This last prophecy mission's achievements are actually pretty though to obtain. Fortunately you only have to play the mission in normal mode but to get both achievements you need to get 2250 kills, which I think is the same as brutal mode.
The worst part of this mission is that it takes a very long time, about 45 minuets game time, and if you fail it is quite probable you will have to start over from the beginning (unless you are fairly close to the goal, at least over 2000 kills). There are some videos for it on youtube but nothing with a solid instruction of how to do it. Basically what I will write is a guideline of what to think of to get through the phases of the mission.
Before you start you can set the gameplay speed lower, you can actually set it as low as slower and this is very useful if you are not great at multitasking or have slow reaction time (I played it at normal speed when I succeeded).
Phase 1, the beginning: early on the pressure is not high and this is when you have time to build up your economy. Keep building probes at all times, build a dark shrine so you can get dark templars, a robotics bay so you can build colossi, build an additional 3-4 gateways and upgrade all gateways to warpgates, this is very useful as you can spawn several units anywhere very quickly. Build a few additional cannons in the north early on to help you with the first part of the first wave and get a few cannons for your western and eastern chokes once you can afford them. In the beginning each wave will come north - west - east and the pause for a while. During your first, or possibly second pause, or actually immediately after the west attack in wave 1 or 2 you should expand to the gold; set up your nexus a few pylons and cannons to block the choke.
In this phase the easiest way to handle the attacks from different directions is to set up a couple (4-8) dark templars on each of the chokes, the rest of your troops can be on standby in the middle (or the north since the first attack is there) and be ready to move out and engage enemies wherever they attack. The dark templars will be enough to hold of any early attacks for long enough time for your forces to get there. Use your phoenxes to take out mutalisks and make sure your colossi are not killed.
Phase 2 is when the hybrids start showing up. At this point you should have your gold fully saturated and a lot of both minerals and gas to pump out units from most your facilities. Build at least one additional forge (even two are a good idea) and one fusion core so you can get all your upgrades simultaneously, upgrade as much as possible when you can afford, this will make a huge difference when you max out your army. It is important that you don't lose too many expensive units; pull units that are hurt out so they don't die and rebuild any cannons that are destroyed, use your voidrays to focus down hybrids early on and use the phoenixes gravitaion beam ability and Zerathul's void prison to incapacitate them.
It is also time to set up cannons throughout your base so that no area of the base is uncovered by at least two cannons, this is for the nydus worms that will appear at the end of the phase.
Phase 3 is when the nydus worms appear. If you have set up cannons appropriately in your base they will die before they fully spawn and won't do any damage. This is also when the carriers will show up to aid you. You can now build carriers and you should do so from both your starports. You should have a pretty powerful economy by now and should have no problem pumping out carriers continuously as well as having several dark templars in front of each choke, take care not to let them run too far during attacks as they might end up running out to the zerg defenses (which they usually can handle until enemies start spawning and they get completely owned), and several colossi behind each choke as well. Set auto build interceptors in your carriers!
At this point I just grouped up all my voidrays, carriers and colossi in the middle and set them to group 1, the dark templars could keep the enemy at bay for long enough so that I could get there with my main force and destroy them then replace any cannons and dark templars before the next attack.
I do have another idea that probably would work better. A. 5-8 Dark Templars in front of every choke B. 3-4 colossi behind every choke C. Carriers, as many as you can build, patrolling between the three chokes, make sure the patrol route is not such that they start attacking zerg defenses or the omegalisk D. Voidrays grouped as 1 ready to focus down hybrids and E. Phoenixes grouped as 2 to take out broodlords and use gravitation beam on hybrids.
Phase 3.5 Once you have mined out the gold (and this will be fairly quick, you can pull back your probes to help with the mining in the main base as well as using the high ground "bridge" for your forces rather than the low ground choke. Make sure you get fully upgraded for all weapons, armors and shields!!!
