So I made the "Shield Battery" Liquipedia page x100 longer, and here it is, a guide.
Overview The Shield Battery is a rarely used defensive building which can repair the shields of an injured Protoss unit. It generates energy which can be quickly converted into shield hit points on nearby units, either a single unit or a group. When constructed it starts with 100 energy, each energy point can heal two shield points. Unlike the medic's heal, the unit receiving the shield recovery cannot move or attack while it happens. To the majority of Starcraft players, the Shield Battery is a mysterious and misunderstood building.
Useages Because of their low cost they can be effective in supporting carriers and archons, both of which can take a lot of shield damage. They are also sometimes used in PvP early game when a defender needs to hold his base against a greater number of zealots. Because of their lack of mobility they are most useful when placed in direct support of a defensive position, such as at the top of a ramp the player is trying to defend. In very rare cases a protoss player proxying a pylon near an opponent's base will proxy a Shield Battery to make the attack more powerful.
On maps where starting locations are close to each other, like on hunters, you can build a Shield Battery to help you contain an enemy.
Shield Battery useages are situational, meaning that you can't often predict using them beyond the spur of the moment, an example being when you expect a tough fight. It is not viable to put Shield Batteries well in advance and to plan on using it. Because going both Photon Cannon and Shield Battery is overkill, you have to opt for one or the other. Opting for a Photon Cannon with range will also enable you to use the required Forge for a +1 upgrade to two hit kill Zerglings. Photon Cannons may be better defense overall than Shield Batteries, however you may not have adequate time to make them. If this happends to be the case, you should opt for the Shield Battery when you don't have time to make the Pylon, Forge, and Cannons. A Forge takes 50 seconds to morph in, and then you have to build Photon Cannons that take another 50 seconds each. A Shield Battery only takes 30 seconds to morph in, which is about a minute faster than making a single Photon Cannon.
As defense, Shield Batteries aren't effective to use on units being attacked by heavy damage dealers. In the amount of time the unit spends not attacking and charging, he may lose more than the regained Shields. This is a reason why they aren't extremely effective in the late game. In the late game it may not be worth it to use on units when you have too many and cannot take them out of combat for enough time to recharge. Also, it may be ineffective to use a Shield Battery since you will only be able to recharge a limited amount of units in your maxed out army.
When pairing a Shield Battery with Archons or any other unit, you have the disadvantage of having to bring the unit away from the fight to the Shield Battery. You will have to wait for a stop in the fighting to take your units back to the Shield Battery.
On certain maps, Shield Batteries become even more viable. On maps without a geyser at the first expansion, like Nostalgia, you will not be able to make the large amount of gas intensive units that are so crucial. You may want to preserve Archons, Reavers, High Templars, and Dragoons; And in doing so, it may be as effective as having another of those units. In island games, where gas is also limited due to difficult to obtain expansions and where air units and dropping is more common, Shield Batteries become more viable as well.
A Dragoon or two with a Shield Battery can be used in combination with Micro to great effect against many Marines. You may need several Shield Batteries to recharge a large amount of your own Carriers. You may benefit from using a Shield Battery in defensive PvZ situations where you use it with a Reaver to hold off an all-in enemy. Corsairs, as well, can benefit from the Shield Battery recharge. In PvT and PvZ and PvP, a Protoss can benefit from having a Shield Battery in aiding his Shuttle/Reaver harass. Low shields on Shuttles or Reavers can be recharged. After a fast expansion, you may benefit from a Shield Battery while being behind on numbers of units.
2v2 Useages You may opt for getting a Shield Battery in 2v2 when you have a Zerg ally since you won't need the detection Photon Cannons offer. In fact, Shield Batteries are more viable in 2v2 games. You may need to hold your ramp as long as possible while your ally's painfully slow Marines or Zealots come to your aid. In conclusion, in 2v2 Shield Batteries are more viable than in 1v1 because there are more "spur of the moments" in games when you may need them, and you may need to hold off the enemy until your ally arrives to help you.
A Shield Battery can be used in conjunction with just about any other unit. Although it requires more clicking around, they can help you fortify a defending location. However just like the previous paragraph mentioned, they aren't terribly viable in 1v1 but in a 2v2 they can really help you defend both you and a teammate, especially with a couple archons with them.
Archons and a Shield Battery are particularly effective against masses of Zerglings. A couple Archons being used in conjunction with a Shield Battery at your ramp will rack up dozens of kills against two Zerg opponents massing Zerglings. If you Fast Expand, you may want to put another Shield Battery at the Expansion so you don't have to retreat back to the original. Also, a Shield Battery can be placed near your mineral line, for your Archons, if you anticipate Mutalisks.
