Hello people! This is my first report; so don’t expect gold material or pictures. I do not know html but I am attempting to learn it. I just hope that nobody puts dumb comments in the comments section. Unlike so many people out there, I don’t care about getting tons of comments, I just want some that offer constructive criticism.

This report will be on the game Warhammer 40,000 Dawn of War, a game that I’m sure some of you have never heard of. It is set about 10,000 years in the future. You might think that after all this time, we would finally have settled down. Unfortunately, we have just advanced to even more advanced weapons and methods of murdering people. The good guys are the Space Marines; armies of powerful soldiers who greatly discourage free thought (hehehe-I mean, for the Emperor!) and are a lot like the Terrans but more badass. Their strong point is all-around. They have some good long range units and some good melee units. The Eldar, a race of psychic warriors who are kind of like a cross between the Night Elves and the Protoss, are the other good guys. Their stong suit is ranged combat.  The Orks, a race of retarded greenskinned weirdoes who would give Thrall a heart attack, and The Chaos Marines, a horde of demon-enhanced warriors who want to take over the universe, are the bad guys. The Orks’s specialty is close combat, though they tend to use numbers to win more that strategy or skill. The Chaos Marines are basically evil Space Marines but with a few more cooler units.

All infantry units in Dawn of War are created and commanded in squads. Besides a few exceptions, there is no such thing as a single infantry unit. All squads start with a certain number of units and most can be added to via an extremely difficult and complicated process called reinforcing, which involves clicking a button and waiting for the new units to be added to the squad. You can attach commanders and add leaders to most squads as well.

Resources are much less of a big deal than in Starcraft or in Warcraft 3. The two resources, Requisition and Power, are easy to acquire and once you have them secured they literally produce themselves. This makes you not have to worry about making sure you workers are in the right places and stuff, which I think is a plus. (say good-bye to heroic peons like Deon, I’m afraid) Requisition (comparable to minerals) is gathered my capturing Strategic Points, Critical Points, and Relics. More on those later. Power (comparable to vespene) is gathered by building Generators.

To collect the Requisition resource, you must capture and hold Strategic Points. These are small metal thingys in the ground that represent areas of strategic importance. Or, they’re supposed to. They often do, but often they’re just there so that you don’t have to go a million miles to get some resources. The more you have, the faster your Requisition comes in. Any infantry can capture these. Critical Locations provide even more Requisition than Strategic Points, but they are rarer and are always somewhere that is desirable to hold, like a bridge or a fort. Relics are VERY rare, act just like Strategic Points that produce almost no Requisition, and they have a special function. Certain high tech level units are so powerful that your superiors will only let you have them if you capture a relic. Taking these away from your enemies will deny them their super powerful tech units and allow you to build yours.

Now for the report.

Playing the Space Marine chapter known as the Blood Angels, I started out with a Stronghold (command center) and a single Servitor. (builder)

I should explain something. The Space Marines do not build any of their units in the field. A Battle Barge, a big, big, space cruiser with enough buildings and troops on board to make a turtler act like a kid at Christmas, follows the Marines wherever they go. Whenever you request a building, the Battle Barge launches it and it hits the planet where a Servitor “unpacks” it and viola! One Space Marine building, hold the onions. (the Stronghold is so big that a dropship has to bring it in) Also, every building that produces units has a landing pad or receiving hatch for drop pods that carry the units.

Following my usual build order, I qued up two squads of Scout Marines (scouts/snipers) and two more Servitors while the starting Servitor commenced building a Chapel-Barracks. (landing pad for infantry) The building landed, neatly packaged up in an orbital delivery frame. The Servitor headed over and began punching buttons, and the big ball of parts began drilling into the ground and unfolding into my structure. Meanwhile, two Scout Marines, the first squad, arrived from orbit. They headed off and commenced pitching the Blood Angel flag on the nearest Strategic Point. The next squad to arrive did the same for another Point.

