A case for returning armada

Honestly RA is only too powerful if the opponent completely and totally screws up. Any decent human player(I will be the first to admit that I might not be able to do it) will use the Vasari early game disadvantage to force them into retreat. The vasari simply put are an advanced race, it is much easier IMO to play TEC or even Advent.

Actually, RA wasn't really weakened much in 1.04. Only the exploit/bug with the negative fleet supply was fixed. The increase in cold down has hardly any practical effect, since the gates need more time to regenerate their antimatter than the cold down lasts.

So it is basically as powerful as it was before, which means it is too powerful once it is set up, so I think it should be nerved more.

However, I also see your concerns regarding the relative strength of Vasari, especially in shorter games. But in my opinion they shouldn't be dependent on an overpowered ability, but instead some of their units should be made slightly stronger. Especially considered that teching to RA isn't a viable strategy on a small map anyway.

Noob question, how is RA used at all? I researched the tech but could not figure out away to activate this special ability in my gates.

Its set to default auto activation, build it, research the tech - and i mean here right to the end of the empire tree - and wait.

Since shipyards and resource and even research (you need eight non-ship labs) are all logistics and a portal costs 10 logistics points whilst a capital shipyard costs 4 i do not really see a problem here.

I have to admit that i have never played against it, only played it myself to see how it is working.

Facts about RA:

1) Its setting you back in shipupgrades if you venture the road. If you go simultaniously for shipupgrades you take even longer to set it up, leaving you even longer with the disadvantage investing huge resources in something else than the usual eco/ship sheme. This is a huge burden early on and makes you quite vulnerable.

2) You don't get simply free ships. You will have a LOT less logistics space for production, economic and research buildings.

3) An aggresive expansion strategy is counterproductive for a RA strategy, because it delays also setting up the portal because you spend a lot of resources to overpower your enemy with unupgraded ships. Once its set up you can expand. But it takes to get to the end of the empire tree first, leaving you with a small empire to start out.

I am not saying any race should be dominating in ANY phase of the game. I am saying i see no problem with RA because the sacrifices in economy and speed make up for the advantage to get free, random ships. Because the other empires can also pump out an endless supply of ships by then - paying for them, but being able to do so.

Shipyards are still smaller and produce faster than a portal can summon fleets. Also the portals take up the same (even way more) slots than regular factories, rendering the "replenish is faster because he gets free ships AND can produce" point invalid. He can't. Either he is building portals or shipyards. Doing both is impracticable. Both share the same structure caps. And nothing eats caps like phase stabilizers.

The portals are simply big, slow, late, expensive factories wich produce random ships but require no resources but a huge commitment to get them running to do so. Think of it as an automated shipyard with integrated trade ports.

The additional production is offset by the fact that the portals eat up shipyard space. Doing both is impractical.

The additional eco boost is offset by the fact that the portals eat up space for economic resources.

The additional research boost is offset by the time it is taking RESEARCHING that road AND your lab space being eaten up (by the eight labs AND the portals).

The menacing presence of something wich spews out an infinite ammount of ships is surely unsettling. But thats what empires do. One way or the other.

The real question is:

Is RA a clearly superior way to do so? Is it working too fast?
Is it impossible to keep up with RA by normal production?

I think it ain't. But then - i might be mistaken.

Uhm, if I remember correctly gates use tac space not logistics. But I could be mistaken...

I agree that if you let the other player build up ships with RA it's really your own fault. The thing I disagree with about RA is that it gives you access to ships that you haven't researched yet. While I understand the in-game backstory behind RA and how that facilitates getting the different ships I think that in terms of game balance you shouldn't be able to get unresearched ships in this manner.

yes, they eat up tactical slots, arguably the most useless resource in the game converted to the most useful resource in the game. Free ship producing gates.

Also, your economy means nothing once RA is up. Once its up you rush max fleet right away, because RA is also your source of income. Especially since it spawns carriers and skirmishers fairly often that you have to scuttle anyways, then use the resources from scuttling to research all those weapon upgrades etc. While being the only person in the game that can feasibly get max fleet cap. GG.

