1.5 Proposed Pre-Beta Not Complete Not Final Changelog...

[Tranj]

OK, so we are going to try something new for us. Here is a sneak peek at the 1.5 change log. This is preliminary, pre-beta, not complete, not final. These are the current balance changes we are looking at. There are several bug fixes that are not in this list! We'll post the bug fixes once we have them fully verified from QA. FEEL FREE TO COMMENT, BUT BE NICE!

Enjoy!

Log is long, going in next post....

Dawn of War: 1.5 Pending Change List:



THESE CHANGES ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE!!!!



General Changes




Hotkey for Grenade Launchers changed from "G" to "L" to avoid conflict with the Attack Ground hotkey
Tier One Buff

Increased hit points and attack of all tier one units by 25%.
Upgrades now give less bonus to tier one units
Turrets are 25% cheaper

Space Marines




Reduced the larger healing aura of the Chaplain and Apothecary from 4 to 2.
Land Speeder

Reduced the cost of the Land Speeder (150 Requisition / 130 Power / 2 Population) to (100 Requisition / 80 Power / 1 Population)
Land Speeder Assault Cannon Weapon:

Increased damage against Infantry Medium from 36.3 to 40%
Increased damage against Infantry Heavy Medium from 19.6 to 25%
Infantry high from 25 to 30%
Infantry Heavy High from 9.6% to 25%


Scouts


Decreased Scout Hit Points from 250 to 230
Decreased reload time of Sniper Rifle from 12 seconds to 9 seconds
Increased damage of Sniper Rifle against

Infantry Heavy High targets from 50% to 75%
Monster Medium from 60% to 75%


Tactical Space Marines


Increased Space Marine Hit Points from 300 to 325
Increased Missile Launcher damage against Vehicle Medium targets from 38% to 50%

Reduced effectiveness of Melta Bombs against Building High targets from 75% to 50%
Increased the cost of the Whirlwind from (145 Requisition / 260 Power) to (190 Requisition / 300 Power)
Reduced the frequency of the stun effect on the Assault Terminator Thunder Hammer
Reduced the reload time of the Assault Sergeant and Sergeant Power Fist from 2 seconds to 1 second.
Reduced the damage the Sergeant Power Sword does to Vehicle armor
Assault Marines


Reduced the health of Assault Marines from 400 to 375
Reduced the damage Assault Marines do to Vehicle and Building armor

Reduced the amount of damage Hellfire Dreadnoughts do to Vehicle Low armor
Enemy players can no longer see the Orbital Bombardment targeting cursor
Orbital Bombardment does less damage to HQs
Sergeant Power Sword damage vs. buildings and vehicles reduced
Reduced Whirlwind hit points from 5,000 to 2,500.
Chaos:




Raptors now have the Flame Thrower heavy weapon upgrade. This flame thrower is considerably more powerful than the flame thrower in Dawn of War.
Chaos Heavy Weapons research has been restored. This ability now:

Increases the number of Heavy Bolters a Chaos Marine squad can equip from 2 to 4
Increases the number of heavy weapons a Cultist squad can equip from 3 to 5
Increases the number of flamers that a Raptor squad can equip from 2 to 4

Chaos has a new research known as Purge the Weak. This research:


Doubles the health of Aspiring Champions and Raptor Champions
Changes the armor type of Champions from Heavy Medium to Heavy High
Bestows the Fear Aura ability on Champions

Aspiring Champions now have a new ability known as Fear Aura. This ability:


Increases the health of all members by 100 hit points

Aspiring Champions and Raptor Champions now only increase squad cap by 1 (down from 2)
Made the following changes to Furious Charge research:


Increased Chaos Marine and Cultist melee damage bonus from 15% to 25%.
Implemented movement speed bonus of 20% for Cultists, Chaos Marines, Raptors and all Champions.
Furious Charge moved to Tier 2.

Increased population cost of Khorne Berserkers from 2 to 4
Aspiring Champion


Increased cost of the Aspiring Champion from (55 req / 0 power) to (65 req / 0 power)
Increased the build time from 15 seconds to 20 seconds

Increased the cost of Chaos Plasma Pistol research from (50 Requisition / 20 Power) to (50 Requisition / 30 Power)
Reduced the damage the Chaos Sorcerer Plasma Pistol does to Building Low by 50%
Reduce the chaos Sorcerer's melee damage to building low by 20%
Reduced the damage the Chaos Lord Plasma Pistol does to:


Vehicle Low by 35%
Monster Medium by 35%
Building Low by 50%

Adjusted the damage on the Aspiring Champion Plasma Pistol as follows:


Increased the damage to Heavy High to be in line with other plasma weapons
Reduced the damage to Monster Medium by 35%
Reduced the damage to Building Low by 50%

Increased the amount of damage that Chaos Horrors do to the following armor types:


Increased the damage to Building Medium by 20%
Increased the damage to Building Low by 50%

Raptor jumps now cost 2/3 of their maximum charge (rather than 1/2)
Added a movement penalty to the Obliterator's assault cannon
Increased the cost of the Chaos Sorcerer to 150 requisition 75 power
Increased the cost of the Chaos Sorcerer to 40 seconds (up from 20)
Increased the hitpoints of the Chaos Sorcerer to 1000 (up from 800)
Corruption now does a minimum of 5 damage every second
Removed the damage penalty from Daemon Strength
Reduced the reload time of the Aspiring Champion and Raptor Champion Power Fist to 1 second (down from 2)
Increased cost of Furious Charge from (50 req / 25 power) to (50 req / 60 power)
Orks




Stormboys

Reduced the population requirement for Stormboyz from 40 to 30
Reduced the amount of damage Stormboyz do to Vehicle Low
Reduce Stormboy melee damage vs. building low by 10%
Speed Boost now a research at the boyz hut for 50/50 30 seconds, requiring Pile O' Gunz and 30 pop.
Stormboyz can once again use stikkbombs

Slugga Boy


Reduced the build time of the Slugga Boy from 5 seconds to 4, reinforce time remains the same

Dramatically reduced the amount of damage the Mega Armored Nob Power Claw does to Vehicle High armor
Increased the damage of the Mek Boy's Mega Blaster
Mega-Armored Nobz and the Mek Boy should not break morale so easily now
Increased the accuracy of the Killa Kanz' big shoota
Increased the Zzap Gun's damage against most armor types
Decreased the damage of the Squiggoth's big shootas against vehicle and building armor
Tankbusta


Tankbusta damage against Vehicle Low and Vehicle Medium increased by 15%
Tankbusta cost reduced to 50 requisition 10 power
Tankbusta hit points increased to 500
Tankbustaz now come with a minimum squad number of 3 and a maximum squad number of 5

Shoota boyz build time increased from 5.5 seconds to 6.5 seconds
Eldar




Made the following changes to Rangers:

Rangers now have a squad cap limit of 1
Rangers now start with 5 squad members
Ranger build cost and reinforce cost has been reduced to 40 Requisition
Ranger Long Rifle now scales more dramatically with upgrades

Banshee Morale Armor reduced to be in line with other units
The Vyper Missile Launcher now has a knockdown effect that can be used to disrupt enemy infantry
The Missile launcher is now the Vyper's default weapon.
Reapers


Accuracy penalty while moving increased
Reduced hit points from 400 to 360

Increased the accuracy of the Eldar LP 2 Brightlance from 0.7 to 1.0
The Falcon Grav Tank Starcannon now does more damage to light infantry
Fire Prism support cap increased from 3 to 4
Reduced Psychic Storm damage to:


Infantry Medium: 90 to 75
Commander: 100 to 80

Reduced Wraithlord Brightlance damage by 25% against vehicles and buildings.
Imperial Guard




Guardsmen

Reduced armor from 120 to 100
Increased hit points to compensate for armor reduction
Increased build time from 4 seconds to 5 seconds
Added a 1 second setup time to the Guardsmen Grenade Launcher
Added a 20% Accuracy Penalty while moving to the Guardsmen Lasgun
Decreased Plasma Gun damage versus Building Low targets from 35 to 25

Increased build time of Infantry Command structure from 30 seconds to 36 seconds
Uncommon Valor research now adds 100 hitpoints to each member of the Command Squad
Psyker's now have a new ability known as Curse of the Machine Spirits. This ability:


Changes the target vehicle's armor from vehicle armor to infantry armor for the duration of the ability
Shuts off the vehicle's weapons for the duration of the ability




Increased the hit points of the Psyker from 200 to 300
Increased the hit points of the Command Squad Psyker from 100 to 200
Reduced the cost of the Telepathica Temple from (100 Requisition / 30 Power) to (75 Requisition / 20 Power)
Reduced the build time of the Vindicare Temple addon from 20 seconds to 15 seconds
Commissar now adds 200 morale to a squad rather than making a squad immune to morale damage
Reduced the frequency of the Priest's synch kills
Increased the damage of the Assassin's Exitus Rifle
Increased the cost of Weapon Specialization to 100 requisition 100 power, and increased the research time to 45 seconds (up from 30).
Gave the following weapons a minimum damage of 1:

Priest Chainsword
Priest Eviscerator
Assassin Exitus Pistol
Guardsmen and Kasrkin Knife
Enginseer Axe
Imperial General Power Gauntlet
Psyker Spike

Weapon Specialization now effects the Kasrkin Grenade Launcher and the Kasrkin Plasma Gun
Fixed a bug that would cause the hellhound to do perpetual damage to units even when no longer attacking that unit
Basilisk


Fixed a bug that was causing the Basilisk not to fire at units within its maximum range
Increased Basilisk reload time from 4 to 6 seconds.

[Weavern]

This thread is going to be heavily moderated. Keep this in mind to those of you who are immediatly going to be making any comments on this post. Also do not be making hundreds of spinoff threads about these changes.

Do note that this is prebeta so for any naysayers or people that are going to be exceptionally negative you have been warned upon reading this post.


This thread is not for complaints for balance issues current or complaints on the things that tranj has listed. This thread is not for suggestion wishlist. This thread is simply to state what the changes were and provide some comments on it.

People who do not follow these directions regardless of the moderator's interpertation will be issued a 3point warning of ignoring moderator directions. You have been warned. If you feel you have recieved warnings unjustly create a thread in forum issues or else dont complain.

[Inq]

OMG

interesting. I do like the buffs chaos have recieved, raptors especially. Eldar changes seem good also.

[wnmnkh]

One very quick thing.
"Reduced the larger healing aura of the Chaplain and Apothecary from 4 to 2."

....hmmm stacked healing? The area of aura is not a problem, stacked healing auras are.

[White_Pointer]

Reduced the build time of the Slugga Boy from 5 seconds to 4, reinforce time remains the same

I don't quite understand this statement...exactly what are you talking about with Slugga Boy build times here?

And still no tankbusta bombs or super stikk bomb? :( It also doesn't appear as if Ork tier 3 and 4 is changing much if at all, and that's where their biggest problems are...

White_Pointer

[I-Guard]

^^ Well first keep in mind this is the beta. Its no where near completion. So do not be discouraged yet.

As for the build time. Its saying if you build a fresh new unit of Slugga Boyz its 4 seconds. But the reinforcement of them is the same.

So faster new unit build time, but the same reinforcement as before.

[Weavern]

The slugga build time suggests that for slugga from the HQ or boys hut their time has decreased 1 second per slugga, so in essence it has decreased from 20 to 16.

[noise_pollution]

Most changes seem to be for the better...
Landspeeder may be too good now....

About the spam and obsolete units issue... that probably fixes tier1 units being obsolete in tier2, but tier1 and 2 units will still become obsolete in tier 3 and 4... Any chance of that being fixed?

Lots of good ideas though... and the new abilities are really welcome :D

[Dys]

Bravo for actually posting this relic/THQ staff

[FlashlightIG]

Movement penalty to Obliterators assault cannon, and you haven't fixed their targetting problems? The only way to make good use of Obliterators is to dance them so they use their assault cannons. Now you nerfed it so they can't stand and fire with guarantee of assault cannon, or dance because of accuracy penalty. Don't forget oblits get raped because while they are dancing you can't target anything.

[nude-fox]

hmm i still cant see chaos tacs being usefull or used over raptors

personally i'd really really like them to have plasma guns back they just dont seem that usefull outside of T1 really in the same way that marine tacs are and quite frankly the heavy bolter setup time dosent work well with the raptors mobilness

and chaos get a nerf to zerks they now cost 4 cap but when most people research they already have some units so if someone wants a zerk squad there is a chance they'll have to wait for long research or get some other squad killed and personally i'd rather have 2 squads of raps with the new buffed aspiring champion then 1 squad of zerks taht only has 8 people no upgrades and no aspiring champion
the sorc also gets a nerf which is probly needed but chaos gets nothing to compensate in teir 2 besides a buff to horros but u still cant reinforce them back up to 5 which makes me sad and i'm assuming fear auroa and furius charge

it also seems that chaos now takes alot of upgrades to get a good army together and thats alot of stuff to clog up the armory

[Whodunnit]

yay, early stormboys and flamers for raptors!!!!

i'm also looking forward to seeing landspeeders.

[Uncle Benny]

Psyker's now have a new ability known as Curse of the Machine Spirits. This ability:

Changes the target vehicle's armor from vehicle armor to infantry armor for the duration of the ability
Shuts off the vehicle's weapons for the duration of the ability.
If this makes it into the final, I will be an extremely happy camper. I hardly use SP's now, but this is not only another power, but anti-vehicle for the infantry in place of missile launchers.

Commissar now adds 200 morale to a squad rather than making a squad immune to morale damage This is what I hoped for when I first saw Tranj's teaser post about v1.5!! *crosses fingers*

Many thanks for the Customer Service, Tranj!! :salute:

[I-Guard]

^^ You and me both davis. I never use Pskyers unless its just to throw them in bunkers. I hope that ability gets to the final too. That would be awesome.

And even though Im a I-Guard man, Im still happy to see commissar only adds 200 to morale as opposed to making a squad immune. Now I will not feel to bad when I win hehe.

[Methuselath]

Interesting, could this mean that Rangers are used more with the buff? I kinda like it myself.

[Avalanche]

Even though they're detectors, too, I STILL don't use psykers. This new ability should make it into the final, no doubt about it. Finally an efficient way to deal with vehicles in general, and Kans specifically.

[ptm56]

Uhhm, the changelog SEEMS prety nice to me. I'd only like to sugest 2 changes to orks...

1.- Make a tier 3 (post fort research) unit called "nobs with powerclaws" They cost the same that actually costs each nob with his powerclaw, but without havin' to put the claws one by one to every nob. Maybe they can be a little bit more expensive and need more time to build, I don't know. This would make theme much more competitive in T3.

2.- Maddoks go back to T2 (uhm... 40 pop + POG??), but without fightinjuice... just healing aura. Fightinjuice'll need a research in Tier 3 and the effect of the juice will apply automatically to the unit the maddok is attached to. You don't have to select which unit you want to benefit from the fightinjuice of which maddok. This way is far easier for the nobs to arrive to melee. PSM run really fast, Terminators teleport... nobs have juices to help. You know what I mean?

I don't know if I've explained well, but I tried... Hope you, at least, read this ideas. :-)

Best wishes

[Chris]

I never use Pskyers unless its just to throw them in bunkers

Psykers, commisars and priests do not add to bunker firepower as far as I'm aware. =/

To sum up the list with 1 word: Interesting.

To expand a little, some of those ideas look fantastiic and it would appear that you're trying to make it so there's a much less defined line between tier 1 and tier 2 which I think is good. Of course since there are so many changes I'm not even going to attempt to decide how they affect internal/external balance, especially since this is all pre-beta. ;)

Hats off to everyone involved though, dispite the frustration with not hearing anything for months at a time it still takes my interest when nuggests of info get revealed. Now... just crack those whips a little harder and get it all finalised. :D

[Noir]

* Increases the number of Heavy Bolters a Chaos Marine squad can equip from 2 to 4

Ha! I've been suggesting this change since forever, but the Chaos whiners wouldn't take of a word of it! :)

[NathrakH]

Some comments on the changes:

_Thank the emperor that they got rid of the orbital bomb damage to HQ!!! something i suggested many times. Nothing is more annoying in this game IMO. :cdance:

_Reducing the reaper accuracy is a real no brainer. I remember suggesting that early on when WA came out and being called a noob for it.

_Reducing the B.L.O.Ws damage was much needed, though the range is a big issue that isn't being addressed.

_The 20 percent guardsman accuracy reduction will be a big help and a needed change for early fights. something i hadn't thought about for balancing them.


----Other comments------

looks like they fixed jogging oblits!! Should have been hot patched IMO. :howdy:

And the huge prism cap!! is that only 7 prisms with an avatar? it's 30/4 right? (owned) :howdy:

The chaos changes look nice. Lots of interesting toys to give them their own feel. With making 'serkers a 4 pop it will encourage people to use marines in t2. :sam:



The only things that I can think of that they missed would be Predator building damage. I think that it could be tuned down a bit. (Would indirectly help orks) And ....um giving back the antitroop option upgrades for preds. It really takes away their flexibility, which is what SM should excel at.


That and they should make B.L.O.Ws require mobilization. :mrpantha:

Isane cap of warp spiders?

The damage of the las upgrade for dreads as well needs some work.

[Whodunnit]

Psyker's now have a new ability known as Curse of the Machine Spirits. This ability:

Changes the target vehicle's armor from vehicle armor to infantry armor for the duration of the ability
Shuts off the vehicle's weapons for the duration of the ability

Good idea, but combined with the incredible anti infantry of the basilisks... basilisk + pysker spam might be imba.

Something to think about....

[grendizer]

Ehhmm. no friendly fire for prism and ww, still 100% accuracy for ww? (teamgamer here)

I supose betatesters will be in charge of the balance and relic guys have been working hard with known bugs and other things(like making chaos more flexible, thanks relic guys, and thanks tranj for posting these changelog).

ANy wat i dont think we can criticize the changelog seriously cause some of the changes obviously depend of others that are not in this changelog.

To other posters: im happy too with this changelog and 1.5 coming but dont be soft, this is our last chance before the expansion to play a balanced game. We have waited a lot of time, and if there wasnt a beta this changes look like the ones in the other patches: not good enough and made by people who doesnt play the game often (7 prisms will still own). Personal opinion of course and maybe wrong ,and as i said I suppose there are changes in this prebeta that are not in the change log, and betatesting is coming.

