Paradox FAQ! news

Newer questions are at the top... because they're generally the ones that people actually ask.

Q: WHEN WILL THIS BE OUT/WHEN WILL THE NEXT RELEASE BE/WHY CAN'T I DOWNLOAD THIS YET
A: This was already answered below but I guess nobody reads this thing so maybe posting links everywhere will help. WE DON'T KNOW. Stop asking. None of us are professionals, we all have lives outside of the mod, and there are always delays. When we have a set release date, we'll tell you. Until then, asking JUST majorly ticks us (Kerensky287 specifically) off.

Q: Are you guys adding the Tesla Tank?
A: Nope. As easy as it would be to make it available, it's entirely redundant. The Soviets already have the Hammer and Apocalypse for anti-tank capability, the Tesla Trooper has the exact same secondary if you want to use it for some reason, and the Stingray is also land-capable if you feel you can't go without lightning guns. The Tesla Tank is just a glorified Hammer, and if we put it in it would do nothing but occupy a spot in the vehicle tab.

Q: What is Paradox, really?
A: Paradox is a total-conversion modification for EA's Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3. That means that we plan to take the core game and more or less flip it on its head. We'll be making enough changes to the gameplay that it almost counts as a separate game from the one it's based on.

Q: Changes, you say! What changes exactly?
A: For starters, we're adding a total of five (5) brand new factions. We are also adding a large number of units to the existing factions to make each one even more unique. For example, the Japanese faction is now getting two different war factories - one for vehicles, and another purely for the Mecha that the faction is so famous for. Click on each faction's symbol at the top of the page to see their army list and what they're about!

We're also adding a number of tech buildings to change strategic aspects of the skirmish game. For one thing, the tech buildings will not be gone for good when destroyed; they will either rebuild themselves or just become neutral when their health reaches 0 (we aren't sure yet). We are also plan to make new buildings for a variety of purposes - defensive, economic, and more.

Q: What does PДЯДАОЖ mean! It's like... Rdyadaozh or something!
A: It's not really Russian, it's faux Cyrillic. Read it as though it were Latin script. We've gotten SO many complaints about this when it's clearly supposed to be a play on Cyrillic text, just like the backwards R in "Red AleRt." None of us speak or read Russian, so when the logo was made the letters were selected based on their resemblance to "Paradox", written as such.

Q: Can you give a quick summary of all the factions?
A: No.

...Okay, yeah, sure.

Allied Nations: From the original game. The science faction! Uses lots of cold-based abilities and units, and has a few units that use Chrono (Time travel, though functions as teleportation ingame) technology. Strong air power, such as the deadly Vindicator precision-bomber which is famous for being a deadly early-game harasser. In Paradox, their major addition is experimental units (expensive, low-health, powerful).

Soviet Union: From the original game. The brute force faction! They use a lot of electricity and magnetism based powers, as well as a few chemical weapons (which we will be expanding on in Paradox). They have incredibly powerful tanks such as the famous Apocalypse, which carries two massive barrels and is big enough to crush other tanks. In Paradox, they are getting enough new tanks to fill up a building of its own (a War Factory variant).

Empire of the Rising Sun: From the original game. The anime faction! Their army is full of crazy robots, ninjas and video game references. They use plenty of psychic abilities too. Their main strength is in their naval force, including the Shogun Battleship which is unmatched in terms of surface firepower and can ram enemy ships for massive damage. In Paradox, they are getting a building devoted to the construction of Mecha (thus, lots of new mecha) and a small number of dedicated aerial units.

Confederate Revolutionaries: Paradox-exclusive. The cheap trick/nostalgia faction! They're essentially a rebel group originating in the southern United States, so they have a lot of units and abilities from older CnC games, plus a number of earth/ground-based stuff like digging units and earthquakes. They are no good in a direct fight, but they have plenty of options that allow them to use guerrilla tactics and "dick moves." Their Sidewinder Tank, for example, is capable of pushing enemy units back with hurricane-force winds, as well as doing heavy damage to buildings and air units, and can dig a tunnel underground to escape conflicts.

Order of the Talon: Paradox-exclusive. The quality over quantity faction! They're pretty much a mix of GDI - from the original CnC - and the Christians during the crusades. They have a bunch of fire and heat-related weaponry. Their units are expensive but powerful, and they benefit greatly from veterancy bonuses, so they also have a number of units geared toward improving durability of friendlies. A heroic-level Cleric (their main battle tank) will almost be able to defeat an Apocalypse in a fair fight, for example, and may heal nearby vehicles at the cost of some attack power if necessary.

Atomic Kingdom of China: Paradox-exclusive. The 60's sci-fi faction! They use phasers, tractor beams, and a LOT of radiation weaponry, being the only faction with access to nuclear weapons. They also have a lot of melee units. Their strength is in their ability to take and hold ground - they move slowly, but in massive numbers, and once they have taken ground they can secure it using a wide variety of deployable defensive structures, such as the Pagoda Mobile Castle, which is armed with multiple heavy weapons and can garrison 8 infantry.

Mediterranean Syndicate: Paradox-exclusive. The Roman-Empire-obsessed-cyberpunk faction! Their arsenal includes railguns, AI-controlled missiles, gyrojets, plenty of helicopters and a LOT of battlesuits. Their army is designed around the infantry, and they have a number of units which project auras that can improve the health, damage or speed of those around them. They have few large ships or fast aircraft.

