1st off, the Advent DO have a refinery ABILITY for their trade port, it just only works in the grav well the port is in.

2nd, the Advent Culture Cannon can be annoying to the enemy, as they then have to spend RESOURCES and LOGISTICS (CIVILIAN) SLOTS for culture centers to combat your culture. The Advent's Illums can also tear through quite a bit, and have more shields than the Kodiaks of the TEC. The Vasari get a fleet limit raise because they are supply and also resource hogs (trust me on this one).

The Advents power is culture. And Strikecraft. The ships they use also have wierd abilities that you don't at first realize are supposed to work like the doomsday is falling on the enemy if you've got them paired with another ship type. The Vasari kind of have this, but its not as obvious and present. The TEC don't have this.

The "refinery ABILITY" is crap. Either you have increased credit rate OR increased resource rate.
Or do I need to build two refinaries?

The culture issue, great as it is, does not defeat any fleet and the strikecraft is very very expensive.

Any other ideas?

THX MuriaticAcid

When you're more experienced and feel good about the mechanics of the game and understand the three races better, be sure to come play the game in online multiplayer--what some people call "The Real Sins Game"--(click the Ironclad Online buttom) and I'm sure someone will demonstrate to you the power of the Unity!  (Really, once you get tired of playing against the predictable AI, which online players don't even count as a player since it's so awful compared to human players, you should come play online.  You'll get to enjoy more intense, competitive, and suspenseful games as well as having human teammates and camraderie and you might even make some friends.)

The Advent have a couple things going for them.  Overall, they do have the best capital ships though you probably won't want to build more than one or two for the online multiplayer game since people tend to focus fire on them and destroy them.  The two capital ships are the Progenitor Mothership which can repair the shields of an unlimitted number of your ships as well as give you the very valuable 20/40/60 colonization bonus and the Halcyon Carrier which can increase the amount of damage your ships do (up to 22% I think) and it also has a good anti-strikecraft capability (aka "the Pimp Slap").

The Advent also have the best and most powerful LRM (long range missile) ship in the game called the Illuminator.  In fact, people often complain about a tactic called Illuminator Spam.  Illuminators are more resiliant than the TEC LRMs and the Vasari Assailants and can fire in three directions at one time, so you try to move a pile of them into the middle of enemy forces and structures and let the rear and side beams do some of the work.  This is a significant early-game advantage for the Advent, especially when fleets number under 20 ships.  Combine the Illuminators with the Progenitor's shield restore and they'll beat up on other fleets in the early game (which is very important since many online multiplayer games are decided early-on).  Their heavy cruiser, the Destra, is also good.

One other overlooked advantage is that they probabl have the strongest and most resiliant scout ships in the game and they only use 2 fleet supply points (Vasari's use 3).  Thanks to Raging Amish, an increasingly popular online multiplayer tactic is for people to spam these out in the early game (only cost 200 credits) and use them to counter enemy LRMs.  You don't need a single military lab to do this.

They also have the strongest culture in the game, which, while easy to overlook, can be rather important.  They have some other research-based advantages as well in addition to the disadvantages that every race has.  In fact, a great many skilled and experienced players choose to play Advent.

As I see it, Advent's main disadvantages are:

They need 3 military labs early-on to make their Illuminator LRM ships as well as to put up starbases (in Entrenchment).  In order to both produce the LRM ship and to be able to colonize ice and volcanic (2 civic labs for each race), Advent needs 5 labs.  TEC needs 4 and Vasari needs just 3.  (Note that TEC needs 5 for starbases and Vasari just 4 for starbases.)

They cannot improve the amount of income they receive from trade (unlike TEC and Vasari).

They have weak hulls which makes it easier for the Vasari to take them down with phase missiles.

The first capital ship that you would build for them (always the Progenitor) is the worst of the three first capital ships for all of the races in the areas of planet bombing and one-on-one capital ship-to-capital ship combat.  (If you play TEC, your first capital ship should be the Marza for its Level 6 Missile Barrage ability, and if you play Vasari your first capital ship should be the Evacuator for its Colonization, Nanites, Phase Jump Inhibition, and Level 6 Planet Suck abilities).

Advent has a weak as shit economy.  Yes, their trade port can become a refinery, but it doesn't work very well or fulfill the full role of refinery (allowing you to boost production from uncolonizable gravity wells).  Their only great economic upgrade is allure of the unity.  On the other hand, Advent have by far the strongest fleet.  A well developed Advent fleet is nearly unstoppable in a direct confrontation, and you either need to defeat Advent on the economic front or through hit and run attacks to split them up. 

Vasari have some incredible upgrades in the late game, but their fleet is by far the weakest.  The only redeeming feature they have are phase missiles and the best offensive starbases.

Dresda, please read what I said carefully.  I said that it was the worst of those three capital ships (Marza, Evacuator, Progenitor) in the area of Planet Bombing and 1-on-1 capital ship fighting.

