Battlefleet Gothic: Armada II
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Battlefleet Gothic: Armada II is the sequel to Battlefleet Gothic Armada and is the first 40k game to be set during the Gathering Storm, an event in which Geedubs finally decided to advance the storyline of 40k in a mostly positive way (to the shock of everyone).
The game will again be developed by Tindalos Studios and published by Focus Home Interactive, and will be released in early 2019. It looks like a decent game compared to Dawn of War of the Third.
Setting
As mentioned above, the game is set during the Gathering Storm event. To summarize: The armless crybaby known as Abaddon the Despoiler launched his 13th Black Crusade which ended with him rage quitting and dropping a Blackstone Fortress upon the planet of Cadia, destroying the planet (though it broke before the guard did) and it's pylons resulting in a chain reaction of warp-storms that created the Great Rift and divided the galaxy in half. It was also on a Monday which makes it double Heresy.
During this time, Ynnead awakened (thanks to the machinations of a certain Dick) and chose the craftworlder-turned-corsair-turned-wych Yvraine as its emissary. Yvraine saved the survivors from Cadia's destruction and traveled to the Ultramarine's homeworld of Macragge where they woke up Roboute Guilliman from his ten millennia long coma.
With more factions likely being made available after release, existing factions are having their ship rosters expanded tremendously, including the addition of various super-ships like the Phalanx, Macragge's Honour, Vengeful Spirit, and the like. Which is nice since it's easy to see what all these damn vessels and weapons look like in motion instead of using our imaginations or viewing smudged over concept art.
Plot
The game has three campaigns at launch: the Imperium, the Tyranids and the Necrons. The voice acting and plot actually look like more than five minutes were spent on them (sorry glares at Dawn of War III). Which is nice since Nids and Neckrons usually get the short end of the stick when it comes to being shown in space battles. Said battles also look really, really good.
Prologue/Tutorial
It has been confirmed that the Fall of Cadia will be the games Prologue/Tutorial. You get to command the Phalanx, so that's awesome. Also a Navy Captain gets blammed so Naval Commissars may not be as incompetent as we previously thought as evidence shows. You get to see CREED, which is great.
Imperial Campaign
Players will again take control of Admiral Spire from the first game. Spire returns from warp travel, but due to the timey-wimy effects of the Warp, he discovers he has been transported several centuries after the Gothic War. He's now tasked with retaking the ruins of Cadia and safeguarding Imperial worlds from the Forces of Chaos and marauding Xenos. Many "special guest appearances" by current characters such as Rowboat and CREED are expected.
Necron Campaign
Players will take control of of a Necron character named "Amarkun the Gatherer", who awakens after several millennia of slumber and is ordered to reawaken the nearby tomb worlds. Amarkun will come into conflict with several factions and eventually come across Trazyn the Infinite.
Tyranid Campaign
Just eat the whole galaxy. By this point you should know the drill.
Gameplay
Aside from some balance changes, gameplay will feel extremely similar to BFGA 1. The new factions will of course be a new experience, as with some new additions gameplay wise. Titan-class ships are playable in campaign and will be available in multiplayer sometime.
Factions and Tactics
So far, the developers have confirmed all the factions from the original are making a comeback, but also Tyranid hive fleets, Necron fleets, dark Eldar, Mechanicum forge fleets and others are coming too. The following subfactions are based on the most famous and powerful elements of the main factions. For example, the AdMech subfactions are based on forge worlds while the Space Marine subfactions are based on the 1st Founding Legions. Gameplay is still a mix of direct and indirect attacks and abilities from your various warships, with proper positioning, upgrading, resource management being key to victory.
The well rounded jack-of-all-trades fleet. They have a nice selection of cruisers and battle cruisers which allow for tons different combos, although they are usually better in brawls, with the Overlord Battle Cruiser and the Tyrant Cruiser having the benefit of the plasma macro-cannon batteries. On the other hand, if you feel like you want a challenge or are finding Ork and SM and Tyranid ships hard to deal with you can go for Gothic and Dictator cruisers and Mars Battlecruisers, as their respective lances and ordinance bays allow you to stay relatively out of danger.
Gothic: Known from the first game for kicking Chaos ass in space and stopping the armless failure we all know and love.
Solar: A proud and storied fleet that is also Terra’s last line of defense.
