Battle for Dune: War of Assassins

[Dunenewt]

All good then!  What are you doing about the Deviator tanks?

[cnc95fan]

Hmm, i probably should break this to you before I go into all that.

We plan to release in tech levels. So in the first release, CY, Windtrap, Refinery, Barracks, War Factory basic defences, tanks and infantry. From there on we will build up the tech levels. So all this stuff in further tech levels is still up for debate, public debate if you like. We enjoy having fans of BFD giving us questions and even running their own polls on our forums.

[Dunenewt]

When you say tanks, what do you mean?

[cnc95fan]

Wrong terminology, I mean vehicles, Flame Tank, Assault Tank, APC, Buzzsaw, Mongoose etc

[Edric O]

So you mean the vehicles you can build from a war factory without a starport? That's pretty much everything except Deviators/Sonic Tanks/Devastators.

[Dunenewt]

Ah okay, I see.  So two basic units for each side to begin with?

[cnc95fan]

Exactly. The Starport will not be included in the first release, due to the Renegade engine not allowing more then one "carmaker". However we will have our coders using the Assemebeler language to allow more then one. I personally dislike EA because of their... lack of interest in releasing the soruce code.

Edit:

There wil probably be more then 2 basic units on each side.

[Dunenewt]

Will you design your own Harkonnen APC?

[cnc95fan]

Like I said, these things are debatable, weather we will include the Harkonnen APC or not. We would prefer a public vote rather then internal decisions.

[Dunenewt]

Well, why don't you offer us some choices on here then?  I think you should aim for the existing Emperor units, before adding any new ones.

[Edric O]

I really like the fact that you are so open to community input. Not like EA... *ahem*...

Anyway, I have two other questions:

1. How will Construction Yards work? Will it be like in Renegade where they basically allow your other buildings to self-repair?

2. What infantry units are you thinking of putting in? Playing an Ordos Saboteur would be fun. :P

[Dunenewt]

In terms of weapons in Emperor, which ones will not work in the Renegade engine?  Will the Atreides get Fremen infantry?

[cnc95fan]

I personally don't like the idea of adding in units that were never there. The contruction yard will be quite different from Renegade. Yes, buildings will Auto-Heal, however, useable MCVs.. You will be able to purchase and deploy these. We will probably program it to automatically build a base around it after a certain time. I.E, MCV deployed -> Windtrap build 15 seconds later -> Refinery build 30 seconds later.

The Sub-houses will be areas of the map which will be capturable, but hostile to its enemy group. Native to E:BFD really. I.E Fremen near Harkonnen or Saduakar = nono.

Also note, if it is in E:BFD, it will be in the mod.

[Dunenewt]

Hmm...I'd prefer it if the Atreides alone had the ability to produce Fremen.

Have you considered adding a House Corrino eventually?

[cnc95fan]

Hmm...I'd prefer it if the Atreides alone had the ability to produce Fremen.

Have you considered adding a House Corrino eventually?

I think you misunderstood what I said. Atrides alone will have the ability to claim Fremen. We will stay true to the game.

I'm sorry, but my Dune knowledge isn't as leet as your's. Could you explain what a House Corrino is?

[Dunenewt]

Well, you know at the beginning of the game, the Emperor dies?  Well the Emperor belongs to House Corrino, and they control the Sardaukar.  There were a few Sardaukar units created in the game, but not used in the final release of Emperor.  If you want, I could send some pictures of the units the were created by EA but not used in the game, such as the Tleilaxu plane, and the Sardaukar tank.

[Edric O]

I personally don't like the idea of adding in units that were never there.

I agree. I would vote against adding a Harkonnen APC. However, balance issues should be considered. Ordos vehicles self-repair; the Atreides get a Repair Vehicle; and the Harkonnen function at full capacity until they are dead. If one or more of these features cannot be implemented with the Renegade engine, changes will have to be made to keep the game balanced.

The contruction yard will be quite different from Renegade. Yes, buildings will Auto-Heal, however, useable MCVs.. You will be able to purchase and deploy these. We will probably program it to automatically build a base around it after a certain time. I.E, MCV deployed -> Windtrap build 15 seconds later -> Refinery build 30 seconds later.

It sounds like the battles could be truly epic in scope. Most Renegade maps don't have any room for new bases, let alone the possibility of players building them.

