I don't get how it is guessing. I guess your thinking the skill(which is called subversion) only effects things being built right then? It lasts 600 seconds at third level, which is 10 minutes. So for 10 minutes you can see everything that moves through that planets gravity well(it gives line of sight as well). So now the enemy has a planet that you can see what he's doing, and it takes him longer to construct ships. Perhaps you've noticed that players ussually don't stop building ships when a war is going on? They'll keep building ships to reinforce their army, while any reinforcments for your troops has to fly all the way across the map. Now his reinforcments are being slowed, maybe even to the point that your ships can get there faster than his(would depend on the map.)

What I've found to make Subversion usefull, is the fact that it stacks. At level 3 it does 45% production slow down. I can't remember the cooldown time but it isin't very long. The best I've been able to do was -225% production time. So if 100% is double the time, 200% would be triple the time. So that is making the time to construct ships go up by more than 3 times.

So if you actually use Subversion and target planets with frigate factories, it can be useful. I like it for line of sight, as sometimes I will push past certain planets to hit more valuable inner ones. I can leave a subversion placed and sometimes see when the enemy is chasing me. Or, if I attack a planet and have to fall back, I can see if the enemy is going to follow me or not. If he doesn't and heads somewhere else, I'll know exactly when to phase back in and continue what was started.



I also get Subversion because Phase out Hull just takes away valuable anti-matter that I need for Distort Gravity. Distort gravity, as you mentioned, it awesome. You can fly ships around with them chasing your marauder while your other ships fire away from behind. Though recently players have gotten more intelligent and actually stop their ships from following after a bit...

Phase Out Hull only lasts 6 seconds or something, that just doesn't seem worth it for the anti-matter. I'd rather just zoom past the cap ship and make it have to slowly turn around to follow. Unless the player stops it, it will slowly turn and start to follow, which probably takes more than 6 seconds. Though some cap ships can fire backwards, the distort gravity can get you moving so fast that you get out of range soon enough.

The one use that sounded good to me of phase out hull though was to phase out your own ships when they were about to die. Then the enemy fleet would target a new ship, and when the phase out ended you could retreat. Thus saving you a ship that can fight in a future battle. I still prefer to get subversion before phase out hull though.

I agree with the idea that your are clueless. Phase out is the most powerful early ability. Only rivaled by raze planet in it's pure evilness. Maybe it doesn't see much use in your games vs AI, but vs players it kills capital ships literally.

It takes 7 seconds to power up for a phase jump. Thats about 21 to 35 seconds extra damage you get in before AM runs out.
If you got a phase jump inhibitor it again is a guaranteed kill, no matter how much micro the enemy has.

Later in the game when AM is basically infinite it can also be used to render the enemies strongest cap completely useless for the whole battle. Imagine that level 10 Radiace not being able to do anything at all for over a minute Quite useful I'd say.

You think Phase Out is the most powerful early ability? And you're calling me clueless?

For reasons already mentioned, its opportunity cost of losing one more rank of movement / subversion is too great.



If you move the Marauder into an enemy gravity well and have ships waiting in a friendly gravity well with a phase stabilizer in orbit, you can use the Marauder's level 6 ability to temporarily 'create' a phase lane directly to the planet it's orbiting. This would allow you to move the friendly ships right to the Marauder.

Also, the only way the ships would be able to ignore jump inhibitors is if the Marauder is using its distort gravity ability, and if the friendly ships were in the radius.

I'd also like to point out that you can visually tell if a frigate factory is producing something but you have to zoom in, then you can see sparks from the production and a semi-complete hull inside the factory.

I find Gravity bomb is the 'bomb' when you want to kill those caps!

This more or less sums up the way I see it being used, too. Early game harassment on the home system, or to stop crucial expansions. That being said, if they're relying on one system to pump their units, you can seriously lock down their production rate so that it won't matter how solid their economy is: they'll be sitting on a fat stack of money and watching units pop out once every 2 minutes only to be picked off by my (pardon the obvious pun) 'Marauding' war-band.

As for Phase Out Hull:

Anyone who doesn't see the power of a disable that stops what is most likely their best source of DPS in a fight (Cap ship), prevents escape, allows you time to position your fleet, and stops the use of any and all abilities CLEARLY has not played enough RTS games. Disables are king.

Haha, which reminds me of a funny idea I've had: In orbit of a star, keep your Marauder there to phase out one of their capital ships for as long as possible, with the increased anti-matter regen. Upgraded reactors to boost your energy pool, and you can probably tie up a ship for a few minutes . I mean, you don't have your Marauder, but presumably your units are off causing havoc all the same. This could be a huge piss-off.