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Was wondering if anyone is playing it and if it's any good.

I've been playing a little. Lots of balance issues of course (that's why they do these betas). The Inquisitor seems to suck, Catachan Devils are unstoppable murder engines (kind of like in the fluff), Guardsmen suck, Guard has huge population management issues. Baneblade is fun, though. The main gun has a tendency to one-shot enemy heroes. Coolest hero is the Lord Commissar. The general is not General Sturn, and therefore inferior.

The multiplayer is the same as it's always been, though, and I can't say I'm a fan of the DoW2 model. Last Stand isn't in the beta, so I can't say if that's any good. The Army Painter is a little lacking for Guard. They seem to have missed a golden opportunity to use the pattern variations that Space Marines have to allow for alternate camo-patterns on Guardsmen.

Guardsmen suck

I'm not so sure they do, to be honest. Once you start giving them flamethowers and plasma guns, they do start to shine against the other basic infantry (Orks and Eldar especially)

I have never seen a Guardsmen squad, even a fully upgraded one (which is prohibitively expensive in terms of population), win an engagement with any enemy unit on even footing. I've seen a fresh Guardsmen squad die to a Slugga mob... in ranged combat.

The only value Guardsmen seem to have is in supporting huge blobs of your other units, which is very difficult because of the population issue. If you have the resources, you might as well just build Catachans.

I personally don't think guardsmen suck. They get a hell of a lot of shooty with their upgrades, and with both leaders as long as you get two out, they're unfathomably cheap to get back to full strength, and as such are great for fighting attrition fights in the beginning, and when you need the cap back you can get them dead quick. They can also make heavy cover in addition to repairing and can fill out a chimaera, turning that into absolute hell on tracks, in addition to being able to pile out and repair. Sure, they aren't the best frontline combat unit, but they're capable, and they're probably the best utility unit in the game.

The inquisitor is also capable of nice anti-armor damage kitted right (as in kill two leman russes) with the inferno pistol, and has some other interesting abilities. Not great but certainly equal to the others.

Imperial armor, though is great, probably good enough to warrant my feeling that guard infantry is just there to support the armor. The Baneblade is win on a stick, and with leman russ support is perfectly capable of taking a game. Hell, if you use the big guns right, it's capable of winning on its own. Throw in a filled chimaera, even, and you can wreck most things. I tend to try and lock the enemy in until I can get some serious firepower on the field, and the baneblade is perfect for that.

Silly edit timer. I just tried catachans in a 1v1 with coffee, and I think I have a new favorite infantry unit. I credit those tough bastards with the win, and they're pretty cheap all told. Much needed too, since the only things that can kill marines are those and heavy bolters and bolters are defenseless when assault marines come out. I managed to take a lot of hate on my chimaera before it died, that thing is a lovely unit, and all told I bought time for the Russ of Doom®. It was fun, and a pretty tight game all told, so that reinforces my opinion that it's actually pretty balanced. My guardsmen were even useful till the end, albeit mostly for repairs and drawing troops to where the catachans could shoot them.

If you want guardsmen to be really useful, get into a drawn out fight with bigger teams where you can establish an actual line. A lot of my high opinion of guardsmen comes from playing 3v3 games.

Does it import from Chaos Rising?

dragon wrote:Does it import from Chaos Rising?

Beta Doesn't and Retribution itself isn't likely to, given we've seen screenshots for each race's heroes from preview.

Coaan wrote:

dragon wrote:Does it import from Chaos Rising?

Beta Doesn't and Retribution itself isn't likely to, given we've seen screenshots for each race's heroes from preview.

Aren't those just mp screenshots? The summary of the sp story I've read seems to pick up straight from Chaos Rising.

Be that as it may, you can play the story mode as any of the six factions, which would make it a bit lopsided if only the SMs could import.

The force commander is not the one from vanilla and CR. He's a different guy, looks a lot more like Tarkus, so it seems very likely that they're changing him. What I really want to see is all the guard units for the campaign, and even better some impressions of how they handle. It'd be real fun if you could take some sort of armor better than a sentinel onto the map, or maybe we'll just get the three heroes, a guard squad, stormies and something else. All that I've seen revealed is the three heroes and a guard squad under somebody who looks suspiciously like sergeant merrick from angel gate.

I'm already using we to refer to the IG, aren't I? This is bad. I'd kill for some non-Cadian models though.

My impression is that the hero for the SM Campaign is going to be Apollo Diomedes.

xthetenth wrote: I'm already using we to refer to the IG, aren't I? This is bad. I'd kill for some non-Cadian models though.

The Catachans and Stormtroopers aren't good enough?

Lonestar wrote:

xthetenth wrote: I'm already using we to refer to the IG, aren't I? This is bad. I'd kill for some non-Cadian models though.

