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ship spammers-A Guide to Fighting Back

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ship spammers-A Guide to Fighting Back

annoying b*tches

from Sins Forums

You all know them, and you all hate them.  You call them ship spammers.   For most of you that word probably has a meaning.  But let me explain it to those of you who have never had a game ruined by a spammer.  A ship spammer is someone who build a crapload of one type of ship (such as 150 LRMs) and attacks.  I am writing this fresh from a particularly stinging defeat at the hands of a ship spammer.  It is important to know that these people CAN be beaten, and playing a game with a ship spammer is not the end of the world.

All ship spammers are n00bs, they spam because they know that they will not win any other way.  Often, it is easy to make a ship spammer stop spamming simply by telling them that they suck and won't amount to anything.

If that doesn't work it's time to go to Plan B.  The whole idea of spamming is to start building ships (the most popular one is the torpedo frigate or it's equivalent), as soon as possible.  Therefore, spammers will sometimes not even bother to colonize other worlds.  They will build 2 research facilities, research torpedo frigates, and start building.  Often times, they will build between 3-4 more frigate facilities to speed up the process.  Their greatest weakness is that they spend ALL of their money building ships, so while you're going out there and colonizing worlds, they're sitting in their one little world building more ships.  This means that often times when a spammer attacks you, the best strategy is to simply attack his world.  They never have more that 3.  Spammers send ALL of their ships in for an assualt, leaving none behind for defense.  Go around his fleet and attack.  Just bomb his planets and he's done.

If that doesn't work, you have to give them a taste of their own medicine.  Spam a ship one level above his.  If he's spamming light frigates, build torpedo, if he's building torpedo, build flak, and so on.  When that's done, there will be nothing left of him, and you can walk all over him.

Please make replies on the Ideas for v1.03 post and tell them that there needs to be a unit cap for individual types of units.

Get admins and hosts of servers to boot spammers and let them know that their n00bey ways are not appreciated.

Beating a spammer is actually easy if you know what to do.

Good luck!

120,683 views 186 replies
Reply #26 from Sins Forums Top
By capping ships at 50% of the total fleet you wouldn't be able to build anything.

Just thought I would mention that.
Reply #27 from Sins Forums Top
By capping ships at 50% of the total fleet you wouldn't be able to build anything.

Just thought I would mention that.
End of quote


Remember it doesn't HAVE to be 50%; it's just the idea. And, though this is admittedly more complex, it doesn't have to come into effect immediately; only after, say, you've got 30 ships in combat or something. Whatever. Just the idea.

And though I recognize that more limits aren't always good and that they may limit the strategy, I think the example given there (excuse me; I'm too lazy to go back and quote :P ) is a bit extreme. Consider instead that pirates are allowed from the beginning, but the Armistic feature is disabled for 20 minutes, or something. Or 10. Or whatever the devs want. I would agree to that - BUT on the other hand if most gamers don't want it then it shouldn't be there... so yeah...

Speaking of which, though, after having thought about it, you (or whoever said this) are right: it's a legitimate though poor strategy. If it's easily beaten, then the spammers are weak players. I can live with that. What I always had the problem with was the AI spamming, but that was due to different things and is not part of this argument.

Yes... I think I've come around. But: What I would want (and forgive me coz I haven't actually played the game... begging the question why I'm arguing here) with a game where spammers are NOT easily beaten, when it was told to me by the developers that one needs combined arms? For that, I'd go to a clickfest RTS. My goal here is to experience good strategy. If a guy tries to spam me, I should be able to kick his butt without having to spam in return. Isn't this what the developers implied? I don't want a spam - counterspam game. I want a spam - spammer gets wasted by non-spammer with little difficulty game. This is admittedly personal preference, but it's what the devs promised. Isn't it?
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Reply #28 from Sins Forums Top
The thing that throws people off Sibilantae, is that they expect a more rock/paper/scissors system. All too often someone comes crying that their 10 ships didnt kill X even though they are supposed to be the counter. Well, it turns out X was 10 times as many ships as what they needed to counter, so it is no wonder they were over come.

