Dawn of War

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War is a Real Time Strategy game for the PC developed by Relic Entertainment and published by THQ. Based on Games Workshop's popular tabletop wargame, Warhammer 40,000, Dawn of War was released in September 2004.

Dawn of War features four armies:
 * Space Marines
 * Orks
 * Eldar
 * Chaos Space Marines

Dawn of War introduces the Blood Ravens, an original chapter of Space Marines created by Relic. The Blood Ravens' history, organization, and other background information about them are described in the Australian White Dwarf, issue 298 (The same article was printed in issue 305 of the English magazine edition) as well as the novel titled Dawn of War.

The Single Player campaign deals with the Blood Ravens 3rd Company as they are called to assist against an Ork invasion on the planet Tartarus. This eventually pulls them into conflict with the Eldar and finally the forces of Chaos.

Notable Features
''Dawn of War has different gameplay to most RTS games, because of its squad-based units, close combat options, morale, and point-based resourcing system.




 * The squad system is innovative and had never really been explored in other RTS games. Squads can be reinforced by adding additional members, equipped with additional special weaponry, attached leaders or special units. For example, a Space Marine squad starts with 4 marines, but can be expanded up to 8 standard marines and a sergeant, and equipped with up to 4 heavy weapons: Heavy Bolters, Plasma Guns, Flamers or Missile Launchers, each of which has their own characteristics. It is also possible to attach a hero or a special unit to the squad. The ability to reinforce even during battle creates interesting situations with armies being reinforced on the spot rather than new units being made in a player's base. The winner can usually expect little defense if he defeats the enemy army completely, since base fortifications are not as prominent as in most other RTS games.




 * The close combat units differ from other contemporary RTS games as well. While idea of a close combat units dates back to Warcraft, Dawn of War implements it more realistically. Many units have both ranged weapons and melee weapons rather than strictly one or the other, as is the case in most other strategy games. Any ranged unit engaged in close combat cannot fire and must engage its attacker in close combat in return. This makes tying-up enemy ranged squads with melee attacks, preventing them from firing, a tactical option and often a priority. Some units are better at melee attacks or ranged attacks than others. In addition, when a unit is defeated in close combat, the victorious unit will kill it off a special (and often bloody) finishing move.  Units are invulnerable to damage while in their killing animations, which some players use to their advantage if the unit is taking fire while in combat.


 * An addition to the typical hitpoint system is morale. While units in a squad take damage individually, morale damage is applied to a squad as a whole. When morale drops to zero the squad breaks and its combat ability is greatly reduced. The player retains control of the unit and may decide whether to retreat and regain morale or stay and fight. Different weapons deal different amounts of damage to health and morale.


 * The game uses 2 kinds of resources: "requisition" and "power". Requisition is generated by the army headquarters and by controlling certain points on the battlefield. Only infantry can capture these points and it takes a certain amount of time for them to do so. Points can be de-captured and then captured by the enemy. There are three kinds of points:


 * Strategic Points are most common, quick to capture, and have an average line of sight. After capturing, a listening post may be built on them to protect them from de-capture; this also increases the amount of requisition generated. The listening post can be upgraded with defenses, which also further increases amount of requisition generated. Certain games can be won by a player holding two-thirds of map's Strategic Points for 7 minutes.
 * Critical Locations are always in uneven amount on the map. These take longer to capture and have a bigger line of sight, but cannot have listening posts built on them, thus making them harder to hold. They are usually located at "choke points", and certain games can be won by a player or team holding half the critical locations on the map for 8 minutes.
 * Relics take the longest to capture and have a small line of sight. However, holding a relic gives access to the race's most advanced and powerful units. Relics can have listening posts built on them.

The power resource can be generated by building plasma generators: up to six generators can be built per headquarter. Additionally, some maps have special points called "slag deposits", at which special generators can be constructed. These are more expensive but produce power at much higher rate. As the player progresses up the tech tree reliance on power increases.

Other features include heroes, 4 completely different races, and clear distinction between infantry and vehicles, with vehicles being almost impervious to the attacks of non-upgraded infantry units, while being able to destroy many of them themselves. The engine allows for full 3D camera movement.

Gameplay
With the addition of a squad system and more realistic ranged-close combat dynamics (see above section), Dawn of War is different than the majority of strategy games. Troops have morale, which, when drained completely, causes the squad to "break" and scatter, severely decreasing firepower but granting a movement bonus. Squads can be reinforced on the spot rather than forcing the player to create new units at their base. The game contains many breaks from the norm of the genre, and introduced several new concepts.



