New Unit Roster for Specific Skins?

[xXKageAsashinXx]

I was just wondering, would it be possible to attach an army unit list to a specific army skin? Like say the World Eaters with CL of the CSM would change up your roster from the normal CSM units to something slightly different? If so, then I've got an idea that won't leave my head that I'd like to post here and see if anybody else likes it.

World Eaters with Chaos Lord Commander
Just have everything revamped to be Khornish.

Chaos Lord
Nothing changes except for his global abilities. His super unit will be added to the T3 abilities.

Tier One

Heretics
Nothing changes.

Khornate Space Marine
Now start out in melee with chainswords and bolt pistols plus that melee aura. Slightly faster and beefier than normal CSM. Melee damage and skill will be lower than raptors to still give an incentive to by them besides their jump, which is slightly different than normal.
Eternal War upgrade remains, but the only Mark one can get is the Mark of Khorne, which does the same thing as it does for CSM already only slightly better, maybe a tiny damage buff or something to signify the increased favor of the dark god. To replace the Mark of Tzeentch you get an upgrade that gives your CSM bolters which are basically a slightly buffed version of their standard one that they would normally get.
The Aspiring Champion is basically the same; he will give Slaughter for both the melee unmarked CSM as well as the ranged CSM. However, for the unmarked melee CSM they will be unable to switch to a ranged stance and use bolters. It's basically Kraken Rounds from the Tacticals, purely a damage buff. Also, if the squad have their ranged upgrade, the Champion keeps his chainsword and bolt pistol, only changing when Slaughter is activated and the squad is in ranged stance.
There is also another upgrade which is available in T3 for MoK CSM that acts the same as the Sterguard and Vanguard Veteran upgrade for SM.

Raptors
Nothing really changes with their base except for their jump. Suppressing enemies with blasts of sound are Slaneeshi, so instead they'll do increased damage and stun like Ork Stormboyz with their Nob leader. It's possible for them to disrupt with their jump instead of stun, but I don't want to make them similar to SM specifically if I can help it, since I'm already making them similar with the CSM upgrade as well as other upgrades later.
They'll also get a MoK which essentially gives the squad chainaxes with power melee instead of their default chainswords.
The Aspiring Champion stays the same.

Havocs
They start out the same in their base form with only a tiny bit more melee damage, but like with the CSM they only get a MoK. However, unlike the CSM, they get multiple MoK since it really only is a name for the upgrade. First obviously they get the autocannon, which isn't changed at all. Second they get a Missile Launcher, why is because Plague Marines are Nurgly, so obviously they wouldn't appear in a Khornate army. Third is called Khorne's Hellfire and they get a Heavy Flamer, for the same reason as with the Missile Launcher, Noise Marines are Slaneeshi.

Tier Two

Bloodletters
Nothing changes.

Bloodcrusher
Nothing changes.

Khornate Chaos Dreadnought
Starts out with a MoK already installed, which should be reflected in its price of course.
Its upgrades consist of The Blessing of Khorne, which changes its huge claws to dread chainfists, gives it a damage boost on top of its already substantial heavy melee and improves its Bloodrage by making it last longer, and the Hellbrute Conversion, which essentially is the same as the Dark Age of Technology as it gives is just a bunch of HP. There's a few more additions to this though. Since now the dread is no longer just a hunk of metal with a psychotic CSM inside, the Hellbrute takes increased damage. Another addition is that it improves Bloodrage by giving it an ability similar to the 'Uge Hammer Nobs. The time the dread is in Bloodrage gets increased by a set amount every time they land a melee hit, its attack speed increases, and it looses some of its extra damage weakness until it gets cancelled out (Bloodrage has the received damage decreased by 50%. As a Hellbrute, that decrease would shoot down to 25% or 20%, and slowly go up with each hit up to 50%. Weapon reload is reduced by 40%. As a hellbrute, it can go up to 60%. The time span for Bloodrage is 15 seconds. As a Hellbrute that can be extended indefinitely if it gets up to its max attack speed and never stops attacking. I will explain this later as this is getting too long and I have no idea if I should put the effort into it should all this be fruitless XD.)
One thing to note, besides the under-slung storm bolter in the chasis, the Chaos Dreadnought has absolutely no range capabilities.

