Homeworld: Armada

By Foba, in Star Wars: Armada Off-Topic

I didn't know where to post this, so my best bet is off topic.

I've been working on a conversion for Armada from the Star Wars universe to the Homeworld one, I thought that you guys would be interested in this kind of thing. :)

By having access to a 3D printer I have been able to print a lot of Squads and Ships, but the snag is the upgrades, officers and Admirals. As I only know the basics, and a bit more advanced rules, I lack in gameplay experience as I haven't been able to field a fleet that often. That means that gameplay and balance vise I won't be doing a too god a job to really get the balance just right.

To date I've the races Kadesh and Turanic raiders printed, and when the turanics are painted I will finally be able to play-test some of the stuff i been thinking gameplay vise.

Turanic: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2754113

Kadesh: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2739820

The quality of the prints are not that good, as they are made with a old printer (M3D), and the paint job really is C**P.

Recap of the races how I've been tinkering:

Turanics fields:

fighters with cloacking (3/squad)

corvettes (1/squad) with salvage ability (stop a ship dead in the water, 1 corvette for small/medium, 2 for big)

Missile corvettes (1/squad).

Ion array frigates (small)( Forward mounted beam, nothing to the side)

Lord-class carrier (medium) as their biggest ship.

Kadeshi Fields:

fighters (3/squad) with swarm ( fitting name of swarmer)

Advanced fighters(1/squad) as corvettes with bomber

Fuelpods (small, pocket carriers)

Multi Beam Frigates (small) ( Forward mounted beams nothing to sides)

Needle Mothership (Medium) as their biggest ship.

Any help with the Cards and balance is GREATLY appreciated! :D

comments too by the way :rolleyes:

Homeworld is one of my favorite games. Sadly this is probably the closest we will ever come to getting a board game. Still, it’s a stellar idea.

True, the probability of a board game (or sequel for that matter) is small, but don't give up hope Admiral!

And thanks, the idea is good, but it depends on how good the execution is. Thats why I don't trust my own judgement for balance and gameplay, and asked this forum for help :D

I’ll dig up my work on it.

I didn’t have a 3D printer, so I bent the best way I could.

Papercraft using the in game textures and meshes.

My intent was to basically set s mirror baseline for each ship and then work from there on the squads.

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Mostly, I was trying to consider standard rules. As in, do you go Homeworld 1 style fuel consumption restriction for fighters, or do you take Cataclysm style...

Even without athat mechanic, you can sorta simulate it by only having Squad value on carriers and support vessels... a flak or Ion frigate has Squad 0...

But certainly, sliding it into armada ruleset is most about die configs, arcs and points.

Very nice! I have always wondered how sturdy papercraft models are? Do they become strong enough to use or are they more suited for showcasing?

Anyway, any thoughts on balance or upgrades? :D

Ninjad! :D

My thoughts was on no fuel supply, and only carriers can push squads. Ion cannons fire only forward, but throw black dies long range. I was thinking on a roll mechanic for the MBF, as kushans and taiidani also have salvagers for stopping ships as in the game, to compensate for the kadeshis inability to keep up with their frigates.

Edited by Foba

Just my basics. I’ll see if I can find my card proto stuff.

i was essentially keepungbit fairly upgrade free, and keeping the Squad/ship destination as much as possible.

mostly for balance.

I think TIE fighters, TIE interceptors and TIE bombers are all good basis points for Scout / Fighter / Bomber examples.

i think id represent the combat corevettes with Irregukar squads with Rogue.

Keep base rules - the idea having the Ion frigate with a monstrous front arc but virtually nothing on the sides is good...

The Taiidan and Kushan were 90% mirrors of each other. Which is where I was going to focus first.

Set the Carrier and Heavy Cruiser as top baselines (Heavy cruiser feels like an ISD to me)

you could even basically experiment with “essentual upgrades” a bit, too.

So, for example.

Let us set an Ion Beam Frigate kind of like a Neb B dice array. Support class.

It has an “Ion Beam” upgrade slot.

Ion Beam Cannon Mk 1 (10)

While attacking a ship with your front hull zone, add 2 Red Dice.

Ion Beam Cannon Mk 2 (15)

While attacking a ship with your front hull zone, add 1 black and 1 blue die.

Ion Beam Array Mk 1 (10)

While attacking a ship or squadron with your front, left or right hull zone, add 1 blue die.

Etc.

That way you provide valid choice of all variants depending on the desires of the player.

Edited by Drasnighta

Good points, we're thinking alot in the same direction. I would want it a bit more basic than the og game, taking the gameplay basic from the game. Aka assault frigate win one on one against a ion frigate, but massed they probably lose.

Upgrades reserved for bigger ships in the form of modules and towers. For additional benefits on the battlefield, you need to field defense field frigates, support frigates/corvettes, minelayers, carriers etc. This would keep the fleets diverse and allow for intresting fleetbuilds. :D

20 hours ago, Drasnighta said:

I’m so often amazed by papercraft. Those models are gorgeous.

