Warhammer 40,000: Eternal Crusade

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Warhammer 40,000 Eternal Crusade is a Third-Person Shooter (think Battlefront) that was announced at E3 2013 and released in 2016, available for the PC, PS4 and the Xbox One/Ten.

Now many of you think that this is such wonderful news, right? Well... This is still up to debate since the game was being developed by the people who have given us such wonderful titles like Wet, Dante's Inferno (PSP), The Lord of the Rings: Conquest (DS) and Naughty Bear. However, Behavior (the guys that were making this thing) pulled in talent from all around - especially from Funcom Montreal (Age of Conan, The Secret World); recently, Graham McNeill and Anthony Reynolds (known for writing the Ultramarines and Word Bearers series, respectively) were confirmed to be working alongside them as well.

The game is dead now. For real this time. As of July 2017, devs have admitted through Twitch they have absolutely no resources and staff to add new content. This means that any plans to expand the setting and polish the game mechanics have been scrapped and their last hope is to collect as much money as they can from its current rotting state. Players have been completely abandoned and have been left with a mediocre arena shooter with a 40k skin. Yet another trailblazing failure in the infamous pantheon of 40k gaming. Emperor helps us all.

Dream Big

When the devs first got the license for this game, they wanted nothing less than to shoot for the moon. An open world the scope and complexity of Planetside 2 with no fewer than four factions, player-driven campaigns, giant fortress climax battles, and everything from Ork nob squads tearing at Wraithguard to a Chaplain rallying the last desperate charge against a fortified Chaos stronghold, with enough different weapons and customization options to always have the player come back for more .

Now naturally you can't just build a game like that in one or two years. Seeing how insurmountable an MMO of this kind of proportions would be to create from scratch, Behaviour decided to scale down the initial size of the game, and then scale that down for Open Alpha. To make sure the engine, weapons, vehicles, graphics, maps, etc. all worked. Updates continued to pour in, and all the races were added.

Unfortunately, as the devs churned out a half-decent Early Access game (by the standards of Early Access) the publishers were getting impatient. A mandate came down from on-high...

Current State

Officially, the game was "launched" in September 2016. This is despite the game being completely unfinished, looking identical to the Early Access mode the game was in when Orks were in alpha mode. For all intents and purposes, the game is basically an early Beta state - All announced factions are in, and the games are played as instanced arcade-esque shooters not unlike Space Marine's multiplayer. The long-term plan was to gradually open up the world, making larger regions, until the continent of EC is one region in it's entirety, somewhat like Planetside 2, as was originally the plan. An invading army would had need to capture at least 2 of a region's outposts before they can attack the primary base of that region, allowing for large-scale strategic planning. The latest "launch candidate" currently has a primitive world map with matches being set on each faction's borders. There's also Tyranids which you can fight in 5-man kill teams to achieve absolutely nothing except bragging right and Steam Achievements.

While this has lead to much outcry from the Founders and the fanbase in general, many do now see the benefit of improving the core gameplay to be a fun shooter, before making a massive world with barely nothing in it and with poor gameplay. Furthermore, through the weekly Twitch shows and an active cooperation with fans on the forum, combined with a positive reaction to the current Alpha build, the initial outrage over this controversial move died down a bit.

In March 2017, the game went free-to-play, with certain limitations to lure the player into buying the complete version. While there were far more people playing on both the Virginia and Frankfurt servers after this switch, the decision was seen by many players as a bad omen. Despite its very lackluster state, the devs remained confident in the game having a future. But it was too late.

As of July 2017, the game is dying. There's only about 500 players on at any one time, console releases were scrapped, there haven't been any content updates for months, and Behavior no longer has any animators, modelers or any significant staff on the game. It appears they're trying to milk it for what it's worth before it finally dies, another testament to GW's mistake of handing out their IP to multiple different developers without any thought behind it.

Races

The game has four playable factions and one NPC faction, each including several subgroups, and classes. Each race has unique bonuses which affect the game in some way, such as the Eldar and Chaos Space Marines using magic for the support class, able to equip two spells that each have a different mana cost, though they only have access to a few backup weapons. Space Marines and Orks Support don't have access to magic, but can deploy health stations and have access to firearms, among other tools.

