So, picture this.
I had a 5th level TEC fleet with corvettes, gardas, 23 carriers, a titan, and an akkan. All upgraded (hull, shields all the way up, armour to the 3rd level).
Then i get 'wailed' on. Entire fleet is gone
How on earth is that fair. Wail is like having an infinite RB in a gravity well with no warning to use my armistice to protect my fleet.
Change it DEV.
It's balanced. The entire point of Wail is that it's supposed to make your hesistant to commit your entire fleet to attacking advent rebel worlds without preparing in advance.
What do I mean by preparing? Be aware of which worlds can wail the gravity wells you need to move through to attack the world you want(including the well of the planet you want to take). if you're attacking a border world chances are there are only 2-4 such world no more then 2 of which have significant population. Thos two worlds need to have their populations reduced before you attack the world you want(use novaliths or lightly escorted suicide mission siege frigates). Kill off the populations of the worlds adjacent to the world you want to take and wail is neutered.
Alternatively you could try to destroy the temples of communion at the planets adjacent to the one you want to take.
Another option is to try knocking out temples of harmony- Wail becomes unusable if you know the advent player under 7 temples of harmony.
The point is once the advent rebel player has been given time to research wail(which is not easy mind you as it requires 7 temples of harmony, which is deeper into the harmony tree then any advent player will go before the super late game) and build up populations on his worlds, you're going to need to scout ahead and prepare for assaults rather then just creating a kill fleet and attempting a frontal assault.
The best counter is of course to take planets before they build up a ton of population or before the advent rebel researches Wail- you have had plenty of time to end the game by that point most games.
Alternatively as TEC you could try to get him to blow wail on a smaller fleet- ocne he wails on most sizes of planets that planet won't have another full strength wail for the next 25-40 minutes depending on planet type & research. TEC economy is strong enough that you should be able to recoup from the losses long before that provided you don't get your entire fleet killed by wail.
When it coems down to it, if you commited your entire fleet to attacking a wail-defended gravity well late enough in the game that the advent rebel player has wail and you made no preparations to deal with wail in advance it was you mistake- if you fleet had not gotten mulched then wail wound't really fufill it's purpose(as that is basically the worst thing you could have done).
Besides, while the range and aoe is larger, it's a hell of a lot easier to anticipate and counter then red button.