S2 Spam

[Alpha Line]

posted on November 24th, 2010, 9:57 am

Last edited by Alpha Line on November 24th, 2010, 10:04 am, edited 1 time in total.

Ok guys, I totally agree with u that Monsoons and a double yard production would have been better  for Funny than building Intrepids and a fast Warp-in.

So, what I say now is (maybe/certain) off topic, but I think I have to say it...

In the end Funny won that match, but I think he won because of the lovely Mayson Phaser turrets... I think that was a good example of how to use them effectively...
True, I crushed single turrets with all my S2s, which means that my own mining was unprotected at that time. But as Funny already said, he kept me busy and built up turret after turret. I invested only in ships, which was at some point of the game useless because i was not able to attack a position with 3 or more turrets. The costs of losing ships were just to high. And engaging in "open field" was not possible, because Funny was always/often near his yards and turrets...

I really don't want to complain about that, because that is the gameplay of the Federation. And I like to play as Feds too (maybe Boggz can remeber our first engagement ...).

So in my opinion, Funny was able to protect one of his 3 mining locations just with Mayson turrets and used his Fleet to protect his other (turret protected) expansion and his main base... The Main base was the lesser defended position of him and i tried to attack him there (which was the weakest point of his defence) as often as possible. But it didn't work in the end.

And my tries to expand ended up in Warpin attacks or attacks with fast Intrepids before i was able to put up own turrets.

Yeah, I know that was all off topic, but maybe of have some tipps for me, what I can improve next time...

Thx for your answers!

posted on November 24th, 2010, 10:19 am

well were u spamming s2 for the whole game, like funny spammed intreps from 4 yards? If so then you should have teched up after about 8-10

Did u have s2 special? One advantage of using s2s as the meat of your fleet is that their special is super useful at all stages of the game.

A couple bombers with their special would have minced those turrets. U can even use c11 weapons focus to outrange the turret. And his intrep spam wouldnt have been able to clear up the c11 cos of adai. Also bombers do increased damage to intreps too. Warpins are large as well.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 10:31 am

as boggz pointed out u still won.

RIGHT?   

posted on November 24th, 2010, 12:01 pm

well were u spamming s2 for the whole game, like funny spammed intreps from 4 yards? If so then you should have teched up after about 8-10

Did u have s2 special? One advantage of using s2s as the meat of your fleet is that their special is super useful at all stages of the game.

A couple bombers with their special would have minced those turrets. U can even use c11 weapons focus to outrange the turret. And his intrep spam wouldnt have been able to clear up the c11 cos of adai. Also bombers do increased damage to intreps too. Warpins are large as well.

Yeah, i had the S2 special and i used it in most situations up to the limit. I spammed from 2 yards S2s and wanted to get T15s after I expanded to another moon pair... But Funny destroyed that whole expansion including the Large Yard with his fast Intrepids and Ambassadors before I could get there with my S2 fleet.

After that I set up another small yard and spammed Bombers from all 3. Unfortunately it didnt help to stop that mass Intrepid spam. Also I wasn't able to stop Funny in taking my old expansion. After that he had 4 moon pairs and spammed Intrepids from 4 yards and built 1 Defiant and 1 Sovereign to show his superior skills in map control and demoralization of his opponent ... That was kind of frustrating ...

posted on November 24th, 2010, 9:43 pm

if u could have dropped all the s2 production, decommed a yard and switched to c17 you would have wiped the floor with him. intreps are super duper countered by supports. c11 would have helped in the mix for a while if u could micro it out of combat.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 11:33 pm

C-17 is an unholy beast of war.  Fairly tough, pretty good at cracking battleships, pretty good against most things, really, awesome against giant borg ships and all stations.

And spammable.

posted on November 25th, 2010, 12:12 am

C-17 is a long shot Myles, it would be a lot better to go T-15 (no prototype, not as expensive, still has great passive for Intreps.) T-15 is just plain easier to get.

