Let's make "Imperial Guard"

[Alkaloid]

Thing is, compared to most of what they come up against the Guard are pretty badass. Most guardsman are going to go through there entire career without even seeing a space marine or an eldar of any stripe, most are never going to see an ork or a necron or the tau, they are largely putting down planetary rebellions and chaos uprisings and the like, sure in the game they are the low quality mass gunline boys, but those scenarios are the exception, not the rule. They should never come up against more than a few space marines at a time, and if a single platoon faces off and kills half a company over the course of the game you are doing things wrong, they are rare and fucking dangerous, so become a boss style challenge, you will take casualties fighting them. Orks are tough but mostly short ranged, so terrain and firepower are how you beat them. Easy pickings in open country, make close terrain really stressful to fight in. Chaos cultists and traitor guardsman should be a common enemy who can kill you if you play stupid, but be a little smart and go through them like a hot knife with butter because you are disciplined soldiers with a plan and they are a mob with guns.

[Rabid]

Yeah, that.

In one of the Cain novels ("The Traitor's Hand"), the moment the Guards hear there's a squad of Chaos Space-Marine on the planet they begin shitting their pants.
In a 40K game, learning that there's CSM on the same planet as you should be Really Bad NewsTM.

Same thing with genestealers, or any other exotic and dangerous enemies.

[Cykeisme]

Stuff that qualifies as "regular enemies" are actually quite narrow: Chaos-corrupted humans (which can range from disorganized cultists to Blood Pact-style organized and trained Chaos troops) and Tyranid Gaunts, perhaps.
At the high end, Ork Boyz and Tau Fire Warriors could still qualify as normal enemies, but not if you're controlling a single Guardsman.
To ensure balance, early in the game when you are alone, the game probably shouldn't throw more at the player than Chaos mooks. As game progression eventually gives you a squad, you can start facing off Ork Boyz and Tau Fire Warriors, etc.

For Guardsmen, almost any of the heavy hitting stuff in 40k would qualify for a boss battle that would require you to pull off some clockwork tactical maneuvers with your entire squad, just to avoid heavy casualties.
A single Chaos Space Marine would qualify as this.. or I can imagine an entire level revolving around having your squad evade a Carnifex through the ruins of a city while simultaneously fighting off gaunts and rippers.


Similarly, even a single Space Marine showing up to assist your squad would be a major event, a deus ex machina that turns certain death into victory. Perhaps the Space Marine might even help you indirectly, if the horde of enemies that was about to kill you just happens to be in the way of his objective.

[Rabid]

What is the consensus about player perspective changes in a game ? i.e. : I play Chapter 1 & 2 as character A, then chapter 3 as character B, Chapter 4 as character C, then I get back to character B for two chapters, etc...

Like, during the prologue you play as a squad's second in command, in a tutorial training session aboard the Navy ship's transporting you toward the planet you are supposed to fight to defend ; then in the first two chapters you arrive on the planet (opportunity to pull a D-Day impression ala WH40K ), the sergeant get shot and you inherit the squad's command.
Then depending on what you intend you put the player in the shoes of different characters as the story advance - to offer the player a bit of gameplay variety, without falling into the "trap" of ÜBER SPECIAL FORCES TROOPS who do everything.


Is this do-able, or is it the kind of things people don't like to go through ?

[Block]

Meh, I think if you want to do the Guard right, you're never a specific character that's on the screen. If you need to make it an FPS then you should be able to do the whole Rainbow 6 thing where you switch between "camera feeds" or something. The Guard doesn't really do single squads though, you should be a platoon or company commander, giving orders to your men as part of an overall objective, sort've like Brothers in arms, but on a grander scale.

[Rabid]

But in this case, wouldn't it become "Dawn of War III : Imperial Guard Edition" ?

[Ryan Thunder]

Something like star wars battlefront seems like a good match.

