Overpriced, but tougher ships are the norm for vasari already, why are you guys arguing over nothing?

general I'd say vasari ships are rougly 15% stronger than their TEC counterparts. some of the people here are talking about 100% i.e. twice as powerful.

and come on. bombing then resettling is stupid enough for tec only, but for aliens? first bomb everything down, then resettle it, with humans even? plain stupid. and those bombardement weapons are wmd and they dont just kill the ruling class or the command infrastructure, the destroy everything on the planet and thats the simple truth. or are they using neutron bombs or some nanotech that just kills certain ppl. barely.

but that just isnt enough. it has to scream differentiation with every aspect.

then why kill them with uber weapons only to settle them again? I would prefer if there were a certain percentage chance of surrender, so that not all of the infrastructure and population has to be eliminated. reduce bombardment dmg to balance it, but it would just feel more sensible.

games? how about the classic we have been throwing around the whole time: starcraft.

everything you list here is extremely shallow, building build visuals? why not play supcom (one of the less differentiated games out there) "unit characteristics" as in whether or not they heal, pff thats a small difference, the Vasari rely much more on shields than the TEC and theirs regen much faster, while the same holds vice versa for plating. I prefer that system because it has depth. "significant differences on strength of units and spam vs. HVUs" I hate that system, the strong expensive versus the weak spammers, I thank GOD the devs didnt use that recycled diaper to shit on. "differences in build layout" doesnt EXACTLY apply "differences in cloaking style" like WHAT? and wide differences in sieges? there ARENT any sieges in starcraft

admitedly its an older game, but the games that mimic it even slightly (C&C, earth 21whatever0) are flat and rather tasteless

the devs have made a MIRACLE of differentiation here on a series of, as blair put it "similar micromanagement structures" which make it easy to understand initially. if your point is something other than "the Vasari and TEC arent differentiated enough" then your not doing a great job of getting it across, if you're point is that, I simply dont know what to do with you.

the races initially begin similar, but even from the first few capitals and the first few techs you can tell that they begin to bridge apart immediately (or at least I can) by tech 5/7 the two are so drastically different that you really cannot survive there unless you think like a vasari, or a TEC.

The thing Schod is forgetting to mention is that while he's 90% right, the 10% is the fact that the Vasari are a little under-powered in the early game. Fix that, and maybe weaken them in the late game, and things work out better.

well just wait a second. protoss shields are far from a minor characteristic. every decent player would have many shield batteries and withdraw injured forces immediately to them. also great on the offense. siege tank ring a bell?

anyways, if you want I can elaborate on all those details. my point is not that is the only way to differentiate in sins, but that its an additionaly way. more differentation is better than less, isn't it? and even if some of them are shallow, so what? I said earlier there is a gameplay differentiation which already exists with vasari, if only at higher lvls (but blair stated they might move some of it down, which is good, you too admitted that AND differentiation should be more present at lower lvls), and there is a felt, a perceived differentiation. implementing some of those things to make them feel different even if the gameplay effect isnt all that major is still more than worthy of consideration.

the problem I have with your argument is not that you're promoting differentiation, rather that you are promoting the degredation of current differences in favor of percieved, 2-D differences of stronger/weaker more expensive/less expensive.

You want the simple sliding scale of unit strength vs unit numbers, whereas he is enjoying the more dynamic and mature multidimensional scalar exemplified by the idea of being powerful without being strong via units that focus on mobility and (for lack of a better word) interference (screwing with the enemy's ability to do stuff).