Flesh Hounds
Fast in both movement speed and attack speed, topping that off with high normal melee damage and high weapon skill, the Flesh Hounds are basically Banshees without the power or heavy melee. Though with low health, they are great for chasing down retreating units. The main reason why they're T2 and not T1 is that they have the greatest number of models not counting the Heretics and can get an upgrade called the Collar of Khorne that gives them psychic damage immunity. That... and because I don't want to make the Heretics obsolete right out the gate by making their only upside being their worship and grenade launchers.

Tier Three

Khorne Berzerkers
This is the T3 upgrade to Mark of Khorne CSM, a conversion to Khorne Berzerkers. They get an array of weapons which could be a berzerker chainaxe, ceremonial knife, a scimitar, and a berzerker glaive for the Aspiring Champion with all of them power melee. The Aspiring Champion is free just like with the Sternguard and Vanguard Veterans of the SM, and like with the Vanguards or the Raptors he can get a weapon upgrade to something like a blood maul or a chainfist.
They get a health, speed, and weapon skill increase while getting a weapon reload decrease as well as a special ability that's an improvement of Slaughter, Blood for the Blood God! Skulls for the Skull Throne! This ability is basically a mix of Frenzy and Slaughter and WAAAGH!!! all combined into one. All affected allied units including the Berzerkers themselves gain a speed buff and a weapon reload decrease, and non-Berzerker units also gain a small damage buff. The buff stacks with each Berzerker that uses this ability just like with WAAAGH!!! A buff that only applies to the Berzerker is that they get suppression immunity and a small damage resist for the duration, while at the same time making them unable to retreat. Berzerkers can also use Bloodrage to the same effect as the dread can, which brings up something very important. If a unit retreats through a Berzerker unit, any allied unit whether yours or not, the Berzerkers will attack that unit instead while they are within melee range out of disgust of their cowardice, even if Blood for the Blood God! Skulls for the Skull Throne! or Bloodrage isn't active.

Chaos Terminators
They'll get chainfists instead of normal powerfists, dealing slightly more melee damage than normal, but that's about it.

Infernal Relic Predator
A predator that has the least starting health out of them all, it starts out with a twin-linked Accelerator Autocannon that fires faster and does more single target damage and less splash damage compared to the normal predator autocannon. The original MoK will do the same as it did before, however it will replace the Accelerator Autocannon with the normal one (The reason being that they found new parts and slapped it on the tank). The other upgrade gives the predator more health to bring it up to the base of the normal predators, and gives it a charge (since it does have those spikes at the front) similar to the Battlewagon, only it goes in a straight line in a direction chosen by the player and it won't stop until it either reaches its max charge distance, or it hits a non-destructible object like a wall or a monstrous creature/walker. The charge can go through a monstrous creature/walker if they are at low enough health, since the charge will kill them and their corpse is destructible cover if it leaves one. Of course, the predator has increased movement speed while charging.

Slaughterfiend
This here could be just brought over from DoW 1, and then have a weapon change to make a Slaughterfiend. Its two limbs it uses for attacking will be similar to the dread chainfist upgrade in damage, and it'll get a Reaper Autocannon on one of the sides of the huge turret that houses its battle cannon. It'll have the same health as the Phobos and it'll also get Bloodrage as well on top of a for the lolz Berzerker that rides the Slaughterfiend, getting off to attack infantry units that go for the fiend's back. This unit replaces the Land Raider.

Bloodthirster
Again could be brought over from DoW 1. This unit must be called from the CL's global bar the same as the GK's Land Raider is, only with one twist. You must use a blood sacrifice on an Aspiring Champion in order to summon it. It'll have health somewhere in between the Avatar of Khaine and the Great Unclean One.
After it has been called, it gives a passive aura that grants suppression and a great psychic damage resist while the Bloodthirster itself is immune to psychic damage due to being a daemon of Khorne and its Brass Armor of Khorne. It gets its Axe of Khorne and its Gorewhip which gives it its two abilities, a stationary jump that acts similar to the AoK's Khaine's Wrath, in which the Bloodthirster leaps into the air with its wings and slams the ground with its axe, and a long range attack with its whip that deals damage and stun similar to the GUO's Foul Snare, only instead of pulling the target model it causes disruption. This unit replaces the GUO.

Thousand Suns with Sorcerer Commander
Same as the World Eaters, just have everything revamped for Tzeentch.

