Should there be a Battlefleet Gothic Armada 3?

[Reginleif]

Rather, is there enough out there to justify and create an Armada 3? Especially after seeing a resurgence of interest in space RTS and TBS games as of late (even if Homeworld 3 fumbled badly).

I pose this question because I was thinking about what a hypothetical sequel could bring.

I don't believe there were THAT MANY more ships they could add from the source material, though I could be wrong. They could, I suppose, make up stuff. Nothing wrong there though it could have pitfalls.

Greater scale? Larger maps, a typical direction sequels often take, doesn't seem like it'd offer anything beneficial. Unless they allowed players to have larger fleets which, to be frank, I'd be for.

More and more diverse maps, perhaps?

More mission types and dynamic events?

Maybe greater customization of ships? Or RPG elements regarding ships.

Or a paradigm shift like Dawn of War going from 1 to 2.

[Harbinger]

Warhammer 40,000 being a relatively minor franchise in the overall gaming market and strategy game as a whole isn't really doing well recently. Above all, BFG's naval (or space) combat is sadly almost niche-genre in itself. So I'd be really surprised if there is a sequel. As avid fan of BFG (only has few tabletop experience sadly), I was genuinely surprised to have this title at all.

On the other note, orignal Battlefleet Gothic, being a specialist tabletop game, was predominantly a rather small-scale tactical battle simulator where individual ships maneuver was important. I'd welcome the change of scale/pace, but it'd be better be a entirely new game rather than being a sequel to this game.

[George W. Kush]

i want some great crusade/horus heresy/siege of terra games. not those card games either, some actual freaking games where i can fight on the front lines or control a fleet laying waste to xenos or traitors. more importantly i want some Iron Warrior FPS games with full siege capabilities on the ground or in command of ships in space just imagine being able to give the order for a saturated planetary bombardment & drop pod assault in FPS or fighting/crafting your way forward in the trenches with your forces waiting for that moment when you can give to order to unleash utter annihilation with your artillery battalions & tell your men to get ready to charge.

[Reginleif]

Originally posted by Narthan Dume:

i want some great crusade/horus heresy/siege of terra games. not those card games either, some actual freaking games where i can fight on the front lines or control a fleet laying waste to xenos or traitors. more importantly i want some Iron Warrior FPS games with full siege capabilities on the ground or in command of ships in space just imagine being able to give the order for a saturated planetary bombardment & drop pod assault in FPS or fighting/crafting your way forward in the trenches with your forces waiting for that moment when you can give to order to unleash utter annihilation with your artillery battalions & tell your men to get ready to charge.

I was also thinking Great Crusade for Battlefleet. We'd get to see more Gloriana class vessels and I think whomever would have greater creative freedom to make up ships.

However, my only concern is that it'd limit the number of factions. Obviously it'd be Imperium vs Chaos. There'd be no Tyranid nor Necron and definitely no Tau.

There could be other threats, of course, and each legion could be a faction unto their own.

But a siege game of any sort would be just as neat. I'd love to see more xcom style games, maybe with an emphasis on building your own chapter rather than playing the Grey Knights or any other existing chapter.

And we all agree there needs to be a Total War Warhammer 40k/Epic game complete with titans.

[optimusrhyme]

Yes but for the love of the god-emperor give me the ability to move/shoot through ships like in the tabletop game. Its beyond stupid that my own ships can't just go over or under each other.

[Reginleif]

Originally posted by optimusrhyme:

Yes but for the love of the god-emperor give me the ability to move/shoot through ships like in the tabletop game. Its beyond stupid that my own ships can't just go over or under each other.

Sequels should innovate or build on previous titles. . and I was struggling to think how a hypothetical Armada 3 would do that. . but this is actually a very good point. Allow ships to go above or below each other. . or more specifically add a second and third plane to work on.

An obvious inspiration might be Homeworld but even Sword of the Stars, Star Hammer: The Vanguard Prophecy, and Battlestar Galactica Deadlock might be worth looking into.

I also do think maybe a ship builder would be fun, not just as a homage to the tabletop hobby but also because it's fun. It can be done like the aforementioned Sword of the Stars.