Just now I got out of a game with a LRM spammer. I don't think he even built a single Cobalt all game. I saw him doing this when I was scouting, so I researched Flaks.

Akkans
~35 LRMs
2 frigite factories pumping LRMs in the system
-vs-
Kol (I think Kol was 1 lvl lower then the Akkans. Kol was at 3 when the fight started)
~15 LRMs
~15 Flaks

He fought to the death, while still insisting on building more LRMs to reinforce. I meanwhile brought a few more Flaks and teched up Hoshikos. Not the ideal lab test for counters I know, but the moral is that ***sufficiant numbers*** of the proper counters make a world of difference. This is compounded by a little mico here and there to get the most of your units.

So why are spammers hard to stop? Because its a strategy that can put a lot of early pressure on people, even if they are not rushing. Not every strategy can beat every other one. Some times you simply picked the wrong strategy that game (like trying to boom when they go for a rush).

P.S. The armistice example was an example of a horrible balance idea; don't support it silly!  :SNIFF!: 
Reply #29 from Sins Forums Top
You all know them, and you all hate them.  You call them ship spammers.   For most of you that word probably has a meaning.  But let me explain it to those of you who have never had a game ruined by a spammer.  A ship spammer is someone who build a crapload of one type of ship (such as 150 LRMs) and attacks.  I am writing this fresh from a particularly stinging defeat at the hands of a ship spammer.  It is important to know that these people CAN be beaten, and playing a game with a ship spammer is not the end of the world.All ship spammers are n00bs, they spam because they know that they will not win any other way.  Often, it is easy to make a ship spammer stop spamming simply by telling them that they suck and won't amount to anything.If that doesn't work it's time to go to Plan B.  The whole idea of spamming is to start building ships (the most popular one is the torpedo frigate or it's equivalent), as soon as possible.  Therefore, spammers will sometimes not even bother to colonize other worlds.  They will build 2 research facilities, research torpedo frigates, and start building.  Often times, they will build between 3-4 more frigate facilities to speed up the process.  Their greatest weakness is that they spend ALL of their money building ships, so while you're going out there and colonizing worlds, they're sitting in their one little world building more ships.  This means that often times when a spammer attacks you, the best strategy is to simply attack his world.  They never have more that 3.  Spammers send ALL of their ships in for an assualt, leaving none behind for defense.  Go around his fleet and attack.  Just bomb his planets and he's done.If that doesn't work, you have to give them a taste of their own medicine.  Spam a ship one level above his.  If he's spamming light frigates, build torpedo, if he's building torpedo, build flak, and so on.  When that's done, there will be nothing left of him, and you can walk all over him.Please make replies on the Ideas for v1.03 post and tell them that there needs to be a unit cap for individual types of units.Get admins and hosts of servers to boot spammers and let them know that their n00bey ways are not appreciated.Beating a spammer is actually easy if you know what to do.Good luck!
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So basically what you're saying is that

1) if the SS (ships spammers) leave even a token force at home, you're screwed (After all, they've been making all ships with it. and they're constantly making more, so they're bound to have em),

and

2) even if they don't you're screwed, because even if you kill their worlds somehow, they killed yours too and now also have a fleet you cannot match for a long while.

or

3) You have to be good enough to be able to be a BETTER spammer, get better technology and more resources and still spam a crapload of ships or you already lost to the original spammer


