What do you expect by a mod made by greedy trader scum!?! It's a well known fact the entire DS team are unenlightened trader sympathizers. Between stant's free traders and Ue-carbon being the de-facto President of the TEC Loyalists, its a wonder they didn't make advent frigates cost twice as much fleet supply. Perhaps you should seek out a mod made by your brethren in the unity.

BURN THE WITCHES!

The culture is not very good in the base game. So its not very good in the mod either.

REND THE HEATHENS!!

Yeah I know It's nothing against the mod, I think it rocks! Just a suggestion of additional techs to improve the advent playing experience.

Any ETA on the mod yet?

ETA? I don't know. Perhaps, 20 of Dec, so that you only get 24 hours to enjoy before we all meet our maker.

Well atleast i can spend my final hours playing a good game with a great mod.

Do the mod in peace, just like to be kept up to date on the release.

Fucking Goa!  Stop trying to steal our fans! 

But he does have a point, more focus is given to the TEC and the others are adjusted around them.  At least in my general practice.  The reason is less because I usually play as TEC (I do play the others to keep my skills up in case I play a game where it would be more advantageous for me to be one of the other factions) but because of the official lore.  The TEC is the defacto faction.  This game is about the Trade Order being the only superpower.  About the TO spreading it's culture, it's influence, it's will to all corners of the galaxy and maintaining for a millennium.  Then enter a second (more advanced) superpower by invasion which forces the TO to become the TEC and transform this vast influential, extremely wealthy, industrial juggernaut, into a cohesive military force beating them to a standstill, and done so in a relatively short time frame all things considered.  Then entering in a third (technically more advanced) superpower hell bent on revenge, but is unable to accomplish very much because the TEC has already caught up in the technological and arms race due to the Vasari invasion.  The Advent's only real claims of success come from hitting areas already weakened by the Vasari.  They're basically little bitches who can't win in a fair fight.

So taking the official lore and translating it into development on a mod where the goal is to enhance, not replace core game designs, the faction that is worked on first is the TEC.  It is the most influential faction.  It is the faction that get's to pump out cheap ships fast, it is the faction that deserves to be the standard that the others are compared to.  After all, every planet that is 'conquered' has humans on it, not Vasari, not Advent.  The Trade Order/Trader Emergency Coalition is everywhere.  Their influence reaches all places and has been there for over 1000 years.  culture spread on their part, culture resistance on their part should happen with relative ease due to it having already been there for so long.  Technologically, they should start off as the weakest, but they should make up that shortcoming fairly rapidly.  They are the economic power.  All things economy belong to them.

From there, I look at the Vasari.  I look to see that their technology is better then the TEC early on, but equal mid to late, after all, they get beaten to a standstill.  They only way a technologically superior force winds up in a stalemate is if their opponent matches them.  Now the Vasari being on the run and being invaders, deserve to start with stronger ships, but no real way to mass produce, and no production without considerable cost in the first place because they just do not have the industry in place like the TEC has.  Their only real advantages in a fight is their ability to move their fleet quickly, and is their phase missile tech which the TEC has yet to duplicate or effectively counter outside of building ships with thicker, stronger hulls so they can absorb more damage from this weapon.  Everything else is either on par or sub par compared to the TEC.  Culture to them is of no consequence since their only use for cultures outside of their own is slave labor.

