Worth it?
Never played a single thing warhammerish.
Similar to?
Thanks in advance for your views
Isn't it like Warcraft meets Company of Heroes?
I think it's similar to Company of Heroes in that you capture sections of map and hold them, build units etc...but not WWII...using Orcs and Humans I think
I played an iteration of it one time loooong ago...it wasn't half bad....but space/magic/sorcery etc really isn't my cup of tea.
Yes, it is. Get it.
If we're talking about the original DoW, one of the later releases (Dark Crusade or Soulstorm) is your best bet. Or just snag a Gold/Platinum pack to get everything. Fairly typical RTS-style game, though it's a fair bit calmer than something like Command & Conquer.
DoW II changes it up and has you command a few squads in tactical battles, with characters who carry over from mission to mission. You'll get wargear you can use to upgrade and customize capabilities.
I've enjoyed basically all of it.
I loved both DoW I and II.
Definitely a lot of fun. More so if you're into any of the fluff for the game.
Quote from: Windigo on May 23, 2014, 01:06:14 PM
Never played a single thing warhammerish.
:uglystupid2:
Get it.
Quote from: Windigo on May 23, 2014, 01:06:14 PM
Worth it?
Never played a single thing warhammerish.
Similar to?
Thanks in advance for your views
As noted above, the same people refined the original engine to create
Company of Heroes, so if you've played that you'll have some idea of gameplay. There are some big differences, too, particularly in the number of factions available for DOW.
I would say no real reason to pick up the first of the DOW1 games or its expansion, except that you need their keys (or will have to hunt up an unlock) in order to play their factions in multiplayer. All factions are open for any single-player option (campaign or skirmish) in the later games, though. Multiplayer is a blast, but unsure how many people still play it. A LAN party definitely works best in my experience. Be sure to patch up.
DOW1 was made about the time as the original
Battle for Middle-Earth or
Kohan 2: Kings of War, and all three games were following out, in somewhat different ways (or a very same way for K2) the RTS renaissance originally pioneered by
Kohan: Immortal Sovereigns. As such all three are still the easiest introductions to modern RTS games: highly colorful games that do a lot of the work of squad management for the player. The other two games also simplify base-building, but DOW1 has a much more conventional base-building aspect although each of the factions have variations on the basic themes.
You've been around long enough to get the basic idea of WH40K I guess: standard fantasy trope factions converted mostly to science-fiction tropes. There are space knight paladins and orks and elves and demon knights and tall skinny beardless dwarves (they took the biggest changes ;) ) and undead robots and dark elves and hyperactive space nuns, and also just poor regular human soldiers with mere little laser rifles and a lot of tanks trying to stay alive while caught between all this mess. (There's also a whole faction spun off the xenomorphs from the Alien films, but they don't show up until DOW2 unless you install an unofficial mod.) It's a crapsack world where there are practically no good guys (nominally the paladins and the elves should be good guys but they're far too xenophobic and arrogant; the tall skinny shooty beardly dwarves are the closest thing to pure good guys -- and are also the closest things to secular humanists in the game, fwiw) and everyone is caught in a cycle of constant warfare which will only continue spiraling until the chaos manifestations of people's greed and violence destroy the universe. Fun!
The campaigns of the first game and its expansion are basically tutorials for playing skirmish and mp, but they have pretty good stories for RTS games. In the last two games (Dark Crusade and Soulstorm) you'll pick any faction during the campaign and beat down other factions by generating tactical battles on a simple strategic map; there's a loose story for each faction, but not so much as in the first DOW1 and its expansion (Winter Assault).
While the early game + WA lacks four of the eventual nine playable factions, some fans still prefer it for skirmish and mp because it's a lot more flexible about letting players go about winning through various build options. With DC and SS the designers (and the main modders) tried to balance the game better by adding more caps on how many of what kind of units could be built (and reducing turret spam), meaning any final force built by a player for a faction will end up being pretty similar to any other final force built by any player for that faction. Also Soulstorm was farmed out to another developer and arrived a little undercooked and rougher looking than Dark Crusade before it.
Still, it's hard to argue that any other RTS is better overall than DoW1: it has more factions, with more real differences between the factions, than any other game I know of except maybe
Warlords: Battlecry 2 and 3; but provides modern control over large groups (unlike W:B2/3, which is a pretty genius game(s) otherwise in its own right); but also provides more flexible base-building design options than Kohan 2 or BfME1. Its nearest modern competitor would be BfME2, which opens up base-building and adds more factions, but ended up somehow broken in its implementation. (My late pupil and I loved BfME1 and wanted to love BfME2 but could never manage its gameplay as well as with DoW1:DC or SS.)
