Comments - IceMaverick13

Heyo Sgt. So, I recently moved computers and didn't think to bring my UT2k4 mod files over with me but I distinctly remember having the prototype weapons for your Ballistic Weapons mod pack. However, I can't seem to find it anywhere anymore. You wouldn't happen to still have a copy of them floating around would you? Some of my favorite weapons were in the prototype packs.

Hey Boothy, quick question for you. Just played Tau since you changed the Riptide's model to the new one. I only really played the one round against a race I don't usually match against but the Riptide suit got absolutely trashed. Did you rebalance it in someway? I was using it as a front-line tank as I usually do but it took a little small arms fire from some Grey Knight Strike Squads and just absolutely melted.
I also noticed that the build time seems shorter than it used to be. Was this just a little confirmation bias from seeing it get demolished or did you make it a lot squishier than initial Riptide release?

I found out that it does work, seemingly fine. Though I'd like you to confirm and make sure that's the intention. The internet where I'm staying currently is pretty slow so the large downloads would be killer.

I have a Bug Report as well and I'm not sure where to submit it, so I'll just leave it here: for the Chaos Daemons faction, the Herald of Khorne does not seem to be gaining his ability upgrades properly (e.g. Doombolt, Chains of Torment, etc.) Researching them does not add the corresponding ability to him, or any other unit for that matter. I can confirm that the upgrades work properly for Nuurgle and Tzeentch, but I haven't tested Slannesh.

Hey Boothy, I'm finally back from Korea so I can actually play Codex again and it seems you've pushed a new update. From reading the descriptions of the files, it seems like I don't have to redownload parts 1-3 for the 3.6>3.7 update. Is that correct? Do they use the same Base Files?

Well I'm glad it's being update a bit :P I'd love to write up the descriptions and everything for the tooltips but I don't actually know the intended item's functions and stuff anything :P I just make certain items or upgrades because it's a nice change of pace :P

No problem man. Even though they're a race I play little, since development has started back up, I'm trying to play as often as possible in as many situations as possible to try and really get a feel for things and I'm trying to create as much feedback as possible because I simply ADORE this mod. It's everything I ever wanted from DOW.

In the current state, I would suggest either a cost reduction for those early units (So that money can be put towards teching upwards faster to get into the viable part of the matchup) Or making those early units a bit stronger.
If the early units are stronger, then I suggest the later units getting a little weaker, because Daemons already crush enemies once they have all of their Tier 3 units on the field. Tier 3 units AND stronger underlings? That'd be insane.

I second this. This is something I suggested a long time ago, but development had ceased then. Simply filling in missing Tooltips would help a lot. Especially for Weapon Upgrades and such for several units (i.e. Devastator Marines, Lascannons, Plasma Cannons, etc. Differences, best effectiveness, etc.) Just simply missing in all of the missing tooltips would go a long way. I know it's low priority, but it's a good quality of life improvement.

The situation is entirely different in a 1v1 situation. 1-3 squads of Tac Marines (Or Fire Warriors) can safely contain a Daemon player and have them fighting for their lives the entire time. Since they can't move out because of the containment, they have to build in the base, but since we're containing/attacking them, they have to build units to repel the attack. Since they're building units, they can't build anything else due to unit costs. I can now safely take over the entire map with Scouts and not worry about the Daemon player being any kind of threat.

I suffer from the same issue when playing as Daemons,the AI simply perches outside my base with 2-3 of any basic Infantry squad and no amount of Daemons will kill them off, and they're too expensive to produce in large numbers, considering how slow income is.

When I play as the Grey Knights, I question if the standard Grey Knight Strike Team gets a bonus against Daemons. I can use 1-2 Strike Teams to completely wipe out a Daemon player in the early game, with little to no trouble. The Psi powers do huge physical and morale damage to Daemon squads, and shooting parting shots at them as they retreat often cuts down half of the squad. The Daemons stand no chance at all if I play Grey Knights.

Let me start by saying that I main Space Marines and Tau, in that order. I've recently started picking up Grey Knights as another Main since they aren't so different from the SM. I generally play on Harder (or whatever 1 below Insane is) for bot matches.

In a free-for-all situation, where attention is divided, I find that the Daemons utterly destroy enemies, simply because they can safely tech to Tier 3 without fear of much retribution because the other races are concerned with map control. I've had armies consisting of Warhound Titans, Dreadnoughts, and 4-5 Tac Marine squads get cut to ribbons by Daemons once they reach Tier 3 with barely a scratch on them. Their Great Daemons and Daemon Prince have huge amounts of health and damage that fielding the Tier 3 Commander, Tier 3 Daemon, and Tier 3 Vehicle is enough to compose the entire army to successfully kill off another race.

Do you have "Enable Allies" checked as a win condition?