Phase 4 Once the archives is finished you should start preparing to fall back; build more cannons on the high ground of your main base and build more pylons; as soon as you leave the low ground the zerg forces will start destroying your pylons and your psi/supply level will drop from 200 to around 140 rather quickly and unless you have prepared for it you will be supply blocked.
Phase 5 you have finished your first 1500 kills and your mothership has spawned, it is really time to pull back to the high ground now. You will actually have quite some time to do this as the zerg forces will take their due to destroy the lower base, use the time to arrange your forces and build more cannons.
I would still set carriers patrolling, this time between the two ramps. Colossi together with all ranged ground units on the high ground between the ramps and all melee ground units, on or just above the ramps, mainly to stop the zerglings and ultralisks to get up the ramps and destroy towers. Use the voidrays to focus down hybrids and ultralisks but be careful not to let them fly too far out or they will be destroyed by corruptors, also use the phoenixes to lift up hybrids. Keep the mothership above your ground forces to keep them from harm's way.
You will probably still be rather well off with money but at this point your income will decrease significantly and your biggest mineral sink are your carriers that need to rebuild their interceptors constantly. Therefore you must save your minerals and build with gas instead, I found that at this later stage archons are very good; build templars and try to use their psistorm on zerglings (it is rather worthless against hybrids) then merge them to archons. These archons might be the save you need at the end when you are swarmed by zerglings, mutalisks and corruptors they will get you those last 50 or so kills you need to finish the achievements.
At the later stages of the game there will be nydus worm attacks at random places in your base, these are fairly easy to deflect as long as you have at least two cannons in range of the worm they won't finish spawning and won't do any damage at all.
Good luck!!
Monday, September 13, 2010
Sunday, September 12, 2010
More zerg
So I tried to play zerg in 1v1 instead last night. To begin with I wasn't entirely sober so that might have come into play but probably not by much. The problem I faced was that I'm not really clear on how to counter everything or even how to prepare for most stuff. One round I was attacked pretty early on by three banshees and I only had two queens who could shoot air, safe to say they died rather quickly. Should I set up a spore colonly or two early on to prevent this or is it better to just try and get out some hydras or mutas?
I did win one game out of the three or four I played and that was rather satisfying as that player was actually in silver league. I actually do tend to meet several players from silver and win those just as much (or little) as I win the bronze leauge opponents, maybe the differences are quite subtle.
I did win one game out of the three or four I played and that was rather satisfying as that player was actually in silver league. I actually do tend to meet several players from silver and win those just as much (or little) as I win the bronze leauge opponents, maybe the differences are quite subtle.
4v4
Tried to play a 4v4 now and we lost pretty badly. I played as zerg, Cannan as protoss, A as terran and our other friend A2 (maybe I should use B?) also as terran. I tried the harassment and expansion style but got smashed down, and they harassed us and expanded instead. Anyway, we survived for a decent time considering it was our first 4v4 game ever.
For the Swarm!!
Well, I went outside my comfort zone and started playing zerg instead.
I should start from the beginning though; me and A played a few 2v2 in the beginning of the weekend both playing terran. We won a few placement matches but we still ended up in the bronze league (of course) where we still played fairly decently (for our level) and won maybe half our match ups. Later I played with C, who I will from now on refer to as Cannan because that is his in game alias, and I decided to try out playing as protoss and zerg, and Cannan also decided to try out other races.
After getting destroyed as protoss in one match I switch to zerg and I kinda fell for the swarming game style and easy way to expand that they have, Cannan kept playing as protoss and soon we had kicked ass three matches in a row. Our tactic was fairly simple and rather easy to counter actually, as long as you did it in time; basically I tried to get a few zerglings with speed upgrade and try to swarm around at all expansions available, then tech into mutalisk and be even more aggressive with them, even harass enemy bases and really contain everyone to their main base. Cannan at the same time would start teching heavily and get a couple of carriers and with those we could destroy our enemies utterly.
As lone as no one gave us very early or even just normal early pressure this would work fine but we have serious problems with our defenses if we are attacked; the speedlings might be good at controlling the map and harass expansions but they suck at defending bases, and if anyone comes with tanks or something like that I am screwed.
