Third new 2.0 GC

[Corey]

You mean planets, units, heroes or all of the aforementioned?
(incidentally Kalo what is your avatar of?)

All of the above

That would be AMAZINGLY fun, but because of the xxx-day bug, would never be able to complete it.

This would depend mainly on how big it was. I don't have exact numbers to back me up on this, but it seems to scale down pretty favourably; a GC with 50 planets and 3 factions takes far more than twice as long to hit the limit than one with 100 planets and 6 factions.  Considering that so much time and effort would have to be put into the original buildup we could get away with making the GC as a whole significantly smaller than, say, Art of War, and still seem to be getting more out of it.

[Lord Xizer]

Hm, this sounds promising indeed then! A War of Three factions as aggressive and furious a bloodbath as London after Millennium came to call.
It would be interesting to put the Warlords scattered North West(Kaine and Jerec at Bastion), North East(Zsinj and Gethzeron at Dathomir, Teradoc at Bonadan), Center East(Pitta at Correllia, Grunger at Ord Pardron), Center(Harrsk at one of the Deep core worlds) and South(Delvardus at Eriadu)
This would mean a many sided war for the IR and NR with no real safe lines at the start.

[Corey]

Well the problem there is you end up with a Warlords faction which is virtually guaranteed to win against Sate Pestage/Isard/Krennal and the New Republic, unless we were to make those two more concentrated allowing for a redistribution of power. Put together Greater Maldrood, Zsinj's space (including the Corporate Sector), and the Eriadu Authority in one faction and I'm not sure what that leaves for the Remnant Proper and New Republic. Mon Calamari, at least, would be cut off entirely since they'd either have to go through Hapes, Zsinj or Teradoc to connect to anything, so we'd need to make New Republic bases centered around Sullust and Bothawui as well. The Essential Guide to Warfare includes a canon design for the Praetor, which gives us some more options for Delvardus.



As for the other GC with the single planet starts, the question there is how to distribute the forces and where to start everybody. I'd say doing a sort of gradient in the level of forces, so that the farther out from the original starts you get the harder it gets to take the planet would be fair, but I'd also like to make the starting planets of each faction not be a shipyard, either, so that would become something the player has to work towards.

[Lord Xizer]

Well, I do like the idea of a third faction with real teeth though. They would be scattered rather than concentrated to represent their separate states so to speak. The idea being a many sided war, no complete advantage for any of the three sides(the IR would hold the core) the NR would hold scattered elements of the Outer Rim and some mid rim worlds with the Warlords sandwiched in and around the other two factions.
The Warlords will actually be quite vulnerable being unable to replace heavy capital ship losses like the other factions. They will hold the initial advantage true but with time and losses the advantage will pass to the other factions. Being so scattered will keep the Warlords from forming a single mass fleet and be killed one by one as they were in the EU.
I think they could be balanced, they could be tough but not unbeatable.

[Corey]

Well, the thing is that they aren't really scattered. Zsinj and the Pentastar Alignment are right next to each other, and Greater Maldrood is only separated by Mon Cal and the Hapans, who wouldn't be there. The only disconnected element would be the Eriadu Authority.

[Corey]

Just a quick update on this, we've started creating the one planet starts GC. 50 planets, and the starts are Carida, Bothawui and Nirauan. The planets get significantly more difficult to take the farther out from your starting planet that you go, with a few surprises along the way.

[Meyer]

what time period? or does it encompass all?

[Corey]

It's not set within any specific time period. The current plan is to put all 3 at the height of their power, or at the point where they have the most variation. So that means Era 5 loadouts for New Republic and Empire of the Hand, and Era 3 for the Imperial Remnant. The caveat here is that since the idea behind it is working your way up through the GC, it's going to be entirely hero-less, and you have to rely on what you make. Making it progresive wouldn't really work since the playable factions don't have access to each other until quite a while into the GC, making it kind of hard to differentiate.

We're still open to the possibilities of more GCs for 2.0 and beyond, so keep the ideas coming.

[tlmiller]

This sounds VERY cool.

[Lord Xizer]

Perhaps something where the Heroes are vital to success. For instance like with Warlord Zsinj, when he was killed his kingdom collapsed same with a lot of the Warlords. Could a GC be done where if the main hero of either side were killed it would mean defeat for that faction?

[Corey]

Vanilla was like that using the faction leader mechanic, and it was pointless. It basically meant that hero was just kept away.