Dawn of War 2, as noted above, is a somewhat different beast, focusing back strongly on story and therefore on managing small hero squads. (If you want to 'play the whole story', play DoW1; take the Order option instead of Chaos in WH and make sure the Eldar get to the final battle; play the Space Marines again for Dark Crusade; and then the Imperial Guard for Soulstorm. They have the best SS story anyway.) DoW2 has three parts to its story: DoW2, its Chaos Rising expansion, and DoW2 Retribution which finishes up the overarching story of DoW2 and ties back to the story started in DoW1 (or just before it actually) -- obviously stay faithful to the Blood Ravens during CR and take the Space Marines in Retribution to get the 'canon' ending. But Retribution actually opens up all six available DoW2 factions (Space Marines, Imperial Guard, Tyranids, Orks, Eldar and Chaos Marines) to 'finish' out the story through their campaigns. Retribution also offers a skirmish and mp game more like the original DoW1 series than the first DoW2, so if what you want is to play a good RTS you should either stick with that one (for updated sfx) or DoWSS (for the most gameplay options) or DoWDC (for somewhat more polish than SS).
I should perhaps add that if you want a more arcadey taste of the Dawn of War games, at least from the Space Marine sides, and don't want to invest in a whole package yet, you could play the Kill Team game which uses DoW2 assets.
Space Hulk, though a bit broken and buggy, is a more methodical turn-based atmospheric introduction to the milieu, focusing on the Space Marines vs one type of Tyranid. The old FPS version of Space Hulk from back in the days of the first Doom game is, in my opinion, still the best translation of that game however, despite being in real-time instead of turn based. It can be found cheap or for free in various places but needs Dosbox to run (and a slightly older version of DB at that. Also for no clear reason I have to re-edit something in DB whenever I want to play the original SH computer game. So while it's great it's currently a hassle to play.)
For a much different real-time or turn-based Warhammer experience with tons of factions and lots of nifty management detail, I'd recommend Blood Bowl: Chaos Edition. It's far more humorous than WH40K by its nature, too.
I've enjoyed occasionally playing the original Dawn of War series and still keep the latter ones installed. While not a big fan of this type of RTS, the WH40K stuff is wonderfully grim stuff and there is a lot of unit variety and upgrades.
It also has a game speed option, so if you're worried about a click-fest you can slow it down.
Despite my love of RPG-style gameplay, I couldn't get into DOWII all that much. I got a short way through the original campaign a couple times but it just felt too canned, and the episodes too small, for me to get into. I believe the later DOWII releases may have a wannabe dual-layered campaign but I think it's just choosing which battle you fight next so it's not a real one. I've not even fired those up despite having them a few years.
Nah, none of the DoW2 games have more than a rail story track with optional side missions. The first DoW2 has that, too; you just didn't get far enough for the optional missions to start popping up, Nef.
I just had a thought. Ahem...
WARHAMMER 40K: DIABLO
That would be like printing money.
Though I love the game mechanics, theme and content of DOW1. I can't seem to get to enjoy it so much. No matter what I do, I lose out to a skilled and efficient AI. I'm quite warry of the genre (base building rts).
Quote from: JasonPratt on May 26, 2014, 07:30:48 PM
I just had a thought. Ahem...
WARHAMMER 40K: DIABLO
That would be like printing money.
I've been saying that a WH40K Action-RPG could be superb.
I would also like to have a turn-based tactical combat game, such as a new version of
WH40K: Chaos Gate. Which was pretty much
X-Com in the 40K universe. We need another one like that.
Quote from: jomni on May 27, 2014, 04:49:13 AM
Though I love the game mechanics, theme and content of DOW1. I can't seem to get to enjoy it so much. No matter what I do, I lose out to a skilled and efficient AI. I'm quite warry of the genre (base building rts).
My biggest complaint with DOW1 is that the Normal-level AI difficulty spanks me but when I lower it down one level, it's a tad too easy for my tastes. So I can't find a proper AI difficulty balance.
I normally beat it on hard. 2 important things are:
-rush to take control points at the opening
-be ready for the tech up tank push. You must have anti armor units with grenades ready when the tanks come. Beat that, the rest is cake.
