I'm talking MP here. I don't play singleplayer.
Okay I got TEC.. They have early trade and they can tank with armor really well, and do good single target damage.
Advent is my favorite. Motherships shield restoring, with gaurdians.. take out entire fleets without even loosing a single frigate. Illumini are so good at killing(Especially cap ships) i'm tempted to call them imba. But they need a ton of crystal.
But Vasari.. What are they about? There cap ships all seem like complete and utter crap with useless abilities except the motherships warp-stopping one. But what good is stopping a jump when you do half the damage advent does? Only good thing I've liked about them is that they get resource gathering boosting abilities early on.. get both ups in 1 cheap upgrade. Also they have reduced ship costs, but nothing reduces research cost form what I see.
So is that it.. the phase jumping between your worlds however you want and making ships cheaper?
So far I really don't like Vasari much. Tec is okay, but I love Advent.