Due to some demand that I’ve seen and the desire to spread some amount of gameplay knowledge amongst the halo wars community who need it I have written a basic 2v2 guide. This is written in the hopes that maybe some players will improve in this playlist, and hopefully I’ll get some better games. The only games I play that are even close anymore are ones where me and my partner run terrible combo for the hell of it, or thew enemy team pulls off a completely fluke thing by sheer luck (most of the times this is a cheese). This guide will cover the basics of 2v2 in a general overview, by detailing what your goals should be to win. It will also include a basic overview of the highest regarded leader combos in today’s 2v2 meta. Specifics such as step by step build orders, and times at which you should have certain units or tech will not be covered since a lot of that is very situational. This guide will be split up into the combos being covered, and then detail what you need to accomplish with these combos on specific maps.
All combos:
This section goes for all combos in this, and even all combos in general. These are things that really just make my day to see, because when you do any of these things you are handing your opponent the game on a silver platter.
1.On crevice, repo and docks… for the love of god EXPO! Your UNSC should always expo when possible, period. It blows my mind when I play a team with a cutter that doesn’t expo, that’s your whole advantage as cutter, use it!
2.Learn to use a d bomb. The amount of d bombs that I seen are thrown that are nothing more than waste of 450 resources is appalling. If I am raging your tanks with my arbiter, and you drop a d bomb, you better be almost certain you’re killing my arbiter. If you have two stock tanks and d bomb my arbiter, I’m going to take a little bit of damage, walk out of the d bomb and recall. You now don’t have a d bomb for 6 minutes, wasted 450 resources, and didn’t kill anything either.
3.Hogs, use them. The sooner you get over the whole “rushing is nooby” thing the sooner you can stat getting good at this game. As any combo in this guide you should be building some amount of hogs with at least gunner in almost every situation on every map. Four hog gunner may not sound like much but it’s quite effective for helping your covey with base damage on their covey and will get you an extra pad kill or two at least. Also, gauss is OP. The only thing that effectively fights large gauss numbers on this game are tech 2 arbiters, and canister shell/PT tanks. This doesn’t mean go gauss every game, but don’t discredit it as an option.
4.Unit composition. If you are still under the delusion that all units on this game have a purpose, let me tell you a little secret. NO! As covey you are building vamps/banshees in every situation except if you’re a brute on labyrinth. You build your unique unit/grunts for rushing but keep in mind these are worthless once tanks stat rolling out. As a UNSC you are building hogs/tanks. Gremlins can be used but are risky, since they get torn up by arbiters, and if you lose air lead, enemy banshees will drop them like nothing. UNSC only builds infantry for hooks and Spartans should be considered a luxury. Other than going quick spartan tank to push off a rushing arby, don’t build spartan unless you’ve already got a full pop of PT.
Anders/Brute:
The meta team of yesteryear has been removed from it’s former glory but is still a powerful combo when used correctly and has the added advantage of it’s arguably the easiest combo to run in this guide (especially if you’re the covey). Anders/Brute’s play style is predicated on the fact that your early game offense is more powerful than any other combo (double brute isn’t a combo it’s a joke) which allows you to have the most powerful rushes available. So your objective is to deal as much damage as you can for as little money as possible as early as you can. Then using that early lead to move into better units quicker, continuing to hold them down and then hopefully ending in the mid-game. The drawback to this is, if you are not able to deal significant damage cost effectively on your first push, you are forced to fight an uphill battle. Out of the three combos detailed in this guide this is the worst overall, but if you don’t have someone who can play Arbiter effectively then this will probably be what you end up running.
Since this combo is the only one in this guide that includes a brute I’ll cover this here. Since brute’s build order is the same and maybe has two variations to it that happen in a specific situation I’ll let you in on it. Temple 1st or 2nd (2nd is better but some map specific objectives make temple 1st preferred) 4 pads upgrade 2 ASAP, get citadel, Summit 6th and 7th, grab boost and double pump banshees. This is all while you are building a few brutes and rushing the enemy covey base. As the game goes on you must be aware that if your opponent gets vampires and kills your banshees, you are forced to get tech 2 and vamps as well, unless your teammate is going all gauss at which point it’s a judgment call. In an ideal situation they should not be getting a significant number of vamps at any point, since you will be denying their summits.
As far as map advantages for this combo, Anders goes hogs better than Cutter, and Cutter’s tanks on expo maps are better than Anders. On double base maps this usually means Anders for at least the first part of the game will be going more hog heavy since she can’t match Cutter’s tanks and Cutter can’t compete with her hogs later on. Anders/Brute is arguably the best combo for Beasley’s though Forge is able to make more money off the hooks and if played correctly the Brute will get shutdown so the map advantage then tips in Arbiter’s favor. They are easily the best combo on Crevice with Brute’s early offense shutting down an Arbiter and Anders ability to become an absolute monster with reactors.
Beasley’s Plateau
One of this map’s nicknames is Brute’s Plateau, because if left unchecked Brute will run this map, steal your hooks, rofl around on your base with full pop of banshees and there will be nothing you can do about it. As Brute on this map you are going temple 1st, period. No situation will change that so get used to going temple 1st on this map every time as Brute. When your temple is finished send your chieftain to your hook (the two free building spots) while you que up a brute squad, set rally point on lift and when the brute ports through put him in the garrison and send your chieftain to the closest enemy hook and repeat the process. As brute you will take your hook and both enemy hooks if they don’t keep this in check, I’ll describe how to do that in the other sections. Once you have taken all the hooks you can, get air lead. Air lead wins this map because of it’s size and distance between bases. If you don’t have air lead (less banshees) get tech 2 ASAP and build vamps to take back air lead. This map is covey run because of the importance of air lead so your primary target should be the opposing covey, if their covey doesn’t have summits and you do, you win this map.
We ran that combo for years. And the Cutter/Arby thing is just my personal gripe, I feel the game would be so much more interesting if decent players stepped out of their comfort zone and explored some other options. We tend to run double random all or Anders/Random covy and it’s so much fun.