lol 11 hours

While I realize for some people these extremely long games is the goal, if your goal is to get better at this game, you should try to see if you can win the game faster.

That is because you are still playing Entrenchment. The vast majority of the people on these forums have the latest expansion Rebellion, or at least Trinity FYI. In these versions the AI will use superweapons. They're only modestly better at dealing with starbases though...

That is a shame, armistice is one of the TEC's best abilities if you use it right. Bypassing planets to hit weak core worlds, an emergency retreat, just stalling for reinforcements to arrive, you have so many more tactics available when you unlock this ability.

The kol battleship is nothing as a railgun

There's only two reasons to get the ship in my opinion.  The first is if you wanna expand quickly, i find that the kol is the best at it (with micromanaging) except possibly for the akann.  The kol has rather powerful autocannons that can fire in all four directions at once, very useful in the beginning as your first cap.

The other reason is that it's a tank...  With anti-air capabilities.  Finest hour is extremley effective and when combined with its high armor and health, the kol is easily the toughest ship in the game.  Where it really shines is flak burst.  Flak hits all ships in its vicinity and with two or three kols, you can keep the skies clear indefenitley.

Btw, get diplomacy, its so much more than entrenchment.

Sova kills the Kol in this regard actually. Getting a pair of bombers on it is the best way you can take out Terran and desert militia with heavy cruisers, and missile turrets make sort work of other militia. And you can quickly rush your opponent with Embargo with it. More than any other carrier cap the Sova is an early game brawler, so your first cap should be either an Akkan or Sova (some people like a Marza just because they want missile barrage ASAP), and if you didn't get a Sova your second cap should be a Sova. After that, its total lack of any AoE abilities means the Sova gets a lot worse as fleets get bigger, so you probably won't build many more.

Or Rebellion, if you can spend a bit more.

I get the kol early so that i'm always prepared for carrier fleets.   Flak burst is probably the best anti bomber ability avaliable to the tec

Flak burst is a level 1 ability, there is little reason in getting a one shot pony just to deal with a fleet composition you might run across, at the expense of effectiveness on anything else. It makes sense with the Marza because Missile Barrage is level 6. And the Marza is a much better combat ship anyways.

Carrier fleets are easily the most common fleet type on ICO

The thing about the kol is that it's very hard to destroy... unlike gardas, which will be wasted by missle barrage

You cannot justify the lack of a couple kols in a late-game fleet when facing carriers.  (which is about 90% of the time)

Yes, but that is late game. By then you can afford the time and money to make a pair and buy their levels up to tier 3. And the most important part of ICO games are often before the carriers and titans come out. It thus makes little sense to get a Kol early.

No capitalship lasts long against focus fire except the Kortul and possibly the Corsev. You don't have to worry about AoEs with capitalships but you still need to be careful with them and screen them well.

No one specifically attacks kols, its just a waste of time late-game.

Gardas just get caught in the crossfire and die.

unless you're going fighter-heavy...   actually, you need kols no matter what.

I'm saying it's better to get a kol early so that you can level it up to 6 and get tier 3 flak and finest.  Not as your first cap, but defenitley as your third or fourth, which come basically at the same time within 20 mins.

I generally go with this order:

1. akkan

2. marza

3/4 another marza and a kol

or

1.  sova

2. sova

3. marza

4. akkan and missl frigs

5. kol

Around the seventh, i'll get a 2nd kol.

This isn't Rebellion where there are Titans runnin around with massive AOEs that makes missile barrage cry to kill a significant Fighter and Garda complement.

Most players including me after so many years are pretty much in the agreement that the Kol is worthless to build nearly 90% of the time. Again the only time it's worth it is for bomber spam and flak burst but that's about it. Fighters and Gardas as well as good micromanagement with Colbalt light frigates can render a all carrier spam fleet worthless quickly.

Especially when this is Entrenchment we are talking about with again no fleet busting Titans around. Also have that many capital ships is a waste of resources for any competitive standpoint unless you are doing Vasari Loyalists (Rebellion) going fully mobile.

double post

Nonononono

I dont get kols for firepower

I get them for the flak burst only

I get akkans and sovas for expansion purposes

Marzas are only for missl barrage, and in my opinion, missl barrage is just about the best aoe in entrenchment.

