Poll: Novalith vs Kostura vs Deliverance Engine

Deliverance Engine

Because I'm an Advent player and a culture maniac.

Novalith. Because randomly murdering the Home World is fun.

Kostura. Because nobody picked it yet.

Novalith... let that son of a ***** fly

nothing says owned like instant killing any damn planet you wish.

The Novalith. Deliverance is cool and all, but only gives you a chance of rebellion. The Kostura is crap, killing only orbital structures. Those are cheap, and easy to rebuild. Novalith? 1-hit-KO on asteroids and weak planets, 2 hits on most and 3 on true powerhouses. Force your enemy to upgrade emergency infra on all his worlds, kill allies three hours after you shot at them, etc.

Nothing says "DOOM!" like big balls of nuclear fire headed towards all your worlds.

The Novalith. cuz killing planets for the sole purpose to bother enemies and really destroy enemies without needing to phase jump is really fun. i love the big BOOM when the Novalith hits planets!

This isn't even an issue. The Novalith is by far the best one hands down and it's one of the TECs advantages. It's like the TEC's version of Returning Armada; it's that powerful.

I find all three useful. I just find them useful for different reasons and I don't think they should be in the same tier.



Um, no. Deliverance gives you a bonus to weapons and shields, and the Kostura is like the Hoth ion cannon on steroids.

When did the Advent start getting a weapons bonus for culture? Last I checked, their culture buff was only an increase in mitigation.

Personally, I much prefer using the Deliverance engine in protracted multi-star games (which is generally the only time I see superweapons used at all unless I'm just screwing with an AI). It hinders the opponent's economy, gives you a good look at their empire (provided you have the appropriate research), supports your fleet, removes culture buffs from theirs, gradually turns planets, and makes it harder for the enemy to take back planets that have been turned. Or, if nothing else, it makes your opponent invest heavily in culture to counter it.

If the goal is simply to win the game as fast and as efficiently as possible with the lowest amount of micromanagement, then yeah. Despite the above benefits, the Novalith is still, most likely, the better choice.

The Kostura sounds good on paper but in my experience, it's just too awkward to be useful. Timing fleet strikes with the stun effect never seems to work out how I'd like, especially in multi-star maps when the shots take an eternity to connect, and the damage never seems to stack properly on multiple shots so using it to harm orbitals isn't terribly effective either. I've tried it a few times and I've been disappointed with the results on every occasion.

Novalith, build 2 in a system with a pirate base and you can kiss raids good bye.

I'm pretty sure the weapon bonus is specific to the Deliverance Engine effect, not to culture overall.

Indeed? Well, that sounds like a mitigating circumstance - although the Kostura still seems underpowered as compared to the Nova, since it still warrants an attack, instead of a "mop-up-and-colonize" party.
I must admit, I've never actually tried either the Kostura or the DE, having drawn my image of their effects from the in-game descriptions of their respective techs and on the comments I've seen other places in this forum.

As a point of interest, can players see the super-weapon shells of other factions, too?

I like the Deliverance Engine, both because of the name and because the effect is pretty fun. But in terms of raw power, nothing really stands up against the Novalith Cannon.

I don't usually bother researching the Kostura Cannon anymore. For what it does, its not worth the expense and tactical slots to build it.

Are we sure that there 'is' a weapon bonus effect because this is the first I've heard of it. The thing, by all documentation (and effects that I've seen), is just supposed to be a long-range culture package.

That certainly doesn't mean it's not true but I've never noticed it and I'm surprised it's never come up in any of the threads I've seen around here.

ive used the Kostura and it is worthless. While ive won a game with the novalith.

I fielded the Kostura and wasn't really impressed as it does little damage and costs two cap ships and a few frigates that do more damage.

I won't build any Deliverance cannons. I had about 6 of them once on a single system and they didn't seem to do jack.

You're supposed to stagger Deliverance Engine shots, as rate of change for allegiance is capped. Plus, they remove enemy culture buffs and give yours.

I with ever one else, that said that the Kostura is useless. We should change this poll to Novalith vs Phase Stabilizer vs Deliverance Engine.

Also, some times I find my capital ships, to be more useful then any of the so called "Super weapons".

It took me 8 Kosturas constantly firing to destroy structures at ONE planet.

The Kostura needs to outright kill a few things in order to have any use.

Like I said, the damage from the Kostura doesn't seem to stack properly. If 5 shots hit a planet in the space of a few seconds or so, only one of them appears to actually do any damage. The rest just make the glowy effect and do absolutely nothing that I can tell.

If the thing actually had a chance to reliably shred a few structures, that would quickly boost it right up to the 'useful' category.

After Testing it the Kostura seems like it was built in the idea it would be a weapon that would be used right before a fleet assaults the planet. The problem is who cares about a stun? My opinion is the Kostura should be the Reverse of the Novalith as it seems that was the intention all along just poorly implemented. The Novalith destroys a planet but does nothing to its defenses while IMO the Kostura should destroy all of the structures around the planet but not harm the planet. The problem then would be the Economic warfare the Kostura would reap against the opposing side.


I don't know maybe i am just ranting but the Kostura just seems to have no use. For the Cost i can have two Desolators and a few cruisers that will absolutely Demolish the planet while my Kostura will do nothing to it...

The kosturas purpose was never to kill the structures, I think. Its the kind of thing you shoot on an opponents main fleet before moving in with your own to wipe it out. If you time it right, it can be quite devestating.

Also, the deliverance effect gives a 10% damage increase to your ships there for a while in addition to the culture effect it has.

Of course not but trying to stun a moving target from a star-system away is... unreliable at best.

Under ideal circumstances, sure. It 'could' be useful (whether or not it's more useful than its weight in credits/resources applied to more ships in your fleet is certainly debatable) but by and large, the other two superweapons are far more reliable when it comes to having their intended effect (with very little micromanagement, might I add). If a Novalith fires, a planet somewhere is going to burn. If a DE fires, your enemy will have to contend with the culture effects. When the Kostura fires, you might get lucky and stun something at just the right time but more often than not, you're just going to get a small light show and a meager damage payoff to a few structures.