[NathrakH]

Well Whirlwinds don't cause friendly fire on the table top. i think reducing their HPs and increasing their cost is a big balance for a T3 unit.

you can beat them now if you micro and take them out at the first sign of any arty flying around. the problem is their HPs keep them around for too long.

[fragba1t]

"Turrets are 25% cheaper"

this change should have affected mines also.

"Reduced the larger healing aura of the Chaplain and Apothecary from 4 to 2"could some1 please explain this? does this mean healing will be only 2x?

"Land Speeder (all changes)"
all excellent changes except for the pop cap.


- Raptors now have the Flame Thrower heavy weapon upgrade
- number of flamers that a Raptor squad can equip from 2 to 4
-Purge the Weak. This research:

* Doubles the health of Aspiring Champions and Raptor Champions
* Changes the armor type of Champions from Heavy Medium to Heavy High
* Bestows the Fear Aura ability on Champions

sounds like raptor harass will be a lot tougher to handle. looking forward to seeing how it actually plays out, though not a welcome change imo.

"Increased the accuracy of the Eldar LP 2 Brightlance from 0.7 to 1.0"
what is a LP2 brightlance ? plat ?

[Weavern]

Let me remind everyone who is planning on quoting then responding to much of the changes of the rules on quoting. "As a rule of thumb keep quotes to around 2 per post. Anymore than 2 and you are running the risk of picking apart anothers post." The Rules (http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=5710) There are additional rules on quotes so read up if you plan to use them.

If I see posts picking appart the changelog and simply refering to these changes with one line information. They will be delt with.

Carry on with your questions and comments but follow the general rules on quote use.

[grendizer]

You have a point nathrakh, but area effect damge weapons without ff are a terrible mistake imo, unit should be balanced according to area effect damage and ff, and no balance the unit so it has no ff.

WW without ff doesnt looks like an important fluf aspect to me, and anyway gamesworkshop didnt balance their games very well, at least when i played fantasy.

Im shure someone is working know trying to make all this changes to a mod, maybe we all can test the prebeta changelog at least :nana:

[Dorkdav]

Rangers now have a squad cap limit of 1

Could you clarify this. Does this mean the ranger only cost 1 population cap or that you're only allowed to have one ranger squad?

[CrossOrion]

OK, so we are going to try something new for us

What precisely is 'new' about this? :P OUt of sheer curiosity

[newghost]

I think that means only one squad if he is speaking AE.

unless theres more bug squashing, im not sure Ill DL, im too happy with my current game (yes its modded)

wonder if they are going to look at the kanz wrongful armor.

[CrossOrion]

They don't have to if their Psyker ability turns the Armor into infantry anyways :P


* Increased population cost of Khorne Berserkers from 2 to 4

This is going to hurt some chaos players, ALOT if it goes in. :p Bye bye berserker spam ^^ Hello chaos marine spam :P Beserkers are going to have to be buffed a little bit more, even though they are moral immune..

[Tranj]

What precisely is 'new' about this? :P OUt of sheer curiosity
Normally we don't post changes before they are completely final and patched into the game. There have been many requests for more information before the patches go live so that people have some time to digest the information and discuss it.

[Penitent]

I'm pleased with the Ork changes, I think they are still relatively weak and extremely micro intensive in tier 3 compared to every other race though, I second this suggestion:


1.- Make a tier 3 (post fort research) unit called "nobs with powerclaws" They cost the same that actually costs each nob with his powerclaw, but without havin' to put the claws one by one to every nob. Maybe they can be a little bit more expensive and need more time to build, I don't know. This would make theme much more competitive in T3.

2.- Maddoks go back to T2 (uhm... 40 pop + POG??), but without fightinjuice... just healing aura. Fightinjuice'll need a research in Tier 3 and the effect of the juice will apply automatically to the unit the maddok is attached to. You don't have to select which unit you want to benefit from the fightinjuice of which maddok. This way is far easier for the nobs to arrive to melee. PSM run really fast, Terminators teleport... nobs have juices to help. You know what I mean?

Could we also see a reduction in the research time of everybody's tier 4, the long research time is meant to delay techers but what actually happens is the counters to their tier 4 units take too long to research. Say you see Fire Prisms and think "I better research predators" but it takes too long to react in that way.

[dreddnott]

These changes are FANTASTIC.

I -am- surprised about Khorne Berserkers. With a cap of 4 that puts them over every other infantry unit in WA. I don't see any buffs for them...is it just the fact that Chaos would be overpowered if they didn't gimp something, or is it that a fearless unit so early is an imbalance to the game?

Well once again, absolutely fantastic changes. I think I've seen every single issue that will be fixed, according to this beta, complained about and discussed in posts on the DoW:WA balance forums. Kudos and bravissimo to y'all for listening to us.

[Penitent]

I think they are 4 cap lin the same way Killa Kans are 4 cap, they become obsolete later on in the game but are quite powerful at the time they are available. The Chaos player might have to pay 150 req to increase his squad cap to field more Berzerker squads, which will help his opponent considering how cheap they are for what they do.

[Trizzdog]

Ooo no over or under buffs. I'm liking the changes so far. It doesn't feel heavy fisted, and it also seems your taking some ideas from the community in a responsible matter. Keep up the good work guys :)

[soldit]

Why have space marines ASM's been nerferd? WHat the heck are they gonna do against raptors now - which have been buffed BTW.

WW are now paper cutouts - good by counter to PSM and Oblits. I see the is the patch of the SM nerf, well it had to come.....

[Penitent]

Speaking of Possessed Space Marines, I think they need a reduction in the amount of morale damage they do.

[Dorkdav]

Does the 25% damage buff affect everything?
Rangers, will they finally be useful?
Psyker's ability, how will vehicles becoming infantry work?
Will a buff to all HP and nerf to damge make storm crappy?
Or will building damage remain the same?
Orks, can tank busters put ork tier 2 back in style?

[dreddnott]

At Tier 3-4? When most units have ridiculous morale, are immune to morale damage, or are vehicles or just plain fearless?

Crazy tentacle armoured marine daemons running across the battlefield at 60 miles per hour, spewing flame and death from every orifice, yeah, that's a lot of morale damage right there. I'm pretty happy that they're not being touched by the patch.

How badly would this break mods? I don't see anything really new besides the various abilities (Chaos, Ork, IG). This of course doesn't count the bugfixes we're going to see later, according to the first post anyhow.

Like others I'm a bit confused by the wording of the changes to Rangers - "Rangers now have a squad cap limit of 1" could mean you can only build one squad but it still takes up 2 cap (most likely), or it could mean you can build as many as you want but they only take up 1 cap point each (less likely).

[Compeador]

I thought it meant that rangers only cost 1 pop cap, and actually do damage to infantry, instead of tickling them.

4 pop cap for fire prisms is wierd though... I would have thought an implementation of friendly fire, about 1000 hp nerf, and slightly increased build time would have been the way to do it. At 4 pop, that means you only get 5 fire prisms at teir 4 without avatar. That's a bit heavy handed, no? Please don't OVER balance them in the other direction.

I know this isn't final, but PLEASE tell me the ridiculously overpowered chaos power sword is getting a nerf to buildings and vehicles.

Didn't see anything about eldar vehicle rush.... only that the starcannon got more uber.

w00t for the changes to Orks. The automatic claws on nobs after orky fort is an AWESOME idea that I've suggested quite a few times, I really hope that's considered.

hp buff for vypers?

I sure hope the 25% damage increase in teir 1 doesn't apply to buildings also.

If hp is increased in teir 1 and psy storm damage is decreased..... will it become useless?

I really like the changes to IG.

I really like the changes to SM.

whoa @ 4 cap for zerks.... but I suppose with tacs and cultists that actually scale into teir 2 it's needed.


oh, and THANK YOU SO MUCH for posting a tentative changelog.



EDIT: OMG! |xSoT| Jesus just pointed something out to me..... I'm sure he'll post it in a second here.

[aerziel]

the changes are interesting at best and its a good idea to make it beta so that the community will have a feel for it and test it out and say what they think of it. Hopefully changes will come and be tested so we can see the final result of the beta patch test

[Jesus]

Just looked over the list and something very very very scary just occured to me.


* Psyker's now have a new ability known as Curse of the Machine Spirits. This ability:
o Changes the target vehicle's armor from vehicle armor to infantry armor for the duration of the ability
o Shuts off the vehicle's weapons for the duration of the ability

* Increased the hit points of the Psyker from 200 to 300
* Increased the hit points of the Command Squad Psyker from 100 to 200


I am forseeing tier 4 tanks being turned into high HP meat puppets by 7 psykers (4 in the CS and 3 from the HQ) chain casting this new curse spell and max kasrkin subsequently raping your armor. LoL or even better sit an assasin outside the action and rape them with pot shots from your uber rifle and the now auto targetting 100 range basilisks.

heck who even needs to build sentinatals anymore in tier 2, mass plasma, psykers, and 1 or 2 basilisks FTW.


I understand this is just a beta testing thing but woooo that added psyker spell just opens up a whole new can of IG worms...

[Romanov77]

Instead I think its good...IG sucked vs armor, sentinel were rather good, but were too frail

[Jesus]

you are missing the point Romanov, now IG doesnt even need to build anti armor unit. psykers + basilisks / plasma guard / kasrkin = dead infantry and armor.

[NathrakH]

I think the land speeder changes will be very interesting. with a cheaper cost and a buff to all damage types they might be pretty vicious in the support/fast attack role they were meant to have.

[I-Guard]

@Jesus

I wouldnt worry about it. I dont think the duration of the Curse of Machine Spirits is going to be ungodly long. And think the recharge time for it too. Im sure it wont be something you can abuse.

Though as an I-Guard player I wouldnt be complaining, since we seriously lack anti vehicle imo.

About FP's
For those who are confused, basically 7 is the most you can have at once. I never have been rushed by 10 fps, but i would think 7 is a difference as opposed to 10 lol. I dunno if thats a big change, but as the other guy said you dont want to overbalance it. I always thought 5-6 would be a more reasonable number. But hey what do i know about 7-10 fps? lol.


Edit: Forgot to add, I would imagine it would take alot to get Psykers the Curse ability. It would be silly to have them start out with that ability. Perhaps create a research to get it or something.

[Ra2iel]

Im more interested what the patch will give in terms of gameplay.

There are some illogical things like :
-Prisms costing 4 pop,instead of just removing the 10 bonus veh cap the avatar gives,with the apropriate HP nerf to the prism.U can still spamm like 15 WLs,,,
-Why the fruit would the AC give HP to the tacticals.Why dont they jsut make a resarch that buffs the CSM health normally.The current change just encourages AC spamming.
-The PS and PP damage to infantry hasnt been changed at all.Its tier1 and a blatant imba.
-what of tier3 infantry units like kasrkin/ogrin/terminator.The spamm still remains
-Eldar still arent specialized again
-Nobz still replace sluggers
-spamm is still effective as alwayz...

im all out agaisnt any form of leader buffing HP of his squad mates.WHY???it doesnt make any sence?!?!

the change log seems like a big step up from ye old WA ,but it needs more changes...and beta testers taht know what they are doing :D .But i seriously doubt that theyve but 6 months into this :(...1 month tops i think
an i know this is just preliminary

[nude-fox]

personal after seeing these changes for chaos now i know its in pre-beta so there definetly not final but if these were implimented i could see alot of chaos players trying to end the game quickly in teir 1 going for PS + AC + Raptors instead of letting it drag on to teir 2 where they seem a bit nerfed

oh yah give marine tacs Plamasma gun upgrade =) how about this can i built a squad of cultist give them Plasma guns then have tacs take them from them?

[Troubleshooter]

Remeber jesus: There is no meantion of how long the duration is, or how quickly it will recharge. And 7 Psykers could (perhaps) stop 7 FP's... then what do they do? IG will still need heavy doses of AV. And just look at the proposed buffs to AV units!!! IG would be left behind without some creative solutions. This is one spell that will go under the micro-scope in beta for sure!!!

As for the 4 cap on zerks now... its because of the OMG buff that just happend to CSM and Cultists. 5 Plasma guns and a rock-hard Champion plasma throwing death dealer who hands out HP bonus to the cultists he leads... thats some serious stuff right there. Zerks will be used to tie up enemy units so your Cultists can melt them down. CSM infiltrating along side zerks and decloaking to the sound of 4 HBs and Plasma ripping the air... yeah... zerks are not much less deadly than they were before, but their fire support just got serious. And consider that the Champions (which are now the backbone of the chaos army) add 1 pop-cap, so 2 squads will cover 1 zerk escort. This actually sounds right to me. And since tier 3 will be about phasing out your tier 1, you wont need the zerk escort... so the pop cap is not an issue any longer.

Raptors just got beefier, but less jumpy, this will make Rap harrass still viable, but more costly if you jump into a nest of cheap turrets :)

Cheap turrets... who would have guessed. Now their cost may reflect thier usefulness.

Pretty much everything looks good right now. Rangers look to be a useful addition to the eldar army. Whirlwinds can actually be countered. Hurray for the return of light vehicles to the eldar and SM order of battle! :beer:

Some items that are not on the proposed change log that are worth a second look:
1. Oblit weapons damage/targeting needs to be revisited. No more jogging means that the other weapons need to have a tier 3 feel and usefulness to them that the unit lacks right now. The only use I could see for the Oblit now is as a Meat shield for the Chaos heros and to provide those heros with deep striking mobility.
2. Defilers could be utterly doomed vs. IG... Meat-Puppet-Effect, or MPE (TM. Jeasus 2006), combined with Sentinal firepower will combine to make an already rickety piece of armor just about totally useless. (and still late to the party.) Horrors may replace the defilers last remaining usefull role: Base busting.
3. Troop transport HP (especially Rhinos) is too low to compensate for all this AV potential. Especially when you factor in the more spammy turrets (with missle upgrade) Hostile troop insertion via tier 2 transports, already a rarity, may become extinct.
4. Blood thirster Pop Cap Gimping remains? Say it aint so! Please reduce the cost of the thirster to pop cap or provide some sort of compensation!

And I want to reiterate how wonderful this thread is for the community and your patching efforts. Giving us a sneek peek and the ability to discuss the effects intellegently can only make things better! Now we have targets and hypotheticals to toss out to the beta testers so that certain aspects can be throughly tested and labbed. Things like Ranger spam vs. Guardsmen, MPE vs. Defilers and FP, FP spam vs. new and improved Tank Bustas, and the ever popular Commie rush vs. SM and bunker rushing all come to mind as personal balance issues for the beta process.

One last question for you tranj:: You said that you wanted to address the "spam factor" with this patch. Certainly you are providing some added utility to certain underused units, but there is not dis-incentive proposed to prevent any player from just spamming 1 unit type if they choose to. Do you consider the addition of alternate viable paths to tier 4 as sufficiently addressing the spam issue (it becomes a matter of choice as opposed to nessecity) or will there be more draconian efforts to encourage unit diversity in build orders. (like hard unit caps a la bassilisks and builders)

Thanx again... now I got alot to think about this weekend :D :heyhey:

[Tesla]

im happy to see the teir 1 buff, looks like its gonna be class

im reinstalling :3d:

[OjKa]

Holy ****

those changes look very well, probably the most well thought out list you've put out so far

Now hopefully the beta could crispen the edges

Thanks for info Tranj

However i think that the Pysker's new ability should not shut down the weapons of the vehicle. Say you shut down a dread. You would probably already have a army of 3+ guards with plasma and they will take that dread down pretty fast, and the dread can't do a thing about it. Like in WoW, a Rogue can go for a stun lock build and they can mash a ton of stun moves on you and you just have to watch and wait and 1/2-2/3 of your hp is down.

[Da_Fish]

Well I can definitely see myself playing again if even half of these changes were implemented. Very good work, especially on Chaos. Now I can see cultists with AC's living and now the Tier 1 units aren't entirely obsolete.


Removed the damage penalty from Daemon Strength

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!

And to think I had 2 free weeks of holidays only to waste them on BF2 and FF6 instead of Beta testing. ;)

Good work.

P.S.
Increased hit points and attack of all tier one units by 25%.
Decreased Scout Hit Points from 250 to 230

What's this?! :)

[DatonKallandor]

Sure, you might be able to take out 1 vehicle per psyker - but once you cast your stuff, you'll need Sents for AV. Pretty fine.

Speeders, unfortunately, will most likely go back to 2pop in the beta. I know my speeders, and with the guardsmen armor nerf + speeder damage increase, 20 of them would spell doom for any IG force.

Love the addition of new units. Also the chaos champions will make bigger squads more viable, because of the health addition. All in all, a great patch, once some fine tuning is done.

Edit: Rangers will need some more buffs if they are limited at 1 squad.



Daton

[LordBOB5]

Increased population cost of Khorne Berserkers from 2 to 4


If the health has been increased, or the squad size, plus an AC will be givin, then :/ OK,
but seriously, the Berzer PSM matchup will be the best example of, how important is to get rid of lower Tier units
A cap of 4 is too much, 3 is enough IMO

[DatonKallandor]

Berzerkers will be relegate to the role they really excell in: Hero killing.


Daton

[NathrakH]

or the role of entanglement and counterattack while the chaos space marines shoot stuff.

[LordBOB5]

From the changelist, I see that the Tier3 spamming will still remain

Thanks for showing us, what you're up to Tranj :)

[ToT)Right(]

PS DmG nerf?
Commi Heal Aura nerf?
Cultist GL DmG To basically everything but especially command?

Where are the nerfs that are strongly needed?

And Flamers on Raps? A morale breaking unit that you cant run from... "ok"
And even stronger Plasma Pistol Aspiring Champions with doubled HP through Purge the Weak and soem GL supporting seem to be very promising...

[Hello_Moto]

Here i go again with my QS nonsense but assuming IG and SM team up in a QS game, the new "Curse of the Machine Spirit" ability for psykers could be a potent combination when mixed in with mass heavy bolters.

1.41 heavy bolters en mass (ie. at least 7 HB squads, each equipped with 5 HBs) already rip through almost everything with the exception of T4 uber units. Seeing as how the CoMS (patented term :p) ability can now turn 3 of the 5 races uber units into infantry_high armor, who needs to worry about ATs permastunning units, when a single SM army (with some help from IG psykers) can quite easily handle infantry_high/infantry_heavy high armor SM LR tank, Squiggy & BB tank respectively? Additionally, it is bad enough that 3 dreads can comfortably take on any of the aforementioned uber units but having an IG ally change your uber tank into infantry and then get your SM pal to DS in a single dread to finish off the job is a little cheap. This consequently frees up your 2 other dreads to commit into battle elsewhere.