Space Marines

Ah, Space Marines. Heroes, Mary Sues, warrior monks and nazi supersoldiers, the Space Marines are the "generalist" faction, with no particular strength or weakness. Their Apothecaries tend to be better in defensive environments, and with the addition of the Storm Shield, they have taken defense as their main stick. There's not a lot to say about them; they're marines, what do you expect. The current playerbase is predominantly Space Marines, and Space Marines fans make up 40% of the fans. So nothing new there.

A lot of people are crying on the fact that Space Marines don't feel "Space Marine" enough, being too weak and feeble for their taste. While the TTK was slated to be increased, a lot of people are in for a surprise when Marines aren't the most powerful faction in a game with four, equally supported factions. Part of the "problem" here is the engine mechanics, which deliberately makes all characters in the entire game somewhat sluggish (the best example is how infantry have a maximum turning speed, so upping your mouse sensitivity won't let you you 360 quickscope, and there's lots of other more subtle examples). It also doesn't help that many new players first start out as Space Marines before deciding which faction to go to next.

• Chapters: Ultramarines, Space Wolves, Blood Angels, Dark Angels, Imperial Fists.
• Faction Leader: Belial, Master of the Deathwing.
  • Sub-Faction Leaders:
    • Ultramarines: Something called a "Techmarine Suprema" the devs puled out of an old White Swarf. The only named Techmarines the Ultras have are Vexos and Fennias Maxim. We'd mention Sevano Tomasin, but he's dead.
    • Space Wolves: Ragnar Blackmane.
    • Blood Angels: Mephiston, Lord of Death.
    • Dark Angels: Interrogator-Chaplain Cassiel.
    • Imperial Fists: TBA

Space Marine Default Classes

	Objective	Heavy Weapons	Ground Melee	Air Attack	Medic / Support
Unit	Tactical	Devastator	Ground Assault	Assault	Apothecary
Weapons	Bolter, Stalker Bolter, Storm Bolter, Meltagun, Plasma Gun, Gravgun, Bolt Pistol, Plasma Pistol, Grav-pistol	Heavy Bolter, Lascannon, Plasma Cannon, Multi-Melta, Grav-cannon	Chainsword, Power sword, Power Axe, Power Maul, Power Fist, Bolt Pistol, Plasma Pistol, Grav-pistol	Bolt Pistol, Plasma Pistol, Grav-pistol, Chainsword, Power Sword, Power Axe, Power Maul, Power Fist	Bolter, Bolt Pistol, Plasma Pistol, Grav-pistol, Chainsword (Wolf Priest cannot has), Narthecium/Fang of Morkai (Second is Wolf Priest only), Crozius Arcanum (Wolf Priest only)
Abilities	Capture Objectives	Suppressing Fire, Dedicated Anti-Vehicle Weaponry	Storm Shield (You can choose a sidearm instead, but if that was the case you'd be better off picking Jump Assault)	Jump pack (Less armor than Ground Assault, but more mobile)	Narthecium/Fang of Morkai for heals, Can Revive Downed Allies at Full Health by Injecting Them, Can Neutralize Poison by Healing, Different Injection Vials (Adrenaline for Melee Buff, Survival for Damage Resistance, Narthecium for HOT), Heal Beacon (AOE, destructible, only one at a time, infinite supply, has cooldown, lasts for some time), Medicae Grenade (Small AOE, Gives HOT, infinite supply, has cooldown, only one at a time, last for a short period)

• Veterans: Veteran Tactical, Veteran Devastator, Veteran Ground Assault, Veteran Assault, Veteran Apothecary
• Elites: Legion of the Damned Legionnaire, Terminators and maybe Techmarines, among others.
• Heroes: Master of Relics, Librarians and Chaplains, among others.

Chaos Space Marines

Pissed off motherfuckers de jure, the Chaos Space Marines are, like the Space Marines, a generalist faction, but thanks to their Sorcerers, Chaos Marks, and the skill of the generally neckbearded veteran players, Chaos Marines are more aggressive, and can have some outright insanely long sieges on enemy points. Chaos Marines are very customizable, and their Marks makes them quite the force to be reckoned with. Said marks include Mark of Nurgle (Defense Buff, health buff, stamina penalty), Mark of Khorne (Health buff, regain health from kills, but can't be healed by consumables or sorcerers and will die when health reaches zero), Mark of Slaanesh (Speed increase, slow armor regen), and Mark of Tzeentch (Faster armor regen, slight health penalty). Otherwise Chaos Marines share most of the same basic loadout as Space Marines, making it fairly easy to switch between playing the two. In addition, the fact that the current playerbase is almost exclusively grizzled 40k veterans make a lot of teams driven and better at coordination. 'Cause dem corpse-worshippin' fellas gotta burn.