MRDred, please actually play the race of which you are speaking before claiming to know anything at all about them. While your arguments would be a slight bit better if gates actually took up logistics slots, which they don't, as they are they can't hold water.


And yes, RA was not nerfed, an exploit was fixed, but it wasn't nerfed. For a full explanation as to why see reply #38 Here

I assume you're referring to the space the eight empire labs take up, because phase stabilizers are tactical, not logistic. The thing is, with RA you don't need an economy. You can simply scuttle any ships you don't need/want, which is free money. RA will replace them anyway.



Yes. On a 3v3 map, I have outnumbered all 3 enemy fleets put together by the 2 hour mark, operating from 2 Terran, 1 asteroid, and a Volcanic. By this point my allies were dead, so they had the rest of the map, including several desert production worlds. I won, simply because I could replace my losses for free while they had to pay for their replacements.
Note that these players were on an about equal skill level as I am.

As for being underpowered... yes the skirmishers suck ass. but they get assailants with ONE milit lab... they can rush LRMS faster than anyone else in the game. TEC LRM rush will generate more LRMS once its running, but on a small map like you are talking about a vas player can have a dozen assailants and a cap ship at the enemys home world by the time he starts production on his first LRM. Or if hes fighting advent, likely before the enemy player even gets LRM research done.

I play vassari a lot here are a few things:

1:phase gates take tactical slots so the only thing you lose at planets is defensive structures.

2:since you are building civilian labs you can upgrade your economy(although this is not really necesary since you are going to get ships for free)

3:in a serious 1v1 game you will never get ra up against a skilled opponant. They will be pressuring you long before you even get a phase gate up. On a small map if you are able to rush ra then you could have beat your opponant before then simply doing a military rush.

4:on medium or large maps when you are playing ffa or teams and you dont get pounded on from the get go ra becomes a serious threat. If you can get to around the 50 minute mark in a game not being harrased you will be set up to unleash the full fury of ra and it will be very difficult to be stopped then.

I do belive that ra needs further tweaking because if you do get it established with multiple phase gates it is almost unbeatable.

one last thing you can build a better fleet with a maxxed out economy but it will take you about 40% longer then going ra and you will never have the replacement speed that ra does.

@bloohawk32, vorash tepesh

Aiiiieee... you are right. This changes everything obviously, adding tremendously to production capabilities. How could i mix that one up. Of course this makes the above statement rather usless.

Okay, it is overpowered then ^^

ra is only an issue when it hits 1+ hour mark.

Vasari will be least effected by fleetsuply penalties due to it.


Anyhow, advent can take full RA spawned fleet with only half of the fleet capacity used. Thats because advents capital ships are just beter than anything else.

Does RA summon Caps as well?

Thats not the point, the point is the vasari player gets his fleet replaced for free while any losses the advent player took have to come out of pocket. And 1+ hour mark? a skilled player can get RA up in a 3v3 in 25-30 minutes. Hell, playing against AI single player I had 6 gates up in a little over 45 mins w/ ra teched, and I can probably do better, it was the first time I actually tried rushing RA. And I had to fend off AI and pirate attacks(since I wasn't wasting credits on bounty) while doing it.

There is no viable counter to RA other than preventing it from being introduced into the game, which in a 3v3 with 2 players expanding and defending the RA rusher is going to be a tad bit difficult. The RA player can be @ max fleet cap in a little over an hour, with NO drawbacks.

Thankfully no.

Guys, it is important to consider all the factors in an issue before making an [illegitmate] assertion.

RA can be easily* defeated in each stage of the game. If you are in incapable of defeating RA, you should be embarassed by your lack of tactical prowess. Describing the obvious methods of crushing an RA rush or its employment is nearly painful.

Early game: just attack. At best, the player will only have a few skirmishers and a capital ship.

Mid game: see above. Attack the tech labs/gates (which are tremendously costly and leave no room for fleet construction).

Late game: you have an economy. You have built up defenses. You have researched your ships. The Vasari player has not, as they have been far too busy pumping out gates and tech labs. If you are Advent, it is still possible to crush a maxed out RA fleet with high level capital ships and their abilities. If you are TEC, you can match, or even better the production of the gates. As TEC/Advent, you also get to choose which ships you produce; the player with RA cannot. As either TEC or Advent, you also have a safety net; your economy. You can lose a few outposts or planets and not suffer a major loss. If the Vasari player has planets with concentrated gates, well, I do not think this sentence needs to be finished.

