Makes sense, but why wouldn't the CAPTCHA that is always (I am running 3.8.2) there stop the spammers just as well?
I've been getting a moderate amount of SPAM - maybe one post a day or so, and we ban the user, ban the IP address, and report the details to
http://www.stopforumspam.com/add
to help others.
One thing I did just modify is that I made it so that even usergroups "Users Awaiting Email Confirmation" and "(COPPA) Users Awaiting Moderation" must "Require Human Verification on Configured Actions," not just "Unregistered / Not Logged In." Maybe this will help.
I also changed the verification option from Image Verification to reCAPTCHA™ Verification which is supposed to be better.