C11? Only Dominus, in his controlled tests, can even begin to get those things to outdo Intrepids. Having a Federation scout's defense stat means that you really only can use them effectively for their specials. Specials that cost tri, on ships that cost even more tri.

posted on November 25th, 2010, 1:26 am

C-17 ...
I never thought about that ...

Yeah i will try it the next time! Thx for the help Myles !

Cya

posted on November 25th, 2010, 1:41 am

C11? Only Dominus, in his controlled tests, can even begin to get those things to outdo Intrepids. Having a Federation scout's defense stat means that you really only can use them effectively for their specials. Specials that cost tri, on ships that cost even more tri.

  Well ... Dom pointed out that C-11's do effectively counter a lot of ADAI units.  However ... C-11's more than other supports suffer from the fact that ANYTHING without ADAI will slaughter them like sheep.  Against Feds, you'll see them fall to Warpins easily.

  Another problem with them is that, while they take almost no damage from the Intrepids, they will have a very hard time actually killing any intrepids due to the fact that the ADAI does in fact still reduce some of the damage coming from the medium range C-11's  .  Just not a worthwhile counter in my opinion.  You're just gonna end up feeding exp to your opponent.

posted on November 25th, 2010, 1:59 am

Well, you only make one or two as ADAI tanks.  They're not designed to be a flotilla of easily destroyed ships.

For example, just build the prototype and eventually one more, and then build bombers if facing intrepids, and see how that works out for you.  So long as you keep your fleet moving, the ships that matter will not take damage, or rarely so.  They're cheap, easy to replace cannon fodder that make ADAI units have a hard time being effective on the other vessels you have due to how auto target works.  This is more for 1v1 or early 2v2 skirmishes, as the C-11 will obviously fall rather quickly in a larger fleet action that involves more than ADAI.

I'm sure some day we'll see more use out of this poor ship.

posted on November 25th, 2010, 3:15 pm

Indeed, what Mal pointed out . A lot of the time people mistakenly try to spam supports to counter ADAI units, but support ships should be used to take the brunt of damage to allow your cheaper, but usually more counterable, units to strike, otherwise you're just going to exhaust your resources. A mixed fleet with a few supports against a group of ADAI units will do well in most situations

posted on November 25th, 2010, 4:08 pm

*Looks through the stats*

How does the Intrepid Counter the S-2? They are both short range. I would think that a proper counteraction might be an Akira spam, or better yet, Excel II spam. Akiras I find to be a very good multi-role ship. It has fairly high Defense value for a cruiser, plus you get both torpedoes and phasers. And you can boost your shields when needed. The Excel II has long range, Artillery at rank 5 and up. Making them huge short range killers if micro'd right. The Excel II special ability I rarely use, since it is strictly aimed for late-game use.

Canaverals are a plausible counter, but they are rather needy of something else to back them up.

But still my question stands, Why the Intrepid?

posted on November 25th, 2010, 4:24 pm

S-2 takes more damage from Short-ranged, which the Intrepid is. The S-2 also does more to long range, which the Excel II is (also, S-2 is 140 speed an E2 is 80, good luck trying to escape an S-2 fleet.) Passives are not everything for sure, but they make a big difference.

posted on November 27th, 2010, 10:53 pm

Well after playing against mayson about 4-5 times, I had a straight winning streak. Boggz said he tested it with star for a few games and lost to S2 spam as Mayson and as Risner spamming Monsoons. I think this shows that some sort of balancing is due for the S2.

posted on November 27th, 2010, 11:38 pm

Hard to say, Funny.

  I think the right outlook would be:  if Monsoons don't effectively counter them, then something should.  Any spam of any kind should have a pretty simple counter to prevent it just being too easy .  If the counter to S2 spam is not to meet them with Monsoons, then there should be something else.

  Not all things have to be Rock, Paper, Scissors, of course.  However, something as simple as S2 spam should not require an overwhelmingly skilled and micro-intensive response .  I'm going to test it further and find out if there is a better way.  When I do, I'll let people know .