Dawn of War: Soulstorm

[Bedlam]

I've tried the campaign and I'm not impressed. Its not really bad but from what I've seen so far its not really different from Dark Crusade. Your on 4 planets now but each only only has ~6 teritory's so overall its not much bigger then the previous campaign and now each teritory look so small on the map.

[Invictus ChiKen]

My only issue with Dark Crusade was the fact it was a lot of skirmish missions for the most part with only the HQ battles and certain locations being any different to mix things up.

So if it's the same thing here I might wait till it's cheaper or in a combo pack.

[Vendetta]

The campaign is not much changed from Dark Crusade. There are a couple of minor alterations to how you move between planets, and your provinces now don't retain all the buildings you built when you conquer them, so defending is less of a joke.

[Invictus ChiKen]

The campaign is not much changed from Dark Crusade. There are a couple of minor alterations to how you move between planets, and your provinces now don't retain all the buildings you built when you conquer them, so defending is less of a joke.

Shit that was one thing I liked about Dark Crusade...

Well can you still buy stuff and place it in your system?

[defanatic]

The campaign is not much changed from Dark Crusade. There are a couple of minor alterations to how you move between planets, and your provinces now don't retain all the buildings you built when you conquer them, so defending is less of a joke.

Is there any advantage to defending?

[Vendetta]

Shit that was one thing I liked about Dark Crusade...

Well can you still buy stuff and place it in your system?

Yes, you can buy garrison troops the same as in Dark Crusade, and you can also buy garrison buildings (Barracks, Armoury, 4x Generators and 4x Turrets, the same buildings as the Forward Base ability lets you start battles with). But those are the only buildings you can start with. If you use the Forward Base ability to buy buildings to start with, they stay as garrison buildings.

Is there any advantage to defending?

A couple. For a start, you only get planetary requisition (The stuff you spend on the strategic map) from provinces that have an uninterrupted line of supply to your home province, so you need to keep hold of provinces in order to be able to get requisition to spend on honour guard and garrisons.

Also, 1, 3, and 5 successful manual defences get you a piece of wargear.

The other thing that's changed is that the special abilities are gained from each race's home province, rather than other ones around the map. This means there are actually less scripted missions. (Missions are split between standard skirmish for most maps, and provinces that have an Ancient Gate in are won by take and hold) Ancient Gates are what allow you to travel between the planets, each one allows you to travel to two other preset gates (one of the special abilities allows you to travel to any gate from any gate, that replaces the old "Attack anywhere" Orbital Insertion ability.)

[Invictus ChiKen]

LESS SCRIPTED MISSIONS!

This game is starting to sound more and more like something for me to wait to get. Is there anything it has better than the last games other than the two new factions?

[Ou des]

Is anyone else having really horrible load times with this game?

[Kojiro]

Actually yes. Not completely horrible load times but noticeably longer than any of the previous versions. My friend's older machine takes quite a while.

[Vendetta]

The delay on loading a campaign is long. I haven't suffered from long load times of individual maps, but they're a touch longer than previous versions.

[Darksider]

This game is starting to sound more and more like something for me to wait to get. Is there anything it has better than the last games other than the two new factions?

The air units are great for scouring the map for that last goddamn builder unit or HQ building you missed in an Annihilation game.

[Vendetta]

Also for giving you LOS for a deep strike at the back of the enemy base.

[starfury]

Didn't they put back in the need to keep the CD in the computer to Keep Playing, all the older games since Platinum edition doesn't require the CD to be in the computer.

[Vendetta]

Yeah, you need the disc in the drive. Not really a major issue though.

[Manus Celer Dei]

I'm getting fucking awful load times on finishing a mission and returning to the campaign map. Like, ten-fifteen minute waits. Fucking ridiculous, makes the campaign almost unplayable.

That aside, I'm enjoying Soulstorm quite a lot. The SoBs are really fun, although I find their Act of Faith stuff mostly useless. The Dark Eldar are entertaining to muck around with but I can't really use them well enough to be worth a damn.

[defanatic]

I think that they could have made air units a bit more impervious to weapons like meltas and flamers. And, indeed, just made air units better, closer to their tabletop equivalents. The Marauder bomber as it is now is kinda crap compared to its tabletop equivalent (even compared to everything else). Oh, and made things consistent. I don't see why a Ravager can't have screaming jets, nor a Raider have a horrorfex. I give all my Raiders horrorfexes in tabletop, I want them here. That's some whinging done. It's time to go to work. :S

[Darth Tanner]

I think that they could have made air units a bit more impervious to weapons like meltas and flamers

Hold on, people with flame throwers can shoot at air craft?

