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So how exactly are Vasari rebels over powered?

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So how exactly are Vasari rebels over powered?

from Sins Forums

I have only ever mained Vasari rebels and I really like them, and I get a lot of people complaining that they're OP. I don't mind the no jumping SB rule that is generally in play, but why is everyone still complaining?

I can kind of get how the jumping Starbase thing might be abused, but even so, you have to aquire level 8 civic tech and they weaken after consecutive jumps. I have hardly ever felt that it'd be necessary to get that upgrade, and when I have, it's only because I was sitting around with my economy rolling and I didn't want to ruin it with a fleet capacity upgrade. I have always just seen is as a convenient way to re-locate a starbase more then anything, thus when I'm told that I can't have this upgrade in a game, I doesn't bother or even affect me.

People complain about phase missiles, which I agree are powerful and allow you to more effectively pick off capital ships, but that's the kind of thing I signed up for when I selected this faction. I feel that it hurts a lot more when I lose Vasari ships than when I've played with other factions, and I feel it when I play against the other factions. When a TEC player starts spamming stuff me, he may take careless losses by blind assaults, but that's the kind of guerrilla stuff that Vasari are good at. If they couldn't do it, they'd have no momentum; they'd just have Marzas, massed corvettes and Cobalts running amok.

Also, I've read about Vasari being too strong against Advent, because phase missiles bypass the shields to hit the weak armor behind it. However, all that I've read only takes into account direct statistics.

I'm going to go slightly off topic to prove a point here: Now, before I bought Sins, I played Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath on the Xbox, which was unbalanced and never got patched, because it was on the Xbox. Some of you may have played it already on whatever console, but the faction Scrin had an 'epic' unit (basically a titan) that could be escorted by these fast-healing bug-like things called 'corruptors' (each one capable of healing faster then damage could generally be done by another single unit), allowing it to chew up entire armies. The only way to kill these would have been to get behind the epic unit or use expensive powers on them. should the army have been able to actually take on the epic unit anyway, it could be instantly teleported back to base by the factions' commando unit, healed again by a bunch more of those corruptors and then put through a rinse and repeat cycle until it reached maximum rank (at this point, having double fire rate, nearly double firepower and armor, as well as passive self-healing). Everyone complained and it was the worst, cheesiest legitimate tactic there was, and it was so economically cheap to do that you could have a full supporting army with it; but there was a way to beat it, and that was to either foil the setup process, or cleverly anticipate it and use flanking tactics to disarm both the corruptors and commando back at it's base. At this point, the opponent could be defeated as straightforwardly as his own shitty plan came to fruition. The point is that OP tactics can be beaten, even when statistics might say otherwise, because statistics do not tell the whole story in an RTS.

I bet that the Advents' phase missile weakness can be countered, not directly, but with alternative tactics. If I am correct, Vasari tactics revolve around mobility, desperation, guerrilla tactics, and are most effective when the enemy is careless. Obviously being mobile and having powerful defenses, they have a lot of time to destroy a planet before actually being needed elsewhere, especially in the late game. I'm not going to argue and say that  there is an easy way to beat Vasari in the late, but if I have to dedicate my limited and currently immobile Vasari fleet to tasks that I can't run away from, and I can't set up, I'm going to be in trouble later on. Playing as Vasari, I've never felt that my entire fleet could be powerful enough to defend two sides of my empire; Plus, with strength in numbers being the general rule with any RTS, I can't really afford to split my precious fleet.

TEC and Advent have motherships with fleet-supporting abilities. With these, you might be able to rush past the early Vasari front and attempt to colonize a stray planet beside them. By having ship production on this planet as well as a supportive mothership, you could have a sort of pseudo-mobility where their attack is anticipated and the ships you're going to retaliate with are being produced on the scene, and are readily supported. The key difference is that you're spending resources where they can't, and your threat has denied them preparation. from then on. If they ignore the planet, they either have to spend a lot of resources setting up defense around it or you are from then on the system is as accessible to you as it is to them. If they destroy it, it still costs them the time that they need to be defending their set-up.

Of course, I'm not sure that any of this could actually be done, but having played the game for a good few months and having gotten a feel for it AND actually playing as Vasari Rebels, I think I have some understanding of their strengths and weaknesses.

strategy
53,733 views 37 replies
Reply #26 from Sins Forums Top

Your bold font and 100 foot long quote box make your point unassailable.  You have won the internets.

Reply #27 from Sins Forums Top

Star-base mobilization looks like it should be designed as a pact in the diplomacy tree since it affects team games. 

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Reply #28 from Sins Forums Top

ARESIV, it sounds like you consider early-game combat to be out of the question...

Besides that, I often find that playing as Vasari, going head-on against a synergistic late-game Advent fleet will only waste your ships, especially against Rebels. But, maybe I'm doing it wrong.

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And even though there are some far more experienced people discussing this situation then me, I'd like to propose a solution to the jumping Orkulus thing. What if it could only jump to friendly gravity wells? That way, it wouldn't be the infallible offensive tool that it's considered to currently be. Keep the current de-buffs, too. Also, perhaps disable jump de-stabilization for the duration of any de-buffs. That way, you can simply jump your fleet to the gravity well that the Orkulus came from, and if it followed, it'd weaken even more. That leaves it as only truly effective when you have to defend a priority target or quickly re-enforce your front line without having to buy another Starbase.

Reply #29 from Sins Forums Top

That idea has already been proposed and ignored by the devs.

Reply #30 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Mr_Book, reply 26

Your bold font and 100 foot long quote box make your point unassailable.  You have won the internets.

 

I am sorry but it is not my fault that this forum software hates multiqotes. #:(

 

 

Quoting Reice, reply 28
ARESIV, it sounds like you consider early-game combat to be out of the question...

