Getting an edge in frigate spam

[Valki]

Say me and my opponents are engaged in a frigate spam war, and say that my opponent is at a slight advantage. Maybe I am Aeon and he is Cybran, maybe he has slightly better economy.

(I usually play Aeon by the way)

What can you do to get ahead in frigate wars?

• Focus fire in large frigate engagements?
• Build Torpedo defense and bait the enemy navy?
• Use bombers (with EMP)?
• Switch to submarine production?

[keyser]

take fight near your naval production = more unit faster.
and reclaim closer to you, so you can take advantage in eco and in frigate number.

don't use T1 sub, only on map where there is under water mexx.

cybran frigate has good aa, air would be no use. or only T1 bomber well used.

T1 torpedo is un-likelly to work, or he need to feel like he needs to attack. if he has more eco, he doesn't need to attack.

i don't really know how to make frigate vs frigate micro. you want to have the most of your frigate to shoot at the same time, and the less of his frigate. so i would say use attack move. but then your frigate stack up, and there is aoe damage... so try to have them close together but not stack up... best way is to use terrain at your advantage. ie, set up a better concave (white fire, try to fight him while he is in the channel, but then reclaim is closer to him, so it might not be the better solution on this map. Only if you know you can rape his navy with yours, but it isn't the situation you are describing.)

not sure if focus fire is good way to do it...

[Valki]

take fight near your naval production = more unit faster.
don't use T1 sub, only on map where there is under water mexx.

But is it better to lose navy completely than to build subs? I'm talking about a situation where I am slowly losing the frigate war.
Or will I still lose with subs?

[Reaper Zwei]

But is it better to lose navy completely than to build subs? I'm talking about a situation where I am slowly losing the frigate war.
Or will I still lose with subs?

well you don't want to lose navy but building subs is a lot of the time not going to help stop you from losing, in fact it probably does the opposite causes you to lose navy faster.

Think of it this way: Your putting more mass into a unit that has less DPS than frigates and takes around a minute to kill them. Sure the frigates cant target your subs but they can do a lot of damage to you before the subs chew through all the HP.

[Valki]

So all I can do is try to get a favorable engagement from terrain.

And I could probably try to find a place where my commander can engage the enemy frigates and/or soak up some enemy frigate fire.

[pip]

You can build a couple subs for support, but not spam subs.
You can try to use the range advantage of Aeon frigates, even if it's not easy.
You should have your ACU in water and reclaim with him near your naval yard, and with that extra mass, you can get back on the frigate spam. If ACU can be targeted by frigate and can shoot due to shallow waters, yeah, soak up some damages and try to OC nearest frigates.
Try to harass your opponent with some auroras where his frigates are not, and force him to build bombers / mantis, or to divide his own frigates.

[Hascins]

Related question: What if my opponent spams subs? And I did spam frigs...when navy meets i recognize that. What to do?

[Zock]

kill his navy buildpower with your frigs or retreat them to safety if that's not possible and go t2. If he tries to kill your buildpower with his subs, defend with torp launchers until you have your first destroyer.

Subs are not as bad as keyser says though.

[Ceneraii]

Depends on map, but usually you kill his navy production, spread them to attack vulnerable mexes and then pull back your frigates, make a t1 torp launcher or two near your production (they shred subs)
and go for tech 2 navy, starting out with a subhunter or two if available, then destroyer. Alternatively you can groundfire t1 bombers (send them in pairs; they will oneshot the subs)

[Kalvirox]

don't use T1 sub, only on map where there is under water mexx.

I do love it when he build like 6 subs and I have 8-9 frigates.. He tries to kill my frigs but they take so long to die I just rally all of my naval facs to his naval facs and spam frigates faster than he can kill them...

Oh, good times