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ghosty wrote:So what do people think the playable races would be?

Ima hoping to be a tyranid apart from it would totally screw up everything.....

GO GO ripper class ^^

mor reilistically i can imagine space marines, eldar and Orks being in it deffinately.

My guess is for simplicity it will start of Space Marines and Guard vs. Chaos and Orks. That the other races will initially present as NPCs for PVE, but eventually be added as playable later on. On the assumption that the mechanics follow DOWII, I think the races that would be hardest to incorporate would be Eldar and Necron, since they don't quite have the scalable hierarchy that lends its self to a leveling system that is tied to a squad based system. Eldar would start as guardians, work up to dire avengers, and then be forced down one of a number of aspects and kinda dead end; as opposed to marines with scout to tactical to Assault or Dev to Terminator or Stern or Vanguard to Command Squad to Honorguard. This is not to say they wouldn't be done, just that the Eldar would need a different structure than the first four I named. Tyranid and Tau I think would be the next easiest to incorporate as distinctive additions. Things like Grey Knights, SoB, and the Inquisition would be pretty easy buy wouldn't bring too much new flavor; probably done as mini-releases with Nid and Tau as major ones.

I think rippers would represent a power of a more powerful Tyranid. Like a high level warrior who can summon a ripper swarm once every minute or so.


I just hope they come up with a good way to deal with actual territorial conquest. Where retaking or taking a planet acutally means something, that isn't just reset the moment an instance closes.

...so this is a speculation thread on how people would want a 40k MMO to play? The truth is nobody will be satisfied as everyone has shown the myriad of possible preferences that are either wanted/needed. At best, if the MMO is just in the starting phases it'll be a few years before we see a beta let alone a released game.

This means absolutely nothing, but I was watching the Darksiders (the makers of which are developing thte 40K MMO) intro today and noticed that silhouette on the middle-right that looks suspiciously like a genestealer. Just for your amusement.

I don't think forcing players to pick a path and stick with it would be the best approach to this. Aren't Space Marines trained to act in any role, so that in one battle they may be a tactical marine, but if the situation calls for it they may be needed to man a heavy weapon in a Devastator squad and then take up a jump pack and chainsword in a later campaign? Similarly, for Eldar, Autarchs are Exarchs who studied many paths, and members of an Aspect Shrine will often leave it to pursue something else unless they become trapped on the path and become an Exarch.

Seems to me that the best approach would be to have a persistent character whose statistics remain independant of what "class" they are acting as. Classes themselves would simply be whatever role they intend to play and influence what their statistical improvements with each level are. This way, people won't have to reroll characters to try new roles; they simply may not necessarily have access to certain things until they reach a certain level, like needing to be a Veteran Sergeant (lvl whatever) to be allowed Assault Terminator status or something. Further still, it allows for personalized builds of characters that won't be possible in a strict "one character, one class" game. For example, If you know you want to be a Terminator later on, but you like acting as fire support and really like that sleek looking assault cannon, you spend a good portion of your early levels as a Devastator marine, getting bonuses to accuracy and heavy weapon proficiency so that when it comes to finally getting those Terminator Honors, you have your role clearly defined by your character's actual experience, rather than the experience simply acting as a pile of "power points" that you mound up over so many hours. If you are an Eldar, and want to be a Warlock later, you probably spend a few levels as a Fire Dragon or Dark Reaper to get your ranged abilities up, then spend some time as a close combat aspect, then maybe take up whatever path the game provides to improve your support/leadership skills. Fire Dragon experience helps increase your proficiency in using explosive area attacks like Destructor(the heavy flamer power), close combat experience will help you use the witchblades and singing spears that are the iconic weaponry of the class, and leadership experience make the Warlock good at what he does (buff other units). Since Eldar are obsessed with specialization until perfection before they move on, give them a bonus to experience gained or make their abilities more powerful the longer they play in one path to set the race apart. Space Marines, who are the epitome of battlefield flexibility, would start each path with more of the beginner skills and powers than other races would when they switch.

