In the grim darkness of later today, there is only the release of Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2.
We're thrilled to release Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2 today! We are currently aiming for a 6PM CET / 5PM GMT / 12PM EST / 9AM PST launch, but stay tuned as we may do a soft release a few hours earlier to make sure everything is working as expected.
A new Launch Trailer will prepare you for battle as all the fury of 12 factions clash for dominance in skirmish and ranked multiplayer, while three full grand campaigns offer hundreds of hours of single-player and co-op content.
With a focus on bringing naval battle strategy into the 41st millennium, Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2 has you considering ship speeds, engagement angles, torpedoes, and strike craft while navigating the fantastical and daemonic special abilities of this dark future. Design and customise your fleet through a fully open points system, picking from one of over 80 sub-factions and dozens of fleet upgrades across seven ship classes and 12 distinct factions.
The team has worked hard on your feedback from the second Beta. As announced in our latest community update, today's full release brings a lot of balance tweaks and bug fixes. You’ll find some highlights and a patchlog at the end of this post. If you're new to the game, make sure to read our Quick Start Guide.
You can also join our Discord to discuss with fellow players and devs: https://discord.gg/fqpAG2D
You'll also be able to finally play the campaign co-op mode today. We'd like to remind you that, as announced at the start of the last Beta, this game is an incredibly ambitious project for our small team and we’ve worked hard to release a sequel improved in every way over the original. It includes 12 factions and three massive grand campaigns playable in co-op. But as we’re working around the clock to polish every part of the game, we're forced to release the co-op mode in an early access state today.
This means that we’re simply not entirely satisfied yet by the level of polish on offer in the co-op mode. It is now available, but we will continue to improve it and fix technical issues in this mode after launch. Our current estimation for the full release of campaign co-op is during March. In the meantime, the co-op mode will be playable on launch but you might experience some technical issues. Your feedback about this mode will be instrumental in making it stable as fast as possible.
Post-Launch plans
Even though the game is now released, we're still interested in getting your feedback about all aspects of the game: balancing, technical issues, and the full Necron, Imperium and Tyranid campaigns. We'll continue to release updates and tweak the game with the help of your reports. Today is only the beginning for Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2 and we'd like to share more about our post-release plans.
As explained above, our first priority is to polish the co-op mode to release it fully as soon as possible. It will come with a balancing patch, as well as bug fixes and additional polish based on your feedback. We'll also develop the competitive aspect with official seasons and rewards to be announced very soon.
This first major update will be followed by the development of new ships and continuous work on balancing. As you've seen in our last Beta update, we have the data to monitor win rates and match-ups and we'll make good use of them to do regular balance tweaks until we're happy on that front.
After this we will be focusing on major new features. This includes a massive new game mode giving you access to skirmishes with truly humongous fleets and legendary ships (the Phalanx, Macragge's Honour, and other ships you see during the campaign). Thanks to the incredible support the game has received so far, Focus Home Interactive and Tindalos Interactive have also begun work on a new, full grand campaign. That’s all we can say for now, but we will announce specifics closer to release later this year.
We can't wait to share more, but as you can see, we've got plenty on the go in the coming months. Meanwhile, enjoy the full release of Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2 and let us know what you think!
Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2 - Release Patch notes
- All three Grand Campaigns are now fully playable!
- Your Imperial and Necron campaign saves from Beta 2 will still work, enjoy!
- Campaign co-op is releasing in an Early Access state. It’s playable and fun, so please try it out and provide feedback, but those who want to enjoy a fully polished and bug-free experience may wish to wait.
- All profiles have been reset. This includes multiplayer rank and skill progression.
- The game is now available in multiple languages.
Improvements & New Features
- Playing skirmish against AI will now grant faction XP
- Added Game Option in the campaign to play non-scripted battles in Cruiser Clash mode
- There are 3 options available: Cruiser Clash, Domination, and Random
- You can choose between these at the start of a campaign or at any time during your campaign by going into the game options
- When playing Cruiser Clash, the stationary defenses are placed at random in a square on the battle map
- Added possibility to remove the Urgency Threat gauge at a start of a new campaign
- The game has been designed with the Urgency Threat in mind, but we understand players wanting to enjoy the campaign at a slower pace
- This cannot be changed mid-game, you will need to restart your campaign if you wish to disable or enable it.
- Skill keybinds are now displayed properly in battle
Balancing
- All Factions
- Rally can now be used during a mutiny
- Reload stance candency bonus now only applies to macro weapons
- Collisions between allied vessels no longer causes morale damage
- Corsairs
- Ship point cost for all Corsair vessels has been decreased
- Tyranids
- Ship point cost for all Tyranid vessels has been increased
- Tyranid assault boat number per squadron decreased from 4 to 3
- Tyranid fighter squadrons decreased from 8 units to 6
- Spiky Carapace now ignores armor
- T’au
- Mont'Ka crit chance bonus decreased from 100% to 50%
- T’au Warfare now properly applies to ships with the T’au Warfare attribute
- Cutting Beam now ignores armor
- Cutting Beam damage increased from 60 to 120
- Cutting Beam charge time reduced from 15 seconds to 10
- Tau Manta Bomber dodge chance increased from 20% to 40%
- Space Marines
- Space Marine Torpedoes activate their tracking system earlier
- Emperor Tarot can now target visible ships
- Imperial Navy
- Emperor Tarot can now target visible ships
- Drukhari
- Burning Scale ship now properly has 1 launch bay instead of 3
- Chaos
- The Daemon Infestation upgrade now properly applies to all ships
- Asuryani
- Kin Crewed Battery max cadency bonus reduced from 50% to 25%
- Kin Crewed Battery cadency bonus per second reduced from 2% to 1%
AI
- In domination mode, the AI will no longer stay in the capture area without reacting to attacks
- AI now prioritizes ships that are not drifting hulks or undergoing a mutiny
Bug Fixes
- Fixed a memory leak in video playback during game hitches (such as when clicking on the create custom fleet button)
- Please note that they will still take some time to load
- Several localized crashes have been fixed
- Multiple localization fixes and improvements
- Custom fleets from the Beta can no longer exceed the point limit before launching a battle
- Multiple bug fixes and improvements
