I've done this strategy a few times before in multiplayer and everytime my Allies criticised me heavily. I did end up winning all of those games though!

I wouldn't say it is the best, but it is workable. If you produce many cap ships I would say it is best used for the planet rush. You can easily expand and kill neutrals without taking any losses, where if you use frigates you're more likely to lose one or two.

More importantly, if you have many capitals you can easily take out enemy worlds. If the opponent has not built up their planet health, a couple marza's, or a marza and a Kol can take down a 1500 planet very quickly. If you pop jump pop, you should be able to take out a couple 1500 planets before he can take out or chase off your cap ships. If you bring him down from 3 or 4 planets to just 1 homeworld, he's in big trouble even if he takes out your cap ships.

You can also combine a colony ship with a dreadnaught. This way you can colonize as you destroy which slows him down further because he'll only have 1 capital ship to take out your planets you've left behind. The hard part is that your colony ship has limited planet siege. Also, if you're lacking resources those extra planets might drain your Credits. It's risky but can really pay off if done right.

Hey Kruppe,

Did you read my post? You play more online MP so I'd like to hear your view on it.

you pretty much hit the nail on it.

On large/huge maps i've started to go for the 2'nd cap asap if i play TEC or Advent. imo it is a bit of a risk but if pulled off it will often win the game

the thing most ppl forget( you mentioned this) is that neutrals will chew up a number of your frigs/cruisers where you get zero loss by going caps - if you don't get rushed this will MORE than make up the credit boost the oposition gets for selling the factory and you end up with 2 lvl 6 caps much faster.

In the end it comes down to timing imo, you become vunerable early game but gain an egde in midgame

I.E having 2 level 6 marzas 5min before the enemy is fun but as i said it is very map dependent

When entrenchment hit's the 2'nd cap option becomes FAR supirior to frig spam as rushes will become (almost) obseleet.(unless you play Phantom1 and his 33scouts in 3min)

P.S I hate rush games (got enough of that in RA2 ladders) so my view is a bit biased.

ROFL, you should start a blog siddy, in 3months you would have the new daily show

but stop being so harsh on begginres, making them better is more fun in the long run

not always, the best CS player i know was terribad for the first 1½years he played. (he's older bro had the first pro team in my region tho') so there is hope even for the worst, and following forums is (imo) the first step away from the path of the noob.

I'm still amazed at the number of *gamers* that never read a forum, and hten QQ when new tac's come around

and posts like this are very good imo both for newb noobs and pros, no matter how good you are there will always be someone that can make you see something from a new angle.

I.E some fools online flamed forgetting 2'nd cap asap without an apperent logic reason to do so, following them would not make you better, going on a forum to better understand the thoughts behind the pro's and con's will.

I know I'm probably going to get flamed by Siddy, but what three ships comprise the holy trinity?

Radience-mothership-revalation

the idear is to use the folloing together

Animosity--> vengence--> malice-->shield restore

the entire enemy fleet will do the same dmg to themselfs as they do to you, but your fleet is doing dmg at the same time = win

argh, my bad- thats the spyship ofc:)

the Rapture ofc.... wtb less capships that start with R

try and do the math friend siddy, vengece is 200% malice is 30%(nurfed to hard imo) makes it more than worthwhile....

remember that with domina support the cap's can NOT be disabled, so even though 3marzas can potentally do more harm, the fact that they can be disabled makes them less effectiv vs ppl with a clue(remember you can add more radience's to bypass shield migitation just alternate the animosity)

And with advent getting good shield mitigation bonuses, that would mean the holy trinity is not important in late game?

yes, it nerfs itself in lategame, where there is more ships that might shoot at you.

irony, i know...

for ease of math i'll asume ships shoot once a secfor 100dmg

cap is at 75% migitation = 25dmg taken by the radience

as the ship shooting at the cap is (again for ease of math) only taking the dmg from vengence for now, making it's migitation 50%

vengence = 200% --> 200% of 25 is 50, it has 50% migitation = 25

every time it takes dmg malice will make 9 other ships take 30% of that 25--> 9x(25x0.3)= 64

total

for each 25dmg you do to the radience your fleet takes 89 dmg

and yes i know the math changes by fleet size but do your own math on that, it takes forever and i'm stoned right now

yes but youforget that the radience will max's it's migitation while the attackers won't and that the radience has an armor upgrade that is cheatinglygood, this is where the math starts to become very complicated and tbh i cba to do it all again (took me like 5days to do back in the day) but trust me it IS a good deal.

/disclaimer

the math i original did may be wrong but idon't think so as i had it looked over by some math geeks

Edit:

remember that with dominas this can not be countered and that me fleet is shooting on you aswell

I don't know, I personally think siege frigates are the smarter chooice early on because the ship supply count.  Extra 50 plus supplies on top of your first cap could cripple your economy before you realize it.  And you are much more vulnerable against a smart player who just want to annoy you with couple smaller fleets at a time.  Bottom line you don't want to lose a captial ship early on, doesn't matter what the rewards maybe.  But that's just me.  I am careful. 

Finally, who doesn't want Akkan as their first cap for the mighty TEC?  LOL  Akkan is too cool for school, colonize, ion bolt disable, long range aura, and peace keeper, fighter supports, the ship is a miracle.