Sorcerer
Stays the same mainly but gets a special aura, Ahriman's Guide, as well as a new global. When a Rubric marine is within a certain distance of the Sorcerer, they will lose their Rubric's Curse debuff even when not in or near combat. Icon of Tzeentch will also grant an improved version of Ahriman's Guide in which the Rubric marine is buffed by the same value it normally would be debuffed when in range instead of just cancelling it out. Essentially, it doubles the strength of Ahriman's Guide to put it in a simpler way. Ahriman's Guide can only stack twice, essentially meaning that while the Sorcerer can get its upgraded version, it is not required in order to get the same bonuses. However, if the Sorcerer does get the upgraded version, then that will stack with one of the other Aspiring Sorcerer's Ahriman's Guide to create an even better buff because the Sorcerer's will always come first. This is confusing but I don't have a good way of explaining this without getting into numbers, which is what I don't want to do. I'll do it if you need explaining though.

Tier One

Heretics
Stays the same except for their Aspiring Champion. This changes to an Aspiring Sorcerer which gets the Ahriman's Guide as well as a power sword and bolt pistol. On top of that, it buffs the damage of Grenade Launcher heretics by giving them inferno damage for their autoguns through Warp Imbuement, however it does not increase said damage. This inferno buff does not apply to the Aspiring Sorcerer's bolt pistol as he ditches it to cast psychic lightning or whatever it's called in-game. The health buff that the Aspiring Champion normally gave still applies also, and the sorcerer makes the heretics' worship have a larger range. This Aspiring Sorcerer is the only one to have an aura Ahriman's Guide instead of only affecting its unit. Heretics are living and thus have no need of Ahriman's Guide, which makes the sorcerer be able to affect other squads besides his own. Ahriman's Guide will only give its movement speed and sight range buffs to the heretics when there are no marines without their own sorcerer or under the commander's aura inside its own aura.

Rubric Marines
At their base Rubicae have the same health and deal the same damage from their bolters as normal CSM, however they get the Rubric's Curse debuff which shortens the sight range of the squad and makes the unit much slower than normal. Rubric's Curse also grants a buff in the form of good suppression resistance and a slight damage resistance, increased versus psychic as that's the whole point of The Rubric of Ahriman, as they are just souls in armor, and Unwavering, which allows them to fire normally under suppression. However, the unit losses its speed debuff when it gets into combat, the fire of battle bringing back the marines' former selves and making them livelier. The unit only gets two upgrades, Eternal War and their Aspiring Sorcerer. Eternal War stays the same, however the Aspiring Sorcerer upgrade comes with the Mark of Tzeentch upgrade from the normal CSM unit in the form of Warp Imbuement. The cost will be a combination of the two respectively. The Aspiring Sorcerer comes with Ahriman's Guide and a power sword, skipping on the bolt pistol for using his psychic powers instead, similar to the one for the 'nade heretics. The Aspiring Sorcerer is also similar to the heretic one in that it is a "die last" model in order to not have the sorcerer die and lose the Warp Imbuement for the squad, then being forced to by the sorcerer again. It's possible to just make the sorcerer a one-time purchase, that way when he gets killed you can just reinforce him normally, however the Thousand Suns are known for having small space marine numbers that are alive and so I'm not going to go down that route with this first time intro with the Rubric Marine concept.

Raptors
Same as with the Rubric Marines, the Raptors start out the same as normal CSM except they have a damage resistance and Rubric's Curse. When the raptors jump they will mini stun upon landing and issue a Curse of Tzeentch within a small AoE. With their Aspiring Sorcerer, they lose their jump packs and instead become a teleporting unit. They lose their mini stun but gain Warp which allows them to teleport thanks to the sorcerer and deal flame damage within the same AoE as the Curse of Tzeentch due to Warp Flame. The unit also gains additional charge range which is similar to, but shorter to, the Interceptors from the GK. The sorcerer comes with a power sword and plasma pistol, and can upgrade to a Sword of Flame. The raptors themselves can get meltaguns just like normal, however the sorcerer will get a meltapistol instead of a full meltagun.

