Question about Vasari

I've always pronounced it that way. Va-sari (like the Indian garment of the same name, but pretty much sorry).

If you don't have to worry about military interference from other players for a little while, Evacuator and at least 4 light frigates to colonize the first asteroid. If you want you can max out your fleet supply on light frigates or quickly build a military lab while they are building and get assailants. Either way max out your fleet supply ASAP.

Thanks for the quick and informative reply, friend.

I always thought it was "Vuh-SAR-EE" (phonetically speaking, naturally).

Va-pwned.

I try to expand as fast as possible in as many directions as possible. If I'm going with a colonizer cap strategy, I usually build a bunch of scouts and then a colony frigate (for whatever direction the capital ship isn't going in), so that the scouts can kill the siege frigate(s) and the colony frigate can quickly warp in, colonize, and retreat, while turret(s) are being built. However, if their first target is a non-dead-end asteroid, it's probably better to build a few light frigates first.

I find that having 8 or 9 scouts for the purpose of quickly killing neutral siege frigates is very helpful in early expansion (less if Vasari though). Although it does create a slight problem down the line because scout frigates aren't that useful in serious battles, I think the quicker expansion rate is worth it.

Don't touch the light frigates; total waste of money early-game.  They're good against Advent T0 spam, carrier cruiser rushes, and massed flak tactics, and that's it.  The AI will never pull any of these, so they're only useful for disrupting support cruisers.

Instead, use scouts for combat purposes.  They're cheaper, faster, and they get a damage bonus against the only two units in the militia you need to kill before colonizing: the Javelis LRM and Krosov Siege Frigate.  Once you've killed the Krosovs, you can colonize the planet and the AI can no longer bombard it.  You can then build a turret, and the only unit in the militia that outranges a turret is the Javelis.  If all the Javelis are dead, then a small number of turrets (usually 1) will kill the remaining militia.  Once the militia are all dead, you can scuttle the turret.

This is very cost-efficient for expansion, and small scout groups can often clear planets of Krosovs and Javelis on their own enabling a colony frigate to waltz in and finish the job, no real expenditure of combat units required.  With these sorts of tactics, you can expand very quickly with relatively little effort. 

Although not superb for fleet battles, scouts remain quite useful in other ways.  The Vasari scouts in particular can acquire neutral extractors, which alone is well worth having a good mob of them.  They are also great for hunting down straggler units like Krosovs that may stray into your territory, they can do scouting runs, and if mixed into your fleet will act as minesweepers.  They're still not useless in combat, either.  Their damage output is high enough to at least contribute against light-type units (ironically, the light frigate is actually a medium-type unit and highly resistant to them).  All in all, the unit is versatile enough that building as many as 20 in the early-game is fully justifiable. 

The reason I like having a few LFs is because they're much more effective than scouts at taking out the neutral LF at asteroids, enabling the colony frigate to warp in significantly faster (before it has 180 AM; maybe even before it has 50 AM). LFs can also be used more effectively than scouts to fight off the few militia in the gravity wells with neutral extractors, which is sometimes useful if there is more than one extractor.

If you have a chain of asteroids, then go with assailants.  They're cheaper, they deal more damage (plus bonus damage to light frigates), only require 1 lab, and are far superior combat units when you merge them with your fleet later.  You're going to want one lab for repair platforms anyways.

Why do you need to fight these?  You're Vasari, your scouts move faster than militia and should be able to play an endless game of keep-away while you charge up your antimatter.

Oh, I was thinking of other factions. Vasari skirmishers make little sense early-game.

Damn. I had no idea scout units were so useful. Thanks for the tips, Darvin. I'll definitely try that next game.

Nice. 

I've always thought it was pronounce Var-SEER-e, but I also grew up reading books with odd pronunciations of names...

Vasari?? Is it an Italian architect ,artist??