I've never been one to play campaigns in strategies, and just dive straight into the skirmish portion... but this game doesn't like me, even on easy haha!

Is there someone kind and wise on the mechanics, who can give a few pointers?
Something on good resource management would be great :)

If you're playing against the computer (which is always a good idea!), don't forget that Homeworld is a pause & play real-time strategy game meaning that the player can pause the action at *any* time during the course of your play session.

Assault class ships is a far more effective opener than the scout or fighter class ships; 5 Assault ships should do.

Try to move the Mother Ship closer every few km to close the distance between a resource patch a Collector has to travel and the opponent's Mother Ship side of the map.

Probes are better at being designated as checkpoints than for spying.

Hope that helps!
:)

Thanks for the help!
Yes, I only fight the computer... On the 8 player maps too, because I love the large battles :)

I actually didn't realise you could pause... As much as I hate pausing, it could be handy I guess.
I'll be sure to try out these tips :)

Not only can the player pause the action, the player can issue commands, as well.

A research ship in 3 components is really all the player needs to complete the necessary technologies to get your fleet battle ready.

The real star in Homeworld is the attack bomber class ships mainly because in control group of 20 or more, the plasma bombs that it carries can crush assault & destroyer class ships in a single pass in Claw formation!

If you have enough salvage corvettes you don't need to make bombers, you can steal them! :P I once snagged a carrier!

The next time I fire up Homeworld, gonna try experimenting with Salvage Corvettes ships. Thanks for reminding me!

Over the years, been having so much fun with Assault ships, Destroyers, Multi-Gun Corvettes and Attack Bombers, especially when you can record the battles, play the fight back, set the camera in a single cockpit of the Attack Bomber then watch the ships dogfighting in the background. I swear, the ships fighting it out looks just like one of those classic Star Wars ship battles!

:)

My favorite is the Missile Cruiser but they are expensive and sloooooow to build so ultimately they almost aren't worth it.

I heard that stealing was a viable strategy... seems quite difficult, no?
Watching Dizzy on the Twitch channel try to use them on destroyers looked hard as hell.

Destroyers are tough to snag. I usually go after missile frigates. Anything built to only go after capital ships is a good target because they have trouble picking off those little corvettes.

And it's not easy, but it's fun! Also you lose A LOT of salvage corvettes. The time I took the carrier I think I sent 12 in and got 4 back, and I had to quick save a few dozen times to pull it off. :P

Is there any real point in using vertical movement when playing against the AI? Or is that more of a human vs human only thing?

Never played against a human. Honestly, while I did snatch these right away, it's been a couple of years since I played through the whole game and my mind is a little iffy on details like this.

Of course there is. Might sound stupid and obvious when said out loud, but it's a whole another dimension. You can bypass defenses, lure enemies away and mount surprise attacks, hide in nebulas. Additionally, capital ships should have their bottoms and engines less armored than fronts and upper bits, so positioning your ships properly before attacking a bothersome capital ship can help significantly.

I totally forgot.
Vertical movement for me is almost crucial for the junkyard mission. It's the safest, albeit slowest way, to get across.

Correction:

Actually, you cannot issue orders to units when the player hits Pause...

...However, the player can move the camera around at any angle while the game is paused.

:)

Sorry for the confusion.

:/

Uh, really?

It is definitely possible in Homeworld2, and the basic way I give any commands there. To the point a skirmish battle clocking 35-40 minutes usually may take anything from 2 to over 4 hours of my time

But might be case for Homeworld, it's many years since I played that and somehow the skirmish mode of it didn't seem appealing for me, I only played the campaign - and found that awesome experience btw.

I got exactly opposite opinions about Homeworld 2 though, had some minor (and mostly technical) dissapointment fom the campaign, but really love the skirmish mode, and fire it up quite regularly once now and then.

This treat doesn't mark with game it is supposed to, but most seems to talk about first Homeworld, so I probably should hold of giving specific Homeworld2 tips here?

The one that apply to both, ideally the salvage corvettes (frigates HW2) should be the only ships you ever are losing. And, you should always have maxed out numbers of those, and use aggressively.