Greetings, Admirals, and welcome back to the devblogs for Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2. Today we’re talking customisation - how your fleet is your own, both in gameplay terms and the aesthetics of your ships. Significant changes have been made since the first game, so read on!

The first and clearest way to customise your fleet is, of course, to change which ships are in it. There are six classes of vessel in total, with multiple configurations of each hull usually available. However, not every faction has access to every class - the Adeptus Mechanicus have lighter ships plus the massive Ark Mechanicus Battleship, while the Imperial Navy can field vessels of any weight category. Your custom fleet is only limited by the points allowed in the match you’re going to play - the composition, weapon choices, abilities, admiral skills, and more are all yours to choose.

Each faction has eight Admiral Skills and ten Fleet Upgrades to choose from. Admiral Skills are special abilities given to your flagship only, making them limited but extremely powerful, able to flip a battle on its head with the correct timing. Fleet Upgrades affect all or a sub-section of your ships, changing weapons, engines, stealth, or some other element to let you play your way. The difference in building a fleet around the correct upgrades and skills can be significant.

Tyranid Fleet Creation

Faction selection also governs your admiral portrait, of which there are hundreds in the game, unlocked through victories. You can pick from those you’ve unlocked for a faction and it will be displayed in multiplayer matches. You must also pick a subfaction to assign to your fleet.

Subfactions govern the colour scheme of your ships, with plenty to choose from for each faction, picked from recognisable Warhammer 40,000, chapters, traitor legions, septs, craftworlds, and so on. Over 80 subfactions are available in total, with at least six per faction, so some are brand new to the universe, added to help flesh out our single-player campaigns.

Each is different, not only in the colour schemes of your ships, but some also bestow new admiral skills to choose from as well. This is not true of every subfaction - the balancing and complexity of more than 80 new admiral skills would be impossible - but allows for a light sprinkling of additional flavour where it seemed most appropriate. Every subfaction is available from the start of the game, so you’re free to match your tabletop army or try something new.

Fleet selection menu

We hope you enjoy all the cool ways to customise your fleet in Armada 2, alongside the 12 factions and the unique elements of the three massive campaigns that make designing and fielding your fleets there totally different.

Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2 releases on Steam 24 January 2019. You can already pre-order for Beta Access December 5 to 12, and a 10% discount!

Returning Battlefleet Gothic: Armada players on Steam instead benefit from a 25% loyalty discount on their preorder of Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2.

http://bit.ly/BFG2Steam