AND THIS IS COMING FROM A PREDOMINANTLY SPACE MARINES (albeit QS) player.

This is by no means a complaint but perhaps you should look into what units can be affected by this spell. I, for one, am quite interested to see the potential uses of this spell for IG because in effect, it is a novel solution to the lack of early AV options for IG:-

-turn vehicles into infantry
-pwn with plasma or grenades
-lol

Nice one Relic....i love the creative thinking! (no sarcasm intended).

[Doomseekers]

I think the land speeders should be 3 cap but 1-3 in a sqaud. Also i think possessed and termies(both kinds) should be 4 cap and berzerkers 3. Also an increase in cap for relic nits and cost for them(you need to be realy advanced to use em!).

[hybris]

Land Speeders are 1 pop now, why aren't Vypers 1 pop?
Whirl Winds and Fireprisms MUST have Friendly Fire.
Gravplatforms must be boosted, otherwise no one will still buy them.
D-Cannons must be made useable, they are the worst turret in the game.
Assault Terminators stun effect needs to be nerfed drastically.
Has the values of the Power Sword and Power Fist been switched back?

[Finaldeath]

Cool changes, however a few confusing ones which seem to be kinda against each other. Overall, a lot more common sense and bug fixing, kudos.

I'd like to know if the singleplayer campaign has any fixes in store (since there are none mentioned here), or if the bugs with the resource rates was fixed (when changing sides), but I only reported that last week I think.

[LordBOB5]

I hope what Tranj has announced was only the top of the iceberg.

Sorry for beeing so a pessimistic, but in 6 month, these changes are "almost" equal to nothing.

Where are the anti spamming mesaures that were promised, etc???

Edit:
However I like everything:), but the new Psyker and Zerker idea is a bit wierd for me, and I hope this list was just a piece of an upcoming new patch :)

[n0z3k1ll3r]

A very nice list. Just two personal thoughts.

This:
Increased population cost of Khorne Berserkers from 2 to 4seems like an overnerf. Berserkers are good, but not pop cost 4 good. Unless there's a Zerk buff I missed somewhere in that changelog.

Also this:
Psyker's now have a new ability known as Curse of the Machine Spirits. This ability:

Changes the target vehicle's armor from vehicle armor to infantry armor for the duration of the ability
Shuts off the vehicle's weapons for the duration of the abilitySeems possibly a bit too good. IG can get quite a few psykers, possibly enough to almost eliminate the need for AV weaponry.

On the other hand, the Purge the Weak ability is awesome, just what Chaos needed, and the Ork and the other IG changes are also really good. Congrats, and lets see what the beta testers make of it.

[Akranadas]

Remember this a A Proposed Pre-Beta Not Complete Not Final Changelog

[The fizu]

...finally my rangers...

nice change log, interesting chaos and orks,nice eldar, right IG, im a bit confused on sm
as an eldar player i cannot see changes on the grav plats...just an highlight...
personally I am interested by this project, all this can be enhanced by a serious bug fixing, especially in the pathfinding....

have a nice work...!

[AppleJuice]

Land Speeders are 1 pop now, why aren't Vypers 1 pop?

Vypers now disturb infantry so it will be too much for a 1 pop vehicle.

[earthtone]

Thoughts of an ork player....

SM land speeders are surely going to get spammed now? Cheeper, less pop, and more damage? Maybe make the pop and cost changes, without the extra damage..?
Big chaos changes! Like it. The Aspiring Champions are now much more worthwhile. Khorne Berserkers 4 pop is also much better, and raptors are now a more genuine option. Like the new abilities and furious charge changes too.

Ork stomboyz! Just getting them out earlier will have a HUGE impact. You only need one squad of dem boyz. but now its nice and early. Sluggas are pretty poor now, but if it only take 4 seconds to make em, well, cant complain really. Tank bustas have a nice change. But how about a minor version of the tank busta bombs? they were damn useful.

[Oblig]

Well I for one am encouraged, they seem to be listening to us, let's not maon but be constructive!

I still have a worry about the Chaos Power sword, is there an oversight here?

Now increased hitpoints to T1 units, I am confused here too, what is a T1 unit? Do Shees and Reapers get classed as such, Reapers are also getting a hit point nerf, will it be buff and nerf? Will Sm and CSM get a hit point buff too?

Vypers surely need to be 1 pop? Zerkers, won't 3 pop be enough? Terms and PSM surely a 4 pop would be right for them here?

FS powers, i sthere anyway thqat these could be scaleable so that she is useful later in the game? Please tell me plats will be viable again?

One concern re the chaos/Eldar match up, won't raptor rush be even stronger now?


Hmm - some quick thoughts, many thanks for the update Tranj

[Corsix]

Like many others, I'm going to say interesting.

[hybris]

AppleJuice: You are forgetting that Vypers are the worst vehicle in the game right now, and it still got its low hitpoints and armourclass untouched.
As well as the extra research unlock to get it.

[Tesla]

well i think the most important thing is to make every unit useful at some point in the game, and looking at the changes it seems like they are making steps towards this.

it seems there even bringing turrets in :)

[Ra2iel]

no,every unit should be usefull throught the game....that means guardians should havea role at tier 4 as well as cultists.Units should not be replaced but complemented by higher tier units.:D

[skills]

Yer 'zerkers should be 3 not 4 pop, i think for the sake of consistancy that maybe IG plasma guns should have a 20% accuracy reduction if the lasguns get it, the guardsmen dont suddenly learn to shoot straight when they get a bigger gun do they? :)

Also im intrested how does this ability affect the vehicles codewise, do all the vehicles have a second armour_type of infantry and the ability use the armour change modifier? or have you added some new code to do this. If its the first then mods will have to add this to all thier vehicles.

One suggestion i think would be a welcome addition codewise would be a modifier which can change the armour pentration values of weapons so you could have researches which improve weapons against for example daemons.

The WW nerfs was intresting but it is still inconsistant that the rhino has a lot less hp than the WW when the WW is a rhino with the missile battery mounted on top, maybe a health buff to the rhino would make it useful and make the WW seem more like it should be.

Last note the prerelease Change list was a good idea hope you will do this with all future patches :)

[admiral_the]

All in all a good list. My concerns are:-

Big gen power costs are not looked at - please increase the cost of the big gen or at least reduce it's HP. It makes a massive difference to Eldar's normal power cost (and anyone else's for that matter but particularly Eldar - builds quicker and they get teleport and their normal gens cost more). How can you balance that between maps?

Banshee building damage?

Zerkers 4 pop and asp chaps only give 1 bonus? Hopefully Chaos's tier 2 buffs will make this so it's not an issue- no way to tell without playtesting. I'm always concerned by increses like 2 to 4, especially combined with ASP champ pop cap nerf why not pop 3 first and see if it works?

Reapers still fire on the move?

Guide bug fixed?

I'm a little concerned storm boyz may be the new ASM. I want them useful but double buffs are always dangerous. I will wait and see.

Whirlwind not nerfed enough - look at HP? Friendly fire?

Turrets 25% less ? I'm worried it will be build turret straight to tier 2. 10% less better? Or buff HP of turrets instead?

Defiler not changed - will still rarely get used.

No change to Rhinos.

Oblits auto cannon nerfed as it should be but it needs buffs to other weapons.

Apoth healing bug?

Do orks get compo for other races cheap turrets?

Prisms need more of a nerf than that. Remove avatar pop bonus - friendly fire- hollofield doesn't affect them? something?

Looted tank needs a buff.

They actually buffed the starcannon!?!

[bob the mighty]

I like a lot of the changes, but i think that 6 seconds for a basilisk to recharge is a bit too much, i paticularly like the new SP ability.

[AppleJuice]

AppleJuice: You are forgetting that Vypers are the worst vehicle in the game right now, and it still got its low hitpoints and armourclass untouched.
As well as the extra research unlock to get it.

oh...ok,I got it.Thanks.

[mad modge]

it looks like it's going to become a lot faster game with alot of assault units and vehicles, raptors with flame throwers, vypers missile disrution to infintry more usefull land speeders and earlyer storm boys, i like it sounds good to me :)

[Tesla]

'Defiler not changed - will still rarely get used.'

well they have increased most teams anti-vehicles infantrys firrepower, so maby long range anti infantry is needed more than in previous updates

[ghodan]

I registered specialy to reply to this change log.
I read this forum daily and i played wel over 2500 online games with Dow en Dow-Wa.

I must say that i am disapointed that after many months only this stuf is in the patch.

Even after many request for a simle light weapon on the rhino we cant have that in a patch. So it wil never ever be used online.

Nurf eldar fireprism by only adding +1 to its pop cost? What a joke.

Instead of giving the community a heavy weapon AV team for the IG tru a patch of even the 3e expansion is to mutch to ask? I heard there will be no additional units for existing races in expansion 3. So no heavy weapon team in patch 1.5 means there will never be a official heavy weapon team for IG?

I though eldar would return their play style with specialised units like they play in the older versions and on the board game.... but they were left like it whas after the comming of the 1.4 patch.

What i realy start the think: Do the testers or the patch disigner even play matches online?
And if they do, i dont think they play enought matches online.

Everybody reply's non reayly negative maybe afraid of a ban or something but i dont care. I only read anyway.

This negative comments should also be seen once in a while to keep some people awake...

:mad:


The time between 1.41 and 1.5 and come up with this.
Ha what a yoke.

[Kjon]

@ghodan
Come on mate, they try.
New models take up to much space in patches and the Heavy Weapons teams in really bugged. Just ask any modder who has tried using it.

[RZetlin]

My recommendation is to give the IG more anti-vehicle options.

Give the basilisk the ability to kill off the tanks.

[Jii]

Im really happy to see/use some land speeders now =D The Whirlwinds hp decrease from 5000t to 2500 is a welcome chance. But the zerkers are wayyyy too "nerferd" unit cap of 4 ? I would recomend to increase it from 2 to 3 but not as high as 4. But the things that Im waiting for this pacth was a FF to artillery units and FirePrisms. And I would allso like to see some chances to the 4min Wraithlord rush. Its really not a nice thing to see 2-3 Wraithlords stomping in your base in 4-5min timeline, when all you got is Force commander and 2 SM squads =/ Even if you can get enough misle launchers in time (during the time eldar wipes you base out) the economical hit would be defastating: couble of LP out whit 1-2 generators and maybe Barracs too.

I personally would like to see more tier 1-2 units. Usually in 3on3 and 4on4 games whit standard resources, the games are 90% a tech rush to tier 3-4. In 9-12(15min) minutes its usually orbital+termis/horror Obliterators dropping in someones base (13-15min FP) and what can you do against that =/ pretty much nothing. The research time for tier 3 should be a lot longer (imho), but for now lets just sit and wait what the patch will bring to us =D

[Tesla]

everything makes a difference.

fire prisms, only +1 cap, but loads more anti-tank dammage dome by tankbusters, new IG, missile teams.

jsut becouse they aint changed one unit doesnt mean they have not added stuf to others to make the difference.

if one unit feels 'right' there is no point changing it that much, but making other units feel 'right' to counter it

[AppleJuice]

eldar tower rush makes it back into the game ? ... tho i highly doubt it,cuz of the buffed t1 troops but we will se.

[Akranadas]

I registered specialy to reply to this change log.
I read this forum daily and i played wel over 2500 online games with Dow en Dow-Wa.

I must say that i am disapointed that after many months only this stuf is in the patch.

Even after many request for a simle light weapon on the rhino we cant have that in a patch. So it wil never ever be used online.

Nurf eldar fireprism by only adding +1 to its pop cost? What a joke.

Instead of giving the community a heavy weapon AV team for the IG tru a patch of even the 3e expansion is to mutch to ask? I heard there will be no additional units for existing races in expansion 3. So no heavy weapon team in patch 1.5 means there will never be a official heavy weapon team for IG?

I though eldar would return their play style with specialised units like they play in the older versions and on the board game.... but they were left like it whas after the comming of the 1.4 patch.

What i realy start the think: Do the testers or the patch disigner even play matches online?
And if they do, i dont think they play enought matches online.

Everybody reply's non reayly negative maybe afraid of a ban or something but i dont care. I only read anyway.

This negative comments should also be seen once in a while to keep some people awake...




The time between 1.41 and 1.5 and come up with this.
Ha what a yoke.

ghodan while your opinion on this is warrented, you should read things and get the fact right before exploding on here with your angst.

This is A Proposed Pre-Beta Not Complete Not Final Changelog

Nothing is final and not all of the changes are present, and who's to know what they've been doing since 1.41; I would say alot of research and testing.

We're (some) getting a 1.5 Beta to test before its even release to futher Iron out the problems. They didn't even need to release this Proposed Pre-Beta Not Complete Not Final Changelog but they did, they wanted community input.

[Grabnutz]

These changes look really good, this is the first I have seen that I haven't read part of it and thought "WHY???" *cough*tankbustas1.4*cough*
How are you selecting the testers out of interest? (note I am not interested myself, waay too much other stuff to do).

[Moe]

Since people are apparently incapable of reading the topic headline, allow me to reiterate:

IF YOU ARE CONSIDERING A REPLY TO THIS TOPIC NOTE THAT THIS CHANGELOG IS NOT COMPLETE AND NOT FINAL

[Da_Fish]

I think the problem with the title is that it takes too long to read. :)

And I think the reason that the reapers "fire-on-the-move" bug, the banshees building damage, etc have not gone on the changelog is because they are so obvious that there's no point in putting them on the changelog. :D

[fneep]

I liked the Grenade launcher for IG without setup time. It made me use GL for the first time.

[Martel]

Interesting, a few things:

As it was I rarely used Zerks, I don't usually spam, instead I tech fast and once I get to tier 3 PSM take over. After this nerf I (and some others who don't go for a spam quick win)will probably never use Zerks.

I'm interested to see the Vindicar get another increase in potency, I assume this is due to few people using him. I do use him though, so this is hella sweet :). With the Curse of the Machine Spirit Vindicars are strangely gonna be a threat to vehicles aswell, Marines players are gonna be pissed when their land raiders and force commanders are iced by a sniper.

Talking of the Curse, Eldar should stand up better then most to it I'd imagine. Their super unit ain't a vehicle, and if FPs get Cursed they may be able to jump out of their and wait for the effects to wear of before going back into the fray.

Oblit movement penalty? Why hasn't the targetting been fixed for them. They are sub par if not walked, now they are gonna be sub par if they are walked. If tier 4 is reached Chaos now have almost useless tier 4 infantry, the worst super unit and a tier 2 tank, upgraded and all as they are, that still won't take other races tanks one on one in my experience.

I don't understand why FP cap usage has gone up, the Avatar's cap increase should just go down, who had the bright idea to make a race that is dieing off and has the most advanced tech of those present in DoW the most numerous. I prefer to see Eldar forces get more powerful in tier 3/4 but lose the cap bonus.

The buff on the Land Speeder might be a bit much

So, I think:
1) Zerk pop cap to 3
2) Go easy with the curse of the machine spirit
3) Fix Oblit targetting
4) But FP cap back and...
5) ...instead lessen the Avatars cap bonus
6) Lessen the Land Speeder buff, though they do need a buff

[Corsix]

1) Zerk pop cap to 3
2) Go easy with the curse of the machine spirit
3) Fix Oblit targetting
6) Lessen the Land Speeder buff, though they do need a buffI would agree on those (1 and 3 especially as I play Chaos). As far as FPs go, I would say 5 pop, and keep the avatar bonus as is.

[Danimator]

I know this is a provisional changelog but as it's apparent that this has been posted by - and is being watched by - Relic staff who are working on the next patch, can they please answer the one question all the modders are most interested in:

Will the next patch break all mods again?

I applaud the decision to announce a preliminary change log, can you please go one step further an advise us if our mods are safe as they are or not...please...with a cherry on top. :wise:

[DatonKallandor]

The oblit targetting fix, the healing auro fix - those are not balance fixes, and we know from previous changelogs that smallish fixes (like the multiple unit CC tieup from 1.4) are not mentioned in those changelogs.


Daton

[Martel]

"The oblit targetting fix, the healing auro fix - those are not balance fixes, and we know from previous changelogs that smallish fixes (like the multiple unit CC tieup from 1.4) are not mentioned in those changelogs."

Perhaps, though some bug fixes are in the change log:

"Fixed a bug that would cause the hellhound to do perpetual damage to units even when no longer attacking that unit

Fixed a bug that was causing the Basilisk not to fire at units within its maximum range"

[psychodil]

Pretty decent changelog. Im confused with the general buff of all tier 1 units though. Does this just mean HQ units, or all tier 1 barracks units?

Looks like zerks got an overnerf. Bring them and Kans back down to 3 pop. If anything needed their pop cap doubled it was prisms.

[Orbital]

There are no changes to the Chaos Predator. A tier 2 pred nerf would be right I think.

[Darkstorm]

Just woke up and found this post. Wow, those changes are pretty, um....interesting. :D I look forward to see how well they work out. Kudos to Relic for sharing with the community.

Anyway, this seems more like a balance patch than a bug hunt. One bug that I WOULD like to see addressed is using Direct Connect through NAT, which has had problems from the word go and has never been touched. And no, you can't use the "just use GameSpy" defense, as 1) GameSpy won't always be around, and 2) some people can't use GameSpy (college student in dorms on locked-down network).

[a1ph4riu5]

Wow, these changes are interesting... seems like you guys have taken the least obvious route to fixing a lot of issues. We'll have to wait and see how it turns out. I like the CSM idea with champs giving more hitpoints, although it will suck for your men to get downgraded if he happens to be the first guy killed. Still, it's kinda fluffy. The Chaos guys are all like "puny servants of the false emperor, Abaddon will lead us to victory", then Abaddon gets owned and they're more like "what have we done! we're sorry... do you think we could join the good guys again? no?". :err:

The best part of this proposed changelog is that Tier 1 and 2 will be much more balanced against each other, but like others have mentioned, I don't understand why Tier 3 has been mostly left alone. Can't you give Tier 3 units a long reinforce time, to reflect their elite status? That way you could still get a whole army of them if you have enough time to prepare, but large units won't pop up out of nowhere. I think it's important that you should be able to beat more powerful units by swarming them with lower tier stuff... but that only works if the lower tier units can out reinforce the higher tier ones.