HEAR THAT REDRUBY? THIS THREAD IS TALKING ABOUT ENTRENCHMENT, NOT REBELLION!

and 20 min's was a little bit of an exaggeration.  Maybe 27.  My reason for getting a lot of caps is so i can get cap abilities for two different fleets simultaneously.  I usually end up with a set frontline at one planet with half my fleet and heavy defenses, and the other half of my fleet is generally going on a hit and run rampage.

I like playing Trinity to "feel" the differences.  It's like watching Shatner for the feeling of nostalgia.

nos·tal·gi·a (n -st l j , n -). n. 1. A bittersweet longing for things, persons, or 
situations of the past.

Which is also why I like Sacrifice of Angels 2 so much.

And I LOVE games that go on for days across multiple star systems.  I spend more time watching the beautiful art and programming than playing sometimes.  Lost in the joy.  

This is how I feel when I play.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wod-MudLNPA

..................  And now some more culture for you ignorant space rats... 

Ode To A Small Lump Of Green Putty I Found In My Armpit One Midsummer Morning

Putty. Putty. Putty.

Green Putty - Grutty Peen.

Grarmpitutty - Morning!

Pridsummer - Grorning Utty!

Discovery..... Oh.

Putty?..... Armpit?

Armpit..... Putty.

Not even a particularly

Nice shade of green

During a reading of the poem, 4 of his audience died of internal hemorrhaging and the president of the Mid-Galactic Arts Nobbling Council survived by gnawing one of his own legs off. Grunthos was reported to have been "disappointed" by the poem's reception.

Let's keep civil here RedRuby heh ~ 

I haven't played any multiplayer games yet - but i feel i will get demolished. I have only fought AIs -

If i may, i tried playing Advent and got thwarted in a 1v1 AI TEC (unfair) , TEC Capships seem to be significantly more durable than advent ships - The Sova was able to clear out near unlimited amount of militia from neutral planets solo including terran and desert worlds (lvl 3+ Cap)  - The Kol eventually hull gets worn out when clearing neutral planets solo and i have to get it to retreat and repair. 

When i was playing as advent, my lvl 5 halcyon seemed to have trouble clearing a desert world solo (anima drone + energy cooldown) - My radiance (lvl 4 with detonate antimatter) got killed trying to kill some Corsairs (pirate Kodiaks) raiding my planet. I hate how AI outbids you in the second right before the pirate launches >.>

(Halcyon design is very nice, reminds me of the Covenant from Halo)

It was also interesting to note that TEC AIs really build economy nicely (maybe cause i set them as economists~lol) 

A lot of the initial tech available for Advent seemed kinda of useless in the Harmony section - such as the one that reduces costs/time or exploring planet - increasing build rates while at the same time, build costs. Trade posts converted to meta/crystal production. Minimal logistic slots.. (although more tactical)

I tried Vasari a bit, just to hear their funny voices xD

While that doesn't quite seem right, the big theme with the Advent is synergies. You have to use their ships abilities together to make a fleet that's much stronger than the sum of its parts. For example, if you had your colonizer progenitor mothership with your Halcyon, you could have restored its shields and taken that desert easily. A properly built late game Advent fleet will murder an AI TEC fleet of the same size. I've sometimes done it with zero losses if everything goes well.

The economy is the Advent's weak point. Once you get the guardian + mothership combo up though you take substantially fewer frigate losses, so if done right you hopefully won't need as big of an economy.

So i played with some "Vicious" AIs in diplomacy - wow, they're nuts, they build ships soooo quickly, i wonder how they managed to build so many ships, it says on the leaderboards that i'm first in Credits, Metal and Crystal but i'm last in fleets... anyways all they do is build carriers and heavy cruisers - had 200 Gardas and they all died from bombers, where's that Kol? >:| ...love the new additions though lol - esp. like sending 40K Crs worth of pirates at enemy planets.

Does the trade bonuses from Envoys stack on allied planets?

I don't think so.

They get unreported "help". You should be officially ahead of them.

While flak can attack bombers they actually aren't the best at it. Fighters are the best way to deal with them if the enemy has no flak of its own.

Kols are not for anti-strike craft roles no matter how they make it seem so. its all about the rail-gun and self anti-matter regeneration to fuel the rail gun.

Whatever damage your Kol is doing a Marza or Ragnarov can do more.

i don't use kols   i don't play tec-only vasari and advent. egg/mother-ship.