Thats not the problem with this game. the problem is that one big fight at the beginning of the game decides it, and that spamming ships is bar none the best tactic because static defenses are useless in small-medium numbers and grossly expensive.
Reply #30 from Sins Forums Top
Why is this even an issue? While they're spamming a tard fleet, you can be building a far more powerful balanced fleet with all manner of special abilities. The only real problem I see with spammers is that it's really not as much fun beating them. Kinda like beating up a cripple: sure you can do it, but what's the point?
Reply #31 from Stardock Forums Top
Instead of using fleet caps to deal with the ship spamming exploit, the devs should build in offense/defense/abilities synergies that reward mixed fleets over fleets dominated by a single ship type.
Reply #32 from Sins Forums Top
Why is this even an issue? While they're spamming a tard fleet, you can be building a far more powerful balanced fleet with all manner of special abilities.
End of quote


And then that fleet can be ripped in half as the ships that are good against the spammed ships survive but everything else ends up as floating debris.
Reply #33 from Sins Forums Top
Ship spamming is not an "exploit"! Spamming low-tech units has been in every RTS I can remember, but people have always found counters to it. Harassment and being generally aggressive early on has always been important in competitive play. People should try to find ways to tech up while withstanding the early push, not cry on the forum. Then again, people have done that on every RTS forum I can remember too.
Reply #34 from Sins Forums Top
Ship spamming is not an "exploit"! Spamming low-tech units has been in every RTS I can remember, but people have always found counters to it.
End of quote


That's the problem. This game is trying to be different from the "traditional" click-fest games.

P.S. The armistice example was an example of a horrible balance idea; don't support it silly!
End of quote

*in a panic* I back down! I back down! :P

Why is this even an issue? While they're spamming a tard fleet, you can be building a far more powerful balanced fleet with all manner of special abilities. The only real problem I see with spammers is that it's really not as much fun beating them. Kinda like beating up a cripple: sure you can do it, but what's the point?
End of quote


The thing is, I think that this is how the game should be - a spammer should be like a cripple, so that it would be no fun to beat them. If a spamming strategy can work without being easily countered, then there's a problem.

The question is, of course, how one defines a counter. Is a counter a big counter-spam, or a combined-arms response? It should be the latter, but IS it?

The thing that throws people off Sibilantae, is that they expect a more rock/paper/scissors system. All too often someone comes crying that their 10 ships didnt kill X even though they are supposed to be the counter. Well, it turns out X was 10 times as many ships as what they needed to counter, so it is no wonder they were over come.
End of quote


I agree with this, and I like the fact that this isn't a rock-paper-scissors system. But is russiangangsta one of these people? I don't know, and I disagree with him anyway on the point of counter-spam.
But I agree with you. What you said right there shows that this
And then that fleet can be ripped in half as the ships that are good against the spammed ships survive but everything else ends up as floating debris.
End of quote

isn't so much of an issue, since the LRM's won't be so powerful as to entirely wipe out all but their "counters"; to say that the would be rock/paper/scissors thinking.

That's why the fact that this isn't a rock/paper/scissors game should mean that spams are extremely unsuccessful, and easily countered by combined arms. This is how it SHOULD be, because this is what the devs implied. What concerns me is the fact that it MIGHT NOT be.

What I want is a game wherein I could easily beat a spammer, but not enjoy it all that much because it was like beating up a cripple. What I don't want is a game where defeating a spammer is hard, when one of the game's selling points was the extreme opposite.

Reply #35 from Sins Forums Top
Sibilantae, you should pick up the game and (after learning teh basics in singleplayer) hop online. I think you will see that once you start thinking in the metagame mind you will really enjoy it.

What I want is a game wherein I could easily beat a spammer, but not enjoy it all that much because it was like beating up a cripple. What I don't want is a game where defeating a spammer is hard, when one of the game's selling points was the extreme opposite.
End of quote


Why don't you want to have fun? As I have been posting: Spamming is a strategy. Its objectively no better or worse then another. So beating a spammer shouldn't be like "beating a cripple." Personally, I find beating spammers very satisfing because they can still be a challenge depending on the game situation.

Again: 30 Lrms *vs* 25 Lrms and 5 Hoshinkos: Combined arms should win every time.