Electrical Protectorate: Paradox-exclusive. The nightmarish evil robot faction! They use a lot of "Grey Goo" (hordes of hostile nanobots) weaponry, sonic weaponry and other technology that has its roots in science fiction. They rely on hordes of weaker units to attack the enemy constantly. Their units and buildings construct instantly, but they are unable to expand at all from their main base and their units are not durable, so money is a major limiting factor. Their vehicles and some naval units can equip "weapon modules" to modify the weapon they use. This allows a skilled player to specify an attacking force for specific uses such as anti-infantry or anti-horde, but requires a lot of micromanagement. They have some larger units that can be used to help the weaker masses make a push through enemy armies, such as the Obliterator Artillery, the strongest artillery in the game, which can destroy any target almost instantly if the right module is equipped.

Q: This sure does seem like a lot of stuff. How long will it take?
A: For the full mod? A long, long time. But we realize that people want to see (and play) some progress, so we'll be releasing different "mod packs" to gradually get the entire mod out there. The first mod pack should be released within the year. We haven't had very much time to work with the SDK yet so we can't be sure, however. A more accurate release date for each mod pack will be announced closer to the time.

The planned order for mod pack releases is as follows:
1. Allied and Confederate units + buildings
2. Soviet and Order of the Talon units + buildings
3. Japan and China units + buildings
4. Protectorate and Syndicate units + buildings
5. Campaigns with full-motion video, if all goes as planned

Q: Will you be using the units from Uprising?
A: No. As far as Paradox is concerned, Uprising never happened. The story in Uprising happens because the Allies won in RA3, but in Paradox, it was entirely a stalemate. They are two parallel universes. We MAY use the Harbinger model for a new Allied Top-Secret Protocol if we can add more, but that's as close as you'll get to an Uprising unit. Sorry.

Q: How much have you got ingame so far?
A: As of this writing, we have very little ingame. The first version of the SDK has a lot of limitations that EA has apologized for and plans to fix at the earliest opportunity, but luckily we have managed to test a bunch of unit abilities to ensure they work. We also have a wide range of models with textures that we can bring in... once we figure out how.

Q: Will there be AI support?
A: If/when we get someone who can code it, yes. As you can probably understand it would be fairly essential to have AI during the campaign stuff, but hopefully we can get someone helping with skirmish games too.

Q: I saw something about Stolen Tech Units (tm) in the forums/on an army list page! What the heck are those?
A: Remember back in RA2 when you could infiltrate an enemy battle lab or something with a spy and then have access to a special mixed-tech unit, like Chrono Ivan? That's what we're hoping to do here. Not sure if it's possible, though. Still, we've got the designs laid out for 64 units that can be gained this way (one for each possible faction combination) and they're generally designed with the idea of rewarding the player in mind. (Translation: some of them are more overpowered than the Giga Fortress. But they'll be expensive to match.)

Q: Assuming you can get them ingame, will you ever give us a list of Stolen Tech Units?
A: Nope. Finding them out is half the fun!

Q: From the videos and content you've released, it looks like some units explode into wreckage from other units. Are you going to be adding custom wreckage?
A: Well... yes. Eventually. The thing is, custom wreckage is less of a balance/gameplay thing and more of a "this makes stuff look pretty" thing. It's important for the polished, finished product, but it's pretty low on the priority list. So yeah, it'll go in, but it isn't a huge worry right about now.

Q: What changes are you making to currently-existing units?
A: We're making a number of changes to the factions themselves, which you can see on their respective army list pages, but we are making a few general changes to the game itself. For example, we're currently (meaning, we've got it halfway programmed) trying to make air superiority units "dogfight", rather than just staying still and getting shot at. This will make them more effective against enemy bombers (they follow them rather than moving, stopping, firing, repeating) and make air-vs-air fights much more exciting.

We're also going to make defensive structures a little more durable. It seems ridiculous that you can lose 8000 dollars worth of guard towers to a pair of artillery units in seconds - the durability boost is just to give the player that little bit of extra time to respond, and to make turtling a viable tactic.

Q: I've been looking at the stuff you're planning to do, and I think [insert idea here] is stupid and/or impossible.
A: Very little on this Moddb page is final. It's entirely possible that we'll find things that we wanted to do but can't do within the limits of the RA3 engine... or that we'll change our minds entirely on. Information will be updated as our plans change, but what you see is what we want to do at this point.

Q: This sounds like a ton of work for such a small group of people. I have some skills that could help, can I join your mod group to help accelerate the release process (and give me a chance to test the game)?
A: Why, of course! Possibly! We're always on the lookout for new people who want to help out with the mod and if you PM either Kerensky287 or Open_Sketchbook, we will get back to you as soon as we can (which should be pretty quickly). Currently, we are desperately in need of programmers, and we would appreciate new modellers and texture-makers. Mappers would be nice to have as well.

Q: I have a question that seems like it would be asked frequently! Why the heck isn't it up here?
A: I'm sure this FAQ hasn't answered every question you guys have. If you have a question, feel free to ask in our comment section or forums; we'll answer it there, and if it's a good question, we'll probably add it to this FAQ as well.