Alrighty, I will do. My Tau knowledge has faded in the last few years. I did huge amounts of research on them this time a year or so ago, in hopes of having something to contribute knowledge wise to Tau development in this mod, but I seem to have forgotten much of it. If I re-research things that may prove interesting, I will be sure to let you know.

On a separate note, I feel like the Chaos Daemons faction feels a little impotent. Perhaps I'm simply terrible at playing them, but it feels incredibly difficult to do any kind of early game work. It feels like mid-game pushes are much weaker than other races and that they rely exclusively on holding the enemy at arm's length until Daemon Princes and their Greater Daemon can be pushed out onto the field. I think this is mostly fueled by the fact that I feel resource starved at nearly all points even if I throw down as many generators as possible.
It may not be an issue with the race themselves but perhaps with my playing. Any advice on how to properly play Chaos Daemons? Anything I should use a lot of? Anything I should hold off on? Any large priorities beyond rushing for Tier 3?

I appreciate taking the time to read through that huge wall of text. A lot of it needs thought into where it goes on the tier list, because balance is always the hardest part of introducing new things :P
Indeed, perhaps breaking the Tau down into their respective Clans? Though I'm unsure if we could find, or create enough differences in those groups to make them into truly unique factions like the other Races have.
Oh a new stand-alone Kroot codex? I hadn't actually heard anything about that (Probably because I'm not overly fond of the Kroot, though I understand why they need to be apart of the Greater Good).
Well there are physical tabletop pieces and rules (Made by Forge World) that can be used for reference for making the 3D models if that is what your main concern is? The only unit who doesn't have a tabletop piece made would be the Darkfire Assassin Squad but they use XV25 suits which are already in game. The only remodeling for that unit would be making a Pulse Sniper Rifle that fits their mesh well.

XV109 Y'vahra Battlesuit - Mont'Ka Post: The XV109 is another, newer variant of the XV104 Riptide. This suit was created with mobility in mind. Equipped with a jetpack and superior walker servos, this unit was designed to close distances quickly and engage at close-range. In addition to it's speed, it's equipped with a heavy, triple barreled plasma flamer for saturating infantry with walls of fire and an Ion Discharge Cannon designed to pepper vehicles with Ion strikes and EMP blasts to disable and destroy them, allowing the XV109 to deal with both soft infantry and armored vehicles. Like the XV107, the XV109 would share the hard cap of 1 with the XV104 Riptide. And considering the XV107's tie to the Kauyon teachings, I thought to tie this rapid-strike, high mobility suit to the Mont'Ka teachings. As such, it is unlocked after researching Teachings of Mont'Ka, making it exclusive to that side. As this is bleeding edge Tau technology, the Farsight Enclaves would likely not have access to this suit.

Apologies for the MASSIVE wall of text, but I felt like a bit of description on each would be helpful on deciding without deep research if it was something you'd be interested in doing if you weren't familiar with the unit already. Really sorry for filling up the board like this :/

With the few changes to Farsight that are on my mind currently (and there's more that could be dug up from the appropriate fluff) I'll move on to the things that all Tau players are dreaming of: Riptide Variants.

XV-104 Riptide: Though already present in the game, I feel like (esepcially if my other considerations are taken into account, especially with the addition of other Riptide variants) this unit will need to be moved off of the Vehicle Beacon. The Riptide requires at least that the Mont'Ka Post or Kauyon Post be constructed so perhaps that would make a good spot to move the unit to, since the Command Card on those buildings only has the 1 upgrade taking up space.

XV-107 R'Varna - Kauyon Post: The height of all Tau Battlesuit technology. This suit is armed with twin Pulse Submunition Cannons, which, from descriptions, seems to operate much like a giant Plasma Shotgun loaded with explosive rounds designed to saturate large areas with micro-explosions that tear apart infantry lines and absolutely demolish larger armored targets. Armed with these weapons (and the lacking of jumpjets), the suit was designed to provide fire support from long ranges instead of closing in on the target. The design of this to be a less-mobile long-range weapons platform makes me want to place this into the Kauyon Doctrine as it's poor mobility makes it better suited for bringing the enemy to the suit instead of advancing on the enemy. This suit would be far more armored and far more damaging than the XV104 Riptide, though it trades mobility for that and forgoes it's jetpack as well as a portion of it's mobility. Compared to the XV104, I would suggest a much slower move speed, longer range, increased damage, and increased health. This unit would likely share the 1 unit limit with the Riptide suit and would only be available after researching Teachings of Kauyon, making it exclusive to that side. Due to how recent of a design it is, Farsight would likely not have access to this suit.

