Does anyone think about that rotating tank from Wild Wild West when you think of the Kol? Ha ha.

Kortul Devastator all the way!

I have this one Kol. It's level 10, and it deals 108 damage with the autocannons. That is f***ing beastly. Nothing can compare with something like that that has the most incredible shields and firepower.

I always build a Akkan first so I can colonize fast. On top of that, the Akkan is actually a pretty powerful ship. After that, I go for two Marza Dreadnoughts. Two of these ships with level 2 raze planet can take a 6000 hp planet down in no time...

For TEC, I usually go Sova and Kol.

The Sova's Missle pod ability is very useful for early dps in taking that first planet. with your two/three cobalts. Also if you lose a fighter or bomber squad, no biggie, it's built for free.

My favorite is the Progenitor. Very little firepower to speak of but it has colonize to start the game and it's two combat support abilities are very nice. I've never really had occasion to see it's lvl6 ability in action though.

in TEC my fav is Marza. Walk two lvl6 marzas into a pirate base, lure the pirates into range, and unleash dual missile barrage....goodbye pirates

I find that Kol / Dunov in concert is pretty tough. Get the Kol to lvl 6 and if they FF on it, fire up adaptive forcefield for damage reduction, finest hour for splash damage and hull repair. Use the Dunov's shield recharge on the Kol. I swear, a Kol with those buffs can absorb the firepower of an entire fleet. And while they're busy beating on your Kol, the rest of your fleet can burn and pillage to its heart's content.

I'm with Shipmaster on this ones, the Kortul Devastator is the best.

There are few ships, that can get it 3 out of 4 abilitie comb.

For TEC - the Kol is the best solo capital ship.

Once we get into serious fleet action, Kol+Dunov makes both more effective. Even more so if you can get 2 Dunov's, put them into a fleet with Hoshiko's in tight formation, and then hold them a bit back from the main battle at about the same range as the LRM frigates.

Then you have a sitution where your Kol's are deep in enemy territory except the Dunovs keep them alive. Attempts to kill the Dunov's by enemies get hindred by all the repair action plus the fact that 2 Dunov's can shield-restore each other.

What do you mean, "3 out of 4 ability comb"? 3 out of 4 abilities combined? I'm a noob, so I'm unsure what exactly you're trying to communicate.

That an easy one CenturionJixra, and no one is a noob, unless they don't what to learn. The lack of knowledge is soon closed, when you ask a question.

The Kortul Devastator has four abilities: Power Surge, Jam weapons, Disruptive Strike, and Volatile Nanites.

Disruptive Strike: has a chance to increase the ability cooldown and deplete antimatter when it's energy weapons hit enemy ships.

Power Surge:Greatly increases the ship's weapon fire and shield regeneration rate.

This means that there is a two comb, when you use power surge with disruptive stike, as the increase in the rate of fire, leads to an increase in the chance chance to increase the ability cooldown and deplete antimatter when it's energy weapons hit enemy ships, over the same time, with out power surge.

Volatile Nanites: increase the damage done to enemy ships, and deals damage to nearby enemies upon target's death.

Which in turn produces a three comb, as the increase in the fire rate, stacks with the chance to increase the ability cooldown and deplete antimatter when it's energy weapons hit enemy ships and deals more damage over time to the enemy ship.

Increase fire rate * Increase damaged * more damage each time you hit = 3 comb. This also does not take into account that your shileds are regenerating faster, and with the decrease in enemy fire power(thougth Disruptive Strike), leads to a longer life for your Kortul Devastator.

That sounds awesome. Thank you for explaining it to me.

A fun little experiment is to try out 2 Dunov's together to do an early game push... if you can afford the resources to get 2 it is sort of wrong. All their weapon systems are laser based so you just get those upgrades... throw in some Cobalts... and start killing stuff. Early game focused fire is not as effective and you just keep regenerating shields on the capitol ships. Not unbeatable but really annoying if your enemy doesn't see it coming.

Agree completely. The Kol isn't about firepower as much as it is about staying power. That's not to say that the Kol doesn't have considerable firepower; she can rip any non-battleship cap a new one in short order. But it's more about staying in the battle under fire. The Marza, on the other hand, isn't as tough but has slightly higher DPS, much greater range, and most of its firepower is concentrated in its forward arc. The Marza is about unleasing a pant load of pain all at once on whatever ship is unfortunate enough to draw it's undivided attention. Not to mention it's area effect special abilities and siege guns. Get a Marza or two with siege gun ability upgrades and you'll never need a single siege frigate.

looking purely at TEC, I break them down the following way:

 

Kol: big guns, lots of health

Marza: lots of missiles, lots of health

Akkan: I don't need to wait for that stupid colony ship!

