Special Forces guard posts - Kill them or leave them alive?

[Fluffiest]

I must admit, I'm not entirely sure of the effect that Special Forces guard posts have. I know that they have pitifully short-ranged weapons and cause +1 AIP on death, so that seems to be an argument for leaving them alive; but I also seem to recall hearing that killing them off reduces the maximum size and replenishment rate of the Special Forces.

Does anyone know exactly how much of an impact killing one SFGP has on the Special Forces?

Do people generally recommend killing these things or leaving them alive?

[Faulty Logic]

Each SF post in your territory (or neutral planets) raises the maximum allowed SF strength by 5% (linear).

Killing the posts in AI territory reduces the rate at which new SF ships are added.

I recommend leaving them alive.

Edit: all of them.

[TechSY730]

Each SF post in your territory (or neutral planets) raises the maximum allowed SF strength by 5% (linear).

Killing the posts in AI territory reduces the rate at which new SF ships are added.

I recommend leaving them alive.

This. Leave them alive on AI planets, take them out if on a non-AI planet. Though with a linear 5% increase, you can afford to leave a few on your territory alive.

[Diazo]

It is not that simple as they are reinforcement gates.

You have a behind the lines system that you want to pull your defenses out of to add more defenses to your border worlds? That SF post has to go, otherwise you'll find your command station that system quickly ganked.

If it is a border world you are fortifying anyway, then I agree that I usually leave them alive.

D.

edit: Huh. I just checked and your right. I wonder how long its been like that and I never noticed?

[Tridus]

They are? I've got a Fallen Spire game going on an X map where there's somewhere around 20 SF posts behind my main chokepoint. In 10 hours, not a single reinforcement has come in through them.

I'm pretty sure they don't count as reinforce gates, the AI can't warp ships to them like it can to guard posts. They're worth killing if you're worried about the special forces and want to shrink them, but if you have solid chokepoints the SF really don't seem to be that threatening to chokepoint worlds and unless you take out a lot of them that 5% isn't going to matter very much (and if you do take out a lot of them, the AIP starts to add up).

I used to kill them, right now I'm ignoring them unless they happen to be next to a capturable I want to keep (since they'll shoot at it if I leave them).

[Bognor]

They used to count as reinforce gates, but that got changed quite some time ago.  I used to leave them alive on my planets to trick the AIs into reinforcing planets that only had one guard post.  I'd have turrets set up to shoot the ships almost as soon as they appeared, but placed so the guard post itself was just out of range.  I thought it was a neat strategy, but apparently some viewed it as cheese or an exploit.