Sins of a Solar Spam?

from Sins Forums
I bought Sins of a Solar empire a few days ago, and was lucky enough to join a great long lasting 4v4. I was impressed first by how massive the maps can be, as well as how chaotic yet interestingly tactical the game allows you be. I came from Dawn of War, which had some really bad spam problems, ultimately leading to the Devs taking action and doing some controversial changes. And at first, I thought SoaSE didn't have these problems, and if I was going to use the 4v4 I had played, where we were all bringing mixed fleets with tons of variation to the fore-front, I would have thought right.

But then just recently I've been playing games where people do nothing but spam. I'll admit to not being a "Pro" just yet, but I know most of the ins and outs of the game. It was me and my friend trying to hold back 1 Advent, that is right, 1 Advent, from destroying one of his planets. Now I had two Akkan class BC's (1 was level 4, the other only 2) where he had 2 Kol battleships. I had various numbers of Frigates and LRMs, as well did my friend. We try to attack yellow, and sure enough he has a massive spam force of Illuminatis and 1 Capital ship(forgot the name). Basically we outnumbered him, but some how he comes away with destroying BOTH my Capitals, the majority of my force, and forces my friend to retreat....how? We had frigates, LRMs, and a few flaks....a very mixed fleet that should have beaten any spammed force, but no, we lose.

Why is it like this? You can say "It is a valid tactic" all you want, but that is crap. How can you possibly say the developers wanted their game to be nothing more than a "Spam 1 unit to winz lol" game? Not only did we lose, but his capital ship didn't even lose his shields by the time we lost both of ours from concetrated fire. So while his 1 cap is sitting there draining ours and basically tanking 4 capital ships, his spammed force is sitting there picking off our capitals while our MIXED force can't do didly squat.

Maybe I'm a nub, but I don't see how I'm supposed to beat spam without spamming myself. This game is slowly becoming no different than the other spam fest games.
35,942 views 35 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
There are many, many threads discussion how to counter Ilum spam, we don't need another.
Sins of a Solar Empire II
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
not again......... listen, we all know u didnt try anything to counter it, you just hate you lost and "report" this

at least first try to counter it b4 whining about imbalanced thingies
spamming = not a bad thing

if you have 50 cobalts ofcourse i make lrm's
if you have 50 lrms ofcourse im not making cobalts!!!

think of the strenght and weaknesses....... spamming is unavoidable
if you have 50 cobalts why would i risk the game to develop an "all round" army instead of cheap anti cobalts (lrm)


people only think about THEIR logic -.-.... maybe it's time to start thinking about THE logic


now people wil start replying.. but he didnt had 50 cobalts!!!
wel.. OFCOURSE.... if im playing a game with you i expect you to either get alot of cobalts, alot of lrm's or alot of both


since lrm's counter this best.. i make those.... whats wrong with that?
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
People need to realize that simply having a "mixed fleet" won't win you games. If he is massing illums, hit him with fighters, flak, scouts, anything that does well vs. light armor.

Also, illums do capital damage, which in itself is fairly balanced in terms of RPS, AND it is the best vs. capital armor, so it is no wonder that he ate your cap ships alive.

Next time you get hit with spam, analyze the situation (know the enemy's strengths/weaknesses), determine the best counters (a combo of SOME kind will usually be more effective than simple counter-spam), and mix your fleet accordingly.
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
You forgot to tell us a few things.

How powerful was his capital ship?

How many ships did he have in total, and how many did you have in total?

Your capital ships were weak, a level 10 radiance battleship would have no problem destroying your four ships on its own considering its massive armor and powerful abilities. If he had 300 Illuminators and you and your friend had a mixed fleet of about 100 ships... then you are going to lose. Illuminators are very good at sniping weak capital ships, which is what it sounds like you were relying on to turn the tide in the battle. Use your own LRMs, carriers, robotics cruisers... basically anything that lets you field your own swarm will beat this.
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
Everyone's advice (even the rude bits) is essentially correct, so instead of adding to it, I'll be the first to say...

You're right. Spamming may be a "viable tactic", but it is NOT fun.

He spams unit A, you spam the counter, which is unit B.

O.M.G.B.O.R.I.N.G.