The Catachans and Stormtroopers aren't good enough?

The stormtroopers are good, and the catachans are hilariously awesome, but I meant for the bog standard guard. I play like steel legion, and I love their look, so I'd love the guardsmen to match. If I'm going to sit back for some trench warfare with an epic WWI mustached general, I want greatcoats! Cadians are okay though, it's just personal preference and them being done to death.

xthetenth wrote:

Lonestar wrote:

xthetenth wrote: I'm already using we to refer to the IG, aren't I? This is bad. I'd kill for some non-Cadian models though.

The Catachans and Stormtroopers aren't good enough?

The stormtroopers are good, and the catachans are hilariously awesome, but I meant for the bog standard guard. I play like steel legion, and I love their look, so I'd love the guardsmen to match. If I'm going to sit back for some trench warfare with an epic WWI mustached general, I want greatcoats! Cadians are okay though, it's just personal preference and them being done to death.

Furthermore if I'm going to sit back for some [small scale] trench warfare, I would prefer something a bit more wieldy than semi-strategic missile artillery.

Really the whole thing feels meh to me. (Which is a lot like how I felt about Soulstorm, and we know how that one turned out)

Standard MP is something of an afterthought in DoW2, though. The campaigns and Last Stand have the bulk of the content, so I wouldn't judge until we can see those.

I've been playing for a while, and my view is that Guard is a lot more useful in 3v3 games where my allies can take some heat for me early game before I can do much. Then once I get heavy weapons teams and catachans I can go support them, and once tier 2 comes out I can hold my own.

Just played an epic Annihilation game on high resources yesterday, 3v3. The Inquisitor is really useful in these long games, quite useless in short and small games. I was throwing out Judge, Hammer of Witches, and Purgatus against their enemy swarms, backed up by a pair of lascannon teams, some guardsmen and ogryns at one point, and a baneblade. Managed to fend off a huge assault on my base from pretty much everything they had, including two Great Unclean Ones. The Inquisitor's invulnerability power and those lascannon teams really saved me. We did win, after they pretty much ran out of resources while we saved up and conserved. Oh, and tyranids took the Guard's old thing of garrisoning a bunker and popping out at any other bunker. It's not a bunker now, just a tunnel, but it's still great.

Commander 598 wrote:Furthermore if I'm going to sit back for some [small scale] trench warfare, I would prefer something a bit more wieldy than semi-strategic missile artillery.

I understand that at least from a gameplay point of view. It's annoying, but I understand it. Plus, that's the Guard equivalent of a dreadnaught, so something that can hammer units isn't out of order. The real problem with picking the basilisk over the manticore though is the micro. One quadruple shot every minute is a lot more likely to be used near its capability than one every 15 seconds. It's perfectly capable of screwing up a vehicle or taking the comprehensive urban redevelopment approach to denying the enemy cover and disrupting an entire wave.

Really the whole thing feels meh to me. (Which is a lot like how I felt about Soulstorm, and we know how that one turned out)

Hm, I don't feel nearly as negative about this as Soulstorm. I think the guard have some issues (mostly that their t2 anti-vehicle units are fixed-purpose and still not too effective or hard to use, but nothing too major.

Brother-Captain Gaius wrote:Standard MP is something of an afterthought in DoW2, though. The campaigns and Last Stand have the bulk of the content, so I wouldn't judge until we can see those.

I really frickin' hope they do a good job with the Campaigns. I'm having trouble seeing how they can do much story out of a Tyranid Campaign and the Orks wouldn't be much better...unless we're returning to RISK IN SPACE.

The IG still need a bit of work. The biggest issues in my eyes are as follows:

1. Guardsmen take up too much pop when fully upgraded. With both squad leaders they take up 18 pop (each leader costs 4 pop and adds 2 GM). So don't buy the leaders. Wrong, leaders are needed because of the free reinforcements they provide. GM are needed as a meat shield for your other units and without the free reinforcements the IG player will be hemorrhaging requisition at T2 and later.

2. Bunkers have buggy firing arcs. The IG heavy weapon team also refuses to relocate the guy with the heavy weapon when inside the bunker the majority of the time which compounds the aforementioned problem. This renders the bunker far less useful than it should be.

3. Stormtroopers suck in their current incarnation. They do good damage for cost (especially with the Assault kit), yet don't have good health for cost. They're squishy and the Assault kit upgrade that makes them shine in an anti-infantry role makes them take 30% more damage. The AV kit gives them meltas, but they have trouble closing with vehicles to actually get in range due to their squishy nature. The Stealth kit is lackluster and only good for ninja capping/decapping, something Sentinels due better IMOH. The best fix would be to make the stealth kit part of the base unit and add an upgrade cost to the others (losing the extra damage modifier on the Assault kit). This should balance them perfectly, as AI stormies won't melt the instant an enemy manages to attack them and AV stormies can sprint to get into melta range without losing half the squad's health. Allowing them to switch between kits for a cost like Space Marine tacs wouldn't hurt either, since some battlefield flexability could help alleviate some of the IG's current population issues.

