how to handle subverters as tec?

How to stop subs as TEC?  A good question!

Not sure it has a good answer.  Theoretically, the light frigate is supposed to counter support cruisers.  Thing is, the subverter can and will shut down light frigates.  Still, building masses of them, keeping them spread out if possible, and researching OVERLOAD REACTOR (or whatever the ability is called) might be one of TECs best tries.  This approach would still be hard to pull off though, especially with the prevalence of the lrm-type frigate (assailants for vasari).

I think I'd try to go with a very strikecraft-heavy fleet.  Micro the strikecraft to target and kill subverters (the strikecraft are immune to subverters, of course).  I believe fighters are best for this, although oddly enough, the subverter might have heavy armor?

The Dunov EMP shockwave will drain subverter antimatter (not sure if it interrupts though).  Thing is though, it's relatively short-ranged, and with the number of subs a vasari will be deploying, it's probably not a good option.

The Akkan's ion bolt will interrupt a subverter and stop its distortion field (shutdown ability).  Thing is, what are you supposed to do, micro the ion bolt to hit every subverter that jumps?  You gonna have the range for that, the antimatter, the cooldowns?  Good luck trying it, LOL.

I guess that's about all the suggestions I have.  Perhaps tell your friend to try fighting in the shadow of his own starbases (which are immune to subs), and within clusters of his own mine fields?

Your best counter is cobalts with the ability to sabotage reactors.  Unfortunately, the subverters are going to hit first, so this will only disable them after the fact and prevent them from doing it again.  A good Vasari player could have your fleet down for the count by then.  Another option is to go with a strike craft heavy fleet, since disabling carriers won't shut down your firepower, but late game a Vasari will just answer with 2-3 Kortul Battleships in formation to jam their weapons.  Interrupts will work if the enemy has only a few subs, but if they have a large number then forget about it.  In practice, you either need some aces in your sleeves or superior numbers.

Personally, I think TEC needs a bigger fleet than its opponents in the late game.  You need a lot of hoshikos to absorb damage, a massive amount of firepower to suppress the enemy, strike craft supremacy to control the gravity well, and a superior capital ship presence.  I don't think you can do that without a significant numerical advantage.  I honestly believe that if TEC doesn't have this kind of advantage, they just get shredded by Advent and Vasari's late game powers.

If the Vasari opponent is using subverters and has more econ AND a bigger fleet than the TEC player, TEC is pretty screwed.  But if the TEC player has a competitive fleet size, they can put up a good fight.

1.  Always kill Subverters first
2.  Spread out your fleet -- a cluster of ships can be locked down forever, but spread out the Subverters will get one or two cycles off before they are destroyed by angry TEC ships, or will have to ignore some of your battlegroups while concentrating on keeping one cluster locked up.
3.  Bombers are the way to go, especially if you can force the Subverters to chase you around a bit.
4.  Having some Cobalts with Sabotage reactor is handy, but since most Vasari fleets have a fair number of assailants, don't expect them to live long.  Cobalts will also get locked down, so I really don't recommend your strategy to hinge on cobalts.
5.  Capships are immune to Subverters, so if your opponent is going too Subverter heavy, you can start adding a few more capships in your fleet and use them to pick off the Subverters.  Just make sure to run whichever cap is being targetted by Assailants.  Sova's or high level Marza or even a Kol can be useful here, as well as a Dunov, or even a timely Akkan Armistice.  Just make sure you have several groups of Hoshiko's or repair bays to support your caps.
6.  Kodiaks and Hoshiko battlegroups can absorb a lot of punishment and endure a few Subverter cycles, as long as they aren't all in one cluster.  Subverters are expensive ships and while the distortion field ability can cripple you, they don't have a lot of punch, so the Vasari fleet can actually be lacking in firepower to kill enough of your ships in time at which point the fight goes back in the TEC players favor (assuming he kills the subverters ASAP).
7.  Be extremely cautious of getting stuck in retreat by subverters, especially in a hostile gravity well with a jump inhibitor.  You can lose your entire fleet.  If you have to run, split your ships up and have them exit from many different spots because if they try to leave in one spot, they will all get locked down and none or few will escape.

So, in summary, to fight subverters you need the following balanced fleet:

- Many bombers from Sova's or multiple carrier groups (even fighters work, but bombers are better)
- Flak to kill enemy fighters
- HC's to endure a beating
- Some cobalts scattered around
- Lots of Hoshikos
- Maybe some High level caps if you are good at keep them alive, otherwise, just use hit and run Sova's from the edge of the gravwell and maybe a hit and run Marza

I would like to add to the above (great) tips an idea: try flanking the Vasari fleet. If you attack from several directions at once, the Vasari is going to need to use more subverters to get the same effect. Also, with the TEC economy, having a secondary "backup" fleet may also help (your first fleet is used as bait to occupy as many subverters as possible, the second takes out the much weaker Vasari force).

I hope that this helps.

-CM

thx, for the answers, i will report back

The little bomb the Dunovs get that depletes anti-matter and disables abilities works wonders ... the distortion field the subverters put out is channeled (and that little bomb is AOE). The Ion Bolt from the Akkan also works.

Missile Barrage makes short work of Subverters.

In short... your capships.

Hoshikos can disable at frigate/cruisers weapons and reduce it's speed. Hoshiko's down side is it's slowness to turn and line up on a target. 100 of these can pause a full blown Diplomacy Pirate attack, you just need fire power to back them up.

"1.  Always kill Subverters first"
"2.  Spread out your fleet." Wide Fleet formation is one key. Cobalt's Sabatoge Reactor ability is not impressive.

3. "Missile Barrage makes short work of Subverters." At that game level you should have 2-3 level 6 Marzas in a large fleet. Your LRMs have a nice area of effect. 3 Marzas doing missle barrages followed up by LRM cluster bombs will devastate larger fleets. A good tech fleet is an umatched fleet killer with the best AOE weapons in the game. Skiiled oponents know this and will try to disable the Marzas, or rush it with bombers.

4. Fighters vs. bombers. I usually build fighters because I do not field enough strike craft to do both. It's a high resource, high MM bother, but a hole that must be covered. I do build a lot of flack, but I need fighters to quickly kill a large bomber assault.

5. Nice mention about the Dunovs. Another TEC AOE weapon.

Carriers + Fighters, only variable way to beat Subverters with Tec and Advent. plus, if you do not have hte biggest economy as tec in late game, that isnt good, you should be at least in the top 3 in a 10 player map for economy.