The T17 also gets a stun ability that is just like the British Bren infantry's ability to button. The big difference is that the stun ability makes it so a vehicle cannot move OR fire their main weapon. This grants the T17 the power to take down Axis heavy armor all by itself; granted it isn't on a 1v1 basis, but if the tank is alone, it WILL die to a group of T17s. This really makes the Allies insanely over powered, as long as they have the fuel to get to the T17 first- It's game over for the Axis team.

Watch this video and see how insanely powerful the T17 is. I have a replay someplace of four T17 Amored Cars taking out an Axis King Tiger right as it was called in. Talk about balance issues!

The video shows some very interesting information about the new units, in the opening scene you see three Geschutzwagens wrecking havoc on a US base on the map Wrecked Train, you can see the massive damage the both tanks seem to do to buildings. They manage to take down a supply yard in just three shots!

• Staghound Armored Car replaces the British Command Tank.
• The Kangaroo Carrier replaces the Cromwell tank.
• The T17 Armored Car replaces the M8 Armored Car.
• The M18 Hellcat replaces the M10 tank destroyer.
• Tiger tank “205” replaces the Blitz Tiger Tank.
• Schwimmwagen Type 166 replaces the Wehrmacht motorcycle (This unit was not in the video)
• Geschutzwagen replaces the Wehrmachts Stug IV.

I haven't had the chance yet to grab Tales of Valor and try out the new vehicles, but it seems that they all have alternate costs. Take the Geschutzwagen (or the GW); It replaces the Wehrmact Stug IV and it's alternate cost is 280 mp and 45 fuel. The Geschutzwagen's health is 375 compared to the 400 of the Stug and it can three hit a British Firefly. So it costs less manpower and five more fuel.. and you have a tank that can take down a building in three hits!

On the other hand, the Kangaroo (replaces the British Cromwell) just doesn't seem justified to me. The Cromwell is a tough and VERY useful call in for the British Engineers Doctrine. I use it as my sole anti tank when I play multiplayer with friends; I tend to just Lt stack and have a infantry blob of doom.

Here is the video of the new Tales of Valor units in action.

From a general standpoint, Dawn of War 2 isn't a direct clone of either the first Dawn of War game OR Company of heroes; It does a great job of taking elements from both games and mixing them together. My main gripe with the first Dawn of War was the massive army sizes and the "select all and attack" that people would end up doing ( I call it blobbing). That really meant that it wasn't much for micro and as long as you had superior numbers, you would win. Now, if you do that and rush headfirst into a heavy bolter squad, well, you are going to be regretting it. Your units will be supressed and unable to move if they rush into open terrain at that HB squad. At least Dawn of War 2 brought in the ability to retreat ( Hint: It is X on the keyboard, it took me a few games to figure it out). Retreating units take much less damage and head back to your base where you can reinforce.

With the changes in resourcing ( and NO base building) keeping at least one guy in your squad alive to reinforce at base is IMPORTANT. The smaller squad sizes and high req costs of units (for SM, it is 500 for the tactical SM squad) means that these units are spendy and it is MUCH cheaper to reinforce them as opposed to throwing them away. That and your units gain levels as they take out more enemy units, so keep them alive! Speaking of no base building, everything comes straight out of your HQ and you get the higher tier units by upgrades to your HQ. This does mean there isn't that much for units to actually build, but there are a massive variety of upgrades to choose from for your units. There is a choice of three commanders for each race in Dawn of War 2. Each commander has different abilities and are marked as offensive, defensive, neutral.

I really liked the gameplay and graphics of Dawn of War 2, but the voice acting isn't up to par to the original Dawn of War. Some people may find the gameplay radically different if you have never played Company of Heroes, so don't fret; I have Dawn of War 2 tips, tricks and stratgey for you! Most of the Company of Heroes tips and tricks I wrote about apply to Dawn of War 2.
Some specific Dawn of War 2 tips for you today are :

• Maintain a variety of troop types, don't go all out with single units. You want a balanced variety of attacks, up close melee hitters and ranged guys together. Try not to clump your dudes up though as you're vulnerable to grenades and other AoE weapons.
• Occupy buildings to keep your guys alive but watch out for grenades.
• If you're capping in Dawn of War 2 and you're attacked, unless you are a split second away from finishing the cap, stop capping, get into cover and fight. You take extra damage when capping and the advantage you gain from having the point capped is wasted if you lose a guy needlessly.
• If you target a unit and they retreat, your units will follow the retreating unit all the way into their base, so make sure you keep an eye on the major battles and watch the minimap for stray blue dots. This one got me a few times and it is annoying.