Your mistake is in thinking everyone wants to play a space game to see fleets of cool ships duking it out over a picturesque planet, with awesome explosions and zooming fightercraft. (I do!)

Nope. Some people just play games to win. I don't know why they wouldn't be happy with every ship being represented by a different colored dot, or maybe a number, since that's all they pay attention to, anyway.

The ONLY way to avoid playing a game where people spam one unit is to either play the AI, or play with like-minded friends.

There's nothing a game designer can do to prevent spamming, because even if they balanced everything perfectly, people would still decide on their own that some particular unit was the "best", and spam it, forcing their opponents to spam the best counter.

You see how DOW handled it. The only way it can be; Hard caps. Best decision they ever made, but look how everyone reacted.

Anyway, sorry.
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
Hard caps aren't a solution to anything: it's the equivalent of the devs throwing up their hands and saying 'we give up, we can't balance this'. I think the 'boringness' comes much more from other elements than unit selection, like the static, bland nature of the combat itself.

Using Dawn of War as an example of how *any* RTS should handle balance issues is like using Counterstrike as an example of excellent FPS balance. Needs more nerf-cycles! :)
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
Dawn of War is one of the most poorly balanced games out there, Relic is notorious for their so called 'balance forums' in which the game is just subjected to a cycle to death. Not to mention the fact that units remain useless for multiple patch cycles at a time.

That said, Relic did alot right with the polish and general balance of the game. It stands up to casual play, but with the cutthroat competitive nature state the game's entered now even the slightest misstep can mean devastation.

Hardcaps are pathetic. The way to prevent spam is to give each unit a distinctive strategic utility, making sure that small groups of units have the power to turn the tide.
This is how it works in Supreme Commander, arguably the game whose balance pattern Sins is trying to emulate.

Quite frankly, the key would be to move LRM and anti capital ships further back in the tech tree, or remove their anti-capital utility. LRMs simply allow too effective an assault to be made extremely early in the game, before defenses actually become cost effective.
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
But then just recently I've been playing games where people do nothing but spam. I'll admit to not being a "Pro" just yet, but I know most of the ins and outs of the game. It was me and my friend trying to hold back 1 Advent, that is right, 1 Advent, from destroying one of his planets. Now I had two Akkan class BC's (1 was level 4, the other only 2) where he had 2 Kol battleships. I had various numbers of Frigates and LRMs, as well did my friend. We try to attack yellow, and sure enough he has a massive spam force of Illuminatis and 1 Capital ship(forgot the name). Basically we outnumbered him, but some how he comes away with destroying BOTH my Capitals, the majority of my force, and forces my friend to retreat....how? We had frigates, LRMs, and a few flaks....a very mixed fleet that should have beaten any spammed force, but no, we lose.
End of quote


You and your ally must have sent in Cobalts, Javelis LRMs, 2 Kols and 2 Akkans to fight a huge force of Illuminators, Deceptive Illusions created by the Illums, and 1 capital ship. Deceptive Illusions are fake ships. They attract fire, but they aren't actually damaging anything. So your forces may have opened fire on them thinking they were Illums and actually hit nothing 60% of the time while the enemy shot you up. The enemy must've focused fire(to whatever extent possible using Illums) and knocked out your Akkans to prevent Targeting Uplink from ruining the illusion show. The only strange part is how the enemy got to Tier 5 and unlocked Illusions but didn't simply get the far more powerful Destra Crusader instead.

Since the enemy was Advent, the capital could also have had a big part to play. A Radiance could have used Animosity to attract a whole chunk of fire towards it or(if Level 6 or above) killed a ton of frigates in one shot using Cleansing Brilliance. A Progenitor Mothership could have used Malice to distribute damage over your weak-hulled frigates and kill them in masses. A Rapture Battlecruiser could've used Vertigo to make the Illums nearly impossible to hit and also protect itself a bit while lowering your DPS.
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top
The reason I think hardcaps were the best decision Relic made with DOW isn't a reason that necessarily applies to every video game out there.

The simple fact is that in DOW, some units should simply be better at EVERYTHING than any other unit. Units like Terminator Marines, if you want them to be even close to what they should be in the WH40K universe (which isn't necessarily a high priority of Relics, it seems. ^_^) should just be better at everything than a standard marine.

