Overview
This guide details each mission within the Necron Campaign and gives players insight into when they can pause to battle AI enemies, research technologies, and build up cities between missions.
Introduction
The campaigns in Gladius are an interesting addition to the standard 4X formula. They can often be a source of frustration rather than enjoyment due to large amounts of hostile forces attacking you. There’s nothing quite like losing a long game just as you were on the cusp of victory because of an event time limit or a massive invasion force.
There are three main campaign mission types:
Explore.
Produce.
Battle.
During Explore and Produce missions, it’s frequently possible to put your campaign progress on hold while you deal with AI enemy factions or build up your forces, but you rarely know what the campaign will ask of you next.
In this guide, we’ll take a quick look at the Necron campaign chapters to make it easier for you to decide when to march forward through the campaign and when to hold back.
As with all quests, you can choose to do this after your game ends in a normal victory if you don’t want to risk also being attacked by another player.
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Chapter 1 – Scourge Of The Old Ones
Produce
This is all standard fare. Produce some units, and if you want to save as much Influence as possible, just invoke rapid rise when the production has 2 turns left.
Explore/Battle
You’ll need to kill 3 scattered Guardsmen squads. They may come to you, they may run around like the mindless drones that they are. Either way, they are no danger for Necron Warriors.
Explore
Head to the marked tile with any unit nearby. In my game I had about 4 squads of both Kroot Hounds and Vespid Stingwings that insisted my units die. I’m not sure if this is scripted or I just got unlucky, but be prepared just in case. You’ll have to clear anything around the tile to progress the quest, this can include neutral Webway gates.
Chapter 2 – Messenger From The Past
Produce
Chances are when you get here, this quest will auto-complete. Thankfully the Cryptek is great, so you’ll want at least 1 anyway.
Once you complete this, you’ll have to wait about 3 turns for the next stage.
Explore
Feel free to look for expansion city spots and work on leveling your Cryptek until this quest completes.
Completing this will trigger a wait time of about 10 turns before you get to move on. Be aware that an neutral Necron army will spawn near your base once the next segment triggers. Try to keep your Cryptek back and not leveling if you need to prepare.
Chapter 3 – Fragments Of The Destroyer
Battle
You’ll have your first decent battle on on your hands here, thankfully the reward is very nice for being early in the game. Necron units can consist of at least 2 Necron Warrior squads, 3 Immortal squads, 3 Heavy Destroyers and a Destroyer Lord style hero unit.
Heavy Destroyers can deal about 5.5-6 damage a shot to Nyzarn, making him die much more quickly.
Chapter 4 – Vaul’s Anvil
Explore
There is a good chance that if you’re been exploring, fighting, and expanding that you’ll already have 3 of the Old One Artifacts.
Once you have all 3, you’ll be waiting about 15 turns again for the next stage to trigger. Try to take the time to build up your units, push your opponents back, or found new cities.
Chapter 5 – A Messenger Revealed
Explore
Seems simple enough right? Well, you’ll have to fight 6 squads of Psychneuein. Be sure to send a capable escort with your Cryptek. Also, in case you haven’t been, you should start making sure your Technology and Army are both getting pumped. You’ll be in a large fight soon. Take the time here to build up, or if you prefer to just stop here and take the resources and XP you’ve been given, that works too.
Produce
300 Influence could take about 10 turns to produce, depending on the state of your economy. Be ready once it triggers, as a large Necron army with multiple heroes and high tier units will spawn outside one of your cities.
Chapter 6 – A Silent King’s Secret
Battle
This army consists of 6 Necron Lords, 3 Crypteks, 2 Triarch Stalkers, 2 Heavy Destroyers, 2 Triarch Praetorians and no less than 5 Obelisks.
Be very aware of the mark the Stalkers can put on your units to take extra damage, as well as the strong heal that the Ctypteks can put onto units, including the Obelisks.
Waiting until you get to Tier 10 tech and having things like Dire Necrodermis and Gauss Pylon can be a huge help in this battle.
The main differences in this battle over some of them for the other races are: 1.) There is no time limit. 2.) The units all spawn in 1 large clump. 3.) They don’t attack you from different directions like many of the final quest battles do.
Battle
Once you’ve defeated the sizable army and captured the device, activate it ONLY when the device is in your main base. You’ll need to heal your units and reform your defensive lines as you’ll have another big battle coming up. This time, the enemies start out at level 7+, making the fight even harder.
This will be an Invasion style battle similar to the kind you faced as Space Marines. Enemies will spawn every other turn in groups of 4-6 and can include any Necron unit. Make sure to move the device next to your city center as you don’t want to lose control of it if enemy units make it that far.
At one point I had 6 enemy Obelisks that were level 8 trolling around, so be careful and try to take them out as they spawn before they build up. One of the final enemies you’ll face is a Level 10 Tesseract Vault.
Once you defeat this, and clean up the remaining enemies, you should be victorious. Congratulations!