Dunov: Shield repair heals more shields than any other early-game unit starts with. I take it as my 2nd or 3rd capital ship if I get one, or pair it with some Hoshiko cruisers and call it an auxiliary fleet.

Sova: essentially unopposed in the early game, is GREAT to have at a reasonably high level when you start to churn out carriers.

 

I tend to start with a Sova, Kol, or Marza, as they tend to pull their weight better in combat. Sometimes I start with an Akkan to go for capturing speed and the tactical advantage of not having to wait for the ceramic teacup of a colonizing ship.

I don't ever start out with a Dunov. Mid-late game, however, it is well worth the resources.

Most of the Dunov's and the Akkan's strength can be attained early on, and there is some improvement later on. With the Sova, Kol, or Marza, the name of the game is to get to tier 6 for the uber-power, and unleash the pwn. A ship healing them while they are doing this compounds their usefulness, without having to go through the laborious, mildly dangerous, and extremely boring process of leveling a capital ship from cold to juggernaut.

Additionally, the system for capital ship experience is not how many ships that capital ship personally destroys, but the sum of the values of enemy ships, divided equally among your capital ships below level 10. In this way, once a capital ship is at level six, it is very smart to pair it with a Dunov, as the first cap. already has its best power, and the rest is just a side show, so it doesn't lose much power by splitting the experience points. What it does lose is offset by the shield recharging and countermeasures that the Dunov packs, such as the EMP or flux field (which is tier 6, very nice, but a pain to get to).

Any faction - battleships. These guys can dish out and take tons of damage, great for handling hard targets. I've had the right combination of bonuses to increase a Kortul's Pulse Beam damage to 209 (20% from research, 15% from culture, 12% from Kinetic Intensifier, and Power Surge).

For the TEC? Marza is plain and simple the nastiest thing out there. Kols will take insane pounding, but missile barrage is a fleet eater, especially against fleets of long range frigates. I usually start with a Marza in MP games, just because I want it to start getting experience sooner. Otherwise, I'd go with the Akkan for colonize. Ion bolt isn't bad, and Armistice is nice, but mostly it's a colony boat.

 

For Advent.. The Progenitor. It's not great by itself, but it starts me out good with colonize, and really helps out later, keeping the fleeting alive with sheild restore. Malice isn't bad either, espeically when at level 3 and used with cleansing brilliance. Target CB on an enemy cap, cast malice, watch stuff drop health. It wont all die, but it'll die a lot quicker when you start shooting at it.

 

Vasari: The Evacuator, or the Space Egg, as it's commonly called. Colonize is nice, of course. Nano disassembler eats enemy caps (especially weak hulled Advent Progenitors) and Drain planet eats planets, plus gives you resources.

I'm not saying anything about Vasari, since I haven't played enough of them to know much of their capital ships. For TEC and Advent, however...

TEC:

1. Dunov Battlecruiser

I do seriously believe this closely matches the Progen and Death Egg in their benefit to a fleet. It's abilities are just incredible overall. EMP Bomb is fantastic for masses of enemies, and especially when against Advent. Shield Restore and Flux Field pretty much ensures that no capital ship will die for a long time. It's only real problem is low DPS, but the Dunov makes the perfect second capital ship to build.

2. Kol Battleship

The Kol makes an ideal starting capital ship. It has high DPS and durability for clearing militia by itself. In addition, Gauss Rail Gun makes a good damaging ability with low cooldown. The Kol becomes more and more powerful as it gains level. Against Vasari, Adaptive Forcefield is an incredible benefit, and Flak Burst clears SC fairly well. The Kol's main problem is that all its abilities are antimatter-intensive, but when combined with a level 6 Dunov, this ship will have insane durability and intense firepower. And even without a Dunov, good use of Finest Hour and Adaptive Forcefield ensures a ship with great staying power.

3. Marza Dreadnought

Missile Barrage is the most powerful ability in terms of damage, and that's a great benefit to build the Marza as a starting capital. In addition, Raze Planet is a great way to deal with foritied planets. However, I feel the Marza is too weak in durability. It required a fleet of Dunovs and Hoshikos in order to survive (afterall, it is the prime target in multiplayer). High DPS and Missile Barrage makes the Marza a great ship, but I feel its overreliance on supporting ships makes the Marza inferior to the Kol.

 

4. Akkan Battlecuiser

The Akkan is an alright. Having Colonize is always a benefit, and Ion Bolt and Armistice have their uses. I feel like this ship can be too situational at times, though. None of its abilities really stick out.

