Part 1: The Aggresive Dismantle

Here Stormer does what Gooseberry has dubbed "an aggresive dismantle" Stormer won a battle over his HW and moved the remaining 9 ships South to Gamma Leporis in attempt to attack Sigma. Hastur responds by building 6 br 3 satellites and is set to build at least 4 more the turn Stormer would of moved in. Normally an empire would throw their ships at this satellite wall and destroyed as many ships as they can. Stormer however dismantles his whole fleet without even so much as marring one of the shiny new satellites.

The next turn, Hastur has 10 satellites over his system. Even though Satellites are cheap, they are not free, so now Hastur is using 40 more minerals a turn than Stormer, who a few turns later hits br 4. Stormer now sends a few attacks down to Gamma and launches one or two at a time at the wall. This does 2 things. It prevents Hastur from dismantling and overbuilding an attack fleet, and it forces Hastur to build a little less in order to keep his Maintainance ratio a little over 1.00 to allow his satellites to heal to full br.

Part 2: Satellite hampered defense

Turn 0: Underpowered ship distraction

About 10 turns later, Hastur dismantles his sat wall and launches an attack on Stormer's HW. Stormer has managed to colonize a little faster than Hastur due to a stargate, thus has a slight econ edge. Stormer wins the battle and immediatly launches a counterattack with 10 br 4 ships. Again Hastur defends with satellites, Stormer wins but has 6 ships left at a pitiful br .(0.055)

Stormer sets the 5 attacks and 1 sweeper to nuke and builds 4 attacks and a colony in his HW. Hastur could destroy Stormer's fleet with 1 br 1 ship, but must defend as if they were going to be at full br

Turn 1: Another defensive stance

This time Hastur defends with 5 satellites and a mine, so Hastur was either unsure of Stormer's br or wasn't able to build all the ships at full br so he was going after the minesweeper. Either way he destroys Stormers fleet but is now strapped with ships he cannot move or counterattack with. This is one of the biggest disadvanteges of satellites, it is important to take surviving attacks and go harrass the enemy, but it is just not possible with satellites. Stormer prepares to move the 4 attacks and colony to Gamma so he can use this system as a stargate jump point for his next attack.

Turn 3: Jump point secured

I is now two updates later. Stormer moved south and Hastur neither built more satellites, nor attacks to prevent Stormer from colonizing Gamma Leporis. Stormer is feeling a little more confident now, since he knows Hastur will not be able to select engineers till br 5 since he already has mines, satellites, minesweepers and terraformers. Hastur does not know that Stormer has a Stargate, therefore he has no reason to build up another satellite wall, which would cost him tech if Stormer did not attack. Since Hastur has nothing but 5 satellites, and 1 minefield, Stormer feels safe in leaving the 4 attacks in Gamma Leporis as he overbuilds a huge fleet and stargates it to Gamma.

Stormer knows that Hastur can only build a max of 5-6 br 4 satellites in one turn without overbuilding, so Stormer builds 11 ships, added to the 4 in Gamma would give him a 15 to 12 advantage the next turn, asssumming Hastur doesn't anticipate the threat and build more this turn.

Turn 4: Suprise!

Hastur only builds a single colony for a total of 7 ships. Stormer goes from 4 attacks to 15 ships in one turn courtesy of the stargate and now is the dilemma. If Hastur had 6 attacks and one colony, he could move them back one turn as he overbuilt to match or beat Stormer's fleet and probably could of done it. However, since the satellites stay put. He only has one choice, to build as much as he can w/o overbuilding. If he tried to build, say 15 attacks in another system, his satellites would get wiped out as Stormer moved in and he would have to build without the benifeit of of 40 minerals used to maintain 6 br 4 sats and 1 br 1 mine. But since Stormer is threatening with more ships than hastur can build in one turn, Hastur has no choice but to build as many satellites as he can and hope he can take out both sweepers in stormers fleet.

This is how satellites can actually hamper defense. If your opponent builds a wall, merely dismantle and allow your tech to increase faster than theirs. If they don't build enough satellites, they cost precious minerals during a defensive overbuild and will be destoyed as the invading fleet moves in..