My biggest problem was trying to be doing something everywhere, at once. Keeping up with the click-fest, which the AI player can easily do.
Despite having a speed option, I still found myself wanting to give multiple orders to different units in different places ASAP but being unable to without having to pause all the time.
You do know the pause button works?
Quote from: Mr. Bigglesworth on May 28, 2014, 11:02:49 AM
You do know the pause button works?
Yes but it drives me nuts when I have to constantly jockey the thing. I naturally tend to try getting by without constantly using it, having some innate aversion to hitting the damn thing all the time in real-time games. It begins to feel like I'm playing "pause the game" more than anything else if it gets to that point.
:'(
In other words you know everything has gone to shit and the pause wont help. Time to try different strategies.
Try these settings
The game should end something like this. I used pause 3 or 4 times.
Slow speed and Annihilate victory conditions? Will do.
I'm sure that my build strategies are terrible, especially since I'm not all that familiar with the progression on most buildings. The same thing that makes the game interesting to me (the nice variety of units, upgrades, and abilities to be bought) has also been tough to learn. Not because I don't understand them but because I don't know how to progress to the stuff I want at any one moment.
If you can take a command point, put a turret on their side then put 2 packs of marines there. You start to get resources at a much faster rate. Try to keep them to the points close to their base.
Later in the game pull them off to a battle somewhere then drop terminators into their base.
In this game it started out handing me my ass. The big mech rushed me almost beating my defenses. Meanwhile he was getting extra resources. It flips quickly in my favor at about 7 minutes when I get a forward turret and a mine field setup outside his base. Once I am getting the extra resources it is all over.
Unless you're playing with special AI mods (which are nice and generally part of DoWPro DC/SS, though the AI mod can be installed separately), you can expect the game to rush your base at the start with its strongest units including the commander while it sends out a smaller group or two to capture points. This is especially obvious during the non-base missions of the DC/SS campaigns (the missions in DoW and WH are far more scripted), and can often lead to an early AI win if it has been buffing up the commander and support squads of the other factions on the strategic map.
Knowing that, I've found the best thing to be not to expand much at first on a new map (and to quickly eliminate whichever faction allows me to keep persistent bases on the map so I can garrison a killzone for future battles before going on to win the map), and let the rush come to me, losing as few of my units as possible for his expensive ones. (Also gaining some xp for my units.) Then start to expand.
A little power (at least one maybe two generators) is important early in a mission in order to buff up troop quality asap, so that and the first tech hut are typically the first things I build plus the strongest early shooty squad possible. (Orks are often my exception to this, but not always.) Ideally two strongest early shooty squads. The idea here is that shooting squads can be put in defensive positions to take less damage while they hit incoming enemies charging from at a distance. Even if the first shooty squad is tied up subsequently in melee, I may have the advantage for a win even without a second squad firesupporting off to the side (meaning I've tied them up in melee!) -- if I can't afford two early strong shooties, that always means the squad is decent at melee, too. Meanwhile I'm picking up early buffs, and then boom I've won the early skirmishes. Sure maybe the AI has taken a few more points already, but he probably doesn't even have them capped yet, and I'm WAY ahead relatively on effective-power-out-on-the-board. (I've still got 500 points of units out on the board, and he has 200 now, or something like that.)
After that, push forward to contact and keep up the pressure; stay away from his turrets until those can be nixed, but hamper his further expansion. (Hard to do on large maps of course, but generally bases are put behind natural choke points so I find it's important to make those work in my favor.) Take a cheap squad around capping my own points, and meanwhile spend the cash on teching up my units, getting some anti-armor up front asap, adding more good shooter squads to shut down the running dogs of my opponents when I get a chance. :coolsmiley: I might not even need to build armor, depending on the map size; and if it's that large I may wait until I'm building forward bases.
This changes a little in cases where I'm having to fight two AI teams on a map, but usually the AI of the farther base will send troops to help his ally rather than threatening my base. (Not always. I've had nasty surprises.) In those cases, the farther base will tend to tech up and possibly outnumber me first, so then it becomes a question of making sure I'm pouring as much of the proper firepower on single units of the proper kind of enemy as possible at any moment. Kill vehicles asap, because they don't get weaker as they take damage (unlike squads). Let broken squads run away if I can't finish them off and focus on non-broken squads, one at a time if possible; the AI can waste money on replacing the broken squads instead of something more dangerous. Spam magic (or the equivalent thereof) appropriately.
