By order of the TEC, Advent, and Vasari ambassadors, we've been asked politely to open a dialog to the Pirates about their recent strength and incursions.
They, quite undiplomatically, told us what we could do with our demands.
Obviously, such disregard for the peace of the local cluster can't be allowed, so a task force has been formed to extend a more reasonable diplomatic effort to the Pirates. One which our Vasari colleague called, "Forceful" and "Prudent."
The task forc...err, peace envoys, are due to arrive next week to creatively express our feelings to the Pirates. Rest assured, a diplomatic solution is forthcoming.
Awesome, thanks gang! I'll go through these and start indexing them on our end to look at.
The plan is to have a Diplomacy update sometime in mid-late November, but no promises (it'll depend on how long it takes to do stuff).
Take your time and do it right! I'll be here following the development the whole way
As long was we can be along for the process (Obviously you devs have the final say), I'm cool with that. I know that TSOP group has done a good job with slimming and trimming a lot of fat of those models.
I think any update patch for the Pirates in Diplomacy would be welcome if it just capped the maximum HP and DPS at a far, far lower level.
I don't need to go over the details as several people here had already, I've had to shelve Sins since the pirate problem as I don't like to play with part of the game turned off and at present with them on - they are possibly stronger than a combined Vasari, Advent and TEC fleet late game.
It would be great if Stardock/IC can fix this as I've been missing a good ole Sins game for a while now.
Or you can ask a modder to create a special mod that weakens them. Watch this.
Hey Ryat! Self proclaimed Pirate Lord... You made them stronger for Distant Stars, now make a mod that makes them weaker for poor chazzie.
I need to stop drinking the apple juice.... (DS lore joke)
ROFL!
There are several laying around. But yeah, I actually had to scale them down a bit for the regular DS, its not hard to do.
And yes, stop with the apple juice.
We must have more Apple Juice!!!!!!
The Juice Must Flow!!!!
This is good news. I haven't played for a while, the weaknesses of the current game became too glaring over time, but even a few decent fixes would help. What would be a good start would be to have an upcoming patch thread where we could discuss needed improvements, rather than this thread which players might miss. A beta phase sounds excellent, just what the game needs.
Everyone has their own notion of capital ship and combat balance, though there is some agreement on what is weak in the current version. Some of the tech tree flaws are well known as well. However, quickly, there are some basic mechanics that could use work:
Pirates: I was among the players so dissatisfied that I made a mod for them. I consider that the key to pirates is trade, you need trade income to depend on the number of trade ships, trade ships to rebuild at a reasonable rate like constructor ships, so that it becomes a viable option to attack the trade income of a faction, and pirate attacks to more heavily depend on trade income and to include more specialised anti-trade raiders, especially at the lower levels. The emphasis on forcing pirates to attack planets is just wrong. If they concentrated on trade and stayed away from defences they could even make attacks on several gravwells with trade ports, or even better, attack trade ships in neutral gravwells. They need some means to avoid phase inhibitors and starbase damage though.
Relationship points: Again, there are basic flaws with the system. If a faction dies you should lose relationship points built up with them. More importantly, the current system gives you diplomatic bonus points for a stronger fleet- this means that as the player gets stronger the AI is less likely to combine against him, which makes the game more dull. It should work in the exact reverse manner so that the more militarily dominant and aggressive a player is the more the AI react with fear and hate. The negative modifier for proximity does not seem to work. These are just the most general flaws, the system has only had one patch and needs a lot more work.
Culture: The current system works poorly, so badly as to make the Advent superweapon ineffective. Culture from starbases had to be boosted to an incredible extent to make the option attractive at all. Some number-crunching to find a better balance and make culture a viable threat seems in order. As it is one culture centre seems an effective defence no matter the amount of enemy culture centres.
Mines: Every time I mention mines other players object, they want them left rubbish because the AI makes far too many and they lag the game. The answer is to make mines vastly more powerful with a far more severe limit on how many can be placed in a gravwell. Then they would be a useful surprise tactic without harming gameplay. I've managed to destroy all the scouts in an enemy fleet before, had then chase me to an adjacent gravwell that I've mined, then got nothing because the mines do no damage. Even though my surprise worked perfectly I lost out because the enemy fleet can be repaired, while the mines cost credits and have been destroyed. One mine should destroy even a beefed-up LRF.
