well, shield is the most abused map next to cb... if you're talking about 1v1, it's shield...
since it's that small, what you can do is very limited. there are only just a few valid moves, considering vaygr is just too low on ru to win...
the valid moves probably are,
1) pure fighter rush - though this can get pwned with a proper plat defense.
2) plat and fighter - to defend from the above strat. it's dooming to do against arm rush.
3) arm rush with plat - but it can still be beaten with fighter rushes...
4) fighter to hyper torp to ion - it can be good, until ions toast u
5) fighter to ion - this is the most typical way everyone does, as it's the safest bet
for one, if other side doesnt scout, go fighter rush and he's toast for sure. 1 mob from ms, 1 probe and 1 col from cc will be just about built before both fighter mods are up, move them both in with 7 cols left behind, just ints are enough, since bombers are pretty slow to move and ints can kill plat mod and cols just fine. if other side goes beyond 10 cols, he can't defend himself. if he's smart to stay at 10 cols with plat mod and fighter mod, then the chance is that you're rather toast, since you cannot make any res mod thus no upgrades. the only exception being, that you actually go res mod right from the beginning and get speed 1 upgrade and sell res mod, which will slow the fighter build by 2 or so, but all the ints have level 1 speed. but once again, this is risky move, if other side is prepared.
arm rush, this is possible, if you can defend cc and res mod. but with pure bomber raid, it can be rather screwed. by the time first flak pops up, other side can have quite some bombers to tear mods or flak apart. but if pulled out right, it can still do some job... but im not a big fan of it. addy-baps loved it though, what an advanced res mod whore...
going to max of 14 cols with fighter maxing to hyper torp, this was very common back in days till people realized (including me after tomcat taught me by blowing me up...) that going pure ions will be rather better as higs arent too tight on ru after a while and killing just some cols in the back doesn't affect much, while having less force to attack can just get everything fried up...
which leads to, max of 14 cols with fighter maxing then to ion massing. but since people doesnt do as effective than those top players, people tend to lose with same builds. the reasons should be,
1) they don't start making advanced res mod fast enough. going 14 cols usually give the best balance for enough ru without much slow down. getting arm as soon as possible is a good advantage to gain.
2) they just dont know how to sell advanced res mod to rather get level 2 ion hull fast. what i do is, when im done making arm, i move ms up with a mob behind, then get a cap fac on ms, get level 1 ion hull, queue improved ms manufacture, when cap fac is done queue cc improved manufature and sell cap fac right away, then after level 1 ion is done, queue level 2 ion and speed 1 ion and sell arm, which will give enough ru to get all of improved manufacture and level 2 ion hull at the fastest way. usually u dont need arm as getting fct is quite out of option with the amount of ru, when getting level 2 ion earlier is a better opportunity.
3) they just couldnt handle fighters well, even ions are equally built but cols and mods are freaked after fighters are lost. but fighter management is for another topic...
4) you dont know how to micro frigs... - its not just fighters that you need to micro. pull the frig that gets attacked back, so they get all sucked in toward you for advantage, even making some of their ions not to reach the target with their ion beam.
if all are done proper, u have a chance to beat tomcat today!
![Laughing :lol:](./images/smilies/icon_lol.gif)