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 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
all in all not a great game, it has no explanation of how everything works (a couple line of text do not count) so your left guessing what does what, don't get me wrong it has lots to choose from, but doesn't feel like a modern game in the slightest.

Everything has a tooltip, click things to learn and it explains, oh and the manual as well.

"It's all there in the manual." That 's actually one of my biggest complaints with modern games is that I read the manual (which is never really good at all anymore. I miss the days of the Starcraft manual and its generation...), then go into the options and fiddle with key-bindings so I know for sure where everything is, then I have to sit through a stupid 30 minute hand holding tutorial that assumes both: 1. I didn't even bother to look in the manual (and sometimes doesn't even teach very important things that are listed there) and 2: that I never played a video game before. That ranks up there with "one generic action button to perform every kind of jump/climb/object interaction" as things I wish didn't exist.

The fact it looks like a 90s strategy game with better graphics is actually a selling point for me. I may very well pick this up.

I will as well although I'm going to wait a while till it comes down in price or is in a deal somewhere - I have enough to keep me going for a long time at the moment!

Ok, a Dakka introduction to Warhammer Armageddon.

Its too early for me to write up a full guide, I only got the game last night, but I have had a big session and learned things the games crappy online manual doesnt provide.
Also a nod to Matty and his video, and my notes here are to supplement that.

How Much!?!

I bought the game at g2a.com. Yesterday I played Armageddon at a friends house, he bought it special offer, but I baulked at the price. This game is overpriced bought from Slitherine, its basically an upgraded Final Liberation, but without the videos that made that title cool. To me it was worth £10, not the special offer £22 or full price £35. Of course your mileage might vary, but this is a very low production game, with issues and isnt wortyh the full whack of price you pay for a game nowadays.
Still as I found it on g2a for £11, I bought it, because as I said to my mates last night. Nice game, but not at that price.

Whats wrong with the game.

No cutscenes only still images. I suppose you don't need them for gameplay but, at the price charged you should get full game quality.
No unit animations. However as our miniatures dont animate either I will let this slide.
No explanations. I can partly forgive Slitherine for this, the game was designed to appeal directly to 40K players and not much else, so you don't need much intro as to what the Imperium is and whom the orks are because the player base already knows. Intro products need to tell you what a D6 is or equivalent, products designed directly for a preexisting audience. That being said the game mechanics are not the same as 40K and while players are expected to know to shoot lascannon at vehicles and heavy bolters at infantry too little is explained.
That price. The main price gouges customers with a premium release price for a modest game because its there because of the above. This game is for fans of 40K, and that 'justifies' the high price for modest content. Rage time guys, how can we 40K customers expect to fork out for overcharged product because of a 40K license! How can this happen guys....guys.....
Air Units. I found that Vultures had to fly around cliffs, and as Matty pointed out anyone can shoot AA effectively. Hydras do have an AA profile but from what I have seen of air units so far it doesn't make a blindest bit of difference if shot at by AA or non AA units. Air units are also painfully slow.

What's right with the game.

Excellent unit selection. Including Forgeworld stuff. This is to be expected as a game specifgically for the hardcore 40K fanbase.
The AI campaign is fairly good. Writing code for Panzer leader clone games isnt hard, and while Slitherine have been lazy for most of their production they didnt skimp on the AI. If you put your units out of place the orks will punish you.
Reasonable storyline. From what I have seen of it so far, faithful to the fluff and to the history of the Second Armageddon War.
Good artwork. Again lazy the images are reversed to show left and right profiles so your comms officers backpack keeps switching the shoulder vox from left to right. Unit artwork is good, and gives you a sense of imagination.
Tactical unit selection. The main plus point, you can't just spam outv one or two types of units, you need a good mix of infantry artillery scouts and tanks.
Solid tactical gameplay Please note that the only bad point making my list based on raw gameplay was the crude handling of air units, not bad for a tactical wargame. Being board based it can afford half decent AI and the game deliverys in its scripting.. Most of the problems of this game are the graphics plus the price, and either is entirely forgiveable if the other was fixed.