Maps: We've made a number of maps over the years, any chance that you could look at them and include the best of them?
I would overjoyed to see pirates and culture fixed... these I sorta feel are the most broken (large) elements of Sins.
@ Des Connor yeah mines are meh ..... but lets say you do make them stronger.
In a week or even sooner every vasari double Skirantra strategy will turn to mine layer strategy. And there will be even more shouting and crying that vasari are OP.
Skirantras don't die easily to scouts and fighters though! It takes a lot of work to get an enemy into a mine trap believe me. Three-four clusters of mines maximum should be enough per grav well, that would make it less time-consuming to get rid of them. It might help make the non-cheating AI better as well, as it tends to waste credits on mines.
Also, if there is a fairly thorough fix, not any new stuff but just the numbers and mechanics better worked out, then hopefully the problems of the next version shouldn't have anything to do with those of this version. Yes the game would be much improved with a reversion of the last Skirantra buff, but there is much else to do.
Lastly, its always annoyed me that the flashy new portraits for the complete edition weren't included in the game! That about summed up the last expansion for me, it would be good if this could be corrected. As the artwork already exists, this isn't really new?
I actually think mines could be made viable in their current state with just a couple minor changes for multiplayer and would make more sense for single player IMO.
Vasari mines already are quite viable in their current state. One of the best ways to cover kiting carriers and retreating forces, or block enemy approaches. The ability to actually deployment quickly when needed is critical, whereas the TEC and Advent really can't deploy them effectively due to the constructor and antimatter limitations respectively. Advent mines would be fine if you just removed the antimatter cost for building them (they completely gimp the carrier building them by draining it dry), but TEC mines will be the hard ones to deal with.
For capital ships, I'm a big fan of using move-speed to help fix them up. We actually tested that in a mod, and it worked wonders. The carriers (due to being exceptional at kiting) were left at their current move speed, and all other capital ships varieties were made faster so they could more easily maneuver to evade attack. This greatly increased their longevity and by extension usefulness. We took Siege and Colony capital ships to 550, Support capital ships to 575, and Battleship capital ships to 600. Carriers were left at 525 as they are now. This worked quite well, and was effectively the difference between escaping pursuing LRF or dying to their focus fire before you could do so.
Oh, and someone needs to make one of those "Patch Change" vote threads where we discuss various problems and cast votes as to what our preferred solutions would be. I don't have enough time on my hands to maintain such a thread, myself...
I like quite a few of the suggestions here in this thread (which is slowly turning into a general patch thread), especially related to pirates, culture, diplomacy, and also to non-vasari mines, but this is one I don't understand. Why should capital ships be made faster? I mean besides the obvious (of having them be more powerful and less susceptible to attack)? I like the idea that they are large, strong and deadly, but not quick and nimble and hence susceptable, and I would not like to see them be made faster. In my humble opinion, anything that encourages making difficult choices regarding what constitutes a well-balanced fleet is good, and anything which encourages utilizing one particular type of ship more than another type is suboptimal. Of course I do not play competetive MP, so I guess my vote doesn't really count, but just thought I'd voice that.
The problem with caps comes from fact that they die before you jump them out of gravity well in scenario when they bomb planet and then 30 assailants or lrms jumps in and attacks them straight on.
Are you saying that there is consensus in the MP community that bombing of a planet by unsupported capital ships should be made more viable? Even if that were the case (but maybe this means you need to figure out how to give capitals anti-LRM support when bombing?), wouldn't it then make at least as much sense to lower the anti-light damage which LRMs cause vs capital ships? I would much much prefer this solution to the problem, if there is indeed consensus that this is a problem. (Again, I realize I don't have your experience in play. I like the idea of susceptible capitals, I *like* having to save them...)
