Glad I waited for the steam sale at $13.59

This is false, they only have "Corvette" and "Antilight" weapons (two of the weapons share a damage type), and they only counter LRFs and titans well. Their side weapons are antilight but that only counters LRF (Which their main weapons already counter), bombers and siege frigates. 

The immunity to AoE is a new thing, before nothing countered titans. The best you could do is spam bombers and hope for the best.

That said, the Vasari AoEs still hit Corvettes for some reason, which breaks them as a counter for these titans (VR titan needs level 6 to get the ability).

And thirdly, several capitalship AoEs will still affect Corvettes, and due to their low base HP these will annihilate them. Also they seem to be affected by all antistrikecraft abilities if I remember correctly.

I do agree with the flak range buff though.

 I disagree.  There was enough balance for the game to be very deep and enjoyable.  but there are a number of strategies that in pretty much every iteration of sins to present have never really been counterable.

In most versions of sins one of the prime examples was late game LRF and bomber spam.  In general the only counters to compositions like this was to do the same yourself.  And yes I am aware that in theory fighters counter LRF & bombers, but realistically speaking a contingent of flak and the sheer magnitude of a late game fleet meant fighters just didn't late enough to really be able to reliably counter such fleet.

Likewise early game carrier-cap rushes tended to be uncounterable with anything besides a well placed starbase(requiring long anticipation of the rush) or a counteroffensive of the same unit(early game carrier capitalships). 

Early game LRF spam didn't really have a counter as carriers are too expensive to spam at that stage of the game.

And frankly the Advent-Vasari matchup has never been properly balanced.   Before the illuminator bugfixe/Malice nerfs Advent had an overwhelming advantage and once their OP toys were taken away advent suddenly found themselves ata n overwhelming disadvantage against the vasari for pretty much the entirety of sins history up to rebellion(due to phase missiles and advent's squishy shield reliant capitalships).

So no, vanilla sins was not the balanced perfection you imply- and I start by saying this because a number of these imbalances were actually addressed in Rebellion.

 They are only a bit cheaper then light frigates, have a much worse armor type against pretty much everything besides capitalships/titans, and less hull/shields.

Yes their DPS/supply is a bit higher, but that is only really due to their inability to bring all their weapons to bear on a single target(side weapons are strikecraft only, and divided between 2 sides)- much like illuminators & flak frigates get high DPS/supply.

 And their total DPS is pretty in line with their cost.  Having multiple weapon systems is nto inherently an advantage- in fact it is arguably worse as:

a). full corvette DPS can't be upgraded with a single weapon research type

b ) multple lower damage weapons are more heavily affected by the growth of shield mitigation then single high damage weapons.

 They have 2 damage types, the two of which are practically identical   The main difference between the damage types in the front/back guns do more damage to capitalships & titans then the light damage type the side guns use would.

Corvettes basically counter 3 thing: Long range Missile frigates, and titans.  As for capitalships they are particularly good at killing carriers since they can't be kited and have sidemount anti-SC weapons.

 Notice some parallel there?  they are pretty much designed to counter all the things we lacked adequate counters against in vanilla

 And did that every make fighters unbalanced?  Corvettes are actually very similar to fighters when it comes down to it, just with a slightly modified role.  As compared to fighters corvettes are worse at killing bombers, better at killing capships/titans, and are more vulnerable to AoE damage and frigate weapons(no 25% miss chance against them for flak & all frigates can attack them) then their fighter counterparts.

Like fighters, you place flak where they need to go(near whatever the corvettes want to attack) rather then try to chase them down. 

 Incorrect.  They are only immune to titan-AoE as they are specifically supposed to counter titans.  All the old AoE abilities hitt hem just fine.  in fact they get hit with both antiscrikecraft AoEs like TK push and antifrigate AoEs like Missile Barrage or meteoroid control.

Rebellion even added a few new AoE tools that can be used to kill them such as the discord's Psionic Scream or the Corsev's Demo team.

Any one of these AoEs can wipe out whole fleets of corvettes almost instantly.

 Again, like with fighters, using flak as a counter is a reactive counter.  you place the flak near whatever the corvettes want to attack.  They either come and into firing range or give up and leave.

