Firstly, teching should not be the only strategy.

Secondly, planet defenses work for what they were designed to. A planet should never equal in firepower to a fleet. Offense beats defense because this isn't a turtling game. All techs impact defenses passively. For example, upgrading fighter/bomber damage will make your defense hangers better.

Large empires have a window of opportunity yes, but this is a multiplayer game at heart. There needs to be a way for people lagging behind to catch up. Otherwise people will quit fairly early in the game.

You expect too much 4X.
Sins is mostly a RTS game though.

You hit the nail on the head, the devs tote it as an RT4X, which I've always said they shouldn't, because it's missing a majority of the features that make a great 4X game, and the features of a 4X that are in there are so poor most people ignore them. This game reminds me of Rise of Nations in space, only RoN was more a 4X than this is. When people read what is on the site, they get the wrong impression, I know I did. IC/SD is doing the same thing the big publishers do with advertising, overhyping. I've often thought that politics and advertising/marketing were only a hairline apart as far as integrity goes, and sins takes the cake. The only strong 4X element is eXterminate, all the others are weak and too streamlined.

This is not to say sins is not an enjoyable game, it just shouldn't be advertised as a RT4X when all it is is just a true RTS (as opposed to the often mistaken RTS which is really a RTT (tactical) or a RTC (clickfest)). Sins does have redeemable qualities, even if currently most of them are still getting the bugs and balance worked out.


Yilmael is correct to a degree, the only advanced techs that confer an advantage are ones that give a purely strategic edge, IE allow you to see things other can't, everything else is just minor bonuses. This I'm sure was done because the devs wanted to give the guy who doesn't know how to colonize planets the same chance to win as the one who can multitask 10 fleets at once and has a doctorate in economics. As most games that are released, they are designed in such a way that a total idiot can play them and still get somewhere. Which makes sense from the standpoint of selling games.

But the point is, since sins is a RTS for the most part, putting in technology quantum leaps would be a very bad thing.

If the abilities and combat strength of individual unit types could be changed in unforeseeable ways the game would become a pure gamble.

I think beefier planet defenses will just slow the game down more, which is definitely not what this game needs.

I definitely agree with the OP (brentrobison) on pretty much all of his points. I don't think Sins needs a drastic overhaul or anything from the devs or even modders, but I think some additions or tweaking could help make this game even better than it already is.

That scenario that brentrobison was describing, that WOULD make the game so much better, more DRAMATIC, thrilling, exciting, and unexpected. I don't know about anyone else, but surprises in games are SOMEtimes the best part, if not all the time, even if the surprise is a nasty one. Surprise creates tension, and also adds ANOTHER reason for someone to keep playing the game, just like cliffhangers or plot twists in movies, books, and the like.

Whatever, I'm rambling on about all that. I do agree though, more, bigger tech options and increased defense effectiveness would add a lot to this already amazing game. A greater number and bigger variety of tech would give the player a lot more decisions and make the decisions much more important, such as "Do I completely focus on making lots of units and worry about upgrading later" vs. "Should I get all my tech and units at their maximum levels so I won't need as many to do what I need to do?" or even a balance between the two. Right now, it seems like for the most part, if you have enough resources to buld a lot of ships, you have enough to do a lot of research. Maybe I'm imagining it, but I dunno, I think a greater divide between the two should be made to make players think more.

And yeah, planetary defense....I think the defenses are OK right now. I've seen my cannons and fighter bays do a pretty good job of fending off attackers, but I agree again with the OP, a fully tech'ed, *ultra* planet should be bristling with defenses and a real challenge to face. I don't know if anyone can relate, but in the Halo universe, there's Earth and Reach with their massive plantery defenses, which make it a bit of a challenge for attackers to win battles, even the Covenant. And thinking of how there are "SIEGE" frigates, thats what I think an attack on a planet should be, a siege. The defenders SHOULD have some big advantages with their developed planets!

--My point I guess is that defense is OK for now, but it should be changed a bit to improve the gameplay/atmosphere/strategy/variety of options for player.

I've talked long enough, been a bit of a nerd, whatever. I'm not expecting every little expectation of mine or of anyone's to be fully met by the devs, thats not their job at all, but I'm hoping a few improvements will be made. I kinda know there will be some actually, cause the devs have already been doing so.

Don't know if that was directed at me, but if it was, then DAMN IT there goes $40 I could have given to some poor African boy. Maybe he would have understood Sins better than I could ever hope to....

All attempts at humor aside, please elaborate on why you believe we don't "get" the game.

hay guys u kno if u dont leik the game u shuld play barb or sumthin lol

I'll gladly make a PJI ship if someone wants it.

Ok... what game have you been playing?

Practically every race has technologies allowing support frigates and cruisers to:
1. Drain antimatter, crippling enemy capital ships
2. repair
3. do extra damge
4. Take less damge..

In addition a 10% boost to HP or armor or whatever is MASSIVE when you look at a fleet of 50+ ships.. your problem is that you are playing the AI, and at small scale, and I bet you have limited yourself to capital ships, who are much weaker then real fleets.
Capital ships should support... I made the same mistake when I was a noob...

Try unlocking all the achivements... You will learn A LOT about the game by doing so.

Tech in this game unlocks structures, ships, and abilities. You can not colonize ice and volcanic planets. Your economy will suck without tech. Tech gives you refineries, tradeports, and braodcast centers, the first two triple your economical might at the LEAST... and the latter add culture to the mix (increases money made AND increases fleet power, AND gives special abilities, AND later on destroys the enemy planets)

You are also mislead about the timescale.. Sure if you fight tanks with spears you will die... but this isn't the timescale involved in the reasearch with this game. Most 4X games are TBS where each turn is a year, and involve many star systems. here you are limited to planet within a star system... the whole campaign takes monthes to years... not enough to develop significant differences in technology.

There are even super weapons... if you research them your power difference is significant.. the biggest one is the TEC's, build several of those and watch all the enemy planets die.

The only complaint I have is that the game has the possibility of having a multi star system game but doesn't have the tools for it... some sort of super technologies that take forever to research, cost a ton, and are only gonna be feaseable in huge galaxies (dozens of stars, hundreds of planets)... the kind of game which can take weeks or monthes or whatever. Theoretically you could make a galaxy so big it took years to play. But you will max out the tech tree pretty quickly and then its gonna just get repetative... but still something interesting. I will consider doing it later.

The AI really does need improving.