Things finally came together a bit for me as Vasari

from Sins Forums

Ok, well I've been playing against the comp for almost a week now and I think things have finally come together for me as the Vasari.  Here's my new approach that worked really good last night:

-I start off with the 2 scouts and a colonizer at my frigate factory.  I build a cap factory that makes the battleship cap and then I scuttle the factory (I used to always build the colonizer cap, but I am finding a high-level battleship to be much better in the long run on the maps I play).  I build the mineral mines at my base.  I build a military lab and an economic lab at my base.

-Meanwhile my cap and colonizer take over the nearby asteroid.  I upgrade the asteroid and build the mineral mines and an economic lab.  I upgrade my home planet (using the black market a bit) and research kanraks.

-Then I spam kanraks until I hit the first fleet limit and if I have another nearby asteroid or non-volcanic/ice planet I go take that over and upgrade it at least twice and max it when I am able.  At this planet I start building military labs and keep building military labs at conquered planets until I get enough to research subverters. 

-Meanwhile I am researching volcanic and/or ice upgrades so I can take those planets.  I am also upgrading my fleet limit to spam more kanraks.  Once I get 15+ kanraks I start upgrading their defensive/offensive capabilities. 

-Once I get 5 military labs I research subverters and add those to the mix as well, continuing to upgrade my fleet limits as necessary.  After 5 military labs then I go for 2 more economic labs to start getting a trade route going and by that time I have a large enough empire that a trade route makes sense.

-All this time I am trying to work my way toward the nearest AI and to figure out where the relevant choke points are.  At the chokepoint planets I build defenses, researching repair bays and I put down a pair of overlapping repair bays and a turret or two.  I also upgrade emergency defenses at the planet and send a small group of kanraks there.  The goal is to delay an attack until my cavalry can arrive.

-Once I hit the point where I can't conquer any neutral planets anymore I build a cap factory and frigate factory at one of the chokepoint planets and get my siege cap built.  I also continue to spam kanraks and subverters from my two factories (this combo does a surprising amount of damage!). 

-Once my siege cap is built and arrives I invade the AI.  Once their fleet is destroyed I may research siege ships (I know they're not loved too much on these forums, but they are handy for taking planets after a fleet has been eliminated).  I will also research and start adding HCs at this point to bolster my fleet and will also add more caps as I am able.

-The final thing I will say (because the above pretty much summarizes how I have been able to now have success) is that I have also found diplomacy and pirate management to be important, especially when I have played against the hard AI.  Getting dogpiled by 2+ AIs plus the pirates (happened to me one game) spells disaster.  So, I make sure the pirates are attacking an AI that I want to keep off my back and I make sure to build relations with key AIs so I have some allies (note: I play 6 AI + me FFAs on large/single/random map).  However, once I have a really strong fleet and am in good position then I'll let the pirates come for me if they want as I can handle them. 

-And that's about it!  I would love any feedback you might have.  Since I'm a new player I don't expect this to educate anyone, but am mainly just posting this to get feedback.  Thanks!

strategy
4,900 views 7 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
If the map layout can make it easy to determine where the pirates are going to hit me, I'll happily build a pirate trap and use it to train new capital ships. The money I spend bolstering the defenses would likely otherwise go to bounty on enemies, and imo, that's just spending money on their training. Also, hangar bays plus phase jump inhibitors mean that every enemy incursion into your system is paid for in blood.

Have you tried getting Returning Armada yet? It's a lot of fun, and the phase gates give you ridiculous reactive capability.
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
Yup, you've got the basic game opening down. What size maps, AI level are you playing?

Use phase stabilizers and connect your front-line worlds, a small defense fleet assisted by planet defenses should repel most attackers.

Vasari is my favorite race to play and I've been doing well against multiple Normal AI on large maps however I'm still not good enough to defeat multiple Hard AI in FFA. Still working on my strats...
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Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
Right now I'm playing large/single/random map against 6 AIs ffa.

I'm not sure what "use phase stabilizers and connect your front-line worlds" means? Sounds like something I would like to do, but I don't know that part of the game yet.

I haven't tried returning armada yet as I am focusing more on the earlier game stuff at this point.

thks for the feedback!
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
Phase stabilizers allow you to directly send your fleets from one planet to another, without using existing phase lanes. In a sense they open a "instant" phase line that directly connects the planets.

And as if that weren't useful enough, they also spawn ships once you have RA up and running :)
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
Phase Stabalizers are a Vasari tactical building. Ships can phase jump directly between any two planets that have stabalizers. Its a huge advantage when you get a lot of them, as you can warp around between planets at a much higher speed (there's another tech that increases the phase jump speed inside stabalizer lanes) then anybody else.
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
Ah man, that's GREAT! I was so annoyed repelling AI invasions having to go through existing phase lines...This is going to make a HUGE difference!! Thanks :D