The game is, overall, very micromanagement-oriented. With the reinforcement system, extra armament for troopers, and special skills, the player is often forced to switch back and forth between different squads and vehicles quickly, making fast decisions to keep their combat effectiveness. The strategic-point system favors agressive gameplay; early in the game, skirmishes and battles within the first few minutes are common. The extra gameplay dynamics open up many new options for players - such as the strategy of sending in several well equipped squads against a stronger enemy force and reinforcing them as they lose their numbers, prolonging the life of the squad hopefully long enough for them to accomplish their objective (usually defense of an area until reinforcements can arrive).



Infantry units in the game more accurately reflect actual warfare; each individual squad is made up of many troopers, which act independently as individuals yet fight and move as a group. If a missile blast hits the squad, the troopers are blown away. If they survive, they get to their feet and resume firing from their position, leaving the squad scattered, as it likely would be in real life. The player could order the squad to move, thereby regrouping them, or leave them as they are, which might put them at a disadvantage, or indeed, in rare cases, an advantage (against arillery barrages, for instance). Troopers fire as they move rather than being forced to stop before they fire (though this is still the case with some heavy weaponry), unlike many other strategy games. When the squad is broken and ordered to retreat, the squad tends to act less cohesively, with troopers straying from the group easier and not moving as tightly, actively reflecting their panicked and demoralized state.

The scope of the squad mechanics means that strategy plays an even bigger part in the game, especially with infantry warfare. Holding of strategic avenues (not neccessarily Strategic Points), such as those with valuable heavy cover near a bottleneck leading to a player's base with Infantry becomes a worthwhile task, unlike in others, where the strategic value of a location without a building or resource on it is usually next to nil and not worth defending.

While in other strategy games, retreat and "pulling one's losses" are not viable because unless the infantry is retreating to a place where it can find more units to help fight or take shelter in turrets or buildings, the squad will fight as well in any other location as it does at the point it is already fighting, thereby making strategic retreat and widthdrawal little-used and not useful tactics. In Dawn of War, however, with the added scope of squad-based infantry combat and reinforcements, widthdrawing a squad can allow it to replenish and regain it's morale at the next set of fortifications or the player's base, allowing it to perhaps drive off it's attackers once they attack again - this is mostly unique in the field of Real-time strategy.

Criticism
Dawn of War was mainly criticized for its short and repetitive single player campaign. All missions are fairly similar in both objectives and execution of therein. Also, despite several patches, some fans still consider the game to be unbalanced in multiplayer.

Winter Assault
An expansion pack entitled Dawn of War: Winter Assault was released in September of 2005. There are several changes in both the singleplayer and multiplayer aspects.

New Race

 * Imperial Guard, previously available in certain single player missions of Dawn of War



New units

 * The Space Marines gain the Chaplain, a powerful close combat hero unit with the special ability to weaken an enemy squad's resolve and a healing aura.
 * The Forces of Chaos gain Khorne Berzerkers, strong and fast close combat assault squad armed with bolt pistol and chainaxe.
 * The Orks gain the Mega-Armored Nobz, slow-moving, but powerful and heavily armored semi-hero unit.
 * The Eldar gain the Fire Dragons, short-ranged fusion gun wielding aspect warriors best utilized against vehicles and structures.

New campaigns
There are two new single player campaigns, which focus around a lost Imperial Titan. The three leftover races from the original Dawn of War (Orks, Eldars and Chaos) are available in addition to the new Imperial Guards, with each race trying to find and gain control of the Titan for their own reasons.

Expansion Criticism
Winter Assault was criticised for its skirmish mode difficulty, with the standard AI setting being similar to the hardest settings of the original game.

Second Expansion
In January 2006, a second expansion was announced. This will feature two new races, including the Tau. It is expected to be released in Autumn 2006.

Novels
In December 2004, Black Library released a novelization of Dawn of War (Goto, 2004). The story expands on the story found in the Single Player campaign, with additional characters and in more detail. A follow-up novel, Dawn of War: Ascension (Goto, 2005) was released in November 2005, continuing the story of Captain Angelos and the Blood Ravens.

Misc.

 * Dawn of War has active modding community. Relic Entertainment released official modding tools for the community to use.
 * Dawn of War is also the name of a less successful Real Time Strategy game set in prehistoric times, published by SouthPeak Interactive.