Gameplay notes.

I am currently playing on Hard, and making good progress through Act 1 having reached Hades hive. I daren't set the difficulty to the top, its just too much.
Some strategy pointers and tips for you.

1. In challenging or harder campaign play, don't risk taking losses. If you played classics like fantasy general you will know that the player cannot afford to lose units and must build up units experience (denoted by gold skulls) to improve the unit. As replacing casualties reduced overall experience this means that to make progress the majority of your force must on each occasion beat the enemy without return fire. This gameplay worked for other similar titles in campaign play, like fantasy general. This doesn't fit with the attrition based combat of the Imperial Guard, though it makes sense for the Space Marines. I would have preferred if the IG had a limited free reinforcement stream so you could afford to play them 'properly'.
This husbanding of assets.

2a. Range profiling is the only way to avoid heavy losses. You need to outrange the greenskins or get under thier heavy guns. Looking at it this is how the Imperial Guard should think, attrition is all well and good with their martyrdom thing, but Ghazkull has come and you need to fight smarter. When you buy your units give yourself a good cadre of artillery and tank destroyers. For artillery start with Griffons in the tutorial, then move on to Bombards and or Basilisks, your choice either will do.
Laser destroyer Russes are also important, though don't take many, just one or two. If your infantry is mechanised you can press the mount button to ride in your Chimera even if not moving beyond marching range, so you can use the range 3 of the Chimera rather than the range 2 of your infantry to fight other infantry. Due to sucky manual support I only recently figured that out, until then I was looping my Chimera to keep the units mounted so they could outshoot the orks.
Look out for enemy artillery and attack it out of range profile, heavier artillery both your and the greenskins cannot retaliate to fire at any range. Take advantage of that.

2b. Range is your friend. Most guard units have decay of 10% accuracy per hex of range, with a normal accuracy of 100%. Orks tend to have an accuracy of 80% and decay of 10-20%. While you do inflict more damage up close, orks do better up close also, however thier range penalties get very prohibitive, unless you are finish off a weak unit open to optimal maximum rather than optimal minimum range when trading fire with greenskins. So if you have range 3 guns engage at range 3 if you can.
Note to Matty from his video. The target icon is the accuracy. The in game screen only shows base accuracy, on the purchasing screen you see the full stats, accuracy followed by decay of accuracy normally something like 100%, -10% for most Imperial weaponry

3. Break tough units units. Units fight back with what they have got, and as you can't outrange everything you will have to take fire. So the first thing you do is judge whether you can avoid the unit. As a rule concentrate your firepower and ignore secondary targets, later if you have spare firepower you can lob them a shell or two but in general be mission focused, both for the scenario mission and the immediate what-must-die-next fire mission. It is a mistake to just shoot orks just because you have the right unit and gun, you need to shoot the right orks.. Use your artillery to soften up a key unit you must attack, if you can reduce its unit strength (number under the unit icon) you reduce return fore for those follow up units that must trade fire. Note that unit strength and hit points are not the same thing. To clarify the help in Matty's video, the Baneblade with a 2 underneath means two Baneblades. Each with ten hit points. The 20 under the guard unit equals twenty guardsmen. For attrition hit point loss doesn't make much difference, so if you need to trade fire you need to do enough damage with the preliminary bombardment to reduce unit strength (make actual kills) so your follow up is easier.

4. Follow up firepower. A lot of the dangerous orks formations are their heavy infantry, ordinary shoots boys with big shootas have range 3, and a lot of firepower. Lootas also. You need to reduce their numbers before any trade of firepower. The same can be said for all the greenskin infantry, even grots. Grots are weedy but if you trade fire at range 1 you will take heavy losses because there are a lot of them. you can break massed standard ork and grot units with flamers though. Any weapon with the terror stat, the only one I have used so far is the Hellhound, though its variants have the same rules. Hellhounds cause a large morale hit, when a unit takds morale losses its unit strength number goes red. When that happens the unit is not combat effective.

