Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak

Alright, let's get into the nitty-gritty of Part 2 for Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak. This section is less about direct gameplay steps and more about understanding the game's evolution through its patches and the underlying mechanics that make it tick. Think of it as getting the inside scoop on how the game was balanced and what technical bits you might run into.

First off, let's look at the changes that came with Homeworld V1.04, released on October 21, 1999. Relic was busy tweaking the units:

• The support frigate's repair rate got a nerf.
• Repair corvettes also saw their repair rate reduced.
• Defender firepower was decreased.
• The hyperspace ram ability was altered.
• Defender gun stats were adjusted.
• Heavy Corvette build time and cost were reduced.
• MultiGun Corvette build time was reduced.
• Minelayer Corvette build time and cost were reduced.
• Cloaked Fighter gun stats were adjusted.
• Carrier build time was decreased, but their hyperspace cost went up.
• Attack Bomber armor got a boost.
• Missile armor and tracking were decreased.
• Missile Destroyer mass increased.

Beyond the unit tweaks, V1.04 brought some quality-of-life and multiplayer improvements:

• The bounty rating in multiplayer was capped at 250.
• Homeworld now checks all available CD-ROM drives for the Homeworld CD, making it more flexible where you put the disc.
• Cheat detection for multiplayer games was added.
• Screensavers will no longer pop up while you're playing.
• Various save game bugs were fixed.
• New features were added to the lobby for multiplayer.
• The game was made compatible with NT4 and Windows 2000.

Now, let's rewind a bit to Homeworld V1.03, which dropped on September 16, 1999. This patch mainly addressed issues from V1.02:

• A persistent problem with auto-detecting firewalls was fixed; it used to incorrectly report that you were behind a firewall.
• OpenGL support, previously unavailable for Nvidia TNT cards under Windows 9x due to driver issues, was re-enabled for Win98 (but still not for Win95).
• The Intel i740 graphics chip became more reliable under Direct 3D.

The guide author also shared some insights from their test systems, which can be super helpful for troubleshooting or just understanding performance:

• Test System 1: AMD900 CPU, 512MB RAM, 32MB TNT2, 17-inch monitor, 40GB HDD, Win ME. This system ran flawlessly, with only occasional crashes in skirmish games when there were too many enemy ships.
• Test System 2: AMD 1400XP, 1GB RAM, 64MB ATi Radeon, 17-inch monitor, 80GB HDD, Win 2000. This system was generally good, though the unpatched version had startup issues. Minor problems occurred in the 15th mission, where ships were sometimes forgotten or transformed into other types (imagine your destroyers becoming frigates!). Save game warnings due to disk access settings in Win2K also popped up. The author loved this system for its ability to suspend the game without crashes, making guide writing easier.

For those looking at the official specs, here's what Relic recommended back in the day:

• Minimums: Pentium II 233, 32 MB RAM, 100 MB HD Space, 4x CD-ROM, 4 MB PCI Video Card (16-bit color, DirectX compatible), 16-bit DirectX compatible Soundcard. The author notes that onboard sound *does* work, but an old system meeting these minimums would be painfully slow and prone to crashing in larger battles.
• Preferred: Pentium II 350+, 64 MB RAM, 400 MB HD Space, 12 MB+ 3D Accelerated Video Card. Again, the author suggests these are still on the low side for a smooth experience.
• Internet/Multiplayer: 32-bit ISP with 28.8+ kbps Modem or LAN. The author couldn't offer much advice here, having primarily played on LANs and not having access to the large ones used previously.