Oh yeah, and the Psyker change sounds like complete madness to me. :wtf: That has so much potential to be overpowered... I'd rather have Psykers that nobody uses than turning them into uber skull probes. Why couldn't Grenade Launchers be the anti-vehicle with Weapon Specialisation? That would also give people a reason to go for a mix of Plasma and Grenades in Tier 2. Make Psykers viable in a better way...

[ForgottenSpirit]

Orbital Bombardment does less damage to HQs

Reduced Whirlwind hit points from 5,000 to 2,500.


Oh thank the holy gods of terra IG are saved late game agsinst SM!!

And is it just me or does that psyker ability sound like tis going to be immense. Lasguns killing a prism FTW!!!

[I_Suffer]

I can see a lot of new strategies comin with the next patch^^ Patch seems fair to me, and before anyone is complaining, just wait and test it. You can't know how these changes will affect the game just by reading the changes. Changes always need to be tested, so let's wait and see.

[santiago4ever]

A lot of changes and a lot of things that will need to be tested, thankfully there will be a Beta ^_^ Will be interesting to see what other bugs were fixed too *hopes for atleast guide and ork mob morale bonus bugs*

People have mentioned some things that imo should still be done, like WW/FP friendly fire, obliterator having the heavy plasma and heavy laser buffed into something actually useable at tier 3. Cultist Grenade Launchers which needs a serious nerf against infantry_med and infantry_high atleast, especially since the psy storm wont instawipe them anymore, they simply evaporate eldar/IG/ork pre-tier2 armies.

@Right: I assume that the raptor flamers wont be available until tier 2, morale breaking will not be such a big deal then and raptors will still die to some tier 2 unit fire.

I'm also a bit afraid of the Kasrkin, you're making them even stronger? Without nerfing that ridiculous grenade of theirs?

Anyway, thanks for the changelog, it's looking a bit scary right now with so many changes and such big changes but hopefully beta will iron out any possible mistakes ^_^

[White_Pointer]

Looks like zerks got an overnerf.

I like that change when you consider the buffs Raptors are getting. You don't need that many zerks now that Raptors and CSM's have received big upgrades.

White_Pointer

[Boomstar]

Good list I like most of it the space marine changes in paticular.

Some suggestions, and some of the changes that I think could use extensive testing:

Landspeeder might have been buffed a bit to much, a landspeeder rush seems very possible.

Zerkers 4 cap seems a bit heavy handed.

Oblits need a small buff in firepower when stationary. I'm guessing the assault cannon comes under bug fix.

Orks probably still too weak for tier 3. Looted tank could use a small buff.

Raptors may become a tad to strong.

All in all though this is the best change log yet imo! Don't meddle with it to much in the beta!

[peturabo]

Only half the issues have been resolved imho, there is still shedloads of issues that are untouched such as Shee building damage.

Pet

[n0z3k1ll3r]

I like that change when you consider the buffs Raptors are getting. You don't need that many zerks now that Raptors and CSM's have received big upgrades.I just think it might lead to no-one using Zerks.

[Titler]

General Changes

Has the 25% hit point increase and upgrade power decrease been applied in order to smooth the gap between early and later tiers? My own first impression of this, and the overall individual changes is that Relic are attempting to address the communities worrys about the tech heavy nature of the game, in particular for certain later tier units.

Does the 25% reduction in cost for Turrets also apply to Waaagh banners and the Eldar Support Platforms, or would that require an additional overhaul of the Ork Tech tree? If not, and I note later that many units and powers damages against building types has been lowered, has the pre-Beta team investigated whether the already disparate races have gained any further disparity with how this buff has been applied? In particular, I am thinking about the ability of the Imperial Guard to turtle or Ork weakness to Waaagh harassment.

Space Marines

The landspeeder being looked at so seriously is encouraging, as it will mean Space Marines have something more than Dreadnaughts to consider. Would I be correct in thinking that, with the buffs only to infantry types, the Landspeeder is being kept as a fast moving unit harasser?
However, has close attention also been paid as to whether the cheapening of both cost and population cap and increase in weapon damage is not too much when combined with it's ability to jump? One of the things which ruined Winter Assault was the ability of certain units to combine hard hitting power with excessive mobility (Prisms, ASM/Raptors, Oblits and Assault Terminators)... Landspeeders should be useful, but they should not be decisive.

The changes to Scouts appear to be designed to turn them more into dedicated sniper teams, although with flamers apparently untouched they should remain versitile enough to be pressed into other roles. Has the pre-beta considered whether a dedicated tech towards massing snipers, as the logical follow up from the Scout Rush of today, is feasable and if so, whether it is beatable?

The Assault Terminator stunning change is welcome, although
obviously we must wait to see the exact time it now runs at and what this means within the game environment.

The Assault Marines changes are also welcome, in particular the reduction to building damage, which was what made early ASM harassment so frustrating.

What is the logic behind removing the ability to see the targetting of the Orbital Bombardment, where as Squiggoth Stomp and the various Eldar spells etc will remain visible? If the worry was that concentrating on the caster as soon as the icon appears too easily nullified the casting, a better resolution would be to tackle the casting mechanics: What makes the Orbital so strong is not the damage to HQ, welcome though that reduction is, but it's ability to AoE and help kill any builders who may be trying to escape. Now Space Marines will be able to do this unannounced, unless your opponent has his nose pressed up against the screen seeking out that specific hero unit, where as the other races still have to give some advanced warning of their AoE's.

Chaos

The Raptor changes are concerning, especially from the point of view of the Ork - Chaos matchup in Automatch. All the Raptors main statistics remain apparently untouched, which indicates their ability to hit hard remains unchanged too; And although the jump changes will limit their mobility considerably, on rather a lot of Automatch maps, there are few, sometimes usually only one viable build order for Orks, and thus only one jump the Raptors need to catch the Gretchin at certain times. As it stands at present, far superior Micro skills could save the grotz and perhaps whatever it was building from the Raptors, but with the new flamer upgrade it's going to be much harder to keep the Grotz out of their reach, thus a wise Raptor harasser could concievably cripple Orks much harder than even presently. And this is before the apparent 20% speed boost they can also gain. Has this particular match up been looked at closely?

The Restoration Of Chaos Heavy Weapons is again a good thing, as Chaos players were often complaining about the lack of versatily in their builds (and lack of character thereof). I raise my eyebrows at increased Chaos Grenades and Raptor flamers though, and encourage further scrutiny here.

Purging the Weak, Aspiring Champions and Fear meets with nods of approval... Giving us things, as long as they are fun things, is always better than stealing away our toys.

Hindering the ability to spam Berzerkers will hopefully prove a blessing: The unit was, in my personal experience, only unbeatable because of the numbers in which they could be produced, not because they were imbalanced per-se.

Reductions in Plasma effectiveness were needed, although with the readdition of heavy bolters as well as grenades one hopes that the plethora of Chaos goodies are balanced against each other well.

I also look forward to not meeting the Chaos Sorcery quite so often now too.

Orks

Stormboyz... Hmm, a mixed bag this one. The reduction in Pop requirement is a step in the right direction, but is it enough? I've not played in a long while, so from memory that would place them appearing at the second Waaagh banner produced (15 HQ, Waaagh, Waaagh for 35): That still seems quite late in the Ork economy, unless you delay your Generator, because although early ASM harass appears now to not be quite so decisive, Raptor harass remains worryingly strong, especially against Orks as I have mentioned. If Raptors were further adjusted, this change to Stormboyz build time may put all the 3 assault types on a roughly equal footing I think, but it needs a lot of looking at.

Turning the Speed Boost into an Upgrade is very bad. I can see that it is perhaps an attempt to keep it in line with the required speed upgrades of other races, however Stormboyz were infamous for their inability to actually hit anything on the move with their Choppaz, and the only work around was to constantly use Speed Boost to keep them in contact. Turning this into a research, when Ork money is always tight, and they desperately need that Boost, is horrible.

However, Stikkbombs are welcomed back as an old friend. I presume the idea now is for Stormboyz to use them to knock over the troops thus allowing them to actually get close and choppy? The Speed Boost Bad and the Stikkbomb Goodness will need some very fine balancing I suspect... Is it just Stormboyz who get the Stikkbombz again by the way?

The faster produced Sluggaz seems like a good idea. Although they cap quickly, they move slowly and are easily killed... They still will be, but gaining 2 seconds in your early build order (3 if you go for the 3 slugga build of course) will help ease some of the later pressure Orks feel when their economy started to lag behind their opponents.

The Shoota slowdown may be designed to balance out against this, but I have a few questions as to how it would work out in combination with the new Stormboyz: If the Stormies are early and strong enough now, it would seem the sensible thing would be to build Big Mek first, then Shootaz whilst the Waaagh goes up for the Stormboyz. Thus, a 1 second delay may not mean much in such a build... but if Shootaz remain the Ork mainstay as they are now, the trade off for faster sluggaz and the economic boost may be too much.

Mega Blaster needs improving, but not to it's previous heights. I have to admit, it was way too strong then. As it is now though, it's a pure waste of money to upgrade.

MANZ were clearly too cowardly for such hulking brutes in such thick armor, but I wasn't aware the Big Mek was quite so fearful. What issues is increasing his morale addressing? Likewise, I thought the sole purpose of his Tank Zappa was the stun effect, and was completly unconcerned with it's damage... but I did miss the Super Stikk Bomb, and sounds like Zappa will be a combination of the two now? Damage and stunning?

Tankbusta changes are very welcome, and although Orks always have a Boyz Hut bottleneck in producing units, give 3 starting units should balance that out... They have been buffed in the areas they needed (vehicle damage, deployable numbers) and not where they didn't (Building damage was probably high enough, they didn't need to come much earlier)... Not passing judgement until we see them of course, but these seem highly sensible changes.

There are no references made to Ork late game however. This really does need addressing: Orky Fort is ruinously expensive to get to, and the Looted Leman Russ isn't really worth the effort involved to do so, and now Power Klaws will do slightly less damage to Vehicle High... Thus even less Orks are likely to bother with tech beyond MANz and Kanz and Bustaz now.

And Gretchin are suspisciously unbuffed. What a muddy funster that Tranj is, he promised us Grot buffs!

Eldar

My knowledge of the Eldar internal workings is not good enough to comment upon most of the changes, but I must second what a few other people have said here: Reducing population Cap for Fire Prisms is good, but their real imbalance lay in how fast they could be produced (frankly spammed), their maneuverability and their AoE all combined. They need one of either a production time increase, an AoE damage nerf, or an decrease in jumping ability such as the Raptors recieved. Again, they need to be desirable but not ungodly: Let me catch them easily but have to fight hard to kill them, or hard to catch but less of a threat. They desperately don't need to remain as they are, but there's a few less of them... I point you towards my replay in the thread "Trukk Racing and the IMBALANCE OF SATAN", where 3 full ork armies were not able to kill one Eldar player producing Prism after Prism.

The buffs to Vipers will encourage more variety. I think I've seen them only a tiny handful of times online, and only in Automatch against inexperienced (ie, hadn't yet discovered the joys of cheese) players. Caveat Emptor of course, but it is part of a pleasing move towards diversity in this patch.

Imperial Guard

Would I be right in thinking that the increase in HPs but decrease in armor is designed to allow Guardsmen to still fight, but be (rightly) torn up by anything with the correct anti-infantry tech?

Curse of the Machine Spirits is an unsual one. It seems horribly ungodly at first, but my second thought was wondering if this is designed to uncourage more Close Combat orientated vehicle production? If it shuts off weapons but doesn't stun, I assume that vehicles like the Killa Kan and Hellfire Dreadnaught can still get in close and use their Melee? Thus it's only a serious problem for the units designed to sit back and fire... This will be an interesting one to watch.

Commisars adding morale and not making their units immune to morale? Hurrah!

I hadn't come across the Hellhound or Basilisk bugs before, but bug fixing is always to be encouraged!

General Thoughts, and Questions I'd Like To See Answered

Whilst I do have a lot of general worries and niggles, I just want to say that the overall feeling I get from this patch is far more positive than it may seem. There's a few areas of concern not addressed, but overall most of the major issues the community has spoken of (ASM harassment, Commisar rushing etc) appear to be in the process of being looked at... And unlike the last patch, within a design framework that actually makes me feel optimistic they can pull it off this time. There's no "What the..?!" moments of envisioning people sitting around and saying "Hey, those sluggas are overpowered, let's make them really bad; the kids'll love it" with this list!

Few general questions though: Can we be given a rough idea of what "behind the scenes" issues this patch will address? NAT routing, Kick Bug, those sort of things?

And (of particular interest to probably only me) is there any attention given in this patch to fixing the 256x1024 map bug?

And with that, I've gone on way too long... time to let everyone else get a word in, I expect!

[I-Guard]

Im not to sure why some people want all units to be useful throughout all tiers. Not to be a jerk, but what use would a group of cultist have up aganist lets say a group of Orgyns? I mean Tier is there for a reason. It almost seems some people want to make all the tiers on the same level. Thus eliminating the term TIER. One unit is always going to be more powerful than the other. Who wants to watch thier avatar get pwned by a group of scouts because we want all units to be "useful". Bottom line when it comes to certain units tier 1's "usefulness" will come to an end. Getting rid of imbalances is one thing, trying to make all the units the same is another.

Anyways keep up the good work Relic. Also for the landspeeder I suggest make them 2 a pop as opposed to 1. If you make them 1, people will abuuuuse that beautiful speeder. And soon we will see people spamming Landspeeders lol.

As for the Berserkers 4 a pop is good. Remember Relic wants to address the spam factor. And putting them 4 a pop is a good start, however I suggest buffing them up just a little bit in compensation.

[ForgottenSpirit]

OOO, i just thought, basilisks + psykers may be enough early teir 2 now lol, because if you can have ~5 psykers (i doubt 7 will ever be worth it) then basilisks can be anti tank aswell lol. Should be interesting.

I still cant stop laughimng at the thought of a hellhound taking down dreads ect. Much fun will be had by me when i get tht ability thats for sure.

[Fyei]

Any word on the basilisk economy bug? :(

[Arkarius]

Mhm Changelog is intersting but i Think Chaos is now really OP just cause of the Champions with more HP more armor und weeked weapons, more cost and Buildtime doesnt mean anything to that fact.

Orcs are really good now, fine thing i think.

IG is ... strange, we'll see which strats will beinvented there but it'll be hard for them on T2.

SM also got nervt but now they have the strongest AV which their rockets an the drones.

Eldar get the most Nerfs... Chaos ownem easy cause of the simple points that Raps are stronger then before and move as fast as reaper. Also That cults get mass heavy weapons but now wont be killed by a psystorm...
SM just have to reach T2 to own Eldar easyly... cant imagine of a unit who can counter SM on T2 with Mass Marines, maybe Spiders but against them u just need dreads and eldar doesnt have any AV oder Vehicle themselfs to counter dread + rocketmarines and drones.
Okay, Orcs and IG Matchups seems to be balanced in most Points but on small maps Orcs could be really hard, but we'll see.

Hope the Beta will bring some changes, there are really good ideas but this changelog could kill DoW...

Greetings, Ark

[LordBOB5]

For the Psykers new ability:

The armour type change is enough, no stun is needed IMO (there's the SkullProbe already for SM, we don't need no two legged Uber SkullProbe IMHO)

Zerkers:

Hope that 4 cap use was just a bad idea, and won't be in the final patch

LandSpeeders:

Yeah, mass LS&AT ftw :wtf:

I still hope, that this list was only the top of the iceberg :)

[Mad Onion]

How about the damage on the Baneblade's main cannon or the accuracy (of ROF) of it's autocannon? Doesn't have that much to do with game balance, so maybe it's less important, but I'd like some kind of damage boost to the main cannon (and as a compensation maybe reduce damage from the cannon mounted in front) or make the autocannon fire faster (doesn't have to do enormous amounts of damage, but have targets light up with explosions when targeted by a Baneblade would be nice :D).

[Captain Wicha]

all i have to say is Thank God that basilisk bug was fixed, man that got annoying... as a hardcore guard player, i have to say that the changes will greatly change the way that i play... for one i dont think that the curse of the machine spirit ability should be able to effect super units, such as squig land raider or BB... for the fire prisms, i think they need to about 1000 hp less than what they have, and a longer build time... but hey thats just me... to be honest i think the guard's lack of AV could have been taken care of with the addition of rocket launchers to squads, but thats just me... speeders should be 2 pop with the buffs that they got, and choas early game still scares me...

^^ a slight, buff to the baneblades AV damage of the main cannon might be nice, but i can live without it

overall great patch, cant wait to see how it is post beta

[LordZon]

Turrets are 25% cheaper

Is a waagh banner a turret? If so... WOO HOO

No one is meantioning the commisar morale nerf. Will the commisar have a squad break message now? Does he shoot himself?

[Captain Wicha]

didnt think about a break message... but even as a guard player, i have to say that the morale change is welcome... of course i dont think my guardsmen will be able to put up the fight that they used to




EDIT: i forgot... one change i would like to see with the patch is either one of two things... one the loss of 100% accuracy for artillery units in visilble areas, or two... a saturate command like attack ground for artillery where they randomly fire around a given spot

what do you guys think? good idea bad idea?

[LoRd KoRn]

Interesting start. Don't stop there. When buffing Tier 1 (I don't understand why Tier 1 units benefit less from upgrades because that kinda makes not much sense when they should be buffed) then Tier 3 and 4 should be nerfed. When Berzerks get 4 cap what about upgraded Banshees? What I want to say is: If you change something, don't forget the rest of the game.

[Kalevispetke]

I would like to hear that THE WIDESCREEN ISSUES have been fixed

[aerziel]

I really dont see why people keep giving out balancing ideas as they havent even tested the patch yet also tranj said that the patch log itself wasnt even complete cause of it being too long. So the ideas here might be there already

[DivineOne]

To fix T3 + T4, give a limit on the uber units (IE, only 2 Termy/blits/Ogryns/Kaskryns allowed)

Other than that, very nice. Ork is still an Nob only race, with the Slugga faster building times being useful only for economy. They still suck in combat. However, I like the Stormboyz buff :D

[Question]

Wow finally some info.Very interesting list there.Not going to discuss it yet because its too early in the works,

[Old Painless]

Sounds good to me, many of the changes are inline with the mini-mod i made...lol

I do have some concerns over the Slugga Boyz, and the incredibly massive fields of dead green skinned bodies thereof.

