Persistent
Fleets & Customization |
"Homeworld2
uses the persistent fleet concept and continues to innovate
on how this concept works within the existing gameplay
structure and balance. You'll even be able to add your own
decals and ship colours to the game to make the connection
even more personal. Persistent Fleets also allow us to scale
the difficulty of the missions. It ensures that player faces
slightly different opposition each time they play." - Dan
Irish, Executive Producer
"The
persistent-fleet concept is still used, but we've modified
the implementation so you won't have to go back a few
missions if you're unsuccessful in preserving enough ships
from mission to mission. We found it was important to the
gameplay since it created a sense of ownership and
familiarity in the single-player experience." - Dan
Irish, Executive Producer
"The
use of persistent fleets is one area where Homeworld and
Homeworld 2 stand out from other RTS games. Instead of
having to rebuild your fleet at the start of every mission,
units are carried over from mission to mission. We've also
tweaked the system to scale better in terms of difficulty." -
Josh Mosquiera, Lead Designer
"The
custom decal system (or badging for short) will allow
players to affix 64x64 pixel textures to their ships in
multiplayer games. There will be a collection of badges
provided with the game, and users will be able to create
their own to use and share with friends and foes
alike." - Geoff Thomas, Assistant Producer
"Of course, harvesting
-- the staple of every RTS game since Dune II -- will
be integral to your success, but Sierra has improved the
"persistent fleet" feature so that you can keep
all the battleships that survived the last mission and then
rely on a dynamically changing reinforcement model so that
harvesting isn't quite as time-consuming." - John
Brandon, Games Domain UK
The
Reinforcement feature makes sense. A stated goal of the
designers was to avoid having players have to go back and
re-play previous missions when they lost too many ships. In
Cataclysm, the solution to this problem was to provide
massive amounts of resources and have unit caps (as well as
mission styles where it was not unusual to lose the majority
of your fleet and rebuild it several times during the course
of a mission), which was generally less than satisfying.
With reinforcements, if a player's fleet falls below a
certain strength, it can be given reinforcements, bringing
it up to a basic strength where the player can hope to deal
with the threat of the current mission, without having to go
back and replay the previous one.
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Formations:
Squadrons and Strike Groups |
"Strike
Groups allow you to form up your fleets into organized
formations. There are three Strike Groups: Fighter Screen,
Frigate Line and Capital Phalanx, each with its unique
advantages and tactics. Fighter Screens are excellent for
quick raids and attacks. With the faster Strike Craft in the
lead, this ties up any defenders allowing the Frigates and
Capital Ships to support the fighters. Frigate Lines excel
at defense. Forming all the frigates in a wall up front
creates a formidable "shield" against any
attackers. Finally, the Capital Phalanxes can be used to
drive a wedge deep into an enemy fleet. With the long range
of the Capital Ships, this means that Battlecruisers and
Destroyers will be attacking targets well before Frigates
and Strike Craft, buying valuable time for these ships to
move in or simply hang back and defend the Capital
Ships." - Josh
Mosquiera, Lead Designer
"So
the first thing we’re going to talk about is squadrons and
Relic’s ability to take their experience with Homeworld
and turn that into an ease of micromanagement for the
player. For example, with strike craft (small fighter craft)
there is no real use for a single fighter.
You would never send one in alone against anything, so
now when you create them, you create them automatically in
groups of five, saving you five clicks and letting you take
that time and put it into planning your strategy and
planning your tactics and executing them, and not about
simply building more units. It’s a common-sense thing that is
not a major change to implement, but it plays a very
important part in how you execute your tactics now. Because
you have ready-made squadrons, you’re able to organize
your ships more easily, more usefully and more effectively.
