A collection of developer journals for the Battlefleet Gothic mod for Sins of a Solar Empire.
Bringing the Warhammer 40k universe to Sins
Published on December 8, 2008 By xthetenth In Sins Modding

The Battlefleet Gothic mod is now compatible with Entrenchment 1.041 as of 1/17/10, and has a new version (1.30) out as of 1/17/10


This mod contains the Imperial navy in a fully modelled state, and Chaos, the Tau and the Orks in a proxied state.

 

BE WARNED: THIS MOD IS STILL RATHER BETA AND IS MISSING MANY FEATURES, INCLUDING:

-A research tree (unlocks, colonization, fleet supply, cap ship crews and long range jumps are quite literally all that's there (well, there's a missile tech, but it doesn't do much, and you WILL be able to get late game ships early)

-GUI elements. some 2D icons aren't done yet, and the ones we have are a bit odd. They will be fixed eventually.

Things that we know about (IE we know about it and it's odd, but it's either a design decision which will be explained or something not implemented):

-Counter description text. It's wildly off and somewhat arbitrary, but the ship descriptions are pretty good and should give the player a decent idea of what to expect, and I'll write more on them on our forum (link here).

-Shield Mitigation. It's gone, but it says it's at 15%. Trust me, it's gone.

-The Emperor Battleship. As a compromise on its heavy dorsal armament that can be fired to either broadside, we made it have the strength of the dorsals and a broadside point forward, and slightly stronger broadsides. We think it works pretty well, but please tell us what you think.

-Chaos ships and tau ships in the Additional Races Compendium are odd. The chaos prow weapons are locked to fire left, so they can broadside well to one side without turning into brawlers and tau weapons are locked forwards so they can concentrate fire, but they lost their ability to fire at half strenth to the sides because multi-arc weapons are impossible in sins as far as I know.

-No stock sins races. GW wouldn't let us include them, and they have a very different gameplay mechanic anyway, and need a very different setup for damage types, much to my chagrin, seeing as I want to know how it'd end up .

 

Okay, now that that's out of the way, we can get to the fun stuff. The ships are working great. If you know the tabletop game you'll know the key things that I need to tell everybody else so they understand the game.

-Ships turn and fire SLOWLY. You need to think ahead, and you can fit in a lot of micro if you know what you're doing. This is intentional.

-Shields recharge VERY VERY VERY VERY FAST. This is a legacy of it being a tabletop game where focusing fire is a big achievement. Shields will fully recharge in the time it takes for you to fire a second salvo of your weapons. Firepower supremacy is big here, and so is using your weapons to their utmost. However, hulls repair rather slowly, so protect them.

-Ships will go up like popcorn, even caps if your fleets get big enough. A fully experienced cap has quite a bit of damage absorbing ability, but it isn't even close to invincible. They're about twice as valuable as a cruiser, and if you're careful, can absorb 3 times as much damage easily. It's a great bargain, but they will die, don't get attached to them.

-Oh right, cruisers. There are cruisers in this game, and frigates are now fragile scouts and flankers. Frigates are cheap, expendable, and surprisingly dangerous in numbers. Cruisers are a lot bigger, much tougher, and carry a good bit more firepower, but a really big price tag. Battleships come in on top, and are really durable, and host a lot of long ranged firepower.

-The weapons are different too. Weapons batteries and Lances are your basic weapons. Lances are focused beams of energy that do best against escorts (accuracy) and armored ships (penetration power, but with just the imperials that isn't that big an issue). Weapons batteries are massed guns that do best against battleships because they can actually be expected to hit a lot. They aren't that different, and the range and strength of the guns means more than their type. Torpedoes are great. They punch through shields 100% of the time, but tend to drop off against bigger targets, which boast the point defense turrets to shoot most of them down. They make great escort killers, and are your best weapon in smaller fights.

-Attack Craft (fighters and bombers) are also very different, they come in squadrons abstracted to one ship, and are much more fragile. They're also much more dangerous. They, like torpedoes pierce shields and can do a lot of damage, especially against smaller ships (including cruisers, battleships are nasty to them though). However, every ship has turrets that can kill them, but if they stagger their waves, they can hit home very hard. They also replenish quite fast until their parent ship runs out of antimatter, so they're really quite good. Fighters are quite capable at interception duties, if you have more fighters than the enemy, your bombers will be able to strike enemy ships while your ships are safe from enemies.

 

Please note!

-Planet capturing is quite different from in standard sins. The transport is your one stop shop for planetary warfare and colonization. They land troops instead of bombarding. The whole idea is a little bitcomplicated, and I encourage anybody who's interested to read the thread I'll post on our forum shortly. The short version is that you build transports, use their bombardment ability to pound your enemies into dust, and then return them to the munitorum depots (they have the advent antimatter recharger icon for now, shouldn't be hard to find on the screen) to refill. It should especially suit the Imperium's style of defend and counterattack.

