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I'd be surprised if they didn't mangled the lore. Starting classes being roughly equal in power (with different proficiencies, obviously) such as ork boy=gaurdian=SM scout=chaos cultist.

Very hard to balance a game and stick to the fluff rules already in place.

Isn't almost all the lore based on leveling up in the ranks.

SM's start as scouts get upgraded and go from there.

IG start off as a trooper and gain ranks.

I am pretty sure orkz get bigger as they get more powerfull.

Nids well they are a special case, biomatter dissolved and upgraded. Maybe at a hiveship (forge)

Eldar I do not know the fluff for them, just that everyone is trained to fight.

CSM and demons can be upgraded by gifts and favor.

Necrons ?

Who did I miss?

Apparently Tyranids are being relegated to NPC status (which makes sense), and we won't be playing as Necrons for what I hope are obvious reasons...

I severely doubt we'd be playing as Imperial Guard. There is no point in the career of a Guardsmen where they become as powerful as a Space Marine, so they'd always be weaker no matter what level. You might start as a Guardsmen then become a Space Marine, however. It's happened before in the fluff.

I'd love it if Chaos Space Marines and Space Marines were also relegated to NPC status.

That way, they're in the game...but we don't have to worry about balancing around them.

Let the bloody Imperial Guard and Traitor Guard take centerstage for once.

I don't think that Joe Mad is going to be a detriment to the visual style of this game at all. The 40k universe already has such a solid visual sense that anything Joe Mad does will just bring his own aesthetic to everything, making the game appear more World-of-Warcraft-esque in it's animation style. I don't think he'll over-bling everything, simply because he can't and have it still have the iconic 40k (I shudder to say this) 'grimdark' look.

I've said this before in related threads, but the fluff is going to have to take a hit if people are going to get to play as marines at the outset - by this I mean that a Eldar guardian is going to have a equal shot at defeating a Marine Scout as an Ork Boy. One way around this is if the developers make this game a little different, and have your 'character' be more of a squad that you control and customize and develop, instead of a single character like, well, every other game out there.

You can then more easily level the battlefield, as it were. An Imperial Guard player would start with 10 Redshields and work their way up, choosing to make each member of their squad more powerful as they choose and specialize them in certain aspects of battle. Eventually you could level your squad up to, say, Stormtroopers, and eventually you could drop off squad members to become a more potent true individual character like a Commissar or Commander. The same would go for Eldar and Orks. This way, vehicles in the tabletop game and the fluff can be represented, as Eldar can save up 'wraith-favor' or whatever and eventually buy a wave serpent or falcon for your squad 'character'.

The Marines would be the exception to this. You want to be a marine, then you only get a one-man-strong 'squad' character to play with, and you upgrade them like a standard single MMO character. This puts an added restriction on marine players as they have to be more organized to maintain numbers, but such is the way of the Astartes.

This way, the marines can take on the numbers of enemies that they are supposed to be able to in the backstory, as well as keeping them visually less dominating to the MMO world.

Will it happen? I doubt it, because it's interesting and different.

Why would only a Space Marine play as a single character when the Eldar and Orks can field troops that are just as individually powerful? An Aspect Warrior or Nob is easily equivalent to a Space Marine.

That's just it - the Eldar and Orks are not as individually powerful when they start out as a Space Marine Scout would be. A Marine Scout, I would think, would be able to take down 5 to 10 Eldar Guardians or Ork Boyz. Letting the Eldar and Orks play as a 'squad-based- character would level the playing field and keep the backstory intact. As the ranks and experience and power increases per non-marine, though, their numbers would dwindle until they get to Aspect or Nob level.

I had thought that in the backstory, a Marine could handle, say, 5 ork nobz or 5 aspect warriors (or possibly more)? Perhaps I am wrong in thinking this, but that was how I thought Marines were portrayed.

It'd be kinda like this:

Marine Scout = 10 Guardians or Ork Boyz
Fully-armored Space Marine = 5 Aspect Warriors or Ork Nobz
Veteran Marine = Exarch or Ork Cybork Nob
Veteran Marine in Terminator armor = 'minor' Autarch or 'minor' Ork Warboss
Marine Commander = Autarch or Ork Warlord

Something along those lines is what I'm thinking. It would be interesting and different as well to be able to decide of you wanted to stay as a 'squad' character and get more powerful, or if you wanted to become the Autarch or Warboss single character type.

