Can't break the deadlock on Hard.

Incidentally, I'm running 1.05.

1.05, then try 2/3 Kodiak, 1/3 carrier + Hoshiko with full fighter.

Or build Phase Jump Inhibitor + Repair plaform + Planet Shield in your choke point planet, then withdraw your ship from that choke point. When the AI move their ship in to conquer that planet, jump back and kill them. If they retreat, pursue else kill them all.

Weird, the AI gets even better in 1.096.

I was in a predicament similiar to yours, except i was slowly losing ground to a very powerful AI. I managed to run and hide in a corner of the map and rebuild. This is what I did (if you don't care about my situation skip down to my suggestion below):

I had 1 terran planet, and 2 astroids and a small fleet + a fairly powerful AI ally. Luckily, I also controlled an artifact that helped me phase jump faster.

We were up against 2 very powerful AI (gateway map) where one had left the Solar system and conquered another all to itself then reinvaded and took all my planets (about 1/3 of the current solar system). The other one had about 1/3 of the existing solar system My Ally had about 1/3 (minus my 3 grav wells).

I managed to create a capital on the terran planet, scuttle my frigate factory on one of the astroids and built a capital ship factory. I sent my ally after them so I could buy some time.  I decided to go on a mad rampage. I built 3 marza, 2 Kol and 1 Akkan as quickly as I could and kept them very close to repair facilities.  

I then told my ally to attack the one AI to draw one of his fleets away from the nearest planet. I left the small fleet at my astroid to defend and send my fleet of Caps to the AI's planets. I didn't attack anything but the planets. Soon as the planet went down I jumped. No colonization, no wasting of time blowing up structures. By the time I blew up one of his planets, he sent one of his big fleets after me. That phase jump artifact helped because I just jumped 3 planets into it's territory and proceded to pop every planet I could. Eventually I killed so many planets I coul start colonizing them. His economy was so destroyed that I was ablet o build a second fleet to attack it on two fronts and wiped him off the map. 

What I'd suggest to you is this:

Build a secondary fleet, 2 marzas and 2 kols, or 3 marza's and 1 kol (Marza's are way better in 1.096 by the by). Then attack at one of his choke points with all your fleets but sent this raider party straight through the battle and jump in as deep as you can. Pull your main fleet back so the AI goes after your second fleet. 

You now have two options of attack. First is to take your raider fleet and pop all its planets, the second is to bring your primary fleet up behind and attack when it's main fleet is chasing your raiders.

Another option is to send that raider fleet through the pirate base. If you fly right through, the pirates won't be able to kill your Caps and you'll be attacking the AI on a secondary front so far from his main fleet by the time he catches up you'll have destroyed enough planets to get the upper hand in economy.

(also, buy up the levels of those cap ships to as high as possible)

Let me know if that works.

Huh. Couple of ideas from me. One is that you should have expanded faster (I'm guessing you're at like 50/50), since the Advent is slow to build. I'm also curious as to your defenses; I hope you have at least 2 repair platforms. I should point out that the TEC is never, ever going to win a fair fight with Advent; their shields are simply ridiculous.

But mostly, the above poster is right; your issue comes down to trying to fight toe-to-toe and beat him back. Screw that. Go defense-in-depth on him; make every planet a nightmare of carriers+hangerbays+LRM+repair platforms+shields. When he really starts doing too much damage, withdraw one planet, replinish the fleet, and repeat. He'll end up sinking everything into trying to break you. Meanwhile, invade through the pirate base, or try and send a second fleet around his, and start killing everything. If he's chasing you, try to just whack trade ports and factories to screw up his economy. If you have more time, do more damage. If you can make him chase you ALL the way to his rear corner, invade with your other forces. You should be able to keep ahead of him in ships and even bounty if you're consistent. Don't even bother trying to fully destroy his fleet until you take most of the system. And Novaliths can help if you keep them out of danger, but aim them yourself; go for actual planets, and the closest ones to his homeworld. I'd even suggest trying to make sure every planet you kill is with a Novalith shot, so they can't recolonize for a while.

Also, for fleet composition of your main attack fleet I'd use something like this:

4 kols 3 dunovs (these are your carrier capital ship killers). Make sure your dunovs are set to autocast OFF. You will need a lot of carriers.. since it's 1.5 i say 40 carriers all fighters ( i don't know how big of a fleet the AI has, but you should be matching him fighter to figher, fighter to bomber. Don't use bombers in this set up). 15 repair ships to keep your carriers alive.

Have 20-30 cobalts to kill start popping his carriers. have 15 heavy cruisers to hit his iconias.. once they die you won't need them anymore.

