[SotF] Addressing Rebellion Balance and Gameplay issues
Sins Forums
After playing Rebellion quite a bit against human players I have several changes I'm going to make to Rebellion to help normalize out many of the issues related to balance and gameplay. And while I have tried to avoid modifying core game mechanics with the original races in previous versions of SotF, I feel these are such an issue to mod play they need to be addressed.
Related journal: [SotF] Improving the AI
Stripped to the Core
This ability poses the most issues as 1) it can only be used by a human player. 2) it renders the planet useless. 3) it gives untax credits/metal/crystal that ignores game speed settings. Consequently a VL player given enough planets, (doesn't require many), can build a larger fleet than any others on the field. Add in phase stabilizers and Kosturas and a VL player can easily avoid most players stripping their planets and jumping out before anything can be done.
I don't want to remove Vasari's unique ability to go mobile, but reducing planets to dead asteroids and asteroid belts is hardly conducive to a fun game. So what's the answer then. Ideally I would like to have a buff from Stardock/IC that initiates the Stripping process in lieu of using Scuttling as the driving mechanism. A simple StripPlanet buff instant action with a OnDelay would work fine given the current implentation.
If a new buff instant action can't be coerced out of the devs, then more drastic measures will be followed. In this approach the VL titan will get it's own version of resource drain, dumping micro-jump, which will allow a VL player to strip all the resources from a planet. Each level will improve the stripping time and value received. The planet will only be allowed to be stripped once and will show on it's info card Stripped to the Core. These planets will still support the same logistic and tactical slots but will be uncolonizable for a period of time. The VL player will still lose all structures on the planet stripped.
Uncapped Titan AOE's
Many of the Titans have marginalized frigate fleets to the point where it can become "feeding the titan" if you bring any frigates to the party. Consequently all Titans with AOE damage dealing abilities will be looked at to determine if a) the damage dealt is to high, or 
the AOE needs a target cap.
Wail of the Sacrificed
This is another ability that can only be used by humans and it's effect is extremely powerful leaving the AI at a complete disadvantage. This ability will be changed to only affect ships in it's gravity well and will damage ships and population at a much slower rate. By moving it to an in gravity well affect the AI will be able to use Target conditions to effectively use it against invading enemies.
Mobilization
We all know the complaints about mobilized Orkulus star bases and I definitely agree. This is yet another area you can completely exploit both AI's and human players. To support this concept but remove the sheer OP'ness of it Vasari Rebels will get two types of Star bases. The first Star base that can be built will be the Defensive only version of the Orkulus. This starbase will never be able to phase jump. When mobilization is researched you will be able to build a special Orkulus that has phase engines installed, but will have dramatically reduced health, weapons and strikecraft upgrades. The mobilized star base will also lack block colonize and trade ports as an option. It may also be possible to tie fleet supply to the mobile starbase which I will investigate.
