New Vasari Starbase is a Beast

This thing is unstoppable when you have all 3 attack upgrades, 4 defense upgrades and a debris vortex upgrade. To help keep itself full of HP after killing everything in sight.  My whole plan was to get on a map with a single chokepoint into my territory against 3 teamed unfair AI. I had to really forsake my economy to rush the starbase to the chokepoint, which was a dead asteroid. I batrely had the first 3 defense upgrades and a couple of attack upgrades before the first massive waves of enemy ships attacked.

The key point is to make sure the asteroid stays colonized, and the AI won't move on to your juicy inner worlds. I kept reinforcing it with capital ships, but they were easily destroyed reapeated due to shear mass of vessels. The starbase was mostly unphased. the only thing that can even scratch it were torpedo cruisers. For those I just task all of my fighters and shift click each one.  The Starbase was perpetually at zero shields and full health. It never had any time to regenerate shields due to the constant war going on, but the debris vortex kept the hull HP very high.  There were a few times when I didn't notice some torpedo cruisers slip in and I got down to 13,000 HP/21,000HP. I was worried but soon after those torpedo ships were dead, my starbase had regenerated on its own.

Because of the massive carnage, I was putting low level capital ships in play and they would instantly level up because of the buffet of experience points in the gravity well.  Eventually, the AI fleets got to a point where I feared my starbase couldn't keep up. I was losing lvl 8 carrier caps like they were light frigates, and replacing them without a care, because they level back up so quick. My only fighters were supplied from just 4 hanger defenses and 4 carrier capitals.

The next jump out was a star, i eventually put 4 new starbases out there, but the AI basically ignores them . I upgrades them with colony pods and trade ports to try and help out my suffering economy of only 3 planets.I only had 2 crystal asteroids and I had to buy 95% of my crystal to upgrade.

Once I got enough weapons labs, i upgraded Hull, Armor and Shields and this thing is a total beast. It fears no one. It laughs at torpedo cruisers, slowly flies toward them and crushes them easily.  its main weapons do like 240 damage or something, plus like 170 or 180 for its secondary and third weapon systems. 24 armor.

With only 3 planets, my whole economy was based on colony pods and trade port from the starbases on those 3 worlds. I bought resources with my mass of credit income. because I didn't have the logistics to make trade structures, all of my logistics were tied up with weapons and empire labs.

Still, 3 Unfair AIs could not defeat me. Try it.

16,813 views 31 replies
Reply #1 Top

The Starbases are now incredibly powerful it seems.  With only Flak Support I had a fully upgraded Argonev in orbit around a Gas Giant (So no other defenses) and it annihilated an Unfair AI's massive fleet (Though took substantial damage)   The Fully Upgraded starbases are truly a force to be reckoned with now (As they should be). 

 

This boost seems to have affected all defensive structures, Gauss Platforms, even pre Meson bolt and Rockets seem to be particularly nasty with their Armor changing.  Upgraded Gauss, a few Hangars, 2-3 Repair platforms and 2(WeaponSystem)3(StructuralIntegrity)2(DockingBooms)1(WhateverYouWant) Argonev can repel just about everything .

Reply #2 Top

Amusing story (and I assume a really fun game), though I don't take this as a reason to tone SB's at all. The AI may fall for that because of a poor judgement of the value of your heavily defended asteroid, but no human would. Try pulling those shinanigans on a 'Natural Intelligence" and I think your economic woes would have proved your undoing x_x . The Vasari SB, fully upgraded with vortex is really fucking awesome (:cylon: ), but hardly invincible. Considering the resources necessary to get it to that point and the ease with which a well-balanced fleet CAN and WILL destroy it, I think its present stats are near-perfect. In fact, I stick by the desire for a tech-upgrade at lvl 8 for all factions (yes, Vasari included), allowing for 1-2 more SB upgrade slots. Your scenario is interesting, though I have also seen the AI handle fully upgraded SB's of all varieties with relative ease when they get going from a good economic base in late games. But anyways, since you seemed to be recommending the experience I won't belabour the point, as I get the feeling you actually enjoyed the 'beast'. It is dissapointing that they still don't seem to factor in the potency of the quadruple SB's at stars... once again another oversight that a human player would never make.