The first Servitor to arrive began building a Plasma Generator (produces Power) while Chapel-Barracks finished unfolding. Pretty soon I was commander of a fine and dandy-looking Space Marine base.

            The Scouts at the top Strategic Point had finished capturing it by now, so I sent a Servitor to build a Listening Post on it. You can build a Listening Post on any captured Strategic Point or Relic. The Post does three things:  It increases the amount of Requisition that you get from a Point, it makes the Point more resistant to enemy theft by putting a building on top of it, and, with a little upgrading, it can act as a defensive structure.

As the construction of the Listening Post was going on, the drop pod containing my first squad of Space Marines crashed into the Chapel-Barracks. These are your all-around fighters. The carry a Bolter Rifle and can be upgraded with several kinds of heavy weapons. At the same time, a squad of Cultists, the Chaos Marines’ basic fighting unit, came charging into my base. Whipping out their pathetically newbish laser pistols of DEATH, they blasted my hapless Servitor a few times, fired at my generator, and then began hacking away at it with their combat knives. I franticly hit the Reinforce button for my nearest Scout Squad while routing them to the enemy. The Scouts got in some good shots with their rifles, circled round the Generator, and then fired some more. The Cultists finally got it through their thick skulls that they were under attack when one of their number dropped to the ground beside them screaming “How could we fail?” (not that hard to tell you the truth. Silly fools) They charged at the Scouts, who now numbered 4 to match the Cultists, and the fight was just starting to get nasty when my Space Marine Squad came charging out of the Chapel-Barracks. They moved into position, opened fire, and the Cultists went down faster than a pair of Zealots against Heartcutter’s peon micro.

With the threat taken care of for the moment, my men turned around only to see a squad of Slugga Boyz charging up from the south. These are Orks with a pistol and axe that tend to be a big nuisance. My troops engaged once more, and as the fight began a Servitor headed down and began building a Listening Post on the Strategic Point right next to the battle. The Orks smacked the poor Scouts around a bit, (who promptly retreated only to about-face and open fire again) and then began making cat food out of my Servitor. The Slugga Boyz finally lost their morale and ran like the wussys they were.

Morale makes your units perform better. When a squad’s Morale reaches zero, they will become pathetic fools. If they are allowed to retreat for a while, they will gain their morale back and become regular fools again.

The Listening Post finished and the attacking Orks were dead, so I relaxed a little and began making plans for the resources that had come in while the battle was going on.

The first thing I did was begin building Heavy Bolter Turrets next to the Listening Posts at the North and South ends of my base. Heavy Bolter Turrets are turrets with twin-linked Heavy Bolters (like the rifles the Marines carry, but more like a mounted machine gun) that are devastating against infantry. While these were being unpacked, I added another trooper to my Space Marine Squad and prepared to tech.

One of my Scout Squads began capturing the Strategic Point to the west of my base. This one is especially good to have because it sits right in the middle of some craters that provide Heavy Cover. Cover is another cool thing about Dawn of War. There are three kinds of Cover: Heavy Cover, Light Cover, and Negative Cover. Heavy Cover shields infantry and walking vehicles from a lot of damage and makes them gain back their morale much faster, Light Cover shields them from a little damage and makes them gain back their morale a little faster, and Negative Cover causes units to take more damages and slows the recovery of morale. Heavy Cover is usually craters and areas next to walls, Light Cover is usually underbrush or shallow craters, and Negative Cover is usually water or hard-to-traverse terrain.

Anyway, they started capturing the Strategic Point, while the Bolter Turrets finished and I called in another Space Marine Squad to cover the Scouts while they captured the Point and to defend the area once it was mine. The squad was Reinforced to six soldiers and they held their position there for a long time. I also ordered an Armory built. The Armory researches upgrades for your infantry and Commanders, allows you to equip your squads with heavy weapons, and allows you to call in Assault Marines.  But while this was happening I was attacked on two fronts! Another squad of Slugga Boyz attacked from the south, and a squad of Chaos Marines attacked from the north. Building those Turrets really paid off here. My troops held the line at the bottom, while the north Turret mowed down the Chaos Marines at the top. When all the enemies were dead, we had no casualties, although the north Turret was sparking rather ominously.