GrimTeef wrote:I had thought that in the backstory, a Marine could handle, say, 5 ork nobz or 5 aspect warriors (or possibly more)? Perhaps I am wrong in thinking this, but that was how I thought Marines were portrayed.

Nope. To be fair, Nobz are individually more powerful than Space Marines, but they're probably the closest for balance's sake. The following would make more sense from a lore-balance point;

Marine Scout = Dire Avenger or Ork 'Ard Boy
Fully-armored Space Marine = Howling Banshee or Ork Nob
Veteran Marine = Warp Spider or Ork Cybork Nob
Veteran Marine in Terminator armor = Exarch (although that really depends on the Aspect) or Meganob
Marine Commander = Autarch or Ork Warlord

That would make from a crummy game though. The Eldar jumps through at least 3 different aspects!

Gorgutz is only going to be in one more game. I loved that snarky, unkillable boss.

I was talking to my friend about this whole topic, he is addicted to AOR, we were discussing how this could possibly work with the races and all. They could split up the races like they did with AOR with the order and destruction for the of PvP and diversity. I thought it could possibly go as follows.

Good: Imperials(Sm's, IG, Inquisition) Tau, Eldar.

Evil: Chaos, Dark eldar, Orks.

the Necrons and Tyranids are not really completely sentient and would make more sense as enemies for PvE.

Other than that I think classes would have to be made in order to fit specific mmo roles. though I could be wrong with all of this,THQ could blow us all away with some crazy way of figuring this all out.

That's an interesting concept GrimTeef. Radically different from other MMO's to boot. The only change I'd suggest might be combat squads instead of lone Marines. The squad concept just seems awesome to me.

The official lineup for the game is Orks, Eldar, Chaos, and Imperium as playable races, with Nids as NPC enemies. I figure as an Imperial, you'll start as a Guardsman or priest, and level up to become a Space Marine. Yes it makes no sense fluffwise, but for the game's progression and balance it seems pretty sound. Considering the Marines are the hometown favorite for 40k, leaving them out would be an oversight.

Alternatively:
You could start as "Hivers" or "Deathworlders" for the Imperium, and it goes from there.

Being able to choose between the Inquisition, Imperial Guard or Space Marines would be about 99% awesome.

Brother SRM wrote:The official lineup for the game is Orks, Eldar, Chaos, and Imperium as playable races

I believe they called that a 'list of possible features'. Though it seems probable enough. Kinda sad that they have both Imperium and Chaos. That seems redundant compared to the rest of the variety they could have provided.

Marine Scout = Dire Avenger or Ork 'Ard Boy
Fully-armored Space Marine = Howling Banshee or Ork Nob
Veteran Marine = Warp Spider or Ork Cybork Nob
Veteran Marine in Terminator armor = Exarch (although that really depends on the Aspect) or Meganob
Marine Commander = Autarch or Ork Warlord

I highly doubt they'll let us level up to commander status of any army... How often does an army of Autarchs face off with an army of Ork Warbosses or Marine Commanders? I hope they keep such high ranks as NPCs. I'm guessing those characters will be quest givers/objective reminders.

You can also give phisically weaker units like guard bonuses to help them out.

Sure its a space marine but I have my first rank fire second rank fire and I get to blast him away with more shots.

Every MMO has more fragile classes, usually it is balanced out by more damage.

Grimteef - that is one godly idea. When I first heard about the MMO I kept thinking and thinking about how they would be able to make it without being another WoW and have it balanced. Making so you would manage a squad would not only be awesome, but I think it would work way better.

Perhaps of the battlefield you'd just play as the squad leader. Instead of controlling a squad you could eventually bring a tank to the battlefield. Not having 30 players per side would also make the game run less glitchy .

I'd much rather see THQ give us more news on Space Marine. Relic has been incredibly quiet about it, and that worries me.

Cheese Elemental wrote:I'd much rather see THQ give us more news on Space Marine. Relic has been incredibly quiet about it, and that worries me.

That game looks remarkably like Dawn of War, only closer to the action.
We'll have to see if there's any news about it at E3 next month.