Your fighters are meant to kill his bombers then his fighters.

Your kols should have their laser and flak skills first, then shield.

The dunovs are going to be the real backbone of this strategy. This is where you'll have to micro manage the most. Make sure all special abilities are not autocasting. You will want the magnetic skill and the heal skill on all dunovs.

If they focus fire your Kols, use your three dunovs to heal the kol under fire and periodically use the magentic ability on his capitals. Use your kols to laser his capital ships to get them dead ASAP. Use those heavy cruisers to kill his support ships. Queue up all the Iconias and Subjugators. Once his capitals are gone you'll want to make sure you have replenishing ships on the way. So if you lost half your cobalts and 1/3 of the carriers, make sure those numbers are already queued and their way point is set to this battle so they automatically arrive with minimal micro management. You'll only have to change the carriers to build fighters as they won't have a build order when they are made.

Now that the caps are out of the way, the computer should run, if not start popping the remained of his support ships with your kols, if your fighters are in good numbers, use them to take out any frigs scattered around. Since you had 15 heavy cruisers, they should have already killed most of his support ships before dieing. Once his caps are gone and his support ships destroyed, you'll be able to mop up those carriers pretty fast.

If the comp focus fires your dunovs, use the other two to repair it. The one under attack, use it to constantly magnetic whatever ships are closest to the enemy fighters.

As long as you use the magnetic ability and repair abilities effectively you should get an upper hand in the Squad battle with less carrier usage, while not losing any capital ships. Sending the enemies squadrons crashing into their cruisers and capitals is such a good strike against advent. It takes away their best weapon while weakening their caps.

Try more Monilth cannons; they will destroy your oppoents economy, and every ship you kill after that, does not get rebuilt (so do hit and runs after you've downed several key planets).  Except on your bottleneck planet, destroy all defences around other plantets to make room.  With a small map, 3 or 4 cannons should be plenty.  The AI will recolonize planets FAST, and redevelop it too, FAST, so it takes a while to wear him down; sooner or later, he will not have enough money to reconstruct his planets AND build new ships.

I'm comming back on at 12:01 to get 1.1 

1) Forget trying to build heaps of caps - they are not worth it due to the fact they spread out the experience. You only need a few.

2) Why are you against attacking via the pirate base? If his fleet is at the other choke point, go through it...

3) TEC have the best superweapon for breaking a stalemate - build 2-3 at least and fire all of them at a planet at once to kill it..

4) Always try to get air superiority by having more fighters. Once his fighters are gone, so are his bombers. Then your bombers can go to work and yuor fighters can alternate between hitting light armour targets and keeping the skies clear.

5) If your income is so uber and you can pump out that many ships from factories, forget about fighting him. Make sure your planets are fully upgraded for health (to ensure you have time if attacked), and repair bays etc... and then frive into his empire. He will either follow you and you can force him back into his empire, or you can then start killing his shipyards etc...

6) Build heaps of media centres and try and flip a planet that way. Worst case you have upped your antimatter recharge rate...

So, I did it. Thank all of you for the advice.

I managed to start winning some fights through some slightly different fleet composition.  I ditched all my bombers, and went all fighters, increased my ratio of kodiaks to about 60%, and built a second Kol to go with my Akkan and Dunov.  In the fight, I micromanaged flak burst and magnetize, turning all other autocasts off until I managed to kill the majority of the bombers.

But that wasn't enough.  They still had too large a fleet, so what I did was let them on into my empire.  I abandoned my choke point, and the AI started branching out, attacking my planets, which I fortified first.  I was then able to pick off segments of their huge fleet one by one, all the while keeping up bombardment with my novaliths.  I had to keep the pressure on, so they didn't rebuild their damn fighters and bombers.

Eventually, I pushed them back to the chokepoint and recolonized my planet.  From there, I was able to push past the chokepoint in the biggest battle yet in the empty sector invervening, and pushed on to take the terran planet they had behind the chokepoint.  MWWWAAAHAHAHAHA!!!

I needed to rebuild my fleet at that point, so I captured my worlds and built them up, and built another novalith when I hit fleet capacity.  From there, it was easy.  I was able to keep my forces more concentrated, especially after I found the artifact that boosts phase jump speed, and actually outnumber the bastards.

Good to hear. I hope you keep on playin!

Do you ever go online?

Now that I know it's possible to win, I'll be playing for a while.    I'm excited to try out that same strategy the AI used against me as the Advent myself.

I haven't been online yet, but at some point I'll definitely give it a shot.  When I can beat multiple Hard AIs, I'll probably venture out.

Cool, well let me know. I dont' mind doing a comp stomp from time to time. I can learn from people playing with them or against them.