Admittedly in small battles individual corvettes may be microed to runa way when wounded, but i nlarger battles where the requisite flak to counter effectively can easily be 25-40 flak or more, theres so much damage flying every which way this can quickly become impractical.

 Yes, countering titans is one of their primary functions.  I think youa re vastly overestimating the number of ships corvettes are strong against.  They only really have an advantage against 3 things: LRF, caps, & titans.

Flak decimate them, they do shit damage to anything with heavy armor(carriers & support frigates), and even LF & fighters have an edge on them in terms of firepower/survivability after armor & damage types are taken into consideration.

Corvettes were utterly broken when they did composite damage, but are perfectly fine now.  

 More often you see an even mix of LF & corvettes.  These 2 units are a natural combo as each counters the other unit's weakness(corvettes counter LRF & LF counter flak).  This is true in much the same way LRF+Flak are a natural combo- albiest one which is a bit less common for anyone besides the vasari.

 Here I may agree a bit- Starbase mobilization is indeed utterly broken.  Wail still may need some tweaking, but is certainly moving in the right direction.  Novalith Deregulation is perfectly fine though- TEC loyals are considered the second weakest faction in the game at present.

All that said balance is certainly not perfect- but each patch has made good strides.  Honestly though the main problems are not corvettes by any means.  The vasari Rebels still need to be tuned down, and frankly titans still are a bit too central to the game IMO.  Also Tec loyals & Advent loyals continue to need some serious love to really be on the level witht he more competitive picks.

I know for a fact in the game I played prior to this I was up against someone with a huge swarm of corvettes.  And neither meteoroid control nor telekinetic push had ANY effect whatsover, in fact I couldn't even fire the meteors at the corvettes as they seemed to be considered and invalid target.   The fact is there is no significant counter to them.   Early game they are extreme cost effective to the point of eliminating most of the other choices for fleet composition.  And late game they are both a necessity for bringing down titans and don't have much to fear from flak as the enemy titan can just gobble up the flaks in seconds.  Its also funny how titans move fast enough to run down carriers and most other cruisers for that matter.

Comparing corvettes to fighters is ludicrous for one simple reason; fighters have ~1/10th the hitpoints of a corvette, and are wayyyy more vulnerable to anti strike craft abilities and weaponry.

I don't quite understand why TEC rebels are considered powerful, I just got done with a game with them and their titan is clearly not as good in a fight as the others, and their ships are inferior to the other factions in general.   I was in a late game scenario versus a vasari opponent where I had *every tech* and was near cap on fleet supply versus an opponent who was significantly behind in both technology and fleet size and yet in the big heads up battle that ensued my fleet was crushed by the vasari, though casualties were heavy on both sides.  The funny part was that the titans were the very first thing to die followed by all the capships.  I did go on to win the game by resorting to novalith spam coupled with big red button attrition.   But compared to TEC loyalists, the rebels seem completely inferior to me.  The Ankylon seems like a much better titan espescially since it can simultaneously buff your entire fleet and debuff the entire enemy fleet quite significantly.  And the defensive bonus technologies seem slightly more useful than the offensive ones the rebels have. 

Advent loyalists do seem inferior when compared to their rebels but their titan still has some spectacular capabilities, particularly the way it will passively steal enemy fleets.  Finally, Vasari seem to favor the mobile starbases, as a fully upgraded starbase exceeds the firepower and defense of most titans before abilities.   Strip to the core seems like a bad idea by comparison as this kind of income doesn't stack up to having a big powerful trade chain.

Hmm, you seem to be right on meteor control, not sure why that is, but I just went into the game files to double check telekinetic push and it says Corvettes should be affected. Perhaps they just weren't "pushed" very far because Corvettes have significantly higher mass than fighters? If they aren't getting the damage and speed debuff that is definitely a bug.

Vasari have the best end game period with those phase missiles and phase stabilizers. If you where facing a bomber spam that might happen, but the Ragnarov is the second best titan in my opinion, with two unlimited AoE attacks and snipe to let it hurt single targets from across the gravity well. It shares the same weakness as the Kol though; antimatter depletion, since all of it's abilities use it. If your enemy had a Kortul or two with disruptive strikes, it is quite possible they drained your titan's antimatter dry before it could turn the tied. With out antimatter, the Ragnarov can hit a single target hard with the rail gun bit is pretty useless against fleets.

