Tips and Tricks

As Thrawn's Revenge is a total conversion mod for Star Wars: Empire at War, many new players and even experienced players may not know all the facets of the Empire at War Expanded mods. This page lists many Tips and Tricks to help both new and old players navigate some aspects of the mod, from basic information such as navigating the UI to general strategies for tactical battles. As a forewarning, it is advisable for new players to have played the base game Star Wars: Empire at War: Forces of Corruption before playing Thrawn's Revenge, as the foundation of the game persists into the mod, so basic gameplay elements remain the same.

Basic Information

Navigating the UI

Each EAWX mod revamps the User Interface, or UI, to include many new buttons and menus, which players familiar with Empire at War but new to the EAWX mods may find confusing at first. In this section is a breakdown of the Galactic-level UI in Galactic Conquest, to help breakdown the information the player is presented with.

The Galactic-level User Interface in Galactic Conquest in Thrawn's Revenge

The first section of the User Interface new players should familiarize themselves with is the lower left-hand corner of the screen, where the minimap as well as multiple buttons and menus are located.

The sections of this part of the UI are broken down as follows:

1. The Planetary Information button, which can display shipyard level, orbital defense strength, ground structure slots, credit value and unique icons on the galactic map for all planets.
2. This button allows access to the Galactic Log, the Campaign History, the Tech Tree, and the Planetary Summary menus.
3. The Cinematic Camera Button.
4. The Victory Conditions and Mission Log button.
5. The Resources Menu.
6. The Faction Government Information Menu.
7. Galactic Faction Statistics
8. The Influence and Unique Units Menu.
9. The Story Events Menu.
10. AI Modifiers, Hero and unit tooltip overview.
11. The Advanced Options Menu, which you must have selected a planet first to view and access.

The second section of the UI that new players should be familiar with is the Galactic Info UI, located in the upper left-hand corner of the screen.

The sections of this part of the UI are broken down as follows:

1. Your current stockpile of Credits.
2. Your Galactic Population Capacity, broken down by your current Unit Population Usage / your Maximum Population Capacity.
3. The current cycle of the campaign, in Thrawn's Revenge each cycle is considered one month in-game.
4. A cycle clock, counting down to when the current cycle ends.
5. Your gross credit per cycle income.
6. Your in-game Year and month, as well as your current selected Difficulty.
7. Your Infrastructure and Resources, which shows your Infrastructure Score, your Ship Crew stockpile and your per cycle Ship Crew accumulation, your Ship Upkeep (how much it costs to maintain your fleets and special structures), and your Net Credit Income (Your gross credit income minus your Ship Upkeep costs).
8. Your selected planet information, which details the planet name, its current owner, the influence level on the planet, the economic station, the construction station, and its secondary space defense structure present.
9. The Galactic HoloNet Feed, which updates whenever a faction takes a planet or a hero dies.

Knowing these sections of the UI is invaluable, as it will help players understand the mod and will help them consult the various menus added in Thrawn's Revenge, which have all the information players could want to know in-game and available to them at all times.

Reading Tooltips

Next to the Galactic-level UI, the Unit/Hero Tooltips will be the next major thing that players need to be able to read and understand in Thrawn's Revenge, as the Tooltips are fairly different from base game Empire at War.

The tooltip for an Imperial Star Destroyer

To understand the basic Tooltips for units in Thrawn's Revenge, examine them piece by piece, beginning with the top of the tooltip.

• At the very top of the Tooltip, you will see the unit name, listed here as "Imperial-I Star Destroyer." Immediately to the left of the unit name is the unit icon, which will match the icon on the build bar if you can build the unit on the galactic level, and the command bar in tactical battles with the unit. These are the primary means of identifying the unit.
• To the left of the unit icon is the Unit Population, signified by yellow numbers in a black circle. This number indicates how much Population Capacity the unit takes up on both the galactic level and in tactical battles.
• Directly beneath the unit name is where players will find the Ship Crew Cost if the unit in question is a space unit, which will tell the player how many ship crews this unit required in order to be built.
• At the top right-most corner of the tooltip is the Unit Cost, visible when hovering over a unit on the build bar. This will tell the player how many credits a unit required in order to be built.

These items at the top of the build bar, specifically the Unit Population, Ship Crew Cost, and Unit Cost, are very important to know, as a faction must be able to meet all three of these requirements in order to produce a unit. A unit cannot be produced if a faction lacks the available Population Capacity for a unit, the necessary ship crews to man a vessel, or lacks the credits to pay for the unit.

The tooltip for a Storm Commando platoon

The next major part of a unit's tooltip will be its description, which functions to tell the player what the unit is and possibly some of its history within Star Wars. Descriptions vary from unit to unit, but most go over a general overview of the unit in question. Following the description section is the "Stats" section of a unit, which detail all relevant tactical information for a unit. This section is broken down as follows:

• Company/Squadron: Most common with Infantry, Ground Vehicles, Starfighters, and Gunships, this section denotes how many individual units are contained within a platoon or squadron unit on the galactic level.
• Squad: A part of infantry stat blocks, the Squad section tells the player how many individual units compose of a selectable squad in tactical battles.
• Health/Hull: Ground units will display "Health" here while Space units will display "Hull", this metric is the actual hit points of a unit. The identifier in parenthesis (Infantry/Capital) denote the unit's armor classification, which affects damage taken and damage reductions to certain kinds of weapons. Players can refer to the Unit Strength & Weaknesses chart on the Thrawn's Revenge page for a breakdown of damage and armor relation within Thrawn's Revenge.
• Shields: This section shows a units shield hit point, if it possesses any. The metric within brackets [3/R] shows how many hit points the shield will recharge after going a period of time without being damaged, recharging the shown number of shield hit points every three seconds. Like with Health/Hull, the in-parenthesis identifier denotes the unit's shield-type classification, which affects damage taken and any damage reductions it may have to certain kinds of weapons.
• Speed: This value denotes a unit's speed, which can be used to compare how fast one unit is over another.
  • Acceleration: A subcategory of a unit's speed, Acceleration measures how fast a unit gets up to its top speed.
  • Turn: Another subcategory of unit speed, Turn speed is the pace at which a unit can turn.
• Weapons: There are a wide array of weapon types in Thrawn's Revenge used by the hundreds of units within the mod, but they all follow a standard format in their stat block. The first line is identifying the weapon itself. The first value indicated after the weapon identifier is how many times the weapon is fired or deals damage within a second. The second number indicates the gap between when the weapon fires initially and when it fires again. The final number indicated on the Weapon Stat Block is the range of the weapon, what is the distance it can attempt to target and deal damage against an enemy unit.

Following the Stat Block, some units will have a Bonuses section, which will detail any special bonuses that the unit itself provides, such as any effects that may let it deflect blaster fire or if it is a support unit that is capable of healing other units. The final section on a unit's tooltip will be its Capabilities, which will list certain things that the unit is capable of because of its unit classification. For example, Infantry units have the Infantry capability, which allow them to capture reinforcement points and build pads, while most Capital Ships possess one or two capabilities called Air Support, which allow it to provide to ground battles either Orbital Bombardments if they possess Turbolasers, Bombing Runs if they possess bombers, or both if they maintain both.

Being able to read a Unit's Tooltip is fundamental in all Empire at War Expanded mods, as all game-relevant information for a unit can be found contained within.