I think you are worring too much about an individual case and not the metagame. For example: I play mostly 2v2 random map games. Whether Returning Armada is balanced or not, my team has had major issues beating Vasari players who rush Assailents then Returning Armada. In a game the other night we saw a Vasari with a few games under his belt and a decent record of wins. Our conclusion: Returning Armada Spammer - counter accourdingly. Guess what? He didn't go that route and I spent most of the 3 hour game dodging his fleet as my partner finished off his oppenent and had to basically beat mine for me. The lesson that I learned was that there was another very good 2v2 Vasari metagame strategy I had not encountered yet.

It would be nice if the forums tied into peoples ICO accounts so you could actually see how credible posters were...hint hint IC. >.>
Reply #36 from Sins Forums Top
IMHO the best strategy should ALWAYS lie in a balanced fleet... if with a balanced fleet I always have a good chance to win, it is ok. If a mono-frigate-type fleet has far more chances than me, the game is broken.. you understand why, I hope.

the question is here for me: do we have a spamming-strategy which is superior to any other strategy, or it can be easyly countered by a couple of strategies?

If yes, than OK.
If not, than the game is broken...

My point is, from a "moral" point of view, spamming is totally allowed, from a gameplay point of view, it must be available (I don't like the cap thing, I want to have to choice), but it should rely mostly on surprise and it must be counterable.

This said, my first post, I love the sp game, soon I check the mp :-)
Reply #37 from Sins Forums Top
Boy i love the OP's stance on spamming, he just needs to learn to play and counter it. It seems in his wishfull intelligence instead of learning to play he has to resort to whinning to the devs to make some sort of change so he can play better without thinking how to counter those nasty, noobish, terrible strategies that are so so hard to counter (they aren't).

I've anticipated rushes for lots of players and have countered them successfully using a variety of tactics and strategies, it is not hard at all its just the OP needs to learn to play. Talk about owned.

So in other words this is the OP's post summed up 'Hello, i got beaten by NOOBISH ship spammers and i hate them so much, they are so NOOB, i would like Stardock to implement some sort of mechanics change that would let me play Sins on easy mode like playing a Wii game because i'm a big baby that can't adapt or change tactics. Instead i will post on these forums without adapting or changing tactics and complain about my inability to be a good adaptive player, here are ways to make the game more like Wii sports so babies like me can play easier'.

Yep there you have it.
Reply #38 from Sins Forums Top
Boy i love the OP's stance on spamming, he just needs to learn to play and counter it. It seems in his wishfull intelligence instead of learning to play he has to resort to whinning to the devs to make some sort of change so he can play better without thinking how to counter those nasty, noobish, terrible strategies that are so so hard to counter (they aren't).

I've anticipated rushes for lots of players and have countered them successfully using a variety of tactics and strategies, it is not hard at all its just the OP needs to learn to play.

Talk about owned.

So in other words this is the OP's post summed up 'Hello, i got beaten by NOOBISH ship spammers and i hate them so much, they are so NOOB, i would like Stardock to implement some sort of mechanics change that would let me play Sins on easy mode like playing a Wii game because i'm a big baby that can't adapt or change tactics. Instead i will post on these forums without adapting or changing tactics and complain about my inability to be a good adaptive player, here are ways to make the game more like Wii sports so babies like me can play easier'.

Yep there you have it.
End of quote


Talk about owned.
Reply #39 from Sins Forums Top
"Again: 30 Lrms *vs* 25 Lrms and 5 Hoshinkos: Combined arms should win every time."

whats the cost in resources, research costs, fleet cap and time to make 30 lrms vs the costs of making 25 lrms and 5 hoshinkos?


Maybe you haven't played against a GOOD spammer?
IE the kind that uses an effecient and quick build strat and has a lot of ships up very quickly and uses them well.

Because if you take it all into account, in terms of research costs and production costs and whatever else, all counter-lrm-spam strats suggested here require far more investment than the lrm spam, which is exactly what you DON'T want in a rush solution.


