"Anything more than a marginal effect"
lawl
Yeah, I can totally destroy those chaos predators with just my trusty plasma rifles.
And he complains about the lack of grind. I have found DoW games to be the exact opposite. Many battles end in draws and even though the enemy might have some steel to throw at me after the battle, my battlements usually chew those or I get some gear going before they annihilate my base.
On the other hand, battles can go on for ever so long, since special abilities fluctuate the unit morale so much and retreats can turn into feints. This is especially true with heavy armor like latter tier tanks that can completely rule a battlefield at first and yet be completely decimated once the foe gets his antitank squads to flank the guarding masses of cannon fodder. Melta bombs are a real bitch if you think your fire prisms are invincible. On that notion, a hell hound can totally decimate well-organized infantry force.
Of the games I've played in Starcraft, not so much multiplayer, note, most of the game seems to be based around dying in a torrent of siege tank fire when assaulting a base. More often than not you can't get the high tier anti-defence "casters" in to the fray since most of your time goes into rush-defence. Alternatively, you can die of facing an early rush.