From Relic - another war in the grimdark future

[SpaceMarine93]

Gamespot had revealed sometime ago that Relic had decided to make Dawn of War III.

To be honest, I don't know exactly how Relic would be able to make another Dawn of War title. I mean, the Blood Ravens storyline is over with the Space Marine Chapter and their recruiting worlds victorious over its enemies without and corruption within, and its not like they have anything else to add to the gameplay.

So, does anyone have any ideas as to what Dawn of War III would be about?

What should it be about, though? What should be the main story? Should they start with a new Space Marines chapter or continue with the Blood Ravens? Maybe continue Taldeer's storyline? What about gameplay? What should they add? Should they bring back base-building? Or perhaps they should go again with the Dark Crusade style game with an all-out brawl between all the factions in the grim-darkness of the far future?

Ideas anyone?

[Wing Commander MAD]

One of the ideas I've heard bandied about for a DoW III would be sending the chapter on a Penitent Crusade. I'm pretty sure Taldeer is dead.

Personally, I wouldn't mind a Guard centered game (won't happen of course), with Space Marines units being limited high tier or even call-in type unit. Essential more Imperium vs Xenos/Chaos and less internal fighting. That or have the guard be one of the initial factions. IG suffered in both DoW I and DoW II for not being a race in the game from the beginning.* While we're at it let's see some more Chaos. We've seen primarily Khorne with just a hint of Nurgle, I doubt we'll see Slaanesh due to America's prudish nature. Honestly, I wouldn't mind if they readded base building, and added stuff like trench networks and the stuff like in the CoH campaigns. Heck even the CoH British trenches were better than the mini-dragon's teeth used in DoW II by the IG. Basically, I'd like a larger scale game than DoW II gave us. Ork, Tyranid, and Imperial Guard armies in DoW II always felt rather small compared to how they are portrayed in the limited amount of fluff I've been exposed to. Space Marine and Chaos Marine focussed Chaos felt fairly elite and thus properly numerous in the game, whereas the Eldar seemed OK since they don't really do full scale frontal attacks.


Note: DoW I IG suffered from being a defensive designed race in a primarily fluid game of attack. In DoW II they suffered from having squads significantly larger than the other factions which played havoc with the cover system. They also got shitty low quality models and textures as a result compared to the high quality models of the base factions and Chaos. Heck the Guardsmen in Retribution are significantly less detailed than their counterparts in the main game and Chaos Rising's campaigns. I believe tics, a less prevalent unit for chaos than GM are for IG have something like 2x-3x the polygon count of guardsmen.

[Uraniun235]

They should license the World in Conflict engine and basically do Epic, WIC-style.

Hell, it shouldn't be much of a stretch: there's infantry, armor, helicopters skimmers, and support/artillery. The TA menu can be used to deploy troops via drop pod or teleport, or to call in orbital bombardment or air support.

And of course at that scale you get to play with Titans.

[Bedlam]

They should license the World in Conflict engine and basically do Epic, WIC-style.

Hell, it shouldn't be much of a stretch: there's infantry, armor, helicopters skimmers, and support/artillery. The TA menu can be used to deploy troops via drop pod or teleport, or to call in orbital bombardment or air support.

And of course at that scale you get to play with Titans.

I'd second this, I want a huge scale game with battallions of infantry, squadrons of tanks and planes, titans, the works. Probably imperial vs Orks or 'Nids or maybe chaos to start it off. A war covering a whole sector maybe in the style of Total war just bigger.

[Stark]

I'll agree with U235 (frankly the lack of a 40k mod for WiC just shows how stupid 40k fans are) but continue to say it'd be nice if it was good.

Ie, not really anything like a Total War game that has scale for no reason.

[Purple]

One thing they should do is bring back a story, any story. DOW1 was brilliant because it had excellent story writing and character development. You could witness the librarian going evil all the way sympathizing with his reasons for doing so. You could understand why the inquisitor failed to see the rot. You get the feeling that these people really are full personalities and not just cardboard cutouts that fight one another because the plot demands it like in DC and SS.