[Harbinger]

Originally posted by Reginleif:

Sequels should innovate or build on previous titles. . and I was struggling to think how a hypothetical Armada 3 would do that. . but this is actually a very good point. Allow ships to go above or below each other. . or more specifically add a second and third plane to work on.

40k ship designs aren't really geared toward full 3D battlespace, unfortunately. Think of Imperial Navy ships, they have to literally switch heading and roll everytime day want to hit something with their broadsides and would look kinda funny. Still, some rigid and simple elevation levels, like TT Aeronautica Imperialis might work, I guess.

[Willard]

Originally posted by Harbinger:

Originally posted by Reginleif:

Sequels should innovate or build on previous titles. . and I was struggling to think how a hypothetical Armada 3 would do that. . but this is actually a very good point. Allow ships to go above or below each other. . or more specifically add a second and third plane to work on.

40k ship designs aren't really geared toward full 3D battlespace, unfortunately. Think of Imperial Navy ships, they have to literally switch heading and roll everytime day want to hit something with their broadsides and would look kinda funny. Still, some rigid and simple elevation levels, like TT Aeronautica Imperialis might work, I guess.

I would go with something like Starfleet Command, the ships are on a fixed plane and just hop over or dip under another ship when they get close and set ramming as an tactical option. That would bring the ramming a bit closer to how it worked in table top where the ramming was almost always targeted, outside of some strange exceptions due to celestial phenomenon.

Personally would love to see another BFG, would love to see more racial campaigns, Damoclese Gulf, Admiral Porel and the void war around Armageddon, some kind of Eldar campaign. I think there is a lot there but yeah it is a narrow section of a kind of struggling property.

[{SLURP}Legion]

there was an aeronautica imperialis game that allowed you to go up and down, but it was removed from the steam store.

[[VI] Skalgrim Fellaxe]

THIRD GAME:

First up, they could make a third game and expand the roster somewhat as there are lots of ships not in the current vanilla roster for many factions that are described in various lore sources. They could (and should) work with GW in expanding knowledge on ships in 40k.

As a point, I added 150+ new ships to the game in Skalgrim Mod. Many of these are my own creations, others are based on ships in the lore that are not in the game (the Glorianas for instance) or even for the Dark Mechanicum (which we know have access to their own ships, but have zero lore for them). I'v tried to make these ships for all factions to follow the lore but its basically based on the concept that currently the Imperium and other factions are creating new ships (Cawl being a cheeky boy).

So can it be done. I have shown it can be. Heck I'm working on a few new ones for the next update.

Now talking about feasibility of a third game - I'd say its low to very low at the moment. Despite the massive uptick in interest in 40K due to the huge success of SM2. There are lots of things working against it, not the least the state of the original dev company Tindalos and their relationship with Focus Interactive that has been the primary licencing partner with GW. Complicated stuff from what I'm told, but its not great.
-------------------------------------

NEW "BFG" TT IN THE WORKS:

...However, and this will come as great news for some of you - I can state with some certainty due to a personal source that have as of yet never been wrong, that GW are in fact working on a Heresy "BFG" style void battle game for TT. You don't have to believe me, but I'v known this for a while now and seeing as how my source could tell me about stuff like Magnus, Angron, The Lion, Warhammer: The Old World, and a bunch of other things often half a year or years in advance from it ever being public knowledge - I trust him on this as well.

So if we assume I'm not lying, or my source is wrong, then there is a good reason for a new game in the series, that would focus on 30K instead of 40K. This would probably mean far less factions - but much larger ship rosters and great possibilities for campaigns and notable battles. It would probably only feature Loyalist Legions vs Traitors, with their subfactions, and then could possibly add on DLC:S with Imperial Navy, Mechanicus/Dark Mechanicum, Aeldari/Drukhari and Orks factions possibly. Necrons, Tyranids, and Tau would not be in this game as they were not active at this time. From a dev stand point this would make the most sense in terms of work load and economic gains over time, riding on a combined GW TT wave for the 30K TT game and greater spread of knowledge of 40K interest due to SM2.