4. Most IG infantry have a hard time getting and staying in cover. This is especially pronounced on fully upgraded 12 man GM squads, which only seem to have half the squad in cover. The Lord Generals retinue suffers from similar problems. Further compounding the above mentioned is the fact the several models always seem to run and stand in front of the directional cover you just placed the squad in. The net result of this is that the GM buildable cover is less useful than it should be. I've found craters that provide light cover to be far more useful than any of the natural or built cover.

5. The Lord General can die before his retinue does. This renders the squad uncontrollable and free kills for the enemy. Mind you this usually doesn't happen because of his HP, but it's still a problem.

6. The Lord Generals call in turrets appear to have improper armor type, vehicle instead of structure. This may be intentional, though it's counter intuitive.

Those are the biggest issues with IG that I see currently. I wouldn't mind hearing what you guys think of stormtroopers, as they're the only unit that feels to be under performing consistently, though the Leman Russ Vanquisher may be a bit off. Keep in mind the Manticore is probably going to be nerfed into uselessness like the Basilisk was in DC/Soulstorm. Likewise, I foresee Catachans being hit hard with the nerf bat in the near future given all the bitching happening over them.

xthetenth wrote:

Commander 598 wrote:Furthermore if I'm going to sit back for some [small scale] trench warfare, I would prefer something a bit more wieldy than semi-strategic missile artillery.

I understand that at least from a gameplay point of view. It's annoying, but I understand it. Plus, that's the Guard equivalent of a dreadnaught, so something that can hammer units isn't out of order. The real problem with picking the basilisk over the manticore though is the micro. One quadruple shot every minute is a lot more likely to be used near its capability than one every 15 seconds. It's perfectly capable of screwing up a vehicle or taking the comprehensive urban redevelopment approach to denying the enemy cover and disrupting an entire wave.

The Basilisk didn't require micro, in fact it was arguably at it's best just parking it somewhere and letting it shell anything that came in view of it's considerable range on it's own while you did other things.

Lonestar wrote:

Brother-Captain Gaius wrote:Standard MP is something of an afterthought in DoW2, though. The campaigns and Last Stand have the bulk of the content, so I wouldn't judge until we can see those.

I really frickin' hope they do a good job with the Campaigns. I'm having trouble seeing how they can do much story out of a Tyranid Campaign and the Orks wouldn't be much better...unless we're returning to RISK IN SPACE.

Well, it seems they'll be playing around with the structure, so the nids campaign iirc will be the swarmlord eating face, and the guard will involve calling in a lot of guardsmen (and hopefully armor) to support your more elite story squads. Give me a bit of time to look for that article again.

Wing Commander MAD wrote:The IG still need a bit of work. The biggest issues in my eyes are as follows:

1. Guardsmen take up too much pop when fully upgraded. With both squad leaders they take up 18 pop (each leader costs 4 pop and adds 2 GM). So don't buy the leaders. Wrong, leaders are needed because of the free reinforcements they provide. GM are needed as a meat shield for your other units and without the free reinforcements the IG player will be hemorrhaging requisition at T2 and later.

Agree here, but with med bunkers and the like you can pull some serious dickery with them too. Plop a med bunker in their fallback, then as they retreat, have the commissar pop one, queue two up, have them back to strength in a few seconds and ready to shoot some more, which means you can set them up in a firing zone as bait. It's not ideal and takes a good bit of micro, but at best they're worth that pop cap. I generally just tend to get them killed down to a tiny squad though.

2. Bunkers have buggy firing arcs. The IG heavy weapon team also refuses to relocate the guy with the heavy weapon when inside the bunker the majority of the time which compounds the aforementioned problem. This renders the bunker far less useful than it should be.

Yes, very annoying, they're more support structures.

3. Stormtroopers suck in their current incarnation. They do good damage for cost (especially with the Assault kit), yet don't have good health for cost. They're squishy and the Assault kit upgrade that makes them shine in an anti-infantry role makes them take 30% more damage. The AV kit gives them meltas, but they have trouble closing with vehicles to actually get in range due to their squishy nature. The Stealth kit is lackluster and only good for ninja capping/decapping, something Sentinels due better IMOH. The best fix would be to make the stealth kit part of the base unit and add an upgrade cost to the others (losing the extra damage modifier on the Assault kit). This should balance them perfectly, as AI stormies won't melt the instant an enemy manages to attack them and AV stormies can sprint to get into melta range without losing half the squad's health. Allowing them to switch between kits for a cost like Space Marine tacs wouldn't hurt either, since some battlefield flexability could help alleviate some of the IG's current population issues.

