Dawn of War II Classic

[Kresjah]

DAWN OF WAR II
CLASSIC

Note: This project will very likely be ported to Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising when it is released.

Status: Currently in development. Expect this to take quite some time. More information will likely come in the upcoming weeks.
Last update: This post. :p

The idea
Faithfully bringing back the gameplay and feel of Dawn of War: Soulstorm, but using the Essence 2.0 engine (Dawn of War II). This means porting various game mechanics like bases and listening posts to the new engine (although there might be some limitations in the new engine that prevents certain mechanics from working, to which the best alternative will be applied).

It will likely be released in two versions; one that is as faithful as utterly possible, and one which retains the majority of Dawn of War: Soulstorm's features, but implements some of the better ones from Dawn of War II (i.e. directional cover).

More specific information will be added to the end of this post (in a spoiler to prevent it looking dreadfully long for people not interested in technicalities).

Help needed?
I'm not specifically looking for additional team members at the moment. However, if you think you can contribute something to this project that I can't (I will be doing project lead, attributes coding and installers for now at least), then do feel free to drop me a note and ask.

What I DO need help with is getting some questions answered. There are many game mechanics from Dawn of War: Soulstorm that aren't easily ported to Dawn of War II. Often things can be implemented with clever workarounds, but whilst I'm experienced with coding for the original Dawn of War, I'm still fairly fresh with Dawn of War II and as such I do need a push in the right direction sometimes.

In the spoiler below, I have compiled a list of threads with questions that will help the current ongoing projects (including this one).

Hiding construction options (http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=238200) Kresjah's big thread of questions (http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=237532)
Texture qoes ; alpha channel playing (http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=236845)
Screenshots
None available at the moment.

Downloads
None available at the moment.

[Bowkers]

Sure thing. For those that have posted. Please, if a post is in the wrong section report it. Moderators aren't ninjas the whole time!

Moved.

[Croaxleigh]

Well, except for Sword_Monkey.

Looking forward to seeing what you come up with, Kresjah! Will you make an attempt at adding flying units in some form, or just stick to the ground-based part of SS?

[Kresjah]

Sorry for not having given any updates so far. I left for Christmas vacation yesterday, and found out that the cord on my laptop's power supply is broken... when it was making sparks on the train, I figured I should avoid using it. :p Unfortunately, all the stuff I brought with me is on that laptop.

Hopefully I will be able to bring you all more up to speed on the details before Christmas.

---

Croax: Ahh. Well, I'll be emulating as much of the behaviour as I can really

I haven't actually looked into flyers yet, but I don't think that will be too hard (iirc, there's still ways of disabling collision detection for units)... I may be wrong though since I haven't really put any research into it.

I'll be doing my best to get as much of DoW1 into the game as possible. I have some nice workarounds for certain stuff going already, so hopefully I can give a tech demo in january some time (do note though; tech demo = demonstrating what functions I've managed to implement... not an full and proper representation of what the end product will be like). No promises though.

I'm actually intending to create two versions of the mod; the "faithful" and the "improved". For starters, I'm only focusing on "faithful" right now, meaning the version that acts as strictly as possible like Soulstorm did (i.e. directionless cover, no physics). When I've gotten a proper and strong base done on that version, I do want to create one that implements some of the aspects of DoW2 that I feel doesn't ruin the "classic" feel, but rather adds to the experience (i.e., direction based cover, physics).

Time will tell. ;)

Oh, and for the record, it's funny running around with an imba of 10 squads of 8 Tactical still with DoW2 damage when you knock on the enemy's doors. :p

EDIT: Oh, and I'll try to implement some options too, like the ability to disable fliers since some people seem to like it that way... although that's a low priority.

[Miguel]

I respect trying to add some DoW 1 features to DoW II, but I'd just like to ask why you'd want to make a faithful version if you could just play DoW 1. I mean DoW II certainly should have had additional game modes, buildings etc. but I'd be surprised that anyone would like to remove the improvements on cover and physics (not that you can do much with it without editing the model files), essentially degrading a 2009 game to a 2004 one.

[mlai]

If you want to make a "DOW1 classic" version, then you should take some cues from vanilla DOW1 and not just Soulstorm.

Biggest things that come to mind that WA/DC/SS ruined are:

1. Ability to shoot and actually kill something while moving. You won't want to apply this to everybody, but the walkers (and Squiggy) should definitely get it back.
2. Librarian's Smite doing KD, rather than no-KD-high-damage.
3. All the explodey bitz that vanilla Orkz had that got removed.
4. The twin-shoota Wartrakk! I miss it so!
5. Vanilla Chaos.
6. Eldar being a hard-counter army rather than the streamlined dumbed-down crap it is now.
7. Infil works great the way it does now; it's kind of like DOW1 infil. DC/SS infil sucks dung.
8. While you're at it, make Nids play like beta but balanced.