Reply #40 from Sins Forums Top
Isn't there a maintenance cost for ships? There should be. That should take care of large fleets without a correspondingly large economic base.
Reply #41 from Sins Forums Top
Isn't there a maintenance cost for ships? There should be. That should take care of large fleets without a correspondingly large economic base.
End of quote



Boy if only they would add SOMETHING as a maintenance costs for ships that would somehow drain your economy as a downside to have more supply points to allow you to requisition and build more ships. I think it would be a good idea to implement some sort of research that would allow you to requisition more units at the cost of your overall econo... oh wait.
Reply #43 from Sins Forums Top

A decent combined arms fleet will typically beat a spammer in terms of cost per cost.

I.e. a combined arms fleet will typically beat a spam fleet at a ratio of say 1.3 to 1.5 to 1 ratios.

I've been a spam fleet by 4 to 1 using tactics in battle but that's only late game.

But no matter what, someone who has a 3 to 1 or 4 to 1 advantage in cost spent on something is going to have a big advantage no matter how you slice it.

I'm sure that if World War II were an RTS that the Germans would have been complaining about American "Spamming" with the Sherman tank which was a fairly crummy tank but they just spammed them out. :)

Reply #44 from Sins Forums Top
What's all this COMPLETE and TOTAL BS people keep saying about a "combined arms fleet" should be able to easily beat a spammed fleet of a single type? Why the hell should that be the case, and what real-world scenario is this supposed to simulate?

In the real world, if your enemy is massing nothing but infantry men with rifles, You'd be smart to mass heavy machine gun emplacements, and just let those guys charge right in. Screw bombers, fighters, missles, helicopters, anything else. If he's attacking you with generic infantry, your best counter is another "spam" - heavy machine gun emplacements. And if your enemy is spamming F-15s or F-22s at you, your best counter is tons of SAMs. No infantry, no tanks, no artillery - SAMs. In other words, NO "combined arms."

The same in this game. Combined arms are not always the best solution, and they shouldn't be. If your opponent has just thrown 50 heavy cruisers at you, why on earth would you want a "combined fleet" with, say, flaks?

Also, for all of those people saying that the devs promised one thing but delivered another, I don't ever remember the devs marketing this game as some sort of "combined arms" game. I have never seen such statements in an interview. I could be wrong about that though, and am willing to be corrected on it.

Look, I have serious issues with the game, particularly the phase jump inhibitor, which has caused me to not even play the game anymore until something is done about it (IF something is ever done about it). But I don't know what all this spamming controversy is about.
Reply #45 from Sins Forums Top
Well, I doubt that they are all n00bs. Ship spammers could easily be players that are: lazy, believe they are facing n00bs, n00bs themselves, or simply trying something new.

A host should never boot anyone from a game, unless their messages are bothersome to everyone, or they simply are lagging (and thus slowing everyone down). There is no point in being a bad host, or a sore loser, or an ass. If you want people to learn, you need to be willing to teach them. When I play games I don't mind telling others what they are doing (or have done) wrong.

I don't like the artificial cap idea... I like the fact that people are free to play as they please. If, and I still don't want it, they add some form of cap to spamming, I feel that it must be a diminishing returns... In other words: You build 'X' amount of ships, after you build enough of them the game will then increase the cost to build more of them. See "Rise of Legends" to see this idea in action. I don't like the idea, but it would be better than seeing a hard cap.
Reply #46 from Sins Forums Top
http://www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_PlayToWinPart1.htmThe OP's whining sounded pretty familiar.
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That is the best gaming article I have ever read. 100% true.
Reply #47 from Sins Forums Top
There is a limit to the number of ships a player can build and it's based on the fleet crew available. The player will need to build up technology and resources to build a super huge fleet.

If the enemy builds a larger fleet than you, and if he owns a much smaller quantity of planets then you did something wrong.

Trying to expand your planetary control too fast is a risk. You're taking a risk of the enemy invading your empire when you have spent little of your resources to build a fleet.