Actually, before level 6, I'd prefer a Progenitor in a stand up fight with a Mazra. Radiation bomb is the only good combat ability for Mazra before level 6, while a Progentior can get a large shield recharge impair the enemies damage.

I said combat abilities. Raze Planet is good, I agree, but in a asteriod field battling it out with a Prog, it won't help.

The advent have an almost unfair advantage, i don't know what you mean "no research that is very helpful" They can increase the  damage output of their fleet by tons with enough research, and the Halcyon's amplify energy aura, thats 35dps for a destra, and 32 for an illum. And if you find the kinetic intensifier artifact... the game is over.

I used to play mainly TEC cause of the economy, but i recently started with the advent and i've been destroying fleets twice the size of mine with no ships lost. If the enemy gets close to the carriers, repulse them. If they are focus-firing, vengence+malice and they're toast. the one area they are weak in is the early game, before all the synergy is realized. After that, a massive advantage in numbers and a multiple-fronted attack are neccesary to defeat them.

The only bombardier cap I can think of that MIGHT, mind you, MIGHT beat the Marza is the Vulkoras, and that's only because of its Siege Platform deploying ability and the passive bombardment specialization ability. In a cap-to-cap fight though, before level 6, the Marza could be beat, as the Vulkoras has Phase Missile Swarm from the get-go, while the Marza's MB is from lvl 6 onward.

After lvl 6, its probably going to the Vulkoras, as it does have Disintegration, which damages enemy hulls while repairing the Vulkoras' hull.

Still though, the TEC have the least expensive fleets, which is great, because then they can pump out ships like crazy after they take losses. The Vasari are resource hogs, at least that's the general opinion, though I have to say their ships are rather on the pricy side, though generally I think that they are more survivable.

A comparison of the three races' capabilities, the TEC are primarily direct-combat oriented abilities, while the Advent have a lot (and I mean virtually everything does it) of synergizing abilities, while the Vasari seem to be more of a mix of the two kinds- some are synergizing, some are direct.

Of course, while I will say the Advent have some advantages, I have EXTREME difficulty playing them, as I find them WAY too elitist. They completely believe that they are in the right. Granted, the Traders might not have wanted to kick the Advent precursors off their planet, but still, the Advent are WAY too elitist. That, and I like playing as the normal humans (its VERY satisfying to win) or the xenos aliens (xeno is Greek for foreign; the Vasari are cool with some of their abilities/ships).

As a result I tend to bash the Advent more than state advantages.

Marzas and Vulkoras beat the Revelation HANDS DOWN BUDDY!!

please don't diss my opinion, as I was Advent-bashing at the time lol.

what the Vasari need is a tech that gives them the ability to Phase Jump anywhere in the map, and even to other star systems (my homeworld to yours), though the other star-systems one would require the LR-jumps; in fact, this tech could be unlocked after LR-jumps is.

Why should the Vasari get this and not the Advent or TEC instead/as well? COME ONE MAN!! The Vasari are the Phase Space MASTERS, gurus some might say. Because of this, it might strengthen them, and would also fit very well in the story, and with the hit-and-run tactics the Vasari seem to be seen as strongest at.

This ability to attack anyplace at anytime would make the Vasari completely imbalanced.  In fact, it would change the entire face of the game since the map layout wouldn't mean much any longer and I suspect that most people would be forced to play Vasari.

All of the races and factions are more or less "elitist" in their own way which is why they won't just roll over and concede the solar system to one of the other factions.  After all, according to Sins lore the TEC couldn't tolerate the Advent people so they kicked them out of the solar system and the Vasari go around enslaving other races.  I just play the race that I either want to play or, more likely, that I think I'll have the best chance of winning with.  I tend to play against skilled human opponents in online multiplayer (lots of 5v5 pug matches), so I need every advantage I can get and if I think that Advent gives me the best chance of winning relative to the other player sand the races they've chosen, I go with the Advent.

I do highly recommend that you try the game in online multiplayer, by the way.  You'll find that it's much more challenging, suspenseful, and more interesting when you have teammates and have to worry about your allies and how they are doing.  Of course, it is also possible to actually lose a game.  So click the Ironclad Online button and come online.  You'll get to enjoy some human camraderie and perhaps make some friends.  If playing against human opponents sounds intimidating, you could start off by playing comp stomps (games against AI) with human teammates, which is still probably more fun than playing alone.

I tested out the siege platforms.  They are approximately equal to raze planet for overall DPS.  However, they deal DoT rather than the instant effect of raze planet.  So, raze planet on its own is better than siege platforms.  The passive bonus does push the Vulkoras into the lead, but then you have a capital ship that's basically a glorified siege frigate (although a siege frigate that's actually competent at what it does isn't a bad thing...)

The first line you hear from the night elves in the Warcraft III campaign:  "these green brutes have no respect for life; kill them all!"

For me, all three factions of Sins are villains in their own ways.

For planets with 3000 or less health, Siege Platforms, Raze Planet, and Drain Planet are all superior.  If the target planet has 4500 or more, then mass hysteria is far more effective than any other bombardment ability in the game.