What you would really need would be a Final frontier type mod, but one where each planet still had a bunch of tiles/territories on it. Something like the Dawn of War 1 campaign for Soulstorm. Imagine each planet with say 16 tiles, which could have cities/factories/terrain types/specials on them.
So at one level you'd have a Battlefleet Gothic type game with starships going on, and then you'd transport ground troops to each planet to fight it out.
Each race has some unitque techs. But most are shared and have generalised names.Tough to think about how a tech tree would work, and how it would work across factions; its tough to see Eldar using the same tech tree as Marines or Tyranids or Orks.
Something in that fasion. Think of the Crew system in FfH. A heavy weapon team could go into a city to swap out it's weapons.Look at the Planetfall mod for some ideas too.
In particular, you can have different types of promotion slots; eg you could have a Weapon promotion slot that was mutually exclusive, so you could upgrade a tactical squad with a flamer (+25% combat strength vs melee units) OR a plasma gun (+10% strength vs infantry, +25% strength vs heavy infantry) OR a missile launcher (+100% strength vs vehicles) etc. etc.
This is similar to what I was thiking.To signify that you need anti-tank weapons against vehicles, I'd make all vehicles have high base strength, but with AT weapons getting large strength bonuses against them.
I was not intending to make anything one shot. It would be to complex for the AI to handle re equiping them. Instead grenades and the like would be done via the FfH spell system.1-shot equipment (like Meltas and frags) could work like this:
There are so few units for most factions that its hard to imagine a very deep tech-tree. A lot of the tech tree would probably be as pre-reqs for particular upgrades.
I'd imagine unit types as:
Melee infantry
Recon infantry
Infantry
Heavy Infantry
Vehicle
Monster
For example: Industry, Infantry armor, Air Superiority, Full Scale Engagement, ect.
Think of the Crew system in FfH. A heavy weapon team could go into a city to swap out it's weapons.
My method would use the spell system, and the AI would just cast the spell whenever it was available and an enemy was on an adjacent tile, and then they are automatically re-equipped (with 25% probability each turn).I was not intending to make anything one shot. It would be to complex for the AI to handle re equiping them. Instead grenades and the like would be done via the FfH spell system.
I think those categories are fine for mental categories of unit slots when designing unit rosters, but in terms of actual in-game unit "categories" (eg mounted units, archer units, adept units, melee units, gunpowder units, etc.) I wouldln't use most of those.This is what I had in mind for infantry:
I think this is a cool idea, and could be accomplished fairly straightforwardly by replacing Ocean terrain type with "Space" terrain, and having starships be Naval units with transport and range-attack bombardment; each planet could then be a section of normal ground terrains in the "ocean" of space.
Even still, with how long it takes a mod to get done I think any new mod started now might not get finished before release of Civ 5 (and that hasn't even been announced yet!)
AI coding is way out of my league. So don't think this would be included unless I can get someone to AI code for me.Thats probably the best way to go.
Well, the AI doesn't understand the crew system in FFH at all.
I'd suggest just making the upgrades permanent. It makes them more strategic, and means that sometimes you should leave them unpromoted. And you could try to balance them and then get the AI to randomly select each one.
Alternatively, you could hard-code them into separate units; the AI would understand that much better and build a better mix. So rather than building a tac squad than can get 3-4 different upgrades, you could just have 3-4 different tac squad variants.
My method would use the spell system, and the AI would just cast the spell whenever it was available and an enemy was on an adjacent tile, and then they are automatically re-equipped (with 25% probability each turn).
The problem is getting them to purchase the grenades in the first place, but you can probably do that by setting some kind of promotion preference weighting parameter.
I don't understand what you meen. That is what they already do in my model.I think those categories are fine for mental categories of unit slots when designing unit rosters, but in terms of actual in-game unit "categories" (eg mounted units, archer units, adept units, melee units, gunpowder units, etc.) I wouldln't use most of those.
Basically you want to have the categories represent armor types and ranged/melee.
So, conscripts, guardsmen, guardians, shoota boyz, stormboyz, would all be Infantry.
Tac marines, warpspiders, would be Heavy Infantry.
Assault marines, nob squads, slugga boyz would be Melee Infantry.
Devastators, and weapons teams would be Support Infantry.
Whirlwhind and basilisk (is that the IG artillery gun?) would be Siege units.
Tanks and razorbacks and dreadnoughts would be Vehicles.
Daemons, avatar, krootox, squiggoth etc would be Monsters.
Warpspiders, stormboyz, raptors and assault marines woud have the "jump troops" promotion, that would make them immune to river-crossing penalty, 1 first strike and maybe a combat bonus vs support infantry.
The only point of the in-game weapons classes is so that you can have strength promotions that give boosts against particular types of units. You want to represent that some units and weapons are better against melee troops (like flamers or dreadnoughts), while others are good vs vehicles, and others again are better against heavily-armored heavy infantry.
AI coding is way out of my league.
