## Unleashing the CELESTIAL ARMADA: A New FORCE in the RTS Universe

The real-time strategies (RTS) are about to change, and this time it’s the stars that have come down to teach us how to play competitively. Stormgate, an innovative new RTS from the team at Frost Giant Studios (full of ex-developers from Starcraft) cracks open the RTS genre and brings a brand-new faction with it. The new Stormgate RTS from Frost Giant Studios, co-founded by Alan Dabiri (formerly at Blizzard) and Nathanias (once a pro-gamer and Gamespot journalist) will breathe new life into the RTS genre – and bring a fresh FORCE to play competitively.

The Celestial Armada: A FORCE of Angelic Innovation

At first glance, the Celestial Armada is tactical diversity realised. The angelic artificial beings of the alien philosophy, borne of the souls of an extinct super-civilisation, offer to the war-gamer a strategic weight on the battlefield that none of the human factions can match. The Celestial Armada eschews the familiar drone farms, colossal shields and wave after wave of mindless minions in favour of a smorgasbord of mobility, defence and resource management capabilities that dramatically alters the very gameplay of who gets to shoot and when.

Deploying the FORCE: Mobility and Resource Management

It’s strategy that takes to the air via the Airship/Arcship, a central base that can move around the map at will, allowing the Celestials a degree of flexibility in expansion and fortification that neither of the two other factions can really match. Add in Prisms, the worker units of this faction, and a builder unit – a Morph Core – that does the generatorating of structures, and you’ve got the faction that does it all on the move. In doing so, the Celestials aren’t just mixing up the resource management strategy – they’re also making it possible to create a FORCE of movement and adaptability to rival the earthbound behemoths of siege weaponry that characterise the game’s other two races.

A FORCE Multiplied: Combat and Strategy

Armed with new combat units and tactics, the Celestial influence permeates across the campaign map, with its presence felt and feared across the entire campaign. The Armada’s strength lies in Power – the limited yet highly effective resource that boosts the ability of units in combat. The simple yet powerful Argent trooper is a good example, paired with the Scanner that can boost their mobility across the battlefield, as well as the Kri units that generate copious amounts of firepower. With energy-dependent attack upgrades, combined air and ground assaults make the Celestials a FORCE to be reckoned with. Large, heavy-hitting units such as the Vector and Saber vehicles, or the nimble but deadly Scythe, dominate the battlefield and retreat back to their troops, encouraging a playstyle that is as aggressive as it is strategic.

The Power of FORCE: Keeping the Armada Charged

At the core of the Celestial playstyle lies Power, a resource that flows through the entire Celestial methodology – from base expansion to unit engagement. Power Banks are huge strategic targets, refuelling units and powering the high-octane offence that defines the very essence of the Celestial playstyle. This reliance on Power not only adds strategic depth to the celestial but also adds a layer of frailty, a weakness that can be leveraged by a good opponent, adding balance to the celestial force.

Echoes of the Void: The Celestial Casters

Their powerful casters are the finishing touches that correlate to the magic-wielding units of classic RTS faction proposals, only celestial. The Animancer has spells that redistributed health and energy, that could swing a fight with stealth and speed buffs, and that could bring a black hole hurtling onto the battlefield. It captures the essence of the celestial force’s dedication to strategic diversity, resource management, and tactical mobility that Armada brings to the equation.

Facing the Celestial FORCE: Strategy and Counterplay

The Celestial Armada, by changing up the strategic metagame of Stormgate, forces people to learn new strategies and new counters to strategies, and provides a great testament to Frost Giant’s commitment to improving the game of RTS. Meant to take on the Storm and Artifact factions, the Celestial Armada is all about the interplay of mobility, resource management, power usage and forcefield-bending RTS chess.

Understanding FORCE in the RTS Realm

In Stormgate, the Staff, Kite and Ship represent not just physical force, but a balancing act of strategy, innovation and resource allocation that define force as everything from the weather patterns that shape your campaign to the operational strategies like supply lines, resource harvesting and mobility management that bring strength to any force. In the apposition of the weapon and the wind inside player psychology, force emerges – through the frame of the celestial panorama – as a multivalent element in strategy that gives it a depth, diversity and dynamism that players need to adapt to so that they can reconceptualise the standard tactics of the genre in response to a fluid landscape of possibilities before them.

Force is not just a means to an end in Stormgate; it is the generative impulse behind celestial strategy, innovation and the future of RTS gameplay in the stars.