Starbases add to a gravwell's defense system, they're not supposed to replace other defensive systems.

Why not stack hangars with loads of strikecraft, then have the hangards defended by the Starbase?  The strikecraft keep fleets on their toes, your starbase keeps their fleet off your hangars.

Perhaps the range should be increased, it's certainly fairly small on the Advent station, but I think the talk of covering the entire grav well is a bit much.

https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/333229

pretty much sums it up.

I was also going to comment on the range and balance.  One of the starbases can move about in the orbit around the planet, which makes it pretty awesome, while others you have to get the enemy really close for effective use (namely advent)

That's a good point. I noticed that my Advent starbase with its weapons fully upgraded wasn't really doing much damage. It certainly wasn't outgunning the capital ship that was attacking it. The listed damage numbers look nice, but it's not at all clear they're really doing that kind of damage.

What if the following was done to give the the starbases a little kick:

1)  TEC -- fully upgraded sb range should be enough to cover at least 50% of the well -- i.e. if you stick the sb as close to the planet as possible, siege frigates can't get in range of the planet w/o getting mowed down by the sb.  Additionally, a powerful planet shield upgrade is researchable so that raiders have to take down the sb to get to the planet (or pound on the shield for a very long time until the sb's substantial anti-matter reserve runs out).

2)  Advent -- fully upgraded sb range should be 65% of the well.  Additionally, Advent get more squadrons for free and if fully upgraded has 50% to 100% more fighters than the other races.

3)  Vasari -- fully upgraded sb range should 35% of the well and remains mobile.  Firepower nerf is removed.  Also consider additional researchable upgrades to mobility.

All sb's should have (i) some sort of gravitational effect on enemy ships that slows their movement while they are w/i firing range of the sb and (ii) anit-strike craft upgrade options.

I also concur with the earlier regarding making the initial building slightly more expensive and significantly longer while making upgrades slightly cheaper.  Furthermore, mine spam is awful.

I believe deadly has hit on an impotant point.  The tiered weapons are what should be looked at.  Tier 1 should be a close range weapon, defensive in nature.  Tier 2 is the real work horse, able to slaughter all the ships attacking at medium range.  Tier 3 should be the weapon which can strike anywhere in the gravwell.  TEC missles should launch and travel slowly across the gravwell.  The Advent psychic blade could instead be a psychic aura whic slowly wears away at an emeny fleet.  The Vasari need nothing of this sort.  Combine these with a phase inhibitor and we now have a starbase which cannot be moved around, and must be confronted to do any sort of damage to the planet/structures around.

Oh and up the build times.  Somewhere in the neighborhood of 5 minutes?

I believe that the starbases are too easy to destroy, I can destroy them with a level 2 sized fleet.(two caps and 28% fleet upkeep)

The inherent problem with giving the starbases and cannons massive range is that, graphically, ships would be shooting each other through planets. Nothing says immersion breaker like clipping.

The obvious solution is to make things bendy and curve around the planet... but that could be rather expensive to patch into the point-to-point bullet code.

Something that might just work (and be cheap to implement) is to have a 'reflector' at the poles of the planet; make it an invulnerable neutral ship that players cannot select and it doesn't show up as a ship in the system. Attacking a ship where the bullets would intersect the planet would actually shoot the target, but the graphics would instead shoot at the 'reflector' ship. Have a little script that watches for projectile animations hitting, and when they do, don't play the hit graphic and refire the same weapon at the actual target.

I'm not sure exactly what the reflector would actually look like, but I wouldn't mind even rubber duckies if it meant we got to test long range defenses. (:

Or, simply give cannons and starbases relative swift movement along the Z axis only to allow them line of sight to the other side of the planet. It would have to be automatic and not controllable by the player, since structures are not supposed to 'move'. The Vasari starbase would have this ability too, but it would keep the player-controlled movement ability

This might actually be the easiest to code and isn't too unreasonable from a gameplay point of view.

