I'll start by addressing the mod's general canonicity argument, then get to specific suggestions/examples:
Before I really get into this, I'll say none of it applies to the Empire of the Hand. With the Empire of the Hand, we intentionally took a large chunk of lore directly related to Thrawn that has very little information available, and then filled the gaps left by that information, trying to flesh it out more without contradicting what is known. It's basically used as an outlet to be a bit more creative, since with the other areas we have to stick within more well-defined boundaries. It gets boring modelling the same space triangle repeatedly.
As far as the rest of it goes, there's really no saying unit x is "more canon" than unit y. Sure, you can say x appeared more often in Star Wars history than y, but that doesn't make it more canon any more than Hobart's Funnies being used in fewer battles during WWII than the generic Shermans makes them less existant in reality. The only place where this would apply is where there's an inconsistency, and leaving aside gameplay necessities, FoC really doesn't have any more inconsistencies than most other sources. Is it chock-full of stupid, unnecessary shit? Sure, but the existance of the Lancer making the Tartan unnecessary to have been made doesn't make the Tartan any less canon. The ZC may seem like the result of a vodka bender and 17 concussions, but nothing's uncanon about it. Deciding the better candidate isn't just whether or not it was just in FoC, or just in other source x, it's based on several factors, the following are connected to the whole sourcing issue though.
- Was this used by group x in this time period?
- Is there a better candidate used by group x in this time period?
Remember, these aren't all of them, just the ones connected to what you mentioned. Neither of them are just directly just "was it only in FoC" however; our goal isn't to remove everything made by Petroglyph. If there's two units that do the exact same thing, and one thing was in 50 EU battles more connected to what we're doing and the other was only in FoC, then we'll tend to go with the more prominent one, but that's true of things that are in "just" Galactic Battlegrounds, just one book, etc. Aesthetic preferences and how smoothly EaW's engine can handle them also enter into it.
Part of that is where the disparity in how much content we kept from space vs land comes from. Space combat in Star Wars is simply much better docuimented, and Petroglyph's space stuff took a lot more liberties than their land stuff in terms of armament and balancing, so where on ground we could compare a direct armament value from another EU source to EaW's, for the space units made up by EaW there was
always going to have to be an executive decision made by us on what that unit's "real" armament would be, which always put them at a disadvantage to their EU counterparts; a challenge not shared by the land units. Add in the fact that there's just so many more possible space units for the same amount of slots and they got edged out. Also, since the specific events we're trying to create come from those other sources to begin with, EaW content has another disadvantage.
So, here's the reasons each EaW-based space unit doesn't exist:
-Assault Frigate Mk. II: Any armament basis we have would just be based off of a comparison with the Assaulty Frigate Mk. II, and when the AFI is just a modification to the Dreadnaught, which also has another modification (Katana) the role was just too saturated.
-TIE Scout: Filled an unnecessary role.
-MC30c: Almost made it in, but not enough build unit slots so the MC40a kept that slot.
-Tartan: Entirely pointless next to the Carrack and Lancer. It's actually appeared in other sources since being in EaW.
-Broadside: Tried to find a way to keep it in, but too weak and no reason to. The marauder's lucky it's relevant.
With land stuff, there's fewer units to work with overall so to flesh the factions out a lot of the EaW units got a pass. Way less competition for space, and EaW is one of the few places in canon to cover land combat in any depth. If we're comparing one unit that only appeared in one place to another unit appearing in only one, at least equally obscure place then yeah, we'll just go with what we have; land units are much harder to do without making them look terrible, since space units don't need animations and don't have as many possibilities for fucked up interactions.
First on my list would be for you guys to possibly and hopefully create the Imperial I-H Imperial class repulsor tank as a replacement for the 2-M saber class repulsor tank.I understand that many of these tanks were destroyed after the destruction of the original death star but some did indeed survive and it's claimed that production did continue at a slow and reduced pace after which would mean that more units of this tank did exist. Wouldn't it honestly be better to have this tank in the mod over the 2-M since the only evidence of the 2-M in existence is only in this game like so many other units in the original game.
As far as sourcing goes, EaW is at least as valid of a source as Adventure Journal and equally as relevant. Anyways, we had 2/3 of the Imperial-class tanks in at various points in development. Neither of them actually fills the same role as the 2-M. The 1-L is a light vehicle that really wasn't worth having with the AT-ST and AT-PT there, and the 1-H likes to think its a heavy vehicle in the vein of the XR-85, TIE Crawler and AT-AT, but it would be generous to even call it redundant with how ineffective it was. The 1-M (the one we never actually did) would be the closest to the 2-M in function (hence how the 2-M was made) but they're both in equally as many equally relevant sources, and the profiles of the Imperial-class tank series actually contributes a lot to how useless they are; their heights and interaction with terrain variability make the designs less than optimal for EaW. It's correctable, but there's no reason to considering the alternatives fit at least as well in this case. Did think about using them for the PA, however.
I know this next request might fall on deaf ears since I know others have requested it but I would be elated to see the AT-ST/A implemented in this game. I know you guys have argued that it's too similar to the AT-ST. For the AT-ST/A all you have to do is make it taller, have enclosed viewports, more powerful (more expensive) with its single chin mounted heavy blaster cannon, better armored and perhaps slower than the original AT-ST. Besides aren't military walkers the most critical military component of the Imperial Army compared to other vehicles?