Besides that, I often find that playing as Vasari, going head-on against a synergistic late-game Advent fleet will only waste your ships, especially against Rebels. But, maybe I'm doing it wrong.

 

Vasari have a slight weakness in early game. It is however mostly offset by their early available and extremely powerful Orkulus starbase.

 

Yes, you are doing it wrong.

 

Focus on the Titan, then the capitalships..... Advent draw large ammount of synergy from those and once they are gone (less than one minute with phase missiles) there isnt much left of Advent synergy in which case you Vasari fleet is considerable superior.

 

Avoid engaging an high level Eradica with anything but your own Titan and capitalships.... use your overpowered phase missile bomber wings to assure no reasonable resistance can be mounted..... use support ships of your own to negate any remaining damage done to your fleet. This is true for all titans and is one of the reason why large bomber fleets dominate late game.

 

Also dont forget that you can easily trade 1.5 of your ships for any Advent ship.... due to your superior economy.

 

Reply #31 from Sins Forums Top

 

Quoting Yarlen, reply 13

I didn't read most of this thread cause I assume it's the usual arguments.  Let me just make public that I am bringing the nerf hammer to the Vasari Rebel starbase issue in the next update.  I'm tired of dealing with this issue - it's a major thorn. So I'm pulling the trigger on an idea some of our internal testers had which should settle things.

And we are not worthy to know, what exactly that idea is about? :)

 

 

Reply #32 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting ARESIV, reply 30

Vasari have a slight weakness in early game. It is however mostly offset by their early available and extremely powerful Orkulus starbase.

Yes, you are doing it wrong.

Focus on the Titan, then the capitalships..... Advent draw large ammount of synergy from those and once they are gone (less than one minute with phase missiles) there isnt much left of Advent synergy in which case you Vasari fleet is considerable superior.

Avoid engaging an high level Eradica with anything but your own Titan and capitalships.... use your overpowered phase missile bomber wings to assure no reasonable resistance can be mounted..... use support ships of your own to negate any remaining damage done to your fleet. This is true for all titans and is one of the reason why large bomber fleets dominate late game.

Also dont forget that you can easily trade 1.5 of your ships for any Advent ship.... due to your superior economy.

Sounds like the Advent could employ their own awesome strike craft capabilities to kill off those massed Assailants, whilst also massing their own Disciples to deal with any Sentinels or carriers of the Vasari's side. The only Vasari frigate not being countered here is the Skirmisher, which can't bypass shields. As for territory control, the Advent only needs 2 weapons labs and 3 civic in order to be able to deploy their carriers, initiate trade and enforce their borders and divert enemy tech with culture. If Vasari wants carriers and trade, they need 4 of each lab. Although Vasari becomes strong later on, those early game advantages against them can be carried over into the late, which allows the Advent to attain their own late game tech before Vasari.

And while the Orkulus is powerful, it doesn't fire missiles until it has received assault systems upgrades to lv.2, which without armor is still an easy-to-down target for bombers, and with armor is a heavy investment on their part which can be ignored (unless they're playing jumping SBs).

So yeah, Vasari have a slight weakness in the early game - which determines the flow of the game from then on - 'mostly' offset by a primarily defensive asset.

Also, I see no reason why Vasari is considered to have a better economy than the advent, being that the Advent acquire their trade ports and culture before Vasari. Anyone care to enlighten me on this?

Reply #33 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Reice, reply 32
Also, I see no reason why Vasari is considered to have a better economy than the advent, being that the Advent acquire their trade ports and culture before Vasari. Anyone care to enlighten me on this?

 

Vasari can further increase trade income, which can be a huge advantage if you have 100+ credit income from trade only, and they can get resouurces from destroyed ships, which accumulates and gives huge income boost as Advent ships die very fast because they are weak.

Reply #34 from Sins Forums Top

They also can get neutrals a lot easier...technically they have techs that reduce the credit cost (VL only) and resource cost of purchases, but I don't think those ever really come into play...

Reply #35 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Seleuceia, reply 34

They also can get neutrals a lot easier...technically they have techs that reduce the credit cost (VL only) and resource cost of purchases, but I don't think those ever really come into play...

 

I remember seeing some VL players research the credit decrease from replays, but resource cost decrease is so very late game tech that would require you to build many many ships to pay it's cost back, and we all know Vasari late game is ridiculously OP even without this research.

Reply #36 from Sins Forums Top

hallo everyone,

I'm not sure how others see it but I think a few changes to the game would resolve the issue around the balance:

1. Add a research to the game that enables all starbases to go into a movement mode(like undeployed arti in other games) while it moves it's antimatter is slowly drained, the regnerration of the shields, hull and AM is set to 0 and the damage it dishes out takes a penalty(like 30-50%). the vasari have a second research that reduces the debuffs and increases the speed.

2. VR jumping starbase: if it jumps it losses all antimatter(thus can't move in the target system) and receives debuffs to damage, shield, shield mitigation and so on. the lose of antimatter is reduced when jumping to a system with friendly cultur and even further decreaed when jumping to one of your own systems.

3. the jump destab. should only be applied if the starbase is within a system that is owned by the owner of the starbase

4. Phase missiles chance of phasing is reduced by shield mitigation. e.g. a 50% Mitigation halfs the chance of Phasing.maybe a reseearch that goes like "shield mitigation added to phase block +20%" -> 20% of the shield mitigation count towards phase block. this stacks with the advent ability of blocking the phasing. additionaly i would give the advent a higher researchable shield mitigation bonus.

5. I think the devs should implement an upgrade for the TEC and Advent phase jump inhibator that counter the phase stabilizer tech(like slowing the ships down).

 

best regards

raimn

Reply #37 from Sins Forums Top

:rofl:  at moving starbases-again