Strategies

There are many different ways to play the game and a variety of cunning **strategies** to defeat the opposing team. Various tips and strategies specific to individual ships and other game concepts appear throughout this wiki, this page discusses some of the more general tactics.

## Teaming up

Fundamentally warin.space is a team game, and players which work together will easily beat a disorganized team. Forming a fleet of ships that stays in close proximity to each other has several advantages:

* Grouped ships are able to eliminate individual ships rapidly, before they are able to seriously damage even one ship in the group.

* Many passive and active skills have a limited area of effect within which all allies will receive a positive bonus. Because these effects don't dilute, it is advantageous to be boosting as many of one's allies as possible. Healing effects stack, and if a fleet contains multiple ships with the *area shield* or *area damage buff* these ships can co-ordinate to have the whole fleet effectively permanently possessing this bonus (see Perma-shielding below).
* Well organized fleets can protect weaker ships behind heavier ships, allowing all ships to participate in an assault. Even more well organized fleets will cycle through ships on the front line, retreating them once they are damaged, allowing them to heal just behind the front line.

There is no disadvantage unless you play it wrong such as attacking Tier 4 Ships by using Tier 1 Ship. Players can gain scrap from opponents' ships by assisting or finishing opponents' ships when their ships are destroyed.

**How effectively teams coordinate fleet battle will determine the outcome of the game. The better-coordinated team will invariably win.**

Given the limited communication options in warin.space, forming a fleet and then moving as a unit is one of the biggest challenges of the game.

Remember: Power in numbers!

### Countering

Once formed, squads are difficult to break up. The only serious counter is to form an opposing squad and engage in a direct firefight.

When doing this, a few ships flanking the opponent can be especially effective. Flanking attacks can pick off enemy support ships that are hiding behind their heavier allies.

Another way is to use turrets to eliminate the support ships behind the front line. This can be done by using M.O.D.s, D.O.D.s, or Alerts to place turrets behind the enemy fleet. This can do serious damage to the enemy's support ships, and can sometimes annihilate weaker fleets.

## Dying a Glorious Death

The goal of an attack on the enemy base is to inflict damage on the enemy' base. Generally, this involves some form of suicide. The most efficient way to inflict damage on an opponent's' base is to position your ship directly on top of the enemy base, and fire continuously until you die. When on top of an opponent's base you inflict little or no damage to enemy ships, since the majority of your fire scores hits on the base. Enemy ships get a shield bonus when on top of their own base. So you won't survive for long; but at least you are inflicting damage that counts.

All too often, large fleets battle their way across the board only to stall against a wall of constantly respawning enemy ships without inflicting any damage on the enemy base. The solution to this problem is to leap across the wall of defenders onto the enemy base so that your death has purpose. A Wall in the fleet can be very effective, since a Wall can give shields to all ships in the fleet. Wait for your Wall to raise shields, and then leap across the enemy line en masse.

If you are attacking with other teammates, you want stack ships on top of each other on the enemy base, as this increases the damage-to-base/damage-received ratio for all of the stacked ships, particularly if one of the ships in the stack can raise shields (Wall, or Bully).

### Countering

It's possible to inflict some damage on the enemy base from a distance; but if there is an enemy ship between your ship and the enemy base you will not inflict any damage on the base. This fact guides defense strategy. It's better to interpose your ship between an enemy and your own base and die than it is to let an enemy ship fire on your base unmolested. Dead ships respawn, but damage to your base does not.

When defending against fleet attacks, enemy ship that are on top of your base should be a priority attack target.

## Creating a Fleet

Each ship can do better than others in specific ways. Specific ships will make a simple team self-sustainable and become a fearsome group, a Fleet.

Ships that have buffs that affect all ships in the fleet become more and more valuable as the number of ships in the fleet increases. Particularly valuable are Healers and Doctors, which heal all ships in range; Walls which give shied buffs to all ships in range; and B.R.U.C.E. which gives a damage buff to all ships in range that provides enough firepower to blast through opposing fleets that would otherwise be deadlocked.

Fleet attacks constitute the bulk of strategy in Warin.Space. The larger a fleet is, and the more compact it is, the better it is. It's been said before, but it can't be said enough. The team that can more effectively assemble attack fleets is usually the team that wins.

But composition matters. A good fleet needs heavy ships with good shielding (Bruiser, Bully or Wall) to form the front line of the fleet, and from Tier 3 on, require one or more healers (Healer, Doctor, Mechanic) to be viable. Other ships bring unique features to the fleet that can be devastating but really only come into their own once the basic provisioning of the fleet (shielding and healing) has been provided.