As cool as that sounds, though, it seems to me that only games with very large numbers of players will be able to justify having the ability to build new bases. So you should probably leave that feature for a second or third tech level release.

The Sub-houses will be areas of the map which will be capturable, but hostile to its enemy group. Native to E:BFD really. I.E Fremen near Harkonnen or Saduakar = nono.

Also note, if it is in E:BFD, it will be in the mod.

Hmmm, interesting. Some subhouse units - like the Fremen Warrior or the Sardaukar - should be simple enough to implement in Renegade (the Fremen is just a stealth soldier with a sniper gun, the Sardaukar is a heavily armoured soldier with a chain gun, etc.) But others - like the Tleilaxu units or the IX Projector or the Guild NIAB Tank - seem almost impossible to mod.

[Andrew]

So will this be a FPS like renegade, with a real time strategy component such as building buildings/units?

Would multuiplayer be possible in the sense that one person could create buildings/units and other players could control each unit?

[cnc95fan]

Indeed it is all possible. Most people would be surprised at what the Renegade engine is capable of. It's al possible.

We are in desparate search for infantry modelers at the moment.

[TeamWolf]

But please remember, these are idea at teh time being, not all of it is set in stone. But stuff like MCVs will most likely only be able to be brought once at a time and limited to about 2-3 max per side.

[cnc95fan]

  If you want, I could send some pictures of the units the were created by EA but not used in the game, such as the Tleilaxu plane, and the Sardaukar tank.

Yes please do, if it is not too much trouble  :)

[Dunenewt]

I think you might need to add some more infantry for the Harkonnens and Ordos to be honest, if the Atreides get sole use of the Fremen.  Plasma troopers for Harkonnens?

Edit - Sardaukar Tank and Smugglers:

http://forum.dune2k.com/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=20393.0;attach=2181

[cnc95fan]

That's cool. Are they in the game itself? Because I havn't noticed them... If not, where did you find them?

[Dunenewt]

They're in the game files, but weren't used.

[Edric O]

I hope it's ok if I put in my two cents with a gameplay analysis:

Above all we must remember that this FPS will be far more focused on infantry than Emperor ever was, for the simple reason that every player starts out as an infantry unit and probably doesn't drive around in a vehicle most of the time. As such, let's take a look at the infantry choices provided by Emperor for each of the Houses:

Atreides

- Scout

- Atreides Infantry

- Atreides Engineer

- Sniper

- Kindjal

Ordos

- Scout

- Chemical Infantry

- Ordos Engineer

- Ordos AA Trooper

- Mortar Infantry

- Saboteur

Harkonnen

- Scout

- Harkonnen Infantry

- Harkonnen Engineer

- Harkonnen Trooper

- Flame Trooper

Scouts don't need to be implemented at all. The scout served two purposes in Emperor: to clear up fog of war and to uncover stealth units. There will be no fog of war in BfD, and stealth will be handled by the Renegade system - meaning that stealth units create light disturbances that can be used to determine their position, but only become visible when firing their weapons. So scouts would be useless. Besides, who would want to play as an unarmed unit?

This leaves us with 4 infantry types for Atreides and Harkonnen and 5 for Ordos. But each house has an engineer, which plays a support role rather than a combat role. So the number of combat infantry types is 3 for Atreides and Harkonnen and 4 for Ordos (and one of those four is the Saboteur, which may be a lot of fun to play but isn't exactly a conventional soldier).

This is a problem. We have far less combat infantry types than Renegade. 3 combat infantry units is not nearly enough to choose from. We need to add more - the only question is where to get more infantry from. One option is to take some subhouses and incorporate them into the main houses rather than making them a neutral third party. For instance, the Atreides could get the Fremen and the Harkonnen could get the Sardaukar. Finding a good match for the Ordos may be a bit more difficult. IX would be the natural choice, but they give you vehicles, not infantry - and one of their vehicles, the Projector, can't really be implemented in a game where every vehicle needs a driver (who would be driving the projections?).

The Ordos do have one extra infantry type to begin with (and one less vehicle type), so the IX would be a good choice as a subhouse for them if the IX give you one vehicle and one infantry unit. The one vehicle could be the Infiltrator. As for the infantry unit... we'd have to invent a new one of our own. One that would be as useful as the Fremen Fedaykin or the Sardaukar Elite. Any ideas?