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ArtIsGreat wrote: No one in the universe wants to field a Flood army. They are boring enough just pllinking away at them in game. And really, who is possibly going to want to play anything but the Master Chief side? I see lots of Red vs Blue matches.
I want a mini of the stupid giant talking plant from the end of Halo 2.
While I agree with you if you're talking about Flood in space (ramming speed!), but Flood on the ground in a 28mm game should be as fun to play as any faction in any miniature wargame. Every flood form would have its own characteristics and special rules based on the host it took over, so a Flood Brute would be different than a Flood Elite, etc. Flood also have the ability to man vehicles and shoot with some forms (humans mainly). Plus you'd be able to take over enemy troops and turn them into Flood on the tabletop, which is always cool.
"Ramming speed" made me laugh and yeah, that might be a bit boring. For a ground game though, I agree, they could be a great third faction.
Hoyt wrote: I loved Halo's depiction of space combat since the Fall of Reach novel. This release has me so excited , It's what I've always wanted
I'm definitely picking up some ships as soon as they are released, regardless of whether or not anyone near me will play it.
The space battle for reach as described in the novel is truly epic. If I can re-create it with this game then Spartan win the contents of my wallet several times over. (between this and the terminator game this year could get expensive, so much for painting more than I buy)
The story as told in the novel is better than the game in nearly every way in fact.
it's the quiet ones you have to look out for. Their the ones that change the world, the loud ones just take the credit for it.
Even if there were only two factions (hey there could be more), there are a number of franchises with only 2, and I would happily be on board. Heck even 40k has 2 factions.. Spesh Murheens and Not-SpeshMurheens. I say bring it on!
Hoyt wrote: I loved Halo's depiction of space combat since the Fall of Reach novel. This release has me so excited , It's what I've always wanted
I'm definitely picking up some ships as soon as they are released, regardless of whether or not anyone near me will play it.
The space battle for reach as described in the novel is truly epic. If I can re-create it with this game then Spartan win the contents of my wallet several times over. (between this and the terminator game this year could get expensive, so much for painting more than I buy)
The story as told in the novel is better than the game in nearly every way in fact.
I agree, Reach butchered the great last stand in the novel and made it feel no where as epic.
Still didn't the novel's battle have around 150 UNCS ships versus like 500 Covenant vessels? Recreating that would not be cheap at all . But if those pics look as good as the finished product, it would look amazing.
I wonder if there will be a mechanic for AI like Cortana? She wasn't the only one, but she was pretty unique in her abilities.
Covenant AI being typically less advanced. Flood could have "Rampant" AI that they had corrupted or versions of the Keyes "proto-gravemind" that could interface with captured ships.
Cortana, Pillar of Autumn wrote:A dozen Covenant superior battleships against a single Halcyon-class light cruiser. Given those odds, I'm content with three ... make that four kills.
Cortana, Cairo Station wrote:Registering all hostile vessels inside the kill-zone. Thirteen cruisers, two Assault carriers. I'm going loud!
I'm also assuming there might be some kind of boarding action mechanic given how prolific it was throughout the series.
I think flood could work in space as a slightly less accurate but more durable version of the Covenant and Human ships. Must have to have the ability to ram!
Medium of Death wrote: I wonder if there will be a mechanic for AI like Cortana? She wasn't the only one, but she was pretty unique in her abilities.
Covenant AI being typically less advanced. Flood could have "Rampant" AI that they had corrupted or versions of the Keyes "proto-gravemind" that could interface with captured ships.
Cortana, Pillar of Autumn wrote:A dozen Covenant superior battleships against a single Halcyon-class light cruiser. Given those odds, I'm content with three ... make that four kills.
Cortana, Cairo Station wrote:Registering all hostile vessels inside the kill-zone. Thirteen cruisers, two Assault carriers. I'm going loud!
I'm also assuming there might be some kind of boarding action mechanic given how prolific it was throughout the series.
I think flood could work in space as a slightly less accurate but more durable version of the Covenant and Human ships. Must have to have the ability to ram!
Oh yeah, I remember in one novel where there was some space combat and Cortana was simultaneously hacking into the enemy AI and eventually disabled their ship. Having different A.I.s that you can pick to upgrade your ships to that give them each unique abilities the way X-Wing has different pilots, would be awesome!
And yeah, if Microsoft gives Spartan some leeway to bend what has been depicted before about Flood space combat, they could potentially give the Flood a bit of variety.
Considering it's been stated in an interview with Neil and Derek from Spartan Games on the Element 270 podcast that so far Microsoft has given them no IP qualms and even let them design several new ship models for the game, I can imagine they'll get some leeway to make it actually work as a game diversity wise by sounds of it!
On the forums, a designer said that they would be limited at Assault Carriers, which are approximately Infinity in length.
If you want to play scale games, the Covenant Supercarrier would be 57 inches long. (approx. 30km in game)
So expect both Assault Carriers and the UNSC Infinity.
To add to GenRifDrake, the Spartan games people said that Microsoft let them invent ships to fill in gaps in respective nation's line-ups. For example, the two large ships in the fleet picture, the Covenant Heavy Cruiser and the UNSC Heavy Carrier were created by Spartan Games.
As for the Flood: I'd like to see them as a possibly Solitaire opponent, give them some basic logic and massive numbers. That fleet could be about a few high capability ships covering for a wave of boarding craft, not very interesting to play but possibly a ton of fun to play against.
Another reason to root for the flood: they could be stand-ins for Tyranids in BFG.
After playing BFG for years, I'm totally okay with the ships not being in scale. Otherwise small craft would be pin head size, and huge ships would be cumbersome.
All they need to make me happy if afordable plastic spartans and covenant in 28mm.