Havocs
Just like with the Rubicae and the Raptors, Havocs have same base stats as normal but with Rubric's Curse. Their upgrade consists of the MoT, Tainted Heavy Bolter that does more damage to both health and courage, though Havocs already suppress almost instantly, and unlike any set-up team, these Havocs can gain an Aspiring Sorcerer. The sorcerer comes with a chaotic staff and the normal Ahriman's Guide. If the unit has the Tainted Bolter upgrade, the sorcerer will grant the Inferno Rounds ability that does exactly that, loses suppression in exchange for firing inferno bolts. It's basically the same as Vengeance Rounds for SM. One other thing of note, the two bolter marines gain inferno damage due to Warp Imbuement that the sorcerer comes with also; only the heavy bolter has to use Inferno Rounds in order to get the ammo change. A final thing of note is that unlike with Rubric Marines, the Aspiring Sorcerer for the Havocs are not "die last", and thus if killed the squad gets stunned similar to Eldar's Wraithguard when their Warlock leader dies. The bolter models also lose their inferno bolts due to the loss of Warp Imbuement and the heavy bolter model can no longer use Inferno Rounds.

Tier Two

Horror
A lesser daemon of Tzeentch, these guys will have similar stats to their DoW 1 counterpart. Can gain a Flamer squad leader.

Herald of Tzeentch
Your artillery unit for the sub-faction. A Daemonic Herald Horror riding on top of a Disk that will have plasma cannon damage similar to the Weird Boy the Orks have, only when it hits it also has a small AoE that'll light an enemy on fire, dealing flame damage for a short time since its projectile will be a big fireball. The Disk itself with have super heavy infantry armor, and an adequate heavy melee damage due to the Screamer the Horror is riding on. As far as health goes though, the Herald could be called a glass cannon in that for a unit with its armor type it has rather low health. Its movement speed would be rather speedy considering that Screamers fly, which can be considered similar to how Eldar vehicles are fast because of their hover technology, but are super weak. Its upgrades consists of the Staff of Flame, which upgrades the damage of both the fireball and the AoE flame damage, and the Burning Chariot of Tzeentch, which upgrades the Disk's health and speed by adding two more normal Screamers, creating a chariot. The normal Screamers have less health than the Disk, and the chariot upgrade is in T3. Both upgrades can be purchased on one unit.

Chaos Dreadnought
The base stats are the same as the normal chaos dreadnought, however it starts with a twin-linked lascannon. Its upgrades consists of the normal MoT with a twist in that it becomes a Hellfire Dreadnought with no melee arm, a plasma cannon, and a twin-linked bolter for its melee arm which gets rid of the hellfire upgrade. It cannot be bought when the dread becomes a hellfire dread, but it can if it stays in its default state or if it gets the plasma cannon upgrade. Also, the Frenzied Barrage can still be used when it gets the upgrade. The dread can also gain the buff from Ahriman's Guide, as the sorcerers normally controlled machines and dreads were no different in their minds.

Tier Three

Warp Talons
Warp Talons are basically Raptors on chaotic crack and steroids. Drawn in by the pieces of their enemies being sent to them through the Warp, this unit is the new global that the Sorcerer is able to call upon. This unit comes with four models, and I mention it specifically because they have no squad leader, just four normal Warp Talons. They come with dual Lightning Claws and their jump pack which is slightly better than their Raptor and ASM counterparts. They are identical to normal Raptors in stats except for their melee skill, which is much higher.

Chaos Terminators
Same as always except that they are purchased from the base instead of the global and they have Rubric's Curse and therefore are affected by Ahriman's Guide accordingly. This is subject to change if I get information that indicates Thousand Sons termies were gifted psychers as well.

Conqueror Class Robot
A robot from the Legio Cybernetica that has somehow survived despite the lack of concern the Thousand Sons have with machinery, it is a big walking gun platform that has a slight damage resist and vehicle armor. Its health is considerable to the Phobos. Its armaments start out with a lascannon, heavy bolter, and power fist, however it can upgrade its power fist to another lascannon, melta, or flamer. It does not get a Melee Aura when it has the power fist. It can be buffed by Ahriman's Guide. This unit replaces the Land Raider Phobos.

Lord of Change
A greater daemon of Tzeentch, this annoying bird has super heavy infantry armor and close to a chaos terminator squad's health. It does close to an AoK heavy melee damage and its psychic ranged damage isn't anything to sniff at either. It has the improved Ahriman's Guide aura, but it will not stack with the Sorcerer's if he also has it. Instead it will be counted as a normal Ahriman's Guide. This unit also comes with a small evasion chance with the Foresight aura, able to make enemies miss him and close by allies more often. Foresight is also an active ability, allowing the bird to gain a 100% evade chance for a short time, while also making the bird stationary and unable to attacks well as removing the aura for the duration. Another of its abilities is a daemonic version of smite that does more damage. Finally, it gets Your Fate is in My Hands, which is a large debuffing aura that makes enemies take increased damage while dealing less. This unit replaced the GUO.

