Steam player DadsDestiny. Currenly logged 2400hrs on SoaSE; love Rebellion. Played Tech for first 5 years. I currently prefer the weakest race, IMO Vasari, for the challenge over last 3 years.. Advent too easy to play.
Simple (?) suggestions for Rebellion balancing (not crazy re-invent the game stuff):
Ships:
-Nerf Eradica. Can take on any titan, any AI fleet, any human (mid-sized) fleet, and any starbase solo after @level 8+. Virtually impossible to beat experienced human adversary unless entire fleet or unbalanced spamming (say 40+ carriers). Just not right
-Advent Radiance (or Revelation?)'s cap ability to disable EVERYTHING on another cap is too long. No other cap ship (or titan) disables for such duration.
-Limit # of types of ships to prevent spamming and force more balanced play. 8 Vasari Devestators or 8 Tech Marzdas are virtually unstoppable without counter-spamming. Perhaps 4, but this will make many users unhappy. No more than 5, but 4 would be more challenging.
-Ragnarov too easy to kill (better armor maybe?) and "spin around". All Titans should have zero blind spots (i.e. rear defenses) even if weakened. I understand the super-long range sniper shot needs to go in the direction the ship is pointing, but the "shotgun" should be mounted on a 360 pivoting turret, perhaps.
-Titans should not focus so much on single cap ship and follow it blindly to infinity and beyond. Too easy to "lure" away or into traps. Perhaps change focus to neighboring target?
-Eradica too fast. Flying fortress of death that is faster than all cap ships. Advent have it too easy... Maybe a temporary speed burst, like the Tech cruiser has. Or a penalty for "overdriving the subspace engines". Once an Eradica has you in its sites, only defense is jump to a planet and pray it does not follow, running to cover if possible.
-Eradica too hard to kill. There is virtually zero combination of any races' frigates in ANY numbers that can be near a level 8 eradica and survive, except airplane carriers and that's because they can stay away and attack from afar. Only way to kill Eradica is try to wipe out supporting fleet first, then wail on it with 6-8 caps plus titan.
-Eradica antimatter too hard to stop. (6x level 10 Devestators have a chance but at least 2 will die before 20% damage done to level 8 Eradica, even with Korastra/SB support).
-Eradica is stuff of my nightmares... And my BFF gloats too much playing them
-Why is Vasari titan the only titan with abilities that do NOT affect any other cap ships?
-Advent Coronata AI does not use super-ability like humans. Rarely used, if ever, and only after most of planet structures wiped out. Humans typically go for jugular asap to stop builder ships and planet control.
-...and AI ships should not "run away immediately" when Coronata takes their planet in one fell swoop. Too easy of an Advent tactic.
-Why doesn't SB Loyalty counter Coronata "I'm taking your planet right now regardless of its health, culture, or even if I've researched it in my Advent tech tree). Slightly imbalanced IMO.
Stars:
-Do not permit 4x starbases on any star. Max of 2. Advent culture goes crazy, and AI never uses this strategy. Prevents users from spamming 30+ bombers in star system when ships already slow. Also, let AI put SBs into stars... one early-game. Two mid-game...
-Culture should not spawn through stars, or more significantly reduced. Advent culture can overcome most AIs and other humans (for example, multi-star system and Advent places 4 SBs on their home "star" and the culture spreads EVERYWHERE). Good luck with that for anyone. Make Advent "force" their way into other star systems like the other races have to...
Pirates:
- AI should never be permitted to bomb pirates. Not realistic to "bribe" pirates to attack others then bomb their home base. These weapons should only be used on human or other AI targets. Since AI almost never "attacks" pirate bases with fleets, this is a waste of their super weapons.
- Spawn random (weakened/salvaged) cap ships on pirate bases. Just for fun. Send them out with raids on occasion.
- Send pirates out with random objectives/priorities. Sometimes to steal coin (attack trade ports), sometimes to salvage (attack secondary structures), sometimes to harvest (attack asteroids/mining).
- Allow bribe function directly on pirate homeworld. click on pirate base, select bribe. Immunity for XXX secs to pass through their space. Perhaps the larger the fleet passage, the more expensive the bribe needs to be. Sometimes the pirate base is in a direct path to adversaries.
-Tech rebels eventually get too many pirate friends on their worlds. It's like attacking an infinite supply of Pirate Bases, but worse/harder. Recommend limiting # of pirate support ships per gravity well.
Races:
-Advent culture can "win" a game without ever firing a shot from a ship, especially with multiple cannons. Little to no defense besides sacrifice labs and build media centers, but even these get overpowered eventually. Need to nerf to Advent culture, or better yet improve counters in other races in higher tech trees?