With my Armory finished, I began doing several things. First, I equipped my Space Marine Squads with Heavy Bolters, increasing their overall Ownage Level to 67%. (documented and proven, muahaha) Second, I equipped the Scout Squad at the west Strategic Point with Flamer and a Sniper Rifle. Flamers are *censored for sheer obviousness* that actually do more damage to enemy squads’ morale than it does to their hitpoints. Sniper Rifles have basically the same effect but, well, they’re sniper rifles, so they can kill individual units until the cows come home. (well, technically, it’s until enemies close with the Scouts and they have to fight with combat knives, but you know what I mean)    They would make my Scouts very good for supporting the Marines in combat. Third, I built a Listening Post on this same Strategic Point.

At this point, I decided to be a little devious, and constructed a Mine Field just below my southern line. These are basically just mine fields (SIMPLENESS) that are invisible to all enemy units except for Commanders and Squad Leaders. (invisibility is exactly like in Warcraft 3, namely, attacking breaks it and it can only be seen with a detector. In this game, Commanders are detectors) Another squad of Slugga Boyz attacked me right after the little beeping bundles of doom were laid, but they went around the Mines! How rude! I felt insulted, and so proceeded to dish out a heaping helping of fresh-from-the-oven-Space Marine-style butt-whoop on the rude Orks. (phew) I also started researching some technologies at the Armory to improve my infantry and upgrading my Stronghold to a Monastery so that I could gain access to vehicles and more advanced heavy weapons.

Now the real fun starts. If any of you raters are thinking about giving this a 1 for boredom, them (PLEASE) reconsider. But first, there’s just one thing I need to explain, this about the map. This map, Tartarus Center, has lots of all kinds of stuff. It has a Slag Deposit for each player, (Slag Deposits are piles of junk from the planet’s core that can be converted to energy. You can build a Thermo Plasma Generator on them to provide a $#%& load of extra Power) There are 4 Relics and 5 Critical Points, 1 in the middle and the others at the four corners. The corner ones are just there because they have lots of cover and are good for a firebase. The middle one though, is on a raised area that is surrounded by Strategic Points. This is the place to hold, and doing so was my plan - that is as soon as I had some better weaponry, that is.

As my evil plans were inching their way to fruition, (and I mean inching-do you have any idea how long it takes to upgrade that Stronghold?) The Chaos Marines launched their first non-pathetic attack on my base. A squad of Chaos Raptors came charging-er-jetting, into my base and commenced slashing away at the north Bolter Turret with their chainswords. Now Chaos Raptors are some pretty badass dudes. They have jetpacks that move them fast over the ground and they can use them to blast high up in the air and come down right in top of their enemies or jump on top of some fort of something. They carry swords that have chainsaw blades running round the outside, and they’re tough, so they can take some punishment as they close with the enemy and start hacking away at them. The best part? They laugh manically as they’re doing it. That is the definition of badass. 

So anyway, these Raptors come charging in followed by a squad of Cultists. They jump-packed over the Turret and come down on top of a newly arrived squad of Marines who were rushing to defend the Strategic Point. The Marines are forced to engage in melee combat, which they re not bad at, but they don’t have swords with chainsaws on them. They run for the cover of the Bolter Turret, but that’s busy with the Cultists. All is lost! Lost I tell you LOST! Oh, wait, no it’s not. There’s a whole other squad over at the western Point equipped with Heavy Bolters and supported by Scouts packing Sniper Rifles. The Raptors are silenced in mid-cackle, and my base is safe for another few wonderful, wonderful seconds.

