Ethereal

From RelicWiki

This article is part of the Dawn of War Player's Guide. From RelicWiki

Dawn of War Commander Unit

Ethereal
Race	Tau
Version	Dark Crusade v1.2 Soulstorm v1.2
Build Info
Hotkey E	Build Cost 175 200  0 Build Time 40 s Built From Coalition Center Unit Size 1 Requires Nothing Limit 1
Unit Stats
Hitpoints	950/2
Armour	Commander
Morale	300/10/50
Unit Mass	10
Move Speed	16
Sight Radius	30 (detection 30)
Attachable	No
Weapons
Ranged	None
Melee	Ethereal Honour Blade

Contents 1 Ethereal 1.1 Holograph Bugs in Dark Crusade 2 Tactics 3 Abilities 3.1 For The Greater Good 3.2 Summon Shas'Ui Bodyguard 3.3 Holographic Projection 3.4 Air Caste Bombardment 4 Weapons 4.1 Ethereal Honour Blade 5 The Dawn of War Player's Guide

Ethereal

"Banish your fears."

The Tau Ethereal Caste is surrounded by mystery, but is believed to be the de facto leaders of the Tau Empire. Although not trained as warriors, they do sometimes join the Fire Caste on the front lines to oversee the battle. Seeing as the Ethereals are the most important figures in the Tau society, such an event generally raises the fighting spirit among the troops. However, the Ethereal can also provide more concrete support by lending his personal Shas'Ui Bodyguard to serve under the Tau Commander as well as providing bombing coordinates to the Air Caste. In addition, the Ethereal can detect infiltrated units.

Holograph Bugs in Dark Crusade

Holographic Projections are supposed to have the same health and armor as the original, but there are a number of bugged units in Dark Crusade. Vespid Stingwing Strains have 250, Pathfinder Teams have 250, Kroot Shapers have 1000, Kroot Hound Packs have 1200, the Greater Knarloc has 6500, Drone Squads have 800, Drone Harbingers have 2500, and Hammerhead Gunships have 3200 and also have vehicle high armor.

Tactics

The Ethereal's primary purposes are to provide passive bonuses to Tau units and summon a free Shas'Ui Bodyguard squad. The presence of an Ethereal grants 200 extra HP and morale to every Tau unit and building, even Harbinger Drones and Snare Traps (only in Dark Crusade), which boosts most Tau units' health by more than 50%. Shas'Ui Bodyguard squads possess the longest base range of any infantry unit in the game and have extremely high durability.

The Air Caste Strike ability is powerful, but difficult to use. It takes a full 20 seconds for the strike to expand from its center to its edge, but it covers a tremendous ground area once it is fully spread out and functions very effectively at area denial for its duration.

The major challenge with Ethereals is to keep them alive. The best way to do this is to keep the Ethereal in your base, at the rear of your army, or hiding in a Devilfish Troop Carrier, although the latter option will disable his bonuses to the Tau army. The latter option is necessary against Imperial Guard, whose Vindicare Assassin can quickly eliminate the Ethereal. A holographic projection of your Ethereal can be used to draw fire while the real one makes an escape. The holograms can also be used as decoys to absorb damage, good candidates are Krootox, the Greater Knarloc and Hammerhead Gunships. Another note is that holograms of Pathfinder Team can be useful too, as their shots still slow down the enemies that they hit, as well as also being useful as (temporary) detectors. The Ethereal is one of the only three units in the game that gain their keep whether in or out of battle, the other two being the Eldar's Avatar of Khaine and the Sisters' Living Saint.

Ethereals are also capable melee fighters as far as Tau go, but it is best that this only be a last resort due to their frailty and importance in providing a boon to Tau units, and the fact that if he dies, this will also severely weaken your forces.

Abilities

For The Greater Good

	For The Greater Good
	Requires	Nothing
	Target Types	All friendly units and buildings
	Range	0
	Area of effect	Infinite	Cooldown time	Passive ability
Effects	An innate and passive ability that adds 200 health and morale to all Tau units except Snare Traps and Harbinger Drones (In Dark Crusade all units are affected). However, should the Ethereal be killed all friendly units and buildings within a radius of 150 suffer 100 points of physical damage, 500 morale damage, and don't call out their status for 10 seconds.

Summon Shas'Ui Bodyguard

	Summon Shas'Ui Bodyguard			Hotkey: S
	Requires	Nothing
	Target Types	Own unit
	Range	0
	Area of effect	0	Cooldown time	120 s
	Cost	2
Effects	Summon a team of Shas'Ui Bodyguards. Limit of 1 squad.

Holographic Projection

	Holographic Projection			Hotkey: H
	Requires	Nothing
	Target Types	Any Tau squad or vehicle
	Range	10
	Area of effect	0	Cooldown time	45 s
Effects	Summons a holographic copy of the targeted unit. The copy's attacks do no damage and it takes triple damage from all weaponry, but take no morale damage. Most units have the same health and armor class as the copied unit (see above). Cloned units will automatically disappear after 60 seconds.

Air Caste Bombardment

	Air Caste Bombardment			Hotkey: B
	Requires	Nothing
	Target Types	All
	Range	40
	Area of effect	30	Cooldown time	110 s
Effects	An orbiting Air Caste ship concentrates its weaponry onto the targeted location, providing destruction on a wide scale. Targets closer to the center of the blast suffer extra damage: area of effect 6, 200-300 damage with 200 minimum damage, 10 morale damage, same armor piercing as main blast. The blast takes 20 s to expand from the impact point to its maximum area of effect, throwing back infantry as it grows (30-55 force).
Damage Values Infantry Vehicles Buildings Daemons Base Damage Low Med High H.Med H.Hi Cmdr Low Med High Air Low Med High Med High Morale Min Max Min.D 100-450 100-750 100-750 100-750 100-750 100-375 100-750 100-750 100-750 - 100-450 100-150 100-150 100-525 100-750 10 100 750 100

Weapons

Ethereal Honour Blade

	Ethereal Honour Blade
Damage Per Second Values Infantry Vehicles Buildings Daemons Morale Base Damage Low Med High H.Med H.Hi Cmdr Low Med High Air Low Med High Med High DPS Base Min Max Min.D Initial DPS: 11.3 22.5 18.8 15.0 11.3 3.8 5.6 2.5 2.5 2.5 5.6 2.5 2.5 7.5 2.5 1.3 2 25 35 2
Cost	Default Weapon	Range	Melee	Setup Time	0 s
Build Time	Default Weapon	Accuracy	100%	Refire Rate	0.8 s
Area of Effect	0	Requires	Nothing

The Dawn of War Player's Guide

The Dawn of War Player's Guide - Thought of the day: Knowledge is power, guard it well.
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