I should start from the beginning though; me and A played a few 2v2 in the beginning of the weekend both playing terran. We won a few placement matches but we still ended up in the bronze league (of course) where we still played fairly decently (for our level) and won maybe half our match ups. Later I played with C, who I will from now on refer to as Cannan because that is his in game alias, and I decided to try out playing as protoss and zerg, and Cannan also decided to try out other races.
After getting destroyed as protoss in one match I switch to zerg and I kinda fell for the swarming game style and easy way to expand that they have, Cannan kept playing as protoss and soon we had kicked ass three matches in a row. Our tactic was fairly simple and rather easy to counter actually, as long as you did it in time; basically I tried to get a few zerglings with speed upgrade and try to swarm around at all expansions available, then tech into mutalisk and be even more aggressive with them, even harass enemy bases and really contain everyone to their main base. Cannan at the same time would start teching heavily and get a couple of carriers and with those we could destroy our enemies utterly.
As lone as no one gave us very early or even just normal early pressure this would work fine but we have serious problems with our defenses if we are attacked; the speedlings might be good at controlling the map and harass expansions but they suck at defending bases, and if anyone comes with tanks or something like that I am screwed.
Friday, September 10, 2010
Welcome to the Jungle
This is another one of those achievements that were pretty hard. Mostly it's because you are misdirected by the Goliaths you get for the mission and although they can be used to succeed in the normal mission they are too weak for their cost to be used effectively. There are a few ways to prevent all the capping and the most direct one I could think of was to learn the sequence and the timing for all attacks and capping, this however is very time consuming and you will have to play the map several times to get to know it exactly.
What I figured, and I also got this suggestion from several other sources, was to mass out infantry. For this you would want all the marine and medic upgrades; Combat Shields (marine hp increased by 10), StimPack (marine attack and movement speed increased by 50% for 12 seconds at the cost of 10hp), Advanced Medic Facilities (allows medics to be produced without the tech-lab addon) and Stabilizer Med-packs (medics heals 25% faster and for 33% less energy, basically making each medic close to twice as efficient). Start producing SCVs, add you a reactor to your barracks and start producing marines and medics. You don't actually have to push out and get any gas until you have secured the whole map but you can if you want to finish up faster.
You need to push out to block the first cap in the west side though, and eventually in the east. I basically left my western force in place and trained a complete new force to push out east after the first assault on the base. Build a second barracks and attach a reactor to that one too, you basically want each of your forces to have a 3:1 composition of marines to medics and a force of perhaps 10 marines and 4 medics can take down most early assaults. As you have a pretty high production of infantry you can easily reinforce both your troops as well as building up a third force in your base. This third force should push out and take down the Protoss base to the immediate north of your own base and set up an expansion there for extra income. Also make sure to get the upgrades for your infantry.
You don't actually have to go through all this as you can probably cap all seven of your gas canisters by now but I found it entertaining, as well as safer, to take control of the whole map before I even started capping anything. From this point you will have a lot more income also so you can build a third barracks, on which I put a tech-lab to make marauders to make an easier job with the ground units and towers as well as producing Goliaths. You can easily push out further and basically make static defenses outside the Protoss base entrances, there are two, one in the west and one in the east, but make sure you take out all Protoss buildings and units outside the base, especially the pylons and warp prisms so they can't warp in more units behind your lines.
When your forces are strong enough you can pretty much get out seven SCV's and simultaneously cap all seven 7. You can also muster up a big enough force of marines, medics, goliaths and marauders to destroy the protoss bases for the feat of strength achievement "You'ze So Crazy!".
What I figured, and I also got this suggestion from several other sources, was to mass out infantry. For this you would want all the marine and medic upgrades; Combat Shields (marine hp increased by 10), StimPack (marine attack and movement speed increased by 50% for 12 seconds at the cost of 10hp), Advanced Medic Facilities (allows medics to be produced without the tech-lab addon) and Stabilizer Med-packs (medics heals 25% faster and for 33% less energy, basically making each medic close to twice as efficient). Start producing SCVs, add you a reactor to your barracks and start producing marines and medics. You don't actually have to push out and get any gas until you have secured the whole map but you can if you want to finish up faster.
