Dawn of War II - Walkthrough - Day 7 extra deployment 1 - Vengeance for Davian Thule

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Mission 10 Vengeance for Davian Thule

• Day 7, extra deployment 1/2
• Fury 5, Resilience 5, Speed 2 (29 minutes; best time Speed 3, 19 minutes), no extra deployments awarded.
• Tyranid Infestation: Calderis 4 (3 after mission), Typhon 4.
• The choice of strategic points is between an Automated Foundry and a Shrine, both of which are very good. We are still aiming for maximum deployments, so we took the Automated Foundry.
• Either a Sniper Rifle and High Powered Shots or Tarkus as a Grenadier will help A LOT in this and all Tyranid missions. You can get by with Tarkus, so going for Advanced Infiltrate with Cyrus first is still viable.
• Tyranids have no vehicles and it is too early to have Carnifexes, so Melta Bombs and Plasma Guns are not necessary.
• There are a lot of Ripper swarms and a flamer is very useful here for quickly taking them out en masse. On Primarch difficulty, Ripper swarms are extremely dangerous in melee.
• Flamers have 100% accuracy and can hit an area (but reload frequently). Combined with supporting fire, you can sometimes just burn them all before they can close on you for long enough to disrupt your attack.
• A flamer counts as a ranged weapon, so if the squad using a flamer is engaged in hand to hand, they will not use the flamer.
• I prefer the flamer on the Force Commander because if you put it on Tarkus, his whole squad follows him to the flamer's engagement distance even though they will not have flamers of their own.
• Grenades are better, but only if you can lead your throw properly before you are engaged in melee.
• No squad is safe for very long (on Primarch difficulty) once a medium to large swarm of Rippers have engaged a squad in melee, even one with melee weapons. With melee weapons you can kill them faster, but they inflict a lot of damage quickly. Further, since you don't really want to be tied up in melee while enemies are shooting at you. Focus ranged fire from your other squads to clear them, or retreat and split up until shooters are clear to fire on the Rippers pursuing someone else.
• Tyranid Warriors with Barbed Strangers are all over the place. They are also very dangerous as a direct hit could possibly wipe out a whole squad, or most of it.
• When you are moving toward it and it fires, KEEP MOVING toward it or to the side. The flight arc is set and the pod will fly over and behind you. Then grenade it or shoot it during the cooldown phase of its weapon. Obviously the situation is much trickier if it is still surrounded by minions, so some initial hit and run could thin out the entourage before you engage it.
• Approaching from multiple angles will also help since it can only fire one pod every few seconds.
• A High-Powered Shot from Cyrus should be able to take out one of them in a single shot and is the best way. Infiltrate, snipe, and flee. Because nearby Tyranids are immediately knocked down by the loss of psychic connection, you could try immediately pressing your advantage with a grenade.
• To kill one with grenades you will probably need about three close hits. Tarkus helps a lot here if he has the Grenadier trait.
• Tyranid squads that have lost their Tyranid Warrior With Barbed Strangler detect as hostile by other tyranids and they do not pursue enemies very far.
• Spore Mines may detonate when near an uncollected WarGear drop. (Not confirmed.)
• Hive Nodes are immobile so you might as well use a Detonation Charge Pack since they can't run away from it. They take maybe 3 grenades to kill and launch Spore Mines that fly very quickly.
• Tyranid Warrior boss:
• It moves quickly, and mainly fights by running away to a leaping distance, then leaping.
• If you chase it, you can sometimes get it to keep running to try to get that minimum distance.
• When it leaps, you could try running TOWARD it or sideways because it has a fixed pounce distance and once it leaps it is committed. There is a small area of effect on its landing, however.
• Probably the best way to deal with it is to grenade it (or use a Demolition Charge Pack) when it has started its bioplasma attack as it won't move until a couple of seconds after the acid has launched. Blind Grenades also work well to create opportunities and should be able to let you call an Artillery Strike on it without it running away from the bombardment zone.
• If you have turrets, set up some OUTSIDE the arena around one of the exit paths and plant Avitus there as well (so you don't have to keep setting him up). The boss won't stay outside too long, so your turrets are safe from destruction. Use that path for retreat so that every time you have to run out, you're pulling it into the killzone.
• Once it starts calling Ripper Swarms (about 1-3 swarms are active on the map at a time), it will retreat to the centre of the arena and sit there, surrounded by the swarms.
• Things get really tedious because the Rippers are so dangerous on Primarch difficulty, so you can only whittle it down slowly before retreating from the swarm.
• You can try another entrance to see if the Rippers are further and that way just draw the Tyranid Warrior boss toward you to fight.
• Having Avitus positioned outside along one of the paths into the arena helps as you can shoot at the Rippers or the Tyranid Warrior when it pursues your squads
• Lining a line of retreat with landmines could also work but you might get blown up yourself because the Boss can run and pounce quickly, setting off mines that might be at or near your location. Also, mines have a very small detection radius so unless you choke off the entire width of your retreat path, it could very well run past unharmed.