5. Spread the pain.
When outnumbered don't finish off broken or reduced enemy infantry. Leave them hanging around so the enemy cant use his numbers. Make the grot shield work your way for a change.
Sometimes you will need to send in a Hellhound on a fresh grot unit, though a range 2 lasgun attack works as well. If it breaks the unit is now a roadblock and might keep dangerous stuff liked burna boys away from your lines long enough to prioritise your kills elsewhere.
You could make a wall of broken boyz units also, but you cant do this with one sweep of a flamer. Don't try it with nobz, though. Nobz do break but you might as well just finish them off by the time they do.

6. Experience is everything. Slitherine don't share the mechanics of experience with us, but trust me the gold skullz matter. You gain experience whenever you cause damage, I think you might get even more of you make the kill, you lose a little when you accept replacements and if your unit does the experience is lost for good. This is important because you have a set limit on the number of units you can field, and limited points with which to buy more on harder difficulty levels, itsd can even be a challenge to replace losses on normal. So don't lose units and let units become veterans.
Now because you lose experience when you take losses the main units to gain reliable experience are artillery and support units not exposed to direct fire. Though I do find that Russes gain a steady two or three skulls and infantry hover about one or two if the unit itself survives. To get more than that you need to last. The differences are massive. An elite unit, and you wont have many of those get some sort of reroll and takes less damage and does more, it time you might find yourself using an elite unit not supposedly suited for a task in lieu of a purpose built but inexperienced unit

7. Do play the Tutorial even when you know the game. As Slitherine didnt actually explain anything it isnt really a tutorial anyway, its just Act Zero. Note that while the fighting is 'non lethal' you lose units that are completely destroyed, so there is a risk especially in the later missions. It also allows uyou to build up your forces over time, rather than just have them handed to you, and you can concentrate on who gets the experience opportunities. I find that the early battles fighting hive gangers are good for giving exp to your core infantry. The Salamander Scout also benefits because of its good firepower and range 3 (which outclasses most intro stage opponents have got) . Even without husbanding that unit it reached six or seven skullz of experience before the orks showed up. Upgrade it to a Hydra, now its lethal.

8. When you have to defend, hold the line not the forward position. You often get NPC assets to hold forward positions, send your tanks forward to cover their retreat if you can. You need the numbers, you don't keep the troops sop you can also use them as meat shields, especially the free conscripts.

9. When the mission changes to retreat, don't waste time. Move! Your line might be holding well, but if a mission changes to a general retreat don't waste time. You wont be holding for long. This sounds obvious but with careful play you can be 'clever' and hold a forward line a few turns longer than the mission requires, even on Hard, but you will take unnecessary casualties which well cost you later.

10. Don't buy cheap throwaway units. You don't have quantity on your side, so you desperately need quality. Some hive gangers and conscripts look like a bargain but they are just waiting to die and dont contribute, eventually you will have to replace them. If you can buy two new units but cant afford buy one unit you need and not two you don't.

11. Buy the right support units, and they arent expensive. There are however cheap units worth keeping long term: Hydras, Thunderers and Hellhounds are all cheap and worth keeping long term. You can also buy heavy bolter or missile launcher heavies, and pay for their chimera later when short of points. You also need about three scout units of any type to expand LOS so your other units can shoot, most are cheap. Armageddon pattern Sentinels being the best choice, you can always use more lascannon, they are scouts though and need to be positioned for role, so often the lascannon are hitting nearby grots. When experienced lascannon sentinels can also finish off dangerous vehicles.
If you end up with better later you can always upgrade your vehicles and tanks.

12. If you feth up and restart in the opponents turn the game will not load properly. Just a bug. So if you really foul up and want to restart the mission wait until the orks have finished punishing you for your mistake and its your next turn before restarting.

13. Power swords are nasty. IG Command Squads are twenty men, and some have power swords. These units are pretty good assault troops, especially against tanks with a poor ROF. I suspect the power sword is used to open hatches so that specialist can use frag or melta charges. While fragile you can assault tanks, with your IG command teams. They can also clear bunkers but you will take heavy losses doing so, its generally not worth it. I take one command squad because it's there frankly. most of the time I use it as regular infantry/Chimera.