Chaos is the second most popular faction at the moment, if only because there have only been 2 factions for the longest time.

• Legions: Iron Warriors, Word Bearers, Black Legion, Night Lords, Alpha Legion.
• Faction Leader: Abaddon the motherfucking Despoiler.
  • Sub-faction Leaders
    • Iron Warriors: TBA
    • Word Bearers: TBA
    • Black Legion: Ash'Hy Mok: a badass sorcerer created for the narrative who has been very busy liquefying space marines and Eldar alike in the short stories release each week.
    • Night Lords: TBA
    • Alpha Legion: TBA

Chaos Space Marine Default Classes

	Objective	Heavy Weapons	Ground Melee	Air Attack	Medic / Support
Unit	Traitor Marine	Havoc	Traitor Assault	Raptors	Aspiring Sorcerer
Weapons	Bolter, Stalker Bolter, Combi-Bolter, Meltagun, Plasma Gun	Heavy Bolter, Lascannon, Plasma Cannon, Multi-Melta, Autocannon	Bolt Pistol, Chainsword, Chainaxe, Power Sword, Power Axe, Power Maul, Power fist	Bolt Pistol, Plasma Pistol, Chainsword, Chainaxe, Power Sword, Power Axe, Power Maul, Power fist	Bolt Pistol, Force Sword
Abilities	Capture Objectives	Suppressing Fire	Capture Objectives	Jump pack	Healing Spell, Warp Instability (Debuff), Nurgle Heal (AOE heal) Slaanesh Lash (Damage + Debuff), Flickering Fire (Damage), Daemonbolt (user-guided missile)

• Veterans: Veteran Traitor, Veteran Havoc, Veteran Traitor Assault, Veteran Raptors, Sorcerer
• Elites: Possessed Marine and Terminators
• Heroes: Fallen Captain

Orks

Da Orkz are slated to be the good old underdog faction we all know and love from the tabletop, and are not particularly geared towards either melee or ranged. Unlike what some of you might think (you know who you are), the Orks are not a horde army in the traditional sense, and Ork characters are on the same level as any other character from another faction, by a combination of 'Ard Armour, Ork tenacity and a little goodwill. A WAAAAGH! can be triggered in certain matches, specifically if 5 minutes are left with no extensions. This radically reduces respawn cooldown and makes Orks faster in order to simulate the green tide, since the teams still have to have an equal number of players, however they don't have a down state and die immediately.

Currently, the Orks have the best community out of all the factions in terms of role play(all by player choice), friendly players, and just good fun in general. Those that are salty after a match are Grotz in disguise.

• Klans: Goffs, Evil Sunz, Deathskulls, Bad Moons, Blood Axes
• Faction Leader: Warboss Skarblitz (a Bad Moon with a Dreadnought's power fist as his Power Klaw and a thing for smashin' Wolves.)
  • Sub-faction Leaders:
    • Goffs: Luguk 'Edpuncha, known for being the largest Goff on Arkhona Orkhona and carrier of the kombi-rokkit launcha called Spare Keys (you know, as in 'Look boss, dis door is locked', 'No worries grot! I brought my spare keys!' KABLOOIE!)
    • Evil Sunz: Brakenek Wazcrash, arrived on Arkhona recently, fought some 'nids and got a cool idea for a plasma cannon design.
    • Bad Moons: Gazzagug, a warphead, and one of the senior members of Skarblitz's tribe.
    • Deathskulls: TBA
    • Blood Axes: TBA