Geez did this take forever to type up... now only the Plague Champion's Death Guard's Nurgle to go...

Death Guard with Plague Champion Commander
Do I really have to add an explanation by now?

Plague Champion
Nothing Changes.

Tier One

Heretics
A few changes here. The heretics themselves have a slight boost to their health and regen due to being infected by Nurgle's Rot, but move slightly slower. Doomblast for heretics has a lower damage output, but infects those affected with a DOT debuff. The range on the debuff is incredibly small and obviously has the detonated model as the epicenter. Aspiring Champion carries a plague knife and a plagued bolt pistol, and the health boost is more substantial while overall reducing the squad's speed even more thanks to him being super slow.

Nurglese Space Marines
The slowest out of all the CSM variants as well as the tankiest right off the bat. Besides that the base stats don't change. The upgrades are where it's at. Eternal War is the same as always, and like the last two there aren't any other marks except a Mark of Nurgle. The MoN turns the CSM into Plague Marines without a missile launcher basically, the stats being around the same. The Aspiring Champion is the same as the heretic one minus the buffs and debuffs of course, and it gives Slaughter all the same which doesn't change either.

Raptors
Slowest and tankiest as usual, other stats same, but suppress as well as infect those around them, giving DOT. Suppression doesn't have a second chance like with normal raptor, nor does the DOT. The DOT is similar to the Blight Grenade. Aspiring Champion is the same as it normally is, carrying a power fist and a melta pistol, only the power fist is actually a plague fist, and the Demonic Strength ability is replaced by a weaker Pestilent Strike that stuns but doesn't give the ranged damage reduction cloud.

Havocs
You get the gist of things by now as far as base stats go. Marks of Nurgle consists of a plagued heavy bolter that gives the ability to load in Plagued Rounds that suppress significantly slower but apply DOT for everyone hit in the line of fire, a missile launcher that's meant to keep the original Plague Marines' job, and an upgrade called Blessing of Nurgle that allows them to explode on death and disrupt, similar to Noise Marines' Cacophony only with the obvious difference. If you have resources to spare, then giving Havocs BoN could save them the next time they're jumped.

Tier Two

Blight Drones
Weak but deadly aerial drones armed with an autocannon each. They're about the fastest unit this Nurgle army's gonna ever have. They're able to hover and fly over any and all obstacles on the map. For impassable terrain, the ability Fly comes into effect. Just like how jump and teleport troops can cross over chasms and cliffs using their ability, same can be said for the drones. Fly does nothing but allow the drones to move in a straight line from point A to point B faster than normal. The second ability the drones have is Acid Spit which is an AoE that downgrades a units armor by one while applying a weak DOT. If a unit has super heavy infantry armor, then it'll have just heavy infantry armor. Acid Spit is used by every surviving model in the unit, so the more models you have, the bigger the AoE and the higher the DOT. Armor downgrade does not stack like the DOT. Stat-wise, the drones have little health but are speedy. They have no melee, but instead just hover around whatever's attacking them and shoots the attacking model.

Plasma Cannon Havocs
For lack of a non-redundant unit.

Chaos Dreadnought
Keeping in theme, it's the slowest and tankiest of all the C-dred variants.

To be finished at a later date.

[Sturnn]

It would be kinda impossible to balance it I think...

[xXKageAsashinXx]

I specifically refrained from putting anything more precise than vague comparisons to existing units in order to not bring up balance right now. After all, this might be impossible in the first place, so no need to start crunching down on the numbers of something that won't ever happen. All of this is just something that literally won't leave my head and I was just wondering if anyone would like it. It'd be nice if it would be considered putting into the mod, but all I'm asking is that you read it and give me your opinion.

Also, sometime today or tomorrow I'll have the Thousand Suns up if anybody wants to see it.

[DandyFrontline]

It is possible, i think, but in some another fun mod. Elite mod = balance mod. The goal of Elite mod is to balance retail game and fix dozens of bugs, not totally change the game like it do some silly "ULTIMATEAPOCALPISISMOD" for dow1

[Swift]

Sorry my friend but you propose some major changes to Chaos just because of how it looks. I hate to sound like an elitist arsehole but you know so little about how the game works and what turns the wheels as far as running the mod goes. Sorry, it just isn't feasible.