Methods to use the Shield Battery There are three methods to using the Shield Battery. 1) You can use the Shield Battery on an empty area near your own units to recharge multiple units at a time. 2) You can use the Shield Battery on individual units. 3) Finally, You can select the desired units and then click on the Shield Battery.
If you use the Shield Battery on any units out of range, however little the amount, they will have to stop attacking and walk back to the Shield Battery. Whenever you use the Shield Battery to recharge units, all units targeted will have to stop attacking while being recharged. This may have a bad outcome for you when you are being attacked on your ramp. An alternative is only targeting the weakest units. Perhaps the most effective method is pulling the wounded units out of the line to the rear to recharge and regroup later. One should note using the Shield Battery on a unit results in it losing its hold position. Zealots can be lured away by Zerglings.
Nice guide^^ I never really thought too much of Shield Batteries, so I definitely learned something here. Especially in 2v2s--this'll help me in my efforts to defend quite a bit.
When I feel BM and I have a lot of Carriers and a huge advantage, I build a bunch of Shield Batteries near an area I'm going to attack and use an exorbitant amount Shield Batteries to make the Carriers invincible
Nice guide. Also, consider mentioning the offensive shield battery if you're proxying 2 gates and you NEED your zealots to do damage, or if you proxied your robo in PvP, and went reaver first without shuttle. Then you can proxy a shield battery outside your opponent's natural, and bring the reaver up to the battery.
Just some interesting situational stuff.
I used to use them to hold my ramp against protosses who 2 gated vs my 1 gate tech. Now I play Terran. :D
On March 18 2011 17:13 DTK-m2 wrote: Nice guide. Also, consider mentioning the offensive shield battery if you're proxying 2 gates and you NEED your zealots to do damage, or if you proxied your robo in PvP, and went reaver first without shuttle. Then you can proxy a shield battery outside your opponent's natural, and bring the reaver up to the battery.
Just some interesting situational stuff.
I used to use them to hold my ramp against protosses who 2 gated vs my 1 gate tech. Now I play Terran. :D
On March 18 2011 17:13 DTK-m2 wrote: Nice guide. Also, consider mentioning the offensive shield battery if you're proxying 2 gates and you NEED your zealots to do damage, or if you proxied your robo in PvP, and went reaver first without shuttle. Then you can proxy a shield battery outside your opponent's natural, and bring the reaver up to the battery.
Just some interesting situational stuff.
I used to use them to hold my ramp against protosses who 2 gated vs my 1 gate tech. Now I play Terran. :D
This is the exact reason I switched from P to T. PvZ and PvT were fine, but that mirror match-up makes absolutely no sense to me. How can he build 20 cannons and still live for so long? And he doesn't expand, so he contains, and then stays on the same # of bases as his opponent? And as soon as Sun breaks out, he... double expands???
You try shit like this in TvT and you get your ass handed to you
Sorry, but I didn't really gain much from this. You gave a bunch of general situations where they might be useful but didn't back anything up with examples from replays or VODs. In 1v1s, shield batteries are probably used the most to augment a proxy 2gate rush, but you only made a passing mention of that. You also wrote a long paragraph comparing them to cannons in PvZ, but never made a real conclusion besides "they warp in faster". Are you suggesting it's somehow viable to use shield batteries instead of cannons in a standard FE build?
Regarding 2v2s, I think I've seen a shield battery once in all of the games I've watched. This includes many pro 2v2s (when it was still used in Proleague) and of course all the games I've casted of top 2v2 teams (like Bella + Semih). You mention that they might be thrown down "while your ally's painfully slow Marines or Zealots come to your aid". This implies that you're either playing P/P or P/T, which are almost never seen in top level 2v2s due exactly to the fact that zerg has so much early mobility.
The only decent point I think is the one about maps with mineral-only natural expansions. I've never played a game on these maps so I can't speak from experience, but what you're saying about using the extra minerals to support your valuable gas units does make sense. On the other hand, I'd probably just make more gateways/zealots. There's also the fact that nobody uses those maps any more.
As I said before, I think the most common use for shield batteries is to support a proxy gateway zealot attack, and also in a few specific defensive situations (1gate tech vs 2gate, sair/reaver vs hydra bust). Other than that, they might be used spectacularly in 1 game out of 1000 as shown in those VODs, but overall I wouldn't recommend using them in normal play.