Ork Default Classes

	Objective	Heavy Weapons	Ground Melee	Air Attack	Medic / Support
Unit	Shoota Boyz	Lootas	Slugga Boyz	Stormboyz	Painboy
Weapons	Shoota, Big Shoota, Rokkit Launcha	Dakka Deffgun, Zzap Deffgun, Plasma Deffgun, Deffcannon	Slugga, Slab Slugga, Kwik Slugga, Pokkit Rokkit Launcha, Choppa, Chain-Choppa, Electrified Choppa, Power Klaw	Slugga, Slab Slugga, Kwik Slugga, Pokkit Rokkit Launcha, Choppa, Chain-Choppa, Electrified Choppa, Power Klaw	Slugga, Slab Slugga, Sicky Slugga, Kwik Slugga, Pokkit Rokkit Launcha, 'Utry Syringe (currently their only melee weapon)
Abilities	Capture Objectives		Improvised Shield (replaces slugga), Capture Objectives	Rokkit (Functions identically to jump pack)	Can both heal & poison with 'Urty Syringe, Heal Station (AOE, destructible, only one at a time), Poison grenades

• Veterans: Shoota Nob, Loota Nob, Slugga Nob, Stormboy Nob, Painboy Dok
• Elites: Cybork Madboys, Meganobz Weirdboys.
• Heroes: Skarboy Kommandos

Eldar

Our favorite Space Elves are the fourth faction in the roster, and are the most alien of the four. Eldar are a faster, more dodgy faction, using hit-and run strikes while backflipping out of harm's way. Eldar have a more limited class customization but have more classes to reflect the paths, as per fluff. Eldar are also the only race of the four with male and female character options, also as per fluff.

Out of all the factions, they have the lightest armor and highest speed, vehicle-wise and on foot. Eldar have great versatility at the start, from stealth melee, to anti-vehicle, foot troops, and heavy weapons.

They're also one of the most hated in-game due to their unbalanced nature and their tendency towards swift hit-and-run tactics. (For reference, a single Fire Warrior can destroy a rhino in less than 6 seconds, Swooping Hawks get the highest points for sniping, and Witchblades can 1-hit you)

• Craftworlds: Biel-tan, Saim-Hann, Iyanden, Ulthwé, Altansar )
• Faction Leader: Jain Zar, Phoenix Lord of the Howling Banshees.
  • Sub-Faction Leaders:
    • Biel-tan: Possibly a farseer named Ksenyia, found in one of the short stories, but yet to be fully confirmed.
    • Saim-Hann: An Autarch by the name of Maelydahn Windstrider; a young and energetic guy with flowing red hair.
    • Iyanden: Soraya, an old Deathspeaker wearing an azure cloak hiding most of her body.
    • Ulthwe: Warlock Amatheon, a badass old guy who, for some reason, can't see through the Warp for shit.
    • Altansar: TBA

Eldar Default Classes

	Objective	Heavy Weapons		Ground Melee		Air Attack	Medic / Support
Unit	Dire Avengers	Fire Dragons	Dark Reapers	Striking Scorpions	Howling Banshees	Swooping Hawks	Warlock
Weapons	Avenger Shuriken Catapult	Fusion Gun	Shuriken Cannon, Reaper Launcher, Tempest Launcher	Chainsword, Shuriken Pistol, Fusion Pistol	Shuriken Pistol, Power Sword	Lasblaster, Sunrifle, lots of grenades for grenade-bombing	Witch Blade, Shuriken Pistol
Abilities	Capture Objectives			Invisibility	Psychic Scream (Suppression)	Glide	Renewal (Healing), Jynx (Debuff), Protect (AOE Shield), Destructor (Lightning), Embolden (AoE Healing/Damage Reduction)

• Veterans: Revered Dire Avenger, Revered Fire Dragon, Revered Dark Reaper, Revered Striking Scorpion, Revered Howling Banshee, Revered Swooping Hawk, Revered Warlock

*Elites: Wraithguards and Outcast Rangers *Heroes: Autarchs

Note: As of July 2017, the Eldar campaign haven't started yet and, considering the current status of the staff, it's unlikely they will get any future updates, including new gear and characters.

Tyranids

An NPC faction, providing enemies for PvE content in underground "Hives", which act as wave defense maps, and acting as a counterbalance to ensure that no one faction remains overwhelmingly dominant over the others by attacking random regions, and so attacking the most powerful factions the most. Or at least that was supposed to happen. Using tyranids to maintain the status quo... Now where have I seen that before?

