Advent were never really supposed to be a powerful early game race. Quick start reversed that, but now that the illum has been toned down, they're a little more like they used to be. I don't really see that as a problem other than that people who are used to being able to stomp other races early as Advent now have a fairer fight on their hands. I haven't really noticed much of a disadvantage for Advent on the defensive side of the rush, but on the offensive side they're much weaker now. 

The forward damage isn't great for the illum, but that just puts them back to the old engage point blank strategy for them, or even the circle and shoot with sidebeams strategy. Old school most certainly. Advent can still kick some arse. I still see people doing dual halo rushes, with seekers and illums accompanying, and having some success.

Yeah they aren't the early game powerhouse anymore, but IMO they were never supposed to be so I got no problem with it.

Something startling that I have noticed is how bad Assailants murderize cap ships now, even without the Evacuators nanites. Maybe they'd just been overshadowed by how fast illums used to do it, but to me it seems like these days theyre eating cap ships faster than fat kids eat cake.

I've been saying it, I will continue to say it:  Caps cannot properly support the fleet because of lrms and bombers.  They can have an early role before substantial numbers of lrms and bombers hit the field, but once that happens, your caps will be sitting on the sidelines, or they will be dead.

If Sins 2 is ever created, they need to address this.  The best solution is probably to make it so that caps are essentially only countered by other caps.  As for now, I've gone back to super old school of just building colonizer cap, and using it strictly for colonizing.  It doesn't see battles, therefore it doesn't get killed, and when opponents fight me, they have no cap to target.

The assailant thing might be more noticeable now simply because in the last patch, you really couldn't field assailants, as outrageous as that sounds.  They got slaughtered by seekers or illums, so personally I had no choice at that time but to push starbases and build tons of flak.

Good, the Advent's main strength was always supposed to be synergies, and this pretty much means that they should be weaker early game. Besides, they still have the Halycon rush, with should be able to counter early lrf fleets if you pick fighters. I'm afraid I need some real solid numbers to even agree they are a lot worse early game than the other two.

So what you are saying is that advent deserves to be lower than everyone else because you thought they were OP in previous patches and balance be damned.....nice.  Also I like the fact that you say you only play MP despite your many MANY rantings against multiplayer in various threads.  Its very classy of you I must say. 

I don't mind being a little weak early game myself if I make up for it in other ways.  Advent used to be the weak one anyways early game before quick start because of lab/neutral advantages that vasari had.  Advent could use some love though or the buffs given to other races can be nerfed some(I mean 900 tax free supply from pacts are a bit crazy while advent gets crap relatively). 

[_]-Greyfox

But that's the point, dumbass.  Yes, I play MP.  Yes, I'm willing to criticize MP.  That makes me more objective than, say, an SP who does nothing but slag MP.