Question- did you actually read my post? I wasn't defending his strategy, I was ripping it in half!
Please don't quote me quoting someone else unless you include my response.
"I used to advocate playing with no minefields, but I guess without them early swarms would be hard to handle."
It's handleable. WPs are the cheapest alternative. You might loose a colony or two, maybe a some minor damage to your homeworld, but if he hasn't been expanding and the attack fleet gets fried, he just wasted a LOT of time and effort.
The WPs are also cheaper to build, so you can have more of them per the same time period. And it doesn't take more to kill the offensive he described. Hell, even speed 6 CSMI ships will do- one of them can kill 3-4 of his "assult ships" if you remeber to select max range.
Phoenix-D