-Vasari defense systems too weak. Repair bays and missile platforms easily overpowered compared to any other race. I barely even build missile platforms any more.
-Vasari SBs do not do enough damage considering they have phase missile upgrades.
-Vasari cannon too weak. 6 Advent cannons can permanently lose a planet. 6 Tech cannons can permanently kill a planet (heck, even 3 but at least there is SB counter with loyalty). 6 Vasari cannons generally do not even kill any orbital structures. Recommend buffing Vasari cannon for longer impact and to perhaps include "radiating" the planet (or call it "phasing the planet's technology" so Vasari are "immune" to the effects) so any ships in orbit (or entering the gravity well during cannon effect period) gets a slight, temporary nerf. Interestingly, perhaps less effect when Vasari bombs Vasari? There are really no long term effects from Vasari cannon, and it's so high in the tech tree.
-Vasari Armada not useful. At 8th level tree, users already have max cap ships and fleet should always be maxed out at ANY level of play. So to deliberately NOT "spend" 200 "ship points" just so I can wait to bring in a few extra ships is not worth it. First, should not be able to summon armadas from deep space from EVERY phase stabilizer infinitely (how many fleets did the old vasari guard lose in phase space, anyway . Once triggered from one stabilizer, all stabilizers should "cool down". Second, allow rally point for stabilizers. Ships appear from deep space and are so confounded they just sit there? "Hi, I've been lost in space for millennia and now that I'm home I'm just gonna sit here for a spell". Perhaps temporary fleet upper when armada arrives and cannot exceed temporary cap to prevent infinite ships. I use armada solely as a cheap way to get cruiser carriers and discard the rest. Vasari frigates have little use. Can't hurt to throw in a "used" cap ship randomly
-Tech fairly well balanced and great for noobs. I am masochistic and prefer Vasari and lose too many times to my BFF's Advent hostile aliens! Have to be special kind of crazy to play Vasari... Hate the Eradica in all cases, all circumstances. He sends a single titan against anything, his whole fleet elsewhere.
-Advent SB chastic burst (whatever it is that makes ships spin) should not effect titans (it does not effect Vasari SBs, for example). It should also have lesser effect on cap ships assuming the crew is "better trained" or has better defenses.
Minor Factions
-Potential, but AI puts too much emphasis on capturing (and holding) as they are soooo easy to stop entirely. A simple "stop abilities" frigate or cap will "cut off" an envoy, allowing another envoy to take over. Or kill the envoy. First recommendation, after envoy "disconnects" for whatever reason perhaps a planet "cool down" period instead of transforming instantly to "KILL YOU NOW" mode. Second, perhaps a permanent "if your envoy holds the planet long enough, it's like you captured it permanently". Perhaps after 5 or 10 mins. Third, recommend a "3rd level" of minor faction tech tree buffing. Make them WORTH the effort of holding that planet. Most faction abilities are little more than rampant militia annoying levels of nothingness that a solid SB can't handle.
-Perhaps new faction abilities that utilize other races' strengths: like a mini-novalith cannon for advent (eeks. Shoot me now with Advent's advantages already) or a culture cannon for vasari. No one wants the orbital structures cannon (see recommended buffs above Bonus SBs. Mobile SBs. Skies the limit. THAT would make factions enticing to hold...
Gameplay
-Would REALLY like to have new ships take on Hold/Local/gravity well attribute of builder planet. Not fond of fleets in general (I know they are popular to some but when fighting my nemesis the Eradica I constantly have to abort single ships and be careful not to command the fleet afterwards...
-AI seems to give up attacking the longer a game goes? Their titan's come asap on vicious, but by mid-game and definitely late game I rarely see them, even on 1v1 (i.e. there's no one else to attack so why not attack me?). With their infinite moola, the AI should never stop sending wave upon wave against multiple planets...
-AI does not seem to "ramp up" to huge fleets. Easy to "conquer" most planets once 6+ cap ships of a human plus commensurate supporting fleet attack. Even easier to "roll over" once 10+ cap ships attacking at once. Recommend limiting number of ships permitted in a gravity well? Need to be careful here as this affects basic play all around. Perhaps a limited number of each type of ship? Spamming is too easy and needs to be discouraged. I once sent 100+ carriers with fighters for fun - thought my computer was going to melt down with lag
Overall, SoaSE is still one of the best strategy games of the past decade and has amazing replay-ability and impressive online response for multi-player. Bravo. Encore for SoaSE2 as well
-DadsDestiny