As development on Dawn of War 4 gathers pace like the Waaagh! of a planet-cracking Ork stampede, we’re getting a better sense of exactly how the real-time strategy Warhammer 40,000 game will play. King Art Games has already published numerous gameplay videos showing off competitive multiplayer, which will be an important part of the game, but how, exactly, will the Space Marines work?
You know the Space Marines, right? The poster boys of Games Workshop’s Warhammer 40,000 tabletop are more often than not the stars of the show when it comes to video game adaptations. From the Ultramarines to the Space Wolves, the Space Marines have been leading the Warhammer 40,000 video game charge from day one. Indeed, the Dawn of War series’ Blood Ravens, which were created by original developer Relic Entertainment, are now firmly entrenched within the Warhammer 40,000 canon as a legit chapter of Space Marines.
In Dawn of War 4 the Blood Ravens return, but this time they have help in the form of the Dark Angels and, briefly during the campaign, their primarch, Lion El’Jonson. In this exclusive interview with director Jan Theysen, we go into detail on how the Space Marines actually work in Dawn of War 4, explore some winning strategies, and find out what sets them apart from the Necrons, Orks, and the Adeptus Mechanics. We’ve also got a batch of exclusive screenshots showing off the Space Marines in all their glory, which you can view via the slideshow below.
IGN: How would you describe the Space Marine faction in terms of how it plays and how its different from the other factions at launch?
Jan Theysen: The Space Marines are definitely the most elite faction we have in the game. You control relatively few units that are pretty expensive, but also very good in what they’re doing. You don’t want to lose them. You want to protect your guys, you want to upgrade them. There are a lot of different equipments and abilities and so on. If you have your small, super well-equipped Space Marine Strike Force, you really want to care about it. So, especially in the early game, you really don’t want to lose one of your units.
But the good news is that in the early game no other early game unit can defeat a Space Marine. They are the big boys. But also there are few. And so that is the challenge: wherever you are you are winning, but you are not everywhere.
IGN: What would you suggest as a good strategy for the Space Marines in multiplayer?
Jan Theysen: In Skirmish and in Multiplayer, it’s very important in general to get out there quickly, to capture resource points and so on. But there’s a little bit of a disadvantage for Space Marines, right? Because, compared to other factions, they can’t quickly capture all the different points because you don’t have that many units.
But whenever you see an enemy unit, you know you can probably kill it. So one good idea would be to go out there, maybe try to recapture enemy points pretty quickly because they can’t get you off of the point easily again. Be aggressive and go after the enemy and only retreat if the enemy has like, two or maybe three units attacking you. You know that at some point you might think about retreating, or you might think about, just stand your ground, maybe auto heal your unit and wait until reinforcements appear, because that is also something you can do as Space Marines. You’re relatively hard to kill. And so you can basically outlast even an overwhelming attack for some time, and wait or keep everybody occupied until the reinforcements arrive.
In general, the Space Marines can build anywhere on the map and they don’t need a builder unit. They just call in the buildings from orbit. And so that is something you can keep in mind. You can maybe put some of your production buildings next to resource points, or almost build a little bit of a secondary base somewhere closer to the front line maybe, so that when you produce units they are already where you need them. And you can also produce units in reserve, which basically means that instead of producing the units and then having it on the battlefield already, you have the unit in orbit and can bring it down via Drop Pod or via Thunderhawk, which gives you a lot of flexibility. Because basically, if there is a surprise attack somewhere else, or if you spotted maybe a point that is not super well defended, you can just bring more units in and really quickly capture this point. These shock and awe tactics, so to speak, is really something that Space Marines excel at.
IGN: What are some of the little details you added to the Space Marines that players will notice?
Jan Theysen: A lot has to do with equipment and weapons. So when the Space Marines level up, you can give them better weapons, but not necessarily just a straight better weapon, but you can then start to specialise them. The Intercessors, for example, you can go for longer range or for more like an Auto Bolter, which fires faster. And you can push the units in a certain direction. And this is also true if you have something like a Dreadnought. Do you want a Dreadnought that’s really strong against vehicles? Or do you want a Dreadnought that’s really strong against masses of infantry? And then you might pick a Gatling gun or you might pick a plasma gun. And so basically, Space Marines are super flexible.
To me they feel like in Dawn of War 1 where you had your units where you feel like, oh, these are my anti-infantry guys, and these are my whatever, and you build this little super specialised squad. Or maybe one or two units together. And then you have your hero killers or you have your vehicle destruction crew or something like that. And that is a lot of fun.
