1) I didn't realize the Dyson sphere wouldn't do a blasted thing until you got to it. Good to know.
The antagonizer will cause it to skip the "not doing anything because the player has never been here" check, fyi.
2) Super Hybrid ISN'T that bad-ass. Oh, he's nasty, don't get me wrong. But really he's a 4x hp hybrid with better shields and guns... and 2:30 regeneration time.
Regen time is probably the same as normal hybrids (I don't remember changing it). Anyway: yea, he's not all that in combat, he's just significantly stronger and can take missions standard hybrids cannot.
1) Is Super-Hybrid-dude supposed to duck himself into carrier guardians?! I mean, he's smart, but that was unexpected!
Goodness, I didn't expect that either. I had no idea units even had logic to hide like that when hurt (other than maybe the neinzul younglings and regen chambers... just checked the code, and transports like the carrier guardian, not the carrier, are any-type-regenerators and other units will try to regen there; it'd be pretty funny if the avenger did that). Anyway, while he's in there his logic is probably not processing at all, which is basically a bug. On the other hand, he'll eventually pop back out when healed. So I dunno if that needs fixed
2) I wasn't warned of super-hybrid until he had already appeared.
Yea, you won't get an alert until he exists, but that's just the beginning of the dangerous stuff.
3) His mechanics are confusing. I took Youngling Tigers as my first unit. I've been using them as streaming death into any hybrid spawnable world in reach, and smacking them around, and it doesn't appear hybrids spawn much in deep space. Does super-hybrid just appear no matter what after about 4-4:30, or is that an evolution? If it's an evolution, is there a max of 1 or can a bunch of these puppies get there?
Each time a hybrid gains maturity XP a certain amount gets added to a central "bank" of points (the amount is much higher if the hybrid is at max maturity already), and when the bank gets big enough it can cash in a bunch of those points to spawn a super hybrid. But it can't do that if there's already a super hybrid in play. In the future there'll probably be more than one super hybrid type and it could have 1 of each, or possibly more than 1 of certain types, etc. The super-hybrid spawn always happens on an AI Homeworld, iirc.
So killing hybrids slows down the process, but new hybrids spawn every 25 minutes (1 each from each hybrid spawner, and there's 1 of those seeded at the start on every mkIV or mkV world), and maturity XP ticks up every 10 seconds, so you're not going to be able to completely stop the super ones from spawning without taking out all the hybrids and hybrid spawners (which means no more hybrids at all that game)
And a curiousity. Can Advanced Hybrid activity result if I take out super-hybrid?
If the bank has enough there'll be another one almost instantly; otherwise it will take a bit of time to recharge, but it's not the end as long as there's at least one hybrid or hybrid spawner (though that would be a verrrrry slow process).
I want to see the last piece of the puzzle so I'm not sure if I should pop this little guy. He's at about 15% when he went and hid in the carrier.
It will delay things if you kill him. Of course, from the player's perspective, that's the point
Kind of like with other hybrid things: if you can stay on top of things, harass them, and not let them do their own thing for too long they remain a manageable threat. If allowed to fulfill their plans, however...