There are a few key ways of getting stars on a few important units. If your playing Covenant you’ll be wanting to get stars on your leader, and if your playing UNSC you’ll be wanting to get stars on your valued units or Spartans. Here’s a quick guide to give the basics…

Your stars basically come from kills (buildings and units), so to get them you’ll need to concentrate on both getting those kills, and keeping your unit alive. If you lose it, you lose all the progress you made. The speed in which your units will gain stars depends on their population size. For example, a Warthog will gain 1 star from destroying a few infantry units. A squad of Jackals will gain a star from killing just a couple of Marine squads; these are examples of the lower population units (1). However a Scarab will have to kill close enough to a whole army before it gains a Veteran star, likewise with other high population units (Vultures etc).

Starter bases: The rebel and Forerunner bases at the start of each map provide the biggest opportunities to start your kills off. If you want to have your Spartan, Leader, or unit on their way to Star level, make sure you’re taking advantage of the kills on offer. The rebel watch towers and turrets each provide a point score and count as a kill, so destroy them individually, starting with the turrets, then the rebel units, then watchtowers, then the base its self. Just one base is normally enough to gain you a star on your unit(s); it’s that simple.

Hooks: Hooks like reactors, barriers, tele-porters and mega turrets are all guarded by rebel infantry, and provide more kills for you to concentrate your unit on. Taking these areas out means more contribution towards your veterancy, even if you’re not going to use the hook its self.

AH, ah, ah, ah staying alive: It’s not good working your way to Veterancy if your just going to die within the game, keep your units alive and this will give you and your Veteran stars the edge in battle. If your playing as Covenant always recall your leader in plenty of time when attacking. If your using Spartans and the vehicle they’re in is destroyed, don’t leave them wondering around the battlefield taking fire – get them in a new vehicle as soon as possible so you don’t lose them. If you have general units with a star, place them at the back of your army, so they are out of harms way, but still doing the damage.  Don’t forget to heal as you go, which will lengthen the life of your units and increase your overall game multiplier.

Remember, getting Veteran stars on units increases their attack and defense level, so having them can mean the equivalent on another 5-10 population in your force; it’s worth working towards.

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The first thing to note in Halo Wars is that every single unit has a purpose, some stronger, more expensive and valuable than others; but generally they all do their bit…

Rock, Paper, Scissors: If you’ve played RTS games before you’ll no doubt be aware of this term. Every kind of unit has it’s counter unit, which is specifically designed and built to destroy it. There’s no ‘super unit’ which is indestructible in Halo Wars. So lets look at the basics…

Check out these Rock, Paper Scissors triangles, the arrows represent their direction of most damage. The damage each unit delivers can vary massively, and these triangles represent each unit countering another. The general theory is that Vehicles beat infantry, infantry beat Aircraft, and Aircraft beat vehicles, like we see in the diagram below…

However this only really applies to mainline (general) units, and there are numerous exceptions which turn this triangle around and mixes things up, and the complicated bit starts…

In Halo Wars each unit possess the ability to ‘hard’ and/or ‘soft’ counter another unit. Some units are only a soft counter to a number of units, some units are a hard counter to one type of unit, and a soft counter to just a few. On top of that, some units have a ‘Y’ ability which can create a hard counter even though they are naturally a soft counter to it. For example the ‘Vulture’ can release its ‘barrage’ ability which can be devastating to almost any unit, even though its toughest against vehicles; and the ‘Vampire’, which is purely designed to destroy air units, even though the RPS chart suggests it should be a vehicle counter. The Wolverine can be upgraded so it delivers a ‘barrage’ which can do increased damage against buildings.

Below are some more unit specific counter triangles to provide more examples of the system:

So how to learn these ‘complicated’ exceptions to the ‘Rock Paper Scissors’ triangle? Well the best way is experience, but the information bar on the menu HUD will help you out too. When you build units it will state their description on the right hand side; take your time to read this, as it’ll tell you what that units specifically designed to do. This applies to improving your units too, when you upgrade them the information will describe what that upgrade does, and what it’s designed for.

Lastly, these charts will help you through whats a hard counter and whats a soft counter, unit vs unit. Study it and try new things, you might find that you’ve been missing out on some great units.

UNSC unit counters (click to enlarge):

Covenant unit counters (click to enlarge):

Thanks to the Halo Wars developer blog for these image assets, and be sure to check out their post about the combat system of Halo Wars, which goes in to more statsticial detail about the game and damage settings.

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If you know your units, you’ll be aware that some are ‘soft’ counters and some are ‘hard’ ones. This means certain units will deliver more damage to another type of unit, and are build for a specific task. For example, Wolverine is an anti air unit, and a hard counter to anything that flies, but a soft counter to anything else.

Units: With the Turtle strategy you want to be focusing your force around hard counters to what your opponents making. The first thing you want to do when Turtling (after you’ve established you won’t be rushed), you want to be scouting your opponent to see what units he is going to go for. If you haven’t been rushed, they are most likely going to be turtling themselves,  or ‘Booming’. Either way you will have time to get yourself together.

If your opponent is ‘Booming’ they’ll be going for their super units most likely, although scouting them will certify this. All super units have a hard counter, so make sure you get these fully upgraded and ready. If your playing UNSC upgrade your Spartans too.

Digging in: So your production and research is under way, now you have to decide what and where your going to defend. Most maps have obvious ‘choke’ points where your opponent is forced to go if they want to attack, if your facing vehicles or infantry, these are good places to place your forces. If they have aircraft, they’ll most likely attack the most important thing; your base.

Save for a rainy day: Turtling is a good strategy to get mega points, personally my top 5 games have been from Turtling. But there does come a time when the game has to come to a close, for time’s sake and because there is actually a points cap on this game; so there’s no point in going on forever.

Make sure while your defense is doing it’s job, your upgrading every unit available. Even if your Anders, upgrade your Marines. You will need a force to ‘finish’ the game, and this could consist on any unit. Hard counters are good for defending what your opponent is making, but if they change their unit production to counter you you’re in trouble.

Finish the fight: Finishing is one of the hardest things when Turtling, as it’s likely your at a stalemate with your opponent. Playing 1v1 is even harder, you have to either do a gradual push and take your time with attacking them, gradually taking one base at a time and weakening his economy and production capabilities; or you can ‘steamroll’ him by attacking non stop unit the games done.

If your playing in teams it’s slightly easier, as one of you can focus on continuing to defend while the other launches the attack, being gradually reinforced by the other player(s).

Turtling can be quite a slow pace of game, with matches lasting for 1, 2 or even 3 hours.

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