Advice for a balanced TEC fleet?

You are missing single most important unit in the game: Long Range Frigates.

See, with your fleet composition, which is mainly composed of heavy armour, mass light frigates can tear your army apart.

About 30+ LRMs, 10+ Flaks, 15~20+ Carriers with fighters and 10+ Repair cruisers would be somewhat ideal.

And if you can, you need to get Kodiak asap. For the price factor ALONE they are the best. Not to mention crazy damage output (since weapon type is composite, thus doing 100~150% damages to ALL armour types)

In late game the whole fleet is usually composed of carriers, heavy cruisers and repair cruisers.

You need very few command cruisers (maybe one to three?) They are helpful for focusing fire to kill a single target, but not much else. Get as many as your micro allows.

You can't have concrete numbers or setup, especially in multiplayer.  Map size plays a big difference, but also what your enemy is building.  There are some fleet that work pretty well, like Kodiak+flak+hoshiko. But such a fleet is not possible if you start next to an opponent, at least not right away.  Pre entrenchment most fleet setups were half carrier/half something else (lrms or kodiaks or cobalts), with some hoshiko sprinkled in. However now you can get away without carriers by substituting healthy amount of flak.

So just keep this in mind, there is no perfect setup.  A specialized fleet will be easy to counter, while if your fleet has too much variety, it will not be as effective vs a fleet that is very dedicated to one kind of damage (therefore one kind of armor).

No, you can't get away without carriers. Flaks themselves alone do not cut it.

I usually find Carriers + flaks always beat pure carriers, while they are more useful in other situation compared to pure flaks.

(of course other not related units not mentioned)

a few points. 

1) Sova is a very risky choice for a first ship. Embargo rushing can be interesting but you often won't get great results with it, particularly since recent patches have somewhat nerfed Embargo. it will also slow down your own colonizing by a huge amount to send your cap ship away early and have to do it with just frigates. you'll set up your econ much slower and you'll miss out on basically free exp for your cap ship. 

2) i think you're building a few too many flaks and not enough LRMs. you need at least a decent handful (10-12) LRMS to protect your carriers and support cruisers (like Hoshikos) from enemy Light Frigates. they're also very good at focus firing capital ships and breaking up battle-balls later when you get Cluster Rockets. 

3) Cielos are very good. try to include 4-5 in any late game fleet. Designate Target is basically a fleet wide 40% damage buff, since you'll generally be focus firing at all times. its ridiculously huge don't go without it if you've gotten to the later stages of the game. Kodiaks are your single most cost effective unit in the late game and should be built to the exclusion of almost everything else once they're available. you'll need to maintain a good force of carriers for air cover, but nothing beats kodiaks pound for pound for durability and damage output for their cost. 

as astax said, if you make a certain generic fleet composition for all engagements, chances are that half the ships will be damage sponges. intel is your best friend when it comes to fleet composition, don't ignore it!! i used to far too often, and i probably wouldve won many more games as a new player if i had the correct composition. generic ones work okay, but a truly powerful empire will specialize. On the other hand, as any gamer in general knows, things never really go perfectly. So, I'd tell you some good fleets for certain situations, but id be contrdicting myself. You and these other repliers obviously know how to make a fleet, but the best one is the one that fits whatever the situation calls for atm. Also, with TEC, getting a good situational fleet running shouldn't be too much of a problem.

I've been playing for a while, and find the TEC to be my favorite race to play as.  Granted I have never played online, though have played quite a few LAN games with friends.  With that, here is what I have found to be a balanced and effective fleet:

Early game my first capitol ship is always the Kol Battleship.  I prefer to have a very powerful ship early on, which makes a big difference.  Then I build about 10 cobalts to accompany it.  The early game is normally dominated by building strictly Cobalts and a couple colony frigates, while making an effort to get your economy up.  That is the key to effective TEC warfare is to have a solid economy early on.  The TEC is an industrial juggernaught once they get rolling.