Armageddon: A fleet in the Armageddon system that’s rather good at Ork killing.
Bakka: A fleet known for the first Tyrannic War and the Battle for Macragge. Admiral Rath of the Dominus Astra is a fine addition to this fleet’s badass history.
Bastion: The biggest permanently stationed fleet after Battlefleet Solar, thanks to their recruitment from multiple sectors. Will definitely need those numbers since they’re tasked with patrolling the newly expanded Eye of Terror.
Koronus: Busy keeping out the worst the Halo Stars have to offer. Operates between Port Wander and Drusus Marches.
Fleets of Chaos
Your typical spiky Space Marines. Ships aren't as tough as their Imperial counterparts but are faster, have longer range, and more powerful lances. Standard tactics basically involve playing keep-away with every single faction. Bombers/carrier spam in general are great for dealing extensive damage, and against dedicated close combat factions such as the Orks and the Eldar refractor fields are life-savers. Ideally you want to hit enemy ships from outside their sensor range, this can be tricky as you will need to get the enemy ships revealed, a work your escorts can do decently.
Alpha Legion
Lost and the Damned
World Eaters
Emperor’s Children
Thousand Sons - did nothing wrong.
Iron Warriors
Death Guard
Red Corsairs
Night Lords
Word Bearers
Black Legion - do you like killing whole squadrons with one broadside? Love cutscene power to the max? Well,you've got the Vengeful Spirit on your side and she's ready to strut.
Space Marines
Salamanders:
Ultramarines - you know them, you love to...Well, up to you. Either way, you get a Gloriana class Battleship ready to broadside the shit out of anything nearby. Have fun.
White Scars
Iron Hands
Dark Angels
Imperial Fists - good news, you get the Phalanx and by Jesus does it wreck shit for Chaos. You can tank ramming a Blackstone Fortress to death and look cooler on the other side. Bad news ; you don't get to use it after. Boo
Blood Angels
Space Wolves
Raven Guard
Craftworld Aeldari
Ynnari: Lots of Eldar seem to love this guy. Can't imagine why... (hint: life is a lot more interesting under his lead) This movement however is currently underground thanks to distrust and fear by more traditional Eldar.
Alaitoc: Is always fighting the Necrons. They were the only ones among the Eldar who knew they'd come back (every faction's gotta have ignorance in some fashion it seems).
Biel-Tan: Militaristic and as Xenophobic and arrogant as the Imperium, despite being almost as badly fucked up as Iyanden due to recent events. Highly territorial of Maiden Worlds, willing to RIP AND TEAR any invaders of such worlds. One could wonder how they and the Imperium have so much in common
Lyanden: Used to be populous, but is now full of dead Eldar in Wraithbone constructs. The dead souls have extra huge balls (a trait unusual amongst the rest of their kin) by risking the damnation of their souls to defend their Craftworld.
Saim-Hann: Is willing to follow the Eldar path with "flexibility", and is considered the more wild and dangerous of their fellow Craftworlds. They're very forthright and borderline reckless in war.
Ulthwé: Famous for its Seers and endless war against whatever the Eye of Terror feels like shitting out. Formerly led by one of the biggest dicks of them all: Eldrad Ulthran. Currently looking for the best timeline to strive towards.
Os'Tara: Home! I'll go home. And I'll think of some way to get Ynnead back. After all, tomorrow is another day. Big worshippers of Ynnead. Has strong ties with the Ynnari and Yvraine.
Aeldari Corsairs
Sky Raiders: Notoriously vicious attackers mistaken for Dark Eldar. Are Bro-Tier enough to assist Eldar Craftworlds.
Eldritch Raiders: They follow Prince Yriel. Abandoned Craftworld Iyanden and harassed Imperial shipping for decades, but shrugged off this streak of dickishness to save their former Craftworld from being nommed by Tyranids.
Steeleye Reavers: Originated from Craftworld Ulthwe. Nothing else is known about them.
Sun Blitz: Believed to be aligned with Craftworld Alaitoc by the Ordo Xenos, but are also bitter rivals with other corsair fleets. The cause of such a rivalry is unknown.
Twilight Sword: Love being pirates, and are supposedly honorable in battle (if this doesn’t put them at a disadvantage).
