That's why it doesn't really deserve higher overall DPS than battleship caps.

Siege caps should have good front DPS but not enough to obliterate battleships with such ease.

The Vasari Vulkoras works about as well for sieging planets.

Raze planet is just much more dramatic because it's a spike. Vulkoras gives more DPS.

Advent on the other hand.. they don't get mass hysteria until level 6.

You make a horrible argument.

What about other cap ships abilities?

What about how much they gain per level?

What about how they perform with a fleet instead of just cap vs cap and cap vs planet?

It's impossible to compare them factoring in all possible level and ability combinations. Or at least too time consuming.

But it does catch your eye when one capital ship performs that much better than others.

It's a fact that at level 1, Marza is doing Kol's job far better than the Kol itself.

That said, it is not really a balance issue since you can't spam caps like frigates. Perhaps the Kol makes a comeback after a few levels, I don't have much experience with the TEC.

Starhound, Siege caps don't pwn battleships with ease. Its only due the current popular/viable tactic of parking ships in a line and focus firing do you allow a siege cap with its superior frontal guns to pound you into space dust. A head to head slugging match places the Marza at an advantage because it can bring all guns to bear to aginst the 1/2 to 3/4 strength firepower of a battleship. Marzas have 46.5 frontal dps but only 4 dps on either side. For example, the Radiance has only 26 frontal dps, but 13.25 dps on either side, not counting the forward plasma bank that sometimes shoots to the side. The radiance must fight the Marza like how the matador fights the bull, don't lock horns and expect to survive for long.
Pity that the infernal LRM has eliminated the possibility for such tactics. (btw, I consider the Marza simply to be an overgrown LRM frigate, if not for its badass attitude and fugly Krosovs, I wouldn't tolerate their presence in my fleet.)

p.s you are right about the Marza doing the Kols job. The Kol has no job, currently all you have to do is spam LRMs and since the Marza is really an LRM, its a perfect addition to the spam. All the Kol is good for is getting shot at if there's a Dunov to charge its shields. If not, its just food for the LRM spam

At capital ship speeds and turning rates, playing matador with the Radiance or Kol hardly tips the balance.

If the speed and turning rate of the Marza was lower, perhaps it would. But the idea of two capital ships playing cat and mouse is.. weird.

I find the situation where two ships will sit still while trying to kill each other to be equally weird, if not absurd. I have yet to actually test my theory though. If the Marza can turn quick enough, it does make it an inviable tactic. However, ist it fast enough, or indeed, any battleship fast enough to chase my carrier around a planet?

Or maybe the cat and mouse does tip the balance, all things considered. I'll try that next when I get the chance.

Seems like there is no much use of one capital ship and they should be compared in a number of group up to ten units or so. And there are looks like TEC shield recharge support capital ships do they job best at any levels, just need several of them and thats a challenge.

I just tested a Radiance vs Marza circle strafing, with cpu as Marza. I found that one can circle the Marza indefinitely and if microed very intensely and stay away from its missiles(they tend to miss and go off in circles when my Radiance was very close). The radiance can launch its det-antimatter perpendicularly so but the Marza couldn't launch its rad bomb in likewise fashion which gave me the advantage. I didn't fight on until the end because the AI "gave up" but the radiance had a bit more hp than the Marza when that happened. Maybe someone would like to test this with a real opponent, as I don't have the opportunity.

When it comes to Cap ships one needs to take more than dps into account. I look for survivability and adaptability. As a TEC player, I do love the Marza, but it is a ship that is heavily dependent on antimatter to do serious damage. It has zero protection vs a Vasari opponent wielding phase missles. Its side weapons do little damage and it has no rear firing weapon. It may rule in face-face confrontations, but its not my first choice for a Cap ship.

The Kol is not dependent on antimatter to do damage. A level 10 Kol whose ballistics tech tree is researched will put out 118 dps from its autocannons alone. Research its armor tree and get an armor rating of 15. Even without its adaptive shielding, it is a tough ship to kill. Four firing arcs gives you the ability to fly into an opposing fleet and do a death roll. With antimatter factored into the Kol equation, you get a ship that can face any adversary from any race and survive to talk about it. Gauss gun gives it Cap killing power. Adaptive shielding keeps those nasty Vasari missles at bay. Flak keeps the opposing bombers honest and Finest Hour keeps things going in addition to making that death roll all the more lethal to frigates and HC.

Kol seems to last in bigs battles longer then a Marza. Sure Marza has frontal punch and cna devastate planets...but the Kol is the ROCK of the fleet.

Everyone please remember: Kol Battleships use kinetic rounds and beam weapons. The Marza is primarily a torpedo ship. It has the highest number of S-S and S-P torpedo banks in the game. So naturally, this ship is DESIGNED to be a Capital ship buster as well as a planetary seige weapon. I mean you take a spread of 16 missiles that are programmed to penetrate heavy armor every 3 seconds and you expect to survive? Reality check here people.

Take a good look at the types of weapons employed, rather then at the DPS. You have to make sure that you use the weapons triangle to get the maximum amount of damage possible. Go read the manual some more and look at where the weapons are placed, types employed, and special abilities of each capital ship.

To be a strategist and successful admiral, you have to tailor a fleet and your tactics to each player you come across.

So if you find someone using the CVBG strat: you need Kols and flack, as well as fighters to combat. If you see someone using a radiance, Bring out a Marza and use light frigates to protect the flanks. And so on and so one ad infinitum (Spell check on the latin please    )

Sova Kills anything at level 6? How about that?

Well, I dunno. See, the battleships are more for tanking purposes. Especially the Kol. It's there to absorb fire that would've gone against your fleet and survive it. The Marza is more about burning down whatever target it goes after as quick as possible, but it doesn't have quite the staying power of a battleship.



I agree. Two Marzas, even fairly low level ones, can waste even a homeworld with ease. Plus it has a a decent area effect ability in radiation bomb and missile barrage isn't bad either. It's a damn good all around warship.