Now to the (justifiably so) little bitches, also known as the morally sick and twisted Advent.  I place them on generally equal terms with the Vasari in the beginning, but it all falls apart for them the longer a game progresses.  Early on more technologically advanced then the TEC, but mid game on par, and late game somewhat inferior.  Early on stronger ships, but mid to late game inferior in a heads up fight.  No real economical or industrial advancements due to them focusing more on revenge, rather then their own survival after the fact.  Unlike the Vasari, they don't have this great weapon to take advantage of.  Their greatest strength comes from the Unity.  Their ability to act and react as one.  A single ship will die a quick death, many ships with varied talents all working as one ship is a great ship.  In their own culture and near their own kind, they are dominant.  As invaders as a regular military force, they cannot win, they must be opportunists and wait for weaknesses to take advantage of.  They need to wait for the Vasari to come in and wear down the TEC, then they can come in and collectively hit both hard, but wait too long and let the others regain their strength and they've missed that opportunity and deserve to lose.  Basically according to what I interpret the lore, they are superior on defense because they're on their own turf, they have home field advantage, but for all of their supposed advancements, their offense is weak and needs help.  Like the Vasari, they have no real economy or industry otherwise the TEC would have noticed them.  Culture wise, they are like the borg, they absorb those they can use and destroy the rest.  They do no deserve easy culture spread because they don't care to spread their culture, they have no need to.  Culture resistance on the other hand should be through the roof.  Vasari shouldn't be able to overthrow anything, and the only reason why TEC should even have a chance is because most of the people on the planet used to be TEC, but it should still be difficult.

That's the way I develop the factions.  Like the official lore says, in the end, all three factions end up locked in a stalemate, which means, military power wise, they end up being equal and playing defense.  Enter Entrenchment where they improve those defenses, enter Diplomacy where they realize nothing is happening and they try to work things out, enter Rebellion where sub factions realize that the talking is doing nothing and decide to give fighting a second chance.

Go ahead, they'll be reborn at the home world anyways.

I know, I usually try to avoid that kind of thing, but it was late, and it was especially hard to resist having already done some of the things he was suggesting you guys do.

That said, back in the day you guys were the masters of pluging and advertising on a large scale. But you can have your cool matching forum icons and control of the galactic economy, the unity will win this forum wars by simply advertising in people's head. You can't beat that no matter how catchy your slogans are!

Oddly enough i don't want to play Rebellion without this mod. I don't know why but the game just feels so empty without it.

Damn you guys are good.

I am not playing this game until this mod is ready.

Agreed.  I still play, but once the mod is ready I'll not be doing the original anymore.  To me, DS IS Sins the way it should have been.

-Twi /)

I know their evil - that's why I like them!! Remind me somewhat of the awesome Borg.

From a lore perspective, they're also the most plausible faction IMO. TEC is a "USA gone galactic" faction much like sooo many others in SciFi. Vasari are your standard "evil" strong strange aliens. Whereas the Advent are acting much like a further evolved humanity. It is a reasonable possibility that we may well evolve into a psionic species over future millennia. What we definitely won't do is stay the same as humans with our current ideals and hierarchies etc.

Though, indeed, to be better in line with the current lore, I agree with a lot Stant said. When the Advent attack, they further steam-roll the embroiled TEC. It's when they encounter the Vasari that they fail to advance further - their shields no longer being effective.

But TEC are no angels! Note that despite existing planets with "rebel" factions on them are supposed to be human, the TEC still conquers them to bring them into their order! What happened to the nice policing of the trade order territories? Surely if they ran a peaceful economy with all shiny bells and whistles, there would be no pirates to start with...

I wonder if it would be possible to design a map in conjunction with a specific set of modded alterations that created the following scenario.

A vast collection of planets, nearly all TEC, very little if any military. Cue Vasari jumping in an invasion right at the start which steam-rolls the outer TEC worlds easily but plays to leave them as basic barren outposts. They could loose each successive world after a set time frame creating a real sense of urgency to advance. TEC react with upping the military arms, thus creating the stalemate. Then the Advent faction is discovered in the outer regions of the map. Only a few planets to start with but great shielding tech and rapid culture advance to convert the heathens More TEC worlds are raped but the Vasari, so bent of running away, advance into Advent territory. Voila, three way stalemate, all the while the outer worlds the Vasari did hold are going dark. Then factor in unrest at the stalemate and splitting of the empires, rebelling worlds etc. Kind of like how the Roman factions split into East/West rebels in RTW:BI.

Makes for an every changing game with highly variable tactics in a few distinct phases. Certainly challenging! But quite a complex set of in-game events. Especially since Sins at present doesn't posses a mechanic for them that I'm aware of.

Ah we can dream re Sins 2

All hail the unity!

Meh, just give a 100000 credits to the pirates and let them burn the witches for you....

Nice Pic Bison.