I liked DoW1 and hated DoW2, just saying.
Edit: I suppose I should elaborate.
The GRIMDARK atmosphere that made DoW1 awesome is completely gone; all the maps in DoW1 were blasted wastelands with over-the-top gothic architecture and rivers made of blood, and when units get into battle there's constant screaming and long-winded battlecries, it's just hilarious and a lot of fun. In DoW2 you fight in bright green jungles and your units are mostly silent. When I click on my Space Marine, I want him to say "IDLENESS LEADS TO HERESY!!" not "Yes brother"; in DoW1 they sounded pissed off all the time and now they're just boring.
Yes some of the atmosphere is gone but it went the way for far more polish IMHO. I will agree I found DoW1's voices far more humorous, although the Orks in DoW2 still have hilarious lines that get me every time.
Aesthetics aside, I don't like how the game plays out. I only played in beta but what I've heard from other people echoes my observations. Capture points barely do anything anymore and are indefensible, so there's nothing aside from holding victory points that's going to give you an edge over your opponent.
Umm, you lose if you don't have control points. That IS your economy, and if you don't defend your points from harrassment/capturing, you will lose. You don't defend your power farm, and you're going to lose the tech race HARD.
If you just prioritize VPs and ignore everything else you will lose, simply put. They will have the econ to just steamroll you back to your base and camp you in.
Attacking their base does nothing, you can't feasibly destroy it. In other words, you don't have to defend anything (because you either don't need to or can't) and the maps are quite large; so basically you can run around in circles and never seriously engage the enemy if you don't want to. There's nothing to fight over except victory points anyway.
That may be the case in 1v1, but in 2v2/3v3, you are forced to combat eachother, not just play musical capping chairs. And I've gotten base kills a multitude of times, they're hardly invulnerable.
I understand that they were trying to go for guerilla combat or whatever but if there's nothing to harass - like a base - it's pointless.
Erm, there's lots to harrass. You're fighting within the first 30 seconds, and if there's a break in combat you're doing something wrong (and letting the enemy gather strength and put you at a disadvantage). If you're not killing their units, you're decapping their points or setting up defensive positions, or destroying their power gens. If you're just idling you're wasting time and losing.
I agree that the first two minutes of building workers and a barracks in standard RTS is boring but this is not the way to fix it.
Like I said it's not for everyone. Personally I'm glad to be rid of having to know how to perfectly orient my barracks to get the optimal timing for my refinery and second supply depot. And when I tier up I don't have to worry about "did I build all the prerequisites I needed?"
If the game has changed significantly through patching (I doubt it, lol Relic) or with this expansion I might be willing to take another look at it, but I haven't heard anything to that extent.
Laugh all you want but Relic has done a fine job supporting this game, and fixing a lot of issues that were present. And it looks like the great support will continue. Other than Starcraft I've yet to see a multiplayer RTS given such attention to detail, even if sometimes they're a little off with balancing.
