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On December 18 2018 07:34 Anc13nt wrote:Show nested quote +On December 18 2018 07:02 ninazerg wrote: I feel like the +1 5rax stopped being as dominant because Terrans aren't doing the mech switch. This is partially because the maps haven't always been good for fortifying a corner main. Otherwise, I think it's a completely legit way to play and more Terrans should do it. One problem with it is that it can drag the game out to 30-40 minutes, which can be very taxing. Lee Young Ho probably stopped doing it because his wrists are in bad shape, and practicing hundreds of 30+ minute games made him want to do something less time-consuming. Generally speaking, when Flash switches strategies, other Terrans tend to follow suit.
As for the battlecruiser thing, I'm not sure I understand it completely, but if you look at the cost values, we see this:
Scourge - 75 gas Battlecruiser - 300 gas
It will take at least 5 scourge to kill a battlecruiser. That will come out to 375 gas spent for the Zerg player versus 300 for the Terran player. Additionally, battlecruisers can kill scourge with a single shot, which means that it may take 6 scourge for a cost of 450 gas. To deal with just two battlecruisers will require the Zerg to make 12 scourge. As the number of battlecruisers increases, the effectiveness of the scourge goes down dramatically. This allows the Terran to do three things: use the battlecruisers to deal damage to the Zerg, force the Zerg to utilize a lot of larvae that could be used to make ground units, and force the Zerg to spend a lot of gas on scourge instead of defilers, ultralisks, or lurkers.
Often times, the Zerg player will not have air units upgraded, or have hydralisk upgrades, which can make battlecruisers difficult to deal with using a Zerg that has tooled their infrastructure to fight defensively against a large and fairly mobile Terran ground army. I think it would cost 225 gas for zerg since you can get 2 for 75 gas. But even still, BCs are good because Zerg needs gas at the mid-late game stage of the game more than terran imo. Along with it's other uses, it's kind of like a gas dump that forces zerg to also dump gas.
oops, you're right. My mind has been elsewhere today...
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how does plague not completely shut down BC's? I haven't really watched any games with bc's, but everything in my brain says that going bc's vs zerg is the absolute worst thing you can possibly do. Isn't it an extremely easy and cost-effective counter by zerg?
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On December 18 2018 18:55 abuse wrote: how does plague not completely shut down BC's? I haven't really watched any games with bc's, but everything in my brain says that going bc's vs zerg is the absolute worst thing you can possibly do. Isn't it an extremely easy and cost-effective counter by zerg? do you know how much damage does plague to Bcs ? hint:they re not with 1hp after plague.
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United Kingdom12010 Posts
On December 18 2018 19:05 [sc1f]eonzerg wrote:Show nested quote +On December 18 2018 18:55 abuse wrote: how does plague not completely shut down BC's? I haven't really watched any games with bc's, but everything in my brain says that going bc's vs zerg is the absolute worst thing you can possibly do. Isn't it an extremely easy and cost-effective counter by zerg? do you know how much damage does plague to Bcs ? hint:they re not with 1hp after plague.
Why not just tell him. Plague does 295-300 damage to a BC.
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1. Obviously, once a build is used that much you expect players to start making micro-adjustments to play against it more efficiently. Quicker hive and lurk off of only 9 mutas for example. Once you stabilize on 3 bases +1 5rax loses a lot of its pressure and the Terran will have to reapply pressure with follow-up tech whether its 2 starport drops/vessels, tanks, or fast expanding into mech switch. I also think that anytime that the Terran ball gets kill by mutaling is purely a mistake on Terrans fault for not reinforcing properly/ making too long movements on the map so you can look at the player in question as well since Flash rarely loses his mnm to mutaling without trading very efficiently. As Soulkey put it, anytime a muta opener is used, mutas can win or lose you the game. You can see it as pros figuring out more efficient ways to use or in the case of faster hive, not use mutas. Compare muta movement from Soulkey to say Effort and you'll see that Effort still struggles against a good +1 5rax.