An outlying element of that is what we call “Strike
Groups.” Now, we’ve all played RTS’s and you have
combined arms; you’ve got your heavy-duty unit and
you’ve got your light, fast unit for protection, and then
you have your some sort of y’know, missile unit…
distance unit… and you lasso them all together and you say
“okay, you’re group 1; you’re all together I’ve got
everything covered: charge!” And they charge down the map, and
you look at them ten seconds later, and your fast guys are a
mile and half ahead of your slow guys, your archers are
completely unprotected, and you’ve just completely lost
all your units to nothing, because they seem to have no
ability to communicate to each other. Now in [Homeworld
2] you have the ability to form Strike Groups, and this is
actually an incredibly complex arrangement whereby ships
become aware of who they’re grouped with, and they behave
differently based on that. So you take your small strike
craft, you add some bombers, you put in a bunch of corvettes
for protection, you add some capital ships, you group them
all together and say “you’re a strike group”; and the
small fighter craft know that they have to protect the
capital ships, the corvettes know that they have to protect
the fighters, and everyone is working in unison; when we say
“go across the map and attack”, the fighters aren’t
going to get ahead of the capital ships, because they know
what to do. And what this allows you to do is: everything
from taking your entire fleet and… very… creating very
detailed strike groups… I want one that does this, and
then I want one that does this, and this is capable of that,
and you organize them very discretely, and have, y’know,
basically the effect of making different chess pieces that
have different functions. On the other hand, you can take
your entire fleet, group them all together, say that
“you’re all a strike group”, and your entire fleet
functions as one coherent unit. And this makes for
phenomenal battles, because now it’s much less about, can
I lasso and click this guy and give him some sufficient
instructions to stop being stupid, and more about, I have
all the options: what’s my best one?"
- Alex
Rodberg, Brand Manager (Sierra)
"Formations
aren’t really customizable anymore. What we found is that
formations didn’t really make a difference in gameplay,
but they will be controlled by tactics. You can set your
tactics to Aggressive, and they’ll make a more aggressive
formation. You can set your tactics to Evasive, and it will
bring your formation together." - Dan Irish,
Executive Producer
"As
for formations, I think the Homeworld 2 terminology
has led to some confusion... As Dan said in the GameSpot
video formations are linked to tactics. The missing detail
here is that this only applies to the squadrons of ships
which were also talked about. So fighters are built in
squadrons and are assigned a formation based on their
tactics setting. The larger formations of more than one unit
are what we currently call Strike Groups. As you will know
if you played Homeworld 1 online micro formations of
fighters were the most effective configuration although the
actual formation chosen did not make much difference. This
just automates that while still giving you control at the
fleet formation level. So there's no dumbing down, no
betrayal, no loss of strategy or tactics." - Cei
Gladstone, Programmer
"The formations
mentioned in the video apply to one squad only and are tied
to tactics, one formation pattern for each tactics setting.
The Strike Groups that have been talked about are basically
formations of squadrons. You can see an example of a strike
group being formed and moving in the GameSpot video. Strike
Groups are formations, so you can put your ships into any of
the Strike Group formations we provide. The difference is
that, as Arioch points out, if you put 5 squadrons of
fighters in to a wall strike group formation then you would
have a wall of 5 deltas." - Cei Gladstone,
Programmer
"One
of the other things we did was, well, every RTS allows you
to control, select a number and create a group. They then
move off as a group - the problem is the fast guys get there
really early and the slow guys get there really late - so it
doesn't really make sense by the time you arrive at the
destination. It's not necessarily the way you want to see,
the fighters being so much faster, so we created the idea of
a Strike Group. This lets you select a variety of different
ship types, that allow you to put them in a strike group -
in a nice organized way. So you get your capital ships in
the middle and your fighter ships on the prow, bombers
around the perimeter, and frigates at the back - and they
move in formation, the way you wanted them to. People
used to do this manually in Homeworld: attach
everything to each other, guard relationships, and put them
in order, formations and move them off. We
spent a lot of effort making sure that the depth of the game
from the first game is still there - but have made it a lot
more approachable and a little bit easier for people to get
into. For
those people who really want a vast experience, all that
depth is still there, all the tactical and strategic boxes
are still there if you still want to use them - if you want
to use the automated system, you can by-pass them."