Overall, I would give the Dawn of War 2 beta an 8.5 out of 10. It really makes me want to purchase the full game when it comes out in February. Don't take my word for it though, when the beta opens up to everybody on January 28th, grab it and give it a try for yourself!
If you need any tips or pointers, or just want to play, leave a comment here OR add me on GFWL: MrMooseinator.

Update: If you are having issues with getting your Dawn of War 2 beta key to work, (usually because steam didn't insert it right). Open up regedit and go to HK_Current_User/Software/THQ/Dawn of 2 Beta/ to view the cd key.

if you are having problems with Games for Windows Live not accepting your username/password, just click the "sign in with another account" and enter your info. You should be able to log in then.

The news has hit the various gaming related news sites, but none of them seem to have any info on HOW one can get into the beta on the 21st of January. The Dawn of War 2 beta will be distributed via Steam and all that is required is a valid Dawn of War: Soulstorm cd key. The Dawn of War: Soulstorm key can only be used once; and is permanently tied to that Steam account as well. That will prevent people from sharing a cd key for Dawn of War 2 beta access. From the Relic Forums:

The Dawn of War 2 beta will be hosted via Steam and offered exclusively to Warhammer® 40,000™: Dawn of War - Soulstorm owners on January 21, followed by a worldwide public release on January 28. The beta will feature all four playable races, five multiplayer maps, and Microsoft’s Games for Windows - LIVE TrueSkill Matchmaking.

Another reason to love Dawn of War 2 is the fact that it will not include ANY kind of DRM--digital rights management--in the game. DRM is only a pain in the ass for the paying customer and pirates either strip it out or work around it anyways.

If you liked the gameplay mechanics of Company of Heroes, be sure to check out the Dawn of War 2 beta coming to Steam on January 21st.
Edit: I was able to get a Soulstorm key from a friend and will get a Dawn of War 2 beta review as soon as I can get my hands on it. Stay tuned for a Dawn of War 2 Beta Review!

It takes a coordinated push from two people to try and dislodge the British player once he gets setup on those fuels. So not only do you have to deal with him, it leaves his American team mate to fast tech to M8 Greyhounds or M10 Tank destroyers with the abundant fuel. To make it worse, is the fact that a SINGLE, well placed mortar pit can hit anywhere of importance on the map (if the British player goes Royal Artillery). So, I hope this Company of Heroes tip helps somebody counter an Allied push on Wolfheze. That or gives you some Company of Heroes strategy ideas for the future.

Now, my Company of Heroes video is all from what happens when the allied players get total map control ( and one Axis player doesn't want to drop). I play the American (Armor Company) player, and my friend Tanith plays British (Commandos!). The Panzer Elite player dropped after I was rushing tanks into his base, but the Wehrmacht player stayed till the very end and kept calling in the CoH off map infantry reinforcements. You know, the kind that comes AFTER your base is destroyed and Tanith decided to put an end to it with some Royal Commando det packs. Also, I would like to say that I love running over guys with tanks; that is all!

Here is the high rez version if you are so inclined.

Granted, it is way more effective when you have the mineplow on the front, and they are going to fix the instant suppress ability.

Now with axis tanks can do the same thing as well (well crush blobs of infantry) but it takes a bit more micro to do it. Today's video is from my friend Dukka, who likes to crush American infantry bastards. By moving his tanks in close, he can neutralize the American Riflemen and hope his opponent isn't looking or paying attention (mass stickies)

So if you watch that, all you really have to do is move a group of tanks right into the infantry ( in this case a bunch of Wermacht Panzer IV) and let the treads do the talking. A good player can see this coming and retreat his guys, but that doesnt help when you move the tanks right into their base to finish them off anyways. The only thing you really have to be worried about is letting those Company of Heroes riflemen get stickies on a tank, that really tends to mess them up.