Fleet formation can be challenging in Warin.Space because communication is extremely limited. A good rule of thumb for beginners is to look for experienced players on your team, and stick with them. Ships with trails, or expensive decorations like the Commander tag, or the Worf Mustache are a reasonable indication of an experienced player, so watch out for those and follow them. After that, the more decoration a ship has, the more likely it is to be a ship you want to follow. You can also look for team members that are high on the leaderboard. Chances are very good that you want to follow a teammate who is high on the leaderboard.

Players will often use one of the smile emoticons to signal to other teammates that they either want to form a fleet, or are going to join a existing fleet.

Fleet strategy varies as the game progresses.

Early in the game, players are competing for scrap in order to build and level their ships up. There's pressure to spread out in order to find scrap that hasn't previously been scavenged. But even then, it's best to hang out in loose packs of ships so that you can outnumber packs of enemy ships that you encounter while scavenging. In the mid and late game, you get progressively more scrap from killing other ships; so it becomes increasingly more important to form large tight fleets.

Base attacks aren't that important in the early game. Tier 1 ships don't do that much damage to the base.

If you have a tier 2 ship you might take a break from hunting scrap to attack the enemy base if you find you have an opportunity to do so.

In the mid game, as more and more players have Tier 3 ships, base attacks start to matter. Although fleets are primarily concerned with attacking enemy ships, a fleet that finds itself close to the enemy base might attack the base.

In the late game, when more and more players have Tier 4 ships, base attacks are the primary concern (although killing enemy ships on the way to the enemy base is important too).

The key to attacking bases with a fleet is recognizing that you do little or no damage to the base unless you are right on top of the base. So the goal of a fleet attack on an enemy base is to get the entire fleet on top of the enemy base where it's dealing damage to the base rather than enemy ships. If you're facing a wall of defenders, you are almost definitely doing no damage. So if you see an opportunity to move onto the enemy base, jump on it!

The majority of play mid- and late-game play in a Warin.Space involves large fleets from each team doing battle down the center of the map between bases, either for kills, or as attack on the base. More subtle gameplay might involve trying to run a smaller fleet of five or six ships down the left or right side of the map in order to avoid congestion in the center. Or using one of the advanced strategies given below.

### Fleet Composition By Tier

Tier 2 Fleet

Tier 3 Fleet

Tier 4 Fleet

## Turret bases

Multiple turrets concentrated in one place are a potent threat. If their combined damage rate is enough, they can reach the firepower of a whole fleet of ships and be similarly effective.

A common tactic is for D.O.D.s and Alerts to begin building multiple turrets near the edge of the map, building it up such that by the time the enemy base drifts close, the turret nest is formidable and able to seriously damage the enemy's base.

Because turrets naturally decay, the most effective turret nests are supported by Mechanics who drop occasional healing pods to repair the turrets.

A large turret nest may deal hundreds or even thousands of points in damage as an enemy base passes by, and sometimes can destroy a base with full health.

A less common, but nonetheless very effect strategy is to place a turret nest at or near the center of the map away from the path of the bases. The turret nest essentially controls the center of the map, dominating all traffic that passes through or near the center of the board with withering fire, and provides a safe assembly point for fleets that will travel deeper into enemy territory and a destination to retreat to when retreat is necessary.

### Countering

Turret bases are only dangerous once they have reached a critical mass which can only achieve by the help of Mechanic, so the best counter is to prevent their formation. A few heavy ships patrolling the edges of the map can destroy turret bases before they are built up enough to become a threat.

The Shogun and Sniper can easily destroy a turret base made of basic or advanced turrets, being able to fire on the base while remaining outside the turrets' range. The Wurship's skill damage in radius can slowly damage and destroy advanced turrets near the edge of a turret base. This use of a Wurship is rarely effective if player's defend the turrets.

If Turret bases become a serious problem, they can still be destroyed by using a Fleet. Wall does greatly help destroying Turret bases.

## Suicide Attack

A suicide attack is an attack on the enemy base by an individual ship or small squad. Instead of fighting their way forward, the raiders sneak or speed through/around the enemy fleet. Such ships are usually destroyed quickly at the enemy base, but not before doing a small amount of damage.

Though such attacks are likely to only do a small amount of damage to an per run, repeated attacks may prove decisive in games where the main battle has reached a stalemate.