I am seriously amazed at the fact that the shield battery is so rarely used, especially in PvZ. Cannons + reaver + shield battery make an unbreakable defense both in mid and late game.
Hydras focus your reaver? Select the shield battery and spam-click r!
Ultra-Ling-Defiler crew is knockin on the door of your Brotoss hood? Select the shield battery and spam-click r!
The shield battery works especially well with the reaver since it has such a slow attack-rate and the fact that the reaver is stationary and has ranged attack. Why is that? you may ask. Well, let me tell you: Let's take two Zealots, for example, blocking a ramp with hold position. They have the support of a shield battery behind their back. Now every time you recharge their shields, they will automatically lose their hold position command and start to chase the enemy down the ramp. The block or formation is broken. And there's another problem: During the recharge, the units will stop attacking. The recharge is over in the blink of an eye and still... those split seconds are noticeable and can affect the outcome of a battle. The reaver doesn't care about these negative aspects of the shield battery at all. The time between two shots gives plenty enough time to recharge their shields, the attack rate is thus not hindered. And since the reaver is such a slow, ranged unit, it will stay where it is.
On March 18 2011 16:32 ArvickHero wrote: When I feel BM and I have a lot of Carriers and a huge advantage, I build a bunch of Shield Batteries near an area I'm going to attack and use an exorbitant amount Shield Batteries to make the Carriers invincible
Yeah, Shield Batteries really make Carriers even more effective than they already normally are.
Best thing to do is to do place a pylon outside in Destination and then place a shield battery inside their main and do some gay DT rushes, those are always fun to do!
On March 18 2011 23:49 AMaidensWrath wrote: I am seriously amazed at the fact that the shield battery is so rarely used, especially in PvZ. Cannons + reaver + shield battery make an unbreakable defense both in mid and late game.
Hydras focus your reaver? Select the shield battery and spam-click r!
Ultra-Ling-Defiler crew is knockin on the door of your Brotoss hood? Select the shield battery and spam-click r!
Reavers defending against hydras is one of the rare situations where the shield battery is useful. The thing is though, if you're having to defend your natural after going sair/reaver, you're probably not in a great spot to begin with. Usually you want to be out harassing with your reavers, not defending. Once you get to the late game with a couple of reavers at every expo though, I could see how it might be more useful to throw down a battery in addition to a bunch of cannons.
And I'm not sure why shield batteries would help against ultra/ling. They have such insane dps, you'd at best get 1 extra shot off with a reaver if it was being targeted down.
One thing that hasn't been mentioned yet is that the shield battery uses energy to recharge shields much like a medic, and thus becomes completely useless when out of energy. I actually always use a battery when I'm going 1 gate tech and I see my opponent 2gate, so I can tell you that the energy goes quite fast. It's not like you can keep spamming and infinitely recharge your shields.
I don't understand the part where you use shield batteries to support carriers -- shield batteries have 200 energy max and carriers have 300+ shield each I think. So unless you plan on making five or more shield batteries it won't help you much.
On March 19 2011 02:06 Zyferous wrote: I don't understand the part where you use shield batteries to support carriers -- shield batteries have 200 energy max and carriers have 300+ shield each I think. So unless you plan on making five or more shield batteries it won't help you much.
It is mentioned in the OP that Shield Batteries recharge 2 shield points per 1 energy point. Additionally, Carriers have a shield of 150. In other words, 3 Shield Batteries can recharge 8 Carriers.
Shield batteries can be useful when you do 1gate tech in PvZ to secure your ramp. They were also used as proxy to augment 1 base carrier in some retro game.
On March 18 2011 23:49 AMaidensWrath wrote: I am seriously amazed at the fact that the shield battery is so rarely used, especially in PvZ. Cannons + reaver + shield battery make an unbreakable defense both in mid and late game.
Hydras focus your reaver? Select the shield battery and spam-click r!
Ultra-Ling-Defiler crew is knockin on the door of your Brotoss hood? Select the shield battery and spam-click r!
Reavers defending against hydras is one of the rare situations where the shield battery is useful. The thing is though, if you're having to defend your natural after going sair/reaver, you're probably not in a great spot to begin with. Usually you want to be out harassing with your reavers, not defending. Once you get to the late game with a couple of reavers at every expo though, I could see how it might be more useful to throw down a battery in addition to a bunch of cannons.
And I'm not sure why shield batteries would help against ultra/ling. They have such insane dps, you'd at best get 1 extra shot off with a reaver if it was being targeted down.