And I mean seconds. The last Raptor has barely collapsed when yet another squad of Slugga Boyz arrived on my doorstep. And this time a squad of Shoota Boyz backed them up as well! (shoota boyz = Orks /w guns) The Slugga Boyz went down without much of a fight, but the last surviving Shoota Boy ran off into the fog of war and recovered his morale. He then came charging back in- and stepped on the minefield.

BOOM!

            The Ork flew threw the air and landed harder than Mark4 in the World War 3-Way FFA. After he crashed, the Marines manning the south flank put away their popcorn and folded up their beach chairs. Time to go back to work. Yup, it was that funny.

            It was at that point I noticed something that I rather disliked. The last Raptor had not, in fact, died. He had fled into the water on the far east area of the map, and that squad that got jump-pack’d on right after they came out of the Chapel-Barracks, now equipped with a Heavy Bolter, had chased him all the way. The Raptor died from being stabbed by combat knives and being poked by the Heavy Bolter (DOOM!) While muttering random expletives under my breath about not training Marines to stay at the base, I ordered them back in preparation and anticipation for the little operation I like to call: DA BIG PUSH.

This would be the beginning of a hard fought battle for the middle involving badass vehicles, missiles, maniacal laughing, bad spelling, and a guy with a big hammer.

            So let the madness begin! As the wayward troops were slogging back to base, two squads of Marines marched to the middle and began pitching the Blood Angel flag on top of the central Critical Location. Since the entire squad that is capturing a point have to stay in place, and not fight, (boo) the other squad covered them. Meanwhile, a rather large Ork attack hit the south flank, and it would have done damage-if they hadn’t run over the minefield. “Private, go get some more popcorn.” Said one of the scouts as he raised his sniper rifle. Orks landed and attempted to salvage their attack, only to run over the minefield again. The few that didn’t die from the mines were blasted in the back by the Bolter Turret. A small few managed to escape with their sad, pathetic lives. There is no word for deodorant in the Ork language. (hehehehehehe)

            While all this and the capturing of the central fort was going on, the Chapel-Barracks receiving hatch began opening again. This time, though, it was receiving more than a Space Marine Squad…

            Another few Slugga Boyz detonated the last few mines and the upgrade to Monastery finished. Also, the central squads finished capturing the Critical Location, and I began equipping them with Plasma Guns (lots of damage to one target, a Commander’s worst nightmare) and Missile Launchers. (a rocket launcher, what do you think it’s good against?) I brought in a Scout squad and their superior sight range revealed something bad. Something very bad. The troops at the center were completely surrounded. Except for the one held by me and one on the southeast edge, every single Strategic Point ringing the center was capped by either a Chaos Marine or Ork Listening Post. Mostly Ork, which explained why I had suffered only three attacks from the Chaos Marines the whole game and enough from the Orks to make me lay down a Minefield. (I hardly ever use them) Oh, wait, I spoke too soon. Another Squad of Chaos Raptors and Cultists came charging at the same spot as last time. Maniacal laughing rang out at they hacked away at the Turret.

            I had no time to worry about this right now, however, because a large group of Orks charged out from an enemy Listening Post at the top of the center. My troops engaged, but got too close and started taking heavy damage from the guns on top of the Listening Post. Things were starting to look ugly when a cry of “For the Emperor!” Rang out and my Force Commander came charging into the fray smashing Orks into the air left and right. Guess what was in that last drop pod? Heartened, my Marines throw themselves back into the fight, and one of them fires a missile that blows the top off the Ork Listening Post! The Orks keep coming, but thanks to the Heavy Bolters and my Force Commander’s ability to absorb so much damage it’s absurd, they are quickly put down. The center is safe - for a while.

Finally done. This took me two weeks to finish, I now respact all you big reporter more than ever. You've all gone through this multiple times! I hope you all enjoyed Part One. Part Two will involve badass vehicles, missiles, maniacal laughing, bad spelling, and more of everyone’s favorite guy with a big hammer! (that’s the Force Commander) This has been a RabidMurloc Battle Report, and remember, a cheese fry a day keeps the bus driver away!

Argh, I need a shower...