(Cut the stuff about Crawler/Mauler from this since I wanna address it seperately)
Because a role was more important doesn't mean you then need more units of the exact same role, and that's what this is. Just redundant. Even if it were put in, it's all well and good to say just make it more powerful, more expensive and slower, but the differences would still be very slight. Almost imperceptible. The end result is that building one or the other is always the "right" choice (more than likely the AT-ST/A), because there's effectively no tradeoff there. It's the exact same situation as the ISDI/ISDII. If it weren't for how canonically ubiquitous both are, we would only have one or the other, because when both are available you really should only be building the II.
I know this is true but the same is true of the tie crawler and the tie mauler. Why not get rid of the tie mauler since it was obviously based on the crawler due to it's incredible similarity and the fact that the crawler was already documented to have existed before the mauler.
Two completely different units and functions. TIE Mauler is fast and anti-inantry, completely useless against almost any vehicle. TIE Crawler is much slower and anti-vehicle. They have completely different armaments, the only similarity is they're both called TIE Somethings. You seem to conflate visual similarities with performance similarities, considering both this comparison and the Chariot LAV to the Hoverscout, which also have virtually nothing in common.
You guys should also add the Swift Assault 5 Hoverscout (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Swift_Assault_5_Hoverscout) for the empire or can't you because it's too similar to the Chariot LAV? (not trying to be sarcastic) If not then definitely for the Pentastar Alignment so you can keep them looking a little more Imperial over Grand Army of the Republic.
This unit has made it on and off unit lists for the past 5 years, however it's role is too similar to the IFT-X and the 2-M to have both on the same faction, era differentiation notwithstanding, and whenever we've tried to make it it simply hasn't come out well. It looks terrible. I've gotten some people pissed off in the past by saying we pick one option over another based on what's "easier" when comparing otherwise similar options, but considering how much time has to go into everything it's less about being difficulty and more about being able to actually finish stuff. When there's otherwise no reason to prioritize one over the other, that's an important consideration. We'd love to be able to just throw in any unit we want, but the reality is we have extremely limited development resources. IT becomes more difficult when dealing with these kinds of references (where it's just some schematic drawn from the side), since coming up with the design then becomes an issue.
I would also suggest giving the S-1FireHawke Heavy Repulsortank (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/S-1_FireHawke_Heavy_Repulsortank) for the Pentastar alignment since the tank was replaced by the 1-M and it would fit perfectly in the theme of them utilizing different/older imperial equipment along with that of the Grand Army of the Republic that you created. Keep the TX-130 but defiantly ditch the Bantha skiff.
This, like the Hoverscout, is something we'd like to do if it's feasible.
Could you guys also have the alignment possessing AT-ST's. I feel like it's too common of a weapon system for any of the Imperial breakaway warlords and systems not to possess. If not then maybe consider the AT-XT (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/All_Terrain_Experimental_Transport).
They got the AT-PT for this role. The AT-XT has a very similar (see: exact same) armament to the AT-PT, and was far less likely to be in possession of the PA.
Can you guys do anything with structures as well
and introduce new infantry to be trained like Imperial ARMY TROOPS at the Imperial barracks and have any Stormtrooper type units trained at a separate structure like say a "stormtrooper academy?" I feel like after the battle of endor stormtroopers became more scarce and Army troopers were used to fill the void. Just make stormtroopers more expensive and powerful over the Army troops.
This falls into the same category as the whole AT-ST/ATSTA thing, only to a far greater degree. There's really no way to distinguish them, so the better ones become ubiquitous and it's pointless to have the others. Stormtroopers still definitely say wide usage, to the point that they're still almost the exclusively mentioned land forces of the Remnant in any novel, so anything below them would either be useless or OP; we can't make the stormtroopers more powerful than the NR SpecForce soldiers, obviously, so the Army troopers would have to be noticably below them to make it possible to distinguish them, but then why buy them? If we just make it so they're weaker but come with more soldiers per unit, they become immediately OP because the health and damage values are already so low for infantry that variations between them don't matter much, so the simple fact that there's more of them = more firing and = more targets that have to be switched between for them enemy = instantly better. Even if we buff the infantry, the relative differences still remain meaningless. There's really just no room within EaW's simplistic infantry systems for specialization. That's why we were able to use the Navy Troopers for the PA; we wanted to differentiate them visually from the IR, and their relative weakness to all the other infantry doesn't end up mattering because at that level the differences are imperceptible.
I also feel like black hole or shadow stormtroopers would be better than the nova troopers in the game. You guys if you're able to could have them become cloaked or invisible for short periods of time and/or until they open up fire.
We can't add cloaking meshes to anything in the game; the Exporter for the versions of Max we have (9) don't function with them properly. As far as the differences between the Blackhole Troopers and Novatroopers, it's effectively just the difference between gold stripe or no gold stripe. Blackhole Troopers were more directly associated with Cronal and Carnor Jax, which is why we went with the somewhat more generic Novatrooper as the IR commandos.
As for the New Republic I feel everything is good except for the HTT-26 Heavy Troop Transport. Suggest replacing it with the A-A5/A-A6z heavy speeder truck. (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/A-A5_heavy_speeder_truck) or the specforce free runner apc (http://www.star.etmortius.net/equipement/vehicles/D6%20-%20vehicles%20netbook/images/Star%20Wars%20-%20D6%20-%20Vehicles%20Stats%20Netbook_img_69.jpg)
We've wanted to do the A-A5 before, but again, until/unless we're able to make one there's nothing wrong with the Gallofree. I'd even say it's even preferable, based on gameplay.
oh yah and the Arrow-23 should replace the T2-B, could use the same armament since the arrow was highly customizable.
IT's really a weaker version of the T2-B, and it's not more canonically relevant than the T2-B, so it's not worth having both. There's no reason to get rid of the T2-B.
Topic: Suggestions for 2.1 (Read 282192 times)