With the increases to weapon strength and sniper scouts, raptors etc the sluggaz may get ripped to bits even easier than they do now, they take too long to kill things and die in droves to anti-infantry fire.

I have been concidering modding a req cost of 20 rather than 30 to make them a little more durable as a squad. The squad size will be regulated by the banner system as is now and they might be more use, stalling tactics will still be the word of the day and they will cost more to keep around as they can be used for longer.

Do you see the sluggas being a shield for the shootas ? That is their supposed use and they are slightly inadiquate compared to other races cc units, raptors will tear them apart unless they are in a big squad.

As it is Ork low teir squads get outperformed by other races units and the orks must capture the whole map, then allow it to be retaken as they tech to Nobs to allow them to recapture the map. They need some staying power and i think sluggas are it, maybe increase the eavy boyz armour bonus from 1.35 to 1.65 ? I would prefer to see more boyz than tougher boyz, so i would prefer the cost decrease option.

Good work on making the underused units more attractive, i would like to see much more of that kind of thinking.

I fail to see why the eldar gravtank has not been reduced in HP and the vyper increased in HP. The knockdown is great from the missile and the rangers changes are also wonderful.

IG Grenade damage needs to be reduced. 250 is far too great combined with the large knockdown radius. The closer squad members are packed together the greater the cumulative effect of the knockdown, with ork squads this is most pronounced.

Banners do need to be included in the turret cheapening excercise.

I know that this is mostly a day job for you guys, but it's how we all spend most of our time relaxing. Thanks for the good work. :clap:

[Darkstorm]

Taking a harder look at the prebetapostalphaalmostfinishedbutnotquitedone change log, I'm having a tough time figuring out the motives between the SM nerfs and the Chaos buffs. Half the units of Chaos have role equivelants in SM race, uber-units not withstanding. Cultists = Scouts, CSM = TacSM, CL = FC, Raptors = ASM, AC = Sarges, well you get the idea. Anyway, issues like bonus for ACs, but Sarge gets their PS nerfed don't really sit well with me. Having ASMs + Sgt charge Raptors + AC should be pretty much an even battle, or if one has an edge, it shouldn't be decisive. Vanilla DoW kept this SM/Chaos balance very well, but it seems with WA we're moving further and further away. :/ And the 2/3 usage for one Raptor jump is just weird.

On Orks: Those proposed changes are very welcomed. Orks got beaten-down with the nerf stick after teir one far too much. They're a good first step, but more probably needs to be done to keep them viable in T3/T4. Good job so far.

On Eldar: The changes look okay in general. The pop cap change on Prisms was well needed (and this from a sometime Eldar player!). Eldar players have been abusing Prism spam for far too long. Eldar are about specialization....use different units in different combinations in different situations.

I do take issue with Farseer's Psychic Storm getting nerfed. FS is too frail to go toe-to-toe with another hero....she needs those spells to survive.

Anyway, that's my $0.02. Again, thanks to Relic for sharing. :)

[Troubleshooter]

Good Post Titler...

Waggh should get a price reduction!!! If turrets are going 25% cheaper, then Orks will need alot more boots on the ground to compete.. cheaper Waagh is the only way to go.

Eldar plats need a build time reduction... other wise I think that they are fine under this new paradigm.

People are really concerned about rap harrassing with the new stuff... remember that the new stuff has a cost, and getting raps into the enemy base before 1:30 is the key to rap harrassing. Flamers, Uber AC's, and speed boosts wont be ready to serve by then. Your grots should be as safe as they ever were :)

Besides, now that I have a solid tech path in tier 1 through cults and CSM, you may not see less jumpy raps in your base as often, cause cheaper waagh and turrets will make Chaos rap tactics far more pricy (reducing the incentive to harrass with them.)

Zerks at 4 cap: Read my earlier post... they are NOT the backbone of a chaos tier 2 army now, they are Moral immune unit grabbers that buy you time to set up your CSM and Cultists for the kill. Remember, CSM will have tier 1 HB, that mass up to 4 per squad with an upgrade, and Infiltrate. CSM will have an early tier 2 advantage on heavy weapons that should wane a bit as other races get their scaling upgrades. Good stuff!!!

Also had another thought on Psyker powers... no mention of range on the power. You might have to meat shield your psyker pretty good to get him close enough to use the power. Theres still alot we dont know on that front.

Land speeder spam FTW? Go for it... Its still a light vehicle, any AV unit will kill them dead, and massed infantry fire will still take them down. Spamming LS's over dreads? fine by me... Sents FTW.

[0dyguru]

Do it!

0dyguru

“And they shall know no fear.” ~The Emperor

[nenad]

i knda wonder about all the weapons upgrade for chaos, no nerf ?
seriously ?

/nenad

to be able to have all those upgrades tier 1 is ridiculous.
and to top it off : a buff for the for all the chaos troops ?

/nenad

[CrossOrion]

I think you need to look at it more carefully.

First, few of those upgrades are tier 1, and 4 popcap for beserkers isn't a buff.

[ArtofWar420]

Eldar rangers squad limit 1? What does that mean?

[I-Guard]

@TroubleShooter

I was thinking the same thing about the psyker. He is probably going to have to be well protected. Its not like he can just walk in the midst of a warstorm and cast such a powerful spell without bein bombarded by x amount of units.

It sounds so easy and imba with the new psykers abilities, but until its tested, its just mere speculation.

[Compeador]

I'm wondering if the teir 1 boost to HP includes aspect warriors. I saw the reapers got an hp nerf. Scouts don't get the boost, and cults and guardians and sluggas shouldn't either, as they're teir 0.

Also, what I said earlier about fire prisms. Friendly fire, 1000 hp reduction, increase build time should be the way to do it not making eldar teir 4 the weakest before avatar.

Also, all non AV-specialised units need a nerf to building damage! (especially banshees)

Chaos power sword too.

Oh, also the teir 1 infantry HP boost and nerf of psy storm don't really mesh well.... it could make psy storm almost useless.


Arrrrgh and one more edit.... what about eldar teir 3? Will it finally become viable and not just something to ignore/skip over?

[Master Azrael]

Looking good, can't wait :D

[mecha_manic]

OH MY GOD!
theyre not gonna stop the spamming of termies, oblitorators and fire prisms! If they dont this patch is meaningless and the game will be forever ruined! oh noooes! :cry:
EDIT oh wait, they fixed prisms.....a bit.... BUT STILL! what of termies and oblits!?

[skills]

Yer maybe a cap on termi's 1 of each kind only

[MicroMarine]

thanks for posting this relic! it looks like a significant improvement, and i cant wait to see how the beta plays out. The day is approaching when this game becomes balanced enough that i can convert my starcraft playing friends to it. (oh yeah, compeador has the right idea about FP's)

[GRIM Ripper]

yeah im most curious about the "T1 25% buff." what exactly does that apply to since other T1 units such as scouts, SM and reapers have seperate nerfs/buffs?

[nude-fox]

Zerks at 4 cap: Read my earlier post... they are NOT the backbone of a chaos tier 2 army now, they are Moral immune unit grabbers that buy you time to set up your CSM and Cultists for the kill. Remember, CSM will have tier 1 HB, that mass up to 4 per squad with an upgrade, and Infiltrate. CSM will have an early tier 2 advantage on heavy weapons that should wane a bit as other races get their scaling upgrades. Good stuff!!!

yah but as i see it whats the point if i could have 2 squads of raps + super champ + Flamers or 1 squad of zerks thave are moral immune but get no super champ and take up 4 pop cap for 8 people i'ts looking like i'ma take the raptors

[Rayden]

What is the logic behind removing the ability to see the targetting of the Orbital Bombardment
Bombardment on anything else than HQ was pretty pointless as all enemy units ran away as soon as they saw the sign.

[SNeakY_BuGGeR]

I really want this addressed:- it is a nightmare to have to order a squad five thousand times during a game to get it to do something. IN AUTOMATCHES you have to order squads multiple times and click about three hundred times a game more than you have to! I want squads to go where they are told, not stop when a dude dies and run back into battle!
Also when they do stop they stand with their backs to the enemy and do not fire! WTF is that all about?

Another pet bug hate of mine is the is the fact that despite squads being told to target things they will often target other itmes instead. OH and also they will only ever approach to the range of the longest firing weapon leaving most of the squad standing idle doing NOTHING! This does not affect eldar scum because they have specialised TOO CHEAP and OVERPOWERED squads. But when you mix weapons in sm squads they are pathetic! You have to keep moving them closer and closer to get all weapons in a squad firing!

EVERYONE that I have ever talked to admits that eldar are too quick to get vehicles out. The star canon does INSANE damage to light infantry now and you are going to buff it even more! So the gayness of Eldar vehicle spam tech will be even more effective than it already is!

When are relic going to sort the stupidly easy teching and resource building of eldar out? It ain't just the ferocious OP ness of every one of their units it is the UNBELIVABLE effectiveness of falcons and now they are going to get a huge buff too!

Oh and I think that everyone that plays the game will say this (Apart from the blatant chaos abusers) Plasma guns on asp champs at tier one is a JOKE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Possessed are already a massive pain in backside and they come very early indeed, two squads can wreck multiple bases and are virtually impossible to deal with without artillery support. Are they going to get a nerf or are chaos yet again going to be the only viable team own every race option? I find it astonishing that chaos seem to be getting buffs to already Overpowered units. Eldar get buffs to already overpowered items and nerf only the amount of their top level stuff. Banshees do insane building damage and tie up multiple squads when teched. reaper are a small penalty but may be easier to deal with early game. but basically Eldar have had a small nerf.
Eldar already can mass warpies earlier than most are tier three to be able to cope with them and the fact that at that stage in the game they also already have at least three wraithlords too. Whirlwinds were one of the only defenses to these multiple threats and now they are half the hitpoints they will be a very expensive glass cannon to shoot with!

[SACSlym]

Bombardment on anything else than HQ was pretty pointless as all enemy units ran away as soon as they saw the sign.

Exactly why it was great, you could use it to move enemy forces, then just cancel it after they went out of formation.

I'm still a little worried to see no reduction of Eldar's Fire Prism Health buff, seeing as 5 Fire Prisms can still do way more damage then they should be able to. Believe me 4 Cap is a step in the right direction, but their health is still far too ungodly to be balanced.

Still confuzzled on Killa Kans cap though...

[Troubleshooter]

yah but as i see it whats the point if i could have 2 squads of raps + super champ + Flamers or 1 squad of zerks thave are moral immune but get no super champ and take up 4 pop cap for 8 people i'ts looking like i'ma take the raptors
Raps cost more, 70 req to reinforce, less durable, not morale immune... Champ will be the only thing left standing very quickly.

Zerks : Durable, high HP, low cost, High speed. No AC... not needed I say. You wont be spamming them anymore, but they serve a different purpose now.

Raps = LP destruction and tier 2 mop up squads.
Zerks = Cultist/CSM escort and shock troops.

Cant wait to see if I am right :)

[mecha_manic]

Hey sneaky bugger, atm there are two things you must realise.
1) the weapons for sm only going to the longest range is a two sided coin, what if you wanted to have your missle armed marines to go kill a tank, its really better just to have the missles firing and no usless-against-veichles bolters.
AND
2)the chaos marines ARE going to be far more powerful that the eldar in the next patch, SO QUIT COMPLAINING.

Although i must agree with you on the ordering squads bug.

[DivineOne]

*agrees with Sneaky*
I forgot about all those bugs...range bugs where you will only have one unit in a squad shooting (lets say you have 1 missile in a squad, none of the other members will move in range and will be standing around. Annoying if they are equipped with HWs such as flamers and plasma). Also, what about the revenge bug? Finally, the stupid LAG that you get when you command a unit. You tell them to do something, and they do it three seconds after you issue your command. Don't say that this is a hardware issue, because over himachi, it was perfect.

And where the hell is a router love? It takes me 10 minutes or more to get an automatch going, due to me having a router.

[mecha_manic]

hey, three sec lag could only be caused by the ping of the game you were playing, 'tis not relic's problem.

[klotzy]

mecha, what about those of us who every online game of DoW we play, we have the lag issue. i have DSL, and every other game i have that i play online does not have this lag problem, even the ones which run on gamespy. if its not relics problem, whose is it?

[Brenil]

Well, I'll go with alot of the other people and only comment on the proposed changes as interesting.

One thing I would like to throw in though, that I haven't heard mentioned in awhile. What about the Power Sword upgrade effecting the SM Force Commander and Libarian? Would this be considered a bug or a 'feature'? I don't think I'm alone in this, if it's a feature, alot of us would rather see them using their Daemon Hammer and Force Staff, respectively.

I don't mind the fact that they benefit from weapon upgrades, damage wise, but perhaps have them graphic wise starting off with swords and once upgraded get their special weapons. This could apply to the Chaos Lord as well, having him start off with a Power Sword and then gaining Khrone's Lollipop.

Anyway, just one thing I hope isn't forgotten and at least thought about with the upcoming patch.

[nenad]

aighty that last post from me was too short and inconsequent.

so here we go :

alot of the changes made preliminary (to view here ) is from my point of view wrong.

ask ureselves this question: shouldnt i first and foremostly have to build an ordinary tac marine squad be4 i make asms ? i think there should be a limit on to when u can build a certain type of squad. what i mean with this is that the game should be a gradual build up up with a mixed up army be4 u can click tier 3 for instance. Now obviously thats gonna take away some of the tactical factors of this game but id rather have that than the abusive shit goin on which all HAS to do if they want to play to win.

lets face it, alot of the plrs leaving this game for others has to do with the fact that the fasttech is to easy to do, the abuses and the imba is bein used to perfection. alot of the good plrs i know talk about this alot. the famous fast build for raptors in an sm base is well known, which u tech behind. also the scout harass in the opponents chaos base. i hate the fact that u can outtech people and spam op units into others units where u dont have a chance to kill them even though they are teched up and u are as good as ure opponent microwise ) . what i mean is that its too big a difference between tactical marines and shooty terminators. the tier levels matters all too much.

i also think that the planned 4 vehicle cap cost per fireprism is ridiculous. in no way should a character give 10 pop cap to vehicles just by bein out on the map. 15 wraith lords ? come on its just bs. the realistic and wise change would be, friendly fire and knockback on ure own troops as they get hit as well as a cap cost of 3 if u consider what they can do in the game and as to how cheap they are compared to how much hit points they have. blast shots from any type of veicle or squad should make troops loose morale which they never seem to do like in the old days.

i would like realistic changes, and also changes that is handling the problem at hand as a whole. not a compensatory change which just creates another imbalnced problem in the game so people get irritated again about imbalance issues.

/nenad

[I-Guard]

Raps cost more, 70 req to reinforce, less durable, not morale immune... Champ will be the only thing left standing very quickly.

Zerks : Durable, high HP, low cost, High speed. No AC... not needed I say. You wont be spamming them anymore, but they serve a different purpose now.

Raps = LP destruction and tier 2 mop up squads.
Zerks = Cultist/CSM escort and shock troops.

Cant wait to see if I am right :)
^^ That sounds about right Troubleshooter.

A few things to add.

- Though I like the Psyker idea, I still think IG needs something else. Solely depending on the psykers could be troublesome, but perhaps thats why his hp has been increased.

- I think Sentinals, Hellhounds, and Chimeras should be looked over. As a Imperial Guard lover, I would like to see my vehicles hold thier own. Maybe its due to my lack of skill but it seems IG's vechs arent really good until the Russ Tanks and Baneblade shows up. Which is faaar into the game.

-Also I would like to see the removal of the Mars Command Pattern, that or have it loaded with upgrades for the Baneblade or other IG vehicles. Having to build an extra building that does nothing else but produce one baneblade seems a little bit much.

- I like the new style of Chaos. New strageties, less spam at least on the zerkers.

- As for the fireprisms, I think its fine, perhaps just lower thier hp. I still have trouble figuring out how some people let thier opponents get up to 5-7 fire prisms anyways. But I think taking away one more thing from the fire prisms in addition to what was stated is a good idea. Like what others said, maybe lower hp, etc etc. I think the best option is to just increase the production and energy cost of the fireprism. There people cant just keep producing them at such a fast rate(well they could but they wont have any production or energy left lol).

- Does anyone know what is up with the ranger squad? Are they saying you can only have 1 out total? If thats the case it may explain why 5 appear starting out. Who knows I could be wrong and completely misunderstood.

- With Space Marines I like the changes, it seems Landspeeders will have a purpose. I suggest making them 2 a pop. But if they are stuck at 1, i wouldnt complain. I know they would sound overpowered at 1 a pop but thier armor is light. So if someone spammed a buttload of ls I would be more than happy to blow them all up. It kinda reminds me of the people who try to spam Chimeras and lose miserably.

- One thing I would like to see is the Rhino Transport changing for the better. Maybe give it better armor or increase its hp alot so it can actually transport units and not get destroyed so easily half way there.

Hm other than that and the obvious bugs, I love what you guys have so far. :)

As for the connection problems people have its due to your computer and/or connection. Its not relic's fault.

[SupaStarAsh]

Well, all in all it's nice to see another update (I hope some nice new maps come with it) - There are never enough maps (especially eight player ones).

However, regardless of this, how about adding the flamer and machine gun to the Imperial Guard Sentinel, along with some twin-linked heavy bolters for the Land Raider?
Talking of the Land Raider, one thing I don't get with that, is it's suppose to be the best tank in the Imperium, yet a Banblade can easily kick ass - LR v BB - BB wins!

How about some bikes anyway :p - Something that was sooooo missed in the original (and don't say it can't be done) they have been modded :D

I would list all the changes I'd like to see, but save hijacking the thread, I'll browse the forums a little more.

[DatonKallandor]

The Baneblade is a SUPERHEAVY tank. The Land Raider is a glorified APC. There's no contest.


Daton

[SNeakY_BuGGeR]

I would also very much like for this game to have its tech tree slowed down for a bit to make tier two troops become more viable and tier three techers to get punished harder so that they learn to build and use an army instead of fast teching to tier three drop and obliterate bases.

