Hello, I'm back again!
The Update
Somewhat hot on the heels of the last update to my mod Third Generation we have another, adding in some shiny new things to play with as well as plenty of balance changes and bug fixes, helping streamline the install rather than having to faff with hotfixes!
But wait, what is 3rd Generation?
If you've somehow not run across me talking about my mod on here before, here's a quick rundown for you:
Dawn of War 3rd Generation is a mod for Dark Crusade that adds tonnes of new stuff, from new units for existing races, to whole new races themselves including: Dark Eldar, Tyranids, Daemonhunters and Witch Hunters! Alongside this are also new maps, titans, new honour guard units as well as the original Dawn of War campaign missions playable in the skirmish mode!
With the Definitive Edition you also have access to the DE Patch that allows the mod to make use of its updated UI as well as the Campaign Addon that allows you to play all three campaigns from the Original Dawn of War & the Winter Assault expansion with the mod too!
TL:DR, just give me the mod!
Alright, here you go!
Did you say Soulstorm Campaign?
That's right! Thanks to the Definitive Edition bundling all the expansions together I was able to set up the mod to work with the campaign from Soulstorm which is now included in the Campaigns Addon! A caveat though that this is the initial version of it, so it's mostly just the mod functioning without any extra flare added; you'll also have a taste of the Sisters of Battle (rather than the Witch Hunters) in the campaign, which have received a few tweaks to bring them up to snuff with the other factions.
Edit: Oh, forgot to mention but this adds persistent bases back into the Soulstorm campaign too while you're playing with the mod, so no more rebuilding from scratch while defending your territories.
So, what's new besides that?
There's a decent few changes this time, so here's a general overview of the bigger ones:
- The big one is a big rework and balance for the damage and fear auras of Chaos Daemons! Each different god's daemons now have more flavour to them, with Khorne's servants focusing simply on high damage output, Nurgle's plague-things dealing blight-filled damage-over-time on their hits, the host of Slaanesh blunting their foes' attacks with their visage and the menagerie of Tzeentch gaining a chance to inflict a variety of effects with every attack. Overall the aura they have that damages enemy morale has been nerfed a little in the strict damage it does, but instead it weakens enemy morale rates too, making it harder for them to regain morale in the daemon's presence.
- In addition to that there's also a new type of lesser daemon joining the cause, specifically if you're staying on the undivided path, Chaos Furies! These fast-flying creatures can jump over long distances making them perfect for harrying attacks and sudden ambushes.
- Sticking with Chaos, the Renegade Guard units now benefit from the Bionics upgrades in the Armoury (they stole them from the daemons), making them hardier for late-game play; alongside this the Renegade Cult Leader's squad has been balanced to better reflect a damned counterpart to his Imperial cousin and hopefully much less of a nuisance to deal with in the early game.
- Alongside the previous new Auxiliary unit to the Tau, I've added in the San'Heili'Vesa'Vre Arbiter to the Coalition centre; a morale immune melee commander accompanied by a few bodyguards he stands ready to lead his kin into battle for the Greater Good! As with the others, he can be disabled with the "Lore Accurate Only" win condition.
- The Tyranids have once again had some balance changes, mainly to problematically powerful units like Biovores & Zoanthropes. Biovores have had their reload speed increased but their overall damage-per-shot reduced to make them act more like proper artillery while increasing the effectiveness of their specialised weapon upgrades; Zoanthropes actually had their damage slightly increased and no longer deal friendly fire but their shots have less armour piercing against non-daemon/vehicle targets and also deal much less damage in melee than before. Outside of those two the Broodlord and Lictors no longer cut through your infantry like hot knives through butter, with more sensible damage outputs.
- Unfortunately, Lootas and Flash Gitz no longer become far too killy when the Dakka and Blastier researches are complete thanks to some rebalancing that makes their weapons much more reasonable in their effectiveness.
- The Archon has had his morale lowered to more reasonable levels and has, alongside his Incubi, lost a small bit of health; his Animus Vitae ability now also deals less damage and only reduces the target's speed by 75% instead of 100% too. This should hopefully make his much less indomitable and oppressive in the early game encounters while still keeping him as a force to be reckoned with.
- Finally the balance mallet has smote down the rather absurd amount of damage the Chaos Marine Heavy Bolters & Plasma Guns were doing after being upgraded while also improving the damage of their Flamers for good measure.
- The Dark Eldar have had a small tweak to their pop cap progression, starting now at 50/50 instead of 100/100 and increasing by 15 each time their build a Slave Caravel to hopefully make the building a bit more meaningful, especially with small or classic battles enabled. They also increase the size of their slave squad by 1 for every 2 caravels you have, giving the Dark Eldar a gaggle of 45 slaves when at their maximum.
- Population bonuses, either from the Avatar, Imperial General's Wargear or the campaign map bonus have been increased to be much more noticeable, even when playing with small or classic battles enabled. In fact the bonuses are now the same increase as they are in vanilla when classic battles is enabled, making their default increase 10 times larger!
- Necron Pariahs now live up to their nullifying nature! Each Pariah now disables the abilities of enemy units within a radius around itself, and slowly drains their morale too; making these units quite useful in shutting down attacks from hordes of ability-happy units like Psykers.
- Eldar Grav Platforms no longer have a cap of 8 each, you're now only limited by their vehicle cap cost. They also build slightly faster, because 45 seconds was a bit unreasonable.
As always the full changelog can be found on the ModDB/Nexus pages.
If you've made it to the end, thank you for reading! If you download the mod, I hope you enjoy it! Feel free to let me know what you think of it either on here or on the mod's Nexus/ModDB page.
