WH40k: DoW Soulstorm – 2nd Faction Revealed
By Steve on Sunday, October 28th, 2007 at 5:37 AM PST In Computer, Game Companies, Game Platforms, THQ
It has been nearly a month since THQ announced Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War – Soulstorm, the third expansion to its wildly popular Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War real time strategy game for PC. The announcement revealed many things, such as the game’s anticipated release in early 2008, the introduction of air units to DoW, a single player campaign expanded upon the territorial concept that WH40:DoW Dark Crusade had, and as well as the announcement that there would be two new factions bringing the total playable faction count in WH40k: Dawn of War to nine.
The odd thing during THQ’s Soulstorm announcement was that only one of the factions was revealed. We were given news that one of the new factions was the Dark Eldar, the twisted brethren to the ancient Eldar race. However, we were not graced with info regarding the 2nd faction. I’m not sure if this withholding of information was a scheme by THQ to generate buzz or a cruel tease to drive the fans insane. Nonetheless, it certainly stirred things up in the WH40k: DoW community. Debates were made and lengthy forum threads were dedicated to “guessing” who this new faction was. Well, it looks like we can end this insanity once and for all.
Gamespot recently scored a glimpse of WH40k: DoW – Soulstorm in person. Among many of the things we already knew about Soulstorm, Gamespot revealed several things that we didn’t know. The most important revelation was that the previously unknown second faction introduced in Soulstorm will be none other than the Sisters of Battle. Here is Gamespot’s take on them:
The Sisters of Battle, on the other hand, are basically heavily armed warrior nuns and the feared enforcers of the Imperium. As described to us, they’re basically the Spanish Inquisition in space. The Sisters are driven by faith, which lets them call on their God-Emperor for “Acts of the Faith,” which are powerful abilities, like a protective hand that shields them from damage or raining brimstone down on the battlefield. These acts are fueled by faith, which can be generated if the Sisters divert resources from unit production and research. That will make you have to choose how much to spend on the economy and how much to spend on generating faith.
Or as I like to call them: Space Marines in skirts. Here are a few other details regarding Soulstorm that we didn’t know before:
- The DC-like single player campaign will span across 4 planets and 3 moons.
- Soulstorm will be a standalone expansion just like Dark Crusade.
- Like DC, you’ll need previous DoW & expansion serials to access/unlock the other races in multi.
- Dark Eldar can exploit a third resource: Souls.
- All factions will get air units.
- There will be achievements.
- Each faction will have its own set of achievements.
- There will be online multiplayer achievements (i.e. win streak).
Gamespot also put up ten new in-game screenshots of Soulstorm showing the various units of the Sisters of Battle and Dark Eldar. Don’t forget to check out the Soulstorm trailer above too.
So no Tyranids? *sniff* At least not as a playable faction. We can always hope they will somehow work them into the single player story to prep for a 4th expansion or true sequel.
Via Gamespot
Well, they have said, or I’ve read that the Tyranids aren’t practical to implement in the DoW engine, so if they make an appearance, it’ll be 2.
1) I sincerely hope the campaign isn’t just the DC one but longer. If I want to play a row of skirmishes, I’ll simply play a row of skirmishes, no need to disguise it as a bad campaign.
2) I like the idea of harvesting souls. I might have to play as them.
3) Air should be fun, but I bet that there will be one over-powered faction air force.
Sisters of Battle…I’m not too versed in Warhammer 40k universe stuff, but…is there really need for ANOTHER imperium faction? There’s already the Space Marines and Imperial Guard, now a 3rd? Are we saying this is to counter the fact that Eldar have technically two faction’s? If so, that’s rubbish because Imperium already had two. Why don’t they just go ahead and make every damn chapter under the Space Marines, starting with the expansion of the Grey Knights into a full faction, instead of giving them one Godly unit.
I also hope they do a lot of balance changes and get rid of some of the ridiculous limitations that DC brought in. I’m not saying we should be spamming our bases with turrets, but the amount you’re allowed is only good enough to protect one base if you have all 5 of your HQ’s turrets allowance built around one HQ. I predict this will be a good expansion, but only that. 7-8 is my estimate.
“Well, they have said, or I’ve read that the Tyranids aren’t practical to implement in the DoW engine, so if they make an appearance, it’ll be 2.”
I’ve heard that before and it’s rubbish. The engine can hack it, as someone has already worked up a mod already. I’ve also played plenty of Survival maps that had insane amount of units on the screen. Tyranids could be scaled to this level.
Remember that DoW has never been about imitating table top gameplay or rule sets. DoW makes a few sacrifices here and there to make the game more enjoyable as a video game.
With that said, I can’t see any excuse for avoiding Tyranids other than perhaps they want to save them for later. We all know they are milking this franchise for all its worth anyway.
And if all else fails, they can just give the Nids much shorter unit build times, and make them come out fully reinforced.
‘Nids would have been better and aren’t the sisters of battle just female space marines? wouldn’t they have the same units its ridiculous at least the dark eldar have some different units
Im Just So Happy..
I can’t wait 4 it to come out!
-i think u should be able to have 2 of most ubre squads(i.e. obliterators,kasrkins, etc.) and 10 turrets per base and a slightly larger squad cap
-dark eldar seems cool, sisters of battle seem cool also, but kinda redundant
-air units will either be awesome or a complete washout
-new larger campaign=
i just want some new ground units too that would be cool…….
DoW is a very good game… But i agree with Mike. why did they limet the amount of uber cool units like the terminators, kasrkins, and harlaquens
. now i thenk that the brought in the sisters of battle because you only heard of the inquisadors in the first DoW game. but come on.. air units 
… that will probably ruin the experiance, i have built all my stradagys around only ground units. over all i do not care how the single player campain will be played i just like slatering my oponits.
P.S. sorry about my speling i know it is atroshis
i don’t understand why they don’t fully do the tyranids because i have it and they use some troops from other races but they should fix it and put it as an expansion with inquisition for soulstorm because then it will have all the races then that will be fun
WHY the sisters of battle? GOD TELL ME WHY!!!
I would have preferred Tyranids by miles, i have the tyranid mod courtsey to dow filefront, and there is a few units that need tweaking, but they would have been insane.
But you must remember that Tyranids will almost certainly come out next expansion as there are no more races… unless you count Daemon or Witch Hunters, who are sisters of battle.
I guess we must wait yet another year and a half for the tyranids.
yh but deamon hunters are a mod on filefront they are different to sisters of battle
can someone explain to me y so many people want tyranids on the game
I have 10,000 mods for this game
And I have the tyranid mod 