[Kresjah]

Sorry guys, still haven't had time to get properly into details. When I get time to write some more tech info on it, I'll get it out here immediately.

Miguel: Well, to be blatantly honest, I don't mod for anyone else but myself and my friends. My main motivation for modding usually isn't neither fame, recognition or "community benefit". The reason I say this is because this is actually part of the reasoning why I'm making this mod the way I am. Doing a faithful "downgrade" like this is both something that will teach me a lot, as well as being a fun challenge in my eyes. It's about self-satisfaction. I'm not so much doing it for the end result as I'm doing it for the path there.

However, once I have this "faithful" base, I have as mentioned been thinking about making a version which blends what I feel is the best of both worlds without completely removing the DoW1 feel (i.e., adding in physics and cover with direction from DoW2, but also making sure base building and general statistics from DoW1 are left in). If I've gone through all the work of creating a "faithful" base, I might as well put it to good use too by creating a 'special edition', eh? :p

I'm actually working on a similar mod for DoW1 too (although it's been a while since I worked on it last time), changing statistics around to match those of DoW2, adding DoW2 functionality to DoW1, simply because I enjoy the challenge and nuances of skills needed to pull it off.

mlai: I can't say I agree with much of what you say. As mentioned though, I will hopefully be creating a special edition that blends the best of both worlds... but I'm first and foremost focussing on the "faithful" version which aims for emulating Soulstorm (regardless of how stupid one might think certain features are).

I already have a fair vision of how I want a blended version to play out, and most of those points don't really go well with my vision. Sorry.

[Croaxleigh]

If I've gone through all the work of creating a "faithful" base, I might as well put it to good use too by creating a 'special edition', eh?
And thus, Greedo shot first. *laughs*

[weyseer astarte]

Wow.....this seems like a direct reply to my thread i had earlier on.




http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=237781

I am actually anxious to see where this go and test it out.

Question:-Is this mod only for Multiplayer or Singleplayer?



This project will very likely be ported to Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising when it is released.

I am getting the idea you work really close with relic in the development team for Chaos Rising....

If anything else matters I'd say good luck dude! =)

[Kresjah]

First, general update: I've arrived home from my Christmas holiday. Did get some work done on this, but not as much as anticipated. I'll see if I can get some time to sit down this evening and write up some of the missing info.

Croaxleigh: Hahaha, indeed, Greedo has struck again. xD We need a Greedo(TM) smiley on these forums. :p

weyseer astarte: The mod will initially be multiplayer only. What will be in store for singleplayer is yet to be determined. I do plan to do something with singleplayer, but it is limited to what can actually be modded of it vs. what I want to do with it.

Also, you seem to be trying to read what it says between the lines, when there is nothing being said there.

This mod/thread is not a direct nor indirect reply to yours. Your thread honestly has had nothing to do with this mod/thread. Think about it for a moment; back before the release of DoW2, people were raging about how DoW2 wasn't like DoW1, and also about how modders would rescue this game, blablabla, etc. The idea for such a mod is far older than your thread... it's seeds were sown even before the release of DoW2. The idea for this mod is far from unique.

Actually, I'm sure I'm far from the only modder to have thought about doing this. I would be surprised if there was no other modder who has thought about "porting" DoW1 to DoW2. However, doing this is a mammoth undertaking, not to mention quite a bit of a challenge.

I've been working on and off on this mod since DoW2 was initially released (although most of what I've done previously have just been simple tests to see if it was possible to implement certain techniques rather than a consistent mod). The very reason I haven't announced anything until now was because I was unsure if this would be possible to a worthwhile degree, and whether I wanted to take on such a massive project (especially with all the other projects I still have to finish). However, as you see, I've taken my choice.

As for collaborations with Relic, let me just refer you to this IRC log from earlier today:

<@[otherperson]> kresjah has sekkrit relic collab
<@Kresjah> Yaes!
<@Kresjah> so sekkrit i not noww self
<@[otherperson]> yare
<@[otherperson]> gimme
* @Kresjah hands secret Relic collaboration badge to [otherperson]
<@Kresjah> Now [otherperson], you too can beam up to the motherRelic
<@[otherperson]> yus!

Jokes aside, I have no ties to Relic at all. I have no idea how you've managed to get that idea at all. All I have said is that I will likely port it to Chaos Rising when it is released. This does somewhat imply that it has to be released before I get my fingers on it. All that sentence means is that once I get my hands on Chaos Rising, I will port my work to the expansion... why? Because the expansion will naturally contain more functions to use and abuse for my own purposes (i.e. it naturally comes with selection of unit stances). It really is that simple. No conspiracy theories here.