[Connor MacLeod]

I think you could do single squads (or part of squads) as part of some sort of much larger battle. If you lose someone in 'your' squad maybe you can pull an NPC 'form the field' in to fill in the slots (temporarily or otherwise.) Or maybe the abiliy to vox for 'reinforcements' to arrive for assistance (you could call in more troops, storm troopers, artillery, aerial strikes, orbital bombardments, Space Marines, Titans, etc. depending on circumstances.)

What is the consensus about player perspective changes in a game ? i.e. : I play Chapter 1 & 2 as character A, then chapter 3 as character B, Chapter 4 as character C, then I get back to character B for two chapters, etc...

Like, during the prologue you play as a squad's second in command, in a tutorial training session aboard the Navy ship's transporting you toward the planet you are supposed to fight to defend ; then in the first two chapters you arrive on the planet (opportunity to pull a D-Day impression ala WH40K ), the sergeant get shot and you inherit the squad's command.
Then depending on what you intend you put the player in the shoes of different characters as the story advance - to offer the player a bit of gameplay variety, without falling into the "trap" of ÜBER SPECIAL FORCES TROOPS who do everything.


Is this do-able, or is it the kind of things people don't like to go through ?

Its not a bad idea, but maybe do that as some sort of skippable 'tutorial' resembling IG basic training or something (learning to use different weapons, or operating the sergeant, special weapons troopers, heavy weapons troopers, vox, things like that.) It might depend on how the game was run. In a single person or 'story' mode that might work out well.. but multiplayer you probably want to be able to design your own squad (or own character as part of a squad, if you're playing with more than one person.) I don't think the ideas are mutually exclusive though.

[Steel]

Given the high attrition rate and weak individual performance does it make sense to do anything FPS or single character centric, or rather to take an existing squad/company level game like Men of War? In that you can do individual control, but are never tied to any one character under your command and can have hundreds of individual units at any time. It is also capable of representing the high lethality and individual customisation you want.

[Alkaloid]

Thats the way to go I think. If you have each individual surviving trooper earning experience in a mission to buy upgrades in skill/weapon training etc and you earn an amount to buy your section gear or new troops to replace casualties. So say you start with a seargant, a corpral and eight troopers with lasguns. First few missions, buy some command upgrades for your NCOs that make the squad overall more useful, some skill for your troopers, special and heavy weapons teams if you want, replace a few casualties. Then, after a bit, you get your seargant to the point where he can be promoted to lieutenant. So you get your corporal promoted to seargant, on or two of your vets promoted to coproral and are given two full squads of basic troopers with lasguns. Now you have to fill out three full squads, so you have to decide if you want to keep your vets together and have two full squads of fresh meat, or if you want to spread your veteran troops up amongst the newbies, start getting them some weapon proficiencies and so on.

You could actually show your command over the course of the game changing from rookies to hard bitten, rag tag non standardised veterans, and if your CO ever kicks the bucket, well just promote his junior or buy a new one.

[The Yosemite Bear]

frag holding the line I've got the keys to a baneblade

[Zanfib]

A 40k tank sim?

[Rabid]

A 40k tank sim?

"Made in partnership with the Imperial Armour team !"

*Darth Vader & Connor MacLeod, together :*

NOOOOOOOOOOOO !!!


- - - - - -

But really, not really. I don't think this could work - or at least it doesn't seem like what Aaron was talking about in the OP.

Maybe a minigame/gameplay phase where you conduct a Leman Russ tank, a Sentinel recon walker or a Chimera transport, yeah sure, I'm all for it ; but making the whole game nothing but a vehicle sim ?... yeah, no, I don't really see it. I don't know, maybe I do lack vision ?

[AniThyng]

What is the consensus about player perspective changes in a game ? i.e. : I play Chapter 1 & 2 as character A, then chapter 3 as character B, Chapter 4 as character C, then I get back to character B for two chapters, etc...

