The answer to scout spam is your own scout spam.
Yep, it's that simple. You see, then you BOTH of you will have absolutely worthless fleets.
Ok, now that I have your attention. I believe everyone knows that Raging Amish is the guy that first had the idea to spam scouts and use to attack. HE ALSO DIDN'T KEEP SPAMMING THEM AFTER HE HAD LABS FOR BETTER UNITS. If you have the labs, and have done the research, for the love of all that is sacred, please, please, give me a challenge and spam a better unit. Carriers, flak, or LRFs, they're all good.
I just got done playing a game where the guy had about 10 disciples and 15 illums. I don't know why, but he switched to scouts...SCOUTS!!! If you can already make illums, for pete sake, make illums.
Scouts are good against one thing...LRFs (and structures every 10 min if you're TEC). Do not make tons of scouts 45min into the game unless all you have to your name is a roid and a frigate factory. If you have any labs at all, build a ship that can fight against more than one thing.
This is the way Amish intended it: spam scouts early, then upgrade to better ships. I think 99% of scout spammers are missing the second part.
That it all.
[DT]Howthe?
EDIT: This is not a post to tell everyone that scouts are OP, or blah blah blah. This post is to get people to do it smarter.
I still spam scouts. Good meat shields and can kill even capital ships when you have 80+ pretty fast. Can block jump lanes as well.
Vasari & TEC scout spam has a hard time keeping up with Advent scout spam -- nevermind that the Vasari scout is 3 fleet supply, so you just won't be able to make as many ships without crippling yourself by increasing capacity early. The Advent scout is the most bang for the buck for combat while the other scouts have better utility features. This is all a non issue as you get a big enough balanced fleet, but it can be hard to get there when under pressure from Advent scout spam. As soon as they force you to start spending money on static defenses, you have lost the expansion war.
And I don't need anyone to tell me that they have no problem dealing with scouts, I normally don't either. The only reason I have this opinion is probably because I was smurfed by JJ or some other veteran a couple times so I got to see how hard it is to deal with....
When noobs copy better players .
I remember I got scout rushed by a smurf (and hit badly) , but he was content in making nothing but scouts . I decided to make Starbase in every gravwell because he never capatilised
If you had the resources to SB all those planets, why didn't you just build up a fleet of LFs and Flak instead?
Though there's a fantastic way to counter a scout spam that few people realize... there's a mysterious unit right next to the scout build icon. Just press it about 5-10 times, and the scout spam is gone.
In large number numbers, even pressing that button 5-10 times isn't enough. Once scouts reach critical mass, a SB really is your best bet.
Not to take anything away from Amish, but he isn't the only one to have this idea. Ages ago I spent a substantial amount of time and energy on scout spam. This was way back when everyone was doing lrm spam, and even when everyone switched to carrier spam for all those months. I concluded separately from Cykur above that the Advent scout was best (ater testing all 3 scouts with a private LAN). I then tried to figure out which research I should go for to beef up the scout to get most bang for the buck (at the time I believe it was shield). I then did quite a bit of scout spamming online, under smurf accounts as well as my "real" account. At the time, I saw no one else doing this but me, so it was an original idea. I even had people laughing at me, calling me a "newb" for spamming "crappy scouts," not that I cared in the slightest.
I'd have 50 or so scouts spammed within the first few minutes of the game. In would roll my opponent's lrm or illum spam, which is exactly what I was waiting for. My results? Not good. I don't think I was ever able to win many, if any games, using this strategy. The problem at the time was that just a few light frigs thrown in by my opponent, or the presence of his capship, would shred all my scouts. I eventually gave up on the idea of spamming scouts. This was all well before I ever saw this dude Amish posting on these forums.
So just today, even before seeing this post, I see Amish's recorded scout spam game, and I download and watch it. He did pretty much the same thing I used to do, except of course that it worked for him. My question is... why?
Of course, I know that Amish is a much better player than me, but that doesn't appear to be why his scout spam worked. It seems his scouts were more effective, less affected by the presence of enemy capships and light frigs, etc. My question is, has there been any scout buff which suddenly made this a more viable strat? Was it a substantial buff or just a slight one? Or has some other dynamic changed which has had the effect of a scout buff (an indirect scout buff, if you will)?
Thanks.
Scout spam combined with light frigate spam is becoming entirely too prominent. It takes all the skill of a trained monkey and practically no effort to do. I have always been against scouts being used as an offensive unit other than scouting and minesweeping. When combined with discs, it removes a good amount of its counters(namely flak and carriers to be killed with LF and lrf to be killed with the scouts. The options you have left to counter are annoying in of themselves. You either go pure light frigate(yay for spam), shoot straight for HC(not optimal unless you have a good amount of feed and all your opponent has to do is build a carrier cap or couple of carriers to pick your few measly HC off), or build an SB which is basically only a stopgap solution since they can go around(and can be crushed while building under the weight of the silly amounts of scouts). And yes, they can totally block a cap and other units from attempting to flee by pure mass(try moving a cap when surrounded by 50+ scouts, it sucks). All this has the benefit of being no labs to do so if you even so much as think to build labs to do something else you will be behind the 8 ball in catching up to spam(1 lab = about 8-10 scouts). LRF do not need another counter. They have several already(SB, fighters, masses of flak, HC, other lrf). Scouts are unnecessary as a counter. They should be removed as such but I find it highly unlikely that they will be.