XV8 Crisis Suits: Commander Farsight's primary method of warfare is not to rely heavily on vehicles or even infantry deployments. His main strength lies in his use of his Battlesuits. The standard Tau forces have a hard limit of 3 on XV8 Suits. For the Farsight Enclaves I would propose the limit be unlocked or, at the very least, raised, to reflect Farsight's gratuitous use of the suits as his primary forces. In the same vein, if other common Battlesuits have limitations on them that I can't recall at this moment, I propose the cap on those be increased as well to allow this Tau faction to feel really unique in it's heavy reliance on Battlesuits over Vehicles. To help encourage this, perhaps some of the heavier vehicle variants could be prohibited to Farsight in exchange for greater quantities of XV8 Crisis suits.

XV9 Hazard Suit - Fire Caste Barracks: Quite a recent addition to the Tau armory, they're very expensive to make and given only to the most skilled of XV8 Crisis pilots. This unit I would propose being added for both Farsight and Orthodox Tau. It was originally crafted by Orthodox Earth caste members, but it was reported that several of the suits were "diverted" into Farsight space. The suits are armed generally armed with heavier weaponry to destroy armor. I would suggest starting with the XV8 as a template: same starting weapons, jumpjets, the works. I would then make the suit more durable and instead of allowing upgrades to Flamers or Missile pods, allow upgrades to Phased Ion Blaster (similar in role to a Lascannon) or the Fusion Cascade (rapid fire, similar in role to Melta weapons). I would propose the unit be made quite durable with a limit of 1, or only slightly more durable and share the limit with the XV8 suit for balance purposes.

The Eight - Coalition Center: Seeing as the Farsight Enclave lacks Ethereals, they will need a suitable substitute for a high-level Command Unit. I propose that unit be a Command Squad formed of Farsight's Seven other Commanders. The group contains an XV104 Riptide, an XV88 Broadside Suit, and 5 XV8 Crisis Suits (Several of which are heavily modified.) The cost of this group would be much higher (of course) than an Ethereal. The Squad would simply deploy the XV104 Riptide first, and then each subsequent member of The Eight would be deployed as a Reinforcement to that squad.

Kroot: Seeing as the Farsight Enclaves are cut off from the rest of Tau Space, Kroot warriors would be hard to come by in large quantities. It wouldn't make very much thematic sense to allow Farsight to have access to the various forms of Kroot, especially the more advanced forms as well as large numbers of them.

Farsight Warriors - Fire Caste Barracks: Farsight's Fire Warriors are unique from the standard Fire Warrior in one way. They lack the crippling weakness at melee range. Buffing the Fire Warriors' melee abilities or otherwise making them more effective at close combat fits them thematically and help alleviate the issue brought about by the lacking of Kroot soldiers. These units would either be a change to, or a replacement of the default Fire Warrior.

Cadre Fireblade - Barracks or Coalition Center: The Fireblade is a Commander unit. One thing I've noticed about the current Tau army in the mod is that they're one of the few races that is lacking in Commander units. The Fireblade would be a nice secondary Commander to help flesh that out a bit. Normally Fireblades come with their own personal Markerlights and act on the field as a Captain of sorts for Fire Warriors, having attained the same rank as Battlesuit operators, but choosing to remain infantry instead. The Fireblade also usually comes with Drones, in the form of either Marker, Shield, or Gun drones. Im not sure if you'd take the "individual unit" Commander approach like the current Tau Commander, or if you'd make it like say, the SM Commander who attaches to squads. If it's an attacher, the drones may be weird to do, but if it's a solo unit, I would recommend allowing him to reinforce with various drones. If he's an attached Commander, I would suggest some form of passive aura that buffs fire rate on nearby squads as more shots is one of his primary abilities.

Now that I've touched on some general expanding, I wish to dive into ideas for the Farsight Enclaves.

Commander Farsight - Fire Cadre Barracks: Commander Farsight would replace the Tau Commander unit. He is an XV8 Crisis Suit that also has a sword melee weapon. Beyond stat modifications and the addition of the potent melee weapon, the only changes between the Tau Commander and Farsight would likely be the removal of the Snare ability and the removal of the XV22 Weapon Upgrades, but the addition of the Crisis Jumpjets, Crisis Weapon Upgrade + Shield system. Farsight can keep the heavy aimed shot ability.

DX-6 Remora Drones - Vehicle Beacon: In the same vein of fleshing out Kauyon, what good would a carefully laid ambush do if the enemy simply rolls in with heavy armor? The Remora drones are low durability drones capable of carrying missile systems in addition to being a cloaked unit. I would have them function like the current Drone Squad unit, but instead arm them with heavier weaponry only effective against vehicles, and of course cloaking. Per rules, Farsight Enclaves would not have access to these.