Whirlwind nerf is far to severe! 3000 hitpoints would be better but 2500 makes them a joke and how are you supposed to deal with obliterator massing in bases now. They will just have to spit at a WW and they will get roasted..... Talk about a sledge hammer to bang a tac in! They are after all a tier three Item they should be sturdy enough to withstand tier three punishment and at 2500 hitpoints they are a joke.

Eldar teching needs to be addressed and although it will be nice for SM to get faster and cheaper attack vehicles the Insane effectiveness of falcon teching will be massively boosted with this patch.Try beating an eldar on mom or fallen city and you know what I am talking about! I am not talking about noobie eldar players that go straight for the big gen and do nt cap points but decent ones that get an economy going first. Wraithlords can be out before you have one missile squad straight to warp spider spamming. Eldar are massively OP in the right hands and if you look at the 1800 eldar player with a 40 game win streak you can see what I am talking about!

[peturabo]

Hmmm just after re-reading& further analysis it:-

SM:- I'm glad SM healing is getting the stackness nerfed, it can be annoying when chasing those scouts down if you arent eldar or SM you cant touch them they can eb very annoying especially when given plasmaguns, the HP nerf is a bit necessary imho. Glancing through it i cant see Space Marines changing much apart from asm being dropped in favour for missiles. Which type is "Vehicle_Medium"? Dreadnoughts/Defilers?

Chaos:- Chaos' changes really intreague me, Raptor flamers, lol? Giving a melee unit a specialist ranged unit im interested into seeing what this does, i dont see the point in giving melee specialists ranged weapons. The new Chaos research "Purge The Weak" is also very interesting. Due to Berzerkers being 4 pop, i cant see many more people using them much longer, they will probably appear about as much as psm in original DoW. But this research also adds 100 HP to every squad member in the unit with the aspiring champion, this is basically Chaos Bionics. BUT this kinda makes Raptors& csm more useful come along Tier2.

I remember FAO saying "We want to make Chaos less linear", well they have and havent achieved this, they are making Berzerkers none useable but in return the are making the T1 units useable at T2. Cultists, well LOL! 5 cultists plasmaguns or 5 cultists nades that is going to hurt anything especially with the Farseer psystorm being nerfed. If eldar thought Chaos were hurting them bad enough as it was, its going to get ALOT worse. Also notice the Chaos plasma pistols damage are only reduced vs Monster_High and vehicle_low NOT regular infantry units(Unless ive missed it somewhere). Powerswords no reduction for Chaos, powerfists im hoping will be worth it. Overall Chaos Zerks will be obsolete , although it will be like more old DoW, but without plasmaguns and the equivalent of Bionics back, Chaos good AV i think Chaos will be stronger, they may arguabily now be inline with SM Tier2 or better or slightly worse not sure but much stronger.

Orks:- Interesting maybe some more Ork jumper builds to be incorprated into the mix, so whilst also having the option with slugga they can go fast stormy strats more Orky options. Well ManZ more CC focused than actually building/vehicle destroyers, with the Zerk nerf this will almost certainly make Orks the dominant CC race. Althought thinking about not sure how Chaos are going to deal with Nob techs, 4 pop zerks and heavy bolters, maybe mass cultists plasmaguns, will be interesting. Ouch uber bustas, they will almost certainly be the vehicle counter which will probably make Wartraks obsolete. I think Orks will be slightly stronger, i can see Orks beating Chaos, chaos beating sm and SM beating orks Hmmm not sure will have to get my hands on a beta patch to test it out more.

Eldar:- Again a few interesting changes, cheaper but only do more damage with upgrades so it might be worth as a support unit in the T2 area. Lots of nerfs to eldar overall looking at them, but they are still exetremely strong. Guardians still beat marines with warlocks, reapers can still chase things down especially with guide. Shee's, spiders, dragons ALL untouched, WL BL getting nerfed.

In the longrun i cant see the Eldar strategies changing a whole lot, i think with the other races buffs they are inlinbe with the other races balance wise. I cant see the knockback a reason to build a Vyper unless you can build like 5 vypers and use them to keep knocking melee units back while the WS mop up, interesting tactic. Psystorm no longer ridiculous so going to be just something to cause minor damage like it should do. But yes overall Eldar arent changing much, but with a few other possible tactics, as it currently stand eldar are alot stronger than the other races so with the buffs of Sm/Chaos/orks they will have alot harder time in winning. BUT i think Eldar still get a minor advantage. I dont see Eldar strategies changing, althought it would be nice if eldar actually had a Tier3 presence and didnt have to rely on killing their opponent T2 by mass suppression.

IG:- I think with the new guardsmen armour, guardsmen will be as they should be, still capable of that uber rush with the commi's but if the CS die, they will struggler to hold their own in ranged battles vs marines/csm and guardians, which is how a defensive race should be. Aha, Psykers new psychic power that means effectively IG wont need to go to a vehicle pit for their Anti-vehicle especially combined with priests. Yes commi priest is till in play but i predict that with weaker guardsmen they will be pretty reliant on him. I still think the Basilisk damage is a bit too harsh, but by the looks of it they might need it. Im still worried that Eldar will eat Ig for breakfast they need something to make them more Warpsider resliant But overall some nice changes& ideas

As stated this just beta but it does gives us a incline as to what the next patch will be like, patch will totally change gameplay strats obviously. I cant see marines changing at all just nerfed healers. Zerks get fruited over, but in return the csm& raptors get made competent Tier2 units. Eldar not changing much strats will be pretty much the same but they will have to work harder for their wins. Orks, maybe some jumper-harass-tech strats coming up, now having competent AV they will be able to fend off vehicle spam well. IG are interesting i fear their feebleness of the guardsmen units and their heavy reliance in commanders will show in Tier2, again interesting changes.

At first glance and predictions based on this changelog i think the races will be something like this:- Eldar> SM = Chaos = Orks> IG(Yes even with the buffs of the other races Eldar are still stronger imo). Again really looking forward to this beta patch to test some stuff out whenever Relic get round to it. Just my opinion.

Have fun

Pet

[FarseerAnimal]

I like most of these changes, especially CoMS. Gives the IG some much needed AV power.
But one thing I don't like about it is Chaos Preds!!! They are still spammable at tier 2. Space Marines have to wait untill tier 4 to get any preds at all. Most races don't have the AV power in tier 2 to deal with this.
I'll post some more comments when I think of them.

-FarseerAnimal

[Hello_Moto]

what is the reasoning behind increasing zerker cap from 2 to 4?

[nude-fox]

the only thing i'm scared of with IG CoMS is that vindicare assasian pluse CoMS = dead vehicle

[Dorkdav]

Pet I don't know if the Zerks will be unused. They cost a lot of cap but Champions still increase cap and now they are a must have for the Choas army. So I don't know if pop cap will be such a problem for them.

[testthewest]

Respect, thq/relic that you got the pre-patch notes out.

I'm must say: A lot of things look great.
I'm very interested if these buff take raptors over the edge of being to strong in early game, still I first want to try out before I complain.
Maybe you think again if you can specialize Eldar again, even if that means that DR get pushed to Tier 2/3.
If you dont specialize them, make the DR upgrade a Tier 3 Upgrade increasing the dmg of DR alot, since their damage output is too low to compete in tier3.

Edit: Some people say KB are overnerfed with 4 pop. While this might be so, they forget that KB should get so kind of special unit.
You might have overlooked the fact that all moral-breaking weapons will get a boost (Rangers, flamers on Raptors, Scouts-Sniper), and that the main advantage of KB will be their ability to be unbreakable. They will be your counter to mass Snipers.
Therefore you will never need that many of them. => pop 4 wont matter that much

[Dunxco]

YES! Finally! The Whirlwind will be looked at. I always wondered how the Whirlwind managed to gain that much HP, considering it's a Rhino with a Whirlwind Missile Launcher attached. Is that the SM idea of armour, to strap onesself with missiles? I think not. Bout time.

Nice idea with the Raptors. It's nice to see that just as I pick up Chaos to play as, this patch could come along to make them all the better. I would like to know just how much "considerably" is, with the flamethrower power. Will it be worth using? The Khorne Bezerker pop uppage is most intriguing. I usually use KB's as a bridge between PSMs, but now PSMs will be cheaper, so it may mean mass Raptors, but the choices are so varied compared to what they are now, that Chaos is going to be a LOT more fun to play.

Orks... Well I love Orks, and I find the Stormboyz most interesting for changing. Of course, TBs get more power (expected), and it's nice that the KK Big Shoota will hit something (if it's used), and it's nice to see a morale up, but what might be done to Stormboyz may make them even less idea for fielding IMHO...

Eldar... Nicely done with the Reapers, interesting with the Rangers, and it seems Eldar are being nerfed, which would be brilliant. 1 pop Rangers seems to be an odd choice to make, and the mighty WL BL and Fire Prisms have been knocked off of their perches. Huzzah!

Imperial Guard, well, proof is in the pudding. A new Psyker ability that is very intriguing, Commissars changed, the Basilisk bug... Things are moving nicely.

I have high hopes that this is a step in the right direction.

[Bobacanoosh]

I just want to second the request made earlier that the heroes (Force Commander, Librarian, etc..) that have their weapons upgraded to powerswords start with powerswords and upgrade to their unique weapons. (I'm not concerned about changing the damage numbers, just the graphics)

Hmm... Most of the changes look good, but many of them, especially the new psykerr power, are going to have to be looked at carefully in beta. A lot of these changes are moving in the right direction, but it's going to take a lot of testing to tell just how far they should go.

To people asking forr friendly fire on artillery, although that could be an interesting game mechanic, I think it would cause some very serious problems without drastically imporved pathfinding, since it isn't much fun to have your own guys flying around because they didn't quite go where you wanted.

[Whodunnit]

Are us modders allowed to recreate these changes and test them out ourselves?

[Hunk]

I love the new psyker ability. That is by far the coolest thing I have ever seen in DoW.

Big up yourself Relic & THQ.

Great Success!

[Whodunnit]

To people asking forr friendly fire on artillery, although that could be an interesting game mechanic, I think it would cause some very serious problems without drastically imporved pathfinding, since it isn't much fun to have your own guys flying around because they didn't quite go where you wanted.

It's not the FF or no FF thats the problem, it's that some teams artillary already has it, while others don't I.E. SM and eldar.

[DivineOne]

I would also very much like for this game to have its tech tree slowed down for a bit to make tier two troops become more viable and tier three techers to get punished harder so that they learn to build and use an army instead of fast teching to tier three drop and obliterate bases.

I agree, T3 is a joke. All spam one (maybe two units if you are lucky) unit and annhilate. HOWEVER, we do NOT want what we had back in DoW - Where T3 units were not as good for pop cap as T2 units (we had 20/20 Tac SM armies, now we have 20/20 AT armies)

Whirlwind nerf is far to severe! 3000 hitpoints would be better but 2500 makes them a joke and how are you supposed to deal with obliterator massing in bases now. They will just have to spit at a WW and they will get roasted..... Talk about a sledge hammer to bang a tac in! They are after all a tier three Item they should be sturdy enough to withstand tier three punishment and at 2500 hitpoints they are a joke.

This is a joke yeah? WWs do INSANE damage to infantry, as well as morale damage (for what it's worth) and knockback. On top of this, they cannot be destroyed without ignoring the 6 ATs owning your army. They are disposable cheap units. Now, they can be destrotyed and are less spammable. Great. Now all we need is FF so the enemy has a chance to defeat those ATs.

Eldar teching needs to be addressed and although it will be nice for SM to get faster and cheaper attack vehicles the Insane effectiveness of falcon teching will be massively boosted with this patch.Try beating an eldar on mom or fallen city and you know what I am talking about! I am not talking about noobie eldar players that go straight for the big gen and do nt cap points but decent ones that get an economy going first. Wraithlords can be out before you have one missile squad straight to warp spider spamming. Eldar are massively OP in the right hands and if you look at the 1800 eldar player with a 40 game win streak you can see what I am talking about!

Eldar are VERY tricky. Any fine balance issue can turn the tide in seconds, whether it is for or against eldar. Who would have thought that fire on the run would be such an issue eh? Now, Eldar early T2 sucks. Not enough WSs compared to those scaling HBs you had earlier. Vehicles are their saving grace. WS en mass however are very powerful. Still not enough when it comes to T3. Anyways, I think that Eldar T2 needs to be delayed (back to DoW, soul shrine is an armoury, mechanise for war upgrade (or whatever it is) is the T2)

[noise_pollution]

please make killa kanz 3 pop instead of 4...

4 pop for a walker is insane... as orks i often find myself with lots of power and nothing to spend it on, as the only unit that needs more power than req is the kan and i can only have 3 of them alive at a time. Considering that they take years to cross a map, one rarely sees 2 kanz fighting at the same time.

[Lord_Ulrik]

Im afraid of one thing, at least a bit :D

We have dow:classic 1.0 maps in the automatch pool and in the leagues also. Ok, some of them with little changes, but imo we need a complete rework of the mappool. Mind, a game cant be balcanced 100% over the unit values, a part of balance is the map so we need good maps to balance the matchups better. Next thing comin up for me is, we need good mappers in the beta with a good gameplay experience also. Btw, just talkin about 1v1 maps because i think its tooo much work to rework all teamplayer maps :crazy:

[newghost]

as long as they remake it armor to diffrent class, thats cool

[Vertigo]

The list looks good to me! Props to Relic/THQ for releasing it early.

[Dys]

Are us modders allowed to recreate these changes and test them out ourselves?

Good idea Whodunnit. I would be for someone making a custom mod that implements the changes shown here to test it :clap:

Someone do it please :jig:

[I-Guard]

^^ Sounds good to me as long as a PRO-Level Modder does it, and not some biased one sided fanboyish modder. Otherwise he /she will have some biased views. That or he/she may fail to see what was the unit truly designed to do.

[aerziel]

hmm wouldnt suprise me if someone is already doing it

[PhoynixFire]

Ive already done it for IG(except min 1 damage.. It so small it wasnt worth doing till last) eldar and Chaos(except flamers on raptors).

But apparently this is ALL SPAM.

however only my postings are deleted.

However this is what happens

IG die like flies heavy bolters rape them so hard its unbelieveable......
maybe I have the hitpoints WRONG
but I set armor to 100 and give them an extra 80 hitpoints so they have 185.

The extra 100 hitpoints to Ig heros(I added it to all heros not just the CS) does nothing noticeable and yes it is working.
heros are still useless

Cultists grenades still own and with the new improved AC the cultist squads are way overpowered.

rangers I dont know what to do about them... as they didnt give any real numbers and they still seem weak.. I made them cheaper and build faster.

Ohh
I didnt improve all damage and hitpoints by 25%....
I was intrested in tier 1/2 changes and as this is surposedly uniform across all races it didnt seem really required to test the other balance changes.

[NathrakH]

another thing this doesn't have is the mines/stealth noise issue.

1. mines don't detect stealth
2. stealth can be "heard"

both are bugs i believe.

[Whodunnit]

At the moment, i'm making the mod, i'm following the change list exactly!!! i will put it up for download when it's finished, i've already done ork SM and half of chaos....

[the_almighty_moo]

it would be far too nasty to not hear stealth and shroud, thats the only dfence against late tier sm and eldar.

i agree witht he minefields, they should detect setalthed units.

Im no lover of prisms but id just be happy with the avatar cap bonuses removed alltogeather, and leave prisms as they are.

CoMS is cheese lol guard rape through most vehicles later game with leman russes, just have plasma, sniper and hellhounds for an easy fix :D probably INF_HEAVY_HIGH or however it is written.

[tyranidsrule]

is there no change in the population cost for killa-kanz?

[FlashlightIG]

What the hell were people thinking about when they suggested friendly fire? What if your teammate is being an asshole? I urge anyone who support friendly fire nerfs to reconsider.

[Whodunnit]

What the hell were people thinking about when they suggested friendly fire? What if your teammate is being an asshole?

That is an extremely valid point, however, basilisks have ff and it hasn't been a major issue.

[Lazerflip]

I don't want to be negative, flame, or start a discussion...but I want to know how I could get involved in the amendment of this changelog because at the moment it seems to be going in the wrong direction at the moment. Is there a way I could get into direct contact with the balance team and let them know some things without posting them here? I believe if I post here I will probably be treated as if I don't really know what I'm talking about, which I do. Thanks.

[FlashlightIG]

The basilisk is capped at 3, unfortunately your teammate can have 10 whirlwinds.

[Captain Wicha]

just thought of this... if i am not mistaken, (chances are... its the case) the BB has building armor as its armor type, meaning it wont be effected by curse of the machine spirit... i know its on the same team as the guard, but i just wanted to point that out...

also, if what im fearing is going to come true happens, (my guardsmen being chewed alive by just about everything) please make them cheaper... to compensate for the losses i know im going to take... i mean, i know its the guard, and dying is what they do best but what happened to being "the superior ranged race" looks like that torch is being passed to the tau.

sorry for whining... i promised myself i wouldnt do it until the beta, but i got carried away

[CrossOrion]

Baneblade has Vehicle Armor_High, not building armor. Same with the Landraider and killa Kanz.

[Captain Wicha]

I KNEW IT!!! i just remember reading from somewhere that it had building class armor... now i want to find where that was...


while im on the subject of IG vehicles... please oh please have T2 armor,health, and damage upgrades for the chimera... right now its so useless its almost pitiful, and i really want to like it... giving it a heavy bolter turret for the turret as a later upgrade might be nice

[PhoynixFire]

I wish they would increase the damage hitpoints or reduce the cost of the balisk aswell.. its been made with the fire change to

50% less damage
50% less knockdown effects

You now need to Balisks for the same power...

WTF they wernt ovrpowered to begin with because IG couldnt deal with infantry masses tier2 with there own infantry...

Ig still cant and all other races but eldar are buffed tier2 units... so they DEcrease IGS ability to deal with mass infantry? when they already couldnt deal with it..

doesnt make sense to me.

but guess im just gonna switch to chaos and spam cultist grenaders.