I supported adjustments to capital ship movement speeds, but this isn't the reason why. The problem is that while carrier cruisers were deliberately made unable to kite LRF, carrier capitals still can, which makes them straight away far superior to other capitals. Another aspect of this is that carrier capitals can kite other capitals, which haven't got the ability to close the range. Battleships are supposed to be able to engage frigate fleets, but need to close the range to do so then have difficulty getting away. While I support battleships and battlecruisers being made faster to fix these problems, I'm not so sure that colony ships should get a speed boost, and it might be an improvement to slow carrier capitals to their speed. This last is very much a matter of preference though.
Here's an example of the diplomatic problems with the system as it is. I played TEC on Desperation against 5 Unfair AI, one TEC two Vasari two Advent. Desperation allows you one natural roid and there are neutrals in the centre. At the beginning I concentrated on not losing ships or fighting too much, to avoid getting negative diplomacy points, simply sniping neutrals when I could. There's limited space for labs but I got 2 levels of civilian tech and the relations bonus for 2 levels, got a ceasefire with the other TEC and loaded it with envoys with the wealth bonus and eventually starbases with trade. At this point I had achieved only 1 of 2 missions the TEC set me, an opportunist destruction of ships, mainly achieved by hitting scouts. By waiting for the right moments I whittled a Vasari down, and am finally able to pursue its fleet to its home and kill the faction.
Suddenly I will have 2 planets and 2 roids, to the one owned by the other factions. However, instead of combining against me, they are keen to sign cease fires and open trade relations, even the ones where I haven't completed a mission simply by killing a faction and thereby eliminating its military and production structures. My relations points have shot up, and I'm also in a position to build more structures to maximise my relations points even further. I will win from here. I have paid no regard to missions, only completing the ones that further my goal of acquiring more space.
If you play any decently interactive board game at home with your friends or family, once a player starts to get a lead the others will begin to adjust the balance of their play to try to stop him. Its a basic element of game strategy. Yet in spite of having an entire expansion dedicated to achieving improvements in AI strategy and interaction the AI is inadequate at even the basics of it. That's even without considering the various fiddles, such as the AI bonus that is designed to make the pacts system appear to work with the AI. When it comes to AI-AI relations the AI seems incapable of even getting a ceasefire.
There you are, an example you can try yourself, you don't have to play at unfair level, any level you are comfortable with should be okay. The relations system does not work. Whether it can be made to work with the current variables and different numbers is another question. However, the basic approach has to be right.
@ omastikon
no what I am saying that even if you have support of your fleet and if they focus fire on your cap it will die and unless you are advent with lvl 6 Progen cap you will loose all experience and caps are quite expensive and most skilled players after they have build 2 or 3 caps depends on how many they want to play with they will scuttle their cap ship factory to get one more log slot for......
Desconnor nails one of the reasons; this allows battleship capital ships to catch up to kiting carrier capital ships, which helps dull their current early-game dominance. The other reason is that this allows capital ships to survive late-game fleets quite well.
This is so they can escape pursuing LRF. Right now, LRF will eventually fall behind, but usually they can keep up long enough to kill their target. For capital ships that need to get close to enemies to use their abilities, this means that actually using your capital ship is practically a death sentence unless you have an ace up your sleeve (typically repulsion or armistice). Carriers can survive by kiting and keeping near the edge of the gravity well, but other capital ship varieties really can't contribute while doing this. The speed change makes capital ships slightly faster so they can get out of range if LRF decide to focus fire. This gives a lot more time to react and preserve capital ships, which makes it easier to use their abilities without taking a very large risk that they will die.
Battleships in particular, with that fast speed of 600, could actually get toe-to-toe with LRF. With good micro and that fast move speed, you could draw fire and still get them out alive. This worked quite well; capital ships couldn't just tank early-game fleets with impunity, but their speed allowed them to survive late-game fleets if well-managed, which is exactly what we want.