You need to push out to block the first cap in the west side though, and eventually in the east. I basically left my western force in place and trained a complete new force to push out east after the first assault on the base. Build a second barracks and attach a reactor to that one too, you basically want each of your forces to have a 3:1 composition of marines to medics and a force of perhaps 10 marines and 4 medics can take down most early assaults. As you have a pretty high production of infantry you can easily reinforce both your troops as well as building up a third force in your base. This third force should push out and take down the Protoss base to the immediate north of your own base and set up an expansion there for extra income. Also make sure to get the upgrades for your infantry.
You don't actually have to go through all this as you can probably cap all seven of your gas canisters by now but I found it entertaining, as well as safer, to take control of the whole map before I even started capping anything. From this point you will have a lot more income also so you can build a third barracks, on which I put a tech-lab to make marauders to make an easier job with the ground units and towers as well as producing Goliaths. You can easily push out further and basically make static defenses outside the Protoss base entrances, there are two, one in the west and one in the east, but make sure you take out all Protoss buildings and units outside the base, especially the pylons and warp prisms so they can't warp in more units behind your lines.
When your forces are strong enough you can pretty much get out seven SCV's and simultaneously cap all seven 7. You can also muster up a big enough force of marines, medics, goliaths and marauders to destroy the protoss bases for the feat of strength achievement "You'ze So Crazy!".
NotBeyBlade vs Ynot
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Mar Sara Missions
Mar Sara Mastery achievement is quite easy to get, the only one that presents any difficulty is the Zero Hour mission's The Best Defense... achievement.
On Liberation Day there is not much you need to do except making sure you find and kill all enemy units and take care not to let any civilians die, basically you can save before you run up the last part of the map where all the civilians are so you can redo it if anyone dies.
In the outlaws mission you just need to be fast; pump out lots of SCV's to get your economy going and build two barracks, one with tech-lab for medics and the other one you can exclusively get marines. There is actually not much you can do to make this easier except you massing out marines and work on your micro skills.
It is in Zero hour you will encounter problems; the mission in its own isn't that hard and I could even do it quite easily on brutal difficulty, but killing hatcheries for the "The Best Defense..." achievement is problematic, especially if you want to do "Hold the Line" as well. I Recommend doing the two achievements separately. For hold the line you just need to keep SCV's repairing, it shouldn't be very troublesome if you do it on normal.
For "The Best Defense..." you might get into more problem, the trick is to mass up marines; first you salvage second line bunkers then you will need at least three barracks, one with tech-lab and the others with reactor, build the barracks when you can afford to build and still produce with all your facilities (barracks and command center). Keep producing SCV's at all times and train marines and medics at all times you can afford. You also want both the weapon and armor upgrades before you push out. At about 13-12 minutes left you should push out through the western choke and move north, kill anything that gets in your way and head to the northern camp, there you can kill a few buildings and two hatcheries. After you kill the TWO hatcheries you fall back and hide in the northwestern corner to await your reinforcements. Produce as many marines and medics you can muster over the next 30-120 seconds and then push out with your second force to join your first, by the time you get together the two hatcheries will have been rebuilt and you can kill them again, getting all your four kills from only two hatcheries. Fall back and defend your base for the last few waves of enemies.
On Liberation Day there is not much you need to do except making sure you find and kill all enemy units and take care not to let any civilians die, basically you can save before you run up the last part of the map where all the civilians are so you can redo it if anyone dies.
In the outlaws mission you just need to be fast; pump out lots of SCV's to get your economy going and build two barracks, one with tech-lab for medics and the other one you can exclusively get marines. There is actually not much you can do to make this easier except you massing out marines and work on your micro skills.