Although, super long range does kind of diminish or negate the movement ability of the Vasari, but if that's taken away from them, I'm sure there are plenty of other awesome specialties they can give the Vasari as replacement.

I personally think that the starbases aren't the end of the world, besides some various issues. I do think range is an issue, but I don't think they should be able to fire across the entire gravity well. However their range should cover most of it (dont forget you can use mines for the unprotected areas and the jump points) and their damage needs a buff. As far as build time, I actually think the build time may need to be alittle increased, but not much. I would rather see the construction of the vessel being made longer than the actual construction of the base. I do think the starbase does need to take alittle more time to build though.

Also I think the cost of these bases are fine. if you make these too expensive and/or too long to build, they'll wind up being a burden to get up (which they shouldn't). However if you were to use these starbases for offensive use (which you should be able to use these offensively, nothing should be made for just "defense") then they should take much longer to build when inside an enemy gravity well. however i dont see the logic in gimping build time when inside your own gravity well. they could also increase build time when taking over a neutral area (ie a star, gas giant, magnetic cloud etc.)

All and all with my experience so far, with mine fileds the enemy cant really bypass your defenses unless they bring a scout to pick them off one by on, and when that happens that gives you time to send a reinforcing fleet. however I will say that the starbase does need to be more FEARED and more EFFECTIVE (primarily at dealing with large fleets). and an easy quick fix they could implement right now would be strike craft defense. strike craft are the only completely rediculous things i see right now with handling starbases than i would HAVE to scream about. carriers can hit FLEETS and STARBASES vs long range structure seige cruisers only able to hit structures, so with them theirs really no point in massing long range structure bombardments. Sure seige cruisers take out starbases faster, but using carriers is more versatile and a safer approach.

Well those are my opinions anyways, and the more i play the more im beginning to understand these mechanics. Maybe after a week we'll realize were all just crazy

I also had the feeling the starbases do not do all the damage as listed.

also, not sure, but: weapons upgrades don't seem to change much numerically, at least I had the impression that the tooltip does not change. I had two TEC starbases, one with full weapons, one without any, both showed 128 128 132. I guess it means that the unupgraded one just uses merely the first one, while the use of all three is only possible via the upgrades.

well, for me that is not clear enough, if I am obviously still wondering. so make the tooltip only show those weapons that are actually available.

furthermore, I have to say that this is something I am not totally happy about. I'd rather have all weapons types there from the start, but weaker and them have them ALL subsequently upgraded via the weapons pods. sort of like 40 - 40 - 40 instead of a straight 120.

but keep in mind that this kind of damage is nomiannly only about as much as a dozen cobalts, and it has a bit less survivabilty. so, it's quite logical for them to go down even to minor attacks. thus, I'd like the starbases to get a little boost in cost and military capability. or more military upgrade options. and some stock fighters or flaks.

Me the way to fix going around starbases is to make it so that hostile forces are not able to jump towards Friendly planets if you have a starbase present. But that they can jump to any uncontroled or that they or they allies ownd.

So Blue owner of planet E can jump to A.

He can retreat back to E if he wants.

But he can no go from A to B and C.

HE can jump to D and then to B.

From be he can also jump back to A, but cannot jump back to B after.

So in the end C is the only planet that Blue cannot jump to without killing reds Starbase at A

Now if the game codding will allow this i do not know. But it would be the best way to do it.

Oh and scouts with jump interference immune research should ignore this and be able to jump everywere anytime.

Ofve course this alone is not enought but it will do what its meant to do, prevent enemi from going into your back worlds, while not getting insane range from shooting one side of the well to the other.

Currently the strongest base is clearly the vasary not only becaus eit can move but because it is able to engage more then one target at a time and thus use 100% of it's weapons, were as TEC and advent can only target one enemi ship even thout they have free guns. Plus teh Vasary base phase missile massively ignore mitigation.

Trust me it uses 100% of it weapons because it can target more then one target were other bases can't.