Advent "deliverance angine" near worthless?

I think that's what their superweapon is called, anyway.

It's very late in my current (large map) game and I'm solidly winning, but things are somewhat stalemated because my fleets are divided up on multiple fronts facing against each AI's entire maxed-out fleet.   I'm advent and both remaining AI's are TEC.  Queue up the superweapons to break the stalemate...

I've built 6-8 of the Advent Deliverance Engines in the system, and have another 6 in the other star system - all are set to autocast and have been firing away for several hours of playing time. (Enough that shots from the far system are reaching my current system).

As far as I can tell, these shots seem to have almost no effect.  Now, with autocast on, it seems to fire at random targets, but even when I manually concentrated many shots at a single target planet, it seemed to have no noticeable effect, either (ie: allegiance doesn't budge).  What should I be seeing?  Is there any benefit - what's the point in building these things?  By contrast, if this was the TEC gun, every remaining planet could have been wiped out by now.

Also, is there any way to get the gun to auto-fire on a single, specified target, rather than just spamming around?  Manually targetting a bunch of these things is a pain.

11,801 views 20 replies
Reply #1 Top
The Engine can turn planets neutral with chained shots (because allegiance loss caps at -.05).

Its greatest strength however is that it's a fantastic fleet support weapon, giving you an extra 20%+ damage reduction depending on circumstance.

It's not meant to be a planet killer, though.
Reply #2 Top
You can also try and coordinate your attacks with the firing, since capital ships repel culture at the planet they're located.
Reply #3 Top
How does the Engine give your fleet 20% damage reduction? Is that passive or do you have to target the system your fleet is in?
Reply #4 Top
as advent shield migation is increased by 6% for any of your ships within your influence, if you research the appropriate culture techs. The engine creates influence and thus makes it so ships there will get that bonus.

personally I prefer the 15% damage buff vasari get within their influence.
Reply #5 Top
Culture really does seem to be pretty worthless in this game, you're right. Just hope for a boost, that's all :)
Reply #6 Top
It's a bit of a micro headache but I'm trying to blast a whole chain of planets with 1 shot each atm, it's having a noticable effect as my culture is already starting to creep in, I'm waiting for the next chain of blasts and then rushing the closest planet with my fleet. I'm hoping once one planet falls I'll start seeing a chain-reaction of planets flipping as they're all slowly losing allegiance from my planets + caps + deliverance.

Another way of looking at the guns is they're doing economic damage to opposing empires. As their allegiance drops their % income and resource mining lowers. Over time you should be able to starve them out via attrition fighting. Try wiping out as many frigate class ships as you can and take as few losses as possible, you should be able to drain them of cash/materials.
Reply #7 Top
eyes of the converted researched as well make sit well worth your while. it gains you valuable intel, and that makes a huges difference in the late game if you know where your enemy is stacking his fleet.
Reply #8 Top
OK, the thing is, in my current game, I'm not seeing allegiance drop at all on the planets getting hit, and I'm certainly not getting the "eyes of the converted" effect. (I'm maxed out tech-wise, so I have all the culture techs)

If I saw the allegiance dropping, and it gave me a view on their planets, that'd be something useful at least. But nothing seems to be happening.
Reply #9 Top
I must say, I also have that problem. But if you look at phase lines, you notice your team color creeping from where you last shot? That's a good thing, even though the effects might be small.

It really isn't used to flip over planets, more for the 20% boost, which ROCKS in mass battles, to an extreme extent.
Reply #10 Top
If he has a ton of capital ships in a system or lots of broadcast towers, it can essentially neutralize a single culture attack.
Reply #11 Top
I suppose the strategic affects of culture don't really take off until late in the game. I have only played Advent so far and most enemy planets are nuked & colonized long before my culture reaches them.

I'm starting to feel like this whole culture thing would be more fun and a lot more useful if it traveled faster through systems.

Question: does a stronger culture (with more culture techs researched) push back an opponent's weaker culture?