- Chris Mahnken, Producer (Sierra)
"These strike groups which
are
essentially meta formations; if you form them into a strike group, they'll actually
behave like a formation. So you'll have escorts, flanking
units, and a core. Because of
the nature of the game and the camera controls, there's a
certain amount of micro-management of units involved. One of
the things we had to do was delineate where we wanted the
micro-management and where we didn't want it. Since
selecting and controlling units usually takes more than 2
commands in most RTSs, we figured giving players more tools
to organize their ships would be a good thing." - Josh
Mosquiera, Lead Designer
"What
makes me most excited are the Strike Groups. Depending on
the purpose, I'll try to get a different ideal combination
of ships. I can change their formation and control them like
a unit. In Homeworld there was much more
micromanagement, you had to reform and reorganize groups of
ships. That I'm now able to control my fleet in the Sensors
Manager is also a great strategic plus." - Dan Irish,
Executive Producer (translated from German)
"Strike
Groups have evolved and will continue to do so as they are
balanced. We've talked about more advanced options (like
unique Strike group orders) but we need to ensure a balance
between fun and practicality without taking the game away
from the player. Traditional hotkeys remain (we'd hate to
see the angry mobs it we took this out!). Think of Strike
Groups as Control Groups on steroids and you'll get an idea
of where we are going." - Dan Irish,
Executive Producer
"Queuing
a unit's actions is something that will be available for all
ships, not just Strike Groups."
- Dan Irish,
Executive Producer
In
case you didn't get all that, allow me to summarize: in Homeworld
2, the Squadron and Strike Group paradigm is a
supplement to the traditional Homeworld formations and key-groupings.
Strike Craft (fighters and corvettes) are now permanently
assigned to Squadrons in groups of 5 fighters or 3
corvettes each (Vaygr squadrons appear to be larger: 4 for
corvettes and 7-9 for some fighters). Each squadron has an automatic formation
based on the Tactics setting you give them (Delta formation
appears to be the Normal tactics formation). When individual
fighters are destroyed, the squadron continues as a
reduced-strength unit until it docks for repair, at which
time the lost craft are replaced (at some resource cost).
Strike
Groups are key-groupings of units, including frigates,
capital ships, and squadrons of strike craft. Strike Groups
can be assigned a formation of your choice (Wall formation
was mentioned as an option), but are smarter than
traditional RTS key-groupings, including additional
intelligence that allows heterogeneous groups to act more
cohesively than they did in Homeworld. Squadrons of
fighters will automatically defend capital ships, corvettes
will protect fighters, and the whole group will move as a
cohesive unit. It's not known exactly how customizable
Strike Groups are, but you can at the very least assign a
basic formation. Since squadrons can be part of a Strike
Group, and individual squadrons have their own formations
based on Tactics setting, there will be compound formations;
for example, a Strike Group in Wall formation containing 6
squadrons of 5 fighters each on Normal tactics would be a
Wall of 6 Deltas.
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Tactics
Settings |
"One
of the exploits in Homeworld was the hidden (and
sometimes invisible) modifiers that Tactics gave ships...
not to mention that some tactics affected orders and some
didn't. In the end, this made it hard for the player to
predict what their units would be doing, something that is a
cardinal no-no in RTS games. For HW2, Tactics
determine a unit's retaliation stance.
- Units set to Aggressive will pursue any
enemy targets in range.
- Units on Defensive will jump to the
aide of any friendly ship under attack (within a certain
range), while also defending themselves. They key difference
is that units on Defensive will not pursue attackers past a
certain radius.
- Finally, Passive does what it sounds
like. Your unit does nothing, even if attacked. It may sound
like a bad idea, but there are many examples (such as
keeping a ship that's cloaked from retaliating) of when not
fighting back is just what you'd want." -
Dan Irish,
Executive Producer
For
squadrons of strike craft, the Tactics setting also
determines the formation of the squadron.
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Command
Interface |
"Homeworld2
uses many of the same conventions as Homeworld did,
however, we've included a few standard RTS features like
camera panning and a taskbar on the lower part of the screen
that shows how your units are being used. The GUI is
scalable according to the desires of the player. Camera
Panning will certainly help ease traditional RTS gamers to Homeworld2's
3D world. It makes maneuvering ships easier as the player
can pan their view-point to the designed destination."
- Dan Irish, Executive Producer
"One
of the main three areas of improvement was user-interface.