I don't understand what you meen. That is what they already do in my model.
This is most likely what I will do.Then you're probably better off splitting the units entirely.
As in: tactical squad with plasma gun unit, tactical squad with missile launcher unit, etc, rather than making them upgrades. The AI will do better at providing a mix of units than it will in choosing different promotions.
Have you not read my post? I specificly explained how the clas I put them in has nothing to do with the combat type or the actual grouping in the game.Except that you have weird things together; you have melee units mixed with ranged units, and you have weak infantry like conscripts in a separate category from other weak infantry like guardsmen. While you have lightly armored troops like guardsmen in the same category as heavily armored guys like tactical marines.
Conscripts should just be guardsmen with lower stats and fewer weapon promotion possibilities, they shouldn't be separate unit classes.
Sluggas should be in the same unit class as Nobz and Berserkers, just with weaker stats.
I am basing it on the lore and TT rulles, not on the PC games.A weapon that is good vs massed infantry (like a heavy bolter) isn't necessarily good vs heavy infantry like tactical marines, while a weapon that is good vs heavy armor (like a plasma gun) isn't necessarily effective vs masses of weak infantry. The same weapons are effective against both terminators and tactical marines (terminators are just much higher combat strength), whereas you need different weapons for fighting tactical marines vs fighting guardsmen.
This is where you are wrong. Jump troops are not designed to fight like their mele or ranged counterparts.And jump troops should be in the same unit class as other ranged or melee troops, just with special bonuses from a jump promotion. Once they jump in, fighting stormboyz is basically the same as fighting slugga boyz, a weapon that is good vs one will be good vs the other. Its just the stormboyz will be more effective vs weapons teams or units with first strikes.
I have a diferent way of defining weapons and bonuses. I will mostly be focusing on representing range and fire speed vs firepower. I have most of the diferent weargear worked out already. I can post it here if you want.Alternatively, you could separate them even more:
Ranged Infantry (conscripts, guardsmen, cultists)
Melee Infantry (slugga boyz, hormagaunts)
Heavy ranged infantry (tactical marines, warpspiders, necron warriors)
Heavy melee infantry (berserkers, nob squads, assault marines)
Support infantry (devastators, weapons teams, eldar platforms)
Light vehicles (landspeeder, vyper jet bike)
Heavy vehicle
Siege vehicle.
And you could even add in jump troops as a separate category if you wanted.
So, for example:
Guardsmen regiment, strength 5, ranged infantry.
Tactical marine squad, strength 6, ranged heavy infantry
Landspeeder, strength 8, 3 moves, 25% withdraw chance, light vehicle
Predator, strength 15, vehicle.
Grenade launcher (available to guardsmen)
...
Have you not read my post? I specificly explained how the clas I put them in has nothing to do with the combat type or the actual grouping in the game.
That seems like a reasonable way of implementing them. I'd give them amphibious too, so they are unaffected by river crossing.That is why jump troops would have a high atack and the ability to withdrawl, but a low defense and a bonus vs support infantry.
Mele meens that you get a clear damage bonus and atack strenth, coleteral damage and other atack bonuses.
Ranged meens that you get first strikes.
Jump meens 1st strike imunity, withdrawl and speed.
I agree with river crosing. Other than that, play DOW1 a litle, try using a squad of Assault Marines as a dedicated atack force against say a dradnought.That seems like a reasonable way of implementing them. I'd give them amphibious too, so they are unaffected by river crossing.
I guess I'm more used to the DOW pc games than the tabletop, so I'm used to jump troops as being assault troops rather than skirmishers.
This is actualy reserved for Khorne Berserkers. They seem like the lot that would do CD.This seems reasonable, though I'd stay away from collateral damage on most melee units.
Mele units are dominating in open ground, Support units are for dominating hills and fortifications. Infantry are general all purpose troops and Jump Infantry are the city killers as they can retreat and will posibly be made to ignore building defenses or be marksmen (depending on the unit) but will have a low base strenth to compensate.So, basically melee units are dominating in open ground, whereas ranged units are better in hills and fortifications (because first strikes are only really very valuable for higher strength units).
Yes, each weapon will have modifiers based on it's penetrative capability.It would be neat to see the tables. I'd still recommend having each weapon type get different strength modifiers vs different other units. So yes, as you say, a lascannon or missile launcher is good vs vehicles but gives no bonus vs infantry.
Atack, yes. Capture cities and units no. Can you imagine a group of marines walking through enemy fire, seting up their heavy bolters calmly and shooting at all the buildings around them?I'd still let support weapons attack, but I've give them bonuses like archers in FFH (or just FF?) where they have a chance of doing damage to units attacking the stack even when they aren't the defender.
I am basing the entire scenario of the mod around the premise that the diferent armies have landed their scout forces on a planet.What have you thought about for building design and terrain improvements?
This is actualy reserved for Khorne Berserkers.