Now I have heard zero news about anything in the works for a third game in the series. But a new 30K take, perhaps by a new studio, would not be impossible. Space RTS games are niche, but Stellaris, Sins of a Solar Empire 1 and 2 and others have shown it has a respectable following - and BFGA2 did sell pretty well and still sell copies, even more now. So who knows. I'll keep hoping, and in the mean time - modding.

[Taliskaran]

Thank you for telling, really good news.

[George W. Kush]

Originally posted by Harbinger:

Originally posted by Reginleif:

Sequels should innovate or build on previous titles. . and I was struggling to think how a hypothetical Armada 3 would do that. . but this is actually a very good point. Allow ships to go above or below each other. . or more specifically add a second and third plane to work on.

40k ship designs aren't really geared toward full 3D battlespace, unfortunately. Think of Imperial Navy ships, they have to literally switch heading and roll everytime day want to hit something with their broadsides and would look kinda funny. Still, some rigid and simple elevation levels, like TT Aeronautica Imperialis might work, I guess.

forget TT rules mate read the novels. imperial ships are perfectly capable of fighting in a 3d/4d (if you include time its 4d) battle space and do it in every novel involving void battles. hell we got the white scars flagship a Gloriana class brute that can literally flip and burn like a little jet a fraction of its size. you are not taking into consideration the amount of tech & resources poured into the construction of these ships the novels even tell you: the resources of entire planets sometimes an entire star system is used for a single ship of the line aka cruisers, battle cruisers, grand cruisers, battle ships, battle barges etc etc. the flagship of the Emperor can fire 10 nova cannon shells the size of smaller ships (frigates) in the same amount of time it takes for the human heart to beat once. stop restricting your self to TT rules. there is more lore and fact in the novels then any youtube vid or wiki page. one of the largest ships in the 41st/42nd mil is the Adeptus Mechanicus Ark named "Speranza" which is 150km³ in size. the flagship of Perturabo, the gloriana class named Iron Blood makes super star destroyers look tiny. a Retrubition Class Battleship is 8km³, USS Enterprise from star trek is 150-170m³~ in size. The Saint Aster (overlord battle cruiser i think ill have to read the books again) from the Dawn of fire novels does a freaking barrel roll underneath an enemy ship pumping out broadsides into the "belly" of the enemy ship.

[Iron Knights]

Only if they make a WH40K including Armada + Space Marines + DoW 1 Dark Crusade. All races & factions available, no fighting between Army & Marines, they are allies after all and for every Marine there are a million soldiers. WH40K : War is Eternal.
Warhammer Universe from Armada 2, each planet can be conquered, territory by territory like DoW 1 (or Auto Battle but more player fair versions). Each territory will save your pre-built bases AND tech.. Optional - jump into FPS mode when Marines attack a territory or another ship. When jumping onto a ship, you will have 2 goals - Capture Ship or Destroy & you will have goal points to accomplish accordingly, like Disable Engines, Weapons, Command & Control. The ships will be scaled to size including space stations, when it comes to boarding.
Each faction will start with 2 home systems in skirmish mode.

[pblogic]

Of course there should be

[banditks]

Looking at this series overall I think big picture it was heading in the correct direction, more open ended campaign to promote player agency and control of their circumstances, more ship customization, more factions to play as, more epic campaign over large sectors of space.

If this were to continue we would see BFG3 be more akin a total war game, and WH3 has made that company piles of money [despite its best efforts to make mistakes along the way]

It would be lovely to see a very large campaign map with each faction playable. The campaign would be sandbox and let the player do whatever, go wherever they want. Perhaps at release starting with Empire, Space Marines, Orcs, Choas, Eldar. with expansion packs adding in Dark Eldar, Tau, Necrons, ect ect. Possible in pairs or three's again following TW's model.

This could be further segmented down to have specific sub factions create new starting locations and different faction buffs, like making a meaningful and noted difference between Space Wolves, and Imperial fist fleets. The many different orc waagh fleets, and eldar craft worlds ect ect for each group.

There is potential here for a really fun game. It all depends of the people who have the power can prove financially it would be a good idea.