Like, during the prologue you play as a squad's second in command, in a tutorial training session aboard the Navy ship's transporting you toward the planet you are supposed to fight to defend ; then in the first two chapters you arrive on the planet (opportunity to pull a D-Day impression ala WH40K ), the sergeant get shot and you inherit the squad's command.
Then depending on what you intend you put the player in the shoes of different characters as the story advance - to offer the player a bit of gameplay variety, without falling into the "trap" of ÜBER SPECIAL FORCES TROOPS who do everything.


Is this do-able, or is it the kind of things people don't like to go through ?

This is the entire basis of nearly every single player Call of Duty campaign ever so no, I don't think this is the kind of thing gamers don't like...

You can even throw in a tank level..

Personally I wouldn't mind a modernized remake of stuff like final liberation, which was an IG based turn-based strategy game.

[edaw1982]

Speaking on Guardsmen being sly and cunning bastards.
Has anyone ever done a Sharpe 95th Rifles style Character/Army (probably Catachans or some sort of 'Scouty' army in lieu of 'Skirmishers'?), or a 'Redcoat' looking Imperial Guard Army?

[HMS Sophia]

There is a boer war era army... with actual models
I nearly got around to making a gun heavy Empire (fantasy) army, with lots of rifles, but never finished it...

[Aaron MkII]

Speaking on Guardsmen being sly and cunning bastards.
Has anyone ever done a Sharpe 95th Rifles style Character/Army (probably Catachans or some sort of 'Scouty' army in lieu of 'Skirmishers'?), or a 'Redcoat' looking Imperial Guard Army?

Yeah, I saw a red coat Mordian army on the net a couple years back.

[The Yosemite Bear]

well my fellow evil, I am thinking of making a French Foriegn Legion themed IG force, now where do I get enough Kepi for said force?

[Vejut]

Green stuff on catachan heads? A lot of those flat tops could make decent kepi tops with a little smoothing and a bill and back flap put on...

[The Yosemite Bear]

yeah I was thinking of that, who ever thought of Khaki and blue touser catchacans with white Kepis...

still that's a LOT of green stuff....

[DrMckay]

What about something like Brothers in Arms, Road to Hill 30, which is an fps with squad-based combat, and a toggle for a "view from above" where you could coordinate troops and tank support, while still shooting ans doing the other stuff. Adding in elements of Battlefront or even world of tanks might be fun as well, for the top down artillery control, or driving a Leman Russ, Sentinel, or Valkyrie. There would be lots of opportunities for multiplayer participation as well as a solid single-player or co-op campaign.

Who knows, maybe even mass-effect style dialogue options for how to play a commissar.

To answer the question about British Guard, I run a Guard army which is sort of Schizo 19th century British where my mooks are painted as redcoats, my veterans are 60th/95th rifles, my penal legionaires are 1880's Royal Marines with Pith Helmets, and the CO is modeled like Wellington with a coat and bicorne hat. my version of Marbo is based off of Harry Paget Flashman. You can do a surprising amount with Model Putty, plasticard, and the basic cadians. Chimera chassis are fun to mod as well.

[Block]

What about something like Brothers in Arms, Road to Hill 30, which is an fps with squad-based combat, and a toggle for a "view from above" where you could coordinate troops and tank support, while still shooting ans doing the other stuff. Adding in elements of Battlefront or even world of tanks might be fun as well, for the top down artillery control, or driving a Leman Russ, Sentinel, or Valkyrie. There would be lots of opportunities for multiplayer participation as well as a solid single-player or co-op campaign.

Already been suggested.

[Jaepheth]

What about a MMO game centered around a single objective; like "Hold this Hive/city/monument/manufactorum at all costs"

Hundreds of players have to defend a city against an increasing horde of whatever. When you die your level gets reset, you win when the fleet arrives in 4 - 6 weeks (realtime). If the city is taken or you win the server resets and you can play again or go to another server with a different objective/environment. Perhaps have a very difficult bonus victory condition where you can actually exterminate the enemy before the reinforcements arrive.

The time to victory could be scaled so you could have fast games that're over in an hour or two, or epic grinds that last for months.

I'm thinking the time scale and frequent character deaths would drive home the grim dark hopelessness of the situation.