Jump Infantry are the city killers as they can retreat and will posibly be made to ignore building defenses or be marksmen (depending on the unit) but will have a low base strenth to compensate.
And 1st strikes are also good for low strenth units
Just give them a higher defense strength than attack strength. And a heavy bolter isn't the only support weapon; semi-artillery weapons like plasma cannons or D-cannons are certainly good for digging units out of defenses.Atack, yes. Capture cities and units no. Can you imagine a group of marines walking through enemy fire, seting up their heavy bolters calmly and shooting at all the buildings around them?
I can't dig up the Exel file but here is the data from my memory.
I was thinking of making weargear promotions make units do diferent damage types.
I am basing the entire scenario of the mod around the premise that the diferent armies have landed their scout forces on a planet.
They are city killers in the sense that they can damage the defenders and withdrawl.Jump troops as city killers? That doesn't make much sense to me. If anything I'd think jump troops would be even less valuable in a city, since they have less room to manuever because of buildings everywhere. Jump troops as skirmishers (withdraw chance) or marksmen seems much better.
Also, logic would suggest that melee units would be better in cramped urban environments (easier to close to range because of short firing lanes and lots of cover), while ranged troops would be better out in the open (where they can take full advantage of their superior range).
As far as I recal, 1st strikes meens that you hit your enemy before combat begins.Statistically speaking, first strikes are more useful on high strength units.
They're not particularly useful on low strength units because they will probably lose the round, and so do no damage in the first strike.
I remember reading a careful analysis once; strength promotions are a straight multiplicative multiplier, they are equally valuable at all strength levels. Whereas first strikes will increase the probability of winning the fight much more if your strength is already higher than theirs than they will if your strength is lower.
I'd also be very careful about adding lots of first strikes to units, you can end up getting weird results like that, and the combat odds calculator starts to be very wrong. You get much more variance in combat results with first strikes.
I'd also be very careful about sticking too close the straight tabletop stats.
Again, this will depend on the weapon being used. I was thinking of allowing plasma canons and grenade launchers to make ranged atacks.Just give them a higher defense strength than attack strength. And a heavy bolter isn't the only support weapon; semi-artillery weapons like plasma cannons or D-cannons are certainly good for digging units out of defenses.
But I guess you could keep support weapons as stack guards, and then the artillery vehicles as offensive artillery for breaking defensive lines.
Becouse even 100 guarsmen shooting their las canons would not kill a baneblade.Hmm. This sounds possible, but I think bonuses to various armor types would be much easier to get working.
So a baneblade won't die to guardsmen because it is strength 20 and the guardsmen are strength 4, and their lasguns or grenade launchers or whatever have no bonus vs vehicles.
Remember that small differences in strength have huge impacts on combat outcomes; a 20% strength difference (5 vs 6) gives ~75% win chance.
So a 5x strength difference probably means you could throw 15+ guardsmen squads at the baneblade and still not kill it. Even worse if it has first strikes....p
That is about my idea. With the guard and orks adopting banor and necrons adopting scion like mechanics.This is about the best you can do.
Ok, standard buildings. I guess you could use particular buildings as build requirements or free xp/promotion givers for particular unit types.
It will be a bit silly though for orks to be building universities and marketplaces.
And necrons should adapt Scions of Patria mechanics.
Watch out for the limitation that each civ can only have access to a max of one unit from any single unitclass (we had lots of problems with that before). That's fine when there's only one possible version per civ (e.g. Warpspiders replaces Tactical Marines); but if you want a civ to have more than one Heavy Infantry unit available, you need to use more than one unitclass, and then use the UNITCOMBAT values to set the combat type for those classes (Infantry, Heavy Infantry, Melee etc as described by Ahriman):Maybe I confused you becouse the list I posted is not sorted by the <unitcombat> tag but by the <unitclas> tag. In my model, both Space Marines and Guardsmen do fit in the same category becouse they share the same <unitclas> but they would have radicaly diferent costs and strenth and <unitcombat> values.
Basically you want to have the categories represent armor types and ranged/melee.
So, conscripts, guardsmen, guardians, shoota boyz, stormboyz, would all be Infantry.
Tac marines, warpspiders, would be Heavy Infantry.
Assault marines, nob squads, slugga boyz would be Melee Infantry.
Devastators, and weapons teams would be Support Infantry.
Whirlwhind and basilisk (is that the IG artillery gun?) would be Siege units.
Tanks and razorbacks and dreadnoughts would be Vehicles.
Daemons, avatar, krootox, squiggoth etc would be Monsters.
Watch out for the limitation that each civ can only have access to a max of one unit from any single unitclass (we had lots of problems with that before). That's fine when there's only one possible version per civ (e.g. Warpspiders replaces Tactical Marines); but if you want a civ to have more than one Heavy Infantry unit available, you need to use more than one unitclass, and then use the UNITCOMBAT values to set the combat type for those classes (Infantry, Heavy Infantry, Melee etc as described by Ahriman):