Void Dragon: A big and aggressive pirate fleet that operates across the galaxy. Infamous for being unpredictable and having enough balls to engage significantly stronger foes (unlike their other knife-eared pansy brothers and sisters)
Ynnari: Worshippers of Ynnead because it will supposedly free them from the strict lifestyle the Eldar force themselves to follow after the Fall of the Eldar. Can’t blame them for it either, not many people want to be celibate and boring for the rest of their lives (and Eldar have VERY VERY long lifespans...)
Drukhari Pirate Fleets
Everyone's favorite emo-elves are back as one of the new factions for BGA2. Essentially their fleet can be described as the most glass-cannoney of the glass cannons. They share the same speed and powerful weaponry as their Craftworld cousins, but they have WAAAY better boarding/crew abilities and stealth at the expense of even worse armour and defenses (they don't have holofields or shields). Overall the Elder from BGAI with a dose of even moar micro.
Also, dark matter cannons with no wind-up, huge AOE, slows 50%, and eats through shields. Use it whenever possible to kite. Be extremely cautious around Tau; they can easily ping you, have lots of fighters to deploy, and then spam guided torps on the fighter-marked target. If you stealth gets knocked out you're essentially boned as DElder ships melt under coordinated fire. Don't let yourself get caught or you are done.
Black Heart: Biggest and strongest Cabal in Commoragh. Encourages strife between the smaller Cabals.
Broken Sigil: Loves confusion and anarchy. Terrorizes countless worlds because they can. Seen as predictable by their peers, and hated for it.
Dying Sun: Hates anything non-traditional or steeped in it. Can destroy stars. Its leader is obsessed with the metaphor of despair that destroying light can bring.
Flayed Skull: Closest to rivaling the Black Heart. Its Archon Lord Vraesque attracts the most ambitious pilots and therefore makes their fleet quite skilled.
Iron Thorn: A force to be reckoned with even after Vect's rise to power. Pride themselves on being "True Blood".
Last Hatred: Want to transcend death itself. To do this, they need many experimental subjects, who they get from undefended areas.
The Severed: Completely space-bound after a failed coup. Collect severed hands to pledge allegiance to their Archon, who's also missing a hand.
Ork Clanz
Goffs - Do you like hitting things with a massive rubbish pile and walking away just fine? go for these guys
Evil Suns - RED MAKES IT GO FASTA
Bad Moons - the 1% of ork kultur
Freebootas - YAR HAR FIDDLE DE DE Being a pirate is alright to be do what you want cause a pirate is free you are a pirate!
Blood Axes -
Deathskulls - if the ultramarine's were orks
Necron Fleets
In one of the most particularly hilarious/infuriating twists from Tindalos, the Necrons are NO LONGER SUPER OVERPOWERED NOW! Also, they're the slowest ships in the game by a huge margin and have some of the weakest, slow-firing weapons too. They also don't have shields, which leaves them really open to ordinance skills and critical hits more than any other fleet, with intense fighter management needed to prevent boarding spam.
THAT SAID... there are ways to make them work to a degree.
Doomscythes are mediocre fighters, and mediocre bombers, but they are both. Tell them to circle around your ships and use your defensive turrets to back them up, or send them after escorts and damaged ships. While one stack won't do much, 4 of them around one ship can actually remove that ship on their own. 3-4 on one escort will actually kill an escort without needing backup, and defend themselves doing it. Finally, they also act as probes. Send them to an area and you can actually see their detection radius. All line ships have them, so basically all line ships have a built in canoptek probe.
You can fix light crits naturally, not heavy crits. The AI tend to focus on one ship at a time, as do players. If your ship starts getting damaged systems, warp out into a gas cloud and cut engines. This will also massively increase your regen if you have the nebula regen ability, and the not-moving regen upgrade. Turn on hull cauterization to regen back up in mere seconds while recouping light critical damage. Come out of the gas cloud as if they'd not hit you at all.
