Dawn of War 2

This guide will show you how to get the most out of the standard infantry squad of the Eldar race in Dawn of War 2. Guardians are very versatile basic infantry that are great throughout the entire game and thus using them to their utmost is essential for well-played Eldar. First we will discuss the many uses of Guardians and then some extra tips and tricks will be presented for you.


Upgrades:

Battle Gear - Available in Tier 1 this upgrade is the first thing you will be spending your power on in most cases. In addition to unlocking Plasma Grenades and Force Fields, the Battle Gear upgrade on Guardians squads will increase their HP by 30%.

Warlock Leader - Available in Tier 2, this upgrade not only adds a substantial DPS upgrade to the squad (as the Warlock pumps out some decent damage with his lightning), but it also passively reduces all damage taken by the Guardians by 25%. What this translates to is a 25% increase in HP. Also the warlock has some melee prowess and although he is not as good as a Space Marine sergeant, he can assist in killing off the remains of some Tier 1 squads that generally dominate Guardians (such as Hormagaunts and Rippers). It is worth noting that he has the same Area of Effect-based melee attack as the Warlock hero with the same disruption, albeit less damage.

Abilities Overview:

Fleet of Foot - Fleet of Foot increases a unit's movement speed by almost 60%. It also reduces ranged damage by 80% and melee damage by 40%. This is especially useful on Guardians for a wide variety of reasons that will be discussed throughout this guide.

Repair - The Eldar have very strong vehicles. Although they require a great deal of micro to properly employ, in the hands of a good player they are irreplaceable. They are also available in the later tiers of the game which means you will need something close by that can make quick repairs. That is where Guardians come in. These dedicated warriors become crucial to late game dominance in terms of utilizing vehicles to slaughter your enemy.

Plasma Grenade - These are the best grenades in the game and - if you are not relying on your Warlock hero to be in 5 places at once - are your only counter to masses of melee-oriented enemies. A well placed grenade can mean the difference between 5 dead guardians and 8 dead Orks. Learning to use these is essential to the survival of an Eldar player into the later tiers in terms of both unit conservation and map control. In the tips sections there will be a list and explanation of their various uses.

Force Fields - For 45 energy these allow the Eldar player to add an extra 1000hp to their Guardians in a strictly ranged fight. Standing behind one of these force fields means that whatever is behind it takes zero damage until the field itself is depleted. If you're having trouble getting your infantry behind them (or behind any cover really) try rotating your camera to look at the rear of the force field then moving them behind it. Again, there will be tips to come concerning this ability.

Embolden - This ability - unlocked by adding a Warlock to your squad - increases the ranged DPS of the Guardians by 25%. Best uses of Embolden will be shown throughout the article.


The many roles of Guardians:

Capping: Guardians are the cheapest infantry available to the Eldar race. They move fast and with good micro can move even faster with fleet of foot. Once upgraded with Battle Gear, Guardians can devastate other capping units with one well placed grenade. If your opponent is busy elsewhere or just allowing his capping units to run amuck on a shift-queued task list, this becomes even easier. What this means for the Eldar player is more map control. When you combine the quick speed of Guardians with their ability to quickly dispatch unwary foes they become beasts in the capping department. With battle gear they are arguably the best capping unit in the game.

Repairing: As stated above Guardians are the only unit the Eldar have which can repair. That being said, they are probably the best at it. With Fleet of Foot, Guardians can get to that damaged vehicle that much faster. Furthermore, once they have the Warlock leader upgrade you will find they are able to make combat repairs and survive doing so. This is due primarily to the damage reduction but helped by the fact that many players will look at Guardians as weak fairy men who can be safely ignored once the more expensive Eldar units are on the field. This means that many times you will be ignored while you repair your vehicles. Utilizing the force field upgrade, you can quickly shield a tank while another squad repairs it or simply repair it after it is safely behind the shield.

Fire Support: This is one of the most controversial roles that Guardians fill as of late. Many have said that their damage is pathetic and negligible and thus they do not sufficiently fill the fire support role. While this is true is some match-ups, it is not the definitive rule. With Embolden active, Guardians pump out great ranged damage for their cost and they have decent range from which to pummel their foes. Also, there is nothing like a well placed grenade while you opponent is busy trying to kill something more expensive. A great example would be grenading your Wraithlord which has inevitably become swarmed with anti-vehicle melee. As stated above, most players see Guardians are ignorable forces on the field of battle. Using this to your advantage will allow you to severely impair your enemy via focus firing. A general rule of thumb with Guardian use is to spread them out (preferably with force fields) in cover and focus fire down whichever unit will die the easiest while activating Embolden. The reason you pick the easiest to kill is simply because 2 or 3 Emboldened Guardians firing on a unit with low HP or armor will result in a very dead unit for your enemy very fast. Typically people do not pay as much attention to their lesser units, just as they do not pay attention to yours (read: GUARDIANS) and losing a lot of units very quickly is devastating.