I do not think there is any "brute force" balance that would make capital ships work. The problem is that they need to be beatable early-game, but not be overwhelmed late game. How do we balance them for the situation where they're fighting 20 LRF (they need to lose this battle if they don't have backup) while balancing them for the situation where they're fighting 100 LRF (they need to survive effectively amidst the larger fight). I don't think there's any values that will do this, but giving more mobility to capital ships gives players more options to manage them carefully and keep them alive, without making them unstoppable engines of destruction in the early-game. That's why I prefer this solution
I strongly disagree here; reducing the speed of carriers would make them far too vulnerable to focus fire. I also think increasing colony cap speed will do wonders for their survivability and make them viable in-combat. Right now, the only times you see them are when they have aces up their sleeves, such as armistice, repulsion, or a ridiculous shield bubble.
This is great news! My friends and I haven't touched Sins for a while now, just waiting for the next Distant Stars update. Some major fixes and upgrades to the core game would be most welcome, so we don't have to use mods all the time to enjoy the game again.
I would take a good look at including the Sins Optimization mod as part of the core game. It offers an almost negligible loss of graphic quality in exchange for improved late-game performance and crash prevention.
Yarlen, how much revision will be possible with this patch? You've mentioned that you'd like to rework the pirates, but are other aspects of the game potentially up for the same consideration? There are several problematic elements that can't just be switched off.
Here's the list I would start a patch thread with, I'm sure to have missed some at this stage, however it should be most of it. Would this sort of list be feasible, or will the patch be more limited in scope?
Major revisions requiring substantial changes:
Pirates - AI relations/diplomacy relations technology - culture/Deliverance Engine - weapons upgrades/Pinpoint Bombardment - capital ship speeds/sub-par abilities
Minor revisions with some change to the principle of a specific upgrade:
Mines/Gravity Mines - Planetary Shields - Martyrdom - Insurgency - Returning Armada - trade/refinery ship speed/build time/numbers
Adjustment after some number crunching:
Skilled Hangar Anima - Phase Detection/Degradation - Ruthlessness - Colony Pods - Resource Focus - Vasari volcanic population upgrades - refineries
The point about the carrier capital speed is that slowing them is an alternative approach to solving the same problem, it depends whether your preference is for stronger or weaker capitals, when making other changes. However I am not keen at all on faster colony capitals, I'm satisfied that at least one class of capitals should have to be careful in combat, and the Advent colony capitals are already hard to destroy when they are evading combat. Faster speeds would make it easier for colony ships to capture a planet then leave while turrets are being built, which I consider a type of abuse.
Naval warfare before aircraft and submarines was all about the range of weapons (which automatically meant more powerful weapons) and the speed of ships. When I considered the weapons upgrade problems I wondered whether it might be an idea to upgrade the range of weapons along with their power, and perhaps upgrade ship speeds along with other upgrades. Whereas a 5% increase in firepower isn't much a 5% increase in range or especially ship speed could be very influential, making upgrades far more important?
Well, most of the stuff you guys have pointed me to/are asking for are items from Entrenchment, which isn't something we'd address with a Diplomacy patch. For Diplomacy we're specifically looking at bugs/tweaks for diplomacy and pirates. I've pointed Ironclad at your threads, however, and they'll look at them in consideration towards a balance update.
Ya, here's one of the pesky things with pacts being offered then immediately rescinded.
https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/396469/page/1/#2772442
How about a Pirate Tech Tree? It could include a specialized cruiser (or maybe even a new capital ship!) that is primarily designed for anti-Pirate use. It could have an interdiction beam which slows down the Pirate vessels, and a ship-to-ship boarding party which allows the gamer to take command of captured vessels. In addition, new Pirate Techs could be added. A Tech Tree for Black Ops could allow gamers to spy on any faction in the game, and a special, cloaked ship could do surgical strikes and sabotage. The same ship, if the Tech Tree is researched far enough, could gain a “Kill Leader” ability which allows it to sneak into a pirate-held base and assassinate the Pirate King. Depending on what the developing team decides, this could “kill” the colony and everything in the gravity well, or instigate an all-out free-for-all between the Pirate defense forces in the gravity well, and the Pirate Raid forces that spawn in it, for a specified length of time. It would also stall any Pirate Raids for the same amount of time. After the Pirates kill themselves off until one team wins, then that team becomes the defense force and begins rebuilding the Pirate Base. That would create an excellent window of opportunity for my TEC fleet to drop in and wipe them out!
