Dune: Spice Wars The Baron: Harkonnen Guide

Introduction

Harkonnen is objectively the coolest faction in the game. They're BRUUUUTAL!

In this guide I will give a outline of how to play Harkonnen covering councillor selection, development paths, armoury loadouts and main base building selection, victory conditions to prioritise and a summary of the Baron's strengths and weaknesses as I have observed after many multiplayer games on the exciting new Heroes of Dune patch!

My goal is for this to serve as a quick resource for you to tab into and read while you wait in the lobby and perhaps peek at during the match! This is my first guide so any feedback or criticism is welcome!

Faction Bonus

- Oppress Everything

- Max out Villages with Heavy Militia ASAP so you can build Office of Order and Oppress Everything.

- Sacrifice Agents on expensive operations or urgent operations

- Pillage Pillage Pillage (After researching Instil Fear)

Councillors

TLDR: Always Take Cron Vatia, Chose between either Umman Kudu & Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen. Piter De Vries is meh.

The most essential in my opinion is Cron Vatia, simply because, most villages benefit from the Office of Order. Any village you put an Office of Order in, also put a Recruitment Office. Hark burn through manpower like no other faction. At least 70% of your villages should have Offices of the Order and therefore trigger rebellions. Taking Vatia means, Rebellions = Money. Simply too good to pass up.

The next Councillor Umman Kudu is excellent if you can't be bothered with Laandsrad. As Hark you always want Combat Drugs and Sleeper Agents Operation active when you are fighting so you're guaranteed the +1 Armour but the main gain is quicker replenishment. Harkonnen already excels in drawn out attritional battles due to the Sleeper Agents, Split Cerebus' and Troopers fighting on for 5 seconds after running out of health. It's not uncommon to train more units and run them into a battle depending on airport placement, this is even more common with Kudu as your councillor.

Feyd-Rautha combines very well with Cron Vatia. Since Vatia is a must pick, you build lots of Offices of Order. Before long there will always be a village under oppression. This means Feyd-Rautha's Influence gain and Agent Recruitment bonus will effecively become permanent. Added to that the Laandsrad corruption ability is an excellent way to overcome Harkonnen's mediocre diplomacy by discouraging other people from taking resolutions you'd like to vote for yourself even if another player has more votes.

Piter De Vries used to be really cool but this patch you simply don't get enough brainwashed agents to spam the sacrifice ability enough to make use of him. Plus once your research Advanced Questioning and have many villages permanently oppressed Harkonnen doesn't struggle with intel production so the discount isn't really needed. He's not bad by any means but what makes him a "bad" choice in my opinion is the opportunity cost of picking Piter over the other Councillors.

Always take Cron Vatia. Never take Piter De Vries. How to choose between Umman Kudu and Feyd-Rautha? I make this decision depending on the other factions in the lobby. Below I will list each of the other factions and my preferred councillor for each. You can then decide who to pick base on how many pro Feyd or pro Kudu matches are in your lobby.

Atreides: Prefer Feyd-Rautha

Corrino: Prefer Kudu*

Ecaz: Prefer Feyd-Rautha

Fremen: Prefer Kudu

Smugglers: Prefer Kudu

Vernius: Prefer Feyd-Rautha

* Corrino is usually a political threat which Feyd's ability is useful against but I often times find myself needing to kill them as the biggest CHOAM threat for Harkonnen and Hark rarely beats Corrino in a straight up fight often needing to opt for long drawn out battles where Kudu helps enormously with his recruitment speed boost. Furthermore the Emperors ability to swap resolutions from affecting elected factions to all factions and vice versa can often interfere with Feyd's corruption ability.

Developments

The opening Development as Harkonnen is very consistent. In 99% of games I open with the following 8 techs in order:

01) [RED] Survival Training

02) [RED] Arrakis Butchers

03) [GREEN] Local Dialect Studies

04) [GREEN] Instil Fear

05) [YELLOW] Work Ethics

06) [GREEN] Lay of the Land

07) [YELLOW] Advanced Engineering

08) [YELLOW] Martial Economy

You should only deviate from this if there is a Laandsrad research boost or malice to capitalise on or avoid.

After these 8 developments you should develop depending on your situation.

