Galaxy Far, Far Away.
PR has given me a new task. To populate the entire Galaxy Far, Far Away campaign, to a high level of detail and realism. This has been a serious challenge. Let me warn you now. This campaign is going to be unlike any of the others and it will be quite challenging. Although it is not finished, I can give you some good insights into the campaign itself.
Before I could even think about starting, we had to determine a way to assess and compare planets to each other, so that we could consistently populate the campaign with ships and fighters that are a) relevant to the planet and its people and commercial contacts and b) that the planet/system could afford to buy and maintain.
This has taken a huge amount of work, and we now have a self-consistent galaxy to work with that accurately reflects the planet’s financial, military, commercial and demographic position in the galaxy. For example, living on a barren ice world with poor resources is going to have a significantly different defence force to say, a rich, urban world near a major trade route. This means that you need to evaluate a planet carefully before you invade. Where possible, we have tried to tangibly reflect these factors in the fleet population. One of the spin-offs of this work has been a re-evaluation of the galactic economy and I am sure you will learn more about this in due course.
But what could we populate these planets with?
It was obvious that just using the starting line-up of imperial and rebel forces was wholly inappropriate and completely inadequate. That got me thinking. Go back to 18BBY just after the end of the Clone Wars and you realise that both the Empire and the Rebel alliance have state-of the art military equipment. So was it better than the clone-wars era equipment? Well no, but it was an awful lot cheaper! Compare for example the brand new TIE Starfighter (60k) vs the Clone-Wars elite Eta-2 Actis-class light Interceptor at a staggering 295k. Now you see what a breakthrough the TIE series really is - 95% of the C.W. era performance at 20% of the cost.
This ably demonstrates the fantastic ability of the Empire to churn out new craft at a frightening rate.
We could not take that for granted in the post C.W. galaxy and that left us with a big problem. Only the pro-Imperial military planets will have access to the TIE series and only the biggest, richest planets in the galaxy will be able to buy the C.W. era ships, and that leaves a lot of planets unaccounted for. If you can’t get these first-rank military models, what else can you get hold of?
Over the last month, PR and I have filled this gap with a huge array of different space forces, comprising over 100 new encounters for this period alone, ranging in size from fighters to dreadnaughts! Some are rich, elite craft, while other cover old models, refurbished ships, less successful warship/starfighter lines, converted civilian equipment, liners and even outright salvaged ships. Pay attention to all the details, as you may not be able to tell the rich from the poor by visual inspection alone.
I can also now reveal 4 of the many new adversaries you will be facing:
CloakShape Fighter
Delta-7 Aethersprite-class Light Interceptor
T.I.E Starfighter
Vulture Droid Starfighter
The Units page has full details on these ships and their variants.
The CloakShape is a Pre-clone Wars heavy fighter made by Kuat Systems Engineering with two light lasers and a concussion missile launcher for added punch. While limited by relatively poor agility, they make up for this in high hull strength.
The Delta-7 was the last in the Delta Series produced by the KDY Yards. With twin dual lasers, excellent shielding, speed and manoeuvrability, this is a deadly ship to fly - if you can afford to buy one.
The T.I.E Starfighter is the original mass produced starfighter made by Republic Sienar Systems - with an horrendous 90k price tag. This is not to be confused with the Empire-era TIE Starfighter designed some 4 years later by Sienar Fleet Systems.
Vulture Droids are fast, light hulled droid fighters armed with 4 light blaster cannons and Energy torpedoes that batter down shields. These are normally encountered in large swarms due to their extremely low production costs.
What else will you find?
I will be breathing infinite variety into the galaxy, and there should be obvious differences between rich, powerful worlds on important trading routes, fortress worlds and military strongholds, smuggler havens, worlds ravaged by war, untouched beauty spots, humble farmers, isolated worlds, alien civilisations and so on. If you are really smart you may be able to spot flaws in the makeup of some of the poorly planned planetary defenses which you can take advantage of. In other systems you will not be so lucky.
You should also be very careful because on the fringes of the galaxy, you may encounter groups with blatant disregard for common law and decency: pirates, corrupt officials, renegade Moffs, slavers, drug lords, shipjackers and so on. These outlaws are highly dangerous and have modified their ships to match their trade. Pay close attention to the stats in combat, because appearances are always deceiving. These boys don’t play fair as the following sequence shows.
At the beginning of the campaign, choose your targets wisely, otherwise it could be a serious mistake. I expect most of the early campaign action to be in the outer rim, slowly moving corewards as time progresses. Your core worlds will be somewhat trapped and undergunned at the beginning so pay attention to building your economy. You will need it. Otherwise, take in and enjoy the variety of a living, breathing universe.
Edited by Phoenix Rising, 21 October 2008 - 06:28 PM.