So, we have the ability to now pan around the screen; you
have much more flexibility with the mouse in setting up
exactly the view and the shot that you want, still able to
spin around and create any sort of 3D angle, and position,
anything… the way that you want. There’s… the user
interface is completely customizable and ranges from totally
invisible, like this where you have a completely cinematic
feel, to something with a lot of information and overlays
that tell you what kind of ships you have, where they’re
going, that their next command is, and you can switch very
quickly and easily between these, to get an overview of the
situation, and get right back into the really gorgeous
graphics, so that you’re not experiencing the game as
symbology, but rather as the adventure that it is." -
Alex
Rodberg, Brand Manager (Sierra)
"One
of the key things we've done that will make Homeworld2
easier for players to get into is the camera. Homeworld's camera was
always anchored to ships so if you wanted to move a camera
around you to select the ship you wanted to look at and
focus on it. So it made it more difficult for the player
because they essentially had to do two steps. As you can see
that kind of functionality is still in Homeworld2,
however like most common RTSs, you can now pan the camera.
This makes it easier to look around, find units, select
them. " - Josh
Mosquiera, Lead Designer
"We've also made some improvements to the camera, making it
easier to manipulate. The introduction of camera panning, a
staple in RTS games, will help ease new players into
Homeworld 2's 3D world. Panning also makes it easier to move
units, since the player can pan the camera to the desired
destination, something that was not possible using
Homeworld's camera.
You can indeed pan up and down. This is used by holding down
a key since it is a more advanced command. Right-click context-sensitive commands
also make simple tasks like moving, attacking, and
harvesting easier to execute.
As
you can see the usual means of movement is selecting a ship
and then moving it using the M key. So usually moving a ship
will require 2 to 3 actions. Now you can just right click in
relative space and your ships will move there along the
horizontal plane. To move along the vertical plane, you just
hold down the mouse and adjust the height."
- Josh
Mosquiera, Lead Designer
"In
Homeworld, when you wanted to build something you had
to do it through the build manager. So you had to leave this
very pretty environment and go to this very static UI
screen. So now our build manager is part of the game
screen. The Sensor Manager remains, but we've added more
functionality to it." - Josh
Mosquiera, Lead Designer
"We've refined it so the user can use an onscreen interface
to manage the construction of new ships, as well as manage
the fleet. This eliminates the need for the player to
constantly switch screens, back and forth from the game
environment to the build manager. We've also included an
advanced tactical overlay on the screen that can be toggled
so the fans can select any degree of the user interface that
they choose--all, some, or none. Of course, we've employed
the standard RTS features like a taskbar, a fleet manager,
and hotkey grouping. This was one of the weaknesses of Homeworld, so we're really focusing on improving its
implementation in Homeworld 2." - Dan
Irish, Executive Producer
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Artificial
Intelligence |
Games
Domain reported that there will be AI characters to help you
control your fleet, but Relic says this isn't so.
"Should
you feel the game is getting too heavy for you to control in
any case, then another of the game's innovations should come
in handy - AI characters to whom control of vital ships and
fleets can be ceded, freeing you up for other concerns.
Whether they work well will have to be seen, but we are
assured that not only will they have their own
personalities, but that the player will come to care greatly
about them, should they but follow the storyline." - Steve
Hildrew, Games Domain
"This
is a misconception. You won't be able to hand control of
your units to the AI to fight on your behalf. Strikegroups
are designed to help manage your fleet, not take control
away from the player." - Dan Irish,
Executive Producer
"The
Homeworld2 CPU opponent will be known for providing
competition that's as stiff as Homeworld's! We've
implemented a ton of changes that enable the CPU to play
like a human, and not have to resort to cheating. One of the
major improvements of Homeworld2's AI player versus Homeworld's
is that it'll take advantage of specific tactics and
implement those into overall strategies. We're relying on
playtest data to provide us with a catalog of strategies
from which to choose. The amount of mistakes the AI player
makes will be dependent on the difficulty level the player
selects; the harder the difficulty level, the fewer mistakes
the AI player will make. We've identified a few different AI
behaviors so far, and as such, will use a combination of
random behaviors rather than follow the same predictable
patterns. This ensures that no game will be exactly the
same, and that you're always in for a unique challenge." - Dan
Irish, Executive Producer
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