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1. The game favours agressive expansion. Because of this all sub faction of all empires which are favouring an agressive playstyle are simply better in this game.
2. TEC is absolutely not the easiest faciton to play. I had a lot of downtimes with vasari and my friend who is playing advent had some downtime too. If you are playing TEC you rarely will have downtime, resulting in a more sweaty playstyle.
3. You can win as TEC, but what i have seen so far is the fact you need way longer to win a game as TEC than the other factions. One of the main reasons for this is simply the TEC civil building slots mechanic.
As Vasari i never have to think about what i want to build in the civil building slots. Furthermore the Vasari can build their research stations simply on their capital ships AND in orbit AND on their planets. Advent don´t have problems with research anyway.
TEC constantly has to split their building space between research stations and trade stations. Furthermore their planetary civil and military labs are the weakest of all the research labs of all the factions.
Me and my friends play roughly 2 and a half or maybe three hour sessions. TEC alwas lags sligthly behind. One is playing Vasari and one is playing Advent. Looking later at the statistics after we won the game, it looks like TEC is doing well. In terms of ressources they consume more credits some metal and less crystals. But the problem is always the research.
Because TEC always has to balance between trade stations and research stations. Furthermore their planet and asteroids building slots are always full very fast.
I personally would rebalance the home defense building of the TEC loyalists and tone it down a bit. Of course they can get very strong with a 500 point fleet which doesn´t have to pay upkeep. But at the same time i would move the twin starbases to tier 4.
I rarely or basically never built 2 starbases in one system, because they ALWAYS comes to late into the game at tier 5. The other TEC faction doesn´t have twin star bases anyway.
Looking at the statistics the TEC are mostly ok i would say. They simply have a very very sweaty playstyle, making the other factions way easier to play.
Last point: The TEC loylaists are bad at defending. Point, blank period. Yes they have a strong homefleet mechanic, but the thing they should be the best at, starbases, is simply weak. I never play with a lot of starbases with them. I always spam the homefleet buildings to break the enemy by having more fleets which cost me nothing.
(Advent basically only needs carriers. That´s it.)
(We are playing often against unfair AI. With all the cheats the TEC AI is getting on this difficulty they can seem very strong. But when you are playing TEC yourself it is a different story.)
TEC economy is... odd. They do not really have any economic advantages early on, outside of the +1 credit boost from tier 1 civil research. They do start on a Terran planet though, which does provide a lot of income. So far, the best approach seems to get Commerce and Mining maxed on the home planet and get the Surface mining tech early.
In addition, their economy is overall heavily focused on credits and spending credits on the market to buy other resources.
Another thing they can do, is go for derelicts. They can complete the salvage faster and get more exp from them, so that can sometimes be a nice boost.
At Civilian Tier 2, they can start specializing planets to a fairly high degree, which is fairly unique(Ice planet item can provide additional surface crystal mining and faster influence recharge, Vulcanic planet item grants extra surface metal extraction and faster unit production).
The problem is, it is somewhat expensive(first have to research the planetary items, then build them), as they have no way to reduce the cost of the process(for instance, Vasari Exodus can reduce the cost of developing planets and buying planet items).
Also in Civilian Tier 2, you can reduce the cost of all orbital structures by -25%. That is a pretty big deal, and in my opinion, something you should prioritize.
You can also get a research that reduces the buy cost of metal and crystal by 10%.
TEC Primacy also gets to bomb planets for credits, which can provide a fairly big jump in credits income if you harass with a small group of Krosov Frigates.
Pirates can provide you with a ship item that generates credits based on damage dealt. Of course, everyone can get access to this, but as TEC Primacy, you have vision of them from the start, so that might be a possible path for you depending on the map.
At Civilian Tier 3, their economy starts to kick in really hard(several powerful economic planetary items, trade centers have a bigger payoff etc.), but at that point, you typically have already "made it", or you are far behind.
Trade Centers are something else entirely.
They take a lot of resources to get going, but the reward is minimal in the early game.
Once you have the tier 2 research to reduce the cost of Orbitals, they are at least not too prohibitive in terms of cost(you see them turn a profit a bit faster).
The problem is that Trade Centers are a long term investment with an expensive start, so if you want a strong early economy for a rush playstyle, they are a bit of a trap and you have to look for economy elsewhere. Which is weird, since they are a tier 1 tech.
By the mid game where you might have 40+ Export points, you can get a lot of credits(your main focus) and should also have some in a secondary resource(what you want depends on the what is most expensive to buy on the market), and the constant flow of escorts can assist in combat, act as a distraction, or simply provide vision.
