A few ideas for improving Sins
Sins Forums
Some of these ideas are mine, some are not but I agree with them anyway. Just thought I'd open up a discussion on them to see what other people think. Also let me preface this with I'm not a developer and have no clue if incorporating any of this stuff is in the least way practical. This is just me thinking out loud on what I think are some good ideas and holes within the game. In my defense I constantly have to deal with people like myself at my job.
1. Fix the problem associated with "Ship blocking". In Sins, whichever ships gets to a plot of land first owns it, and all other ships have to maneuver around if they wish to go by. Now this seems like a decent enough idea until you start playing online and other people begin to exploit this to kill capital ships and vasari starbases. I primarily play Vasari and can't think of how many SB's I've lost because a fleet of scouts or light frigates were purposely moved into my path and I could get to repair bays or attacking torpedo cruisers in time to save my SB. The same thing is being done with capital ships as well, though not quite as common. My thought is whichever ship (or SB) is larger, gets the right of way. Other ships would simply be pushed aside.
2. Ships should lose their preference to jump at angles going from gravity well to gravity well. Rather they should just move to the quickest point they can jump from and go. Often times this can lead to a traffic jam trying to get out of a fight and the slower (more expensive) ships get there last and have to wait for the traffic to clear before the can jump out.
3. Starbase improvements. In my mind the SB is a "stand alone" defense and should be able to survive without a supporting fleet. Far be it from online players to accept that though 
. I think a few simple upgrade and research options would bring these back to their original purpose, rather then just creating a fleet "safe zone" with their weapons range. For starters they need to have the option of some sort of anti-fighter/bomber type weapon, more then hanger capabilities. Not ridiculously effective to counter a large SB killing force, but certainly better then watching your SB die to a smaller swarm of SC over several minutes. The work around for this is some flak frigates with engagement range set to local area or hold position, but I think this could be integrated into the SB to give it better survivability.
Another thing would be to rethink the idea of the "Super long range" weapon. Instead of it being its own weapon requiring anti matter I think it would be more effective as simple increasing the range of the third weapon to encompass the whole of the gravity well. In my mind it could apply to all 3 races SB's because even though a Vasari SB can move around it still isn't going to catch a fleet trying to avoid it while it perishes to SC.
And obviously giving TEC and Advent SB's the ability to fire in all directions to deal with Z axis threats. https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/370503 Which brings me to...
4. Giving hosts the option of disabling the Z axis just like they can disable pirates or change the game speed. It is poorly implemented and is usually only used by those trying to exploit bugs within the game.
5. A new defense structure something along the lines of a hanger bay for constructors. It would let you stockpile and rapidly deploy constructors to replenish ones destroyed by the enemy. Another idea is to give them researchable upgrade options to let a gravity well temporarily have more constructors then the level of infrastructure allows. This would be similar to the Scramble bombers ability the Vasari carrier cap has. Another option would be to research a "combat constructor" prototype which would have much better survivability.
6. Reworking the auto-explore on a scout ship. Perhaps giving it options like "avoid the pirates base" or being able to set a priority to explore enemy space rather then friendly. Also lowering the ability to disregard phase inhibitors on the tech tree as it is rarely if ever utilized.
7. Save the Kol battleship from utter obscurity. Flak burst doesn't cover enough real estate and the Rail gun is a waste of anti matter because it has to go through mitigation before it deals damage.
8. Make weapons, armor, hull and shield research more worthwhile. Right now they will give you an edge but a smaller upgraded fleet will still fall victim to a larger unupgraded one. I think this game would benefit from both increasing the upgradable levels from 30% to more along the lines of 60-75%, but also making it more cost prohibitive. Just like in real life governments chose between a highly trained and equipped military (USA, UK) or one based more on the concept of a human wave (China, Iran, North Korea) and various levels in between. Also hull repair rate? I'm glad it is included with hull points because even fully upgraded it is still too slow to be of any combat importance.
9. Fixing both the silliness of strike craft and the exploit that has become common to avoid it. Right now SC will attack something then do a absurdly long loop before starting another attack run. In response to this people have begun to set their fighters/bombers to hold position in tactics management and simply park them above the action. This way there is no fly by they simply sit there and shoot shoot shoot. Instead of doing a long slow loop, make it shorter and more efficient (perhaps research upgradable). At the same time still give people the option of using hold position for greater damage output but make SC take additional damage from enemy fire while doing so.
10. Give players the option of being able to set engagement range for a ship through the frigate factory. That way all ships produced at that factory don't automatically start with gravity well engagement range unless the player wants them to. It is all to common in long drawn out SB battles to lose lots of new ships because directly after they are built they head straight for the enemy (rally point or not). The two alternatives are to either have to constantly stick with a battle and change engagement range on every new ship, or have the rally point in another gravity well and then change them over in batches and send them back to the battle.
11. This one is really far out there, but I might as well mention it anyway . As ships start to take hull damage they could start to lose combat effectiveness. They would do less damage, shoot slower and have less engine power. Being in the military myself I fully understand the concept that stuff works great until it has been blown up a couple times. http://www.pbase.com/adam_and_misti/image/93986355/original