Ideally the next developments to pursue are:

09) [YELLOW] Modular Parts

10) [YELLOW] CHOAM Integration

11) [YELLOW] Crew Training Program

12) [RED] Recruitment Initiative

13) [BLUE] Intelligence Network

14) [BLUE] Spying Logistics

15) [YELLOW] CHOAM Support

16) [RED] Parallel Training

17) [RED] Adrenaline Addiction

If you are experiencing early aggression due to a close neighbour, contested spice field, or the Fremen being rambunctious it is encouraged to deviate from the above tech path and develop the 3 essential red techs (Recruitment Initiative, Parallel Training & Adrenaline Addiction) for earlier Command Points and Training Slots. After you get these you can defend yourself and continue researching as outlined above.

18) [BLUE] Enhanced Questioning

19) [GREEN] Local Hubs

20) [GREEN] Civilian Defence Force

21) [BLUE] Cruel Reputation

22) [BLUE] Counter Measures

23) [RED] Mechanisation

Final Techs depend on your situation, if you just want to bunker down with extra missile batteries while you push for your preferred CHOAM win condition, research:

24) [GREEN] Border Defence

If you are assassinating somebody research:

24) [BLUE] Spying Mastery

25) [BLUE] Nefarious Contacts

If you're against Corrino and/or destroying bases research:

24) [RED] Siege Incentives

If you've got lots of special regions and want to pursue Hegemony using Crafts Workshops as a backup win condition research:

24) [GREEN] Savage Cleansing

25) [GREEN] Symbols of Authority

Main Base Buildings

TLDR: My Preferred Main Base Build Order:

1) [1 slot] Administrative Hall

2) [1st 3 slot position 1] Mason Guild Hall

3) [1st 3 slot position 2] Recycling Vats

4) [1st 3 slot position 3] CHOAM Branch

5) [1st 2 slot position 1] Recruitment Centre

6) [2nd 3 slot position 1] Research Centre

7) [2nd 3 slot position 2] Intelligence Agency

8) [1st 2 slot position 2] Command Post

9) [2nd 3 slot position 3] Interrogation Centre

10) [2nd 2 slot position 1] Military Academy

11) [2nd 2 slot position 2] Barracks

Cathag has one of the best Main Base Configurations in the game. A single 1 slot district, two 2 slot districts and two 3 slot districts,

In my opinion, build the administrative hall in the 1 slot first then rush to fill the first 3 slot district with yellows ASAP. then one of the 2 slot districts with reds. I then build the second three slot district up with blues. Finally I finish second 2 slot district with reds. Either at the very end or right after filling the yellow 3 slot. This rounds out your district bonuses as +10% Solari Production, 2 x +1 Armour to Military Units, +100 Votes and a miscellaneous +15% development boost.

The 10% Solari Bonus ASAP is self explanatory. I opt for +2 Armour > +20% max Health (3 slot red) because as Harkonnen with the armoury gear I chose, I want the Cerberus to die and split due to Elacca Injector as soon as possible (this also can spawn a sleeper agent). Then I want all the Unchained Cerberus and Sleeper agents to die relatively quickly in order for Executioners to gain stacks of Bloodthirsty ASAP. Similarly Troopers do more damage at a lower percentage of their total health pool. Scarring Armour and Morbid Climax help them survive as long as possible at that lower health dealing maximum damage. For this reason I think stacking armour, through Rabban, gear and now building slots is preferable to increasing max health. This choice of armour over health then enables Harkonnen to go for 200 votes which can catch people off guard since Harkonnen is usually not a big player in the Laandsrad!

Armoury

There are two ways to gear the BRUTAL Harkonnen military and they depend on your Councillor and Hero selection.

The first is what I call the "Beefy Build" This can be done with any combination of councillors and Rabban as your hero. The Beefy Build is all about stacking armour and prolonging death, then utilising Rabbans ability your hurl this ball of tanky units into the enemy. No Micro, no Finesse, there is nothing elegant about it. The army composition should consist mainly of Troopers, Cerberus and Executioners. Plus Rabban the flying Overlord Flagship and 1-3 Gunners. Harkonnen Gunners are only really useful for dealing with flying units so the amount of these you bring to battle should depend on whether or not your opponents have flying units.

Below is my recommended unit gear for the Rabban "Beefy Build"

And an example army composition:

The second build is the "Horde" Build. This requires the Councillor Umman Kudu and his 20% recruitment speed increase plus the Hero Iakin Nefud

TBC

Gameplan

In a nutshell your goal as Harkonnen is to make buckets of money and monopolise the CHOAM. If anyone tries to stop you send your BRUTAL troops to murder them. If the need arises they are decent faction for pulling off an assassination. They hold their own politically in the Laandsrad, especially if you take Feyd-Rautha and build a 3 size blue district for +100 votes. Their military is very good especially on the defensive. If you can get up close and personal or fight near airbases/garrisons the Harkonnen excel!