[xXKageAsashinXx]

It is possible, i think, but in some another fun mod. Elite mod = balance mod. The goal of Elite mod is to balance retail game and fix dozens of bugs, not totally change the game like it do some silly "ULTIMATEAPOCALPISISMOD" for dow1

I didn't plan on totally changing up chaos, just making a sort of bonus or secret unit roster if you use a certain skin. Grey Knights weren't in retail and yet here they are, so that's why I bothered to put this up. All I really want is to just jot my ideas down and see if you guys like it, and if you do, then great, then we can get to the question of if people actually want it, and then get to the questions of whether it is possible, and then finally get to the balancing stuff and whatnot. "You like the idea?" is the whole point of this.

Sorry my friend but you propose some major changes to Chaos just because of how it looks. I hate to sound like an elitist arsehole but you know so little about how the game works and what turns the wheels as far as running the mod goes. Sorry, it just isn't feasible.

If you didn't want to sound like that then there are quite a few different ways and different words you could've used to show that. Nevertheless, just like with my response for the other guy, this whole thread is for whether people like it or not, and then whether it is actually possible to have a sort of alternate unit roster for a certain skin. The normal chaos would still be there, and in the big what if possibility that this is possible, you'd get an option of using the alternate or staying with the default.

In case anyone wondered where this even came from, it was just me thinking about all the complaints about chaos being a Chaos Undivided faction. It's not like it meant anything, but it got me thinking. After that, my imagination just took off from there.

[Swift]

Well ok I'll get straight to the point: no I don't like it.

I really appreciate the creativity I really do, I come across as elitist but the thing is, you suggest this stuff but you can't just make all of these ideas and then when questioned about it say "It's just a suggestion cor blimey." I can see us getting dragged into something awful. I do like that you are taking an interest it's great to see people pop up and show that they are interested but you must know that what you are theorising is so much strain on the modders, removes the aspect of it being a balance mod and also creates a massive bias centred on Chaos. Great enthusiasm, but just remember that many people know a lot more about this game than you so they will naturally call you out for it

[xXKageAsashinXx]

I'm grateful for the feedback.

Well, it truly is "just a suggesting" as you say. There is no place that I know of that I can post something like this where people can see and not get a bunch of "Da hell is this?" comments from people that know nothing about 40k or at the very least, DoW 2 itself. I also posted this fully expecting to be shot down too. I do know, maybe not entirely but definitely I'm not ignorant to it, the effort this would require to pull off, which is why I didn't expect any good responses that was more than "I like it." I can't lie and say that I didn't have hope for it, but I didn't also have any serious dedication to this beyond just jotting my ideas down and aking sure someone didn't have a fatally wrong misunderstanding. As far as the balance aspect of the mod goes, I can make an argument that it went away with the arrival of the Grey Knights faction, which isn't even a bonus SM roster but an entire faction in and of itself, however I don't want to accidentially make it sound like I'm pushing for this. I just want to see whether people like this idea or not. And lastly on the chaos centering, I totally don't mind helping out with making alternate rosters for different factions. I just started out with chaos because of the Chaos Undivided controversy.

Thanks for the warning, I'll keep it in mind.

[Swift]

Ah well that's the point, Grey Knights are not as such an extension of Space Marines they actually function as their own faction, the rerason they occupy the Space Marine fourth slot is because the UI issues could not be resolved, though that is being worked upon. Grey Knights are indeed a separate faction, though it is interesting that they are Space Marines by lore, though that is down to it being convenient with the models existing to a high enough quality.

[xXKageAsashinXx]

Yeah, thought it was that way.

Oh, I forgot to ask, is there anything specific you don't like about my idea or just the idea in and of itself?

[Atlas]

o/ bro welcome to the forum!

Been skimming through this forum thread and I'll try to boil my thoughts down.

The basic problems I see with this proposal basically boil down to being way too complicated to manage properly. Elite mod is selling itself as a serious balance mod and that job is made a lot harder when you have to balance various subfactions as well as the generic faction. The job literally becomes exponentially harder to manage.

The best they've done, and imo the best they could do, is to allow custom army schemes ingame like World Eaters for example. Anything more than that potentially breaks the faction with "better" and "worse" subfactions. It's one of my biggest pet-peeves with the Command and Conquer series games like Kane's Wrath where imo Black Hand is way better than most and Reaper17 sucks compared to the rest of Scrin.

