From The Depths - Forum

Full Version: Dark Angels: Conversion to Avian Supremacy
So for a while now I've been looking over the Dark Angels in relevance to where they stand at as a faction. Let's look over why the Dark Angels are strong, then let's look at why they are weak.


- High-quality cannons and missile systems
- Versatile and able to handle most types of enemies
- Access to many active defenses of good quality, including LAMS and high-strength shields.
- From a builder's standpoint, their designs are price-efficient. Without many exploiting weapons or requirements for high-power lasers they can be a fun faction to fight when it comes to a match of DPS.


- Their price efficiency is detrimental due to the high prevalence of wood being protected by active defenses. With many ways to bypass the defenses the craft are very vulnerable for the most part.

- Many craft are lumbering airships that are constructed of light material. This makes even the largest craft of the faction look like pushovers as an explosive round takes out a massive chunk of the hull, even if the armor has many layers. There are a couple exceptions to this, namely the Duskmender and Harrier as of current.

- "Primitive" offensive weaponry means no access to offensive lasers or particle cannons. Their access to EMP technology is also restricted outside of surge protection.

- As a whole faction they are lacking some aesthetics to form the required force. They are also lacking many designs to fill certain roles.

The supposed changes: There are a few changes in mind that may help alleviate the Dark Angels weaknesses without overpowering them.

Remove wood from standard building material outside of easy designs. Alloy is no longer very expensive so alloy is now a much more viable building material. It's a little tougher than wood and will be vastly improved with the next major update.

Allow heavy armor in higher limits on slow craft. Right now the Dark Angels are very limited on heavy armor usage regardless of the craft. Perhaps adding more heavy armor to the lumbering thrustercrafts (right now that would just be the Therum and Reprisal which need massive upgrades anyway) will help resilience.

Make more specialized craft. The Dark Angels really are a jack of all trades, master of none faction. Pretty much every single craft is adept at fighting different targets. (AA cannons on the Reprisal and Therum, which are already sky-high bombers, is a good example. Also nearly every craft has some type of anti-sub weaponry.) By having a few more specialized craft the Dark Angels can look to have a competent fighter-class aircraft or a smaller, yet more dedicated bomber that can match a larger craft in damage.

Avian aesthetics upgrade: Right now I've slowly been trying to convert the Dark Angels craft to more avian designs for the most part. It's mainly been adding in wedges to resemble feathers, applying a frontal wedge section to resemble a beak, then adding in blue to resemble eyes, or light neon blue to resemble the "dark ascension" of the more advanced designs.

Craft to be worked on: For anyone interested I will list the current designs below that need to be worked with, if anyone wishes to contribute. They will either be full remakes or improvements with general reasoning. Remakes will have a classification of what they should be redesigned to.

(If anyone wants to work on a design and would like to use the original craft as a base, please let me know and I will post the blueprint.)

Gale - This remake has been completed.

Judicator (Remake) - This remake has been completed.

Lightspear (Remake) - The Lightspear is an exception from the upcoming avian remake. However it needs more emphasis on being a spear of light that blazes through the sky to deliver swift payloads. It will most likely be the main high-speed fighter for the faction.

Therum (Remake) - The general idea behind the Therum is rather solid. It's a large imposing thrustercraft that excels in zone control and handling all types of threats. Its armor right now is rather lackluster and could be upgraded. Alternatively it can just be remade to be a giant flying angel of death.

Dawnbreaker (Upgrade) - The Dawnbreaker has been around for so long and has changed from being one of the Dark Angels's most prestige designs to one of the most mediocre. This is because the world around it has changed so much. Whether it's remade or simply upgraded is fine to me. It should retain its status as "airborne weapons platform", capable of providing supporting fire, repairing allies that get close to it, all at the expense of being fairly slow.

Restitution (Upgrade) - My first-ever helicopter taken through timeless advancements, the Restitution is finally due for an upgrade. Any upgrades should retain its signature "heliblade" with the rams at the end along with its versatility of being able to pick a fight with basically anything.