So just keep in mind that in Company of Heroes, your tanks can be great infantry killing machines; whether it be Axis or Allied.

So what happens with some of these people is that are used to playing against the computers in Company of Heroes and are just now graduating into the "Big Leagues" and starting some real multiplayer games with four or more people. They are used to having a little performance decrease when playing local skirmishes, but when you play online, because of Relic's crappy netcode, you can seriously degrade the other players experiance if you don't turn down your settings. So hopefully this guide will get out there to some of the in-between players and help you enjoy the game more, and make your game run smooth!

So first we start with the issue that many don't even realize they have; Port Forwarding. Company of Heroes uses a peer to peer system, and you can greatly increase the amount of games you can get into by opening up UDP ports 6112 and 30260 (what the readme says is wrong for the ports needed for Company of Heroes). If you don't know how to do this with your router, do a google search with your router and how to do port forwarding, there should be plenty of guides out there. This will greatly increase your abillity to connect with other people in Company of Heroes.

Another excellent way of increasing performance in Company of Heroes is to mess with some video options. Now, you may think that you have a super computer (and you probably do!) but when you get into the larger games in Company of Heroes, you can really start to run into performance problems with your video settings if you have everything cranked to max.

A good start is to turn off Post Processing in the video settings; this will greatly reduce load times in Company of Heroes. It also will put less of a strain on your system. The rest of the options are pretty self explanatory in the video settings. Try turning down AA and look at tweaking the texture detail. The texture detail will eat your ram alive if you set it to high and will increase your load times. Also, for the love of the deity, DO NOT USE DX10!. It currently is poorly optimized and will greatly hurt your Company of Heroes performance.

Another way to increase your performance in Company of Heroes is to turn down the Physics. The physics in Company of Heroes can use up a lot of CPU power when trying to determine the path of flying bodies and bits of buildings. If you turn it off, you won't get all the flying bodies, but then again, your computer won't lag out when artillery hits in CoH.

Overall, the biggest thing to increasing performance in Company of Heroes is to know when your computer is struggling, and turn down those settings for the benefit of the people playing with you. But you cannot do that while in a game, so do it afterwards, or better, before you get in the game! Also, you will decrease your load times by keeping the textures and other settings on medium/low, and it will still look really good; and people won't yell at you for ruining their game!

So play around with the different settings in Company of Heroes and try and find a balance for the types of games you usually play, (1v1s, 2v2s, etc).

A great Company of Heroes tip is to use the mini map to your advantage. It is a great and efficient way to move around the map quickly, and locate key areas of intrest. The tactical map is another great way to keep an eye on things. To access the tactical map, just hit the numpad zero key.

Another great CoH tip has to deal with your precious Armor. The worst thing you can do when your tank runs into an anti-tank gun or another tank, is to let it show it’s rear armor. The rear armor is less protected than the front, and this means your tank will more than likely die as it retreats. So what you do is to select the tank(s) and then do the drag and click method from above. Make sure you keep the command close to the tank and face the arrow in the direction of the attack; this will make your tank reverse to that point instead of turning around and showing its rear end. Be warned though, the path finding in Company of Heroes can ruin this… keep an eye on your tanks!

Also, try to learn how each tank moves and try not to put tanks in too large of groups, that path finding will make you pull your hair out. Also, make sure you know what tanks are good against what targets. The Panzer Elite PIV will only kill infantry; it will NOT kill a Sherman (it can sometimes kill a Stewart). With some of the faster tanks, a good tactic is to have one engage and take the focus of the enemy tank and use it to show its rear to your other tanks. This way your tanks will get better penetration and you will kill it quicker.

To help keep your unit’s moving towards the front, use Rally Points. All you have to do is click on the building and then right click someplace on the map (or another unit).

To help keep your units alive and well in Company of Heroes, a great tip is to put them into good cover. If you move your cursor over some cover, it will bring up a green (best) yellow (so-so) or red (negative cover) shield icon. Always try to keep your units in green cover, as it is the best kind of cover. Stay away from red cover, because your units will take more damage than normal.
A CoH tip regarding machine guns (and houses in general); houses and bunkers have better than green cover, but not all houses are created equal. Try to stay out of the wooden house (they burn up easily). Also, just try to stick with machine guns in the houses; if you put a riflemen unit in there, only a few of the squad members can fire out, while the enemy units can all fire at you.