LESS SCRIPTED MISSIONS!

This game is starting to sound more and more like something for me to wait to get

You do realise there is a skirmish mode that might meet your needs. I'll never understand why people thought replacing the story led campaign with a load of skirmish battles was a good move rather than simply Relic being cheap.

[Vendetta]

Hold on, people with flame throwers can shoot at air craft?

Flamers can't, artilliery can't. Meltas can. Air units still take splash damage from flamer and arty fire though. They're basically implemented no different from skimmers barring their ablity to cross impassable terrain and path over other units (and go fast).

You do realise there is a skirmish mode that might meet your needs. I'll never understand why people thought replacing the story led campaign with a load of skirmish battles was a good move rather than simply Relic being cheap.

Quite frankly, scripted campaign missions always feel like a glorified tutorial. They don't fit the universe very well, because there's rarely a viable in-universe reason to withhold some of the factions' abilities. It's also frustrating to players because they only get to play with the Cool Shit once per campaign.

Never mind, of course, the fact that creating a fully scripted and balanced campaign along those lines for even seven factions, let alone nine, would take far more time and money than could possibly be recouped from an expansion. Hell, remember the original Dawn of War only had a campaign for the Space Marines, and anyone else was left to whistle.

[Rogue 9]

Goddammit. I had hoped that this wouldn't share Dark Crusade's propensity for crashing to desktop in late game, but it apparently does.

[Invictus ChiKen]

You do realise there is a skirmish mode that might meet your needs. I'll never understand why people thought replacing the story led campaign with a load of skirmish battles was a good move rather than simply Relic being cheap.

Let me try that again. My issue is there LESS Scripted missions. I honestly get bored with all the skirmish after skirmish missions of Dark Crusade. I at least want something to jazz it up a bit you know?

It doesn't have to be much or that many. Just look at Dark Crusade where sometimes the win condition was say destroy the other guys generators or generate so much power.

Just an example could have been hold out for so many minutes. Missions that let you have a bigger population for just that area ect.

Edit: Fixed quote tags

[Darth Tanner]

barring their ablity to cross impassable terrain

How is that handled, is it like the 'jump' ability of jetpack troops and speeders or can they move over impassable terrain as if it was normal land, even stopping there?

Quite frankly, scripted campaign missions always feel like a glorified tutorial. They don't fit the universe very well, because there's rarely a viable in-universe reason to withhold some of the factions' abilities

Early missions are invariably a tutorial but later missions are useually quite challenging. I always remember one of the missions in winter assault where as the Imperial Guard you have to hold off wave after wave of orks.

the fact that creating a fully scripted and balanced campaign along those lines for even seven factions, let alone nine, would take far more time and money than could possibly be recouped from an expansion

Then just build a campaign around the new factions, or even just one of them. Just throwing it all out the window and leaving us with a glorified selection screen for a skirmish mode is not acceptable (to me). Although the stronghold missions in Dark Crusade were enjoyable they were the only missions that were not simply skirmish maps.

[Vendetta]

barring their ablity to cross impassable terrain

How is that handled, is it like the 'jump' ability of jetpack troops and speeders or can they move over impassable terrain as if it was normal land, even stopping there?

Treat it as normal terrain.

Then just build a campaign around the new factions, or even just one of them. Just throwing it all out the window and leaving us with a glorified selection screen for a skirmish mode is not acceptable (to me). Although the stronghold missions in Dark Crusade were enjoyable they were the only missions that were not simply skirmish maps.

And fuck everyone off who wants to play with the other races. Which is generally what a large proportion of DoW players tend to do at least at first. Again, the fact that only one side had a campaign at all in the original Dawn of War was a big turn off for a good may people. So then for most of your audience all you get is skirmish anyway. Way to get sales....

[defanatic]

Hold on, people with flame throwers can shoot at air craft?

Flamers can't, artilliery can't.

Not quite true. Inferno cannons can (so, the imperial guard inferno cannon, and the battle sisters' flamer turret). Pretty much every weapon in the game can shoot at air barring melee, infantry flamers, and artillery. Unlike in tabletop, where every weapon with a range under 12" or any weapon with indirect fire, ordnance weapons, and nearly everything else requires a 6 to hit.

Also, Ravens don't use their dark lances on ground targets. Colon S.

[Rogue 9]

Infantry flamers can shoot at air units; what makes you think they can't? I had a squad of Shoota Boyz with burnas shooting at a Land Speeder Tempest just last night.

[Bedlam]

Well they are Orks you'd expect them to shoot at things they can't possibly hit with a flamethrower and then laugh as the burning fluid falls back down on them.