Cannon Fodder: While unit conservation should always be foremost in your mind, sometimes you need someone to do the dying. There is no cheaper unit available to Eldar players than Guardians and as such they sometimes get used as fodder. Once you have fielded expensive and exotic, highly-specialized units it becomes acceptable to sacrifice a few Guardians to utilize them to their maximum potential. There are many instances where this is the case but as a general rule of thumb you must bear in mind unit costs as you decide when it's dying time for your delicate friends. Several good examples include:

• Letting your opponent take out a few Guardians with a light vehicle while you set up a bright lance out of the fog.
• Throwing a grenade at your feet into a huge swarm of melee before your banshees rush in to mop up.
• Popping fleet of foot and meleeing that venom canon Carnifex for a few seconds to buy your anti vehicle efforts that extra shot needed for the kill.
• Repairing that Wraithlord just enough to let it kill the extra few units it needs to, to force an enemy retreat.

In the screenshot below you can see a Guardian squad meleeing a Deff Dread in the hope of causing a sync kill which will allow the brightlance/d-cannon one more shot before he moves out of range.



Spotting: This is a mid to late game role that relies on well placed force fields. With the current state of Rangers it is unlikely you will be building them for anything more than cool trench coats with hoods. What this means is that someone needs to be up front as the eyes for the big guns like D-Cannons and Fire Prism. The best way to accomplish this is to set up several forward force fields spread out in a line and put a couple of Guardians behind them. These force fields should be just forward enough to spot for the maximum range of your D-cannons or Prisms. Also, if your opponent gives you time, it is useful to set up two tiers of force fields as a fall back point if the guardians become overwhelmed before the big guns have a chance to annihilate your opponent. This second tier of force fields should be moved to with fleet of foot and, if possible, grenades should be thrown at the swarm before the retreat.




Tricks and Tips:

Getting the most efficient use out of your Guardians will more often than not result in your victory. You will have more of them on the field than any other type of unit and all of their various abilities are crucial in all stages of the game.

Plasma Grenades: There have been many uses for these stated above but what else are they good for? First and foremost, grenades that are not used on infantry should be used on enemy buildings such as Ravener tunnels, generators, activated power nodes, brood nests, WAAAGH towers, turrets etc. Also, if you know there is a mine field in the way of your advance and do not feel like gimping your game by building rangers, a relatively safe pathway can be carved out with the simple throw of a plasma grenade or two. Of course there is no substitute for a grenade through the window of a building inhabited by your enemy.
One of my favorite tricks with grenades is taken directly from the days of CoH. Specifically, if you run up near some cover, your units will automatically get behind the cover by themselves. When they are deciding to do this you can throw a plasma grenade which will be semi-masked by the move into cover. Also, the close distance this throw originates from will allow your opponent less reaction time which only further improves the usefulness of this tactic. In order to get up close fast fleet of foot can be used. To summarize how this is done:

1. Activate fleet of foot.
2. Right click close to but not on some cover.
3. Press G and aim your throw.
4. Left click to throw the grenade when you see your units auto-moving into cover.

Although grenades now damage the squad throwing them, sometimes grenade spiking is still a great idea. In fact, a lot of the time it is your only method of escaping a mass of melee units who have somehow gotten the jump on your Guardians. Without the knock back and suppression from the grenades, your chances of escaping in a retreat are slim to none. That being said, if you find yourself in a situation where you are going to retreat anyways, throw down a grenade at your feet and mash the retreat button. Retreating units take very little damage (if any) from explosive-type weapons such as grenades. Ideally this will result in your enemy losing his squad or at least retreating it as well and thus functions to stall the game at the very least. Just make sure you retreat in time - there is no room for martyrs in the Eldar economic struggle.

Plasma grenades also do semi decent anti-vehicle damage. I can't tell you how many times I have been able to get rid of an enemy vehicle quickly because he underestimated the damage of plasma grenades. If you are able to immobilize the vehicle through something like a haywire grenade or a Warp Spider Exarch entangle ability, dump all available plasma grenades on it. Even if it does not get destroyed, hopefully it will scare your opponent into moving it back for repairs. With a Brightlance Platform around, a well placed plasma grenade can usually mean a dead vehicle for your opponent as he underestimates your anti-vehicle prowess.

