Dawn of War Codex

Hello everyone.

I know this is something I asked frequently, but it's also something that's been on my mind for quite abit. As I try to conjure up the new changelog, I always look for abit of pictures for a source of inspiration, and as I was doing the Grey Knight Terminators, I was browing some images and reading up on their general information, and there's something that's bugging me.

The existing Grey Knight Terminators are good, but purely animation wise it's been abit semi-"annoying", to a degree, as they are always holding their Halberds with two-hands. And whereas they are in ranged stance (and firing) they don't seem to be in a very much tactical position to be firing. (Since I believe they utilize the Chaos Lord ranged-stance, which is more of an arrogant pose if you ask me, and doesn't neccasarily transition well into the overall feel of what I believe the GK should be)

So I looked for in-game comparisons to make. And Strike Squad, pictured in my head correctly, re-modeled into Grey Knight Terminators would seem more fluent and accurate as to how even a Grey Knight Terminator would actually be moving around. They would move holding their Halberds with just one hand, and their ranged-damage position seems abit more nimble and well-thought out.

Besides, it also gives some more transperency and unique-ness to the Terminator "variants" by having them possibly utilizing abit more different animations. Paladins are however, fine as they are in their existing state - seeing as the Hammers are more likely to be abit heavier to wield, so I find it nothing but appropiate that they are holding it with both their hands.

So the question goes out to the people who know this voodoo stuff, would it possible to somehow work around the GK Terminator models/animations , or possibly conjure up a new-model (and possibly even utilizing existing models to ease up the time restrain on making a new potential model). Or is it just too much work?

Of course, there's one thing which is their speed and how it relates to how the walking animation turns out. But that's something that I'm considering on re-tuning in terms of how Terminator balance is suppose to be.

For an ex. if the model would work, but the animation for walking turns into abit too sluggish and dumb-looking. That's perfect, because that allows me to bump up their movement speed to an appropiate level to re-configure the GK Terminator variants to be more unique and ability-dependant heavy that fits in-line with the overall theme of GK's being abit more ability dependant then other factions. Along with damage- adjustment, their cost effiency can be changed accordingly, making way for the Dreadknight in the future alot smoother for variants of different playstyles.

I don't think that Grey Knight Terminators need that much additional work. I see them great as they are.

I'd pay more attention to the power-armoured Grey Knights like Strike Squad, Interceptors, and so on with halberds. I think they should use the Space Marine Captains Thunderhammer animation instead of the sword ones. They look very weird handling their long pole weapons like they do now.

Well, Terminator and Power Armour animations / models work with oneanother for the most part. ( small problems with fingers / wrist I think, also the right shoulderpad would have to be flipped around )

Biggest issue would be the position of the head.
It just hangs alot lower on power armoured models -

if you'd put a GK terminator together with Strike Squad animations his head would be burried in his chest, I think.

A potential workaround ( that doesnt require new animtions ) might be removing the head from the model, and fixing it on the torso itself.
The head would be static / no longer animated then ofcourse.


____

GK Librarian with SM Librarian animations.
( would be nice having the Librarian shoot lightning to stand out a bit more )



And with Forcecommander/ASM animations

I suppose the fastest way to avoid that ^^ would be to completely reassing the bones to the mesh that has been rescaled and adjusted accordingly. It would still be a lot of work but way less than making a whole new model.

Okey, this is what I just found out after some testing. ( maybe its common knowledge allready, wasnt to me )

If you turn GK Terminators on melee stance they will carry their Halberds with both hands. -click-

If you turn them on ranged stance they will carry them one handed and use their free StormBolder Hand to aim while running. -click-

All in all I really dont think its worth the extra work.
Here are GK Termis next to GK Termis using SS animations.
How many would even notice the difference? There is a short idle animation where they take the halbderd with bothhands to look around, but if that is the problem I think it would be easier to just remove/replace that one animation.


The biggest difference would propably melee where Strike Squads swing their weapon one handedly from time to time, but otherwhise?
Maybe I just dont see the problem *shrug*

If you turn them on ranged stance they will carry them one handed and use their free StormBolder Hand to aim while running. -click-

If they could lower their arm with the mounted-storm bolter, that would be good. The goal like I mentioned is to make them abit more agile. Strike Squad always carry their Halberds with one-hand. Ranged-stance they always pre-empatively aims, which looks abit odd. If they go into melee, they will lower their mounted-bolter arm.

For say, balancing purposes - in terms of context to animations/unit roles

The Paladins are more durable, their weapon/animations reflect this.

Grey Knight Terminators are just below paladins, but at the expense, they're abit more agile and more psyker-dependant. It's purely visual representation with the overall unit role I want to go with them, I just want them to differentiate abit.