Yes, but Disruption Vortex is a pretty weak AoE ability by titan standards, it can't deal with normal frigates anywhere near as effectively as the Ragnarov can. It may work better against the titan counters of corvettes/bombers though, as you say it relies on buffs rather than direct damage, so being unable to do much damage isn't as much of a handicap for it.

I agree the TEC Loyalists have better research, but it's mostly at the end of the tech tree, while the TEC as a faction is better early game. Perhaps the flux of new players have changed things, but in the old days with mostly pro players the game was mostly decided by the time you'd get to tier 6-8 techs if you weren't rushing something. Truce Amongst Rogues is amazing in the eco slot, and I guess some players like the damage boosts, but otherwise TEC Rebels research is pretty meh, which is why I think it's the titan that so many players pick it.

Not passively, the Coronata loses antimatter when it captures a ship, and if it is out of antimatter, it can't capture ships anymore.

That's why in serious game Vasari Rebels are (or at least were) banned.

It was nerfed pretty hard after every game would have 1 player on every team rush to get it. Also have you tried hunting down a level 6 Vorastra titan task force? It is not fun. Vorastra and fleet jumps in, Vorastra micro phase jumps to your ships, eats them with Maw, and if it still can't win in spawns a phase stabilizer and jumps to the other side of the map and repeats until you eventually collapse or quit in frustration because it never stays and fights to let you hunt it down.

Ok, good point o nmeteoroid control- I had thought they were on the filter for it.  That said, every other AoE I listed does hit them.

TK push definitely hits them though

This is incorrect.  Their firepower per cost is only slightly higher then that of a Light frigate, and that firepower is divided between weapon systems that can't all be brought to bear on a single enemy.  The survivability per cost is lower then that of Light frigates.

Flak IS a significant counter to them.

Moreover Building a Corsev or Discord will obliterate a fleet of corvettes in no time flat.  The counters exist, you just refuse to acknowledge them

Well I do agree titans destroy flack- and frigates in general too fast.  But corvettes aren't the only option.  Bombers work just as well if not better for taking down titans then corvettes- Bombers are far less liable to getting countered(even late game a single capitalship AoE hard counters a corvette swarm).  Not to mention if you keep your carriers at a nice safe distance any bombers you lose only cost antimatter as opposed to the resources lost when a corvette dies.

They can catch carriers as you said, but their damage coefficient against heavy armor is abyssmal, not to mention fighters(fielded by said carriers) are decent at killing corvettes.  you're much better off using Light frigates to hunt carriers.

Why are you comparing a single fighter to a corvette? A corvette is more on the magnitude of being compared to a whole squad of fighters- which together have comparable hit points to a corvette.

Not to mention onces against corvettes are vulnerable to a lot more types of damage then fighters are.  Yes they are less vulnerable to nti-SC AoE, but in turn flak is even more effective against corvettes then fighters, every type of ship can shoot at corvettes, and most non-titan-AoEs can target corvettes

Ragnarov is widely considered the second best titan in the game after the Eradica.  It dwarfs the single target damage of any other titan, has 10000 attack range, and can frontload more AoE damage then any other titan.

The Tec aren't supposed to fight head on- they are designed to have a superior economy and force the opponent into a war of attrition.  They are designed not to win clean decisive victories but rather to force the opponent to trade casualties with them, and with their superior economy they are better able to replace said casualties then their opponent.

TEC are an early game pressure race- vasari are a late game race that takes a very long time to get rolling- late game in a direct confrontation they are supposed to crush TEC fleets.  

Perfect- TEc has a stronger economy- comparable losses on both sides is in your favor

Here's the thing: you say buff the entire fleet, but "Inspire and Impair" fails to buff the only really important super late game damage sources: titans & bombers.  At the stage of the game where titans are level 6+ frigates aren't present anymore in skilled games, meaning Inspire & Impair has somewhat limited usefulness.