Agreed, stormies are pretty damn lackluster, and as the guard's only proper mobile source of AV, this leads to a lot of my annoyance.

4. Most IG infantry have a hard time getting and staying in cover. This is especially pronounced on fully upgraded 12 man GM squads, which only seem to have half the squad in cover. The Lord Generals retinue suffers from similar problems. Further compounding the above mentioned is the fact the several models always seem to run and stand in front of the directional cover you just placed the squad in. The net result of this is that the GM buildable cover is less useful than it should be. I've found craters that provide light cover to be far more useful than any of the natural or built cover.

Building the cover in two rows instead of one seems to help greatly. You only need four or so wide for a GM squad, but build it two deep.

5. The Lord General can die before his retinue does. This renders the squad uncontrollable and free kills for the enemy. Mind you this usually doesn't happen because of his HP, but it's still a problem.

Really? Wow is that stupid.

6. The Lord Generals call in turrets appear to have improper armor type, vehicle instead of structure. This may be intentional, though it's counter intuitive.

Considering they're basically a hull down leman russ...

Those are the biggest issues with IG that I see currently. I wouldn't mind hearing what you guys think of stormtroopers, as they're the only unit that feels to be under performing consistently, though the Leman Russ Vanquisher may be a bit off. Keep in mind the Manticore is probably going to be nerfed into uselessness like the Basilisk was in DC/Soulstorm. Likewise, I foresee Catachans being hit hard with the nerf bat in the near future given all the bitching happening over them.

The stormies are a good support unit, but they're a lot of why I find guard sorely lacking in AV. They need a lot of fire support/meat shielding to do their job. Shame about the Catachans, but they are hilariously powerful. With explosive shot and then a nade volley I can ruin a charging squad's day. Absolutely ruin it. Throw in their stupid durability, and things are just awesome there. Hopefully they recognize that the Manticore is about right in that it can be devestating but isn't generally. If they make it much weaker though, the Guard will only have one good anti-vehicle choice until t3, which is a bad state of affairs.

Commander 598 wrote:The Basilisk didn't require micro, in fact it was arguably at it's best just parking it somewhere and letting it shell anything that came in view of it's considerable range on it's own while you did other things.

Different game. Life is a lot more expensive. I don't think they'd make it autofire on friendly spots. 2 is a lot more micro heavy and a lot more about managing small squads. Something just automatically reaching out and derpcannoning things is very against the gameplay model and would be hilariously broken or utterly useless with about no ground between the two.

xthetenth wrote: Different game. Life is a lot more expensive. I don't think they'd make it autofire on friendly spots. 2 is a lot more micro heavy and a lot more about managing small squads. Something just automatically reaching out and derpcannoning things is very against the gameplay model and would be hilariously broken or utterly useless with about no ground between the two.

I see new posts and threads complaining about the Manticore every day. At this point I think it's merely a matter of "How do you want your nerf?" It works and seems like it was a good idea now. By the time they're done with it I wouldn't be surprised if it started to rather closely resemble the Basilisk in function, or become less effective than a theoretical mortar team would've been.

Commander 598 wrote:

xthetenth wrote: Different game. Life is a lot more expensive. I don't think they'd make it autofire on friendly spots. 2 is a lot more micro heavy and a lot more about managing small squads. Something just automatically reaching out and derpcannoning things is very against the gameplay model and would be hilariously broken or utterly useless with about no ground between the two.

I see new posts and threads complaining about the Manticore every day. At this point I think it's merely a matter of "How do you want your nerf?" It works and seems like it was a good idea now. By the time they're done with it I wouldn't be surprised if it started to rather closely resemble the Basilisk in function, or become less effective than a theoretical mortar team would've been.

Oh god dammit. This is why we can't have nice things. What magical yet inaccurate capabilities do they attribute to the manticore? It's not particularly accurate and it only gets to contribute to a battle once. Sure, maybe a squad or two gets a bloody nose, but compare it to a heavy bolter team or even just catachans and it looks weak. It can only really just disrupt the enemy's firing line for a bit, but on its own it isn't going to do a lot unless you're really lucky. Yes, it can kill a vehicle, but only if it stands still, and generally doing anything more than getting knockback and some damage in on the firing line is very unlikely. Five bucks says that none of the people griping have seriously played guard. Oh well, it isn't really good enough to use now, so it's not much of a loss, and maybe they'll give guard some proper capabilities against heavy infantry in the early game, considering a third of the races are heavy infantry.

Erm, I'd say it extremely accurate actually. But people are moaning because it automagically wipes setup teams (no mention of hitting the retreat button obviously) and bunkers (it's a goddamn huge rocket, what do you expect?) and neatly blows up big blobs of units.