The Death egg, the Skirantra and the KORTUL!!!!!!!!!

Wait......(reads title) what the..advent

hmmm probly the mothership, the progenitor and the halycon

or the mothership, radiance, and the halycon

EDIT: cko7 what about u?

Well anyway back to multiplayer practise.

The Halcyon Carrier also makes a good choice as a first cap, and it's becoming more common. When right next to an enemy, having the four SC can really make a difference.

Though ultimately, I usually seen at first, ProgenxHalcyon in any order.

RapturexHalcyon is a combination that might be worth a look. Especially with multiple Halcyons, so the Rapture can boost their SC while still being able to fight.

Progen, Radiance, Rapture for me as well. Progen colonizes early on, and regens shields. Radiance has a bunch of killer abilities. Animosity forces ships to target it, and the Rapture's vengence throws the damage back, with the progen regenerating the shields of the Radiance. Malice and cleansing brilliance also work well, and antimatter bomb targets those caps. Resurrection restores your Radiace if it takes too much damage from animosity. And converting the enemy's ships with the Rapture is nice. This combo can easily take out a starbase alone, though adding some illums with shield regen makes it easier.

I'll add in a Halcyon next (If I can), to kill the SC and amplify the illums, as well. And the Revelation's siege ability is nice, but it's still the worst Advent Cap.

Ok. First you need to evaluate where you are on the map.

If you are in the economy spot, the Progenitor makes the most sense, the colonization bonuses make logistic slots easier to obtain.  If you are in the economy spot, there is rarely any need for another capital ship though, unless you are forced to fleet, if this is the case, see below.

If you are fighting, the Halcyon really should be your unanimous choice capital ships.

Each of the three abilities the halcyon offers are extremely helpful, and i would prioritize them in this order

1. Adept Drone Anima (Extra Squadrons)

2. Amplify Energy Aura (Reduces cooldown on weapons, essentially increasing dps on each ship, which is awesome.)

3. Telekinetic push (Great for keeping bombers off a sb, or just from harassing your fleet.)

After my first Halcyon i usually go one of two ways (another fork in the road)

A. Fighting still intense

Another Halcyon really is quite practical in these situations, increased air superiority is crucial and forces the enemy to contemplate flak, in which case you can produce even more illuminators and crush him.

B. You beat the guy you were fighting, and now you need to continue on another guy.

Get the Revelation the Revelation has a couple really great abilities for this situation.

Faster bombing is great, as you want to be done as soon as you can with the guy you are fighting, and onto the next guy.

Also, the Revelation has the Clairvoyance ability which allows you to spy on other planets and place a remote sensor there for an extended period of time, so you can have a heads up on when your enemy is coming.

C. You got your guy, and now its time to ease off, kill his planets and establish an economy.

The Progenitor is the best choice, as the colonization bonuses will come in handy when setting up an economy.

Honestly, I totally agree that the Halcyon is an awesome choice for a front-line player, but I'd still err on the side of the Progen a lot of the time.  Shield Restore is great in combat, and the ability to get colonies going without having to drag along missionaries is invaluable (not to even mention the savings on infrastructure).  You can always get the Halcyon second, especially in team games where you can ask for a few thousand credits feed.  I often time my big push just so that I can bring in a second cap, and as Advent it's almost always a Halcyon.

Also keeps fighters away from your scouts or illuminators.  Seeing as any rushing Advent will use one or both of these, it's a great way to cut at your opponent's options.

Whats best to get as advent if your enemy is just spamming nothing but cap ships, I play with a friend on LAN and he just gets like 2-3 caps early game and uses most his credits upgrading them c..c

I was thinking halcyon's with bombers ? He never makes flak and very rarely SC :3

Can someone explain exactly what malice does?

Does the original target for damage have to be the selected target for malice?

Does the original target take 100% or 70%?

Do the others get 30% each or 30% among them?

What  if there is more than one original target?

Why are fewer than the allowed # of targets affected even though all are in range/  Is there a much smaller radius of effect from the selected target? 

With advent the progen really strikes out: shield reg, vengeance and cheap colonization of planets => lvl progen bitch to lvl 3, choose colonize twice and shield reg once.

Now get lots of scouts and lf if you got some distance to your enemy. Then kill the siege frigates in each grav well. Then immediately build one-three turrets and then move on with your colonization fleet. (btw: someone like to prog a space colonization like the one for civ 4?)

=> nough planets to bolster weak advent eco.

=> nough metal and crystal mines

=> nough logistic slots for both 2 civil and 3-5 military labs early on

=> get culture and trade after you built your first 30-50 advanced ships and boom.

So the best cap combo for advent is: PROGEN. no other cap needed within first 15-20 minutes.

Later yes, you want to counter that lvl 6 marza with a radiance, you want to add firepower to your lums with halcyon or your strikecraft with a rapture. These are all good choices then. But dont get ahead building 4-6 advent caps without fleet. They are too weakly armored, esp. against Vasari assailants and egg-nanites.

I don't think it's that the strategy is no longer viable, because it is. I think it's more that Progen, Progen lends itself more to a fight where attrition in the battle is the dominating factor, A.K.A. I'm saying this was used a lot more when it was lrf vs. lrf battles. Now that counters are  more viable to just about everything, you don't see it as much because sure the Progen will live, but no amount of shield regen will save the fleet around the progen.

For instance, if you made me pick between the fleet of

2 progen and 50 illums vs. 1 akkan, 1 marza and 150 scouts, the TEC fleet will winout every time. The counter game is just a whole lot different now, so variety in the caps will help more, however, I will part with these words:

As long as you use a second cap to some attributable impact, then yes, a second progen is quite powerful. It's just not as common because the other caps can prove to be more viable in a larger variety of situations.

actualy you can defeat 150 scoots with 50 illums ^^'

double progen 4 guardians ^^

hummm dunno but i'd go for scoot scram while spaming 30 disciplz for reinforcement all at once

i'd use illums right in middle of scoots, and make em go on their back to make em turn around

so that several times and you won't loose much while killing bad, once disc rdy i'd make illum move to well edge, make dis jump in right on scoots and have guards with repulse (if possible) positioned so scoots can't run out

if not repulse then leave guards in middle of illums

prob for ion bolt is you can't use it on both progens fast enough

having 2 akkans would be stupid and since my second progen would have malice exept of colonise i think scoots would have a hard time ^^

Radiance has two complementary abilities with itself:  animosity and energy absorptive armor.  EAA is pretty much a no-brainer anyway.  At levels 4-5, throw Detonate Antimatter on auto-cast; use the little bit of extra antimatter you got.  He'll find the right targets for you.  Too much thinking for me.

Combine Radiance with Progen, tank up.  Radiance forces enemy to shift his targets around, then Progen lets you replenish everybody's shields. More shields for Radiance means more antimatter.  500 shields =~ 50 antimatter.  You get your antimatter from Animosity back.

Progen's colonize bonus does not appear to be time-delayed anymore, as the OP suggests.  I get the bonuses right away.

Halcyon with Rapture.  Halcyon's ultimate ability + Rapture's concentration aura screams "starbase buster", without the hordes of Drone hosts. If the OP is correct, the Rapture need only stay close to the Halcyon for maximum effect.  That's a lot easier to micro than keeping it close to a fleet of Drone Hosts, whom I like to hold back.