I think in general the Space Marines are probably one of the easier factions to play because you don’t have that many units you have to control at any point. And since they’re not that easy to kill, they forgive if you take a couple of seconds longer to realize that you’re under attack. But on the other hand, if you then lose a couple of them, or if there’s like a surprise attack from the enemy, it takes longer until you get back to full speed. Because not only do you have to buy a unit again if you lost a unit, but then you also have to upgrade them. And so you really want to make sure that you keep your units alive.
IGN: In terms of animation and design, how did you approach building the Space Marines so they don’t all run around looking like Buzz Lightyear?
Jan Theysen: I think we can all agree that Space Marines look badass, but this also comes with a lot of problems when you want to animate them, right? I mean, having these huge shoulders and having really restricted movement because of the armor and so on does not make your life easier. For the animators, it’s figuring out how can we make sure that they feel right in terms of, they are very strong and they are very massive, but they are also very quick. Which is a little bit of a problem, right? Because if you have someone who’s just very strong, but then very slow, you can easily communicate, okay, it’s like a muscle mountain and usually slow but super strong. But you also want to make them quick, right? And so it’s like, okay, if they’re just stronger and quicker than everybody, then they are again kind of normal humans.
How can we communicate this strength? If a Space Marine fights an Ork, or they can also fight in our game a Guard in Multiplayer or in Skirmish, then you really see the difference. Then you really see, okay, how big a Space Marine is and how powerful a Space Marine is compared to other units.
And this was also one of the reasons why we actually start the game or the tutorial with the Guards. Because we wanted to set the baseline first. Like this is normal people, normal soldiers basically. And these are Space Marines, and this is how much better the Space Marines are. Because in the end, if everybody is like a super warrior then nobody is a super warrior.
IGN: What are the most powerful endgame Space Marine units?
Jan Theysen: In general, compared to other factions, the Space Marines do not have like this one super unit at the end. But they have a strong roster all the way through. They might even be a little bit focused on infantry because they have definitely a lot of different options there, including Terminators and Bladeguards and Eliminators, so very different kinds of infantry.
But then at some point you get the Dreadnoughts, which are already nice, but then you get the tanks. We have the Gladiator in two different versions: the Lancer and the Reaper. And then we have the Redemptor Dreadnought, which is the biggest tank in the game and also one of the biggest units in the game.
But compared to, let’s say, an Imperial Knight, which is what the Ad Mech gets, they are not on the same level because they are still meant to be like a unit that you use in normal battles basically, or like in normal situations. So you might have two or three Reapers, you might have two or so Redemptor Dreadnoughts, and then you have your little tank strike force there. So it’s not like this, okay, you have one of those, and this is like super special, right?
IGN: Which characters are available for the Space Marines and how do they work?
Jan Theysen: The Space Marines actually have the most characters and also the most playable characters. We have two Blood Ravens and two Dark Angel characters in the game. The Blood Ravens are Cyrus, who is basically a sniper / infiltrator who can hide, and he has a very long range weapon and a lot of stuff that revolves around hiding and scouting. Then we have Jonah Orion, who is a Librarian. He, of course, has a lot of different spells and stuff he can do to AOE attack.
Then we have for the Dark Angels, Astoran, who is a Captain in Terminator armor. He is the tankiest of the commanders we have in the game. You can equip him offensively, defensively, range, melee, so he’s really, really flexible. But he is always super tanky. If you put him in a group with Bladeguards or other Terminators, that’s definitely a brick that’s hard to kill. And then lastly we have Ezrael, who is a Chaplain on Bike. And his main thing is, first of all, he’s fast because he’s an Outrider, but also, he can buff and motivate, so to speak, people around him. So he’s very good at making others around him fight better. But he’s also really a good character for just quick interventions. Because again, as a Space Marine, you have the problem that you can’t be everywhere at once, right? So attach him to a unit of Outriders and have him as a fire brigade — something is burning, go figure it out. He’s very, very useful for that.
IGN: Since the last time we spoke the game was pushed back to December. What are you now able to achieve that you wouldn’t have been able to otherwise?
Jan Theysen: It’s not like the one big thing we still wanted to do, right? It’s more like there are a bunch of different things that we got from feedback from playtests and so on, where we felt like, oh yeah, that would be good to have it, it would be nice. Also, sometimes things we said, okay, we’re probably not going to put it in the launch version, but then, that’s definitely a we should do later on.
And then when we talked about, okay, do we want to launch in September or December? We basically said, okay, if we start in December or, you know, late November for the preorder guys, we could just put a lot more of these nice to have, should haves, and so on into the game and also, of course, just polish everything more in terms of performance and visuals.
And, as you know, this September is very busy. So a lot of things came together. We basically said, okay, this is probably the right decision because in the end, it’s less than three months later, but we think the game is a lot better because of it.
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War 4 launches on PC on December 3, 2026.
Wesley is IGN’s Managing Editor. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
