In every single one of those tests, the left side spent far more money than the right side, of course the left side is going to win every single time, that's like complaining that cobalts suck because 2 cobalts lose to 4 cobalts. In that cobalt vs aeria test, the left side spent more than twice as much money as the right side.



Oh, where I'm from, it's considered a counter if you can spend less resources than the enemy and defeat him anyway, or spend the same amount and slaughter him... I guess it's not the same in your world?

Durikkan said

First of all, the disciples cannot "slaughter" cobalts so I guess you're admitting that Disciples are not a counter against cobalts since the word "slaughter" is in your definition.

Second, a "counter" unit in RTS is a specific type of unit that absolutely destroys another specific type of unit with minimal damage/losses to the counter unit. That's RTS 101. You should know that.



There is a lot more to factor in than just "money". There is also metal, crystal, time, and the cost for required military labs. military labs also require credits, metal, crystal, and time.

It's not as simple as you like to pretend it is. Of course, that is EXACTLY why I already told you that you can request any scenario you like and I will test it and tell you the results because I already knew that little Einstein-want-to-be's would bring up this argument.

please people stop posting... I see the loop forming already.

a: tests are invalid, due to prices...etc.
b: no they are not ask me for new tests and I will tell you the results
c: more people bring the same argument up and new results not posted yet.
b: " " " " " " "
a: " " " " " "
d: tests are invalid.

and gets to page 11-12, with nothing achieved.

oh just to make sure people are not insulted, im not implying anything about a,b,c,d.

ok, I officially am stop replying to this post until new patch comes out.

Well the post is very accurate. But anyone with some skill that hangs around IRC would know this, as we have pointed this out weeks ago.

Culture is useless, and that's what Advent is good at. What should be an available option it to build up defenses and let your culture do your fighting for you- It should flip neutral planets to YOUR side and be fast enough that it's as signifigant a threat as a fleet of equal cost.

Yeah, it is true, cobalt spam is the hardest thing for Advent to deal with. It is especially hard in a 1v1, because you don't have an ally with LRM's or Assailants to come punish the cobalt spammer. As people have mentioned, 1.04 Illuminators will help deal with this situation.

I'm not sure where you are getting the 2:1 Cobalt to Illuminator ratio for your tests. It isn't quite as bad as all that. If you are going by cost, it is probably more of a 3:2 ratio, and if you go by supply limit (before fleet size forces your opponent to up his logistics), you can have 5 Illums for every 6 Cobalts. Anyhow, I'm just pointing out the numbers, but of course in an actual game you might not even get a chance to make Illuminators before the Cobalts come for you.

The ratio for Disciples to Cobalts should be about 10:8. At those numbers, they should be so close to equal that player tactics makes the difference.

The trick to survive long enough to mass up your Illuminators is to fight where you are strongest -- near your repair bays, and using your cap ship synergies. A Halcyon or Progenitor can tip the fight so your massed Disciples can beat his massed Cobalts. Again, be near a repair bay, and you might still have to run if he decides to focus fire your cap ship. The only good thing about them FF on the cap, is your frigs should be able to kill a lot of the cobalts and get the upper hand in the fight.

You won't be able to take the fight to him for a while, so you have to watch what the TEC player is doing. When he expands, you expand. When he goes to attack, you defend. If he switches to LRM's, you switch to Defense Vessels (which are countered by Cobalts, so you have to be careful here). The goal is to make his offenses cost him more in losses than they cost you to replace while you slowly tech up to where you can get the Advent fleet synergies going. Once you mass enough Illuminators (or HC's), get some Guardians, and have a couple of cap ship synergies going, you can turn the tables on TEC, but until then, you are on defense.

And no, I didn't say it would be easy. If the TEC player can keep you on defense with only part of his economy while he uses the rest to tech up to heavy cruisers, you might be screwed. If however, he is putting 100% into killing you and you hold him off, you should see things get easier once your various ship synergies start going.

This is still going to be valid in 1.04, the main difference in 1.04 being if you manage to survive to get Illuminators out, they will DECISIVELY smoke Cobalts, while currently you need a small fleet of them grouped with Guardians and a Progenitor.

(1) It's easiest to see patterns with the simplest cases. Also, in a case such as 40 Cobs vs. 10 Illums, 10 Carriers, the outcome will depend on the situation and not just the math (for example, a better player would attack carriers first, if they were sufficiently close etc. etc. etc.). It's a lot easier to see patterns with simpler cases.

(2) The biggest problem with replays is that you will not be able to get everyone to agree on what exactly happened (in many situations). "Well, if he would have done THIS, then it wouldn't have mattered" etc. etc. ad infinitum. And then there's the matter of one player being more skilled than another - a skilled player might win even with the weakest strategy, and that would muss up the 'data'.

With a simple case of X numbers vs. Y numbers, we can all add up the math or do a little fleet vs. fleet battle for simulation, AND (most importantly) we can all agree on the RESULTS. That's just one less thing to argue about.

