Dawn of War II: ELITE is a third-party modification for Dawn of War II: Retribution that started out as an experimental balance mod for high-level players and branched into adding completely new abilities and units after support for Retribution was cut. As the retail game will not be patched anymore, ELITE seems to have become the definitive multiplayer version of Dawn of War II. The first proper tournament with a money prize for the winner is being hosted and streamed on September 8–9 by Good Games Live.
ELITE makes a plethora of visual upgrades and balance changes; some stats and abilities have been tweaked, some entirely removed or reworked. Pathfinding and projectiles have been tweaked to reduce glitching, and there are general mechanic changes such as units now receiving +50 melee skill while retreating (to stop the horribly annoying special attack attempts that always ruined your squad wipes). Completely new units added in ELITE include:
- Chaos Raptors
- Chaos Terminators
- Land Raider Phobos
- Dark Reapers
- Fire Dragons
- Sternguard Veterans
- Vanguard Veterans
- Whirlwind
- Painboy
- Flash Gits
With a full new faction (Grey Knights) being added in near future.