[Block]

One thing they should do is bring back a story, any story. DOW1 was brilliant because it had excellent story writing and character development. You could witness the librarian going evil all the way sympathizing with his reasons for doing so. You could understand why the inquisitor failed to see the rot. You get the feeling that these people really are full personalities and not just cardboard cutouts that fight one another because the plot demands it like in DC and SS.

DoW 2 had a story... so did its two expansions.

[Nephtys]

Yeah, the DoW2 crew was pretty characterful. Which made Chaos Rising all the more interesting when you see them deal with what happens.

[Alyeska]

I'd like to see Relic try another Homeworld game. Company of Heroes on the Russian Front would be nice. And of course some taste of modern combat. Relic has plenty to choose from. They have old game series, and current. They branched off for a few new titles. Space Marine is another direction and style they could consider. It seems Relic has settled in as the W40K company for now.

[Samuel]

I'd like to see Relic try another Homeworld game. Company of Heroes on the Russian Front would be nice. And of course some taste of modern combat. Relic has plenty to choose from. They have old game series, and current. They branched off for a few new titles. Space Marine is another direction and style they could consider. It seems Relic has settled in as the W40K company for now.

The Eastern Front mod already fills that niche. For some inexplicable reason it is the first hit on google for "eastern front", beating out the actual war.

[Darksider]

I wonder if relic could use a newer version of the Homeworld engine to make a Battlefleet Gothic game.

I've always been interested in 40K naval battles, but there's nothing really out there.

[Brother-Captain Gaius]

I wonder if relic could use a newer version of the Homeworld engine to make a Battlefleet Gothic game.

I've always been interested in 40K naval battles, but there's nothing really out there.

It's a bit of an obscure niche. It's essentially Age of Sail - In Space, which tends to have a relatively limited audience.

[xthetenth]

I wonder if relic could use a newer version of the Homeworld engine to make a Battlefleet Gothic game.

I've always been interested in 40K naval battles, but there's nothing really out there.

Part of the problem is that no existing game has the engine to do a really decent job of it. It's really just a system that works better on tabletop than on a computer. I should know, I made pretty much the most completed BFG mod out there with two friends, and it was incomplete and trying to get it actually functional and near the fluff burned me out megafast.

[Darksider]

Right now there's an EaW mod that looks rather promising, but I doubt it will very fluff-accurate. The EaW engine is pretty limited in what it lets you do

[Stark]

There's a BFG mod for almost every spaceship game around; they just run into limitations when trying to get things to work 'properly'. The Sins one is particularly limited by the base game, for example.

On the other hand, Homeworld existing is validated by the Macross DYRL? mod, so it's just the subject matter. I bet it'd be easier to make a flash/mobile BFG game than a 'proper' 'rts' 'strategy' game.

[xthetenth]

There's a BFG mod for almost every spaceship game around; they just run into limitations when trying to get things to work 'properly'. The Sins one is particularly limited by the base game, for example.

That it is. Ask me about trying to get torpedoes to work. Not about getting torpedoes to function in the manner of the game, but just trying to get them to function in a manner so that they could do anything to fill their gameplay niche. If I ever restart it, I'm sure as hell not going to be trying to get nearly as close to the tabletop as I tried the first time, that's for sure. Getting nova cannon working was about as far as I go, and that was hideously complicated and probably doesn't work right, chaining large numbers of ability effects is incredibly annoying.

But that's the story of trying to make a BFG mod. Most things work, but there's just a few. damned. things. that you need but won't work, and indeed can't work without a major overhaul, at which point, congratulations, you've torn your hair out if you're a modder or basically made an engine for BFG if you've got actual resources, although if you're smart you could've made something that's basically a generic universal space battles engine. Both of those come with major problems. The first means nobody's satisfied, the second means you've plowed a ton of effort into a relatively niche market.