I do like the amount of work you put into the idea though! I just feel like it's impractical in the scope of this particular mod :/

[xXKageAsashinXx]

Ah, thanks. Been following Indrid for quite a while and finally decided to get on the forum.

Thank you for the thoughts. I do realize how hard it would be to properly balance all these "sub-factions" as you call them, which probably is the best term to use here, which is mainly why I don't expect anything out of this except "Cool story bro!" or "Ay! Dis guy got a few screws loose!" Like earlier stated, there isn't any other place to my knowledge that I can post something like this, so guess you're stuck with me.

I knew someone would bring that up, since it is something that has to be seriously considered in the event that sub-factions are created. The way I had it figured was that the normal chaos roster was your "Jack-of-All-Trades", Khorne was your "Melee Freak", Tzeentch was your "Wizards Gone Wild", Nurgle was your "Revenge of the Fat and Smelly", and Slaneesh was your "Metal Heads". In english, Chaos Undivided = All-Rounder, Khorne = Melee Specialists, Tzeentch = Psychic Ranged, Nurgle = Ranged Tanks, and Slaneesh = Buff/Debuff and Orb Affecters. I haven't actually gotten to Slaanesh yet, so their designation might change if I even bother to go that far.

Thank you for the feedback, however you haven't told me if you like the idea itself.

[Nurland]

I don't think it is possible to create different rosters for different skins. It is possible for different heroes but not for skins. Skins affect only the visual aspect afaik. (I'm sure somebody has more precise knowledge).

It does sound horribly hard to balance and requires quite a bit of work even if it was possible. Also the army is extremely one dimensional. You rely solely on being able to win all melee fights and being able to jump all suppression and crowd control.

Also Bloodrage for KDread DECREASES the damage it takes. It doesn't take extra damage but the opposite. It takes less damage when the ability is active.

Where do all these new animations and models come from?

[xXKageAsashinXx]

Would it be possible to just add a boolean that asks if you have a certain skin configuration, correct color and sigil and ornaments and whatnot, and if that boolean ended up true it would activate the methods that hold the new roster? I want to go into game designing and programming, so I'm already taking classes on the coding aspect, Java specifically, which is why I think this is a possibility. Of course, I can be wrong, and the game's coding might not allow for something like that.

As far as balance goes, I just thought up a way to make it slightly easier, which is of course assuming everything I type up after this sentence actually happens. DandyFrontline, Swiftsabre, and Atlas have mentioned that sub-factions aren't for "this type of mod". Well, how about have it as its own mod made compatible with Elite? Get a separate mod team completely removed from the elite modders and have them work on this. That way you guys can work on balancing with the current factions, while the other mod team can work on making the sub-factions balanced from your releases. I have zero confidence that something so convenient would happen, so I guess that would be another reason in putting it in this forum, in the otherworldly chance that a free modder would see it.

Isn't that how Khorne works? Blood is blood whether it comes from enemies or allies, and I did make is specifically a melee-heavy sub-faction because of that. It isn't hard to jump suppression units and get them to tear down, though there are situations where you might lose the jump unit in doing so. I haven't actually put up Tzeentch or Nurgle yet, but those two would rely more on ranged combat similar to SM and Eldar.

In the codex it read INCREASES damage taken. Well, if I'm just blind and it was correct, which I'm pretty sure is the case, then it won't be a hard fix to make.

Most of these would come from DoW 1 and the APOCALYPSE mod. The terminator chainfist would come from Space Hulk, and I think the dread chainfist and the accelerator autocannon would be the only two models that you'd have to do from scratch, maybe the infernal relic pred too. The accelerator autocannon can be two Syrtis autocannons put together twin-linked, make the barrels slightly thinner as it gets closer to the end and make the muzzle brake slightly different patterned. The infernal relic is pretty much the same as a normal pred visually, only the turret is at the back of the tank instead of the middle, and the turret is slightly taller. The dread chainfist looks to be similar to the nemesis force weapon on the GK dread, only much thicker in order to house a huge chainsaw, so you can wrap around a chainsword on the GK force weapon.

[Wise Windu]

Would it be possible to just add a boolean that asks if you have a certain skin configuration, correct color and sigil and ornaments and whatnot, and if that boolean ended up true it would activate the methods that hold the new roster?