You learn the most playnig with/against others in a full MP game (i.e. no AI). However this can be brutal for people starting out.

The biggest lesson I learned when I went to MP is that I played slow against the AI - you need to be quicker online. Turtling is no good as someone will buidl an empire 2x your size and then smash your defences. Entrenchment might change this some, but not vintage Sins (at least not 1.05..)

In a slow game using TEC I think it is impossible to win an equal fight.  Planetary defenses with repair bays should provide an edge if you are the defender.  I recommend positioning your fleet at either the front edge of the jump well, so you hit them piecemeal at poing blank range.  Or at the back of the jump well so you can get more use out of Gauss guns.  Or 1 jump away.  Fighters are better than bombers if the enemy is using lots of strike craft IMHO. 

TEC can fight unequal using scout demolition technology and novalith cannon.

Because I cant get it to quote right, consider the red text quotations.

I'm TEC

Theres your problem right there.

1) I can't win an even fight.

No matter what ship composition I make, I can't win an even fight.  In this particular case, I'm being mobbed by fighters and bombers, while being unable to seriously damage them due to massive numbers of defenders shooting up shields over the whole area.  It's not research - it's far along, and I've had this problem with all other types of AI.  My best odds seem to be using 33% kodiaks, 33% percherons, mostly with bombers, remainder split between hoshikas and gardas, with a handful of cielos to round it out.  Missile frigates are good for only a volley or two before being destroyed.  I use different mixes of capital ships, kols, dreadnoughts, durovs, usually 3 or 4, with a total of about 300 ships in play.  Yeah, that's a lot of ships.

I try destroying their capital ships, and I often can, but they never seem to retreat, usually because they outnumber me 2/1 by the time the capital ships are gone, and they've got other capital ships enroute.  Even if they don't they still don't run because they outnumber me, and by that time all my bombers are gone and I can't take the frigates.  Or if I can, more ships arrive.  I can only win when I outnumber around 1.5/1.  Technically, I shouldn't even be able to hold them off, except they're overly scared of my planetary defenses, and when they do chase me off, they never fortify enough.  That leads to problem 2...

You WONT win an even fight. TEC is weak in combat, their advantage is in numbers. You must spam. Research Industrial Juggernaught (50% faster ship building), when in a epic battle set your rally points to the place where its taking place (Rally points can be set in any gravity well, anywhere).

2) I can't outproduce the AI when it comes to ships.

I just can't.  Even with me having more money and resources, with multiple shipyards churning out ships as fast as my money will allow, they've always got more.  Any gains are quickly crushed by a new fleet to trash my worn-out victors.  I don't understand it.  With this much fleet logistics in play, they should really be hurting for resources, especially with less income.  Yet somehow they keep churning out cap ships, no matter how much I keep blowing them up.  My economy is in high gear, with max planet upgrades, trade lanes, and orbital refineries.

Scuttle the orbital refineries unless there is 4-5 phase jumps on that planet. Refineries can support the planet they're on plus the planets 1 phase jump away. But even then they are pretty much useless unless there are a lot of planets 1 phase jump away.

You seem to think caps are the be-all-end-all of warfare. Not so, caps are fragile and more support ships than enything. Instead of building 16 caps, build 6. Save the money and use the supply to build carriers, HCs, repair cruisers, ect. They will deal more damage and have more collevtive HP.

Here is a nice trick: Send in ONE Akkan. Get swarmed. Use Armistace. Send in the rest of your fleet. IDK if it still works, but the enemy fleet ont fight back.

3) The AI seems to have infinite money.

I've tried tanking the AI's economy with raids, but it took too much away from my defense.  In desperation, I built 2 novalith cannons, and I've got them autofiring to blast the enemy planets to pieces, which should be tanking the economy, since they've essentially got almost no population.  In fact, it seems to be, since when I quit the game, I can see their credit income rate is in the toilet.  Yet somehow, they keep replacing the ships I blow up, even super-expensive fleets of capital ships, and running up the pirate bounty on me.  The noviliths seem to be helping a little, but they STILL seem to be outproducing me.  Even if they had an absurd stockpile of credits saved up they've been draining, that sitll makes no sense because they're outproducing me in ships.

Research Pervasive Economy. You get a fraction of whatever your enemy spends. The Novas are good for hurting him, but if you're not strong enough to capitalize on it then its useless.

I sugggest loading up an autosave and not researching refineries, those last 8 cap slots, and novas. Spent that money an Industrial Juggernaught, Pervasive Economy, more ships, and altering your DNA to become Vasari.

EDIT: Why cant I get it to properly quote what I want it to? It does these stupid quote within a quote littered with my [/quote] commands.

