Business Representatives From La Guadaña

For a drug cartel, La Guadaña is both well equipped and well organized. The cartel’s troops are grouped together by their overall rank, training, and equipment. There are three tiers: thugs (also known as Los Marcados), hired mercenaries, and elites (also known as Los Soldados). Each tier of cartel fighter can include members of different archetypes. As you progress through the game, your enemies will start equipping heavier weapons and armor. In addition to the seemingly endless throngs of foot soldiers, La Guadaña appears to have a varied pool of improvised armored fighting vehicles, fleets of sports cars and SUVs, and a squadron of helicopters modified to carry rocket launchers and machine guns. Despite the technological and skill advantages T.W.O. boasts, the fact remains that there are many more La Guadaña members than there are T.W.O. mercenaries in La Puerta.

Los Marcados (The Marked)

Los Marcados are the basic foot soldiers of La Guadaña. Tattooed to prove their loyalty, eager to please, and possibly hopped up on the cartel’s finest products, these thugs are lightly armed and poorly protected against what you’re capable of throwing their way. They make up for it with sheer numbers and an enthusiastic fervor to draw the blood of their cartel’s enemies, and they are fearless to the point of sheer ridiculousness.

Mercenaries

La Guadaña mercenaries are better trained and better equipped than any Los Marcados member. Individually, these mercenaries are not quite up to par with any member of T.W.O., but they do have better gear and training, and they are just as driven by their paychecks to fight as hard as they can for their client. Expect mercenaries to offer heavier resistance and quicker responses to your maneuvers.

Los Soldados

Referred to by El Diablo as “elites,” Los Soldados are the most disciplined and well-equipped fighters La Guadaña can send your way. Los Soldados are a capable para-military force. In recent years, they have proven to be a near insurmountable threat to the Mexican police, capable of standing their ground against the Mexican military.

Enemy Classes

Soldiers

• Deployed by: Los Marcados, Mercenaries, Los Soldados

The most common enemy class is the soldier. They are proficient with a wide variety of weapons, but they tend to favor using assault rifles, shotguns, and pistols. Soldiers from Los Marcados tend to be more reckless, while soldiers from the other two tiers are more tactically-minded, working better with their comrades to try and pin down T.W.O. soldiers and set up flanking attacks.

Shield Soldiers

• Deployed by: Mercenaries, Los Soldados

Using a riot shield to protect themselves and any allies behind them, the Shield Soldier is slow and can be easily flanked by a smart team. They exist to slow down and deny forward progress, using their shields to defend themselves as they slowly march forward with pistols in their free hand. This sort of coordination is a bit too much for Los Marcados to handle, but both mercenaries and Los Soldados use Shield Soldiers to bolster their ground forces.

You can destroy Riot Shields or knock them out of the hands of Shield Soldiers.

Snipers

• Deployed by: Los Marcados, Mercenaries, Los Soldados

Snipers tend to stick to elevated positions, using high-powered rifles to reach out and splatter skulls from many yards away. Whenever Alpha or Bravo call out a sniper, immediately take cover and start scanning for the tell-tale red laser markers that wave over the battlefield. You can also tell if a sniper is looking at you from somewhere in front of you if you see a red spot of light flashing across the screen. If you see that red spot and you’re out of cover, they are seconds away from scoring a headshot. As you might expect, snipers from Los Marcados are not as proficient as those in the mercenary and Los Soldados tiers.

Stabbers

• Deployed by: Los Marcados, Mercenaries

Either through sheer insanity, force of will, or a lot of drugs, Stabbers only exist to get close to their enemies and engage them in close-quarter combat with knives and machetes. Los Soldados do not stoop to tactics this suicidal. If Stabbers get too close, they initiate a Physical Encounter, requiring victims to mash the button indicated on screen in order to survive. This is an incredibly dangerous state. Fail to win the physical enocunter and you are immediately killed. To make matters worse, while you’re in the middle of this encounter you are also exposed to incoming fire. Your partner can shoot the Stabber off of you, or hit them with a melee attack from behind for an instant kill.

Brutes

• Deployed by: Los Marcados, Mercenaries, Los Soldados

Brutes are essentially living tanks. Kitted out with heavy armor and protective helmets, Brutes can sustain absurd amounts of fire to their bodies. They tend to be very slow, marching forward while firing the heaviest weapons in the cartel’s arsenal. Whenever a Brute joins other troops, the dynamic of a battle changes. All Brutes can be taken down the quickest with concentrated firepower directed at their heads. Grenades can stagger a Brute, giving you a chance to close in and score headshots.

Brutes will always counter melee attacks, initiating Physical Confrontations just like Stabbers. It might be advantageous to instigate this in some situations, since Brutes aren’t able to use their heavy weapons while you’re tied up trying to stab them to death.

Enemy Equipment

Technicals

Technicals are light trucks with machine guns crudely bolted onto them. Technicals tend to pull up to a position and hold their ground while their gunners lay down suppressive fire. Your best bet is to flank a Technical’s gunner, or to simply charge at them head-on using Overkill.

Destroyers

Consider these to be “Super Technicals.” Armored like tanks, Destroyers are surprisingly fast for their size and can absorb significant punishment.

Mounted Machine Gun

La Guadaña has no compunctions about where they place mounted machine guns (MMGs). You can find them in civilian dwellings, graveyards, churches, and the ruins of villages. They are almost always set up to try and lock down a main route. Luckily, there are almost always side routes that will help you flank them. In the event that you can’t locate a safe approach to flank the gun, you can always rely on Overkill.

MMGs can be turned against the enemy. If you elect to man one, be sure to control your fire so that you don’t overheat the weapon. All MMGs have a special shield that protects the user against attacks from the direction the weapon is pointed.

Attack Helicopters

La Guadaña has a fleet of small civilian helicopters modified for combat. You won’t encounter these very often, but when they do appear, you’ll need to take them out quickly.