Group area shield is certainly good, but honestly it isn't going to save your frigates from the AoE damage of a high level Ragnarov or Eradica.

And Disruption Matrix has rather pitiful damage for a titan AoE.

The last point is the reason the Ragnarov is better then the ankylon.

When it comes down to it, the most important role of a titan is to hardcounter frigates- which is done via AoE.  Titan's are ranked in power first in foremost in how effectively they can kill frigates en masse.

Practically speaking the ability to steal frigates isn't as useful as it sounds.  Early game you don't want to use it as it results in your titan leveling slowly(converted ships give no exp).  late game the only frigates the enemy is likely to have are carriers parked on the other side of the gravity well out of Coronata's reach.

heck, the Eradica can often steal a comparable number of ships ina given situation by dropping AoE-death and reviving clones of 15% of the ships it kills.  

But again the main problem the coronata suffers from is complete and utter lack of any form of AoE.  It levels very slowly as a result and leaves the Advent Loyals with no efficient way to wipe out masses of frigates quickly when the need arises.

 QFT

The Advent desperately need a good phase missile counter!

TEC Rebels are considered powerful because TEC Loyalist are the weakest faction in the game. The Ankylon is inferior to the Ragnarov in many ways and more easily countered by AM draining ships. TEC Loyalists only have one good tech and that is the militia upgrades that come at tech 5, dont help anything with expansion and wont make a world of difference in the late game. On the other hand TEC Rebels weapon upgrade affect all ships, giving them better fighters, bombers and a more powerful - single - starbase on neutral territory. Only good thing about TEC Loyalist is their Novalith Deregulation, but this advantage is situational and rarely will prove a large advantage over TEC Rebels.

What would be the weakest faction in the game for you? Dont say advent Loyalist because after all the buffs they got they are easily better than TEC Loyalist. The Coronata is the weapon of choice to kill Titans 3 levels above your own with only minimal losses and it becomes nearly unkillable on higher levels thanks to Supression Aura. They recent eco buff is another nice thing and the firepower increase helps a lot to make the illuminator more useful in the late game.

Thats correct. It is still a lot better than the Ankylon however, because even without abilities it can quickly kill a Kortul... something the Ankylon cannot hope to do as Power Surge will outlast its firepower permanently. With the AM being drained... the Ragnarov cannot use abilities for a while.... because it will pulverise the annoying Kortul just with conventional weapons and after that am regneration kicks in.

1. It is Disruption Matrix... how do you come on Vortex?

In theory the ability to disable all abilities is immensivly powerful... in practise however the short duration wont buy your fleet the time it needs to make a difference. It doesnt disable Disruptive Strikes on the Kortul as it is a passive and so there is nothing you can do against the drain of Antimatter.

Exaclty.

This is true, but then perhaps the Advent Loyalist dont need an overy powerful AOE after all.

The Advent Loyalist have several researches that make the illuminator more powerful. This gives them one of the best spread out firepower in the entire game. Illuminators have only two weaknesses.... lack of firepower and lack of durability. The first one is addressed by the additional damage buffs AL can have, the second one is mitigated by the Coronata Surpression Aura.

Illuminators do very poorly against singular hard targets, they are however murderous against many light targets.

And this is where the Coronata comes in.....

200 Illuminators are no match for an fully upgraded Orkulus..... they all die..... no matter the research upgrades.

However.... a fleet of just 50 illuminator supported by as much a a level 3 Coronata will decimate the same fully upgraded Orkulus effortlessy... with only a few illuminators being lost.

What I am saying is that the Coronata deals wth anything the Illuminator cannot deal with properly and it does an awesome job at it.

Just send your Coronata forward into the enemy lines... it is more than durable enough to withstand Chastic Bust for quite a while, something that is not true the opposite way as Unity Mass does severe punishment to even higher level Eradicas. That of course leaves the enemy fleet... but with 40 % damage reduction they going to need time to destroy your Coronata..... time they dont have. First nuke the Radiance with Unity Mass.... then use it to force the Eradica into retreat, preferably supported by your own Radiance.... once the Eradica cannot microwave your fleet into oblivion anymore move in the rest of your fleet and watch the heathens burn!