Titans need to be more......BADASS

I do find the current abilities somewhat lackluster. The TEC Rebel Titan feels like an Olive Garden breadstick that gives hellish heartburn and the Loyalists is like playing with a space turtle in it's shell. On the other hand these Titans can plow through almost anything. Giving them another special ability might necessitate a reduction in their strength. then they wouldn't really feel like Titans anymore, rather something more gimmicky.  I'm looking forward to the new dynamic from the other faction's Titans once they release, as the lack of them might be skewing my perception.

As of now, there is only one Titan that does have a special, passive, ability that becomes active when the correct tech is researched. It belongs to the Vasari Loyalist's Titan.

Can you say karma?

What is that ability?

My guess would be the one that makes it strip mine a planet dry, draining all of it's resources and leaving a dead asteroid behind.

I think that it is the planet eating thing.  And the mobile Capital Planet.

To Mr. Haze, that is not how "Stripped to the Core" works, you need to own the planet, and you do not need a titan.

The ability is like Return of the Dark Armada, like what the phase gates already have, but as of now, the ships are free. In the current version, I bet what they have going on right now is a proof of concept - I say that because as soon as a ship is destroyed, and if you have available fleet supply, another ship gets warped in.

Needless to say, I played with 2850 fleet supply. It was fun.

it really depends om the titan. Some have  a lot more of a bad-ass feel than others. i actually think the TEC rebel titan is one f the cooler ones, as long as you can keep it's AM level up it chews through caps/SBs/titans with rapid fire chain snipes. The Advent rebel titan is amazing for chewing through swarms of ships, and is basically the aoe equivalent of the TEC rebels.

Those two are probably my favorite so far, though I haven't gotten the Vasari loyalist up high enough to test out it's maw ability, so it could be pretty neat. 

The others feel like they're focused more on other  aspects to me, with the titans being more supportive. TEC loyalists turtle like crazy with dual starbases, and an uber-tank titan while building tons of Novaliths. And The Vasari rebels phause-jumping starbases are a battering ram like no other, capable of getting close to 40k  total hp + forward shield & a massive ammount of armor. The Advent loyalists niche is supposed to be being able to capture enemy ships in a variety of differant ways, but they are probably who I'm least sure of in terms of unique tricks they bring. Mostly because I'm just not a fan of getting random ships you can't pick though, not because the concept'itself couldn't work.

The vasari loyalist's 'ultimate' is called the maw, it turns all ships and buildings in an area in front of it into resources. If I recall correctly.

They get sucked towards the "maw" at the front centre of the ship, if they reach it, they're broken down into resources.

I imagine it's interruptable.

Yeah, i just heard about how the "Stripped to the core" works and its pretty disappointing. I think almost everyone assumed this will be a role for the Titan. HERE IS THE PLEA TO DEVS: PLEASE CHANGE IT TO BE THIS WAY. Even if the only reason to do it would be rule of cool.  

In regard to the Fleet Beacon: does it replace lost ship for the same type? I mean even Capital Ships? Or is this replacement random? 

EDIT: Given the original scope of this thread, i would again suggest in case of Vas Loyalist Titan to give it the ability to strip/kill even enemy planets + keep the fleet beacon ability, and in exchange for this remove all its offensive capabilities, bar the maw ability and perhaps anti-fighter flak defences. Other than that, no phase missiles, no wave cannons, nothing. In order to strip heavily defended enemy planet you would need to accompany the titan with a proper fleet to protect it, what should be made somewhat easier thanks to that fleet beacon.  

I do not know, whether this will be balanced, but:

- it would make the Vorastra instantly different to lets say Ankylon or Ragnarov

- stripping the planets would be hell more of fun than in the titan-unrelated scuttle button like case working on your own planets only (which is apparently current,   although unfinished, state of the things). 

@Timmaigh: It's an engine limitation. Ships can only ever have 5 abilities, and the last one must be a passive. That means the only way to put planet draining on it would be to have it replace an existing ability. Doing so would natrually blow it's balance vs fleets all to hell. Titans are going to be a key part in late game fleets. Without one thats as effective a fighter as the rest the vassari loyalists would be doomed to lose every game. They're just too powerful for their cost and supply to be matched by anything else.

As to titan badassness?

IMHO i have to agree that the don't feel that badass much of the time. Having played the stargate mod recently however i can quite quicklly put my finger on why. Stargate has some reserchable high cost high supply, and high power capital ships. They're bassiclly a titan made using the limits laid out in diplomacy. There's a few important diffrances however. They're scaling in health, firepower, and ability points are in line with normal capital values, (in percentage terms). Their abilities whilst showing a marked increase in power over those of standard capitals are still much weaker than the normal for the new titans. What turns them into titanic bemoeths is their raw hull and sheild values. Battles with these aren't 2 minute affairs of ability spamming until the titan or it's foes are dead. They're raw 5 and 10 minutes slugfests of warring fleets and their titanic leaders trading volley after volley after volley across the void at each other. I never need to use much in the way of suport ships vs the AI, but if i where to do so i'm pretty sure i could drage these conflicts out to 15 minutes or more before the mods titan equivelents fell.

The new titans just don't have that "Fleet unto themselves" feel about them. That they're powerful is beyond doubt, even the stargate mods Aincent city ships with their, (fully upgraded and levelled), 260K EHP couldn't beat them down. But al that power s in their abilities. They're lighning bruisers that come in and deliver powerful body blows, but they lack staying power. They just feel like an oversised capital with super powered abilities. Not the super massive engines of destruction we expected.

As i said, i do not know, whether it would be balanced. But if they kept the fleet beacon working as Yottsu said it is currently working, i mean instantly replacing lost ships, it could stand a chance, not because of its own armament, but because of protective fleet it can summon. As far as engine limitation, if the devs cant increase number of abilities, they still can replace one of existing abilities for that planet-devouring. Or simply widen the effect of maw ability on planets as well. Bottom line, i do not think its impossible to do and everything can be relatively balanced to not look overpowered or underpowered. 

When do we get to play as the advent and vasari?

The question should be "how did these guys get to play as advent and vasari?

Is true, with my friend think that, "THE TITAN´S MUST HAVE UNIQUE ABILITIES OF THE FACTION"

TEC - Frigate factory is OK.

Advent - Some control mentals.

Vasari - Like the idea of Phase stabilizer.

Attack with TEC, you can create fleet on the battle, attack with vasari can do phase jump directly on the titan, and on the war, attack with advent, do the enemy fleet killing themselves, doin the game balanced for all factions.

And this abilities do more balanced the titan, why?, because, you want have frigate factory or other attack abilities¡?, or reemplace the resistence for frigate factory, with the same lvl up, selected 2 abilities per lvl, but adding this unique ability to choise, the new great ability on lvl 6.

Who are "these guys"?

The game files for Advent and Vasari are already in the game. Right now the factions are merely tagged as unplayable. It's been too long since I modded to remember exactly which files need to be altered or the line in them. Besides I don't think IC wants us to go overboard on playing "unreleased content" until this phase of the beta is done. Get's old I know, but that's just part of beta testing.

Back on topic, Compared to pretty much anything else I think they are. However, they do lack a FEEL of epicness, sometimes anyway. Once you get them to level 6 or so, I've never had one stopped by anything, and just go on a rampage with them.

i know which files need to be altered since i did it in trinity to enable Pirates, but that was when these files could be changed into txt format, is there a way to do that to the rebellion files????