Haven't really had the time to work on the painting of the turanics, but the printer has been running Day and Night. (got a new one :D )

Here's a sneak peak of the progress so far, and gives a rough scale on how it will look. Hope you enjoy. :rolleyes:

IMG_20180116_165712-min-min.jpg

I got to test out the Turanics and the kadeshis tonight.

Basegame only, no commander, no upgrade cards.

I went as turanic, my friend as kadeshi.

I fielded:

Lord class carrier 101p

2 ion array frigates 96p

2 standard corvettes 36p

2 missile corvettes 36p

2 interceptor squads 28p

=297p.

He fielded:

Needle Mothership 91p

MBF 43p

2 fuel pods 72p

2 advanced swarmers 38p

4 swarmers 56p

= 300.

Conclusion:

Me 224 points, him 28 points :D

Interesting change of pace as the IAF and MBF had only forward facing attack vectors, meaning a lot of turning was necessary to get into attack position.

Biggest MVP was the salvager keyword on the standard corvette (if in contact with opposing ship, lock speed to 0), which managed during the game to lock down the 2 fuelpods and after their destruction locked down the needle ( after some careless planning by my friend :P )

As a base this works, will need some tweaking to the points and keywords, as the upgrade cards are still absent.

Wanted to upload some pictures, but max total size for pictures is 0,05MB? :huh: Even with 99% compression on my pictures it's not enough to upload :huh:

If anyone knows how to upload bigger pictures do tell :D

You only have a set total limit. Every photo uploaded decreases that.

upload to imgur and link instead ?

Thanks,still a noob :D

http://imgur.com/a/sNWx3

Ion array frigates substituted with a corellian corvette and a missile destroyer. Decided that I'll print them again with better quality :P

15 hours ago, Foba said:

Thanks,still a noob :D

http://imgur.com/a/sNWx3

Ion array frigates substituted with a corellian corvette and a missile destroyer. Decided that I'll print them again with better quality :P

Tip: if you want your pics to appear in thread instead of a link - after uploading, you should be taken to a screen that shows your pictures. You should see a box with the link to it, and a pull down box with several link options. Choose “Direct Link.” Copy/Paste here.

3 hours ago, GrandAdmiralCrunch said:

Tip: if you want your pics to appear in thread instead of a link - after uploading, you should be taken to a screen that shows your pictures. You should see a box with the link to it, and a pull down box with several link options. Choose “Direct Link.” Copy/Paste here.

Thanks for the suggestion, will be remembering this in the future :D

Still any and all ideas for upgrade cards (and pretty much anything) is greatly appreciated :D

I love this idea! I absolutely loved Homeworld and would be glad to act as a sounding board. I'm very excited to see where this goes :)

4 minutes ago, FortyInRed said:

I love this idea! I absolutely loved Homeworld and would be glad to act as a sounding board. I'm very excited to see where this goes :)

Brilliant! I might have a big calc page of stats coming up as my next post of progress, as long as I figure out how to post it in a sensible manner :D

Hello, back with a fast update. Been dogditting this weekend so didn't have time to do much on this project. Only thing I can show you isi a pic or to about two how far I am in the printning stage: https://m.imgur.com/Lir1Qlv,TEMXExe

Enjoy :D

This is fantastic stuff! I've been following you on Thingiverse and loving everything that's come out of this project. Tried to print a few ships but no unqualified successes so far (still getting used to this 3D printing business, got a Lulzbot Mini for Christmas).

Here's a few of my (attempted) prints: https://photos.app.goo.gl/xvBGfxuM239Pq1dX2

The Kadeshi Multibeam Frigate came out the best, only a little scarring on the top. Kadeshi Mothership has some elephant foot issues, thanks to a bad z-index (alas, it's juuuuust too tall to print as a single ship on the Mini). Turanic Ion Beam Frigate fared the worst, I didn't put a support ceiling on, so those supports are stuck on for good.

Thanks for the support, really appriciate it :D Your prints don't look half bad, how big a layer are you useing? :D once you get it calibrated and increase the resolution you should be getting nicer prints. One tip for printing most of these ships: print them standing, not laying flat. I found that the details prints much nicer this way. It might waste a bit of filament but in my opinion really worth it :D

Here is a little sneak peek of the cards I've been working on, hope you like it :P Any more help with upgrades and titles appreciated :D

Now Workin' :D

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Edited by Foba
Pictures
11 hours ago, Foba said:

Thanks for the support, really appriciate it :D Your prints don't look half bad, how big a layer are you useing? :D once you get it calibrated and increase the resolution you should be getting nicer prints. One tip for printing most of these ships: print them standing, not laying flat. I found that the details prints much nicer this way. It might waste a bit of filament but in my opinion really worth it :D

Multibeam (and I think the Ion Array) was at 0.25mm, Mothership at 0.18. Now that I'm a bit more dialed in, I'm printing at 0.10 (max resolution for the Mini). Here's my current print (Taidani Destroyer), using MeshMixer for supports instead of Cura (will post real pictures tonight when I get home):

Regretting not using a raft here, used it for a few D&D Minis and it worked well there.

Screen Shot 2018-02-05 at 9.28.20 AM.png

Edited by SomeKittens