[_]-Greyfox
lets look at the alternative when facing someone who went pure lums at the start.
If tec you have a few cobalts and maybe a few lrms. You will instantly lose the first fight. What are your options now. Building flak will just delay your defeat and next battle you will most likely lose your cap cause thats the first thing they will aim for. Flak would've worked if you made them from the start but you didnt. Flak with hosh doesnt really kill much unless again u started making this combo from the start. Doesnt reach a critical mass effect until you have 30+ flak with 10+ hosh. Good luck trying to kill their cap with that fleet. You can try to build air, but you will be behind cause they take so long to make and are expensive. HC will take too long too make and the since he has lums already he can make carriers with bombers. Spam lrms. Will advents have the best lrms for the buck. You will lose badly. Turtle with turrets and repair. This allows your opponent to expand, so it just delays your defeat.
Vas. You have more assailants then he has lums. You may think you can win but you will lose. Pray u have neutrals so you can try to quickly make carriers. Assailants may be a nice lvl 1 tech, but against lums you will lose badly. You can switch to flak, but they secretly nerfed charged missle ability. Yes they did. Equal amount of vas flak (with charged missle) vs lums and vas won, but not anymore. You need a greater amount of flak now. Vas has the WEAKEST HC in the game. Options would be to SB your planet, try to expand and build a fleet thats bigger then his cause none your units are stronger.
For Advent if you didnt lum spam for the start you are behind. Trying to quickly produce lums now means you will lose. Most lum spammers will have 2 or 3 carriers to protect their lums from air. You can try to hold him off with Flak, but that wont threaten him. Most will wait till they have mass diciples before attacking you again.
Scouts can only kill lrf effectively. Makes a lum spammer cry cause now they cant mindlessly just make 50+ lums and 2-3 carriers. Whoa they have to actually start playing the game now and make other units other then just lums.
JJ, I take it you don't think spamming scouts and LF to be mindless spam as I have see you do such on multiple occasions. As mentioned there are already many counters to LRF. Scouts aren't needed.
I could sarcastically say the same for you when you scout and LF spam.
Which arent as good as scouts! As mentioned before only thing scouts can kill are other scouts and lums.
Grey all you play IS advent and do lums with some carriers. You beat I do scouts and lf. Why? 90% of advent do lum spam.
I don't do just illums with carriers. What I do is largely dependant on what my enemy is doing. If my enemy builds a SB then I dont build much illums at all unless I am gonna get a huge ball of them to take it down but instead I build carriers. If my enemy is building lrf, then I will build illums and maybe carriers but maybe flak or a few guardians. If my enemy is building scout spam then I try to go HC if I can manage it, if not then I get discs. Sometimes in this case I get a SB but I prefer not since it isnt mobile enough. Tyr is the illum spammer you are thinking of. When he plays advent, he 90% of the time gets illum spam with as much upgrades as he can.
Scouts do really only good against lrf but thats not the problem. The problem is scouts combined with LF. LF removes a lot of the counters for scout spam(flak and carriers namely). Plus, neither take a lab at all to build. It is a very boring and annoying thing to fight against. It can be done certainly but it takes the fun out of the game.
Dont know about you but I have lots of fun taking on lum spammers
sorry grey but i have to agree with JJ on this one. while Vas don't get them, scouts and LF are a great stratagy for taking out illum spammers. they are quite counterable just like any other unit combo. advent have the easyest time with it because they almost always get 3 labs so getting carriers with their illums isnt hard.
Really it comes down to now, good advent players cant set all keys to build illums then smash their head on their keyboard, game after game and still end up winning 90% of the time.
_|~Uber
You replace one spam with another. It is not an improvement since it takes no effort at all to mass scouts and LF. It's just worse.
It is because eventually both sides will have a balance fleet in the end. The game doesnt end with lum spam.
lrf < scouts < lf < lrf < carriers or hc or maybe more scouts or support units.
cobalt spam is better than scout spam because scouts have an average damage of 2, and take 2 supply, cobalts average 10 damage and take 5 supply, cobalts are twice as efficient, but with research I prefer javelis LRM spam, they do more damage over all, longer range, and take less supply. I can have up to 500 of those suckers.
Dude, this thread came before the scout nerf.
NECRO!
This takes me back. Good old Raging Amish and his Seeker shenanigans.
Also, RHEmpire, there's more to damage dealt than just the number on the card.
There have been a lot of necros lately.
oh
All the new ones coming in.
For years people have been bashing advent with (noob tubers) phase missiles and tec missile spam calling themselves space ponies..when once in a while a Skilled advent player blows there strategy to pieces with advent scouts (point intended since the devs buffed them so much) they scream foul. Frankly speaking anyone who is against advent scout spam *early in the game* is a tard.
Jedi noobs spaming lrm is not skill. Opening with halcyon(s) for bombers,push to deal with fighter counters, Spamming scouts to counter lrm then to add desciples to counter flak and starbases-by then setup up a trade network-then to counter lf with illums is skill.
Lol they all say:
"OMG your such a rusher noob "
"Don't you need a license to be that annoying"
"He's not stupid; he's possessed by a retarded ghost."
Which translates to: "This game is stupid, trees shouldn't be cut down by bullets"
Yes-you chopped leg off with that one Grey.
I have a word for advent scouts --i call them unicorns.
there much better than your space ponies
best necro i've seen...LOL this was a long time ago.
Holy crap, how did this thread pop up again?
Someone must have been lurking deep inside the archives.
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