Dev Diary #25: The most EXCITING update in ages!

Empire, Empire, Empire. The total overhaul; what's new for the Imperials in the Galactic Overhaul project?

Hello! And welcome to the latest Dev Diary for Age of Legends. This is, truly, a really exciting one. It’s all about the Empire, and how the Galactic Overhaul project will dramatically reshape their roster and gameplay. Read on!

What’s wrong with the current approach?

Firstly, why does the Empire need to be improved?

Well, the current public build of the mod was designed at a time when space rosters were capped at 26 units. It was released before the build bar was expanded to include 40+ units at a time; before space filters were introduced to allow for three lots of 40 units.

It also includes some strange anomalies from the before Petroglyph released the official patch increasing the playable faction limit to 100. Such as the Galactic Empire, Dark Empire, and Imperial Remnant all being different faction slots. That is an artefact of a time when the mod was split up into multiple submods covering different eras, to try and get around faction limits that no longer apply.

This meant that I had to design rosters and capital ship complements to try and capture the flavour of each period, and I was unable to represent the fullness, variety and strength of the Imperial Navy in the vast era the mod covers.

Thanks to the Galactic Overhaul project coming out in v1.34, none of these limits now apply. That means the Galactic Empire is finally getting the full Age of Legends treatment it deserves.

The exciting new possibilities for the Empire in Age of Legends, v1.34…

In the coming weeks I will be releasing a series of articles on the Empire and the overhaul it is getting. But I want to give some highlights now:

Imperial leaders and heirs to the Empire…

The Empire will be getting a whole new leadership system, as I outlined all the way back in Dev Diary #12: Imperial Leadership Succession (the most popular article I’ve written so far). Different leaders unlock different heroes, and some special units. In short, picking one leader above others might also cause the rejected leader to appear as an emergent faction fighting against you; like Trioculus on Kessel, or Lord Cronal on Mindor. There will be a vast range of “what-if” heroes, like Empress Ederlathh Pallopides, the child niece of Palpatine, or the Dark Side Luke Skwalker.

A massive, rebuilt roster…

The Empire will start, in 4 ABY, with a gigantic space roster of c.60 buildable units. This is the core roster that will persist, more or less, all the way into the Second Galactic Civil War era. With some tech being locked as the years pass by, and some becoming available for research regardless of what leader you choose. This is that core roster: