Couple of more feedback items:

1.) Civilian ship AI (possibly include the colony frigates as well) needs to be tuned so that they avoid enemy and unexplored gravity wells if possible (prioritize explored friendly areas first, then unexplored areas, then known enemy areas?). Having trade and refinery ships constantly attempting to go through an enemy gravity well and having the computer continuously telling me my fleet is under attack is poopy. Another option would be to allow a person to setup trade lanes for trade and refinery ships to follow.

2.) Capital ship kill experience should never be less than cruiser ship kill experience and frigates should be worth less than cruisers. I noticed in a game I'm currently playing that Kodiak Cruisers are worth 100 exp but a level 1 Marza Dread is worth 80. Doesn't really make sense since a Marza is way harder to kill even at level 1. Also, I haven't seen this, but I would think that as a ship increases in levels it should be worth more in experience. It may already be like this, but if it's not, then it should be (just seems logical to me).

In addition, killing capital ships should be worth a lot of experience. I was supprised when I saw the Marza was only worth 80. They should start at 200-250 at least (takes soooo long to get my ships to a high level). Also, I think currently the same experience is given to every capital ship involved with the kill, but if you increased the experience given per kill, you could split the experience between all capital ships involved (to help balance some). This would reward 1v1 battles more (since the crew would potentially have learned how to deal with a deadly situation) and prevent capital ship spam fleets from all leveling at a crazy rate.

Anyway, having a great time playing so far. Keep up the great work!

As far as I've been able to tell, it is split between the cap ships in the system.

This was also posted in a discussion about cap ships, and making them less prevalent (or at least making the other ship types more useful) but I think it also belongs over here. I have a couple of suggestions:

1) If you increase the overall speed/turning speed of the smallest ships (i.e., give fighters a big speed boost, frigates a slightly smaller speed boost, and cruisers and bombers smaller still, but leave cap ship speed alone) you can increase the tactical value of the less often used ships. The goal being that in a scenario of all cap ships, the frigates could run circles around them continually attacking from behind. The fighter speed increase would help mitigate the use of bombers since if two fleets started at any appreciable distance, the fighters could intercept the bombers before they could release their payloads. In non-combat situations, the increased speed is also quite useful for exploration and getting reinforcements to systems under siege. It also makes guerrilla warfare a possible tactical option as frigate fleets could do hit-and-runs.

2) IMO, there's no real reason why all ships shouldn't have experience. The smaller ships may not get level-up abilities, but they should benefit from the increases to damage, shield and hulls, which would keep them useful even in end-game scenarios.

3) Grant cap ships a small upkeep, anywhere from -.1 -> -.5 credits per second and possibly another -.1 metal and crystal per second. If you want to go all cap ships, then you'll have to have an economy of scale to support them. Right now, you can turtle with 5 systems build 8+ cap ships, and then destroy everything with little consequence.

Hmmm, I think capital ships are already pretty balanced with the high costs and more importantly, the 40 Fleet Points they require. NOTE: There should be a tiny difference between cost & Fleet Point requirements for each capital ship based on usefulness/purpose.

For example, the Arkan 'Battlecruiser' has to support colonists and the Sova Carrier has to support a ton of strike craft. So maybe these two ships should require 45 Fleet Points instead of 40.

Anyway, Capital Ships just need to be included in the research tree and all will be fine.

Also, it seems some of you guys have been using high % capital ship fleets and have been doing extremely well against the PRESENT AI. Some of these guys are now complaining that Capital Ships are too powerful and unbalanced.

I just have to say that if you try using capital ship only fleets in multiplayer, you are going to get so SMOKED by the rest of us.

True but I do not play multiplayer. I only play singleplayer. I want a good tough AI.

One reason I liked the GalCiv series. Good AI for singleplayer.

Hey Xerxes712, notice I said "PRESENT AI". The finished version AI will cut your Cap Ship only fleets to ribbons.

I can testify to the truth behind this

Hehe, no offense taken - that's what beta is all about

Hi Blair, I've been going on (and on) about the need to allow Phase Space Inhibitor ships in the game...especially in regards for turning Star Gravity Wells into battlegrounds.

Well, I've now been told that the Vasari are going to have a Phase Space Inhibitor ship because of their advanced Phase technologies. However, the Advent and TEC will not. So games without Vasari players won't be seeing forced battles around stars.

So, what do you think about increasing the importance of Trade/Refinery ships in the game? When they can, Trade/Refinery ships like to take shortcuts through the Star's gravity well. If they become more important, players might be encouraged to place Raider forces by the Star to intercept and destroy enemy trade/refining.

Of course, players under economic attack would place counter-raider forces around stars. The resulting counter-counter-raider forces might make for some awe inspiring battles.

I'm pretty much the same. It's good to hear that in MP balanced fleets already rule, now for that AI...

I just watched Tsed's video showing what it looks like if auto cannons actually had a realistic fire rate. It was so cool that I am no longer happy watching battles occur with the present fire rates. Look for yourselves at

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-407227294302653153

I know this might be a problem with the Shield Damage Mitigation system, but please seriously consider making the adjustment. The effect adds a LOT to the battles.

I only have a few problems with beta 2, the first and foremost of which is -

1) Pirates. What the heck is up with these guys? They went from ignorable wimps to psycho rampaging badasses in one beta. I'm playing on medium and I'm having a WAY harder time dealing with the pirates then the two ais teamed up against me. They constantly hit my systems with fleets of over 40 ships (I'm guessing this is because my bounty is over 70,000? but it's still ridiculous). Though my defense network present in all of my systems can wipe them out with no ship support required(I'm a defense nut - all my systems max out tactical right after I get them, I take immense pleasure in building the nastiest defense grids possible), it's still quite ridiculous.