Darkfire Assassin Squad - Fire Cadre Barracks: This one here really pads out the Kauyon ideals of ambushes and stealth... The only issue is that this is simply a popular Homebrew unit and not officially in any Tau Codex, so it may violate the ideals of the mod itself, so take this with that in mind. The Darkfire squad is a team of higher ranked Stealthsuit units that use modified XV25 Battlesuits. Darkfire units are Snipers in full. They wield modified Pulse Rifles meant for high damage over long distances and since the Darkfires are cloaked, makes them perfect for setting up in a position to pick off enemies being lured back. I would equate these units to Space Marine Scout-Snipers in that they operate in a squad to pick off groups of soft targets at range and I would implement them as such. As with the others, I would gate this unit behind the Teachings of Kauyon and it would make a nice Barracks mirror to the Mont'Ka XV8 Crisis Team.

Apologies for the huge delay in replying. I only check this page every few weeks for updates.
I realized I spoke a little hastily in this because I didn't check as thoroughly in the Tau race for new units and I found the new Riptide suit (and am relatively pleased with it, besides the walking animation not matching the move speed :P) but there's still plenty to be had. You asked and I shall try to give enough fluff mixed with some more concrete in-game terms to pique your interest in seeing about adding them in. Be warned, this is probably going to get quite long.
First of all, my 2 biggest things that could flesh out the Tau would be to give something else to the Kauyon path (As nearly all of the new units are Mont'Ka)and to include content from the Farsight Enclaves (Perhaps as a Faction choice, much like Chaos and SM? Orthodox Tau and Farsight Enclaves?). With all of my suggestions, keep in mind that I have no understanding of what is within your power and what kinds of changes can be made via the mod, I am simply suggesting somewhere to start. With that preface, allow me to begin:

Tetras - Vehicle Beacon: These units are supposed to act like a vehicular substitute to the Pathfinder unit. They're very quick and very fragile and poor combat units. Their primary purpose is much like the Pathfinder: Scout the enemy position and mark them with target lights so the main guns have better shots on the target. I would suggest tying this unit to the Kauyon as that doctrine is all about knowing your enemy and preparing to lure them into a well placed trap. A high mobility scout to draw attention and quickly update yourself on their positions feels good for that. I would suggest the unit unlocks after researching the Teachings of Kauyon, has the Markerlight ability Pathfinders have, and (while not technically accurate) perhaps something to assist their mobility like Jumpjets? Per rules, Farsight Enclaves would not have access to these.

I'm glad work on this has resumed. Maybe I can finally see my wonderful new Tau Codex units ^_^

Ho... holy hell?! I checked this on a whim and there's been an update?! Emperor be praised! All of my desires from last year have been answered!

You need to edit the codex_3_5.module file in your Soulstorm install directory. Just open it up with Notepad or something and then
To quote Mr. Deathteam on page 3:

First of all, you should install Advanced AI 3.2 before installing the Black Templars mod... Finally, you need "DPX2" and "W40K" at the bottom of the list, i.e. it should look like this:

RequiredMod.1 = Tyranids
RequiredMod.2 = BTmod
RequiredMod.3 = codex_base
RequiredMod.4 = DXP2
RequiredMod.5 = W40k

This also applies to any other single race mod that you want to install (e.g. Salamanders, Inquisition Daemon Hunters, etc.) Just add it as a required mod lower on the list from BT and Tyranids and change all of the numbers accordingly.

I'll keep that in mind xD

So deathteam, how's that massive-*** FAQ on the factions/items coming along? :P Can we hope to see it before the next Codex update? ;D

I don't believe this feature is actually implemented into the mod yet. In all of my time playing with it, I've never encountered it. It might have been an experimental feature that was going into the next update before development stopped or it was scrapped as an idea long ago. In it's current state, I don't believe the Blood Gate exists.

Can you provide a little more information? What race are you trying to play as? What do you mean by the "Khorne Blood Gate"?

Did you tell the Codex mod to load them up in the combiner file? You should have a file called codex_3_5.module somewhere in your Soulstorm directory. Somewhere in there it should look something like this:
RequiredMod.1 = codex_base
RequiredMod.2 = DXP2
RequiredMod.3 = W40k
RequiredMod.4 = dowai
RequiredMod.5 = objective_points_SS
RequiredMod.6 = Tyranids
RequiredMod.7 = BTMod

I have objective points and the DOWA.I. mods loaded in because BT needs DOWAI and Tyranids needs Objective Points. If you have no other race mods being used, then those should be all of the things you need in that file. To add more races, just simply put RequiredMod.[#] and the name of the new mod you're trying to combine.

Yeah... it is. There's literally a comment from the author up there from a month ago saying he isn't working on it.

That's strange then... because I have the settings to what feels "most difficult" for Insane AIs and they're still very lazy Nids :P I'll see if I can play around with the settings more and let you know if I find something.