Early Game Get 2-3 Villages including your first spice field until you research Instil Fear. Once you complete this development run around with your Troopers and pillage everything in between expanding. Harkonnen can survive on 2 spice fields for a while due to oppression squeezing more spice out than any other faction can but you should beeline 3 spice fields. Try not to fight opponents too early if it can be helped. Your main goal is to brutalise the planet of Arrakis by pillaging and oppressing villages. Buy CHOAM whenever you can especially if it's cheap. Build Offices of Order on your spice fields ASAP. This is when the Money really starts to come in.

Mid Game Pillage, Oppress, Pillage, Oppress, Buy CHOAM, Pillage,Oppress, Pillage, Oppress, Buy CHOAM!

You get the picture. By month 2-3 you want 3 spice fields all with a Refinery, Recruitment Office, Office of Order and 2 yellow/blue buildings depending on quirks (usually plascrete, water or research)

Try not to build maintenance centres, spice silos, airbases etc in your Office of Order villages. Nestle those in between where adjacency benefits the most. At this point you also want a near full standing army which you should constantly be roaming around pillaging with. Hark makes alot of manpower. For this reason I recommend attaching an Ornithopter to your Harvesters but leaving them on Greed Mode.

Late Game By month 4-5 make sure you have 2-3 agents in Counterintelligence. Almost all of your Main Base Buildings complete. Contra to the lore Hark doesn't need to start many fights, you really want to sit in your corner of the map and make bank until attacked. If your neighbour is weak it's worth conquering more spice fields. If you somehow manage to get 5 spice fields and build offices of order in each you'll be printing more money than the Federal Reserve. Aim to get just over 30% CHOAM and sit there building up money. Then when the lobby is distracted on a hegemony or governorship leader you can make your dash for 50%

Army Match-ups And Combat Tips

In my opinion Harkonnen's army fight best against Fremen, Atreides and Ecaz. Corrino and Smugglers are tougher if the opponent is good at kiting your deathstack and micromanaging their artillery or snipers. In this case never fight without combat drugs and build more Cerberus and don't forget the Speed for missing health upgrade to charge them down! Against Vernius your very powerful sleeper agent operation should be swapped out for an EMP.

In my experience Corrino is the toughest match-up. The aforementioned Artillery are hard to deal with unless you chase them with Cerberus or focus them with the Overlord. Sardaukar also heavily counter both the Trooper and Executioner by executing them which interferes with all their abilities and gear bonuses to do lots of damage at low health. For this reason I recommend assassinating the emperor But if you do have to fight him, Cerberus spam is the way to go!

Match-up summary (easy/intermediate/hard to play) plus preferred operations.Atreides (Easy): [Combat Drugs + Sleeper Agents] Harkonnen win the even fight unless invading their well defended territory and they have the homeland buff.

Fremen (Easy): [Combat Drugs + Sleeper Agents] Hark has a better time against early Fremen aggression than most factions. Late game battles are Harkonnen favoured.

Smugglers(Intermediate): [Combat Drugs + Sleeper Agents] Build more Cerberus to chase down Snipers.

Ecaz (Intermediate): [Combat Drugs + Sleeper Agents] You will probably lose the first battle to their Perfected super stack. BUT, you rebuild much much faster and will win the long war, especially with good airbase and rally point placement.

Vernius (Easy): [Combat Drugs + EMP] Easy peasy as long as you land a good EMP.

Corrino (Hard): [Combat Drugs + Sleeper Agents + EMP] Easily the hardest match-up for Harkonnen and unfortunately for the Baron (you), Corrino is one of the most popular factions in multiplayer lobbies. Try to 2v1 Corrino with another player and/or assassinate them. Focus Artillery with Cerberus and the Overlord flagship. Sardaukar and/or Aramsham severely counter Trooper/Executioner army composition, lean more into Cerberus plus try to use assassins on Sardaukar. Toxic Vapour works quite well against Wensicia and her 2CP Conscripts. Similar to the Ecaz match-up, Harkonnen can overcome Corrino in long drawn out attritional conflicts where their cheap,disposable and easily replaced units (Especially with Umman Kudu) combined with well placed airbases eventually exhaust the Emperor.

Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3210856816

The Baron: Harkonnen Guide