Reply #12 Top
Question: does a stronger culture (with more culture techs researched) push back an opponent's weaker culture?


Yes, if you have a lot more culture tech and a bunch of stations in one place, I've seen it lowering morale at enemy planets 2 jumps away, and that place had a morale station.
Reply #13 Top
BTW, multiple culture structures stack. I've had about 12 culture growth on some planets as Advent. You can see the colored lines expanding.
Reply #14 Top
Max culture decrease is only 0.05 per second so stacking multiple deliverance at the same time won't benefit you (unless he has Caps there, then you would be overcoming their resistance). That's why I've started spreading out my deliverance shots over several planets, each of them dropping at the same rate is more efficient.
Reply #15 Top
Deliverance is suppose to work with Siege groups.

Theres nothing more satisfying then sieging somebodies homeworld , then sending deliverance so that he can now nolonger re-colonise his homeworld
Reply #16 Top
Deliverance is like the more ecologically friendly version of Novalith. Since the projectiles aren't really "fast", it can take quite a while for them to finally get there, but once they do, like with the Novalith, it's an unending hail which will eventually destroy every enemy colony there with relatively little effort from you. It is, however, a very SLOW process, not at all fast. Allegiance loss is only 0.05/s, so a 100% allegiance colony would take a good 20 minutes to die from this, assuming that there is no interference from any positive culture structures or suppresors like capships. Combine that with the fact that it takes 30 minutes for the shots to likely even GET there, and several more before the shots pile up and flip culture, and you're easily looking at up to an hour or more before anything actually HAPPENS. The first signs that it's starting are when Eyes of the Converted starts actually showing you something. In the meantime, build more of them. The Advent tactical slot bonus lets you put two per planet.

It's not as immediately destructive as the TEC Novalith is, but at least it's environmentally friendly. If you set a dozen Novaliths on autofire, you can forget about colonizing anything there anytime soon, as the same 30-minute shot arrival time applies, so you're looking at maybe 30 minutes to an hour where that area is COMPLETELY UNSAFE TO COLONIZE as "Novalith Bolts" becomes your local weather, and any attempt to colonize it will result in your fledgling, or not-so-fledgling, colony being ANNIHILATED BY YOUR OWN SHOTS. In contrast, the Deliverance is "safe". You don't care if Deliverance shots strike your own planets, they do not harm you at all, and are, in fact, good for you. Rumors suggest that the Novalith was also supposed to work only in-system, and not trans-system like it presently does. Which would make it much less useful in games where everyone owns their own system.
Reply #17 Top
Wait, you get armor/damage boosts by creating culture/broadcast? How and how much?
Reply #18 Top
All races get a small buff while in their own culture area, Vasari get a small damage boost, Advent get a shield buff. I'm not sure what the TEC get.

Edit:
Hrm... I remember seeing a thread about it but can't find it ATM. Maybe it was earlier in beta...

But here's a thread talking about it for Vasari / Advent
https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/?forumid=404&aid=300494
Reply #19 Top
TEC has increased anti matter regeneration in culture.

Also culture spreads faster the more stations you have
try filling a desert planet with culture stations only and watch the lines grow FAST.
esp when you have the culture artifact and a culture bonus on said planet...
Reply #20 Top
OK, the thing is, in my current game, I'm not seeing allegiance drop at all on the planets getting hit, and I'm certainly not getting the "eyes of the converted" effect. (I'm maxed out tech-wise, so I have all the culture techs)If I saw the allegiance dropping, and it gave me a view on their planets, that'd be something useful at least. But nothing seems to be happening.


It takes 2 shots or so depending on how many cap ships your opponent has stationed there to get the Eyes of the converted effect. It is awesome though if you have several Deliverance Engine's, because after some time chaining them, you can see every single fleet your opponent has at a frontline planet + you can engage him with the shield mitigation bonus while he loses his own bonus (depending on race). Quite fun actually :D