Gabe: I think part of the malaise that Miguel feels in the perceptible lulls in Dawn of War 2 may have something to do with the fact that we picked up the co-op campaign (which is indiscernible from the solo campaign) from the very beginning. But I have a feeling something's missing - either from my perception, or from the game. What fills the void in Dawn of War 2? Tactics? I guess I can see it, especially during the boss fights. In an MMO, you're spamming Sinister Strike or something. In a Diablo-style game, you're holding down a mouse button to keep on swinging during these dense moments. In Dawn of War 2, I never felt harried there were a good 60 seconds between ability activations. I'm pretty sure that message board generals call this "actions per minute" - the number of commands you can send to your units in the span of 60 seconds, including ability activations, move orders, and attack commands. In the scenarios Gabe and I played, this meant two for each of us, which equals "something quite manageable", if you're thinking in terms of Diablo-style input-intensity. When playing co-op, all the units on your side are divided between you and your partner.
But the level to which this was so was a little surprising. The missions we played were evocative of a Diablo-style RPG, and I was sort of expecting that, since DoW2 eschews its predecessor's dirt-farming for Company of Heroes-style tactical play. Let's just say that I was missing those understated, crucial moments between cooldowns. Yes, all this talk of spamming and jamming is indeed pertinent to Dawn of War 2's co-op game, which Gabe and I got to play a few days ago.
The cooldown tends to be the decider - the "oh button that can save you from a durability hit, or the epilogue to an extended fight.
You spam heals to keep your party alive, or jam your bread-and-butter attacks to make the enemy's health bar drop. Miguel: In MMOs, the most important gameplay tends to happen in the seconds or minutes between ability cooldowns.
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