Finally, the guide uses some specific terminology you'll see throughout:

• Guns: Usually refers to massdrivers on most ships.
• Bombers: Specifically plasma bombs used by assault frigates and attack bombers.
• Ion Cannon: The blue (Taiidan/Kadeshi) or red (Kushan) energy weapon.
• Super Ion Cannon: The powerful, rapid-fire beam weapon used by the Bentusi.
• MS: Mother Ship (can also mean Carrier in multiplayer).
• CV: Carrier.
• HCV: Heavy Cruiser (also called

Ship Orders:

1. Evasive: Ships will not move or fire to defend themselves. Strike craft split into pairs and engage the entire enemy group. Evasive increases fuel consumption and speed for strike craft only; capital ships are unaffected in speed.
2. Neutral: Similar to Evasive, but ships will fire to defend themselves without moving to attack. Engaging squads, they will attack the entire group.
3. Aggressive: Ships will not evade enemy fire. They will attack, move into attack positions, and follow nearby enemy ships. When engaging a group, they will attack one ship of the group.

Orders can be changed mid-combat. For example, you can use aggressive inbound, then change to evasive to turn fighters quickly, then change back to aggressive.

Formations:

• Broad: Generally considered useless.
• Delta: Best for attack bombers.
• X: Only good for fighter engagements.
• Claw: Useful only against single ships.
• Wall: Best for corvettes as anti-fighter walls and for support frigates to support an entire group. Very vulnerable to burst weapons if using for fighters.
• Sphere: Useful for escort. In multiplayer (MP), this modifies the rate of fire of all fighters.
• Custom: Locks ships into their current formation. Can only be set, not called.

Capital ships should generally not be formatted as they act better and the whole group can fire at the same time. Support craft can effectively support the entire fleet when in a tight group, only needing slight movement to use repair beams instead of flying long distances.

Fighters often work better unformatted. Interceptors set to aggressive will move as if in evasive when attacking an enemy wing, turning faster as they do not need to maintain neat lines. Be careful of heavy fighters, as they can be a runway for enemy fighters if you approach them.

Formation Effectiveness Against Specific Targets:

• Claw: Best versus capital ships.
• Delta: Best for bombers versus capital ships.
• Broad: Useless.
• Wall: Defenders only.
• Sphere: Best for defenders and defense.
• X: Appears good for fighters versus fighters, though this is debated without evidence.

Heavies are an exception; placing them in walls allows nothing to get through, and support craft can easily support them due to their small space requirement compared to capital ships. Mixed-up heavies also work well, though support frigates might have difficulty reaching them.

Additional Formation Notes:

• If fighters must be in formations, keep groups small. Mixing 75 bombers into an X formation created a gigantic, slow-turning, and highly vulnerable formation where the edges often didn't get a chance to fire. Turning is worst as formations turn collectively, not individually, except in small groups. This applies even more to capital ships; putting 100+ frigates in an X, Claw, Broad, or Delta makes the formation too big and horrendous to turn, limiting fire of edge ships and making support difficult.
• A single gigantic Claw formation of 75 bombers was effective but vulnerable, moving extremely slowly and taking ages to turn. This allowed bombers to float above the victim ship for a long time, killing capital ships extremely quickly, though the tips of the Claw could not fire.
• Larger unformatted fighter groups (25+ fighters) have a high possibility of shooting each other, though it is rare to lose fighters this way, often only resulting in yellow damage. This does not happen often in smaller groups.

Fighter Maneuvers:

Fighters are fast units capable of extreme maneuvers, avoiding enemy fire easily. They are weak alone but powerful in wings of 15-20, and obscene in wings of 60+. They require fuel, with consumption varying between combat and normal cruising. Fighters cannot hyperspace without aid from hyperspace gateways or other ships, and most need to be pointed in the direction of the target. Their capable extreme maneuvers include:

• 180-degree pitch
• Strafe in any direction
• Continually fly in directions opposite to their engine block. Capital ships can do this but not continually; fighters in a Sphere guarding another can move in one direction and fire in another indefinitely. Capital ships do this, then turn to the horizontal axis before moving off.
• Pull off the wheel of death (though this is more associated with corvettes).
• Rapidly change direction.
• The defender 2 rake.