 

Now that you know the basics of the game, you can download the mod here:

DOWNLOAD (7ZIP, 109 MB) (This should work properly but I've been having lots of problems with it, if not, please tell me so I can remove the link while I fix it. )

7zip or winrar both can open 7zip files, and both are available for free, and much smaller than 50 MB.

DOWNLOAD (ZIP, 162.63 MB)

And please visit our forum at Modcraft if you want to learn more about the mod and what to expect, volunteer or give detailed feedback:

OUR FORUM

 

Dev Journals: These guides will help you know what to expect in the future and understand the current state of the gameplay.

Dev Journal 1: Ships of the Imperium It explains all the imperial ships and their fleet's way of fighting. Should be useful.

Dev Journal 2: Fleet tactics of the Imperium It focuses on the use of the Imperial ships in a fleet. Definitely good food for thought, may apply more to tabletop than the mod, I need to test the theories some before I fully endorse them.

Gratuitous screenies:

Gothic class cruiser pummeling a dictator class cruiser

Gothic class cruisers pummeling a Dictator class cruiser with lances and torpedoes

 

Retribution class Battleship firing at an enemy cruiser

Retribution class battleship firing its prow lances and torpedoes at an enemy cruiser.

Finally, the trailer for the Imperium (thanks again, Thrawn!)

 


Comments (Page 34)
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on Jul 23, 2009

i might be able to get some of the tau stuff inert made ages back ready if i can find em. but not this week as i've got work and sleep to be doing

on Jul 24, 2009

when do u think the mod will have more than Imp in it i wanna play chaos and space marines(will there b dif chapters of just just the one race for them?

on Jul 24, 2009

i think a kick ass game would b like SOASE but with battles of planets as well. no game pause during land battles all totaly RTS on a massive scale.....any else think this or is it just me? (scale for land battles like supreme commander)

i think it would b sweet as hell.

on Jul 24, 2009

with Sins, forget about it. It's all space man.

on Jul 24, 2009

i got a question. I see the enemy and my allies building them ramilis star fort constructors or something cause i keep seeing more than 3 of those of the enemy team or allied team color in my vision and i dont understand how to build one or something, and what is the javilis prototype i cant find that or anythign for the last upgrade on the fleet scale.  its friday no release?  im looking foward to it maybe tomorrow?

on Jul 24, 2009

when do u think the mod will have more than Imp in it i wanna play chaos and space marines(will there b dif chapters of just just the one race for them?

I'm releasing a mini expansion pack style addon thingy for the mod with placeholders for chaos and tau and maybe a surprise (trust me, it's worth it even though it'll take till tommorrow), but none of them have a full set of textured models. Chaos has two untextured cruiser models that proxy all of the cruisers and their escorts, but the infamous team color cube for their caps, and the tau have only one untextured model, which is doing triple duty as the protector and hero variants, and maybe I'll use it for the merchant and envoy classes too.

Space marines are going to be in the second version of the add-on. They'll be team color proxies too, and I'm not sure what we'll do for color. One possibility if we can make versions with different textures hash the same way then you could make a texture for some chapters (dark angels, space wolves, blood angels and black templars are the ones I'll ensure get made, I bet enough people are going to ask for smurfs that they'll be in too), and have the various fleets be different companies. Doesn't make sense if they're fighting each other, but it's probably the best we'll be able to do.

i think a kick ass game would b like SOASE but with battles of planets as well. no game pause during land battles all totaly RTS on a massive scale.....any else think this or is it just me? (scale for land battles like supreme commander)

i think it would b sweet as hell.

It would, but that's something for a different engine. It'd also be likely enough to result in enough battles that it'd go really well with multiple players on a team, something I'd like to see in the rts market. I want to see a team based

i got a question. I see the enemy and my allies building them ramilis star fort constructors or something cause i keep seeing more than 3 of those of the enemy team or allied team color in my vision and i dont understand how to build one or something, and what is the javilis prototype i cant find that or anythign for the last upgrade on the fleet scale. its friday no release? im looking foward to it maybe tomorrow?

Hmm, that's interesting about the constructors, because they definitely aren't listed to be buildable. I just tried taking them out of the player files, which will quite possibly work. Stupid bloody computer not playing by the same rules. If that fails, I'll just make it cost 40,000 creds and make it overpay horribly for cheating. And yeah, release'll be sometime tomorrow, I just couldn't wrap it up today. Not much left to do, so it pretty much depends on when I wake up.

on Jul 24, 2009

oh... they are so usefull at repeling small invasions..  but when you hve my fleet jumping from planet to planet with 7 capitol ships, easilly 15 cruisers and god know hows many frigates the start fort doesnt stand a chance.

on Jul 25, 2009
Yeah, if you need to counter a full fleet, you'll need a full setup of defences. It'd hardly be fair for a 6k credit defence to stop easily 20k worth of ships. I want to know how well a well with a ramilies and a full tactical cap worth of defences can stand up to a decent sized attack. It's not really supposed to be insurmountable, just really powerful and a cornerstone in a strong defense. There will be other starbases eventually, but they're not really thought out yet.
on Jul 25, 2009

the smurfs?! You dare insult the honor the Ultramarines 4th Company in this way?!