Temporary Pirate alliances might be good too. The Tech would be a regenerating one that would grant a cease-fire between the researching faction and the pirates for a certain amount of time. It would be costly in the long run, thus discouraging excessive use, but could prove to be a saving grace in the short run!
A Black Market Option for ships and technologies would be nice. The Pirates could act as mediums (or vendors) through which excess ships, and enemy techs, are sold or purchased; for extortionate prices of course! That opens up a whole range of Tech possibilities even in itself (Frigate, Cruiser, and Capital Ship availability Techs; Cost Discount Techs; personal selling price increase techs, enemy tech purchasing options, etc!). Think about it; say you have four Cobalt Light Frigates. You want to scrap two and purchase two Javelis instead. You only get a portion of your resources back. Why not sell them on the Black Market? Since no other faction except the TEC can get Cobalts, you could crank the price up to 400 or 500 credits and get your money’s worth and more out of them. Or, if you’re hard-pressed for crystal or metal, you could set a price in either of these commodities (200 crystals?). You could designate exactly which Cobalts to eliminate, so that you don’t accidentally weaken a fleet. Furthermore, the ships would vanish from the screen once placed on the market. If you change your mind, you could take them off the market and have them reappear in their original places, or by a ship factory. This could be done for any of your ships (you would automatically have your fleet points credited back to you upon a sale). Of course, it allows your enemies to use your own ships against you if they purchase them; enter the stolen ship tech market. If your espionage (I’ll get to that in a minute!) wasn’t obtaining Techs for your newly diversified fleets quickly enough, you could purchase them off of the Black Market for Techs. Example: A Vasari Warlord has a penchant for Cobalts. He loves ‘em and likes to use them as skirmishers. However, standard Cobalts just aren’t cutting it; he needs them to be souped up a bit. His espionage is still working on the Stage One LASER Tech, so he Googles his local Pirate Broker and purchases the Destabilize Reactor Tech; for an extortionate price of course! Now he has one Tech that is currently being stolen, and another which provides his Cobalts with an immediate edge! Again; this could be applied for any ships. Of course, you would need the fleet size and crew member points necessary before you signed the contract on these exotic ships, but, of course, that part is already an old mechanism in the game and is quite familiar to everyone.
On the Black Market Techs: any ships that are sold automatically have their relevant Techs displayed. After all, reverse engineering and systematic analysis of enemy ships (another new researchable tech!) would yield the knowledge necessary for your civilization to develop these Techs. Making them automatically available on the Black Market (for an extortionate price, of course), speeds up the process and adds another dimension of game play. In short, there would be three different ways to earn Techs for recently stolen or purchased enemy ships: Espionage could slowly steal them, you could by them (for extortionate prices!), or you could research them as you might if you were the enemy civilization (at about 2 times the usual research time, and for maybe 1.5 times the usual prices, and only after researching the reverse engineering Tech!). Another note about the Black Market Techs: civilizations in need of money could “sell” their Techs to the Black Market, or, use researchable diplomacy options to sell them directly to other civilizations. Again, this opens up a whole variety of related Techs that could be researched (increased price-gouging, better Market and civ. relations, etc.). Example: TEC could sell its Expedited Permits Tech to the Black Market for much needed resources. Black Market turns around and sells it to the Vasari. Flip side: TEC engages in direct negations with the Vasari and charges a steeper, or lower, price. However, the Tech remains private and is not placed on the open market (unless the Vasari decide to export their exotic Tech). Any star base Techs that are stolen or purchased could be engineered (expensively) to fit your own faction’s star base, thus yielding more varieties and surprises.
A Pirate Tech could be added which prompts them to sabotage enemy utilities. For example if your Black Ops Tech Tree yielded some saboteurs, and they were discovered, your enemy would know who it was that was attempting to sabotage them. However, if you drove your repulsorlift down to your friendly neighbor Pirate Agent’s Office, and signed a sabotage contract (for an extortionate price of course!) they could do it for you without alerting your enemy as to your involvement; even if they got caught. Of course, the pirates already attack ships, structures, and planets. This, though, would be stealthy; they could either destroy structures without warning, or, they could inhibit them (i.e. – drain resources from planets and asteroids, slow down ship production, lengthen structure construction time, etc.). In the long run, it would probably do more to hurt the enemy; if they didn’t notice it and research their rechargeable, but highly expensive, “Purge Sabotage” Tech.