I already have 10 copies of the Halo Tabletop Game, and a complete collection of Halo Action Clix. I mostly just need more Covenant and vehicles
I just hope that they don't apply their current shipping practices to Halo. Tons of box sets and no single purchases, forcing people to buy ships and even whole squadrons they might not need for that one single model, unless you go through their own expensive website.
Love their rules, love their models, but their sale models are utter crap.
BRB wrote: I just hope that they don't apply their current shipping practices to Halo. Tons of box sets and no single purchases, forcing people to buy ships and even whole squadrons they might not need for that one single model, unless you go through their own expensive website.
Love their rules, love their models, but their sale models are utter crap.
All ships individually purchasable. Been that way for a while. They did this because people wanted to buy bits, so they got a guy onto it and he managed to sort it out. Thats the cool thing about spartan.
I must admit, I am hoping these will be cheaper (by dint of being plastic) than the Firestorm stuff. Several times I have looked at that game and the resin/pewter prices have put me off. Ideally, I'd buy these Halo ones at no more than £15 for the largest ships, before discount.
BRB wrote: I just hope that they don't apply their current shipping practices to Halo. Tons of box sets and no single purchases, forcing people to buy ships and even whole squadrons they might not need for that one single model, unless you go through their own expensive website.
Love their rules, love their models, but their sale models are utter crap.
All ships individually purchasable. Been that way for a while. They did this because people wanted to buy bits, so they got a guy onto it and he managed to sort it out. Thats the cool thing about spartan.
May wanna read what BRB said more carefully, cause he actually mentioned the exact route you just linked to:
BRB wrote: unless you go through their own expensive website.
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Well, fortunately, as has been pointed out, you can buy singles from their webstore.
It may not be at a 30% discount from some website, but its there if you desperately require only 1 ship and not a single one more. I can only imagine this trend continuing with their Halo game.
Perhaps in the future online webstores will also offer singles, but until then, its a small price to pay for a company that is really one of the smaller fish and needs to maximize their product to shelf space ratio in order to be competitive for B&M stores.
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Cause they changed the size of units and early-adaptors are forced to buy additional units to get proper-sized units
Yeah, I find myself in that position. Though, It depends on what you mean by proper-sized....maxing out a squadron size is not always desired or required . And there are other ways to fill out squadrons than via the Spartan website...there is eBay, old stock at stores, and even community trade forums like the one here on DakkaDakka. The website is just the most convenient method. By and by, the shift to box sets directly alleviates the old "hot dogs in packs of 8, buns in packs of 10" problem Spartan had with its blisters, since the boxes now come with enough ships to max out a squadron if desired. So, I would call that a definite improvement.
To try and steer this back towards the topic, this whole thing might be a non-issue, as Spartan Neil has said in interviews that the Halo ship game will have no fleet-building rules. Not sure what that means exactly, but it sounds possible that there won't even be squadrons in the game in the way that we know them in US/FA/DW.
One thing they mentioned was a very 'free' game which took a significant stylistic guide from the video games.
That would argue against most of the game design conventions which, while making sense for someone who is used to miniature games, doesn't make sense to a non-miniature gamer.
I listened to the podcast. One thing mentioned is that they do have the ability to create new ships and have already done so. I will probably stick with FSA for my ship game, but I am very interested in a skirmish game.
Blacksails wrote: Well, fortunately, as has been pointed out, you can buy singles from their webstore.
It may not be at a 30% discount from some website, but its there if you desperately require only 1 ship and not a single one more. I can only imagine this trend continuing with their Halo game.
Perhaps in the future online webstores will also offer singles, but until then, its a small price to pay for a company that is really one of the smaller fish and needs to maximize their product to shelf space ratio in order to be competitive for B&M stores.
In most cases, it just doesn't afford to buy the single over the box set. Take the Terran Carrier for example:
Carriers and Escorts used to be available seperately and only seperately. A Carrier was priced @11,50€, without shipping since I was able to pick it up at my local store. Now they pulled the carrer blister and the escort blister and packed them together in a box set @€23,00. If I want a second carrier for my fleet, I'd either have to buy the €23 box set and throw away the escorts that are included, since as a loyal veteran customer I already have all the escorts I can field from the old escort blister and it simply isn't worthwhile selling them on the secondary market, OR go through the spartan web store and pay ~€30 (incl. shipping) for the single carrier without the escorts.
So I'm buying and throwing/giving away ships that I don't need, because it's cheaper than just buying the single ship I do need at more than twice the price than before. I don't know if it's because their distributers bullied them into pulling the blisters or if it was by their own choice, but it's very customer unfriendly.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2015/02/13 08:35:03
I'm really excited about this game. I don't have a space combat game to play, primarily because no one around me seems to play space combat games! Hopefully the Halo license will entice people into it!
Although I should honestly just breakdown and buy some BFG fleets...
I am both incredibly excited and deeply saddened. I have spent so much time, effort and money on putting together a 28mm UNSC ground force that the idea of them suddenly being released as actual models (and likely better than my conversions!) is somewhat gargantuanly disheartening, especially as I am just finishing up the last touches of paint on my Marine. Still, can't wait for space combat! I'm purely excited for that part!
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and yeah, that might be a bit boring. For a ground game though, I agree, they could be a great third faction.
, It's what I've always wanted
Mordian Iron Guard - Major Overhaul in Progress 
. And there are other ways to fill out squadrons than via the Spartan website...there is eBay, old stock at stores, and even community trade forums like the one here on DakkaDakka. The website is just the most convenient method. By and by, the shift to box sets directly alleviates the old "hot dogs in packs of 8, buns in packs of 10" problem Spartan had with its blisters, since the boxes now come with enough ships to max out a squadron if desired. So, I would call that a definite improvement.