@ Railguns - That idea is probably the best I have heard so far, allowing players to adapt thier character to fit whatever role is needed, or whatever specific job they would like to fulfill. I can see it working for guard as well, putting in some Special Weapon time as well as some rapid assault to get good at Stormtrooping with a Melta.

I imagine it would probably work out something like, given a large set-piece battle against an army of NPC Tyranids, the player side may consist of any number of "Order" side players. An Eldar player who has spent a great deal of time as a Fire Dragon obliterating heavily armored targets would have to use his mobility to pick and choose the best targets for his talents because he loses a great deal of effectiveness when he changes classes and thus would be wasting his time trying to switch classes for whatever happens to show up in front of him. A Space Marine player, however, can start the battle as a Devastator with high RoF weaponry gunning down the chaff so that the previously mentioned Eldar player can go about his business without being bogged down. Should his position be overrun, he can go run to a supply station or something, switch his gear/class to Assault Marine, and use the good number of utilitarian starting abilities to clear away his position with relative efficiency rather than being insta-screwed by circumstance. Should he and his buds manage to clear a good firing position again, they can go back to their intended role. They won't be as awesome scything down gaunts like Striking Scorpions would, but then again a Striking Scorpion is basically stuck in that role for that battle while the Space Marine benefits from his flexibility. The min/max efficiency players get their nasty, nasty glass cannons while players who like to be prepared get their forgiving, heavy armored ubermensch.

as long as they don't screw up the lore like they did for wow. I'm happy with anything .

Rymafyr wrote:...so this is a speculation thread on how people would want a 40k MMO to play?

There really isn't enough information to do anything else, and it is fun to do.

Rymafyr wrote:The truth is nobody will be satisfied as everyone has shown the myriad of possible preferences that are either wanted/needed.

I doubt nobody will be satisfied. Sure, some people will be disappointed because it isn't the game they want, but that is always going to be true.

Rymafyr wrote:At best, if the MMO is just in the starting phases it'll be a few years before we see a beta let alone a released game.

Uhm, this isn't in the starting phase. THQ announced development on it some time ago. This is the announcement that we will finally see the work that has been done.

Here is a few scraps of info on gameplay + races

http://kotaku.com/389784/first-proper-details-on-warhammer-40k-mmo

Voodoo_Chile wrote:Here is a few scraps of info on gameplay + races

http://kotaku.com/389784/first-proper-details-on-warhammer-40k-mmo

scraps is right really they didn't say anything new just "WE WILL BE THE AWSOMIST OF THE AWSOME" thanks though for sharing as I do look forward to seeing what they do with this. Kinda wish they would even release some concept art or lore.

Railguns wrote:I don't think forcing players to pick a path and stick with it would be the best approach to this. Aren't Space Marines trained to act in any role, so that in one battle they may be a tactical marine, but if the situation calls for it they may be needed to man a heavy weapon in a Devastator squad and then take up a jump pack and chainsword in a later campaign?

I think the way they'd go about it is not a class base system. If it does take an approach similar to how DOWII did, I imagine the unit type you'd control and its function would be the by product of your equipment and not of any sort of class. That as you progress in level you are simply qualifying for new equipment. So that when you complete the tactical squad "tree" (we don't know if there are, but lack of a better word) or enough of it, you unlock the "Assault tree" and "Devastator tree" where you can select what additional skills and training your squad should recieve. That decision is yours and is the "character" building aspect of it. The reward for completing a certain number of "skills" might be access to terminator armor or artificer armor. Additional training as sergeant or commander may allow you to take on more marines into the squad or vehicles, or allow you to become a techmarine, apothecary, chaplain or just a better commander.

Empchild wrote:

Voodoo_Chile wrote:Here is a few scraps of info on gameplay + races

http://kotaku.com/389784/first-proper-details-on-warhammer-40k-mmo

scraps is right really they didn't say anything new just "WE WILL BE THE AWSOMIST OF THE AWSOME" thanks though for sharing as I do look forward to seeing what they do with this. Kinda wish they would even release some concept art or lore.