It is in Zero hour you will encounter problems; the mission in its own isn't that hard and I could even do it quite easily on brutal difficulty, but killing hatcheries for the "The Best Defense..." achievement is problematic, especially if you want to do "Hold the Line" as well. I Recommend doing the two achievements separately. For hold the line you just need to keep SCV's repairing, it shouldn't be very troublesome if you do it on normal.
For "The Best Defense..." you might get into more problem, the trick is to mass up marines; first you salvage second line bunkers then you will need at least three barracks, one with tech-lab and the others with reactor, build the barracks when you can afford to build and still produce with all your facilities (barracks and command center). Keep producing SCV's at all times and train marines and medics at all times you can afford. You also want both the weapon and armor upgrades before you push out. At about 13-12 minutes left you should push out through the western choke and move north, kill anything that gets in your way and head to the northern camp, there you can kill a few buildings and two hatcheries. After you kill the TWO hatcheries you fall back and hide in the northwestern corner to await your reinforcements. Produce as many marines and medics you can muster over the next 30-120 seconds and then push out with your second force to join your first, by the time you get together the two hatcheries will have been rebuilt and you can kill them again, getting all your four kills from only two hatcheries. Fall back and defend your base for the last few waves of enemies.
Loss + win
So I tried out my new delayed reaper tactic on a 1v1 last night, it failed miserably! I attacked with 5-7 reapers and they got smashed by my opponents mass marines, who as soon as my troops had died retaliated and took my base down in a matter of minutes.
Second match I gave up on the reaper idea and went for marines and marauders. But just I had my first two soldiers out I was attacked by a bunch of marines, and they kept on coming without any delay. I soon found two enemy barracks in my base and fortunately I had three of my own and one with tech-lab and one with reactor, so I soon overpowered the opponents cheese and quickly countered. Of course he had spent all his resources on that early attack so I won this match in pretty much the same way I lost the first one.
This is still no development on my part but at least I learnt to scout my own base more carefully.
Second match I gave up on the reaper idea and went for marines and marauders. But just I had my first two soldiers out I was attacked by a bunch of marines, and they kept on coming without any delay. I soon found two enemy barracks in my base and fortunately I had three of my own and one with tech-lab and one with reactor, so I soon overpowered the opponents cheese and quickly countered. Of course he had spent all his resources on that early attack so I won this match in pretty much the same way I lost the first one.
This is still no development on my part but at least I learnt to scout my own base more carefully.
A Sinister Turn
The second Prophecy Mission's achievements are much harder to get than the first one. In "A Sinister Turn" you'r normal achievement is to kill all enemy protoss which will take a lot of time and your hard achievement is to finish the level in 25 minutes which can be quite though, this pretty much means you can't do both achievements on one go.
To do the normal achievement you should just try to build as solid a force as you can possibly muster; get a few gateways and secure the robotics facility and the dark shrine early on, you can then move out and set up static defenses just outside the two enemy bases. Keep producing as many Immortals as you can in the west, if your economy can support it you should get a second robotics facility, I would also recommend having three to four gateways to produce mainly stalkers. The east side is pretty easy to take, focus down the void rays with your stalkers and it is pretty much powering through, secure the templar archives and build a nexus to increase your income.
The problem with this achievement is that the longer you take the tougher Maar will become and the protoss forces will also get stronger and more plentiful over time, but it takes time and a pretty sizable army to take down the western base so you will need to expand in the east as soon as you have taken it out. Mass stalkers and immortals and attack the west when you feel comfortable, don't use zealots here as the archons there will just destroy zealots. Try to get all your upgrades before you attack. Once you have both bases you can pretty much force your way through the final base, I used a small static defense just across the bridge from the base to fall back to when Maaw spanwed.
For the hard achievement, "Maar-ked for Death", I used two gateways to produce a few zealots and stalkers in the beginning, enough to counter Maaw the first few rounds. As soon as I could afford it I built A static defense with several (5-6) cannons just above the eastern ramp and put my zealots there. With this many cannons and a few zealots (you might have to replace the zealots once in a while) nothing will get past it so you can pretty much leave it to take care of itself (this is nice if you like me have problems with multitasking).