Woah that's much better than mine and I didn't even have to type anything.

You noticed the bit about choppas twatting aircraft though eh?

I was surprised how good power swords are as well, and assault units in general. I started going OTT on Baneblades when they showed up and it bit me in the arse. The Guard command squads are surprisingly bad-ass, as are the Dreds, and the Centurion Assault squads are absolute fething killers!

That being said the game mechanics are not the same as 40K and while players are expected to know to shoot lascannon at vehicles and heavy bolters at infantry too little is explained.

This is apparently covered by the armor-piercing stat that each weapon has. While it's not explained within the game, the player is expected to figure out that you want high AP weapons against armored targets.

Now having said that, the game has one *very* irritating habit I've noticed that I think is tied to the AP stat. You'll select your Guard infantry unit, check the expected results for shooting at a nearby Ork vehicle unit, and determine that you'll inflict three losses on the unit (which is pretty good, since the target vehicle unit probably only has 5 hp). So you fire... and don't hurt them at all. What appears to be happening is that the game is computing the raw damage values, but ignoring whether a target is armored/the shooting unit has AP. So you get optimistic forecasts that are, in fact, impossible to obtain.

I've found the Guard Flamer unit to be a suicide squad. I use it on one turn to wipe out an Ork unit. Then on the next turn, another Ork unit assaults it, and wipes it out. As a result, I don't use them anymore.

You get access to two Guard artillery units early on, and one of them is, to be quite blunt, largely useless. The armored mortar (the Griffon, I think) is the first one that you get, and has a 2-3 range (iirc, it also ignores LoS). The second one (the Manticore, I think) also has a 2-3 range. The difference is that the first one also has the Supporting Fire ability, which means that it can return fire in support of nearby units that are attacked (assuming that the attacking unit is in range, of course). The second artillery unit doesn't have this ability. And the third artillery unit - which you get just a bit later - has a range of 3-6, making it *much* better than the previous unit.


Oh, and I second the comment about flying units being slow. iirc, the Salamander is faster than flying units.

Eumerin wrote:

That being said the game mechanics are not the same as 40K and while players are expected to know to shoot lascannon at vehicles and heavy bolters at infantry too little is explained.

This is apparently covered by the armor-piercing stat that each weapon has. While it's not explained within the game, the player is expected to figure out that you want high AP weapons against armored targets.

There are a lot of stats in the weapons and unit profiles, and some are more valued than others. Weapons have different profiles than expected, humble Hydra doesnt have any AP, and has an ROF of 2 per autocannon, a single autocannon get an ROF of three and 10% AP. However an elite Hydra can do some real damage, from use, I think the number of skullz effects the chance to hit, AP and chance to avoid return fire.

Eumerin wrote:

Now having said that, the game has one *very* irritating habit I've noticed that I think is tied to the AP stat. You'll select your Guard infantry unit, check the expected results for shooting at a nearby Ork vehicle unit, and determine that you'll inflict three losses on the unit (which is pretty good, since the target vehicle unit probably only has 5 hp). So you fire... and don't hurt them at all. What appears to be happening is that the game is computing the raw damage values, but ignoring whether a target is armored/the shooting unit has AP. So you get optimistic forecasts that are, in fact, impossible to obtain.

I mainly look at the expected results to see the incoming fire and only concern myself with the outgoing if the attack is favourable. There are too many orks, being alive to pull the trigger nerxt time overrides the damage an attack will do.

Eumerin wrote:

I've found the Guard Flamer unit to be a suicide squad. I use it on one turn to wipe out an Ork unit. Then on the next turn, another Ork unit assaults it, and wipes it out. As a result, I don't use them anymore.

Thanks for the heads up. I havent used them. The complete lack of range hurt it means they have to assault, every time. Even command squads take heavu losses in assault. I cant afford, and your flamer squads will never become veterans even if you use them against isolated broken orks all the time. Which is a waste.