COURAGE AND HONOR!!

on Jul 25, 2009

Oh i cant wait for the next release (hopfully tomorrow yeah?) I have been hard promoting your mod to  ..well just about everyone really ( i think some people might be getting abit tired of it as well lol) With the planet killer i asume you can only build one or somthing ( as ther only is one) im quite intressed in what you be doing with space marine as these were a major issue in the table top gane to. they were expesive and to week now ther expesive and death incarnate, mind you, will you be making them the same expesive to build but ouch. as space marine liek most of the tech is prized and scares. most chapters only have 2 or 3at most 3 battle barges, as it oly take one of these to turn up and the whole dam system is loyal and complinet prity dam quick. but ,ind you if you were strick to 40k you only ever see a strike cruisser turn up now and then. Sorry once again im passionly rambling, i woudl realy like to help con tribute ( any odead shout please). i really must stay away from the coputer when ive been drinking lol.

on Jul 25, 2009

well atm i fought against a maxed out defense of a planet and i didnt lose one major ship.. meaning cruiser and above, i lost maybe a frigate and a duantless but thats it..

on Jul 25, 2009
Sorry before hand for any formatting oddities, the sins forums are acting up for me, so no quoting and the like.

@Whiskey144

About the smurfs, not only do I insult the honor of the fourth company but I insult every last blue one of them all the way to papa smurf! Mwahahaha! ...Ahem. If you didn't look at the list I gave, it's pretty much a list of the main codex disrespecting chapters in the imperium. I'm a black templars fan with a fondness for space wolves and blood angels who dabbles in guard. It's natural to be jealous of you guys and your half price rhinos from the templar viewpoint and the way you steal the guard's glory. Sorry, won't happen again =P .

@ja_147

The release will be whenever I get it done, but I'm winding down, I'm just waiting for the k... *ahem* cruiser model nert's prepping for me tomorrow. The planet killer, I'm going to make as available as the ramilies, since the navy's pretty sure they killed one during the 12th black crusade with the torpedoes of the lunar cruisers of Omega squadron but another showed up during the 13th black crusade. I'm taking this to mean that chaos can build more of them and given the exaggerated numbers of ships we're already fielding, 3 potential planet killers isn't too bad. I mean you can have as many battleships as battlefleet gothic, we're playing a bit hard and fast with the fluff. Same goes for the marines, they tend to group up for key campaigns we're assuming our games are, but we don't have the ability for multiple textures, so it's gleefully ignoring scale. GW does it all the time, it's why marines aren't like movie marines but are instead the 15 point 3+ saves we know and love.

@NeighborKid

I'm surprised by that, how much firepower did you have? I think I'll up the tac cap though, I want turtling to be possible, so allowing people to build up a ton will probably go in.

Anyway, it's gotta be tomorrow, took too long leaning how to export models to get enough coding done. Sorry, but it'll be awesome hopefully and the new model is sweet.

on Jul 26, 2009

so what can expect from the next release? chaos race? semi textured/modelled? any improvements to imp? any surprises we should wait and see for? will it be balanced? any new game mechanics that the new race('s?) bring?

on Jul 26, 2009

lot of excited people waiting for this next release, oh yeah xthetenth are you in america or uk, os i can get in sink with days example whn you say oh ill be addin this tomorrow i know your torrow is my night if your american.

on Jul 26, 2009
Okay, things to expect:

Chaos and Tau race, very slightly textured/modeled (a few models, none textured, the rest cubes), a few assorted fixes to minor issues, a rather large surprise to wait for, maybe balanced maybe not (I won't have time to test all the permutations but I'll try to make sure the stuff I can test quickly is), and definitely new mechanics. Chaos are long ranged broadsiders who suffer in close, while tau are fighter spammers who have all their guns concentrated into their nose arc and can hand out serious punishment as long as they don't get flanked too much or engaged very closely. Chaos also benefits from very effective cruisers, but their battleships tend to be less effective. They also have a grand cruiser now. Grand Cruisers are toweringly nasty ships with the firepower of a battleship in a package somewhere between battleship and cruiser price tags. The tau also have orca escorts on some ships (explorer battleships, the Kel'shan merchant and the custodian battleship has orcas proxying the nearly identical warden escorts for now). Chaos also has the planet killer, an offensively oriented super with firepower to match the ramilies, significant defenses and the potentially devastating armageddon gun (essentially the hybrid offspring of cleansing brilliance and nova cannons). I'll deal with what the surprise brings to the table when I release, but it will have some seriously fun stuff too.

And yeah, I'm an american and don't have much time free today until most everybody east of greenwich has gone to sleep. Sorry to hear you'll have to wait another day for it.

Does anybody else not have the formatting bar show up in the posting window, and have to do their formatting in HTML or is it just me? Sorry if my formatting is terrible.

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