5. Sova Carrier

The Sova is my favourite ship in the game, but it's quite possibly the worst capital available. It's far too situational. Embargo is great in small maps, but is insignifigant on most maps due to too many planets having not enough tax rates. Missile Batteries is extremely expensive in antimatter, and Heavy SC is near-worthless until far higher levels. Also, it's 'ultimate', Rapid Manufacturing, is extremely weak for its cost. 120 antimatter and three minute cooldown just to make its own SC replace instantly and increase some build rates for a minute? It's DPS are the lowest of any TEC capital, though being completely laser-reliant can be useful early-game. The Sova, however, is just too weak and situational to be worth its large cost.

And Advent... I'll get to them later.

As nice as the Akkan and Dunov are, they don't come close to the individual abilities of the Marza and Kol.  The marza can be easily outmaneuvered as all its weapons fire on one target.  Kols have insane health and will not die beyond level 6 unless you have an entire fleet FFing them for a minute.  Marza's die in about 15-20 seconds.  The fastest way for the TEC to stop MB (aside form ion bolt) is to just FF the marza.  It'll die in no time.

If you tried the same strategy on a Kol, I would have killed 2-3 of your caps by the time you killed my Kol plus some other things my Kol would have killed in that time just by its other weapon batteries.

 

And another thing.  In a direct battle, Kols will defeat a Marza when both are at the same level, though it will only have about 100 health left...  At level 10, the Kol will kill the Marza, but the Kol will die a few seconds later from Radiation Bomb.  Also, the Kol will when by a landslide in any case if you maneuver it properly.

 

EDIT: text deleted due to inadvertent inaccuracies.

... to the scrapheap.

Not as long as Vasari have anything except the EGG.

Uhh...  You do realize the the Kortul can take any other capital ship in the game aside from a Radiance with Cleansing Brilliance and win by a longshot right?  Kortuls counter everything you can throw at them...  If you really want more of an explanation, check out my thread about the battleships...

Have you EVER seen two capital ships fighting just like that? A two cap one on one?
Moreover, have you seen two caps fighting for 20 minutes without any interference? That's about as long as it takes a Kortul to defeat any cap ship with its undeniably awesome weaponry. 

There's always a fleet around, or coming in. Kortul may negate abilities on one ship or kick enemy strikecraft out of the fight temporarily, but all in all it just doesn't do anything to anybody. It just negates, caps or strikecraft. If Volatile Nanites were actually good, it could negate frigate spams too.
But they're not.
Kortul VolNans a frigate blob. Frigate blob blows Kortul to bits.
You realize that you have to blow about 10-15 frigates within 60 seconds and they have to be all tightly packed (i.e. the enemy must be an idiot not to spread them out for those 60 seconds) for this shit to actually work? The only good use for Vol Nans is debuffing enemy starbases with increased damage taken.
Along that line you might argue Marauder is an awesome ship, that can bring reinforcement from anywhere, make your fleet go 100% faster and whatever.
But truth stands that it's useless 99% of the time and most games never see a situation that would let a Marauder do its job.

Hmmm...  How do you know this?  I don't think so!  In my LAN testing, a level 1 Marza using Radiation Bomb easily beat a lvl 1 Kol using Gauss Cannon, with about 1500 hull left on the Marza!  (Rad Bomb vs Gauss, after depleting 100 AntiMatter by jumping into the dead asteroid to fight, auto attacking, no micro [w/fighters? I think]). 

A lvl 1 Kol with Adaptive Force Feild did worse.  The Marza had 1800 hull left then. 

And... a lvl 2 Kol with both, vs a Marza with Rad Bomb & Incendiary Shells, also lost by 1800 hull!

The following is a copy of part of my earlier testing.  P.S.  Major Necro, the first page and a half of this thread is from early 2008! 

 

"The following is the results of some ‘real life match ups’ of  Level 1 Cap ships, and approximately how much Hull remained for the victor (W=win, L=loss):

 

T Marza Rad Bomb                            W           1500       L                            T Kol Guass

T Marza Rad Bomb                             W            900       L                             T Sova Miss Batt

T Marza Rad Bomb                             W          2300      L                             T Akkan Ion Bolt              
T Marza Rad Bomb                             W          2400      L                             T Dunnov EMP Charge

Wow...  I don't know...

It was on Close Encounters...  It was over his HW.  I had already subdued the AI, but it continued to try to win by creating Marza after Marza, so I decided to see what would happen to a Kol...  I had a fleet nearby in the GW, but were on hold position and autoattack was off...  The SC had been sent to the other side of the well to kill his labs but were not autoattacking...  Really, the only thing I can come up with would be a technological advantage...  I suppose that would have to be it.  I didn't think I had researched that much of the tree, but I must have...

It seems more of the Egg being so completely dominating than the Vasari capitals actually being weak. The Skirantra and Vulkoras certainly seem like good enough ship choices, while the Antorak would be great in larger maps.