• Creatures:
  • Small: Hormagaunts, Termagaunts
  • Medium: Warriors
  • Large: Carnifexes

Possible Future Races

Progress for the game has crashed and burned, but for a while the developers said that they wanted to add all races over time. A testament of the original ambition and confidence the team had back in the day, here is a list of non-launch races that have been mentioned by the devs.

Dark Eldar

Unconfirmed, but implied in a newsletter.

Tau

Were noted in an interview by Miguel Caron as being one of the three most requested races, at the time of the interview. Watching the devs try to justify the Tau appearing is going to be fun to watch, since the game takes place clear on the other side of the galaxy.

Adepta Sororitas

Were noted in the same interview as being one of the three most requested races. Were also referenced by Creative Director David Ghozland as being on the post-launch list via twitter. They discussed the possibility of adding them in as a hero character rather than a faction, but no confirmation as of yet.

Necrons

Were also one of the three most requested races.

Setting

Notice the planet Simahgr. Take out the 'h' and re-arrange it, and then it spells out as "Sigmar"... clever eh?

Now anyone who has knowledge of Warhammer 40,000 obviously knows the setting. However, the games events take place on the Kharon System, located in the northern part of the Segmentum Obscurus. The original intention was to follow a planet wide contest for a single undisclosed planet, known as Arkhona. The planet in question was once an effective Imperial settlement, but due to the planets volatile nature, no great foothold could be gained on the planet other than small outposts. The planet was also once inhabited by an alien race, that supposedly was exterminated during the Great Crusade. Now, Tyranids are appearing out of absolutely nowhere, killing everyone left on the planet, apparently coming from the underground of the planet like they had been hibernating there. Weird.

All this calls the playable races to action for different, yet to be revealed reasons, and are now to duke it out on the surface of the planet while the Tyranids eat everything. Lovely.

Arkhona is actually just the primary planet in a system, one that has three different colored suns, for some reason, and with ten planets or moons of playable size, so obviously down the line there will be downloadable content where you start fighting on a new planet.

Arkhona, fifth planet from the three suns, hopefully far enough to not fucking melt in the daylight.

Monetization

How it was

During early stages of development, Eternal Crusade started out by offering a "Founders" program, in which future players could, through an important sum of money, basically "fund" the game and receive exclusive weapons, gear, updates and many other goodies with the hope of getting even more benefits as the game expanded, not unlike any pre-order or Patreon pledge. How many people bought these packs is anyone's guess, but the truth is that said sums were pretty high, and it was a risky investment since there was no clue how it was going to turn out.

During the Alpha stage, EC was known for its ridiculously high price, at a staggering $39.99 on Steam (more or less depending of the country.) While this scared off potential buyers right away, players who bought it were shocked as they got an incomplete, sluggish mess of a game, filled with bugs and completely unoptimized. Devs insisted again and again through weekly streams that they were working to improve everything, but time was running out and progress was minimal, even after a year.

A cash-shop was then introduced. Items sold are almost entirely cosmetic, and they can be bought through RTC (Rogue Trader Credits), an in-game currency you can get in exchange of real money. Prices range from 2,000 RTC for a helmet or chapter symbol, to 10,000 RTC for unique deluxe weapons, like a golden power fist. While devs repeatedly stated there wouldn't be pay-to-win in any form, there's a special subset of weapons that have minor buffs at the cost of taking up far more loadout space (such as the infamous Abaddon's Grace Autocannon, which deals minor soul blaze damage).

There's one huge problem with the shop: RTCs can only be obtained in packs of odd amounts (4000, 9000 and so on), while all prices in the shop are in even numbers. This means, if you want an item that costs 5,000 RTCs, you have to purchase the 9000 pack, which leaves you with 4000 unusable credits left unless you go for cheaper stuff. And to makes matters worse, the catalogue is relatively scarce, with no option for deeper customization. It's a scammy, unfair cash-grab, which has lead to much outrage from many players.

On the plus side, there was another currency introduced called "Requisition Points", which are basically skill points obtained through performing various actions in a match including kills, captures, executions, etc. These can be traded for "Supply Drops", which are mystery packs that contain weapons, upgrades and unique gear not available through the cash-shop. While opening all the boxes takes much time and effort, at the end the loot obtained isn't that great and once you've got everything, you can't do anything else. Unless, of course, you want to give more money to The Man.