The Akkan Battlecruiser actually provide a lot of extra trade capacity(I believe it is 6 extra capacity at level 5), so consider using them if you want some fairly early efficient trade going. The Akkan is also one of your fastest capital ships, so if you go for stealing early derelicts, it might be an interesting choice.
Where trade might shine through, is on maps with low resources as a factor. Planets will generate less, meaning the impact of trade will be bigger.
On the other hand, maps with high resources will make trade worse as an economic benefit, but it might also make it easier to get them going early and then get the benefit of escorts.
At our discord we do run community challenges, and in preparation of those, I do run test games, to see what could be an expectation, to make the challenge most fun.
Because of those challenges, I have recently made a few economy tests, and I can bring some numbers into this discussion.
I have simulated similar starts, on a 1.25 income speed, and checked income at minute mark 15. While minute 15 is rather early into the game, this is where some theoretical combat could happen for one, and even though it does not give exact information for economy at minute 50, as economy scales better, if you get more early, it means a small difference in minute 15 will get proportionally bigger to minute 50.
With TEC and Akkan as first cap ship I had: 56.5/11.3/11.5 income per second
With TEC and Kol as first cap ship I had: 47.3/11.4/11.5 income per second
With Advent I had 35.2/12.2/12.1 income per second
As it can be seen, TEC was ahead, even if player opted to go with a military capital ship. Another note I would like to make, is that it's unfair to calculate resources trade at 1:3 ratio. TEC can easily switch income, and focus on resources, so their realistic trade is at 1:2 ratio. Even if this does not sound convincing, at a 1:3 ratio, there is a clear advantage for TEC in economy, when a player plays.
What is interesting is that this does is not fully reflected in the mentioned AI numbers, and combined with other threads it does seem that TEC AI underperforms. I will share this knoweldge with the team, and thank all for participating in the thread, while providing very detailed information
because they are insane?
you did that on normal income speed?
Income alone without actual total income to that point can be misleading.
Also my own testing.
Balance of power(intentionally didn't settle the middle paradise planets as advent because I could actually colonize them early but couldn't as TEC)
Advent reborn(not wrath which is better)
Started with a Carrier(best starter bar none in the game)
15min
Total Credits 13.48k.
Total Income Credit 26.8 credits
Total Metal 5.2k
Metal income 8.6
Total Crystal 4.9k
crystal income 7.2
Had the full Desert economic upgrade+50% credit building
As soon as game started I went for tier2 civ research for the +0.5 crystal bonus for each.
Which is how I normally play.
The Extra orbital slots and income for almost nothing+50% credit income are fantastic, also Divination is to good to pass up, like outright -25% speed and cost to explore for exotics is just insane.
Especially didn't even go mining at all, was building my second carrier cap at 15 min mark.
TEC Starting Kol(no frigates, with frigates is actually slower and worse, cant afford upgrades)
Tried to go Economic upgrade as soon as game started for the +1 credit for each level... but couldn't afford it and had to wait 5 mins for the second level(or not upgrade planets)
got Mining tecs as fast as I could afford them(but not orbital extraction or orbitals still had to upgrade planets at this point)
Total Credits 15.6k
Total Income Credit 27.7
Total Metal 4.5k
Metal income 7.8
Total Crystal 4k
Total Crystal Income 7.7
Was still trying to upgrade my volcano world which I just colonized.
Didn't need to "not" colonize paradise world, I hadn't made it there yet.
No trade ports or orbital extraction because I couldn't afford to do so unless I was not going to upgrade planetary income/mining.
Was not building a second capital.
Considering I was not even going tadeports yet and I could not build a second capital just yet and if I was fighting myself I would be overrun with 2 Advent Capital carriers were sent to attack me.
Can you explain what map you got those numbers on, and what was the build order... because Advent had resources to play around with and build a second capital, my TEC did not.
TEC was only improving planets/ getting crystal/metal mining.
Advent had tons of resources to play with of all types, TEC was constantly short.
So unless I was not going to develop just credits/mining on the planets I couldn't really do anything much more then I already did as TEC.
So either I am missing a super easy "TEC" strat... or something is wrong.
I can't get numbers even close to yours as TEC or Advent... however I did avoid colonzing as Advent... something I didn't need to do as TEC.
Only feels fair, considering Adven't Unity buildings take 1.
Otherwise trader ports gobble up civic orbits ways too much, leaving little space for anything else, including orbital mining.
But TECs science buildings give +2 research instead of 1, so maybe that's fair.
Granted, they offer a flexibility to your economy that other empires don't have, but you're basically spending 2 slots to get more or less the same minerals as 2 slots of orbital extractors, except that you're paying far more for it upfront. It pays off in the long-run, but then again so does every empire so how is that a help? I suspect this is one reason why the TEC is always the first empire to fall in my vs AI games.