Another Pirate Tech could be “Interception,” and it could have two or three other researchable levels. The warning bar for Pirate attacks could disappear altogether; that would definitely randomize the game and add some extra spice! The Interception Techs would replace it by allowing you to detect Pirate force build-ups, raid party launches, etc. They could even progress to the point where you can determine who is placing bounties on you, and allow you to trace the routes the pirates are using to attack you. Also, the pinnacle Tech could be “Intercept Aggressor,” where the Pirates are ambushed in each gravity well as they make their way towards you. This would seriously deplete their strength, and could even destroy them if they are located far enough away from you.
The ultimate Pirate Tech would be “Elimination.” This would be a Tech that all three individual empires must research before it could be used (definitely a team Tech). Once all three have researched it, and their experimental weapon tech (i.e. –Novalith Cannon, Kostura Cannon, and the Advent Psionic Cannon), then the leader of one faction can “build” an elimination ship. The other two factions will be prompted by the computer to accept elimination invitation or not. If both do, then they share the expensive costs and construct a computer-controlled elimination ship. The three factions each submit a target. The three targets are randomized and one is selected by the computer (or they could vote like the U.P. in Gal Civ.). Once the target is acquired, the elimination ship, armed with cores from the Novalith, Kostura, and Psionic cannons, will approach the Pirate (or enemy!) planet. It would look like a typical envoy (the target which won the computer’s dice roll decides which envoy is used). Once in the gravity well, all three cores would explode simultaneously. I’m still trying to decide whether or not the elimination ship should destroy the planet or whether it should just eliminate all unfriendly units in the gravity well……
I like the trades that somebody else in this forum mentioned; swap the Pirates a couple ships or Techs in exchange for reduced attacks. Of course, they’re pirates though; they might double-cross!
Off of the subject of Pirates, there are a few suggestions to be made…
The envoys should be classified as civilian vessels, and should receive the same bonuses that constructers, trade ships, and ore carriers receive from Techs like the reinforced hulls.
Torpedo cruisers should be extra effective against capital ships too; not just buildings. There are not, after all, any anti-capital ship vessels or Techs yet…
The whole dimension of Black Ops, Special Ops, Stealth, etc. hasn’t been explored. Just think; cloaking arrays that mask gravity wells, cloaked ships, cloaked fighters and bombers, portable cloaking generators which mask fleets to allow a player the chance to set ambushes, the list can go on and on! Long range sensor arrays that reveal enemy activity (over 2nd generation PSIDAR!) would also be a great Tech. Espionage I have mentioned more than once, and could be used to steal enemy Techs and reveal information about enemy movements, planets, gravity wells, and resource allocation; thus providing critical strategic information. Sweeper ships and Sweeper arrays (for gravity wells) could reveal enemy ships that are cloaked, and could intercept in-bound espionage forces.
Transports for Ship-to-Planet invasion would be nice. Of course, the idea of planetary invasion opens up another whole Tech tree. Better weapons, armor, warfare tactics, etc. could be researched for attacking troops. Though the space-to-ground bombardment option is always available, it destroys the colony. Space-to-ground invasion would give an empire the option of capturing enemy planets without destroying infrastructure, thus adding some diversity to the game. Transports could also double as boarding parties for enemy ships; particularly capital ships. The only hitch with boarding capital ships is the crew issue. Perhaps you could capture it if you had a capital ship crew available. If not, then the boarding party could self-destruct it. There would have to be a mathematical equation that could factor in all of the relevant data, and then roll the dice to see if the boarding party, or invasion force, was repulsed, or if it succeeded; it could be along the lines of the Galactic Civilization’s planet invasion counter…
More Capital Ships!!!