If you ignore building a large fleet then you are asking for defeat.
Reply #48 from Sins Forums Top
While it seems that there are some good counters for spammers, the continued predominance of the strategy implies that its counters are not as effective or simple as some make it sound.

I think that limiting the number of ships to 50% of your fleet is not the best solution because it limits the player's choices too much. I think there is a way to limit spamming to some degree without restricting gameplay too much.

I propose either a mod or a user enableable option in the multiplayer setup. Once enabled, the idea is to make ships increasingly expensive once a set number of them had been built. The set number would increase as you increase your logistics spots, but so should the cost of building more ships over the allotted amount.

Let me give an example; say you reach 2nd tier logistics. Once you build maybe 15 lrms, the cost of each additional lrm goes up 20 credits and the metal cost 3. Once you upgrade to 3rd tier fleet logistics you can build up to 30 before they penalty kicks in, but when it does its an increased cost of 30 credits and 5 metal. This continues throughout the fleet logistics tree.(BTW I'm just making all these numbers up for explanatory purposes.)

This would allow spammers to continue spamming if thats what makes them happy, but it means that its not nearly as economiclally viable to do so. Again, let me say that this should be a user enablable option in multiplayer setup.

On a side note, I think that one of the biggest opportunities this game has is the implentation of more multiplayer game setup uptions to customize games. (Similar to civ4 custome game setup.)
Reply #49 from Sins Forums Top
Ok sure, building a bazillion Lrms is a Strategy and it does work. But other Strategies in the game take more money and thought then spamming, so the people who spam are afraid of using the meat on their shoulders so they resort to spamming. The devs could put a cap on all ships that makes it (as said before) that no one ship can account for 50 % of your fleet. I would really like that.
Fine line between spamming and building big fleets. Spamming is just building ships ASAP---> taking a planet or two ---> GO. Building big fleets is, Cap --> Expand ---> Reinforce---> Destroy / Take --->Reinforce ---> Exterminate. There is a difference.
Reply #50 from Sins Forums Top
What's all this COMPLETE and TOTAL BS people keep saying about a "combined arms fleet" should be able to easily beat a spammed fleet of a single type? Why the hell should that be the case, and what real-world scenario is this supposed to simulate? In the real world, if your enemy is massing nothing but infantry men with rifles, You'd be smart to mass heavy machine gun emplacements, and just let those guys charge right in.
End of quote
If you're commanding an army in the real world, you're nuts. The same applies to in a video game. What you're suggesting is to fight like back in the colonial days where soldiers in regal uniforms lined up and shot at each other until enough people died that one side or the other had to retreat. We've moved way beyond that.

Sins supports a variety of tactics and there are numerous ways of defeating any fleet be it a spam fleet or a well-balanced fleet. If you're faced with rifle men (LRM's) and want to go spam heavy machine guns (Flaks) back, then both you and the opponent are just going to fight to see who has more resources and more ships. What do I do? I'm going to send some heavy machine guns (Flaks) too, but I'm also going to park special forces (Light Frigates) behind the enemy rifle men (LRM's) and strategically draw fire with tanks (Capital Ships) and armored vehicles (Heavy Cruisers). If you do enough damage to the enemies I have in front of you, assuming they're not flanking, then I'll have them retreat. While you're chasing them I still have people at your rear doing damage and it's going to take a significant amount of time to turn around and get shots off at them. Furthermore, I can have those forces stay behind you so you can't fire on them (someone deemed this as cheating yesterday when all I was doing was issuing circular move orders via shift clicks). The result? You or the enemy loses their spam force and I face minimal losses because I exploited the assets of my forces. Armor and HP are NOT the only things at your disposal. Speed can be a valuable tool especially when it's on a cheap craft.

There are legitimate and effective ways to counter spamming. There should be no additional caps or limitations. If there are, it should be optional as a match setting.