Should go without saying but only warp offensively if you have a plan. Most Necron abilities are better used defensively. Starpulse can knock out fighters, torpedoes, bombers, assault boats, anything small. Double tap alt so that you can see when fighters are in range. Stagger it out so that between your ships you always have at least one Starpulse available to wreck their fighters. The dispersed lightning arc has great utility. You need hit only three ships with it for it to be more effective than reload stance. But your ships default to 13500 range, not the 9000 needed to make use of it. Always set your engagement distance. When your lightning arcs are upgraded to drop armor by 25, set your engagement range to the required 4500. Also, the pull ability for lightning arcs can keep opposing ships in range for the armor pen effect. Combine all three of the above for comical effectiveness against fleets that are desperate to fight at a distance or hide, like any of the three Eldar. Never underestimated Transdimensional Bolt. It has unlimited uses, it has an extremely fast Cooldown, you can aim it to hit the enemies whole fleet if lined up properly, and it does as much damage as a starpulse wave while ignoring armor and shields. It's a god send early game, able to wipe out the escorts and LC you fight against. It's also the best 2v2 ability. IT CAN HURT YOU AND YOUR ALLY, aim carefully. Scarab Swarm nets you the largest overall benefit to any of the Necron abilities, with the catch being that it's pretty easy to see coming. The game hands you Mass Recall+Scarab Swarm at the beginning though, so that ones easy. You really want to put out hurt though, warp into the center of an enemy fleet, mass recall, and then scarab swarm. Combine with all on dispersed lightning arc and the lightning arc upgrades. Kill everything they fielded that isn't bigger than a Cruiser while regenerating your own fleet.
Don't forget that Necrons actually do not suck at boarding. Even before upgrading it they have pretty decent troop efficiency. They also have two leader upgrades that make it stronger and cause fires, and four upgrades to make it stronger in your tech. Their boarding abilities can hit a ship from across the map, light that ship on fire, and kill their engines all in one go. Use it.
Warp always points your ship in the direction needed to get to that point. Necrons don't rotate quickly so always take facing into account. That being said, you can use it to straight up run down a smaller ship without any chance of a reaction.
Avoid asteroid fields like the plague unless you have a leader cutting out their damage. Yea you'll regen through the damage just fine. Every second spent in there is another hull point you'll never regen again. Stay away.
T'au Merchant and Protector Fleets
Adeptus Mechanicus Fleets
Agripinaa: A world near the Cadian Gate that suffered many raids. Luckily for them, they gave as good as they get.
Graia: A mobile forge world capable of warp travel. Its Battlefleet was made to escort this FUCKHUEG spaceship/forge world.
Lucius: Your run of the mill forge world known for supplying shit to many other battle groups. Has an artificial sun in its planetary core, which is why it’s so powerful.
Mars: The home of the AdMech and the forge world we all know and love. As such it’s the greatest and most advanced of all the forge worlds. Has a rich history and dark secrets under the surface.
Metalica: Not so subtly named after the famous metal band, this forge world has no life at all but a shitload of natural resources. Has been able to produce shit for many campaigns, including the one on Armageddon.
Ryza: Many Ork WAAAGHS! seem to have a fetish for this forge world. Is known for its great plasma weaponry and the genesis of the Stormblade tank. The dark days of the 41st Milennium will make this forge world and its stores and abilities especially valuable.
Stygies VIII: A forge world that would’ve fell to Horus if not for the Eldar. The High Lords are worried this new bond will lead to Xeno corruption and HERESY, even though this is a stupid line of logic since that would make the Tallarn Desert Raiders regiment questionable as well.
Tyranid Hive Fleets
Kraken: As typical of any Tyranid Fleet lucky enough to get away, they adapted and learned from their mistakes. This trait (along with many others) almost led them to omnom Craftworld Iyanden.
Leviathan: Out of all the fuckhueg Tyranid Fleets, this one is the most ECKSBAWKS HUEG of them all. Currently one of the galaxy’s biggest threats.
Ouroboris: Origins unknown, and Imperial records suggest sightings of this fleet alongside Chaos incursions (although unconfirmed). Is also rumored to have arrived at the Cadian Gate as early (or earlier) than M36.
Tiamet: One of the earliest “Forgotten Fleets” (fleets suppressed or misanalyzed thanks to the Imperial bureaucracy we all know and love). Is harder to kill than a roach infestation, and survived their original worlds being fusion-bombed.
Hydra: Awakened thanks to the pointy-eared emo faggots. More Om-Nom-Nommy than your average Tyranid Fleet, because they breed like rabbits (relatively speaking in Tyranid terms, anyway.) For some reason, they team-kill and om-nom older Tyranid fleets.
Gorgon: A Hive Fleet so adaptive it made the Tau and Imperium do a temporary alliance (which lasted a predictably short time, I might add).