/dcg/ Dropzone/Dropfleet Commander General

Smug Cyborgs vs Smug Aliens edition

>Hawk Wagame's website, with links to models, rules, and forums
hawkwargames.com/

>DZC rules, units, errata, etc
mediafire.com/folder/3e69ovwksc27r/DZC#3e69ovwksc27r

>free DZC army builder
dzc-ffor.com/

>dropfleet preorder, showing prices and lotsa pics
waylandgames.co.uk/3951-dropfleet-commander

>DFC Kickstarter, lots of useful information to drudge through
kickstarter.com/projects/hawkwargames/dropfleet-commander

Reminder to ignore bait, unless it is masterfully crafted.

Initial topic of the thread: What are your personal theories for Faction X, whether it be fluff or possible gameplay style?

My guess is some enemy of the Scourge. Maybe something that they are trying to fight, like the Shaltari are trying to fight them.

that's my bet

OR one of the ancient races of the Shaltari's has come back with a vengeance, and they're jealous of Humies so they want to kill them too

Along with Faction X being survivors of an earlier Scourge invasion (after rebuilding) like the UCM, these two are also good guesses.

I wonder what unique gameplay niche they'd fill though, in both DZC and DFC.

>PHR
>smug

Bruh. I thought we were chill.

I like the inclusion of the army builder! Love that damn thing.

as for the topic, I'm going to maintain pungari nation as my suggestion because fuck it, its the only alien species we know of that don't have a sub army yet. Even Destroyers have their melee counterparts.

You can be smug and chill, bro.

Chug. Smill. No, those don't work. Somebody help me out here.

Might as well finish off the ships while I'm awake, here comes the PHR!

>tfw you only had to look up the name of one of the cruisers
Guess which one it was, thread

Don't sweat it, brah. Why don't you come over later and we can lift?

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>Ajax class cruiser, armed with a prow laser and full light broadsides
>effective against light targets

AKA the PHR ship that will make me the most frustrated as a scourge frigate spamming bastard.

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>Orion class cruiser, armed with a prow medium cannon turret and full medium broadsides
>effective against all targets

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I don't think the new faction will be anything related to alien auxiliaries of a current faction.

I am seriously curious as to what their design aesthetic will be, though. We already have Utilitarian Space Military, Skeletal Bodyhorror Alien Biomech, Smooth Mechwarrior Cyberforce, Weird Geometric Alien Magic Space Crystal Tech, and Rusted Junkyard Duct-tape Warrior Badasses. I'm really not sure where you go from here without using 40ks cop-out tactic of "existing race but spiky and evul" (Chaos Space Marines/Dark Eldar) or "entirely based around a single gimmick" (looking at Necrons, who also overlap with the Eldar/Shaltari area of Magic Space Crystal Tech and with the Skeletal Biomech of Scourge/Tyranids).

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>Perseus class cruiser, armed with a prow medium cannon turret, half light broadsides, and half heavy broadsides
>effective against light, all, and heavy targets

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>Ikarus class vanguard carrier, armed with a prow medium cannon turret, half light broadsides, and strike craft hangars
>effective against light and all targets

Question about the calibre rule on PHR.

Since it only gives a bonus vs a specific target type, and not a penalty vs the opposite type, isn't it literally always better to have a light or heavy calibre gun than a medium one? The medium seems to just be strictly worse.

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Yeah, I've got no idea. maybe a race of giant creatures? That could be interesting, a bunch of creatures about the screamer's size or bigger that act as their tanks, with slave races or young as their infantry.

>post yfw Scourge-d units of the new faction start showing up a wave or two after they're first shown

Medium guns are good on their own, and I believe that the light and heavy guns are actually slightly worse variants of the medium in general (less average damage, or worse probability distributions), except against their preferred targets.

We'll just have to wait for the stats.

Maybe we'll get an alien race that is either:

>Non-carbon based
>Does not have a central nervous system

So they're immune to scourge parasitism.

What if it's a race of, say, plant-people, or amoeba-like things?

>Achilles class heavy cruiser, armed with a torpedo launcher and full heavy broadsides
>effective against heavy and superheavy targets

I just don't see how that could possibly be the case, unless medium guns just get more shots.

Light guns have the most shots, but it should be fairly easy to finagle the light and heavy gun's stats to make them slightly worse than the medium in general.

That's a good point. I don't envy Dave the task of creating a unique aesthetic for both ground and space forces.

As for game mechanics, maybe something that doesn't depend on dropships at all?

Ajax a SHIT! SHIIT!

>maybe something that doesn't depend on dropships at all?
So Scourge? The only reason I take dropships is for infantry - everything else can take care of itself.