2) Culture. It's immensely irritating taking over a system and then having to wait 20+ minutes to colonize it because of enemy culture. I found it was far more practical to just completely wipe out an ai and get rid of all their culture, instead of taking one system at a time and then waiting FOREVER to colonize it. Please make culture spread way faster then it currently does, or at least let me colonize planets in an enemy culture zone. I loath the current system.

3) Cruisers are worthless, with the exception of the carrier cruiser and possibly the kodiak cruiser, which is totally awesome. I fought the ai 2vs1, and never lost a single capital ship the entire game. They built fleets comprised almost entirely of cruisers, while I simply massed frigates and utterly destroyed their more expensive fleets while taking minimal losses.

4) Economic research could be improved.

5) Stuff takes way too long to do. This is without a doubt the most frustrating thing about Sins. I HATE waiting on things. I constantly find myself sitting and twiddling my thumbs while waiting on culture to gather or resources to gather.

Even with my grips, im still incredibly addicted to the game, great job guys!

After reading the 8 pages of comments, I have a few things to say regarding what other people have posted (double post I know, sorry =[).

People have labeled the pirates as being able to wipe out their fleets, what exactly are you doing wrong? I can take 40 pirate ships out with defenses alone, I don't even NEED a support fleet.

I've seen people mentioning that LRMs are too weak, and they die too easily. I'm afraid I have to disagree. The majority of my fleets are composed of LRMs, because they pack such a huge punch and are incredibly cheap to produce. Kol Battleships, LRMs, and Carrier Cruisers + Kodiaks make for a deliciously well balanced killing machine.

About crystal being too hard to get - I agree with that wholeheartedly. I spent over 50k credits on crystals in the latter half of the game at 1-1.5k per 100 and then ran out of them again 10 minutes later.

Also, I disagree with AIs building too much defense. I haven't had a problem with them building up defenses at all (maybe because I've been playing on medium?). My fleets can usually take down their gauss cannons and hangers with minimal losses, I just let my frigates and capital ships deal with the gauss cannons and enemy fleet while the bombers I brought along with my carrier ships make quick work of their hangers. It's all about strategy.

Questions/Suggestions -
Will there be a 'titan' ship class? Maybe a mothership-esque ship that dwarfs capital ships but is immensely expensive to make? I love the idea.

Please fix the robotic cruiser's sounds. It's immensely annoying when they're all I can hear.

I'm sure this is already being worked on, but the AI needs to be way more aggressive, all they do is fund pirates atm.

As I've said many, many times before - no motherships.

You know, I've got to admit that's visually appealing in a Battlestar Galactica kind of way.   I don't think it necessarily has to hurt shield mitigation at all if the damage on each autocannon round in turned down.

Yep, since shield mitigation is on a per damage basis, it wouldn't change a thing.

shieldAbsorbGrowthPerDamage 0.001

Btw. please also change the Kol's beam weapon synchronized targeting to false. It looks so much better.

SynchronizedTargeting TRUE

What Vandenburg said!

Hmm, are you patched to the latest version? Pirates were toned down considerably since the initial beta 2 release.

Yes, I also like the crazy autocannon fire, I'm glad he took the time to show me By all means, everyone who is interested should mod the game and show us what they think is better for Sins (graphically or balance-wise), it can be very convincing to see something tangible.

LOL 362&363 and 364&365, two double posts in a row!

(One of many) Tech research items that needs to have it's cost changed:

Modular Architecture
Level 1 costs 600 credits (ignoring metal and crystals for a minute) and reduces the cost of mines, light factories and capitol ship factories by 8%.

Mines cost 250, 8% reduction = 230 cost. You need to build 30 mines before level 1 ever pays for itself. Light factories cost 600 for a reduction of 48 credits, 12 factories before break even and capitol factories save you 80 credits. Cost of researching needs to be cut drastically.

A small suggestion: put the button to expand logistics/tactical capacity within the build menu for defences/structures. I find it a little annoying to have to go back a menu, click build, back again, then to click the menu I started from. Great game so far!

Repair priority: I don't know if the hoshiko's have the same problem, but I just had a repair facility spend its 20 antimatter on a nearly full up guass turret (as in during the few seconds it took me to find the one it was doing, it was fully repaired), while one with several thousand HP down went unrepaired.

Can anyone tell me, since i have yet to pre-order, if a capitol ship has like 1 hull/hit point left, is it still as lethal as if it had full health? Also can indiviudal weapon system be taken out physically or do u have to destroy the enitre ship?

Thanks.

Ships are fully capable until destroyed. And, ATM, there are no individual systems to take out.

That said, I do have a bit of gameplay feedback: Make trade ships interstellar, rather than intrastellar. As things stand, refinery ships will travel between the stars, but the trade ships will just stay in-system, even if there is just one planet there.

Edit:

Another useful bit of AI feedback: Sometimes it'll ping a planet I don't know, and all I get is an ? when I try to find it. Make AI's asking for help more open to intelligence packs, or something.

Edit:

You might want to look at re-evealuating unit priorities for targeting, too. Given the choice between killing the light frigates and the several hoshiko's supporting them, the hoshiko's really need to go first to keep them from repairing the light frigates.

Yet Another Edit:

Also, consider having the AI periodicly re-consider the defensive structures in its systems, especially core systems. Having it place a dozen or so gauss cannons on a phase lane that leads to an asteroid system "dead end" is... a complete and utter waste.

Yeah, the AI does waste resources sometimes bulking up defense platforms in dead end planets/asteroids.