Yes, that's one of the problems with Culture. Its effects are too slow compared to the amount of time it takes to make a fleet and rush the enemy. The amount of time it takes for culture to actually over throw a planet is not proportional to the amount of time it takes to rush in and destroy a planet. Also, one of the biggest issues is how easy it is to counter culture. Just put two broadcast towers and place a capital ship on the planet and the effects of culture are negated. And since its so easy it relatively makes the nearly the entire Psitech tree useless which in turn makes Advent semi useless.

Advent has terrible starting military and economic functions. The good thing about having military and economical is that they are active, as in you can use them to gain footage to expand your empire. This can't be done with culture since it doesn't effect uncapped planets and that it takes forever to turn a planets population hostile. This actually turns Advent into a turtling faction.

The skills in the Psitech tree need to increase the effects of how fast culture takes over a planet and the effectiveness of advent culture breaking through enemy culture. Its just too easy to just make a couple of broadcast centers and *maybe* sit a cap ship there. I wish I could just make two hangar defense structures and a cap ship to defend against TEC and Vasari zergs.

This entire thread is the main reason why I lose interest in rts's. It's the whole number crunching, my unit is better than your unit thing I'm just not a fan of.

Said a million times, i say it again. These direct unit vs unit tests are useless. Many other factors play part in the outcome of a battle.

Some small thing i am missing here.. noone mentions the guardians.

Well, I was talking about ALL your weak startegy posts in general.

My problem with your posts is that most of the stuff you write is totaly false and that n00bs who know shit bout' the game come on these forums and read the crap you write, then they get paired with me in MP and of course they get wiped out because they follow your missinformed strategies. I mean, if you want to write startegy, do it in your own clans private forums as to not influence new players negatively.

I'm not a troll, I'm writing this because a lot of people DO read your posts. I was in a 3V3 the other day and one of the players made this comment to our other ally (Who was n00b and following an all too familiar strategy): What the hell you doing? Please don't tell me you've been reading that MAGOG clan trash on the forums (Not an exact quote but close). Also, in the Lobby, players often critize your posts and I'm sure I'm not the first one to tell you they are misinformation.

Guardians are non factor. You can spam cobalts from the get go, to get guardians u need tier 3 military tech, and they cost a mint. And even when you use em, it only provides defensive bonus, the enemy can just as easily get hoshikos, then what? If anything, a repair platform would help significantly in a cobalt vs disciple fight.

Yes, but these unit vs. unit tests give us a good idea of what to expect performance-wise from each ship compared to each other ship. Empirical data on an easy experiment is the basis for a lot of knowledge. Physics didn't start out with a Grand Unified Theory. When people do tests like these, they are trying to see patterns to, overall, get somewhere.

You are particularly incorrect here since what people are talking about is very early game when people haven't teched up to Guardians and Subjugators with multiple cap ships.

And you can just as easily do these 'useless' unit vs. unit tests with a few Guardians or Subverters or whatever thrown in to see their general effects as well.

@Peter Quince: You don't have to pay attention to any of this stuff. You can play the game as you wish without needing to know all these things. But it seems like your objection to the game is that it is based on numbers in the first place. Are there interesting games which are not based on numbers? Instead of using math, I suppose we could build games out of fwoophuggle, but we don't have a highly developed system of fwoophuggle, if you get my meaning.

As much as I love fwoophuggle, that wasn't my meaning. It's the e-peen stroking shat that I hate.

Ah yes, I misread 'unit' .

It is unfortunate that any large enough gathering of humans will result in the eternal alpha-male (and female) struggle. However, numbers are not to blame . This thread, by the way, is actually quite tame compared to a few others...

I have an idea:

Someone mentioned testing 40 cobalts versus 20 illums and 10 area drone hosts earlier. I am relatively certain that a human player, managing this fleet correctly should be able to maneuver the drone hosts around forcing the cobalts to chase one at a time. While all of the cobalts with their short range are chasing the drone hosts with bombers, the illums should be able to do the rest of the work.

Of course, it may be implausible for the advent player to get 20 illums by the time the cobalts come. In this case, I think it would be fair to test 40 cobalts versus 10 disciples, 10 drone hosts, and 15?ish illuminators. This third advent fleet balance should be able to beat the cobalts. By making 10 drone hosts early enough the advent player should also be able to transition to a proper fighter/anti lrm fleet in case his or her opponent decides to switch to lrms. In any event, the advent player will need illuminators to properly "crush" the cobalts but with any luck the player will still have either the illuminators or the drone hosts left after the battle.

Mind you, this is impossible to test via AI (because they wont micro the drone hosts etc.), and, because replays are biased towards more skilled players, implausible to test in practice, although I invite any of you to show a replay of this (I will not).