Sorry man upon further inspection I got the link to the original PC Gamer article and interview. The kotaku article really sums up the info
http://www.gamesradar.com/f/warhammer-40000-online/a-20080502174245201051

And here for more concept / screenshot

http://kotaku.com/5415951//gallery/gallery/1

Rymafyr wrote:The truth is nobody will be satisfied as everyone has shown the myriad of possible preferences that are either wanted/needed. At best, if the MMO is just in the starting phases it'll be a few years before we see a beta let alone a released game.

Its developments been in progress for 2 years. There is a strong implication that aspects of DOWII were incorporated into this, not just the publisher, but that key indivduals were moved from the DOWII team to the development team working on the MMO. The fact that its being announced at E3 says the developers believe its no more than 2 years off. That is not to say they'll stay on schedule, just that its far enough along to show something they think will impress.

Will "nobody... be satisfied"? I don't think so. I think there are people who no matter what will enjoy almost any game that is atleast put together well, even if it doesn't fullfill all their wants and needs. I think the only real way for this game to "fail," is if it tries to be or comes off too strongly as or is flat out a WOW clone. That ship has sailed, people who want THAT type of MMO can find a good number of clones to choose from in addition to the original. 40k is its own thing and as long as the game tries to be 40k, in more than just name, it should be successful.

I think this games biggest competitor will be "Old Republic", now that the MMO market is moving more and more into Sci-fi, mmo games in that category will not help but be compared to each other. So to be successful it needs to do something different and do it better than one of the other biggest Sci-fi franchises of all time. What can 40k be to compete with Star Wars?

I just hope that

1. battles are power epic, either give each player a squad to command, or huge numbers of npc's in action, or something, but I want my fights to look like the cover of my codex.

2. ability/player customization is strong enough I can do fun/unique things.

if it's a single character kind of game, I'd like to see em do something more along the lines of a MMO version of Borderlands where it's like a MMOFPSRPG, instead of like WOW where you just target a monster and press 1, 2, 3, 4 & 5 over and over again, and every once in a while move out of the fire, poison clouds and big black circles. What I do love about WOW is the whole quest system, and it worked great for Borderlands too.

Hopefully, space marines will be NPCs, and everyone will at least start out as the toughness of an imperial guardsman, eldar guardan, etc. That or make everyone marines, chaos marines, aspect warriors, etc.

You know, I hadn't thought of this much before I read the articles about the 40K MMO, but I think one distinct issue that the game will have purely from a subscriber perspective is that I doubt that the game will be able to attract a similar female playerbase that WoW or Everquest have been able to garner. I mean, I don't know what the numbers are for those games, I know that the fantasy genre has a greater appeal to women than sci-fi, in general, and military sci-fi (which is what 40K is really), in particular.

Grundz wrote:I just hope that

1. battles are power epic, either give each player a squad to command, or huge numbers of npc's in action, or something, but I want my fights to look like the cover of my codex.

2. ability/player customization is strong enough I can do fun/unique things.

1. Apparently we'll be taking to the field "alongside massive AI armies". Supposedly it's going to feel like controlling a single squad in the middle of a huge RTS battle, which has me totally giddy in the manbits. So you're covered there.

2.According to THQ, we'll have "The coolest looking characters ever", and they went on to say "You can call us on that once we really start showing off the game". Apparently we'll have everything from weapon mod kits, to improvements on armour, to different camo schemes, and we'll even get to add purity seals/litanies, books, chains and, of course, LOTZOFSKULLZORZ!!1!

"If you think about it, “Group” is a just another way of saying “Squad”."

This seems to imply that you control one character and groups of people together are squads but I could easily be wrong. But in support of this:

"Relic has the RTS angle covered with the awesome Dawn of War series - we are making an RPG."

