, not unlike the Space Marines, that Necron players can disrupt unit formations when up against large numbers of ranged units. Equally important, the Wraith, a Necron scout unit, is an actually useful "true sight" unit that is difficult to kill. It comes at a cost though. Necron vehicles are universally underwhelming. They have no tanks with multiple guns or siege units to blast stuff from afar. Only getting a mobile Monolith going seems to equal this out and that takes a bit of doing. So while I suspect the Necrons will be played by plenty, their online usefulness is suspect.
As for the vehicles themselves, they are not entirely without merit. Necron counter grav vehicles move faster than most other races stuff such that a strong force can cross large distances in time to make an impact. As a final note, the Lord Destroyers ability to posses enemy vehicles is nice... but smart players can easily defeat this with infantry support. Be that as it may, the Necron Tomb Spyders offer an interesting problem. Each Necron player gets 4 max and they are sitting inert in his/her base at game start. If one dies, it lies in its place of death until it is bought again. So if you lose your spyder in the middle of a turret field... it could be hard to get it back. By the same token, let a tomb spyder die in the middle of a big lost battle, move the fight elsewhere, then use its special ability to ressurect some of the lost Necrons lying on the field. Suddenly you have a second attack force built nearly instantly.
But it is the Necron buildings that are the show stoppers. Necrons only get one unit production building. The Monolith covers all your bases for production. Thats both nice and not. Its an expensive building so if you need men faster, its a chunk o change to double your production. But if you get the Monolith mobile, it can build men as it moves about the map breaking stuff. As well, all Necron stuff only costs power. And there is no limit(such that I have hit) of how many generators you build. With enough time on map, Necron players can get enough power to buy anything. If the Monoliths get moving, you would not even need to worry about holding strategic points as much, since they only increase unit cap.
The T'au Empire:
In the first game, most people I talked to decided the Space Marines were unquestionably the best. They hit harder, lived longer and could teleport stuff all across the map. Now... the Tau are in a position to challenge the champs.
Tau units are all awesome. The initial unit, the Stealth Suit, requires no research like Marine Scouts to be invisible and can take flags while cloaked. They have good firepower and can EMP vehicles, stopping a vehicle rush. Beyond them the Tau have units to fill every gap. Close in is covered by Kroot Carnivores and Hounds who can tackle enemy units and do good melee damage, though less than some of the other melee units in the game. Long range has the Tau Missile Hovercraft whose ability to plaster an area with a missile barrage destroys defenses quick as well as breaking up infantry concentrations. But most important, the Tau have three units which are nearly impossible to kill. Their top unit, a giant dino bird kinda thing can be sent into an enemy base, ignored, and when you come back to it it will have killed most the buildings, wrecked the infantry and still it will be in the green. Behind the "Greater Knarloc" in damage but not in toughness are the Krootox. These ape like things tear through infantry and vehicles alike and are nigh indestructible. Plus a total of 5 can be fielded, making them unstoppable as a unit. As well the Tau can field a tank not far under a Marine Land Raider in damage potential but faster as well as being able to build two instead of just one.
Besides being indestructible, the Tau have a good line up of stealth units, the most important being a stealth troop transport that can carry three infantry units. Since the Tau commander can also get stealth, it is possible to field a totally stealth unit with enough firepower to take on a determined assault. And probably kill any sensor units quickly.
An equally devestating (read cheap) tactic is to load the new XV88 Broadsides into the transports. Not unlike Dreadnoughts, XV88s are the mobile turrets for the Tau and as such, can dish out massive damage to vehicles OR infantry. And three units of three can be places in a stealth transport. So it is possible to sneak in just one vehicle and suddenly have 9 "turrets" built in an enemy base. Add more transports for greater effect.
What are the weaknesses? They are pretty small actually. Tau cannot build turrets, relying instead on the walking turret Broadsides. However, with three to a unit and coming equipped with uber powerful guns, this is not much of a weakness. It can actually be a strength since the transports can carry Broadsides, allowing a player to quickly move them to where they are needed.
The Tau also suffer a lack of tough Hero units. Unlike the walking meat tank who is the Space Marine commander, your Tau commander is actually a soft target. The secondary commander, the Ethereal, is even softer and losing him cuts the damage and moral of ALL Tau units. But again, this in no real handicap. The Tau commander can gain stealth, making him hard to find and target. And the Ethereal's special benefits are global, meaning there is no reason to take him along for attacks.
Finally, though I don't know how much of a weakness this will be, the Tau must choose what top tier units they want. One way is big tanks and armored suits somewhat like Marine Dreadnoughts. The other way is the afore mentioned Krootax and Hounds. Either way works fine but a special building must be built and a 400 requisition + 400 energy research is...Read more›
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Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War -- Dark CrusadeExpansion pack to internal THQ studio Relic Entertainment's critically-acclaimed real-time strategy hit Warhammer 40000: Dawn of War. Dark Crusade features an all new single-player experience and 2 new races - The Necrons and The Tau - allowing the gamer to play up to 7 unique races from the Warhammer 40000: Dawn of War universe. Based on the world of Warhammer 40000 - the dark futuristic universe from Games Workshop - Warhammer 40000: Dawn of War - Dark Crusade offers massive non-linear strategy. System Requirements:Windows® 2000/XP DirectX 9.0c (included on disc)2.0 GHz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent AMD Athlon XP processor 512 MB RAM 3.5 GB free hard drive space (not sure about this one yet) 4x CD-ROM drive32 MB DirectX 9.0b compatible AGP video card with Hardware Transform and Lighting DirectX 9.0b compatible sound card 16-bitKeyboard and Mouse.Format: WIN 2000XP Genre:ENTERTAINMENT UPC:752919492987 Manufacturer No:49298
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