Glossary:

• Capital ship: Large, high-crew ships that self-repair, cannot dock, and leave no trails.
• Wheel of death: The front of the ship points towards an enemy ship while going in a circular orbit around its target.
• Lt corvette: Light corvette.
• Multi vett: Multi-gun corvette.
• Mini missiles: Corvette-based missiles.
• Normal missiles: MD missiles.
• Furball: A messy ship-to-ship fight.
• Defeat in detail: Using massive and overwhelming force.

Corvettes are larger than strike craft, possessing more firepower and armor at the cost of RUs (resource units) and speed. They require fuel and have larger tanks, lasting longer. Like fighters, they cannot hyperspace without assistance from hyperspace gateways or other ships. Corvettes bank instead of performing a 180-degree pitch but compensate with omnidirectional turrets.

Capital Ships, such as Frigates, are general-purpose warships that can serve as a fleet's backbone against anti-fighter or strike formations. They have limited self-repair capabilities and can hyperspace alone.

Super Capital Ships include destroyers, cruisers, and carriers. These are large, slow, and powerful vessels that are slow to build and require significant RUs, crew, and have better self-repair abilities. They can be used for ramming and can hyperspace alone.

Motherships are the largest vessels, acting as carriers, fleet foundries, refueling stations, and minor combat vessels. They are vulnerable, and losing one often means losing the game. Scuttling a Mothership can destroy nearly all fighters and frigates, and heavily damage super capital ships within range.

Explanation of Terms:

• Mass: Weight of the ship.
• Armour: Hit points of the ship.
• Firepower: Damage output of the ship. Varies in formations; sphere formation reduces firepower to 50-70% of an attack run.
• Coverage: Percentage of a sphere a ship can cover (press the cover button to crouch behind walls or objects) when stationary to intercept.
• Type: The kind of weaponry the ship uses.
• Manoeuvrability: How agile the ship is.
• Max Velocity: Maximum speed, with separate values for normal and combat speeds. Scouts can briefly use afterburners for higher speeds.
• Special Action: Unique abilities a ship may possess, like afterburners.
• Fuel: Determines how long a ship can operate before needing refueling.
• Evasive/Neutral/Aggressive: Combat stances affecting ship behavior and fuel consumption.
• Service time: Time taken for support craft (strike craft only) to dock, fully repair, and launch from support frigates. This can take 10-15 seconds plus docking/launching time, and is generally measured against support frigates.
• RU Cost: The cost in resource units to build the ship.
• Available from: The mission number from which the ship can be acquired.
• Time to build: The duration in minutes and seconds required to construct the ship.
• RU per sec: Resource units generated or consumed per second.

Scout

• Mass: 40 tons
• Armour: 110
• Firepower: 12
• Coverage: 8%
• Type: guns
• Manoeuvrability: very high
• Max Velocity: 1500 m/s (with afterburners), 1000 m/s (normal)
• Special Action: afterburners
• Fuel: Evasive: 6 minutes (combat), 10 minutes (normal); Neutral/Aggressive: 8-9 minutes (combat), 13 minutes (normal)
• Service time: 13-16 seconds
• RU Cost: 35
• Available from: mission 1
• Time to build: 12 seconds
• RU per sec: 2.9

Scouts are cheap, fast, and very useful for engaging interceptors, especially when set to evasive mode. They are hindered by fuel limitations and fleet size caps. Afterburners consume more fuel, reducing combat time. In early versions of Homeworld, a cheat allowed scouts to become nearly impossible to hit.

Interceptor

• Mass: 60 tons (V1.05: 10 tons)
• Armour: 160
• Firepower: 18 (bugs have reported 26)
• Coverage: 8%
• Type: guns
• Manoeuvrability: very high
• Max Velocity: 875 m/s
• Special Action: none
• Fuel: Evasive: 6 minutes (combat), 10 minutes (normal); Neutral/Aggressive: 8-9 minutes (combat), 13 minutes (normal)
• Service time: 14-19 seconds
• RU Cost: 55
• Available from: mission 2