Play Beyond All Reason with friends and AI — on a new map every game
Everything below is done in Eclipse, the free unofficial launcher for Beyond All Reason. The offline parts are free, and so are the online rooms. Beyond All Reason itself is free at beyondallreason.info.
Against the AI, offline
Beyond All Reason's own AIs on a map nobody has played. The AI runs on your computer; nothing is sent anywhere.
Create a skirmish
Open Eclipse and press Create. Choose Against AI, offline as the game type and type your name. Pick the teams — 1v1 up to 8v8, or a free for all — and Eclipse fills the other side with AI.
Pick the map
Choose a style (open land, mountains, islands…), a size and a biome, or leave them on Random. The map is generated in about seven seconds and saved to your Maps library, so you can replay it or rebuild it from its name.
Choose the opponent
The default AI is BARbarIAn, the one the game ships with, in four difficulties: Easy, Medium, Hard and Hard aggressive. For a defence game pick Scavengers or Raptors: they come in waves and get stronger with time. The Simple AIs are for learning the controls.
A room for your friends
Eclipse hosts rooms on its own server. Your friends need Eclipse too (the installer is about 60 MB); they do not need to find or download the map, the room gives it to them by name.
Host
Press Create, choose Online game, name the room and set the teams. The room appears in everyone's Play list; friends join from there, or you invite them from the room.
Fill the teams
Not enough people? Right-click your own name in the room and Add AI — any difficulty, on either team, as many as you like. An AI you add runs on your computer. Mixed games (two friends plus two Hard AIs against four Mediums) are the best way to introduce someone.
Generate the map
Type !genmap 2v2 in the room chat, or !genmap 4v4 MOUNTAIN_RANGE for a style. Everyone gets the same map from its name — no file is sent. Do not like it? !genmap again.
Start boxes
Pick a preset (north vs south, corners, east vs west) and the start boxes are drawn on the minimap for everyone. The map's start areas are listed under each map in the gallery.
Votes
Whoever made the room is the boss. Everybody else can call a vote with !cv in front of a command — !cv genmap 3v3 — and the room decides.
Parties
Open the Party tab, invite a friend, and join a room together: press Balance and the party ends up on one team.
Keep it fair, even with mixed skill
The map is mirrored
Every generated map is symmetric: both sides get the same ground, the same chokes and metal spots worth the same. Nobody wins because they knew the map.
Ratings and balance
Eclipse keeps a rating per player from the games on its server. Balance in a room sorts the teams by it, and keeps parties together.
A bonus for the newer player
Right-click a player and choose Add bonus: a slider from 0 to 100 %. A +30 % bonus means 30 % more metal and energy from everything they build, and every reclaim is worth 30 % more. Enough to let a beginner play with veterans.