[Znieh]

Just a quick update on this, we've started creating the one planet starts GC. 50 planets, and the starts are Carida, Bothawui and Nirauan. The planets get significantly more difficult to take the farther out from your starting planet that you go, with a few surprises along the way.

Yay! An idea of mine was accepted! So proud 

We're still open to the possibilities of more GCs for 2.0 and beyond, so keep the ideas coming.

Another idea, but one I don't have much knowledge of, is have a GC based on the Restored Empire story. It seems all their units exist in the mod already, and its set in the mods timeline. 

[Corey]

Another idea, but one I don't have much knowledge of, is have a GC based on the Restored Empire story. It seems all their units exist in the mod already, and its set in the mods timeline. 

None of their planets (of which only one seems to ever be named) or heroes do, and as far as units, it's basically just anything from the Republic in the Clone Wars. We never finished our AT-TE, which is their main tank, lost our files for the fighters they apparently used, and while Venators aren't exactly useless they aren't able to stand up to any of the other three factions main capitals by that point.

[Lord Xizer]

Would the Restored Empire be a minor faction then, since they technically opposed the IR(or at least the leadership) and really only had enough ships to take down 5 ISDs. Their whole goal was a coup since they lacked the might to truly be a power unto themselves. I doubt they'd be a galactic threat.

[Zeron]

Would the Restored Empire be a minor faction then, since they technically opposed the IR(or at least the leadership) and really only had enough ships to take down 5 ISDs. Their whole goal was a coup since they lacked the might to truly be a power unto themselves. I doubt they'd be a galactic threat.

You just answered your own question there. No, they aren't even big enough to be considered a minor faction. We'd have to make far too many new models/textures, if we were going to put in that much effort we could do someone more major like the Ssi-Ruuk. There's like a hundred little factions that size that we could include, but there's really no reason to. They require far too much effort for their impact, which is minimal considering any other faction can just roll over them. Considering that we still have the Yevetha, EotH, and possible future factions to fill out there's really no way we're going to put in such a minor group.

[Lord Xizer]

Yes I thought so, I think a GC with the Ssi Ruuk, the EotH and the NR might be interesting.

[Enceladus]

One of the main problems with the Ssi Ruuk is that they're dinosaurs. Not the easiest model to make sadly.

[yutpaeksi]

One of the main problems with the Ssi Ruuk is that they're dinosaurs. Not the easiest model to make sadly.

Also, I don't recall any description of their units other than a cruiser/carrier and fighters, and infantry. I don't recall them having any land vehicles or anything else. Also I believe only like two of their planets were named.

And the biggest thing about the Ssi-Ruuk is that they entomb their prisoners. Without that ability/aspect to their gameplay, how different are they really from other factions? I don't think they're interesting enough to include in the mod, as the team would have to flesh them out completely, even more so than the EtoH. And the Chiss/EtoH (I consider them one) are much more interesting and cooler...

[Corey]

Also, I don't recall any description of their units other than a cruiser/carrier and fighters, and infantry. I don't recall them having any land vehicles or anything else. Also I believe only like two of their planets were named.

And the biggest thing about the Ssi-Ruuk is that they entomb their prisoners. Without that ability/aspect to their gameplay, how different are they really from other factions? I don't think they're interesting enough to include in the mod, as the team would have to flesh them out completely, even more so than the EtoH. And the Chiss/EtoH (I consider them one) are much more interesting and cooler...

I think the suggestion was as a non-playable faction. As far as entechment goes, that isn't something that would really show up in the game mechanics, even just population capacity taken from other planets would technically fill that role; it's just their power source, but it's not like the other factions have to worry about reactors or something. If anything population capacity fits them better than it does any other faction. As far as needing to be fleshed out, they're far more complete on their own than 2/3 existing minor factions, and way more complete than the Empire of the Hand was when we started, which only had one fighter. The Yevetha had one fighter type and one frigate type, the Hapans two frigates and two fighters. The Ssi-Ruuvi have  D'kee landers, Lw'hekk manufacturing ships (carrier), Fw'sen picket ships, Sh'ner assault carriers, Shree battlecruisers, Wurrif cruisers, Swarm droid fighters, and V'sett interceptors, all of which have a design, except the V'sett which has a description.

[Lord Xizer]

Yes I meant them for a minor faction in the EotHs back yard so to speak since they have a relatively secure territory with only three routes that attacks can come from. The Ssi Ruuk could be done like the Yevetha with just one or two worlds and large amounts of ships and troops.