Strategy at the Crossroads: Dawn of War Meets DoTA
The original Dawn of War was an excellent contribution to the RTS genre, combining traditional mechanics with some invigorating changes that promoted squad battles over macro-style management thanks to the innovative control point system. Moreover, it provided an opportunity to amass the Warhammer armies that would be ruinously expensive in cost and time to amass in real life. The Warhammer license was not superficial but had an impact on how the game actually played: the production of squads as opposed to individual units, determining what gear they have, whether a commander unit is attached, and so on. This meant that each squad was a significant investment, not merely pawns to be casually rushed towards the enemy as in so many other RTS games. It also improved the dynamics of combat thanks to its faster pace and the huge variety of races and customisable squads. In short, the game preserved enough of the RTS tradition to be recognisable but also streamlined it all in the awesome trappings of the 40k license.
When I began playing Dawn of War II, however, I found that this time the mechanics were alien and unrecognisable. I've heard that they are similar to Company of Heroes, a game that unfortunately I have not played. The closest comparison that came to mind for me was League of Legends or DoTA. The single-player campaign is almost entirely focused on hero units (that have a handful of squadmates) that level up, get better equipment, new abilities, etc. As a result, all of the battles are rather small-scale, with an emphasis on skillfull use of cover, abilities, and close coordination to fight off the much more numerous enemies.
Mechanically, I think this is a poor route to go down for RTS. It's about as fun as playing LoL or DoTA against bots. This is not because the AI is dumb, although it is, but more that the customisation options are rather limited and the game plays out very predictably. Combat in DoW II simply does not have much strategic depth because of its eradication of most of the things that make an RTS what it is. This is not like the Myth games where you cannot produce units but instead have to rely on strategy to win with what you have. This is more like only having three or four guys in Myth and using them to complete the entire game. As the ability to amass huge and varied armies was im my opinion one of the best features of the original Dawn of War, I couldn't help but be disappointed by this change. The missions are also very repetitive in structure, often consisting of 'defend this point' or 'go to A and kill boss B'. What particularly highlights the sense of repetition and grind was the re-use of cutscenes, maps, and mission types throughout the game. The dismissive summation of LoL and DoTA (that they are RTS games for people who can't play RTS) is oddly applicable to this game too: it's taken inspiration from games that were meant to be played multiplayer as a template for a singleplayer game, and the result is unsurprisingly somewhat mediocre.
On the whole, I still feel that Dawn of War II is sufficiently polished to be an enjoyable game, and it offers a much-improved storyline and production values over the original entry (how could it not, though?). However, it is very far from the impressive depth that the original game attained. Also, the improved production values come at the cost of the recycling of assets that saps them of their impact. Personally, I have no attachment to labels, but I think that the liquidation of RTS tradition in favour of the hero-battle approach results in a loss of depth and brings with it casual, simplistic game design.
As of writing, I can only comment on the Last Stand multiplayer mode. Unfortunately Last Stand relies on the same simplistic hero mechanics that drive the single-player game, so whilst challenging and fun enough it also becomes repetitive very quickly. It sounds like most of my complaints would be answered by the more traditional multiplayer battles, which bring back base building and unit production to a degree. However, I have yet to find a game, although I suspect being able to play this would significantly improve the experience for me (either it's desperately unpopular or it's my Australian timezone).
Although I'd only give the single-player campaign 3-3.5 stars, from what I've experienced of the multiplayer mode and the expansions justifies a four-star rating. The main problem I have thus far is an ultimately lackluster single-player campaign that is irrelevant to the online play because of its repudiation of the core features of RTS. Hopefully the expansions, which I plan on checking out, will address the issues I have with the campaign.