Eumerin wrote:

You get access to two Guard artillery units early on, and one of them is, to be quite blunt, largely useless. The armored mortar (the Griffon, I think) is the first one that you get, and has a 2-3 range (iirc, it also ignores LoS). The second one (the Manticore, I think) also has a 2-3 range. The difference is that the first one also has the Supporting Fire ability, which means that it can return fire in support of nearby units that are attacked (assuming that the attacking unit is in range, of course). The second artillery unit doesn't have this ability. And the third artillery unit - which you get just a bit later - has a range of 3-6, making it *much* better than the previous unit.

Buy two or three artillery before Act 1. Griffons are a good start because they have indirect fire. Medusa are nastier but are direct fire and fragile. allowing for the doctrine of not taking return fire this is a non starter. Bombards are the first upgrade because the 3-5 range is good and they have good firepower and AP. Use them against tanks or infantry. Heavier artillery cant perform supporting fire, this isnt an issue though as you must rely on avoiding attrition rather tham moshing. The only supporting fire unit you need is the heavy bolter squad, as it can use terrain, and the only time you will be holding and trading shots in a static defence is at a fortification line.

Eumerin wrote:

Oh, and I second the comment about flying units being slow. iirc, the Salamander is faster than flying units.

Armoured Sentinels are the scout of choice. The Armageddon pattern Serntinel upgrade costs 100pts, for that you get 51 armour, way better than any other scout unit in the early game, a lascannon and an extra point of movement 6 vs other scouts 5.
Sentinels level up easy and because they are light vehicles you get 8 in a squadron, 8 lascannons is enough fire volume that they aren't bad range 3 infantry harassers, and very good at killing light vehicles. Sentinels also have very high initiative, so a badly damaged target is often wiped with no return fire, so they are good finishers. Because of this Sentinels are easy to gain exp with.
Salamander Scouts appear better at first because they gain lots of exp in the tutorial, this is due to the targets available in that stage of play. Nice vehilces, but I cant waste a slot on one when facing the orks, and as every guard players knows, you cant have too many lascannon.

I'm really enjoying the game.
I've currently got a combined infantry and tank force.
Been using the guard flamer squads and I can agree they don't do much, I've mostly used them to finish off units or damage emplaced ones but they rarely do a lot. I've been meaning to replace them frankly.
Salamanders however have been a lifesaver. They have excellent spotting range combined with an autocannon which allows them to hit a lot of things and lend some decent fire support to my infantry. I've got a pair of them I use a lot. I did want to get some Armageddon pattern sentinels though.

Other than that I've largely found the same things as I've been playing. Using the supplied troops was a nice one to discover early on. Saves a lot of trouble.

I was wondering if they planned to add mod support or any new stuff to the game at a later date.

 purplefood wrote:

I was wondering if they planned to add mod support or any new stuff to the game at a later date.

Apparently the devs have been pretty quiet about it, I am guessing they will if they have shifted enough copies though, everybody is out to make a buck!

The devs have already mentioned adding extra races as DLC.

 Orlanth wrote:
The devs have already mentioned adding extra races as DLC.

Awesome, have they named any?

 mattyrm wrote:

 purplefood wrote:

I was wondering if they planned to add mod support or any new stuff to the game at a later date.

Apparently the devs have been pretty quiet about it, I am guessing they will if they have shifted enough copies though, everybody is out to make a buck!

I'd love to see some more guard regiments even if they were only skin packs (Though different stats for the regiments would be cool)

Agree with most of what has been said here already. It is a fun enough game when you dig into it and has a bit of that 'just one more go' factor to keep you playing. I have to admit, the lack of unit animations really put me off initially but you get used to it after a while. The explosion effects are nice enough. Be warned, there are no cut scenes other than the talking heads in between missions and no end scene - you finish the last mission and it dumps you back to the start screen, no credits, nothing.

Is there a way to unpatch this game?

The patch added so many infantry to units there is no way you can kill them all fast enough. It takes focused fire from six or seven units just to kill off a bunch of grots.