:beer: Cheers to the slaughter! :cylon: + x_x}:) + :rofl:

Reply #3 Top

Has anyone found that against ai it is better to set ur vasari starbase at chokepoints to not move? That way you can have structures supporting it and not leave it vulnerable at teh edge of wells where it can get surounded far from your fleet at times. Its great to let it roam free and kill everything but keeping a leash on it seems to work better when turtling. Thoughts?

Reply #4 Top

I'm still worried how that's gonna work in MP because no one is going to stick around to play with a fully upgraded Starbase.

They're just going to take the AM loss and hull damage and go wipe out your inner worlds uncontested because the player with the kickass starbase has no fleet.

And frankly, the AI should be coded so that they don't stick around to fight a powerful SB either unless they have enough ships to blow it up.

Reply #5 Top

Quoting Hound, reply 4
I'm still worried how that's gonna work in MP because no one is going to stick around to play with a fully upgraded Starbase.

They're just going to take the AM loss and hull damage and go wipe out your inner worlds uncontested because the player with the kickass starbase has no fleet.

And frankly, the AI should be coded so that they don't stick around to fight a powerful SB either unless they have enough ships to blow it up.

yeah, it shouldn't. I had a similar case, where I thought I could crack an AI stronghold, but failed, so eventually I chose to take slightly less fortified route which at least brought me to their relatively undefended hw. gameover. but the ai could have hurt me quite a bit by bypassing too I'd imagine.

just one thing: if you chose to bypass it, you have to be aware that it will be very hard to pull out. you take 30% hull loss and all am, then you may have to fight a fleet eventually at the hinterland and if things are not going too well and you have to retreat, you will have to take another 30% loss (of remaining hp) and the am. combine that with the fact that it might be extremely hard to bring reinforcements to the battle past that beast starbase and it's not that easy. failure could leave you wide open to attack.

Reply #6 Top

those long range cruisers have a happy time with starbases i managed to pretty much dismantled a whole planets defence platforms including starbase with 10 of them while my main fleet fought off there's in multiplayer.

 

the one unit which i can never find useful is anti-planet ships, they never seem worth it as they are crap in combat and cap ships can do it better.

Reply #7 Top

Try frontal shield instead of the vortex... I know it ruled in beta 2. Vasari sb=SBkiller.

Grtz,
[_]-Flipkik

Reply #8 Top

My inner worlds were soft, but not that soft. I had starbases at each one, though only with economy upgrades,

Reply #9 Top

I played Gaian Crescent against an AI, fired Kostura on his Homeworld, sent a migrator with support to the newly formed Phase Stabilizer Node, and had an Orkulus up before his fleet got there, and as you can imagine, it ended in slaughter. I still feel that Orkulus should build and upgrade faster, since it's the main anti-building unit for Vasari.

Reply #10 Top

I still feel that Orkulus should build and upgrade faster, since it's the main anti-building unit for Vasari.

They changed its first weapon upgrade (that unlocks the anti-structure weapon) to build in 25 seconds instead of 60 :P

Reply #11 Top

Question for all.. I know this has been addressed in another thread, but I still don't get it. The Frontal shield for the vasari SB.. it reads 100% dmg reduction for its first upgrade lvl.... does that not mean it is an invincibility shield for the front-facing part of the SB?

Please, explain this to me anyone who knows, because at present it seems a totally absurd super-power.

Reply #12 Top

Quoting the_only_normal_1, reply 11
Question for all.. I know this has been addressed in another thread, but I still don't get it. The Frontal shield for the vasari SB.. it reads 100% dmg reduction for its first upgrade lvl.... does that not mean it is an invincibility shield for the front-facing part of the SB?

Please, explain this to me anyone who knows, because at present it seems a totally absurd super-power.

well, at first, from what I gathered, it's a timed abiltiy (45 seconds I believe) and requires am, so it won't be up indefinately. and second, it says 'frontal' shield. if you are lucky and the well is not crawling with enemies, surround it. split your fleet into multiple parts and attack it from various angles. I'm not sure how much that would result in you taking fire from more banks than from a purely frontal assault, but it would be worth a try. also, I'd imagine, since it's am based, that am draining abilties would really limit the SB's use of the shield. though again the lfs are getting so brutally slaughtered by SBs that I'd rather go for capital ships for that.

Reply #13 Top

Quoting Annatar11, reply 10
They changed its first weapon upgrade (that unlocks the anti-structure weapon) to build in 25 seconds instead of 60

Which is great and all, but it takes two minutes to build the starbase in the first place, if it's in an enemy well, so losing 35 seconds on the first upgrade isn't enough to really help.  That change, back from beta 2 I think, was in effect a huge stealth nerf to the Vasari.