Once the economy starts rolling, I make a research push for Light Carriers and Kodiaks.  Those two ships make up the bulk of my support fleet.  Once I can make Kodiaks, I usually never build a Cobalt again.  The numbers of each are determined specifically by what the enemy is using.  If the enemy is building lots of carriers (aka the Advent), then I focus more on fighters in my carriers for protection while using the Kodiaks and Capitol Ships for the knock out punch.  I typically focus on building multiple fleets once the economy gets rolling instead of one massive fleet.  For that here is my rundown of what each fleet will carry:

FIGHTING CARRIERS:

- 3-4 Kol Battleships: When fighting carriers, these will be your major heavy hitters.  Focus on taking the flak burst ability to protect them

- 2 Marza Dreadnaughts: The missile ability and raze planet are an absolute must when on the offensive

- 1 Dunov Battlecruiser: This will support the other ships with shield recharge and antimatter charging effects

- 20 Carriers: Fill these with over half fighters for protection.  I have found fighters are much better at defending against bombers than flak frigates.

- 20-30 Kodiaks: These will be the main element in the fleet, and with the Dunov and Hoshikos will keep fighting while taking a pounding from bombers

- 10-15 Hoshikos: Necessary to keep Capitol Ships and the Kodiaks protected

-5-10 Ceilo: When your research catches up with you, add some of these for some good late game damage increase

NOTE: Fill your capitol ships with fighter squadrons not bombers to protect them

FIGHTING HEAVY SHIPS:

With this, take the above setup, and replace the fighter squadrons in the carriers with bomber squadrons.  If you find the enemy too difficult, add more Kodiaks.

FIGHTING FRIGATES:

This is probably the hardest enemy I have found with my fleet, a genuine threat from lots and lots of frigates.  The best way I found to do this is with plenty of kodiaks over carriers, and by replacing carriers with LRMs.  This is the only time I will waste resources on LRM frigates.

I hope this helps some in your quest.  The TEC is a great race to play as, and having a good balanced fleet combined with a solid economy to replace destroyed ships is a game winning combination.

Flaks will work against fighters, but not against bombers.  If you have no fighters of your own, bombers could be very dangerous to a HC laden fleet.  Definitely bring along some carriers.  With substantial flak and kol backup you don't need many, just enough to cut down on their bombers before they get too many passes over your army.

Frigate fighing, 2 lvl 6 mazes

Heavy ship fighting, 2 lvl 6 mazes, 1dunov

SC fighing, 2-3 kols flack barrage 2 or 3 , 1 dunov

of couse this is just caps

mazes missle barraage is awsome, read this fourm

https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/343984

Wow. 

What size maps would you need a fleet like that on, and roughly how many planets do you have to have under your belt to get up to that size?

I'm a noob, and I get anything over 15 ships I think I'm doing good.  Of course, I just moved from the small maps to the medium maps, so maybe that's it.

Which fleets? 

medium-medium large maps usually end up with zero fleet supply and 2-3 fleets

Usually the small maps you won't get that many ships, usually 3-4 capitol ships will be sufficient.  That all depends on how quickly you attack.  With the TEC, finding the right balance to offensive and defensive warfare is key.

I stopped playing small maps after I moved from the medium to the hard AI.

Thanks for all the help, everyone. I've been adding more Javelis' and repair ships, and they have been working quite favorably.

And typically, the games I've played have started with standard (100) fleet supply on single-star games.

no matter what race i play, i never send LRM fleet anywhere without a solid flak support. but that's just because i'm paranoid. i am still a good person though, i swear 

sometimes i go really crazy and actually build 2 flaks for every 1 LRM i got. i'm not kidding, i've done it, when i started right next to an advent. you can imagine my annoyance when the guy only built illums. I thank thee God, for the Great Gift of Skarkovas

So by act of God, you start as TEC and turn into Vasari by mid game?

yes, the ways of God are mysterious. either that or i was feverish. it's probably the second, either that or i was actually advent and dominated some tec ships then a skarkovas 

or it could be, that in fear of loosing i 1v1v1 myself on 3 laptops and really annoy myself with all the crap i pull against myself. of course, i get really sad after every game because i loose 2 games for every 1 i win. that makes for some really bad stats on ironclad

yes, the ways of God are mysterious. either that or i was feverish. it's probably the second, either that or i was actually advent and dominated some tec ships then a skarkovas



or it could be, that in fear of loosing i 1v1v1 myself on 3 laptops and really annoy myself with all the crap i pull against myself. of course, i get really sad after every game because i loose 2 games for every 1 i win. that makes for some really bad stats on ironclad

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