2. Mech switch is fairly map dependent, not too much to say about that. It requires a lot of resources to accomplish as well as being given the time to put down factories and upgrades. This is normally accomplished on 4p maps by using mines, mnm groups to block drops, and forward pressure with vessels. One thing about the mech switch is sometimes you see Terran gearing up for it even if the Zerg is behind so lets say a late 3rd or low muta count. This can potentially let Zerg back into the game by allowing them to drone up and take expansions with minimal pressure whereas if Terran went SK and stayed ahead on upgrades, constantly making vessels and drops as well as BCs (leading to #3) they would set themselves up for an easier win.
3. BC aren't a build every single game and at a random timing thing. Yes they are good gas sinks because youll always have left over gas if youre producing mnm on 6+ barracks. This assumes you also have a healthy vessel count beforehand, you dont want to have 2 BC and 0 vessel and its mostly to disrupt production of the Zerg. Note that BC sees most use before the introduction of Ultralisks. You force Zerg to spend more gas on scourge and defilers with constant pressure not allowing for the massive Ultralisk tech switch. One thing that isn't quite new but is used a lot as a follow-up in case they can't close the game with MM + BC is "Neo-SK" which involves the constant production of MM + Vessel/BC + Upgraded Tanks. It slowly starts to look like a Mech transition but much more sustainable because of the constant pressure you're applying which gives you the time as opposed to the mines and whatnot of a traditional Late Mech Transition.
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On December 18 2018 18:55 abuse wrote: how does plague not completely shut down BC's? I haven't really watched any games with bc's, but everything in my brain says that going bc's vs zerg is the absolute worst thing you can possibly do. Isn't it an extremely easy and cost-effective counter by zerg?
Plague is pretty good against BCs but takes a lot of attention to do. Also, some zerg might not have plague ready (I rarely do tbh, but I am noob) for it anyway. Even if it does work, I think the damage occurs slow enough that it's kind of like irradiating an ultralisk; it's good but it's not great tbh.
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Thank you everyone for the interesting posts.
I'd like to add that dealing with BCs are a pain. They aren't APM intensive for T and by the time you get your scourges over they would have done some damage already.
As others said, they make zerg spend some scourges and throws their game off (might leave them open for drops or vessels). Other methods of dealing with BCs (hydra/defiler) require more attention from the Zerg than the Terran.
On December 18 2018 12:51 BigFan wrote: ^ It's not that different from turning drones into colonies then canceling once wraith leaves, and putting them back to mining. Having burrow also helps with erasers later on.
It's a big difference, the investment into burrow can be used for many other things while turning drones into colonies requires more attention and is a waste of minerals.
I know others have pointed this but I can't miss this opportunity to join in and say + Show Spoiler +l2p nub!
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Vatican City State1872 Posts
I've always realized it was there but I never thought about APM as a resource
So many people saying the simple fact that you can A-move a bc to a zerg base and it basically handles itself while the zerg has to spend his time dealing with it properly in a late game scenario is actually a really big deal lol.
- ramblings of a brainless protoss player
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TLADT24917 Posts
^ Late game TvZ is really APM intensive. It's why Sharp with his 300+ APM had a hard time keeping up with SK Terran demands late game, and was floating in the recent KSL finals. BCs are a nice unit to use if you have a large enough vessel count already, and can spare to make a couple. I don't think they are as a-moving as some people are implying, but obviously the Zerg needs to dedicate more attention to dealing with them. Thing is, a single swarm with several hydras is more than enough to ward them off. The question comes down to attention required, and time invested. The nice thing about BCs is that you need an AA unit to kill them, and they are quite tanky too so if you get caught in another engagement or have to macro, you don't have to worry about looking back so fast to micro them out. Granted, if you are playing SK Terran or neo-SK Terran, the Zerg will likely have plague ready and that with either spores or several hydras+swarm can completely shut them down.