When you have a unit like that, I honestly don't know what you'd have to do to balance it enough to keep some players from spamming it.

Before you made it cost enough in whatever resources or time to keep it from being spammed, you'd have made it cost too much to be worth the price.

Hardcaps might be a heavy-handed way of balancing things, but games have been using them for decades. Why are video games any different?

Picture a game of chess where everyone could have as many queens as they wanted, and the only way to stop a player from having a full board of queens was to make pawns just as useful in certain circumstances. Now how stupid would that be?
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
Its all about hard counters. Thats a system of making certain units do extra or less damage to other certain unit types. Sins already has a very good hard counter system in place. Flack frigates are a medium to hard counter to long range frigates because they are much tougher, have a higher damage rating, do 100% damage to lrms, and lrms only do 75% damage to them. Fighters are a hard counter to LRM frigates as well since they do 200% damage to lrms and the lrms pretty much have no chance of hitting them (note you have to run your carriers in circles to keep them away from the LRM's). Its also about scouting. Scout frigates move around so well that you should always be able to tell what kind of fleet your opponent is putting together and build appropriate counters.

The only thing I could see changing is perhaps adding 50 credits and 5-10 crystal to the cost of long range frigates.

Another thing I will mention is that the Akkan cap ship isnt as good at supporting a fleet as the Dunov. Dunovs shield recharge is highly useful and its other powers are awesome as well. It excels at keeping other capital ships alive such as your friends Kol Battleships. Akkans have there uses as well but you shouldnt be building two of them before getting a Dunov or a killer like the Kol/Marza. Robotics cruisers are also essential to any TEC fleet. Tec is all about survivability through repair and shield recharge as well as missiles by the 100's. Vasari is about the raw power of their enforcers and long range phase missle frigates. Advent is more about shields, fighters, and awesome cap ship abilities.

happy hunting!
Reply #12 from Stardock Forums Top
You can't be serious. That's not strategy, it's asshattery.

I mean regarding certain units doing more damage than others to certain targets. It's a very simple, braindead way to artificially introduce strategy. Ships should have real tradeoffs but it should not be "This one kills this one and that one kills that one lol"
Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
Lol have you played a strategy game lately? Pretty much every rts has had some element of this. Even the great starcraft with its explosive, concussive, and splash damage types. The real world is even this way with aa emplacements > fighters > tanks > infantry etc etc. We cant even build a weapon that will do everything cause it wouldnt be cost effective.

If you DONT have a hard counter system in an rts then it becomes a stale game of research better do everything ship and spam spam spam. Your telling me that thats strategy? Lol
Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top
Ironic, since the simplistic rock-paper-scissors theory of game design is also what causes spam.

HARD counters suck far more than hard caps. Soft counters are a natural occurrence and are obviously part of any wargame, but make them too hard and too artificial and it's just stupid.

God save me from the light scout trooper that can't be scratched by the uber-tank-killing laser, just because it's made for killing uber-tanks and not wimpy little scouts. (I'm not making that one up, either.)
Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top
Ironic, since the simplistic rock-paper-scissors theory of game design is also what causes spam.
End of quote


Not really. A very strong RPS system is one way to ensure that a balanced force is the best choice. (The Total War mod Samurai Wars is a good example of this, if you've ever played it.) The problem of this approach, of course, is that a balanced force is the _only_ valid choice. This is also the problem with hard unit caps.

IMO a good RTS game is a mix of all of these approaches. It needs soft counters for flexibility, hard counters to make scouting and force composition more important, and hard unit caps to provide flavor in the form of hero or elite units.

Making a balanced force always the best choice is a rather boring design decision, and doesn't fit RTS games unless they're tactics only, like Total War. Good scouting and map control need to be rewarded more than just passively building a balanced fleet.
Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top
IMO a good RTS game is a mix of all of these approaches. It needs soft counters for flexibility, hard counters to make scouting and force composition more important, and hard unit caps to provide flavor in the form of hero or elite units.

Making a balanced force always the best choice is a rather boring design decision, and doesn't fit RTS games unless they're tactics only, like Total War. Good scouting and map control need to be rewarded more than just passively building a balanced fleet.
End of quote
Are you suggesting a non-extremist viewpoint? Blasphemy!!