That leads into the next Company of Heroes Tip; DON’T let the AI fight the battles for you. If you leave a unit alone, the Ai will more often than not.. kill it for you. It likes to move your guys out o cover to get a better position.

A Company of Heroes tip for keeping your units alive; make sure you know how each of your units goes against every other. Some units are better at long range, others are better at close range, cover will keep them alive longer. Some matchups require very little micro, others require a lot. This brings into the ability to micro well enough to “kite” a unit. So, constantly micromanaging your puma to stay at max range against the riflemen’s sticky bombs (while still doing damage and killing the unit).

The game that led up to the point of this video was pretty bland. We went for early map control, and then teched for M8 greyhounds and Half tracks. (remember, fuel is VERY important for this strategy). I had went Weapons Support Center and Airborne doctrine, and my team mate Armor with Riflemen instead by building the Barracks.

So, thankfully, the guy we were going against was nice and decided to stay in to watch the fireworks show. Again, this is a great video of why Company of Heroes has such a great physics engine (even if it is rag doll based). I wish I could have gotten more time of the explosions in action, but the Bombing Run and Calliope pretty much destroyed the guy's HQ.

So my first Company of Heroes tip is all about if you use the keyboard or the mouse? Personally, I use the keyboard mostly for the shortcuts (the F keys select your base structures) and the mouse for just about everything else. To play effectively in Company of Heroes it takes a mixture of both.

Now, a Company of Heroes tip on camera control; for those of you who are REALLY new to Company of Heroes, this tip is for you. If you hold the Alt key and drag the mouse, it will rotate the camera. To reset it, double tap the backspace button. I hardly use the camera in other position than default.

A big CoH tip for those of you who play 2v2s and up in Company of Heroes, communication is key. You have two options: Hit the enter button to talk to your teammates, and hit shift+enter to trash talk the enemies.

Now we move onto tips and tricks for Company of Heroes dealing with managing your units in the game. First off, lets talk about Control Groups; Control groups are made by selecting a group of units and hitting CTRL + a # (such as 1 through 10). After you make that control group, you can select it again by hitting that number, and if you double tap that number, it will center the screen to that control group. If those units are spread apart, Company of Heroes will do its best to center.

To add a unit to an existing control group, hit the number for that group and add the unit by holding shift and selecting it. Once you have all the units you need, just do the CTRL+ # again to update the control unit.

To drop a unit from that control group, just un-select that unit by hitting SHIFT + Click and then reform the control group by doing CTRL +#

A really good Company of Heroes tip is to use your function keys to the fullest. F1 usually selects your HQ, F2 your barracks, etc. If you hit that function key twice, it will center the screen to that location. You can also select your buildings by using the little row on the user interface on the control bar (they are usually small, yellow buttons).

To move between members of a control group, use the tab button and shift+tab. To select all the on screen units of a specific type, use CTRL+ Left Click. Another great Company of Heroes tip is to use the buttons to cycle through your idle units. Use the “,” to go through builders, “.” (period) for infantry and “/” for vehicles.

This Company of Heroes tip is very important, I tend to see this quite a bit for newer players who don’t know how to properly face a machine gun or an AT gun. This tip deals with directional deployment; hold and drag with the mouse to set the direction a unit will face. Like I said, this is VERY important with AT guns and MGs

Another great Company of Heroes trick is to keep your units moving is to que orders. All you have to do is hold down SHIFT when you are giving your units orders. The units will do whatever you tell them in the order you set. This means you can use your engineers to cap a point (while you hold shift) select another point, and after they finish caping the first, they will automatically go to the next.

When your queued troops encounter an enemy, they will defend/seek cover/attack until the enemy dies or retreats before continuing the queue. If you want them to continue their assignment, you should cancel the queue and micro them manually until there are no enemies in sight.

It seems that I have way too many Company of Heroes tips and tricks for one post, so I will finish up my list and post the rest soon. I do hope that this advice will help out the newer Company of Heroes players and maybe even teach the old dogs some new tricks!