It's odd you say that. I know where you are coming from and it makes sense, but I almost always have less fleet than the AI opponent yet very rarely lose a game (hard or unfair) playing with TEC. I never find I need more numbers to beat them and it's pretty rare that I do have more. Even in fleet battles, if I want low losses I'll try to outnumber them, but even with a smaller fleet I tend to win or at least suffer less losses.

oops double post

I am also a Vasari player but was in a similar situation.

Hyperion gates; four players, FFE, one TEC AI set to hard.

I dominate the Vasari AI in my system, but they still control a corner when suddenly a juggernaught of a fleet comes through the star, taking seven planets before I can muster a respectable defence.  I burn my stockpile (now quite sizeable due to forgetting about building) to use returning Armada to use up all of my support slots and retake all but the terran chokepoint.  they repulse around four of my attacks of nearly maxed fleet, I finally research the last fleet upgrade, and take the planet, their fleet fleeing.  I hold and do not follow up on my advantage.  at this point I deal with the Serak Warriors (the in-system Vasari) with a few interuptions to deal with full fleet invasions which I repulse fairly easily with planetary defenses and my full fleet.  they only send one capitol ship with each fleet, even though they have multiple in the other system (as I found out later).  I station a Navigator at each of the stars, to give me a chance to see them coming.  I rebuild my fleet and push my tech advantage to take their terran chokepoint, where they had massed their fleet to push another invasion.  I manage to drive them away, but most of their fleet survives (except their capitol ship - whenever I went against one of their fleets w/ a cap, I made sure that the cap didn't survive).  they flee to a nearby planet and mass once again, and I attack before they can.  they already have a Marza, which doesn't survive when their fleet immediately flees.  at this point I have a foothold still, but am limited to two planets in their system. 

I haven't really played much past this point only because of time constraints, but it was a full force fleet that I had to use.  I have built up static defenses on most of my planets to repel the thrice-be-damned rebels that appear at random planets, because of the TEC's ability. (They have come to be an extreme pain in the a**)

Build a lot of novaliths have them fire at once at the enemy planet. Due to radiation enemy cannot colonize planet. The end. You win. Hahahahahaahahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaaha

It's so funny

Inject Vasari hormones to become Vasari. P.S. Marauder rocks.

I've actually developed a nice TEC strategy that works almost all the time. Here is what you do in turns of fleet composition.

1) Build Cobalts. Lots of cobalts. Shit tons of Cobalts. On average my fleet will be usually made of 55-65% Cobalts. ir cheap, their fas, and if upgraded, can do quite a bit of damage to ships that use anti-matter. Plus they are awsome at carrier rushes.

2) Don't rely so heavy on carriers. if i have a fleet of 300 ships, I usually have 20 maybe 25 carriers. No bombers all of them are fighters.

3) I can safetly say that I have gone through entire games against the hard AI without flak frigates. I don't even bother with them, it's all about the fighters.

4) LRMF should be used liberally. This is usually my second most numerous ship, especially with the AOE upgrade. While your Cobalts are carrier rushing and your fighters are running interferance, your LRMFs can do some serious damage.

5) That repair cruiser, the one with the crazy name, Hock-a-loogie, or something, is also very important. If you have 100 cobalts, you should prolly have 20 HRCs. The demolition ability helps alot too.

6) You should also throw in a few Kodiaks and Cielos, but in a fleet of 100, you should have 15 kodiaks and 5-10 cielos.

Now dont worry if the enemy has waaayyyy more carriers than you. Thats okay. Your not supposed to match him in carriers, you just want enough fighters to stop him from completely raping your LRMFs. So here is your basic combat doctrine.

Cobalts, Kodiaks, and Cielo charge the enemy fleet, along with any HRCs and Cap ships you have. This should cause the majority of the enemy bombers/fighters tp go for them.

Your carriers should stay back and let the fighters zip around, running interferance and cover your LRMFs.

Let your LRMFs blast away at the enemy fleet.

If it is a close fight, mircomanage your fighters. Focus them on the enemy LRMs/equivilant and carriers, while your Cobalts go flying in. I can not tell you how important Cobalts are. Build lots. LOTS. If you build ten Kodiaks, build 100 Cobalt. Cobalts Cobalts Cobalts Cobalts!!

says the man stuck in a dead ships as kostura warhead after kostura warhead pounds into the planet he is at.  and is raped by my 212 squadrons of fighters.

yes because you fighters will be sooooo effective as their carriers are shredded by long range cruise missles

actually theyll be there for a few more minutes after their host dies and if theres as many as you say there are your cobalts will drop like flies