Two grenades at once on a single unit seems like overkill but in some cases this is a great use of them. Utter annihilation is always preferable to simply wounding your opponent. As such, if an opportunity presents itself to dog pile grenades onto a unit, do not hesitate. The best example I can think of from my games is throwing 2 or 3 grenades onto a Shuriken platform as Assault Marines fly in on it. For whatever reason, Assault Marines are drawn to platforms almost to the exclusion of everything else and you can use this to your advantage to setup a plasma grenade shaped trap. Basically, in any case where you know your opponent cannot react fast enough, hurl as many grenades at him as you can.

Force Fields: As stated above, force fields are directional immunity to ranged fire. A good habit to get into is putting them up in frequent places of combat such as close proximity to VPs. Keep in mind that they are directional which means that as long as you put the front towards your enemies base he cannot use them against you. Also, their cost is very small and cool down is instant. What does this mean? SPAM THEM. Put force fields everywhere you can think of but always leave yourself enough energy for a clutch grenade. Once you have a lot of force fields up you can use them with any of your units and can use tiers of them as fall back points if ever you are overwhelmed. Always, always, ALWAYS protect your heavy weapons platforms with a force field as they are extremely easily to dispatch. It is worth noting as well that force fields protect your platforms from sniper fire. Here you can see force field tiers. These were built by 3 Guardians squads and took only a few seconds each to make.



Dancing:
Dancing refers to using two or more Guardian squads in concert to kite around your enemy while you dump loads and loads of fire into him. Essentially, you move with the squad your opponent is trying to kill, while you other squads are shooting. Inevitably your opponent will switch off to another squad at which point that one starts dancing and the former begins shooting. This dance goes on for as long as it needs to and can be rather micro intensive. It is also absolutely crucial to winning engagements when playing the Eldar and as such you must become good at it. So practice.

The optimal method of dancing is first in the setup of your Guardians. When moving Guardians together always keep them separated. The ideal distance apart is maximum firing range. Since you will also always be moving from cover to cover, sometimes they will end up closer together. If possible create your own cover with a force field as they take almost no time at all to setup. In summary, make it a habit of always having your Guardians spread out in a line ready to engage your opponent.
At this point, your opponent is rushing your fragile Guardians with beefed up melee. It is not difficult to ascertain which one of your squads he will be gunning for if you have them sufficiently spread out. The first thing you want to do is select the other two squads and activate Embolden. A very useful method of doing this that I have been using is pressing the hotkey for one of them, holding shift, and pressing the hot key for the other one, then activating Embolden with E. As soon as this is done, select the soon-to-be-crushed squad and right click behind them while pressing F to activate fleet of foot. The path you take is the key. You can literally lead your opponent to the next logical target (another one of your Guardian squads) and thus be all the more ready to start the next step in your little dance. On that note, once you see your opponent switching to another squad, quickly hit Embolden on the one you have been dancing with, then select the new squad and hit F and begin the whole process again. Ideally you want to run this second squad as long as you can to get fleet of foot back on the first one, or run them to a third squad with fleet of foot ready to go.

As you can no doubt tell this is very difficult to do for a beginner. Once you get the hang of it however, you will be able to add plasma grenades into the mix and will have very little trouble with swarms of melee as long as you have your Guardians set up and react fast enough. Also, try to use fleet of foot before your opponents get too close since all units engaging in melee get a similar speed buff once they are close enough to the enemy. This charge bonus gives them the same speed as Guardians so be careful.

In this video you can see how dancing works. In the end pay attention to how many Guardians are left and how many Orks died.

Flanking: Thanks to their good speed and decent survivability (once upgraded), Guardians are great for flanking with. Due to the low cost in shoot outs it is very likely you will have more individual squads. Even if they are not all involved in the initial fight, they are no doubt nearby and can get to the fight fast (even faster with fleet of foot). Considering all of this, whenever you are in a shootout, first get into cover with the unit taking fire then use your other units to flank around behind the enemy forces and use Embolden or Grenade them. All cover is directional so firing from behind completely negates the bonus. If the enemy switches its fire to your flanking squad, move the first squad up and jam a plasma nade down their throats while they are distracted.
The same is true for heavy weapon teams. Guardians with the Warlock upgrade have one over almost every other infantry unit because they can instantly and reliably break suppression with Embolden. This means that if the opponent managed to suppress one squad then suppress the flanking squad, your first squad can pop up and rush them with fleet of foot and deliver a plasma sandwich to the enemy.

In this video below you can see how to flank without the use of grenades or Embolden. Adding both of those into the mix will only multiply the advantages of flanking.

Another great thing to do is melee your opponent when he retreats. Although retreating units take sufficiently less ranged damage while retreating they take bonus melee damage. Even though Guardians aren't the strongest in melee, a retreating unit cannot hurt you. If possible, get into melee as they retreat and you may just get yourself an extra kill or two.