Steel Division 2 - Blog Post - Multiplayer Army General

Hello all!

We hope that everyone is doing fine.

As you might remember, we have been talking for some time now about introducing multiplayer into Steel Division 2’s strategic Army General mode. Well - you guessed it - we are getting very close to implement this popular-requested functionality in the near future.

In today’s post, we’ll take a closer look at what online play in Army General will entail.

However, before we continue, the whole Eugen team sincerely hopes that all of our fans and players are well and healthy. We are still hard at work - just from a different place (home). To the community: stay strong, keep safe, and see you on the battlefield!





We always envisioned the Army General mode in Steel Division 2 to be an in-depth experience in commanding units and formations on a massive, strategic level. It would allow us to broaden the perspective from the tactical battle to a campaign dimension, expanding the combat experience across multiple days and kilometers. This opens up an exciting new dynamic.

As a single-player experience, we never stopped working on what an Army General campaign can offer, but we feel it’s getting pretty close to its final form. Introducing an online component, and allowing players to fight against each other, was one of our original objectives when we launched Steel Division 2. Alas, having a great idea is one thing - working it out, prototyping it and making it fun is something completely different. It took us a bit longer, but we got there in the end!

Along the way, we realized that we needed to separate online play in Army General into two constitutive elements: cooperative and versus (also known as Cooperative Mode and Battle Mode).





The first multiplayer experience we want to introduce in Army General is a 1v1 versus Battle Mode. This is a pretty straightforward experience, on paper, but making it real and working properly within the complex machinery that makes up the innards of the Army General mode required some additional time and effort.

In Battle Mode, each player takes command of a separate army. Everything else is as normal: each player moves their units around during their turn and engages into battle before handing over the turn to the other player. We have added extra information about the opponent’s actions to make the experience as easy and comfortable as possible. If needed, a tactical battle can also be resolved using our Autoresolve mechanic. We decided against having players taking their turns simultaneously due to design constraints and the unforeseen ramifications in the underlying game systems - simply put, we couldn’t guarantee a fun experience in the same way.

The Battle Mode will be the first to be released. We don’t have a date yet, but it will come soon!





The second experience we want to introduce into Army General is the Cooperative Mode. The idea is to allow up to 3 players to join forces and play against the AI. One of the players will act as the host and gains the ability to invite the others into a shared Army General campaign. The host is also the one who can take all the strategic actions during a turn; of course, the other players can provide vital advice while they spectate.

Much in the same way as a normal Army General campaign, the host can decide to auto-resolve a battle or to fight it. When this happens, each player takes command of a battalion. If there aren’t enough battalions? No problem, the game adapts and allows everyone to play at the same time.

Cooperative mode is focused squarely on 100% human players battling it out against 100% AI-controlled opponents. We are still putting the finishing touches on this mode. When we have more news, we’ll let you know!



In the meantime, don’t hesitate to let us know what you think of Steel Division 2 or its latest expansion, The Fate of Finland. As you know, getting the Steel Division 2 History Pass gives you access to all the three history DLC planned, two of which have already been released: The Fate of Finland expansion and The Death on the Vistula expansion.


https://store.steampowered.com/app/988171/Steel_Division_2__History_Pass/

You can always drop us a line on Steam and Eugen forums, or on our social channels (Facebook and Twitter). You can also join us on our [https://discord.gg/TEeBArm]Discord server or Reddit page. Especially Discord is a great place to find other Steel Division 2 players to kick off an online or coop match!

Stay safe and take care. See you on the battlefield, commander!