LMAO GET REKT PARASITE

>Hector class heavy cruiser, armed with twin prow lasers and full medium broadsides
>effective against all targets

Are the heavy guns just imported straight from the PHR ground unit railguns?

>we get literal wood elves
>They deploy on the ground all over the place, but you have to scatter them about
>Their infantry don't get into CQC but instead become a bunch of creepers climbing through the building, hunting for the objective
>Occasional massive treefolk growing from the ground to smack tanks
>Lots of stationary defensive structures to slow the other races, and chemical attacks for days

I'm okay with getting space fantasy in here

There just aren't enough stats for guns to do that. There's lock value, number of shots, and damage. That's all.

If Light has the most number of shots AND has the same lock value against medium targets as a medium broadside but also a better one against smaller ships, it's strictly superior to a medium, for example, unless medium batteries have a higher damage value.

> Game about urban combat
> Get a nature-themed army
Try again?

In case you haven't noticed, Dave loves to re-use assets in his sculpts; it definitely helps tie together faction aesthetics.
In any case; "sort of"; they have the same general shape, but the details are slightly different.

Eh, seems kind of gimmicky.
A proper "THE BLOB" kind of bio-horror faction might be neat.

God, I need a 2-up 4-up? on my desk. Bad.
Has someone already shooped a pic to cover every bit in spinal lasers and light turrets? Because if not, it's criminal.

iirc, light guns have a lock of 5+, but a whole lot more shots than the mediums.

I've noticed, and I like it in most cases. I think the heavy batteries just look a little weird sticking out like that.

>tfw getting the 2-up Beijing and 2-up Ajax

While they do look a little wonky, like they could be sunk in a little bit more or with a thicker stalk, it's not that egregious.
I kind of like it, it's a very unique turret shape, if it can even be called a turret.

>A proper "THE BLOB" kind of bio-horror faction might be neat.

Would be awesome, but I feel like Scourge has the bio-horror angle covered enough that Dave wouldn't use that for another faction.

>Bellerophon class heavy carrier, armed with twin prow lasers and double strike craft hangars

Okay, how about instead of an army that's plant like we get full robots? To keep them different from PHR, you'd make them all skeletal and barely assembled. Have them be constantly reassembling themselves, and have them be the originators of the white sphere. Turns out they had been visited by the Scourge who ran at the sight of them, and white sphere was part of an emphatic faction that sent the sphere as an emissary to the next suspected scourge target.

Maybe not "bio-horror" per say, but perhaps something more along "bio-alt"
The Scourge are biological looking, clearly alien looking, but also clearly sinister looking.
This hypothetical faction could still be biological and alien, but not sinister.

Skeletal robots is overdone.

you can play non urban battlefields btw

Eh, if we were doing robots, I'd prefer something along the lines of a particularly benign example of a Dyson Berserker or grey-goo-gone-good

>Theseus class light cruiser, armed with half light broadsides and half medium broadsides
>effective against light and all targets

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Shit, I keep forgetting the troopships.

>Ganymede class troopship, armed with a prow medium cannon turret, half medium broadsides, and bombardment cannons
>effective against all targets

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>Orpheus class troopship, armed with a prow laser and full light broadsides
>effective against light targets

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>Andromeda class escort carrier, armed with a strike craft hangar

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>Calypso class frigate, armed with a ECM/ECCM array

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>Europa class frigate, armed with a small medium broadside

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They could go the maximum geometry route (pic related). Maybe a fleet of damaged von Neumann probes that don't even know they've stumbled into a warzone and just see big piles of already-refined metals?

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>Medea class strike carrier, armed with bombardment cannons

Light broadsides, 5+, 4+ against small targets
Medium broadsides, 4+
Heavy broadsides, 3+, 2+ against targets bigger than cruisers

The smaller the weapon system the more shots you get. Cruisers have space for two 'banks' on either side. Light broadsides are 6 shots to a bank, medium 4, heavy 2.

The Ganymede has one bank of mediums so gets 4x shots per side. The Leonadis has 2x light and 2x medium per side, so gets 12x light and 8x medium per side. A 40 shot double broadside.

>HUEHUEHUEHUE

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Derp. Forgot my picture.

Well, good to see that Ork players will feel right at home

>Pandora class frigate, armed with a prow beam

Yes, this is good.
It would be a good foil to the Shaltari; just as geometric and decorative, but in a different way.

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>Minos class battleship, armed with a large heavy broadside, two torpedo launchers, and neutron missile launchers

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>Heracles class battleship, armed with a large heavy broadside and a prow mounted dark matter cannon.

>tfw you forget the pic

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