In the west I set up one or two cannons by the ramp and then pushed out to secure the robotics facility. A few cannons as static defense and continue producing immortals and stalkers (zealts are a waste of money here IMO). Once the force is big enough push out to attack the south protoss base; run south and hide somewhere until Maaw spawn, wait for him to pass you and then attack, try to sneak around the side so you don't have to kill the whole base and withdraw when Maaw spawns.
To do the normal achievement you should just try to build as solid a force as you can possibly muster; get a few gateways and secure the robotics facility and the dark shrine early on, you can then move out and set up static defenses just outside the two enemy bases. Keep producing as many Immortals as you can in the west, if your economy can support it you should get a second robotics facility, I would also recommend having three to four gateways to produce mainly stalkers. The east side is pretty easy to take, focus down the void rays with your stalkers and it is pretty much powering through, secure the templar archives and build a nexus to increase your income.
The problem with this achievement is that the longer you take the tougher Maar will become and the protoss forces will also get stronger and more plentiful over time, but it takes time and a pretty sizable army to take down the western base so you will need to expand in the east as soon as you have taken it out. Mass stalkers and immortals and attack the west when you feel comfortable, don't use zealots here as the archons there will just destroy zealots. Try to get all your upgrades before you attack. Once you have both bases you can pretty much force your way through the final base, I used a small static defense just across the bridge from the base to fall back to when Maaw spanwed.
For the hard achievement, "Maar-ked for Death", I used two gateways to produce a few zealots and stalkers in the beginning, enough to counter Maaw the first few rounds. As soon as I could afford it I built A static defense with several (5-6) cannons just above the eastern ramp and put my zealots there. With this many cannons and a few zealots (you might have to replace the zealots once in a while) nothing will get past it so you can pretty much leave it to take care of itself (this is nice if you like me have problems with multitasking).
In the west I set up one or two cannons by the ramp and then pushed out to secure the robotics facility. A few cannons as static defense and continue producing immortals and stalkers (zealts are a waste of money here IMO). Once the force is big enough push out to attack the south protoss base; run south and hide somewhere until Maaw spawn, wait for him to pass you and then attack, try to sneak around the side so you don't have to kill the whole base and withdraw when Maaw spawns.
Whispers of Doom
The two achievements for the first Prophecy Mission is quite easy, all you really have to do is save after you pass each encounter and load if Zeratul takes any damage or anything happens that you could do better. Most of the encounters are pretty straight forward but for some you will have to think a little and probably try more than once, as for the end section where you run from the mass zerg force you will have to use blink to get past some obstacles and even use Zeratul's void prison to avoid taking damage.
My development so far
I am a rather bad player but I have learnt a bit and developed my game some since I started playing a while ago.
What has helped me the most I think is the challenges; I have managed to get gold in the first three basic challenges about unit control and I think I have a pretty decent grasp of what is good against what now. I think my openings are pretty decent too and I did get gold on both the opening gambit and the rush defense challenges. The problem I have is where I go from there though, before I used to just build one of everything and try to get as much tech as possible, tech is cool and should be good right. Well you get screwed over pretty quickly if you try to do that.
So my first major change was to get three barracks as soon as possible, two with tech-labs and one with reactor and pump marines and marauders as well as upgrading stimpack, combat shields and concussion grenades. But I still rarely won unless I did an early push with this. I think the problem is that if you don't push as soon as possible with this kind of build you will be run over by higher tech units, but if you push out and get taken out without doing enough damage you will be run over by just about anything. The difficulty lies in knowing when to push and how to react to your opponents forces, know when to expand and how to defend that expansion. I've lost so many times now because I missed a hidden expansion and thought I had a game after I killed of a bunch of workers.