I said it before, but look at the worst case scenario: trying to build an offensive Vasari SB in an enemy Vasari player's well, when he has his own fully-upgraded SB heading towards your incoming fleet.  There's no way your in-construction SB will survive for over two minutes, and even if it did manage somehow to survive long enough to get the first weapon upgrade, it'd still be outgunned at least 3:1 (and more like an 8:1 margin on defense) by the defending SB.

My earlier suggestion would be to invert the Vasari build times, since their base is more offensive than defensive.  That is, if TEC and Advent build in 40/80/120 seconds (I forget the exact numbers) in friendly/neutral/enemy wells, have Vasari be 120/80/40 or just a flat 60/60/60 or something.

Reply #14 Top

Which is great and all, but it takes two minutes to build the starbase in the first place, if it's in an enemy well, so losing 35 seconds on the first upgrade isn't enough to really help. That change, back from beta 2 I think, was in effect a huge stealth nerf to the Vasari.

Yeah.. they reduced deployment time in hostile wells a bit for beta 3, but it's still a little long when you factor in upgrade time for them to not be paper-thin.

Reply #15 Top

well, at first, from what I gathered, it's a timed abiltiy (45 seconds I believe) and requires am, so it won't be up indefinately. and second, it says 'frontal' shield. if you are lucky and the well is not crawling with enemies, surround it. split your fleet into multiple parts and attack it from various angles. I'm not sure how much that would result in you taking fire from more banks than from a purely frontal assault, but it would be worth a try. also, I'd imagine, since it's am based, that am draining abilties would really limit the SB's use of the shield. though again the lfs are getting so brutally slaughtered by SBs that I'd rather go for capital ships for that.

When I used it it has enuf am to be in use continually.

Reply #16 Top

Quoting Annatar11, reply 14
Yeah.. they reduced deployment time in hostile wells a bit for beta 3, but it's still a little long when you factor in upgrade time for them to not be paper-thin.

 

Last night I played my first game of the fully-released Entrenchment, and they actually addressed this!  There's now a tech upgrade at tier 7, I think, that reduces build times in enemy wells by 20%/40%.  There are also a couple new tier 8 upgrades; one adds +3 to starbase armor and something else I forget, the other adds +1 to the number of targets per bank AND 10% to starbase weapon damage (with two ranks, IIRC).  Between these and the Beta 3 addition of the third offense upgrade, the Vasari starbase can now be brutal.  (Although, I'm not sure... it seems to me that the base Vasari SB damage was cut way down since beta 3.)

Once I saw this, I decided I was going to play a starbase-heavy game to test it.  And frankly, I'm in trouble; I'm in a 6-way FFA with five hard AIs, only one of which has a cease-fire with me. (Since the other four keep sending fleets at me, it's practically impossible to get their relations up to cease-fire levels, because the penalty for killing ships adds up so quickly.)

Even though I have the best economy in the game, I'm getting hit from four sides at once, and I've lost two capital ships so far (something that NEVER happened to me before), mainly because my supporting fleets are downright pathetic.  (Seriously, my best fleet is four capships and five carrier cruisers, plus a handful of scrub frigates.)  I have four front-line planets covered by heavily-upgraded starbases (3 offense, 4 defense), with supporting structures, and for now they're holding, but it's a race to see if I can get a decent fleet up quickly enough to take out one of the four enemies completely to help the odds out.  If I'd spent the resources I used for those bases on better mobile fleets, I think things might be going a bit better.

Also, I think the fighter AI was tweaked, they seem much more likely to pursue damage capships fleeing a battle than they used to be.  That's how I lost one capship; it started fleeing at 80% hull, and died just as it was about to jump because two dozen fighter squadrons just wouldn't let go.

Reply #17 Top

Yea, I was unable to retreat my high level caps in entranchment 1.0 I find its better to stay put and slug it otu and force the AI to retreat. Assuming things are about even. But also the AI doesn't retreat so much now, which makes the game harder, I can't manipulate them to leaving me alone with a bluff. warp in a large fleet to scare them away. No, now they stay and fight and cost me that fleet, or if I retreat them, they take my planet.

Reply #18 Top

Your not kidding about the ai not backing down so much. I jumped a large fleet into one of their wells and they fought until I killed of mos of there fleet. 