You're actually asserting that late game RA can be defeated? Give any halfway decent Vasari player and hour to himself, and its game over. It doesn't matter how awesome his economy isn't compared to yours, because when you're both at 75% upkeep, you can't afford to replace a lost fleet and he can.
The problem with RA is that its a late game "I win" button. Between two players of equal skill late game, the player with RA will win. It isn't balanced if its only counter is not to let them get it.

Just a quick post ignoring some of the otherwise interesting points made.

infall1ble, I agree with you when you argue that Returning Armada is a necessity for Vasari given their otherwise somewhat lackluster power when compared to the other races in the current balance landscape. But, I respectfully disagree with you when you conclude that means that RA should be left untouched. To me, it's an indication of how a more radical overhaul of the Vasari is needed. The Vasari's dependency on RA just isn't sound in my mind. Especially, since RA in it's current state just isn't a fun ability to play with or against.

I would like to add that I haven't lost a game facing RA since 1.01. A 4v4 turned 1v4 due to time constraints on the part of my allies, in which I faced 2 Vasari players with RA. That is my only defeat at the hands of RA. I know, it sounds like I'm an arrogant bastard, and it's naturally at your discretion to decide whether or not you believe me. The thing is, that I've been fed up by being accused of being a noob that just doesn't know how to counter RA, every single time I've argued in favor of changes to RA... Couldn't contain myself any longer, sorry.

Illegitimate assertion? of all of those counters, the only one that has even a half decent chance of working is the Early game one.
Mid game: Unless your playing 1v1, good luck with that, his allies should be spending most of thier time making sure you don't do exactly that while hes teching max fleet cap and waiting for more free ships.

Late game: Thanks to the free supply of income the vas has, hes got everything he could possibly want researched, as well as max fleet cap and a steady supply of free ship production that you will never be able to match. Even TEC can't match this spam as their units aren't even as strong as the vasaris are for the most part(there are a few exceptions), vas gets a higher max fleet cap thanks to research, and, of course, the TEC player is losing a god awful amount of resources to upkeep, while the vasari could care less about his upkeep.


This is of course assuming both players are equal skill level, and not both retards where who wins is about as predictable as a dice roll. I have friends I could specifically write down an entire RA rush strat for, give them time to do it, and still kick their asses. I can do this with those people in just about any game, they're just not real good gamers. The majority of the gaming community falls into that category, though some would give a good player a better run for their money than others(note, I don't consider myself awesome or anything, maybe 'upper middle class' would be the best description of where I consider myself skill wise). A good player w/ advent or tec vs a middle-of-the-road vasari player has a good chance of kicking his ass. A good player w/ advent or tec vs a good player with vasari is fucked as soon as ra gets out. If its a small map 1v1 hes likely screwed anyways as the assailant rush is pretty powerful if done fast enough since you don't usually have shit all to counter them by the time they show up at your base. If its a larger map the vas has allies to both feed him resources and play the delaying game, 1 advent, 1 tec, and 1 vas would work really well for this atm, just have the TEC player econ and the advent go straight milit. while the vas rushes RA. or 2x TEC and vas, but I like advent, so I felt the need to include them .

At any rate, RA does need a nerf, but vas do need some kind of buff for VERY late game when someone has a lv 5-6 fleet cap balanced fleet that comes and pounds on them. Of course its gotta be a huge map before vas need to worry about the game going on that long.

That said I'm done explaining why RA is overpowered... honestly if you can't figure that out for yourself(assuming your using the correct data, mrdred was not, and realized the error of his ways once they were pointed out :)) theres something wrong.

Evidently, you will not be convinced of anything other than what you have already determined for yourself, which is fine. I feel the need to point out that you have completely disregarded the fragile nature of RA in your approach to countering it (I assume you do not play Vasari). TEC is the weakest late game faction, and should* lose out to the other races. Advent can still defeat RA late game if the Advent player is smart enough (the Vasari players skill does not matter in this case).