My second change came in the 3v3 game I talked about previously. To make delayed reapers and kill off as much as possible. I've tried one early reaper and reinforce that as soon as possible but as my multitasking skills are kinda on the lower end so I usually fail at my own macro and lose too much from doing that, it is also very easy to counter 1-2 reapers. While the delayed higher amount of reapers easily can take out a few marines and even a marauder or two (or zerlings, roaches, queens and zealots, I think only stalkers would present a real threat). It is also easier as you will have most your structures up and running and only need to use your hot-keys to produce more reapers and SCV's for a rather long time, letting you focus more on the reaper harass.
Now I just need to figure out when to do what and how to do it properly, as well as building and teching up to higher level units.
What has helped me the most I think is the challenges; I have managed to get gold in the first three basic challenges about unit control and I think I have a pretty decent grasp of what is good against what now. I think my openings are pretty decent too and I did get gold on both the opening gambit and the rush defense challenges. The problem I have is where I go from there though, before I used to just build one of everything and try to get as much tech as possible, tech is cool and should be good right. Well you get screwed over pretty quickly if you try to do that.
So my first major change was to get three barracks as soon as possible, two with tech-labs and one with reactor and pump marines and marauders as well as upgrading stimpack, combat shields and concussion grenades. But I still rarely won unless I did an early push with this. I think the problem is that if you don't push as soon as possible with this kind of build you will be run over by higher tech units, but if you push out and get taken out without doing enough damage you will be run over by just about anything. The difficulty lies in knowing when to push and how to react to your opponents forces, know when to expand and how to defend that expansion. I've lost so many times now because I missed a hidden expansion and thought I had a game after I killed of a bunch of workers.
My second change came in the 3v3 game I talked about previously. To make delayed reapers and kill off as much as possible. I've tried one early reaper and reinforce that as soon as possible but as my multitasking skills are kinda on the lower end so I usually fail at my own macro and lose too much from doing that, it is also very easy to counter 1-2 reapers. While the delayed higher amount of reapers easily can take out a few marines and even a marauder or two (or zerlings, roaches, queens and zealots, I think only stalkers would present a real threat). It is also easier as you will have most your structures up and running and only need to use your hot-keys to produce more reapers and SCV's for a rather long time, letting you focus more on the reaper harass.
Now I just need to figure out when to do what and how to do it properly, as well as building and teching up to higher level units.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Finally won a 3v3
We finally won our first 3v3 match!!
Actually it is not entirely true, we did win a placement match a while ago but it was placement so it doesn't really count.
Now we wont a ladder game match, although it is bronze it is still a win, I think our rating now is something like 9 losses and 2 wins (the first one in placement as mentioned). It was pretty exciting actually, a TTTvTTT setup on Colony 426. I decided to try something I've never done before; delayed reapers, in mass. It was a tactic I saw in a commentary video where a high level terran player, don't remember who or what game, built three barracks and massed out reapers. It is not really like the early reaper harass when you get 1-2 reapers before your opponents have any defense but more a longer term harass that will keep you opponent(s) on edge and on the defense until you can expand and transit into something else.
While I was getting my first 3-4 reapers ready our opponents showed their hands; they were marine rushing one of us and actually got through and into my friend's base, I think I could have helped him out with one or two reapers but that would have both delayed and revealed my intentions so I let him fend for himself, and our other friend did get in there with a couple of marines to clear it up before it got too much out of hand. Actually the friend who got attacked, lets call him A (and the saviour is C, don't think this is arbitrary because their names actually start with A and C), also intended to go for reapers but because of the early attack he never got any up.
By the time their attack was repelled I had a couple of reapers ready and full production from three barracks going on so I pushed out to a Xel'naga tower in the centre, a scan on opponent 1 showed a defenseless mineral line and I made a 90% of his workers less alive and killed off a command centre without losing a single reaper. Back to the tower to gather up a few more reapers, a scan on opponent 2 and then off to make him as miserable as his friend was.
I think our opponents were actually still sending out all their marines to hurt my friend A and that left their defenses so much weaker. Anyway, at opponent 2 I encountered a few marauders but with speed upgrade and now ten or so reapers they couldn't stop me so I killed off a lot of workers here too as well as the command center. As soon as that was done I grabbed my new reinforcements and went on to opponent 3 but he was more prepared with several marauders and some marines in the mineral line and I had to withdraw after just one or two SCV kills.