But the verdict has already been in: Unless an advent player is skilled enough to balance a fleet containing both drone hosts and disciples/illuminators, they will have to sacrifice disciples to take out cobalts. Victory in an Advent 1v1 vs, TEC opponent will depend upon sufficient scouting of the TEC player.

If the TEC player is going lrms just make defense vessels/drone hosts with fighters. If the TEC player is going cobalts then the advent player should go for drone hosts with bombers and then rush to illuminators for their hitting power; however, it is possible that the "crushing" victory required for the win is impossible for the advent player.

I hate to say it, because I hate the things and find them inferior to the other heavy cruisers, but it looks like the way to win in such a case against a TEC player who continues to mass cobalts is to rush to Detra Crusaders after "neutralizing" the cobalts that the player currently has.

Still, proper Drone host micro combined with disciples/illums for hitting power should mitigate the flood of cobalts sufficiently (If not enough for a crushing victory in any event), for the advent player (who already will have more military labs than the other player) to go for guardians/crusaders etc, and win by attrition.

In this case though, ensure that you have enough of a research base to compete. Do not defend yourself into economic submission... take enough planets to do this early, regardless of the number of ships you need to make to defeat the cobalts.

Thank you

Odd, I find the Crusader superior to the other heavies, especially after a little research, and ESPECIALLY after ruthlessness is researched...

Advent HC deals the most damage in the game when fully upgraded (not accounting for caps). They really synergize well with the bread and butter advent cap ship combo, mothership + radiance. malice + the crusaders = lots of aoe damage very quickly. The radiance prevents the mothership from popping and can also lay out it's showstopping cleansing brilliance.

HOWEVER, that's pretty much all shut down by a single subverter, with the exception of the cap ability combo. nerf subverters!!

So the Crusader is actually quite good. I have tested them out a bit and they own. My previous statement was based on my inexperience with them. They're slow, they are expensive, they take extra military labs, etc, but they do a ton of damage and actually work well with some illum/defender escorts (watch out for bombers!). Personally, I enjoy going for Drone Hosts/Illuminators/Guardians and no crusaders at all more than getting a lot of crusaders. Whereas, when I play tec and vasari I often end up hording heavy cruisers when i'm not going for dark fleet, and when the game has lasted past "the lrm stage".

The Advent have a distinct advantage late game due to their awesome late game ships/ how well their ships complement each other/ their amazing cap ship abilities especially at high levels. Of course, this late game edge is compensated for by planet wacking cannons and the unbeatable vasari "dark fleet".

Therefore, most advent player's best bet is to rush to their "late game" ships, while their opponents are still stuck with lrms/cobalts/assailants/sentinels/etc. This can be very risky; but, often advent players don't have much of a choice. Against the cobalt rush, advent players will have to get drone hosts/illums, because if they chose to have nothing but disciples they will be done for when javelis lrms come.

My conclusion: Just as vasari players have to rush out a bunch of assailants to remain competitive and tec players have to rush out lrms, advent players will lose the game if they do not "rush" to at least defense vessels if not straight to drone hosts and illuminators (especially once 1.4 comes out). A skilled advent player should be able to crush the tec cobalt masser (especially with crusaders!). This requires a "technology rush", as I have said earlier, and puts advent players on the defensive too early, in my opinion. Drone hosts partially allow an advent player to be offensive though, and so I think any advent player's best bet is to at least get some drone hosts as early as possible.

What do you guys think?

have you considered using fighters instead of bombers against cobalts

seeing as how fighters are anti-frigates

and cobalts are frigates, which as you'll notice is not a cruiser or capital or structure

cruisers, capitals, and structures are what bombers are good against

Because fighters deal anti-light damage. Anti-light damage is weak against medium armor, the armor of cobalts.

I have had massive cobalt fleet spamer while I play as the advent but i have no problem at all becaus of using 3 capital 120 deciples and 30 defense vessels agaisnt 100 cobalts and 20 lrms and 4 tec capitals. I annialated the whole feet while loosing only 10 desciples.

That's odd.

That should have been a closer fight.

That stresses someone else's point about the importance of fleet micro and also how therefore human on human tests are always biased towards the player with the most tactical fines. If I were managing that tec fleet and had an extra 40 lrms I think I may have been able to win. Cobalts destroy defense vessels, which are too slow to retreat, while the lrms can easily escape the defense vessels and come back and destroy the deciples once the defense vessels are dead.

In any event, deciples and defense vessels do work relatively well against the tec; however, if that tec player had had 120 lrms you would have been in trouble... you would have lost all of your deciples while the tec player could then have slowly pulled back while sending in cobalts to counter the defense vessles. Defense vessels destroy lrms, but you need at least a 1:2 ratio of defense vessels to lrms to counter them effectively; also, they can outrun you easily, making it very easy for the lrm spammer to retreat.

The problem is that cobalts + lrms counters anything Advent can produce, including disciples and defense vessels (obviously, i'm not taking into account HC's which counter everything - I'm simply talking early game)