As to the other comments about changing the entire nature of the Vasari, I have thought of that aswell, but I do not think it is a realistic option. Ultimately that form of thinking leads to all three races having the exact same ships with the exact same tech and the only difference being a trivial appearance.

If we nerf RA, we should also nerf Mass Transcendence, for the Advent and half of the income upgrades for the TEC.

Most people think that RA is over powered, because the Vasari get free ships. But this is only, so that they can stand up, to the higher level capital ships, of the Advent, and the deeper pockets of the TEC. The TEC, makes so much more income, then the other two factions that there ships could count as free, when you take the Vasari income - the TEC income. The capital ships of the Advet, are at so high a level, when staked against the other factions that it feels like they have extra "Free invisible ships" fighting by their side. This is why, if we nerf Ra, we should also nerf Mass transcendence and half of the TEC income upgrades.

NO the real problem with RA, is that it is automatic. You can hit a button and get a small fleet of ships. The time need for the Phase Stabilizers to get the antimatter needed, is just about the amount needed, to built the fleet, from a Frigate factory. The differnce, is that I, with RA need to only hit one button, while all the others must hit it about 5 times. Also, I can put RA on auto cast, which allows for it to be even more automatic. After I put it on autocast, I no longer, have to put more brain power into build my fleet, and can put more into the fights, which leads to me "out thinking my enemy".

Me + AI(thougth RA) = more of my brain power on the battle, instead on the factory line.

Look at auto cast, in general. Why is it even in the game. It in the game, so we don't have to give evey little command, and can put more into the macro, instead of micro level. Auto cast allows for us to work on the macro level and fix small problems on the micro.

Think of how you program a computer. You never program it in machine lang., which is the same as commanding every unit with out auto cast. YOu program in a higher lang. , which allows you to get more done in a shorter amount of time, as well, as allow your, to focues on the big picture. That why, it seems that we all ways have bugs, as there are all ways low lang. problem, that we never fixed. But this game allows us to fix low level problems.

No, we never program, in lower lang. as take away, form the over all goal.

This is why RA seems to be over powered. It not because of the free ships, but because the Vasaei player can fight on a higher picture, then the other two factions

"If we nerf RA, we should also nerf Mass Transcendence, for the Advent and half of the income upgrades for the TEC."

Or we could just replace RA with something else.

I've only lost to RA once, from HuntingX, in nearly 200 games played.


Maybe I'm just "lucky".
Or maybe I just know how to play instead of whining about a certain tactic.

innociv, I think it's far more likely that it's a combination of the fact that you, as far as I know, don't play the settings that favour Returning Armada bur rather play small scale competitive matches, focusing on RA in the short-term just isn't a sound strategic choice when you're pitted directly against a skilled player like you. The most prevalent balance issue that faces Ironclad is that what's balanced in small scale games isn't necessary balanced in large scale games. Returning Armada is a prime example of this, since a large scale game doesn't place the same natural constrains on Returning Armada as a smale scale game. It's also important to remember that the relative worth of each Returning Armada ship increases as the scale of the fighting does due to Returning Armada's relative independence of upkeep. Luck, is that I've yet to face a competent player that doesn't overemphasize Returning Armada in a large scale game.

My main issue with Returning Armada is that it oversimplifies the game once it's up and running. The effort and skill required to counter Returning Armada post hoc, is far greater than the effort and skill required to manage it. I've often been frustrated by the fact that I had to spend a relatively large amount of time killing a lesser skilled player, simply because he had Returning Armada up and running. It's not much better to feel forced to attack the Vasari player first (if it's even possible - sometimes the circumstances doesn't allow it) just to avoid the time consuming process of fighting Returning Armada.

What would you replace RA with Anubis208?

The only one that I could think of that would fit the lore, is to make it the Return of the DARK fleet, in which ever fleet, now gets a bounes for being a fleet. Like an increase in hit point, shield points, or firepower. I think this was already done in Conquest: Frontier wars, where you fleets, where build, using admiral. Each admiral gave different bouns to the fleet, under that admiral command. But I already posted an ideal like this one, in which not one posted back.

What would you replace it with, that fits the lore, and how the Vasari plays?