Darvin3

Reply to Core Game Mechanic Suggestions, Long Standing Complaints, and Realistic Concerns in Sins Diplomacy Sins Forums

[quote]1. Long standing complaints, bugs, and glitches: Anything that's existed in Diplomacy, or previous versions that we might be able to fix between major tasks.[/quote] AIs suiciding on starbases. AIs overbuilding ineffective defenses that just get avoided. Z-Axis blind-spot of starbases. I second DirtySanchezz and Howdidudothat.

Reply to New Player seeking some Guidance in Strategy Sins Forums

[quote]Right now it appears to me that I'm colonizing and building my ships too slowly. How can you colonize and build effectively without going broke?[/quote] First of all, let's make sure you're not making the obvious beginner mistake: [i]are you purchasing planetary population upgrades?[/i] When you first colonize a planet, its income will actually be negative and bleed your treasury. In order to make the planet profitable, you will need to purchase planet

Reply to advent econ help (start) in Strategy Sins Forums

[quote]One of the reasons to use scouts to expand is so that your fleet can be fighting your enemies instead of clearing militia.[/quote] Furthermore, scouts are better for taking down LRM's and Krosovs, which are really the only militia units standing in the way of colonization. They're fast, ridiculously inexpensive, and pretty tough for their low cost. [quote]The primary reason bombers are better then fighters at clearing militia is because flak will kill the fi

Reply to Newbie-ish player looking for advice on what to work on. (Entrenchment 1v1 Advent Replay incl.) in Strategy Sins Forums

A critique of your replay: Your first problem was in strategic choice of planet colonization. While your choices were acceptable from an economic standpoint (a tad too much backtracking), they left you militarily exposed. By 7:30, you'd scouted enough of the map to know that the desert planet Hercynia is a choke point between you and the enemy. You should have bee-lined for it with your Progenitor, or at very least the dead asteroid Tercinida. Simply capturing

Reply to BioWare Employee Busted in Dragon Age 2 Review Scandal in PC Gaming Sins Forums

[quote]However, the bolded part though is HORSESHIT! I'm playing it right now and I love it.[/quote] As always, YMMV. I thought the SC2 story had its high points and low points, and can see why some people would love it or hate it. In that sense, it's a poor example of reviewer bias, since opinions [i]do[/i] vary dramatically. Personally, I thought the campaign started relatively strong, lost a little steam on some of the story arcs (Pr

Reply to BioWare Employee Busted in Dragon Age 2 Review Scandal in PC Gaming Sins Forums

This is just another reason why you can't trust scores anymore, you always have to read between the lines of what the reviewer is [i]saying[/i] to get a feel of where they're coming from.

Reply to New player - what version do I play? in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Yeah, you can jump straight into Diplomacy. It has all the content. Just make sure to disable the pirates; they're quite nasty and completely unmanageable when you're first learning the game.

Reply to ability definition in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Hey Zeta, how'd you manage to post a link? The forums are acting all wonky for me and I can't type anything but plain-text (I can't even do linebreaks!)

Reply to Carriers! in Strategy Sins Forums

No problem; Vertigo is one of the game's best-kept secrets. It's [i]far[/i] more powerful than most people give it credit for. It works out to a 50% damage reduction to affected units when you max it out, which is positively insane when you're already soaking up most of that with a shield regeneration/projection combo.

Reply to Carriers! in Strategy Sins Forums

[quote]i wish the advent would get a better healer or at least make it so they dont have to face who thier healing its veary time comsuming and by the time [/quote] There was a developer comment recently that the Domina is going to be getting an overhaul in some manner. [quote]and for vertigo that only works on frigets right it wont stop a cap ship?[/quote] Vertigo works on both frigates and capital ships. There is no target cap, so you can potentially affect dozens of frigates simultane

Reply to systems at war (map) in Strategy Sins Forums

I'd say definitely go on the offensive. The starting systems on this map are [i]extremely[/i] porous and easy to attack, with homeworlds right next to the star and just about every planet open to attack. You should be able to get a foothold in their star systems relatively easily and move for the kill from there. The central system is tempting, but defending on this map is so impractical that your best defense is a good offense. With pirates enabled, there's really nothing to be gained f

Reply to advent econ help (start) in Strategy Sins Forums

[quote]I tried to do this tactic and the militia instantly tarted all my seekers (i was in daplomacy not sure if that matters)[/quote] Did you make sure to have the Progenitor jump in first? If the seekers arrive first, the militia will target them instead of the tougher capital ship. The only militia unit that prioritizes seekers is the Kodiak, but these are only found on desert and terran planets, and seldom in significant numbers. Seekers are extremely tough for their cost, so they sh

Reply to ability definition in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

There's always the Sins Wiki: https://www.sinsofasolarempire.wikia.com/ Some of the pages are stubs, but Zeta recently did a pass through and ensured they at very least have the in-game tooltip. I'm not nearly as active as him, but I'm making an effort to add some tactical tips on some of these pages.