Even with losses I still had a decent reaper output from my base so I was still over ten reapers and could go back to harassing opponent 1 and 2, reapers are also fairly cheap in minerals so I had a huge stash and could easily motive an expansion. So while I was running around with my reapers making trouble for two of our opponents I could run out to the gold in the middle and set up a Command Centre there. I would have liked to build it earlier in my base, upgrade it to Orbital Command but my multitasking skills are lacking so rather than sacrificing my reaper control I decided to just run an SCV out and build on the spot.
At this time friend C who had been left alone all the time had managed to tech up to banshees with cloak and he flew off to harass our opponent 3, and that was basically the nail in the coffin for them. Opponent 1 tried to attack my gold expansion with a tank and a marauder but it wasn't even enough to kill more than a few SCVs, I had already stopped my reaper production and transfered into marauders, as well as built my factory and starport so I had both medivacs and vikings out. Opponent 3 fell to the banshee pressure and they all gged.
Actually it is not entirely true, we did win a placement match a while ago but it was placement so it doesn't really count.
Now we wont a ladder game match, although it is bronze it is still a win, I think our rating now is something like 9 losses and 2 wins (the first one in placement as mentioned). It was pretty exciting actually, a TTTvTTT setup on Colony 426. I decided to try something I've never done before; delayed reapers, in mass. It was a tactic I saw in a commentary video where a high level terran player, don't remember who or what game, built three barracks and massed out reapers. It is not really like the early reaper harass when you get 1-2 reapers before your opponents have any defense but more a longer term harass that will keep you opponent(s) on edge and on the defense until you can expand and transit into something else.
While I was getting my first 3-4 reapers ready our opponents showed their hands; they were marine rushing one of us and actually got through and into my friend's base, I think I could have helped him out with one or two reapers but that would have both delayed and revealed my intentions so I let him fend for himself, and our other friend did get in there with a couple of marines to clear it up before it got too much out of hand. Actually the friend who got attacked, lets call him A (and the saviour is C, don't think this is arbitrary because their names actually start with A and C), also intended to go for reapers but because of the early attack he never got any up.
By the time their attack was repelled I had a couple of reapers ready and full production from three barracks going on so I pushed out to a Xel'naga tower in the centre, a scan on opponent 1 showed a defenseless mineral line and I made a 90% of his workers less alive and killed off a command centre without losing a single reaper. Back to the tower to gather up a few more reapers, a scan on opponent 2 and then off to make him as miserable as his friend was.
I think our opponents were actually still sending out all their marines to hurt my friend A and that left their defenses so much weaker. Anyway, at opponent 2 I encountered a few marauders but with speed upgrade and now ten or so reapers they couldn't stop me so I killed off a lot of workers here too as well as the command center. As soon as that was done I grabbed my new reinforcements and went on to opponent 3 but he was more prepared with several marauders and some marines in the mineral line and I had to withdraw after just one or two SCV kills.
Even with losses I still had a decent reaper output from my base so I was still over ten reapers and could go back to harassing opponent 1 and 2, reapers are also fairly cheap in minerals so I had a huge stash and could easily motive an expansion. So while I was running around with my reapers making trouble for two of our opponents I could run out to the gold in the middle and set up a Command Centre there. I would have liked to build it earlier in my base, upgrade it to Orbital Command but my multitasking skills are lacking so rather than sacrificing my reaper control I decided to just run an SCV out and build on the spot.
At this time friend C who had been left alone all the time had managed to tech up to banshees with cloak and he flew off to harass our opponent 3, and that was basically the nail in the coffin for them. Opponent 1 tried to attack my gold expansion with a tank and a marauder but it wasn't even enough to kill more than a few SCVs, I had already stopped my reaper production and transfered into marauders, as well as built my factory and starport so I had both medivacs and vikings out. Opponent 3 fell to the banshee pressure and they all gged.
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