How it actually turned out

Originally, there were plans to have a free-to-play dynamic known as "Free To Waaaagh!", in which players could enter the game but limited to the Orks faction. The idea sounds brilliant and its quite fluffy, since Orks are literally a huge, green piledrivin' horde, and for that, you need players. However, concerns in game balance/population, and the fact that matches never went beyond 60 players crushed that possibility.

But eventually it happened. The game went into a freemium state, with a few restricts. You can't access the Assault class and progression is slowed to 1/3 normal state, but the other 2/3s will be given to you upon upgrading to premium or spending $20 in the cash shop. In other words: Without paying, players can access the game, but receive a third of their earned requisition and experience. Those who buy the game are given all of the currency and experience they were withheld from while free-to-play.

This transition caused quite an outrage in the Steam community, specially those who ended up spending $40 or more during the early years. But at this point is obvious it was the Founders who got the short end of the stick.

To add insult to injury, the last noteworthy addition to the cash-shop were the "Heroes", which are unique characters with special abilities, but they come at the insulting price of 25,000 RTCs. Ouch.

Game Features

In short:

What we never got

• Planet-wide open world with multiple continents
• Long-lasting global campaigns
• From huge climatic battles to swift skirmishes over territory, supplies, etc.
• actual campaign goals set by a player-controlled War Council
• Tyranids as NPC balance mechanism (e.g. attacking the faction with most territory and/or most abundant in resources)
• Huge array of vehicles and weapons
• Players and Guilds getting their own space ship as HQ, with visual customization.
• Day/Night cycle
• Weather, which would had an impact on combat
• Dreadnoughts, Terminators and faction equivalents
• The opportunity to get a massive game that reflects the large-scale epicness of the 40k universe.

What we ended up with

• PVP oriented with splashes of PVE
• Combat is visceral, skill-based, over-the-shoulder dakka/melee, basically an expanded copycat of Space Marine multiplayer.
• Predators, Vindicators and Rhinos for both marines, Trukks and Kill Burstas for Orks, and Wave Serpents, Falcons, and Warp Hunters for eldar. Land Raiders and equivalents where planned but ultimately scrapped.
• Five preset classes (seven for Eldar) and five slots for custom classes, plus one slot for a veteran class. Each class has 1000 points to spend on weapons, equipment, and upgrades.
• Limited and expensive visual customization.
• Extremely scarce variety of weapons and upgrades
• Friendly fire (which leads to a frenzy of teamkilling, specially the typical newbie with the plasma cannon)
• Bleed-out/Revive system, with the option to bleed faster (nominally for avoiding executions, but mostly for respawning faster)
• Executions, which give bonus XP when performed and prevent a downed enemy from being revived, but leave the player vulnerable during the execution animation.
• Cover system with crouching and vaulting.
• Classes that use jump-packs can wall jump.
• Playable Elite and Hero characters, with a few minutes to a day's worth of cool down.
• Veterans, with extra 400 loadout points and veteran-specific aesthetic options, at the expense of being able to deploy it only once per match.
• Supply drops for weapons, gear, mods, etc.
• Mediocre performance optimization, with FPS drops even on a behemoth rig
• Regular matches never go beyond 40 players.
• No more new content from July 2017 onwards

See also

• Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine
• Warhammer 40,000: Dark Millenium, which was canceled then un-canceled then turned into Eternal Crusade

Links

• Warhammer 40,000: Eternal Crusade
• Meet the Team Video Notice how the opening looks strangely familiar.
• An interview with the developers, lots of information.
• Official Forum
• Meet the Team 2 This video shows some very early game footage.
• Full Pre-Alpha Footage Gameplay
• Wars of Arkhona Official Trailer

Gallery

• 

  "We go where we wilt, we slay who we wilt. Let the Emperor judge the righteousness of our deeds!"

• 

  "In the name of the Dark Gods, we will bring down the rotting edifice that is the Imperium!"

• 

  "I reckon these humies are just puny soft gits who need a good stompin!"

• 

  "How foolish they seem to our eyes. Once, all this was ours, and it will come back to us!"

• 

  Where Ultramarines: The Movie had bolters that looked too big, this promotional artwork of the Tyranid reveal has bolters that look too small.