Faction Spotlight: Sol Imperial Worlds

For fifty years since the discovery of the Dark Matter Drive (which helped accelerate space travel exponentially), the Human race has been controlled by military dictatorship, with civilian governments administrating individual planets. After their first encounter with an alien spacefaring race in 2145, the Sonna, conflict ensued. Four years later, the Sonna were all but eliminated. It has been speculated that the Sonna, a peaceful race, did not want war. The Fleet Admiral at the time pursued war to achieve his objective: To create a powerful Navy with the support of several large military corporations. Expansion continued until the Imperium had first contact with the Genari Star Empire. The Genari, likeminded in terms of expansionistic goals, fought back fiercely against the Imperium. For over 30 years now, the long and bloody war seems to have no end in sight, with both sides escalating in their development of bigger, more powerful warships. The Humans have a technological advantage, however. Their plasma weapon technology is more accurate and has longer range, and their ion drive technology surpasses the power output of the more dated, fusion drives of the Genari.

 

Some lower tier ships:

 

Tier I ships are AI only, so you can't get to use them (and you wouldn't -- they're cannon fodder). Tier II is available for use, but only for the daring, while Tier III is what most players will be starting with.
Here's another tier3:

 

Yes they are fast, but more than anything, they cost a lot less to acquire, and the XP required to upgrade your officers is a lot lower as well.

 

That option was considered a while back, but it can be abused quite a bit that way. So the officers of a specific ship remain with that ship, you have to upgrade officers individually for every ship you acquire.
The XP to upgrade an officer one tier for example, on a Class VII Cruiser is 20x the XP to upgrade on a Class II Escort.

 

Yes, they are lost, so that's why you try not to lose your ship. However, there is a special medical officer skill (sol only) that allows you to rescue your officers.

 

Yes, when your ship is destroyed, its gone for good. There is no magic in the game, so ship don't suddenly reappear. But as a newbie with a starting ship (corvette class) you automatically get another.

 

Routing basically means that the ship takes off out of the region -- that means the ship isn't destroyed. So if you enter a battle, get hurt bad and decide to leave and go back to your base to get repaired, you are being 'routed'. That is what would happen most of the time, especially when you're at the Class IV Frigate stage and higher.

 

You have full tactical control of your ship -- so very move/round is up to you as to how you plan to fight, repair, flee etc... Remember this isn't an RTS game controlling fleets of cannon fodder. Its pure tactical single ship to ship combat.

 

Each tier is a significant step up; but of course, head-to head a Class IV is going to have a terrible time against a Class VI. So there isn't a rock/paper/scissor system in the way of classes, but there are some things that give the lower tier ships an edge.
Eg:
-The lower the tier ship, the more maneuverable it is -- a Class X dreadnought isn't going to chase down a Class IV frigate.
-Lower tier ships can 'warp out' of the region faster, while the larger ships may need up to three rounds to spool up their engines for warping out.
-The higher the tier of ship, the more expensive in XP for the Officer skill upgrades.

Rock/paper/scissors element (in a more complicated way) can be said about the races, on the other hand.