On December 18 2018 13:28 iCCup.Trent wrote:Show nested quote +On December 18 2018 12:51 BigFan wrote: ^ It's not that different from turning drones into colonies then canceling once wraith leaves, and putting them back to mining. Having burrow also helps with erasers later on. Are you sure? In my experience, making colonies is very cumbersome at that speed. You need a large free rectangular space between minerals, base and in between other drones and you're not exactly rich at that time in the game. Burrowing is clicking drone and pressing B, works every time. I've seen it done by Larva before, and I'm positive that other Zergs have tried it. I'm not saying it's less APM intensive or so, but if your main goal is to save every drone until your AA comes out, it's another feasible option.
On December 19 2018 04:01 JieXian wrote:Thank you everyone for the interesting posts. I'd like to add that dealing with BCs are a pain. They aren't APM intensive for T and by the time you get your scourges over they would have done some damage already. As others said, they make zerg spend some scourges and throws their game off (might leave them open for drops or vessels). Other methods of dealing with BCs (hydra/defiler) require more attention from the Zerg than the Terran. Show nested quote +On December 18 2018 12:51 BigFan wrote: ^ It's not that different from turning drones into colonies then canceling once wraith leaves, and putting them back to mining. Having burrow also helps with erasers later on. It's a big difference, the investment into burrow can be used for many other things while turning drones into colonies requires more attention and is a waste of minerals. I know others have pointed this but I can't miss this opportunity to join in and say + Show Spoiler +l2p nub! rofl, just taking pot shots I see! Go read my comment right above to see what I was implying + Show Spoiler +scrub, someone who's lost to my BCs many times! :D
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So I guess I need to rewatch Effort's series vs Flash and Last and pay more attention to his opening BOs and ling speed timing but my impression is that literally just zergs deciding to get faster ling speed (IE before or at same time as lair) sorta nullifies the entire FE-ish 111? By FE 111 I mean the sorta 111 that takes the natural with just like 1-2 vultures? Flash used a 1-base 111 build in the MPL very recently but that's sort of a fundamentally different build, right? Or is it just an adaption made based on the Z going 2 hatch instead of 3?
I don't watch many streams or understand any korean so I'm probably pretty misinformed. But Effort seemed to beat or severely threaten 111 builds by getting very fast ling speed and doing a lot of damage with 12+ speedlings when T only has 1-2 marines and 1-2 vultures before the vultures even have speed. Did it really just take like ~1 entire year for Zs to figure out how to abuse that window, or is that a sorta 1-off thing and it just seems like the FE 111 (probably not the right name for it and actually is just confusing to call it that) is dead but it's not really?
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I'd ike to see pro Terrans fall back on bio with a healthy mix of tanks instead of double starport. I get that dropship harass is brutal to deal with and a large vessel count is also deadly but tanks just seem way more stable.
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On December 19 2018 09:15 kidcrash wrote: I'd ike to see pro Terrans fall back on bio with a healthy mix of tanks instead of double starport. I get that dropship harass is brutal to deal with and a large vessel count is also deadly but tanks just seem way more stable.
it's not that fun to lose tanks to swarm when you don't have enough of them or mines to buffer for them
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On December 18 2018 18:55 abuse wrote: how does plague not completely shut down BC's? I haven't really watched any games with bc's, but everything in my brain says that going bc's vs zerg is the absolute worst thing you can possibly do. Isn't it an extremely easy and cost-effective counter by zerg?
That's why they are used as a harassment unit with max 2-4 at once. Just enough to be annoying but at the same time not get screwed by plague on 12 BCs.
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One thing I would add in addition to all the other explanations given here is that SKT pumping vessels off 2 Starports all game begins to have diminishing returns as the game goes on.
When Terran has 10 vessels, 2 more are unlikely to provide more than a very marginal benefit. Zerg will cut into the vessel count with scourge but it will steadily rise until big groups of vessels get plagued. In those situations it is better to have a couple BCs posted more than a plagues distance away since plaguing 12 vessels plays out about the same as plaguing 10.
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How reliable/effective is lategame vulture with bio for terran ? I think i remember some of sharp's tvz where he does that and it seems to help hold the zerg even at hive tech(ultra). I think he was sneaking alot of vulture mines on the zergs common path
And vultures are extremely cheap for their purpose and really mobile
On December 18 2018 07:52 XenOsky wrote: 4 rax 2 starport is the future i dig this
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