Stealths are the quintessential raiders, being able use their unique ability to approach the enemy base in an invisible and invulnerable. The Doctor can also be used as decent raider, using the speed part of its *Burst heal and speed* skill to race through or around the enemy defensive line. The Shogun can also be as a raider because of it's speed.

A successful suicide run typically deals 50 to 100 points of damage to the enemy base per run. But a single ship running continuous suicide attacks from the mid-game (Tier 3) onward can easily inflict 1500 points in damage over the course of a game, which is more than enough to determine the outcome of many games.

### Countering

Stealth ships cannot be prevented from reaching the base, but their damage can be limited by having a high-damage ship (such as a Bully, a Moth) on defense to destroy raiders quickly.

Turrets along the attack path of Doctors that are using suicide attacks can significantly reduce the damage inflicted, but not eliminate it altogether.

If the damage-per-raid is kept low, a Mechanic continuously dropping healing pods on the base may be able to negate the damage. Otherwise the only effective counter is to destroy the raider's base before their continuous attacks destroy yours.

## Team Suicide Attack

A Team Suicide Attack is an attack on the enemy base with help of Doctors' speed buff. Instead of dying alone, teaming up with heavy ships can deal devastating damage. Doctors can tow slow heavy ships such as The Bully or Wall from base to base along the right edge of the map using their speed buff, thereby avoiding heavy congestion that usually occurs in the center. The Doctor can tow heavy ships from base to base in two or three speed buffs. The final speed buff should be used to tow heavy ships right onto the enemy base. A doctor alone can inflict about 100 points of damage a run in the middle game. A doctor and a Bully or a Wall can inflict 400 or 500 points a run, and can sometimes single-handedly win a game. A doctor and two heavy ships can deal even more damage, and end a game quickly.

Bullys and Walls should save their shield buff if possible for the final speed buff onto the base in order to make it past defenders close to the enemy base.

If Bullys or Walls are not available, Doctors can also team up with Stealths or other Doctors by stacking their attacks. A Doctor or Stealth alone can typically deal 50 to 100 points of base damage per run. A pair of ships will deal about 100 to 150 points each because they will live longer if they can stack on top of each other on the enemy base.

Team Suicide Attacks are also very effective when conducted by a Healer and Bruiser in the middle game (Tier 3).

### Countering

Suicide attacks are difficult to defend against. Usually the best counter is to respond with your own suicide attacks.

In the late game when most ships are Tier 4, an effective counter strategy is to attack the incoming ships before shields are raised on the final speed buff, so that their shields are at least partly depleted when they arrive on the base.

## Wall Shielding

A group of 3 or more Walls can be very hard to defeat. Walls are able to repeatedly use their *Area Shield* skill and provide a temporary shield to themselves and their nearby teammates. Now if all three (or more) Walls were to use their shield ability one after another, they would provide a non-stop shield for teammates.

As any nearby teammates who aren't Walls will also benefit from this, this strategy is helpful in getting groups of teammates close together, helpful in attacking other large groups of enemies, and is helpful for attacking the enemy's base.

An equivalent "perma" effect can also be achieved with the *Area damage buff* skill.

## End-Game Attacks

In the late end game, most ships are Tier 4 ships. Fleet attacks through the center of the map tend to founder on walls of constantly-re-spawning defenders.

In order to end a match, players need to break-through opponent's defense. The Doctor, Mechanic or Stealth is required to break-through the re-spawning defense.

Another way to end a match is using a M.O.D, D.O.D, or Alert, either by itself or supported by allies to quickly place a turret inside the enemy base, the quickly retreat. This method is very tedious, but can finish a low health base, and is pretty much impossible to counter effectively.

## Using The Moth

The Moth, when in possession of a large compliment of upgraded advanced drones, deals the most damage-per-second in the game. Thus it can be a powerful asset to its team. However building this many advanced drones costs thousands of scrap, and all of this investment is lost if the Moth is destroyed.

Therefore The Moth can be considered the "glass cannon" of warin.space, powerful but fragile. Players playing as the Moth should take extra care to avoid dying once they start building drones, and team-mates should protect their potent but vulnerable asset. Moths should be priorities for healing ships (such as The Doctor and Mechanics), and should be allowed to retreat behind heavier team-mates when engaging the enemy.

On the other hand, Shogun also has drones as same as The Moth but Shogun are limited to five drones. The scrap waste upon death is not as significant and their continuous fire power are not high compared to others so Shogun is not in top priority ships for being healed.

### Countering

Because of the above, targeting Moths with several drones should be a priority when engaging an enemy fleet. Players may also be wise to target any support ships aiding a Moth.