As far as I can tell, it isn't possible to add this kind of thing without doing it like the Grey Knights are implemented. It is possible to change the looks and portraits of the units based on Chapter, but beyond that, it seems like it's hard coded that way. Maybe you could do it with SCAR code, but I'm not sure. Myrdal (hakon) would know more about that than me.

Well, how about have it as its own mod made compatible with Elite?

Assuming this were possible through SCAR or something, it could be done that way, but as you said, it would take a separate group of people to do it, make the models and animations, implement them and whatnot.

In the codex it read INCREASES damage taken

It says decreased: "reduces weapon cooldown by 50%, weapon reload time by 40% and received damage by 50%"

It increases the damage dealt: "Increases speed by 2.5, damage by 30%, special attack chance by 25%;"

[xXKageAsashinXx]

I was hoping it wouldn't be like that, but it doesn't surprise me. Thanks for telling me.

Figures.

So I am blind. Time to get me some glasses and a new set of eyes.

Thanks for all of this Windu. What do you think about the idea itself, without taking all of what you just posted into consideration?

[Wise Windu]

I think it would be hard to balance; it's almost like adding three whole new race into the game. Though differentiating armies based on their backgrounds, like tabletop I suppose, is still an interesting and fun idea I think. The biggest problem I can see with it is one Nurland mentioned: that the Khornate army relies heavily on melee and would then be easier to counter with setups, counter-initiation and things like that. They would need a way around that sort of thing without making those methods overpowered.

[xXKageAsashinXx]

Even though at the time I thought I would be going overboard, would it be possible to give the berzerkers suppression immunity, and then give their Blood for the Blood God! Skulls for the Skull Throne! suppression immunity for all the affected allied units instead of only themselves when they use it? I modeled it after the Frenzy ability of the Nobs, but the berzerkers wouldn't have nearly as much hp to make it OP to have suppression immunity beyond an ability use. It would give them options in dealing with suppression teams beyond raptor jumps and bloodletter warps and dreadnought/flesh hound charges for T3 when single units can get trashed during a counter initiation. Also, now that I think about it, the infernal relic predator with the charge upgrade can also take care of set-up teams if you manage to time it right to have the rest of your army back it up, and in the case where you can get it out, the bloodthirster's whip can also be used since it does disruption and stun at a decent range. I did put some thought into counter suppression when I first made this after all... wow.

The way I see counter-initiation for the Khornate sub-faction would have to be something like a sentinel stomp or a warp vomit or something that stuns/disrupts, as until T3 the Khornate sub-faction will be superior in almost all melee fights, and even then they'd probably wipe the floor against everything minus LC termies, melee walkers, and super units like AoK.

Once again, thank you for the feedback. I really appreciate it.

[Nurland]

I might have sounded more harsh than I intended. While I think the idea itself is kinda cool and fluffy, I don't see it being viable since a) getting models from DoW1 is pretty much illegal iirc and they would probably look horrible. And b) it would require a lot of work and an insane amount of time spent balancing that stuff since it creates a crapton of balance issues.

[xXKageAsashinXx]

Don't worry about it too much. I proposed something insane and so the way you responded makes sense completely.

I didn't mean to literally copy and paste from DoW 1 of course, just use them as a skeleton to create a model for DoW 2, though now that I think about it that might be illegal too... welp...

The balancing would be handled the way I mentioned with Windu, just get a different team to make it while keeping it compatible with elite. You guys worry about elite, they worry about the sub-factions. The thing wrong with that is that the chances of getting a different team to do this, ignoring all the complications that question the possibility of this, is next to none, so might as well give up on that notion.

Can't really say it enough, thank you everybody for your feedback.

[Swift]

Well if you can make something that is a spin off of Elite, I.E. Elite with all of this stuff, go for it! I think everyone should be allowed to try something as long as they understand the consequences, so this sounds like it might be interesting from a lore stand point.

[xXKageAsashinXx]

What would I call something like that? Fluff Master 2.0? XD

Well I hope to get the Thousand Suns Tzeentch sub-faction up today so that people can see the differences between a purely melee faction vs a psychic and predominantly ranged faction, so this might take a while. What's the character limit for any single post?

[Swift]

What's the character limit for any single post?

Is there one?

[Wise Windu]

Yeah, I surpassed it once with my random stats thread. Can't remember what it is, but it's pretty big.

[xXKageAsashinXx]

Well I hope I can at least get the Death Guard up there before I run out. Finished the Thousand Sons Tzeentch sub-faction. Any thoughts?