[Demon Ryu]

Anyone looked at the obliterator's lascannon???? The damage it does is pitiful...... please increase it. Give PSM their morale back at say....500??? Zerkers also need to be deshafted by making them pop 3 but make them more expensive so they won't get spammed, give them the blood frenzy ability (20% faster attacks.... or they'll use their use after T2) BTW is it just me or do earthshakers work horribly against other artillery? BT summoning also seems extremely slow... you've already got to get a relic, get T3 HQ that takes forever and research for Chaos Projectiles which also takes eons finally when you get to the BT you seem to have died of aging meanwhile you're army is getting slagged by the BB and LR. Kaserkins also need to be buildable after you reach T2 HQ........normal IG just gets eaten alive........ LASTLY........ Horrors need to be able to be reinforced..... they are vehicle killers alright..... but without being able to reinforce them their usablilty is diminished.

[newghost]

"the superior ranged race", tell that to my holy bolter heritic.

the guard are known for 3 things. 1: lots o arty, 2: lots o armor, 3: lots o men. thats all

serously though, i think the BB has biggest armor type.

[PhoynixFire]

newghost
yet in DOW

They have less men then chaos
Less arty then all other races
Weaker tanks :P

[CrossOrion]

You probably read it in the gamespot/spy/IGN unit preview or some forum rumour.

Think it was stated that the BB had building armor but less HP to reflect it somewhat against the Landraider.



WTF they wernt ovrpowered to begin with because IG couldnt deal with infantry masses tier2 with there own infantry...

I wasn't aware that IG had any problems with mass infantry to be honest, since they can outmass their opponents just as easily, if not easier. If your talking about massed CC Units, ASM had their HP decrease, Zerkers have a higher popcap, Raptors have their jump cut down, so they'll be mowed down if they mistime it...

Also with upgrades now give less bonus to tier one units, I'm guessing they are talking about a bionics and targeter nerf overrall...

[Captain Wicha]

@newghost

1. ok this one i think i can get behind... the basilisk rocks

2. i dont know... the guards armor just doesnt seem right to me... other races armor seem to drop the hammer on it... sent, great vehicle that cant take any damage, hellhould, your only choice for a bullet magnet with decent health and damage output, chimera, dont even make me go there... steel legion (mod) had me almost in love them, in winter assualt they are next to useless...

3. thats what i mean... but i want guardsmen to cost less, so the losses dont hurt my economy that much maybe they could be dropped to 100 req instead of 160

[the_voice]

Good afternoon everybody, The Voice is here,

First thing first, let me congratulate THQ team for their great work, and thanks for this pre-changelog for patch 1.5.

Things looks great, I swear, I can't wait for the next 1.5 patch however, as a good player on all races, this changelog is still unbalance on some aspect. The thing is to make all abilities usefull and make them have their place in strategies

General:
- Detect hidden units:
Remember that space marine have 3 chief + 4 apothecary to discover hidden unit and buildings. Same for IG: 1 boss squad
+ sniper + 4 psychers. Where Orks have 2 chiefs, Chaos have 2 chiefs eldar 2.
Ok Eldar can cloack their building, Chaos can cloack some of their units and orks can cloack their builders. But at least the Avatar of Khaine or Rangers should be able to discover hidden unit.

Maybe add a new research like infra red vision of somethig like that, for Chaos, which would be temporary to not make other races disadvantaged. For orks, make the builders able to view cloack units is not a bad idea too.


- Building area:
Building area for Orks and Chaos should be revised. For Chaos it should be bigger. And Orks, certainly less bigger but allow Wargh banner to extends area like eldars do.

- Rhino are far useless in this game. I mean, there is several way to make them useful.
1. greater armor and HP which would make them able to go throught ennemy lines
2. buildozer like
3. Detector

I think since the Space marine has enough mechanical unit and detector, the Chaos Rhino could be either a detector of hidden unit and be why not warp teleporter: the chaos rhino could create a warp hole, from a point in map to another, where units could travel through and be buildozer like.
While Space Marine Rhino could have a heavy heavy armor.

A.1 Space Marine|facts:
To be honnest, space marine is the easiest and the more powerfull race in the game because they have a good pair
Tactical-Assault on bio units and mechanical units. Let see:
tactic space marine-assault space marine
terminator-assault terminator dreadnought-hellfire
And around that, a bunch of whirlind, land speeder, land rader, predator, etc... Well, thanks THQ and the Emperer.

I do not know if you have ever tried to face a wall of tactical space marine with heavy bolter and missile laucher and a couple
of dreadnoughts, this is suicide.

Plus I have found a tactic, which is awesome with the space marine on tier 3, can smash every opponent with that.

A.2 What should change:
- Make terminator less harder to kill, for instance, less armor or HP. Think about it. If Whirlind are less powerfull, which unit can face Termies? A little of karskin? hum 7 squad of banshees? Or maybe the new rangers can do that....

- assault terminator hammer stun effect frequency should drop dramatically.

- And can you tell me what is the reason to hide commander's Orbital Strike? What about eldric storm and others?


B.1 Chaos | facts:
Chaos will be well balanced I think for this 1.5 patch, but I am a little bit worried about khorne berserkers. With a 4 cap, they would be useless. I am used to play with excellent chaos player, berserk are generally just a way to resist before getting possessed squad. Should they get a cap of 4, they may be forgotten and players would prefer the combination chaos space marine + raptors, with flame throwers!!!.

Chaos has only 2 mechanical units, I can't count rhino, see general section, but since former patches, Defilers are useless. Ask to chaos players if it is not preferrable to get a chaos predator rather than a defiler...

Obliterator are still linked to a RELIC, which is not acceptable if Space Marine has Terminators without having a RELIC.
And what about maps where you do not have any relic?

B.2 What should change:
- change berserk cap from 4 to 3. Or give them something else to make them usefull, in a tactical way.

- Make Defiler much stronger in melee, give them a more powefull canon to look like, but not as good as, whirlind or basilik.

Or maybe much more HP to have a reason to have them in battle|defense.

- Make obliterators available without relic, it is a MUST HAVE.


C.1 Eldar | facts:
Eldar are still a complicated race to manage but still great in battle. The reason why there are great in battle it is because they can have 10 prisms in battle in T4, when you have the avatar of Khaine. Make them cap 4 will have a huge impact in battle, you can't attack two different locations anymore, or it will be hard. I know that you can still have Wraithlord Spam, but they are slow in battle|cannot teleport.

Farseer psychic storm is ridiculous. Hum, I mean, okay it is available from the beginning but it should have something else like immediate fear or slow down opponent attack rate for few seconds.

There is no real force to face terminators, their heavy armor make them to hard to kill, even with Fire Prism. Even Sear council is struggling when fighting with Termies!!!

Grav platform are too slow and boost ability is annoying. I mean, these platform should be an advantage in attack and
an alternative to other mechanical unit.

Reaper are still too unbalanced they are something that might be useful at the beginning of the game, but useless after T2. I mean, this should be the squad to have against heavy heavy bio units like termies|oblits|ogryn. In this case, Eldar still the race for specialist, hard to play but very effective when played well.

Bonesinger WraithTomb is useless as well since it just block the building for few seconds. It could be more effective is the WraithTomb was performed on an area like the edric storm and|or stay longer.

Finally upgraded support platform always destroy our own building and mechanical units when the opponent attack in melee, that is why we have to think twice before upgrading support platform!!!

C.2 What should change:
- leave the cap 3 for prisms but maybe add a max cap of 8 rather than 10 when Khaine is in da house.
- Give farseer psychic storm another ability like immediate fear or slow down attack rate.
- Get a rid of grav platform booster, grav platform should be always fast in attack and drop a bit their building time.
- Make reaper specialise to annihilate heavy heavy armored unit like Mega-Armored Nob|Oblits|Termies|Ogryn.
- Upgraded support platform should not destroy our own building and mechanical units
- WraithTomb stay longer and|or affect an good area like eldric storm rather just 1 building.


D.1 Orks | fact:
Orks is definively untouchable at the beginning of the game but it could be nice to have something equivalent in T3|T4.
Orks building are too easily destroyable.

Plus, Nobs claws are a waste of time if we have to add them one by one, like it was in Dawn Of War with Sear Council.

Killer Khan cap 4 is too big.


What should change:
- Make upgraded Warggh banner a bit stronger in defense
- I think it was a good idea to have another team with Nob with claws, available in T3 or T4.
- Killer Khan cap should be 3


E.1 Imperial Guards:
The new version of IG is just great, I mean, the new psycher ability is awesome. For this race I have nothing to say or maybe if you see psychers and basilik, run for your life!!!

The last but not the least, Thanks a lot THQ team for this great game. I am as well a Starcraft player. THQ brang a new game different from Starcraft, With a great universe, very fast game play, adding plenty of different tactics. With the next update with the TAU and the other race, it will be very good for our neurons!


PS: Please, for dawn of war 2, can you just add flying units? It make very very different and virtually unlimitted tactics...

The Voice is out, thanks for your attention.


Cheers mates

[newghost]

DoW is a pale comparison to WH40k

for those who think that the BB has building armor, thats TT rules.

[CrossOrion]

3. thats what i mean... but i want guardsmen to cost less, so the losses dont hurt my economy that much maybe they could be dropped to 100 req instead of 160

You mean you want them not only to cost only 20 req to reinforce (Ork sluggas cost 30) but also 100 right off the bat? You start with 1000 resources on a standard game, 100 per IG squad means you can have 5 IG squads AND a Tactical bunker, a couple of Commies within the first 2 minutes. So within the first 2 minutes, you have 15 IG grenades, 3 of them with commmies, being reinforced very fast, very cheaply.

So. No. Your guardsmen, unless they recieve a serious nerf, will not cost less :P

@voice



this changelog is still unbalance on some aspect.

Changelog isn't final, and to be honest I think some of your points are complete pants. For one, walls of HB and missile squads are uncounterable only if you are on the losing end of a game, for the last 5 minutes. Another, ANY Buff to the Wraithtomb ability would be a mistake. A few seconds is all you need to stop that extra dread from coming out before your firedragons or banshee smash down the vehicle commands. Also, Wraithlords.. SLOW? I'm trying to think of a walker that's as fast as this guy but I can't. Among other reasons.

[WarMachine245]

to be honest from my point of view, gaurdsman are still gonna be a decent force to contend with. i mean, gernade launchers will still pawn SM heavy bolters pretty badly because of the setup time HBs have (i think it was 2.5 secs?) seeing how the gernade launchers knock units off their feet, and that delay time HBs have compared to what the 1 sec delay gaurdsmans GL's are getting is really not gonna make much differance. the only time IG i see getting owned in this patch is gettting mauled by cc units and being outnumbered.
*prepares for any flaming or dps charts that are gonna be shoved in his face*

as for the patch changes themselves, i am loving it!! however, i do have a couple strikes against it:


Reduced the cost of the Land Speeder (150 Requisition / 130 Power / 2 Population) to (100 Requisition / 80 Power / 1 Population)
Land Speeder Assault Cannon Weapon:
Increased damage against Infantry Medium from 36.3 to 40%
Increased damage against Infantry Heavy Medium from 19.6 to 25%
Infantry high from 25 to 30%
Infantry Heavy High from 9.6% to 25%

keep the requisition and vpop as is and just lower the power cost a bit and it should be fine *takes cover before the flaming begins*


Psyker's now have a new ability known as Curse of the Machine Spirits. This ability:

Changes the target vehicle's armor from vehicle armor to infantry armor for the duration of the ability
Shuts off the vehicle's weapons for the duration of the ability

maybe if you posted the proposed cooldown and duration time along with this proposed ability maybe it would have gotten lil more love

make it a T3 reaserch and it should be ok (seeing how all the scary vehicles come out then and the sentinal will still get so SOME "love" in T2) *hugs a nearby sentinal*

khorne berzerkers being at 4 ipop? hmmm... *prays to khorne that the furious charge skill will apply to the khorne berzerkers and that they will get lil more hp*

raptors get flamers? hmmm.... there are 2 ways you can do this:

1. let them get the 4 flamers but move the raptors to T2 (i dont think anyone wants to face T1 PSM without anyway to deal with them)

2. let the raptors stay in T1 but limit them to only 2 flamers per squad only, and only get them at T2 after heavy weapons have been researched (not the extra 2, and im not sure if this is overnerf).

even if ppl are bashing the patch and saying its so IMBA it makes 10 FPs looks properly balanced long before its even close to being release, im still looking forward the patch in the current proposal.

also note: i admit i was wrong, posting the changelog was not such a bad idea after all, it must have taken tranj alot of arm twisting and alot of :censored: to get this kind of info out(imagine the risk THQ is taking with this changlog, i mean alot of ppl are gonna be pissed if THQ/Relic doesnt come through with some of these changes)

but anyways *takes cover before the flaming of either me or THQ begins*

[.42.]

Aspiring Champions now have a new ability known as Fear Aura. This ability:

* Increases the health of all members by 100 hit points

I guess this means that after the research any squad member of a squad with an AC will get 100 hp bonus. Will this bonus affect the AC itself and attached heros?

[Stim]

Yeah... The Chaos gods speak clearly now... I already can see hordes of GL cultist begging for death to switch to plasma guns :dyn:

[soldit]

Can no one see the raptor abuse that is about to happen if these changes are implemented? Its going to be blatant if this patch is released, raptors with heavy flamers plus AC - its just going to be like ASM all over again

[WarMachine245]

honestly, not from where im sitting. looking at the cost of Raptors (factoring in cost of materials in order to get raptors to begin with ie barracks, armory, a few Lp'ed Sps) and the cost of the next tier and the flamers and AC with fear aura. chances are the only time you'll see raptor abuse is in QS. in standard i dont think you can budget your resources enough to gain both map control and mass early raptors. maybe on a small map like valley of khorne and fallen city MAYBE but i really dont think its gonna be THAT horrible like everyone is making it out to be, true it does seem a bit difficult to handle at first, but chances are its not gonna be that great. just remember, ITS ONLY ON PAPER!! things sometimes dont look as good as they do on paper

[S7even]

For me I think you all need to relax a little, this isnt after all WH40K table-top game (inundated with stats etc), I do understand the need for ballance changes, but these can only ever seem unbiased when it's your favourite race not getting a good kicking :loco:

The changelog provides only a glimpse of what is to come, I am sure that those who are helping out with the beta testing will highlight a majority of your issues once the testing is complete.

Tranj - Is there any chance of a changelog outlining those issues which are being resolved that are non-blance issues, i.e Widescreen support etc?

Thanks to all at THQ for their continued effort and support
:bow2:

[LordBOB5]

OK,
so I've read the list again:
I'm mostly a Chaos player, so I'll analize this one a bit more:
The AC will be the new uber CC unit for chaos, that will outrole Zerkers. Why?? It's pretty simple:
Zerkers will cost 4 cap, from you could by 2 CSM squads instead, thes 2 squads have 20 CSM and 2 AC (wich have Heavy inf high armour, double health [~1600HP], power fists and PPs),
they give 100 plus HP to all CSM so that is 20 piece of 400 HPed CSM, and the FC gives all CSM 25% bonus CC damage and 20% speed bonus, and the top of that CSM can infiltrate.

So my question is wich one would you get:
Eight (to say something still useful) fearless Zerkers, or
20 mad bloodthirsty CSM with 2 ACs, that have (almost) the power of an AT???

Edit: OK maybe I worry too much cause this is just a Proposed Pre-Beta Not Complete Not Final Changelog :p

[soldit]

Yeah but think about the investment that goes into ASM. Doesn't stop the abuse

[_DH_RayS23]

First of all: Great Job THQ! 1.5 looks very nice 2 me.

My hope is that u really fix the StealthSoundBug (my mate hears EVERYYTHING that attempts 2 sneak in or already is) MovementBugs in general and the BasiliscsEcoConsumeBug @ normal Shots. Also reduce the damage of the Whirlwind a lill bit please.

[Stim]

I'd vote for 4 mad AC and threw CSM out of window...

[-Processor-]

ppl say 10 fps are imba ok nurf fps; ppl say commie rush is imba ok np nurf that; ppl don't use landspeeders anymore ahh we need to make them useful... I dont feel this is a good method to balance a game this scale simply because these buff/nerf decisions are hardly correlated and they might generate more balance issues then they'd fix. there should be better algorithms to balance a game like this, at least these buff/nerf decisions should be put into a big picture with ALL races considered together. Like how would space marines with buffed this and nurfed that go against the eldar with buffed this and nerfed that against IG with buffed this and nerfed that and so forth....

Hopefully ppl at relic are looking at a big picture instead of dealing with one race at a time.

Just my 2 cents....

[CrossOrion]

... Your saying like they don't do that.

People don't say 'things' without reason, and I would assume Relic would look at the reason as opposed to going with 'people say'.

If Relic followed us like mindless sheep then we'll have a Starcraft clown instead of a good RTS like Dawn of War.

[WarMachine245]

soldit, you are absolutly right about the possible abuse of raptors. i havent played chaos for a while so i forgot that you didnt need the armory for the raptors despite the high cost of them, i deeply apologize soldit for my misinformation. maybe the armory could be a requirment for the raptors and the sac pit be the requirment for the flamers plus the heavy weapons upgrade int tier 2 to get the extra 2 flamers.

as for the AC, theres really no need to throw him and his ability out the window. just make him 100 req and make him T2 and the purge the weak research at the sac pit. by then im sure all of the other races should be reasonably prepared to handle the upgraded CSM and raptors

once again i deeply apologize for any misunderstanding i might have made in my previous post

[Shorty]

I haven't had time to read through the all posts snip

What makes you think that other people have the time to read through your post then? -Moe

[CrossOrion]

You need the armory for ACs however. And since the Raptor Squad is still the same raptor squad (aside from the fact that they can only do a single jump at full charge) pre armory, I don't see the big deal.

Several things yet to be considered is the research time for Purge the Weak (could tie up the armory for 20-30 seconds.. not good considering you still need alot of other researches from there now, including furious charge, which has apparently been bumped up to tier 2) and research cost (100/150? oh well... forget about that Chaos pred then, or that extra horror squad... OH @!#!@% A DREADNOUGHT!)

While it might be more powerful overrall to use CSMs, it might even be considerably cheaper to get out two squads of Zerkers, which will last longer and won't get killed as easily.

[LordBOB5]

I've got a question, for Tranj:
Will there be other changes too, or does Relic think, that these changes will be enough?? I know there will be a beta too, but after that a few things could only be changed. I'm just worried about WA's new patch.

Was this everything what Relic has planned to change??