CrazyThang wrote:"If you think about it, “Group” is a just another way of saying “Squad”."

This seems to imply that you control one character and groups of people together are squads but I could easily be wrong. But in support of this:

"Relic has the RTS angle covered with the awesome Dawn of War series - we are making an RPG."

See, but having a squad to control hardly even comes close to classifying it as an RTS. ME2 wasn't an RTS - it was an RPG. SWBG wasn't an RTS, it was an FPS. One brick won't build you a house, right? That THQ has the RTS angle with DoW means nothing as far as the likelihood of player squads goes.

It might even be that you only command a squad on the battlefield, and then you're on your own when out of combat, which would be a much more likely explaination of any singular referances. That, or because the squad would be made up of NPCs, they probably only refer to the player character as that's the main focus. Having squads likely won't make any difference in parties either. To me, squads seem like Vigil's version of a talent tree, with each squad member representing a branch of the tree. So your Guardsman's heavy weapons spec might be two guys with a heavy bolter instead of you carting one around yourself like some kind of roid-monkey. Then you might build up a healing spec as your second choice, which would put a medic into your squad. Makes perfect sense. Just gives others a visual battlefield representation of what your character build is.

I guess we will just have to wait for E3 :( . ... is it E3 yet?

A cross between an MMo and RTS would be interesting, but I think 40k would be best as a 1st person shooter MMO.

Aye, 100% now in my mind this whole 'Squad' thing is wishlisting. It's obviously clear when he's talking about the Squad, he's just referencing that in the 40K MMO you'll be making a Squad with other players not a Group.

Nothing in that that says you'll be controlling more than one character.

Oh and the extra art work was stuff from a concept artist who then got fired when it hit the net. No one actually knows if its any indication of the game's look although he did say it was just him practising and it wasn't supposed to be in game stuff.

They probably fired him as he was no longer seen as safe to keep leaks under wraps. Real shame if it wasn't him as he suggests who posted the info on the net.

metallifan wrote:See, but having a squad to control hardly even comes close to classifying it as an RTS. ME2 wasn't an RTS - it was an RPG. SWBG wasn't an RTS, it was an FPS. One brick won't build you a house, right? That THQ has the RTS angle with DoW means nothing as far as the likelihood of player squads goes.

It might even be that you only command a squad on the battlefield, and then you're on your own when out of combat, which would be a much more likely explaination of any singular referances. That, or because the squad would be made up of NPCs, they probably only refer to the player character as that's the main focus. Having squads likely won't make any difference in parties either. To me, squads seem like Vigil's version of a talent tree, with each squad member representing a branch of the tree. So your Guardsman's heavy weapons spec might be two guys with a heavy bolter instead of you carting one around yourself like some kind of roid-monkey. Then you might build up a healing spec as your second choice, which would put a medic into your squad. Makes perfect sense. Just gives others a visual battlefield representation of what your character build is.

I would love it to be a squad based MMO, as then it would really have something to differentiate from other MMOs and it would be easier to balance classes and races while staying true to fluff. You could start with something like a '20 point squad', which is 1 Space Marine, or a handfull of Guardsmen or Orks Boys, and as you level go up to something like a '200 point squad', like a 10 man Tactical Marine Squad, or 5 Terminators.

But sadly, I have yet to see any real evidence that the game will be squad based. Any luck in finding the article you mentioned earlier in the thread, metallifan? Because every interview/preview I've seen doesn't mention squad based combat at all. You'd think they would promote such a feature if it was actually in.

I haven't had any luck, no. Which is a downer because it mentioned a whole schwack of good stuff they were planning on putting in. The squad combat was just the one that stuck out most for me. There was a bunch of stuff though, about choosing homeworlds, what sort of armour and weapon kits you'll be able to find, all sorts of good stuff. Spent the better part of two days looking. My guess is that someone from Vigil or THQ got a little too loose-lipped and they asked to have a sheet tossed on the topic until release. Makes me sad