Just took the rebellion version for a spin. It was nice, well the little that is in that is hehe. Pirates worked nice although they could be a little powerful with tec rebels due to the "pirates are my friend research". But hey thats just cool.
I wonder something, in the planet uppgrade menu there are room for 3 more uppgrade buttons, are one able to do anything at all with this or is it off limit due to hardcoded or something?
Also the TEC dread ability "advanced fire controll" overlaps with the ability of the tec colony cap (giving a radius +to range and to hit) Maybe not have it overlap like this but do something else instead. Also a 75% increase in range is pretty crazy, thats almost double the range, it makes threats like torpedo vessels and long range frigates very weak due to you outranging them.
One of the other abilities of the tec dread has a wonky description, its the one that gives armor bonus to a different ship, but from the description it reads more like it only work for the dread.
Also for the rebel/loyalist version of the new races i would suggest: i assume you might want to go for sonewhat polar opposites
Replicator: the standard version is pretty aggressive and looking to cleanse the biologicals or something, then i reckon that the other version would be more inclined to coexist peacefully with other lifeforms. So cleansing/coexistance kinda.
As for norlamin they strike me as peaceful preferably non violent race focusing on research so maybe have their other part be more aggressive and callous. Maybe they want to take charge of the universe instead of sitting back and watching it all.
Trade alliance are wandering traders. You could focus on the wandering vs settled part but i think it would be better to focus on the trade part. And then you might do their other version as a criminal enteprise. Like a legitimate business vs organiced crime, stealing/extortion etc.
I could try to come up with some ideas for the differing abilities too if you want to hear them. But you may allready have your own ideas on this front so in that case just forget it hehe.
Also i think that dreads are currently too powerful compared to the single titan that takes ages to build in comparison. Every time i return to play sin i think i nag you abouth the dreads.
and then i forget the last time i did it and rinse and repeat hehe. Let them cost 100 cap but let it go above the allowed limit so it will only affect built ships from that point on imo, or just cap them at 1-2. For everyone who like to use x8 speed and turtle they are just so unbearably overpowered as they cost nothing and you can easily have 2-3 after a short while. Also i dont see any reason for them to have the lvl 6 ability at all. Atleast not for every faction.
Lastly more diversity between the factions. The more the merrier. Give one faction huge bonuses in one area and a weakness in others etc. Suggest you take a look at enhanced 4x for rebellion by goafan77. It has some nice concepts like a different starting bonus for each faction to make them more unique.
Planetary weapons! Its such a terribly shame that planets are almost left untouched in the game, so many things that could be built on a planet. At the very leasy i want to see some weapons fire coming from it. Would be nice if one could implement a planet uppgrade button for that with 3 tiers or so.
Also the new ship models and such are really great. A real improvement from the also good ones you used to have. Keep it up! Looking forward to seeing the new titans and such.
Guess thats it for now, let me know if you need anything.
edit: i forgot to say it but i noticed that one dread think it was the advent or something had 12.0 in culture repel while the titan have the same as a normal cap 0.75 or something. And this was not while any ability was active so either its just a mistype or i would say it was a bit over the edge.