Reply to Open thread on improving technology system in Sins and Rebellion in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

[quote]Something else: tech just plain isn't used in short games, other than like lrm's and carriers. It just seems that 90%+ of the tree is for after 1.5 hours[/quote] When I'm just screwing around with the AI, I'm often [i]maxing out[/i] the tech tree after 1.5 hours even after pulling off a rush. Trust me, it's entirely possible to hit those high-end techs as early as one hour into the game if you can get the economy to support it. It sometimes happens that you're econo

Reply to Open thread on improving technology system in Sins and Rebellion in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

[quote]What if you haven't researched the first level of hull (tier 1) and you by now have 4 labs set up? Those additional labs beyond the requirement could make the lower-level tech cheaper and/or faster to research (even if just by a marginal cost). Of course a tier-4 would be unchanged for you at this point.[/quote] The big problem with this is that it'd only discourage early teching - which is pretty poor investment as it is. Some of the tier 1 techs are worth picking up, bu

Reply to Carriers! in Strategy Sins Forums

The problem with domination is that you need to be in combat to use it, meaning you'll be taking casualties anyways as the fight goes on. If you're actually increasing in fleet size from using domination, that means you're not taking casualties in combat, and you've pretty much already won in this case. Domination is highly overrated. It's worth it to grab hoshikos and overseers, since Advent lacks any decent form of hull repair, and in the mirror match it's good against g

Reply to advent econ help (start) in Strategy Sins Forums

[quote]and stop shipment production to do focus on mining[/quote] [B]Never ever do this[/b] I've run the math, this ability is absolutely [i]horrible[/i]. You'll earn way more money by keeping them in trade port mode and using the credits to buy from the black market, and that's [i]with[/i] the high-level upgrades that improve efficiency. This ability is an outright joke. [quote]i use my radience as my first wich plows through any militia easly.[/quote]

Reply to Should resources be limited instead of unlimited? in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

I think it used to work this way back in the original beta (I wasn't around back then) and got changed because it just slowed down the game needlessly. The biggest problem is that metal and crystal extractors are [i]already[/i] the best form of early-game income, but dwindle in importance as the game goes on. There's no reason to make them any weaker in the late-game when they're already marginal at best. This would also be a [i]brutal[/i] nerf to refineries, which are a

Reply to Rebellion - Supply Lines - can we have ammunition and fuel ships or a clear LOS for ammo ship resupply & structures in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

There are some big issues with what you've suggested: 1) It's extraordinarily complex, so it's going to take a lot of development time away from other features. 2) It's management intensive 3) This makes starbase choke points way too powerful, essentially preventing bypass tactics that are critical to breaking stalemates 4) There's really no [i]reason[/i] to punish people for making "deep raids". With starbases on the scene, the balance is pretty good in

Reply to Carmack says Direct3D is better than OpenGL in PC Gaming Sins Forums

[quote]Sure enough, right there in the middle of the top row are some numbers that strongly support your claim: 56% of the Steam respondents are using DX10 (which also implies Win7/Vista).[/quote] Uh... 56% is a very [i]bad[/i] number. You're talking about throwing away [i]half[/i] your potential market by developing for DX10 exclusively. You'd have to [i]double[/i] your sales with the remaining market in order for this to pay off, which is highly unlikely. This is

Reply to Carriers! in Strategy Sins Forums

Carriers have numerous advantages and disadvantages. The biggest problem they face is that they're just too easy to run down and kill with frigates. Light frigates in particular are fast enough to close the gap before you can blink, and early-game this is going to put a quick end to your carrier-based strategies. In the late-game, huge swarms of strike craft get countered by the right capital ship abilities. The Vasari in particular can completely shut you down with ja

Reply to The Rebellion Speculation/Suggestion Thread in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

[quote]I don't want to seem like I'm running in here just to nitpick, but wouldn't that gametype be a bit one dimensional? Rush the'Mega Weapon'.[/quote] First of all, "rush the mega-weapon" isn't necessarily as simple as it sounds. You have to survive long enough to build your economy to that point, and presumably the economizers will need to feed. The overall team's efficiency will have a substantial impact on how quiclky you can bee-line for it. Second of all, a

Reply to advent econ help (start) in Strategy Sins Forums

Advent really doesn't have any special economic tricks, and more or less play as an inferior version of TEC in terms of early-game eco build-up. The Progenitor Mothership offers you a wonderful colonization discount while doubling as one of your best combat capital ships, which is pretty much your only advantage over the Akkan (which offers a better colonization bonus but isn't so hot in battle). The Advent do have an easier time clearing militia due to their stronger starter unit

Reply to Noob gettig beaten on easy, help! in Strategy Sins Forums

[QUOTE]got roughly 8 planets before i got stuck expanding ... this is after like 3-4 hours playing[/QUOTE] Eight planets in 3-4 hours is [i]extremely[/i] slow. This really shouldn't take you more than 40 minutes tops; ideally it should be more in the range of 20-25 minutes. So there's a lot of room for you to speed up. As others have mentioned, a common beginner mistake is not purchasing planetary population upgrades. New planets will bleed your treasury unti

Reply to Rebellion and Multiplayer in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

The only games that last "way too long" are those with overly tight choke points. Otherwise games that last longer than 90 minutes are uncommon. That's probably still too long, but not "way" too long. I think Sins has very strong multiplayer, but it wasn't able to hold on to a large multiplayer community.