Old sins player, new to expansion.

1. Starbases - Simply put they are the most powerful fortification your faction can construct. In vanilla you probably noticed the standard turrets were a bit lacking. These things, on the other hand, are easily the most powerful entity in the game. Fully upgraded, they can have over 20,000 HP, insane armor, and multiple weapons capable of hitting 4-5 targets each per bank. The result is that they can somewhat replace a fleet for planet defense duty, and can even be used offensively in some situations as you can build them in gravity wells you don't control. To prevent the enemy from completely skipping them, enemy ships take damage and lose antimatter if they leave a gravity well with one present, making them sitting ducks if a well prepared fleet engages them afterward. They also have some miscellaneous upgrades that can benefit your faction if different ways. TEC's base is noteable for its ability to produce frigates and self destruct, resulting in the destruction of the entire enemy fleet many times. Obviously they are expensive.

2. What new ship are you talking about? There are a couple.

3. Overall Entrenchment has improved the game. Early game it isn't much different, but once you can afford the defensive improvements it does much to combat the lack of real choke points in the original Sins. Also the quick start option is helps speed up games, to the point that you won't remember how you lived without it.

4. Yes, it is one of the biggest balance complaints in the current game. We are hoping the next balance patch will finally give it a boost.

Starbases, like anything, really depend on your situation and strategy, and whether you're fighting the AI or human.  Building a starbase is ordinarily a huge decision, but they're easily the most powerful battlestations in the game.  They're effectively impregnable in the early game.  With a small fleet to support them and 3 or 4 upgrades, it can be nearly impossible to take a starbase down.  On the other hand, starbases can't phase jump, so if you put it in a bad location the enemy can still ravage the rest of your empire. 

This is especially true in multiplayer where human players will simply look at a powerful upgraded starbase and keep going.  They'll attack softer targets, and if your fleet is much smaller there's not a lot you can do about that.  As a result, starbases need to be placed very well to have any overall benefit, and won't save you at all if your fleet is substantially smaller.  However, the AI is prone to just charge them head on (a death sentence) so building one or two on the front lines is a great idea in those situations.

 

Well, there's the Envoy Cruiser, the Construction Cruisers (build starbases), the Assault Cruisers (anti-structure), and the minelayer cruiser.  Envoys are purely diplomatic, and construction cruisers are only for building starbases, so I'll skip over them.  The assault cruisers are for TEC and Advent.  The TEC Ogrov is a great anti-structure weapon that can rip through starbases quite nicely due to its long range and high damage.  The Advent Adjudicator is less useful, since it's more expensive and packs less of a punch.  It's generally regarded as a useless unit since it's too fragile for its high cost.

Now every faction has minelaying capacity.  The TEC build them like tactical structures, and so they don't have a dedicated minelayer unit.  In general, this means TEC has to set up their mines long in advance since their construction frigates have to meander about and build each mine individually.  The Advent carrier doubles as its minelayer, but this really consumes lots of antimatter so it's not very effective.  The Vasari have a dedicated minelayer, and it's simple to use with no strings attached, easily the best minelayer and the only type of mines that I ever bother to use.  However, its only purpose is to lay mines.

 

Entrenchment has brought a new world of strategy to multiplayer.  For singleplayer, it has its upsides and downsides.  On the one hand, it's got lots of new awesome features.  On the other hand, the AI hasn't taken well to starbases and I've found the difficulty has never been the same as a result.  The AI is particularly bad about spending too much money on starbases and gimping its fleet (thus screwing over every planet not protected by a starbase, leading to defeat) or charging headfirst into my own starbase and getting its fleet ravaged. 

 

The Kol is still underwhelming.  Definitely in the bottom 5 capital ships, arguably the bottom 3.  The Sova is pretty awesome now, and the Akkan has been much improved, so TEC hasn't been completely ignored, just the Kol.

Hey Darvin3,

I haven't played since Diplo came out. Did they buff the Akken before the x-pac or after. I always used to use the Akkan as my first Cap....always. It was never the best cap out there but I loved the colonize (I know is better since first level gives you the first extractor free), ion bolt, target uplink (I love the extra range), and Armistice (which if you are skilled at piloting you can break apart an enemy fleet and and destroy the ships outside of the range of the ability). Did anything else change on it to make it that much better than it was before?

 

Thanks in advance,

Codan

Cheers for the updates guys, if any of you want to add me on ICO for a few games feel free, hUssmann on there too..

Akkan was buffed in Entrenchment and maybe vanilla Sins as well. The colonize is much better now, probably the best in the game. Armistice is still more or less the same.

It was patch 1.18 that the Akkan got its buff, which was before Diplomacy.  That patch saw a lot of improvement for the various types of capital ships.


The only thing that was changed was its "colonize" ability, which now grants an additional free extractor at each level, and gives a small extractor income bonus to the planet for a few minutes after it's colonized (the latter effect is Entrenchment/Diplomacy only).

If you tally up the benefits, the new Akkan colonize has surpassed the old Progenitor colonize (even before we account for the fact that the Progen's colonize got nerfed!)

How do you figure this? 

I don't get that at all.  The potential cost saving on all infrastructure, and logistic upgrades alone outweigh the $250 you save per extractor.   Those 2 upgrades are almost alway purchased eventually anyways.  Not to mention the other potential upgrades savings.

A. The extractors are built instantly, so you get extra resources equivalent to the build time.

B. The substantial mineral bonus of 33%/66%/100% bonus lasts a while and does miracles for the early game economy.

C. The extra credits saved on extractor you already mentioned.

Logistics upgrades are seldom purchased in the early game.  Later on the potential from the Progenitor's colonize is indeed higher, but early on you just don't get enough planetary upgrades to make it superior, and later on there's very little left to colonize anyways.

Maybe in your style of play.  But I disagree that this is always the case, or the best strategy. 

Yes, the potential savings are indeed much higher.  And there may be little left to colonize, but late games often include a lot of recolonizing of seiged planets, and/or the capturing of enemy planets.

Finally, the improved artifacts in Diplomacy make this ability all the more valuable, especially combined with the tech for improved artifact "scrying".