^_^

Seriously, best opinion in the thread.

Reply #17 from Sins Forums Top
IMO a good RTS game is a mix of all of these approaches. It needs soft counters for flexibility, hard counters to make scouting and force composition more important, and hard unit caps to provide flavor in the form of hero or elite units.
End of quote


I agree with most but quibble a bit with the hard cap part. Sins already has a "hard cap" for Caps, it requires research before you can build more ships. This makes it possible to have all-caps ship (was quite fun getting my 'Go big or go home' badge) but not without work.

As far as lesser units, a similar type of "cap" can be implemented by tweaking metal, crystal and fleet points required for ships. Increase any of them too much and it starts getting too expensive to bother, you limit the number of that ship by making it not worth over-producing them.

For damage units (like LRFs) that's hard to control since damage always "stacks" but for the support units, an excess of the support units only provides for losses. For example, multiple guardians don't "stack" (a unit can only benefit from one at a time) but a smart player can micro and fire them off one at a time, having extras to cover losses.
Reply #18 from Sins Forums Top
There are many, many threads discussion how to counter Ilum spam, we don't need another.
End of quote


Malekish, you're a very rude person. Speak for yourself and don't use the word "we".
Reply #19 from Sins Forums Top
I can just imagine the captain in charge of Pearl harbour on the morning of the attack, complaining about the spam of approx 100 Najakima B5Ns shredding through his fleet in minutes.

It's just not fair...
Reply #20 from Sins Forums Top
I think the most simplistic way of stopping this from happening is A either making the LRMs/Illumiantors etc etc alot mroe expensive, or increase their pop to like 8 each instead of 4...
Illuminsators do get really REALLY rediculous especially. I have seen illuminsators to have upwards to 25 dmg.. Thats rediculous.. That is outdoing damage on a Kodaiak heavy crusier.. Hell the Advents heavy crusier with the energy aura I have seen do 35 dmg.
Reply #21 from Sins Forums Top
I'm sure England told Germans during World War I to stop spamming U-boats like noobs! Even thou they were effective. And then they told God to nerf them.
Reply #22 from Sins Forums Top
Now for my serious response.

I'm sure this will be looked at and am pretty sure the logistic costs of ships will be tweaked somewhat, along with their weaponry/tanking so that it makes sense to fight with some sort of mixed fleets.

It will never get rid of the spams but may lessen it somewhat.

The fleet logistics costs is a great idea and maybe could be even more severe.

It would also be cool if we could have options in the future to limit the number of certain ships to force us to play in a certain way.

Just some thoughts...
Reply #23 from Sins Forums Top
Germans probably complained about Russia and USA spamming them with Shermans and T-variants during WW2
Reply #24 from Sins Forums Top
People spam for two reasons.

1) It's effective,

2) they suck

In SOSE, people spam for reason #2. Yes, it's annoying to have to counterspam, but what can you do? You can't force people to not spam. The best option is to simply play against better players...
Reply #25 from Sins Forums Top
Doeden, here's what you did wrong:

1) You had no support/healing/repairing ships supporting your fleet. Next time get a Dunov or some robotiks cruisers.

2) You had 2 Akkan capital ships (these things fall apart easily). You have to park them in the middle of a fight for all their weapons banks to fire, and that leaves you open to multiple illuminator hits since they shoot out their sides as well as fronts.

3) You were fighting Advent, which normally puts some sort of damage propagation (Progenitor Mothership does this) or attack-counter damage (Rapture Battleship does this) on your ships so that damage is spread out across all your vessels regardless of if they're getting hit or not. Advent has some of the nastiest and most effective abilities in the game.

Next time consider having a mix of attack and support units. Try a Kol and a Dunov, put more flaks in your fleet (flaks counter illuminators and LRM's), or consider using a Sova for it's heavy fighters and missile platforms (fighters will counter illuminators and LRM's).

Personally, I like it when people spam me because it's so easy for me to counter since I normally build my ships using the "just in time" business model (little inventory, but the moment there's a need I churn out ships every couple seconds from multiple locations).

There is no need to change the long range frigates in this game. There are plenty of ways to deal with them.