How about a new capital ship that sports fighter/bomber busting? It would be the equivalent of a huge Garda Flak Frigate, and would serve as small ship defense. Special abilities could include flak platforms (like the TEC carrier’s missile platforms), jamming, EMP nets, and a gravity-well-wide fighter/bomber disabler. The flak platforms are self-explanatory. The jamming ability would decrease the accuracy of fighters and bombers, and could decrease their speeds (due to their flight planner’s difficulty in interpreting the scrambled sensor data) which would make them more vulnerable. EMP nets could be deployed like flak platforms, but act as a literal net. They can be fired at a group of inbound fighters/bombers and envelop the dense formation in an EMP field which destroys them or disables them for a certain amount of time. The disabler would be like a gravity-well-wide EMP with the same effects. Rather a diabolical thought actually; the enemy fighters/bombers would be no good at all for a certain amount of time, and the enemy cannot regenerate them because they are not dead. It would be the bane of a carrier fleet.
Another main battleship would be sweet. I like the Kol a lot, but I often feel as though it and the Sova are the only two TEC ships that feel like warships. The rest feel like unwieldy freighters, although the Akkan and the Marza do possess some decent firepower. I am thinking another Heavy beam based cruiser with a few conventional lasers sacrificed in favor of missiles (thinking of a more balanced arsenal). Instead of a Gauss rifle slug, it could have a Meson bolt. The adaptive shield is nice, but, since the Kol already has that, it could possess a scrambler which disrupts missile trajectories and grants it temporary safety against all trajectory-tracking weapons (like missiles and phase missiles). Instead of a flak burst, it could have mini-swarm SRMs for anti-fighter/bomber use; or, it could have boarding parties. Since Finest Hour is already taken, it could have something like Last Stand or self-destruct. Last Stand would be akin to Finest Hour while Self-Destruct would be akin to the Space Station’s self-destruct mechanism.
Another carrier would also be terrific, but I’ll leave y’all to contemplate that one!
Actually, another expansion pack or two might be in order…….
Holy crap that's a lot and I've only read the first few paragraphs, but I have to say, the pirates already do have a tech tree, and in some mods, especially Distant Stars, pirates have capital ships and use them on you. If you have diplomacy, while it's not possible to ally with the pirates, you can pay them off to run missions for you, so it's kind of the same thing.
Just scanning the rest of it, black market training would be fun, but not sure how useful it would be when you can and will most likely be able to build your own ships and tech up cheaper and have the results be better because it affects your whole fleet rather then one ship.
Again, the pirates already have a tech tree, some mods developed it out further, it's been a long time since I've looked at it, so I don't recall what's already there, but I know I get pissed off real quick once they learn the tech to ignore mines (in DS at least). It forces me to actually come back and do something about them rather then let them get shredded at entry and let my standard planet defenses mop up.
An issue I see with your ultimate pirate tech thingy is that would require cooperation within all three races, currently research pacts of the same level can only be held between you and one other faction, making that impossible before you even begin, and that's even if all three races are represented in the game you're playing and somehow willing to cooperate.
Anti cap ship vessels would be heavy cruisers and/or missile frigates. (That is, if you don't have enough carriers to spam bombers.)
I like black ops stuff, I routinely refer people to Hegemonia - Legions of Iron for a similar game that spent a lot of time working on just that. (In case anyone is looking for ideas)
More cap ships? Eh. They've covered the areas that need to be covered anything else would just be more of the same ships. On the TEC side of things, Kol's, and Dunov's have abilities that can take care of strike craft if you use them properly. The other races have similar. The problem really is due to the fact fighters and bombers have different armor types making weapon systems tough to balance. Personally I always gear them more to take out the bombers since those do more damage.
I'd rather work more on the current battleships then try to bring in a new one. Sins is already pushing the memory limits as most modders know. Adding ships and structures for each side adds more to the memory issues and eventually make the game unplayable. How nice is that? Build yourself into failure.
A new carrier would be horrible. We already deal with strike craft spam in the form of bomber runs that wipe out cap ships in a single pass... Add another one?
Another expansion 'could' be nice, but only if it includes a 64bit executable.
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