paying 500k for a single spire starship... uh...
Well, that's if that's how the cost schedule goes, then yes. I've been feeling like the spire starships are a bit underwhelming for a while, anyway -- they're supposed to be significantly more awesome than the Zenith one, so worth the cost. In that sort of circumstance, this is actually a matter of the starships at the upper end perhaps being less valuable than they should be. Hard to say, but we'll see what people think when they see it in practice.
I suppose paying twice as much in knowledge isnt enough cost as it is?
No, not at all. Because if the metal/crystal costs are off, then having to pay twice as much knowledge is still a no-brainer. You just get the cheaper ship and spam it.
Did you miss the part where bombers outdamaged both siege and bombstar past mk1? The part where the only really effective counter to fleet ships is other fleet ships? (fleet starships do pathetic dps comparatively) the entire bonus ship bit?
You're looking at this stuff in isolation, which is largely irrelevant. Fleet starships aren't for direct combat, though they have some direct combat skills. The reason you want those in every strike group is because they buff your other ships.
And raw damage is somewhat irrelevant, too, when looking at siege starships and bomber starships. Siege starships can project an ENORMOUS amount of firepower across a huge distance, and so if it takes a little longer that's okay. Plus if they get damaged you can retreat them, versus having to rebuild parts of your fleet at higher cost.
There should be incentive to retreat your starships rather than rebuild, and when you do that their ongoing costs is actually lower than the cost of maintaning a fleet that gets constantly replaced, I'd wager.
As for the bomber starships, those have enough health and enough quick-dps that they can go places that bomber fleet ships can't get. Two different roles, in my opinion. Though perhaps if the bomber starship isn't surviving enough, it might need a tad more health, not sure on that.
Fleet ships are meant to be churn-and-burn. Starships are meant to be investments that you protect and retreat, etc. This isn't meant to be an either-or choice, players are meant to need some mix of both in the same sense that you generally wouldn't go turret-less.
Am I sure that 2x costs on starships is the way to go? No. But I think it's in the right direction, as I agree with you Lancefighter that the starships weren't unbalance in combat. But I agree with some of the others that starships were unbalanced in terms of ROI.