Star Bases are pretty amazing. The Vasari one being the best.  No scouts make it past my front line worlds and live to tell about it....

Reply #19 Top

It isn't a beast, it sucks.  Last night I finally got a game after HOURS of trying (multiplayer), got a starbase into my enemy's planet, it actually finished building (amazingly enough), and his minimal fleet came in and destroyed it quickly.  Yes, I had my fleet there to protect it - it didn't do any good.  My teammate put a TEC starbase in a neutral well to protect the mines he took.  His opponent came in with just a few carriers set to bombers.  They took his starbase out in no time.

Tonight I finally get a game after HOURS of trying.  Played an Advent player.  Dumped a starbase into his planet, kept my fleet there to protect it while it built.  It took FOREVER to build, of course, and his fleet came in.  He just dropped mines around it while it was building, they all blew up and took the starbase with it.

Results:  starbases - 0, opponents - 3

Reply #20 Top

It isn't a beast, it sucks. Last night I finally got a game after HOURS of trying (multiplayer), got a starbase into my enemy's planet, it actually finished building (amazingly enough), and his minimal fleet came in and destroyed it quickly

 

It does NOT suck. The problem is SBs can't be effectively built in enemy grav-wells. If you build it at 1 of your own planets and upgrade it, it will be extremely good.

Vasari should not counter SBs with their own SB. They should get some other unit that fills the anti-SB role.

Reply #21 Top

Yea, I was unable to retreat my high level caps in entranchment 1.0 I find its better to stay put and slug it otu and force the AI to retreat. Assuming things are about even. But also the AI doesn't retreat so much now, which makes the game harder, I can't manipulate them to leaving me alone with a bluff. warp in a large fleet to scare them away. No, now they stay and fight and cost me that fleet, or if I retreat them, they take my planet.

I had 2 fleets. One that was in an uncolonized planet and met with the enemy fleet. To try to get them to back off I sent the other fleet into their home world. I thought this would get them to back off and come home to defend. Nope it stayed and slugged it out with my other fleet. Once engaged they will not leave unless they are clearly losing the battle they are in.

Reply #22 Top

Yes, I had my fleet there to protect it - it didn't do any good.

Did you have a skirantra healing it along with overseers healing it too?Did you upgrade it with vortex and deflector shield?Did you have a kortul to protect it from sc?If you dont have proper counters to his fleet it wont work.Building a sb in an enemy well is disatrous for the enemy it shouldnt be something that is easy.Also you might try dealing with his fleet first before trying to build a sb.

Reply #23 Top

Did you have a skirantra healing it along with overseers healing it too?

Of course not.  I started with the egg and could only afford one capship at that point in time.  As far as overseers, I wasn't teched that far (neither was my opponent).

Did you upgrade it with vortex and deflector shield?

Of course not.  It didn't last long enough to be able to do any of those things.

Did you have a kortul to protect it from sc?

LOL.  See first retort.

Building a sb in an enemy well is disatrous for the enemy it shouldnt be something that is easy.

I actually agree - no argument.

Reply #24 Top

Quoting Spatzimaus, reply 16
Once I saw this, I decided I was going to play a starbase-heavy game to test it.  And frankly, I'm in trouble; I'm in a 6-way FFA with five hard AIs, only one of which has a cease-fire with me. (Since the other four keep sending fleets at me, it's practically impossible to get their relations up to cease-fire levels, because the penalty for killing ships adds up so quickly.)

Even though I have the best economy in the game, I'm getting hit from four sides at once, and I've lost two capital ships so far (something that NEVER happened to me before), mainly because my supporting fleets are downright pathetic.  (Seriously, my best fleet is four capships and five carrier cruisers, plus a handful of scrub frigates.)  I have four front-line planets covered by heavily-upgraded starbases (3 offense, 4 defense), with supporting structures, and for now they're holding, but it's a race to see if I can get a decent fleet up quickly enough to take out one of the four enemies completely to help the odds out.  If I'd spent the resources I used for those bases on better mobile fleets, I think things might be going a bit better.

I know what you mean. In the earlier betas, I'd focus on starbases at my chokepoints. With the new AI behaviour being a bit more aggressive, this becomes completely impossible, as no matter how nice an early game starbase is, two AI fleets teaming up on it will take it down. Makes early game fleets more of a priority.

I like it! Good work Devs!

Reply #25 Top

sprinkle mines where you are going to build it :O