If maneuvered properly, the AI will do a lot of the fighting work for me, leaving me to micromanage more important things -- my main purpose as commander is to supply my troops with what they need to win (replace lost troops and special weapons asap), and point them in the right directions occasionally.
Notice by the way that the above strategy is helped immeasureably during Dark Crusade and Soulstorm campaigns by concentrating first on territories with good starting shooters (and buff units for them where applicable, like commisars to attach to Guard troops), and by concentrating first on eliminating the faction that provides advance base drops as rewards.
Then I can buy the tech upgrade hut and a power grid or two right off the bat for my forward base, even if they're scattered in a screwy fashion upon landing. That's less time and effort needed to get my starting troops ready to receive visitors and to kick ass in a counterattack. I can put my builders to work on a turret or two to help defend the rush while waiting for my troops to take the first resource spots and cap those.
Lets talk general RTS strategy. I approach it as a project using the Critical path method. There are critical things I have to do by a certain time to stay in the game. In DOW 1 I have to get to 3 full packs of marines with the commander at about 6-7 minutes. Then the focus shift to getting 4 heavy machine guns in each squad. That lets me stay competitive until its time to go armor. If he has teched up I have 1 squad with 4 rocket upgrades. I get 1-2 packs of jetpack guys with the armor granade. Should be done by 10 minutes. At 15 minutes you should be pushing walkers with gun upgrade. If he is still in the fight at 20 minutes you should have tanks, terminators, walkers. Armor is much easier if you have an advanced power site. Hoard those on the maps they are available.
In general the AI is weak even on hard in most games. A prime example in Supreme commander where you can wipe the floor with the hard AI, then get beat on the easy scripted missions. They are all difficult first time through. Once you know how the script is going to hit you it's ok. One game where I find the AI challenging is CoH. It can send the optimum counter at you in various parts of the map while they continue to grab points.
Speaking of resource locations, they are what makes RTS somewhat realistic. You have to be able to kill the rate of units the enemy throws at you. The easiest way to win is strip it's resource gathering rate, or it's manufacturing rate. That means the post French Revolution Grand Army, total war method puts civilians square in the sights as they build what feeds the army. That means proxy wars achieve nothing. A future conflict like countering a Russian advance has to result in the invasion of their homeland to cut off the supply of weapons. That means of course they will use their trump card to stop it. So will we. Putin has put the world on a very dangerous course.
Wow that went political! >:D
Somehow the internet has not yet meme'd Putin and WH40K, e.g. something from the Imperial Guard. WHY HAS THIS NOT HAPPENED!? I guess in Russia, Putin warhammers you. O0
Back to DoW. Yeah the jetpack guys are mostly useful for having melta-bombs, and for quickly tying up distant shooters, but I usually find it more cost-effective to go with missiles (or anyway infantry with dedicated hard-target shooting) as that's one less level of management to worry about in a fight and missile troops work well against buildings, too, while at least disrupting infantry. (And then some jumptroops, like the Eldar, have no anti-vehicle weapons worth talking about anyway.)
Also, when playing as the Marines I try not to go all out with heavy guns at the beginning precisely in order to save room for plasma rifles. They take care of all things even though they don't have suppression, so I shift my Marines over to those asap. (But one squad goes full missile.)
The AI in Company of Heroes is definitely better than in DoW (1 or 2), and will brutalize me easily on skirmish, probably because by now my 'thoughts' for that engine are too wired into taking advantage of shooters vs. melee and of course WW2 has no melee. But in either game getting the resource advantage as soon as possible is critical, moreso with CoH. But even in DoW1 the point about parrying the initial thrust is that it provides an initial major applied resource advantage over the enemy -- which might be only temporary if not exploited soon, but still.
I'm not so great about putting out armor. Sure, more things that hurt the enemy are great in principle, and they don't get weaker the more they get hurt (also they don't panic and run away), so they do have lots of advantages, but it's just too easy in DoW for a human player to take out the vehicles more quickly than their investment in resources would otherwise justify. I almost regard AI vehicles as a benefit for my team, because those were resources the enemy will quickly lose which they could have put toward chewier tech. (Once the late game arrives things tend to even out more of course.)
In CoH the AI may seem far more advanced when the big difference is you are greatly reduced in income. Its a struggle to buy a few units. That makes the counter unit far more critical. I wonder if it builds counters to what you have in the building pipeline.
^^ That makes a lot of sense. I really should pull out CoH1 again and mess with it (or at least play the campaigns all the way through).