Thank you for answering Tranj (But I hope not :))

[CrossOrion]

He said, at the beginning of the first post, this wasn't all of it ;p

[Hells Gurdian]

Oh god, turrets 25% cheaper?, turret Not so good at the game guys will be happy

[the_almighty_moo]

i myself would like to see a random map feature for custom games, and im guessing some smart ass will say 'play automatch'. That is if such a feature can be implemented in a patch

[Boomstar]

I've noticed that with the new buff IG are (possibly) getting and many races getting better AV in general the 4 cap killa kan is really outta place. 4 cap kans was already kinda excessive and really only IG had that hard of a time handling them. So in another words test out 3 cap kans for a bit during the beta orks will probably need it!

[Servius]

Wow, SMs got...um...violated. So, unfortunately, nothing to chear about for me (except that IG commiguards me be weaker). Relic has made a mostly awesome game, and balance sometimes requires things get nerfed, so I'll put my hope and faith in the beta testers to make sure the balance is better than before (and to make sure SMs didn't get knocked unconscious by that nerft bat :-)

[CrossOrion]

Here's something curious.. Why does Tranj call the Big Mek 'Mek Boy' and Highlighted 'Eldar' in italics?

Is there a hidden meaning?


Anyways SM stand more to gain then they have to lose if these changes go in.

Sure, they lose a bit of healing, and terminators can't totally cripple things by just being in thei presence, but now they have a viable fast (cheap) anti infantry support vehicle, Better Bang for Buck Missiles, Tougher Tac Marines...Sniper scouts...

[Moe]

Was this everything what Relic has planned to change??

Generally when someone refers to a list as "not complete" it means that the list is in fact not complete.

[Stim]

Increased Space Marine Hit Points from 300 to 325 totalling in about 536 after bionics, though no CSM health buff(meaning CSM now'll get pwnd by SM even in t1)!

Increased Missile Launcher damage against Vehicle Medium targets from 38% to 50%
unbeatable ML SM?

[Scarlet_Pimp]

I think even with the new psyker power for IG they will still be lacking in AV. Cant see why relic dont just give the IG inf a misile launcher, I know the weapon team they tried to put in is bugged, but this isn't table top so why not just alow the missile launcher to be added to a squad. It doesn't have to be in a weapon team with 2 guys 1 man can hold a launcher and fire it I dont think it would take relic that long to knock out a new IG model with launcher. Don’t give the launcher to kaserkin and you have a use for IG inf well into the game where normally you wouldn’t see them.

Also I would like to see the leeman russ come out earlier its what the guard is known for massed tank and inf but buy the time you get the russ the game is most probably decided.

[SNeakY_BuGGeR]

LoL obviously it shows that you are not thinking! the smaller the area of effect! The harder it is to pack units to benefit from "Stacked Healing" which is a whinge that is ridiculous. As marines are the most expensive unit on the battlefield by far they should be able to heal!

RHINO'S
No one ever whatsoever uses these useless no guns no hitpoints items! Give some consideration to troop transporters. Seriously who in any battlefield anywhere in the known universe has heard of a troop transporter that does not have some sort of gun on it? c'mon give the rhin a use and give it triple hitpoints and a gun! Not an ownage gun but something that does some damage to infantry! Chaos would love to be able to use a third vehicle too. Please make the rhino useful!!!

[W0lf]

beserks cap 4! :screwy:
THATS INSANE!

i thought part of the problem with chaos was how raptors got replaced by zerks asap and zerks with psm asap.

now it will go raptors - psm and no zerks.
reduce the cap to 3
you made csm usable but made zerks no longer usauble :insane:

BUFF THE RHINOS HP AND ADD A WEAPON PLZZZZZ


also the biggest problem is; LEAVE the fps cap and remove the avatar bonus or else it will just be a case of 15 wls FTW!

tier 1 vs tier 2 now seems much much much better as tier 1 are not 9as) obsolute to tier 2 but what about tier 3-4?

ALL TIER 3 UNITS NEED A CAP INCREASE TO 4!

[the_almighty_moo]

i think chaos need a vehicle health upgrade imo, soemthing that is added alongside projectiles?

And orks. Later tier anti vehicle is a bitch. i think the ork russ should be like the guard russ v vehicles

[W0lf]

i think the game was far far far far far better using the dow tech tree. 1.3 was full of imbas (guardian rush, reapers and brightlance, orks were gd! etc)

it was full of imba but i (and many of my motu clan buddies) enjoyed it much more than the tech then spam fest this game has becombe.

SPAM needs to be stopped/slowed/prevented etc...

Bfme 2 has a interesting way of dealing with this (wa is still better) it has HARD counters, much like eldar in 1.3 (y they were so uber)

this is apparent in a few circumstances now but needs to be moreso e.g i spam oblits then ds but my opponents base if full of possessed, the psm OMGWTFPWN the oblits in no time.

this then leads to a chaos vs chaos game needing to mix psm and oblits for fear of a counter and WHALLA! u have a mixed army...

[LordBOB5]

I know that Zerks spamming pwns and needs something done with it, but making them 4 cap is not a good solution, in this case (following this this logic) PSM should require 5-6 cap, but then all super units of the other races should cost the same cap (ATs etc.), however, I think that could balance (almost) the whole game :D
I hope you got my point there :)

[W0lf]

squad cap past 4 is just riducluless no one would have 4 units of ats over 10 sm units unless the at were UBER buffed, and as we know that is not a good path to take. i personally think kans and zerks need cap 3 and a (LITTLE) nerf as only tier 3-4 units should have cap 4.

[forinax]

With this it seems like Chaos is gonna be #1.

[LordBOB5]

I think, the linearity of chaos is caused by of the removal of the CSM weapons.
In WA Tier1 you have CSM shootin, Raptors CCing, and harassing, Cultists capping.
In Tier2 you get no upgrades for these, however, you get the multi purpose Zerkers, and aginst Vehicles 2-3 Horrors are currently enough. In Tier3 you get anti-all squads (PSM, Oblits), that take care of everything.
This is the problem.
If CSM would have still their hevy weapons, then Zerkers could be made just anti-inf and Horrors to a quick (cause of DS) anti-vehicle support unit.
PSM should stay anti-everything, but whit little numbers. They should get 4 pop cap, (and Oblits), not Zerkers. But to be able to keep up the fight with ATs, they should get a pop increase also IMO :)

Edit: How about making for CSM a squad increase upgrade in Tier2 (since TacSM will start with 325HP and benefit from bionics and targeters), but the Fear aura wuold still remain, and then in Tier3 allowing CSM HB to benefit from the Chaos Projectiles upgrade (decreased set up time, increased damage against INF Heavy High etc.) ??

[Black]

Guys. It's a tentative patch.

Stop making damned conclusions when you have no freaking clue how these changes interact with each other. You can't just look at a bunch of numbers (that are very subject to change) and decide if it's imbalanced or not. There's a reason there's going to be a beta: You can't tell if it's a good patch without trying it out. Stop making baseless assertions.

[Wargrim]

I must say, those ( uncomplete ) changes definitely look like a step in the right direction.

[terracomm7]

MoTu | Nurgle, Ork Nobz are the equivalent of population 4, yet when they first come out they require upgrades to be able to even stand toe to toe with Call to war banshees / berserkers, what are you complaining about exactly. Berserks would still be great hero killers and support instead of pure "spamming" as not everyone uses the same unit exclusively and compliments their army with various types.

[Hands_of_Fate]

As I am more of a modder, I am largely unconcerned with balance issues, but greatly interested with any new developements in the coding section. Threfore I need to ask: will the patch would introduce any new modifiers/requirements/resource/code overall?

From the present changelog, it does not seem to be the case apart form new Curse of the Machine Spirits IG Psyker ability which may, but doesn't necessary has to, introduce a new modifier.

Should the changelog still be open to suggestions, is there any remote possibility to suggest new modifiers/additions from us, mod coders?

If so, I humbly ask you to visit Adeptus Mechanicus section and we'll produce a list of most interesting additions code-wise in no-time.

Thank you for your time in any event and keep up the good work.

- Cheers, D.

[W0lf]

MoTu | Nurgle, Ork Nobz are the equivalent of population 4, yet when they first come out they require upgrades to be able to even stand toe to toe with Call to war banshees / berserkers, what are you complaining about exactly. Berserks would still be great hero killers and support instead of pure "spamming" as not everyone uses the same unit exclusively and compliments their army with various types

ork nobz shouldnt be cap 4, as i said only tier 3+ should be IMHO

cow is a upgrade so if banshees have a upgrade nobz should need one aswell to stand up to them, also why would you have bezerks now? surely ther are not twice as good as raptors? If they are then that in itself is a problem with scaling and then nothing has been fixed properly so...

also now zerks cant stand up to banshees or nobz with there rediculous cap, how is this good? there not oped its just they r to gd vs commanders.

[Moe]

Stop making damned conclusions when you have no freaking clue how these changes interact with each other. You can't just look at a bunch of numbers (that are very subject to change) and decide if it's imbalanced or not. There's a reason there's going to be a beta: You can't tell if it's a good patch without trying it out. Stop making baseless assertions.

Quoted for truth.

[Stim]

Dunno 'bout overall balance and stuff, but one thing I can tell you for sure: sarges boosting hp is the most unnatural and devious feature in explored galaxies, keep it away plz!!!

[Captain Wicha]

i side with scarlet pimp... give my regular guardsmen (not karskins) a rocket launcher upgrade, (but still only three heavy weapon slots, perhaps an upgrade to four in T3, to keep them useful and to prevent karskin spam)... and i would be happy, hell i would be more than happy, i would be overjoyed... truth is, i dont like psychers, not one bit, back when WA first came out, i could crank out 3 of them and use them to take up building spots so they could fire weapons out, but not anymore, so i barely ever use them, besides the ability seems kinda cheap if you ask me...

[Troubleshooter]

Can no one see the raptor abuse that is about to happen if these changes are implemented? Its going to be blatant if this patch is released, raptors with heavy flamers plus AC - its just going to be like ASM all over again
Things we dont know yet:
1. Cost of the flamers.
2. Damage/morale damage
3. Cost of the HW upgrade
4. Shit we anit even heard about yet.
In other words... RELAX!

And, point of refrence for yalls
SM Tac HP: 300
After patch HP : 325
CSM HP: 300
After Patch HP : 375

Assuming CSM get the Hp Upgrade... thats 475 per. What this means is that CSM tacs With an AC and Upgrade will be slightly less durable than SM with Searge + Bionics. And with Targeters, SM will take the lead convincingly. CSM will have the early momentum and sneakyness while SM will slowly overtake them and come out on top in tier 2.5 THIS IS A GOOD THING!

Now, all you rap spammers... what are you going to do when you meet a cheap turret guarded by massed plasma in tier 2? Good luck with that if you dont start phasing in the zerks earlier than you are guessing. Zerks are still indespensable, they just hurt your popcap more if you go heavy on them. So what... just buy the inf pop increase and spam to your hearts content... never saw more than 4 zerk squads before anyway :)


also the biggest problem is; LEAVE the fps cap and remove the avatar bonus or else it will just be a case of 15 wls FTW! WL bright lance nerfed... Everyones AV infantry Buffed... WL's can be tied in CC by meat shields. Have fun storming the castle :)

[SpaceMarineJoe]

Wow really awesome changes, I haven t been able to read over all 200+ posts, just some I thought was interesting.

I would have to say though there is HUGE potential for disaster in some of those things namely turning vehicles into infantry would give you an entire AV army for too little and this would be especially true in team games. I don t want to see 2 HB squads dropping a dread nought in under 8 seconds... 3 dreadnoughts in 24 seconds cause of psykers.

Another potential for disaster would be the land speeder which is buffed AND decreased in cost AND reduced in pop. You are basically making it a more fragile chimera with way better movement and much mroe powerful guns(but not against vehicles).

Tankbustas sound a little over the top with a buff in cost and dmg along with SBs stik bombs it could be a little too much AV.

But the changes look awesome so far, hope we get more info soon, but I REALLY think the whole psyker making vehicles into infantry armour has potential for disaster unless it lasts only but a fleating moment.

Imagine 3 IG squads going around and dropping dreads and KANz and LRs as if they were but measely infantry armour o.O, would let the assassin(who is now even stronger :D) be able to kill preds and land raiders and vehicles in a few shots!

In terms of FP nerfs I am keeping my fingers crossed that the pop was not the last of the nerfs cause they vehicle in general is just broken and having one less before avatar isn t gonna be enough.

Also the WL nerf is pretty good, but I wanted to see a buff to lascannon and rokkits too.

15 WL/BLs won t be a problem at teir 4+ when you get las preds and projectile preds/LRs/LLRs because 15 WLs would just be a pathing nightmare and will get picked off from a distance especially since there DPS per square feet will be much less than the stronger tier 4 units

Also I can see where the bezerker pop is coming from cause it encourages people to use the chaos boyz more now in tier 2 and didn t they say all tier 1 units were buffed in HP department? And all tier 2 upgrades are much less effective now? Aspiring champion with double HP is stronger than a sergant and raptors if they get more HP for being tier 1 along with the +100 HP from AC in addition the the reduced HP of ASMs and reduced upgrade benefit means that they will justify there cost in tier 2 even without dmg upgrade as the AC is still stronger and now with more HP than tac sergs and all the other abilities that raptors have makes them worth there build time and cost in tier 2 not to mention there ACs build much faster than sergs :D

[Stim]

Increased hit points and attack of all tier one units by 25%.
I think this needs to be clearified, which ones DO receive the 25% hp buff?

[SpaceMarineJoe]

Well if raptors get 400+ HP while ASMs are at 375 now and raptors get ACs... that COULD become an issue if it affects all units except tacs who only get 25 more HP and ASMs who get 25 less HP.

[psychodil]

I asked that a long way back in the thread stim. I believe it will be only HQ units. I cant see them buffing tac marines HPO and giving them a 25% damage increase, nor can I see them giving guardsmen a 25% damage buff :salute:

[SpaceMarineJoe]

I can t imagine CSMs getting a 25% buff that puts em at almost 400 HP while tacs only get 325 and on top of that CSMs will still be able to get there ACs and HBs(MORE HBs now). I don t know how SM would even escape tier 1 at this point... especially since raptors get an equal buff + flamer abilities and all the upgrades are gonne be even better, yikes !

[LordBOB5]

Joe,
1. maybe Scout snipers will do the trick :D (read the text more carefuly)
2. calm down, this isn't a complete changelist

[Mullertime]

I quite like the sound of the changes.
Seems fair to me.
The commonly used units are powered down, and the lesser-used units are powered up. Nice! More balance.

I especially like the FP being upgraded to 4 pop cap. That means we'll have new threads with: "Aargh! I jus got hit with a 7 FP spam!". lol. That helps sort out a major gaming issue.

Oh yeah, the "Chaos heavy weapons research" (or similar), would I be right in saying that the marines still only have the heavy bolters?

[SpaceMarineJoe]

I found that to be a strange buff for the scout, 50% more dmg against heavy med but didn t address the issue that it really requires more power and too expensive to get just the upgrade to start buying snipers. The dmg buff is also gonna be partly countered if the scout gets 20 less HP while other races are lookin at 25% HP buff.

But anyways, like was said, it is still Pre-beta so the final product may look completely different.

[LoneWolf666]

I wonder if they'll look into AI in 1.5. And maybe pathfinding? Will my poor guardsmen still be unable to enter a transport without the chimera driving around them?

Excellent work posting the changes, Tranj! I just hope my IG won't get massacred in T1! :D

[Hirmetrium]

my worry -
oblitorators did not recieved weapon correction, their weapons will still be weak and useless at range standing still

LONG LIVE THE PSM SPAM!

bezerkers also seem to be hit too hard. i'd aggree with this change if they were buffed slightly, but now chaos's super fast no tier 1 tech has been removed from the game. i suggest increasing furious charge to affect bezerker HP and damage, but increase the cost of furious charge to 100/100.

otherwise - holy crap i soooo wanna use psykers now. and IG. and maybe FFA's will see less extreme fire prisms spaming :)(I HOPE)

this are damn good changes relic. it looks like it will be a bang up patch anyway, and with the beta ahead i see it getting MUCH better. dear god i might be playing WA again very soon :D

[Pokey ork]

Most of the balance changes seem very decent and i think this is going to be an excellent patch in comparison to the previous ones.

However id like to ask a question to Thq and Relic. Has your balance team actually worked WITH these changes? And if so how well have these changes worked? The current ones anyway.

[Bio Terra]

someone is just a bit biased to certain race..... Orks are still gonna be the weakest race imho

[W0lf]

i think scout rifles need to cost less because atm they are not worth the cost, 1 unit of jump troops can destroy triple the amount (for cost) of scouts. also why do csm get 4 hvy bolters and not 5 like sm?

also the heavy bolter increase for cm will be in tier 2....

anyway thank god the scouts got a nerf, i quit automatch after being scout rushed 5 times in a row, its just not funny when your heretics are all dead and you have no sps before you can build a armoury or before the cl is done. Even then they dance him, he does nothing then the sm arrive and its gg

[FooF]

I don't know if this has been said but this would just make my day:

Make it so the the Space Commander/Librarian don't lose their super cool power weapons when upgrading to Power Swords! It just doesn't make any sense!

That is all. So far, I like the changes. Encourages new playstyles.

[Bio Terra]

well chaos dont need 5 weapons considering the uber asp champions theyll have now...

[GRIM Ripper]

geeze sneaky bugger, calm down... does it really have to be said AGAIN that this is a tentative change log??? there are a lot of bug fixes (supposedly) that arent listed that may impact many parts of the game, and there are usually always unlisted changes and probably many more changes to come... the patch is still more than a closed beta away, so there is going to be PLENTY of time to sort things out im sure.

so far, the patch changes look great in my opinion; sure there are a few questions, like the tripple landspeeder buff and whether chaos will be OPed, but thats impossible to tell before playing it. im way more excited then skeptical though.

[LordBOB5]

well chaos dont need 5 weapons
just Cultists, just Cultists

[Scarlet_Pimp]

A coupe of little things i hope they fix are the FC soud start with the sword then get the hammer when he is upgraded cos he looks cooler with the hammer, the librarian should keep his staff and the chapplin and librarian both need more parts on there armour that is non team colourable my librarian and chaplin both look daft but if they had armour like the FC that stays gold that would be cool.