One thing that hasn't been mentioned yet is that the shield battery uses energy to recharge shields much like a medic, and thus becomes completely useless when out of energy. I actually always use a battery when I'm going 1 gate tech and I see my opponent 2gate, so I can tell you that the energy goes quite fast. It's not like you can keep spamming and infinitely recharge your shields.
Someone's not going to live a long life of lively thx 2 the shield battery.
Seriously though, this guide is very nice. Lots of things that would take testing to learn, so it's very useful (ie 2 points of shields per magic point, the build time, etc).
On March 18 2011 23:49 AMaidensWrath wrote: I am seriously amazed at the fact that the shield battery is so rarely used, especially in PvZ. Cannons + reaver + shield battery make an unbreakable defense both in mid and late game.
Hydras focus your reaver? Select the shield battery and spam-click r!
Ultra-Ling-Defiler crew is knockin on the door of your Brotoss hood? Select the shield battery and spam-click r!
Reavers defending against hydras is one of the rare situations where the shield battery is useful. The thing is though, if you're having to defend your natural after going sair/reaver, you're probably not in a great spot to begin with. Usually you want to be out harassing with your reavers, not defending. Once you get to the late game with a couple of reavers at every expo though, I could see how it might be more useful to throw down a battery in addition to a bunch of cannons
I'm pretty sure he's thinking about the event of a Hydra bust and you opened up with Reavers, where a Shield Battery could be very handy indeed.
On March 19 2011 02:06 Zyferous wrote: I don't understand the part where you use shield batteries to support carriers -- shield batteries have 200 energy max and carriers have 300+ shield each I think. So unless you plan on making five or more shield batteries it won't help you much.
note the adjective "exorbitant" used to describe the amount of Shield Batteries lol. No, I don't think it's that viable in a normal game (maybe), but it's fucking funny to use when I'm bored.
For the sake of contributing, when I scout a 2 Gate Zealot last or something, building a Shield Battery is a must (since I go 1 gate core robo).
1) You can use the Shield Battery on an empty area near your own units to recharge multiple units at a time.
Holy crap I did not know this.
Yea, it takes a lot of the micro out of using shield batteries. Simply r click near your units and you get an easy recharge on all units in proximity.
Typically, batteries are used in conjunction with single key units, i.e. reavers or goons defending an all-in, so you typically don't see the area recharge method.
Reavers and batteries enjoy synergy since the inability to attack during recharge doesn't matter with the reaver's high cooldown. Batteries are also good for defending against early all-ins, giving your lots/goons an edge with a quick ~60-80hp health boost for only 100 mins.
If only a shield battery could repair buildings...
1) You can use the Shield Battery on an empty area near your own units to recharge multiple units at a time.
Holy crap I did not know this.
I didn't actually know there was any way to do it other than that, having only used them once in the Protoss BW campaign when they were already there and they told me to use them.
Another shield battery reaver example. A standard thing you can actually plan for in PvP... Get the shield battery when you expo so that your reavers without shuttle don't die to reavers with shuttle on 1base.
1) You can use the Shield Battery on an empty area near your own units to recharge multiple units at a time.
Let me add to this, that the shield Battery has infinite "recall" range. So it can be use in a fierce battle to quickly retreat the wounded units.To do it you just hot-key the Shield Battery. Select it, and press R somewhere over the battle, the units that could need recharging will run back. Often not useful I would say, but maybe there are situations where it could be used (rearranging a bunch of carriers maybe?)
I remember from some UMS, that a hero with high shield, can´t go to more than 2 shield Batteries in a shift-keyed chain of orders. Pretty strange. Does this apply to normal games also, if a hurt carrier is shift-key ordered to go to 3-4 shield Batteries, where all the Batteries has very low energy, will the carrier stop after reaching the second Battery? I don't have SC installed, so I cant test it.
Shield Batteries are really only good for certain defense situations, and not much use for any sort of offense maneuvers. And they're pretty much useless for Carriers because of EMP, so... As a general rule, shield batteries are only useful in defensive situations with only a few key units. Otherwise they really aren't worth their cost.
OP didn't mention that recharge sequence can be interrupted at any moment if you command move or attack to the unit, meaning that you can attack-recharge (some shield points)-attack-recharge-... with zealots, goons or archons, could be useful in defensive situations.
Another point is if you invest in shield upgrades (let's say middle or late game) now your shield regeneration is more meaningful due to upgrades, could be useful in PvZ or PvP. Don't forget the fact that when your shields are almost depleted the next attack will activate your shield upgrade + your armor upgrade, at this moment you can perform a multiple minirecharge, so several units could use again this protoss property. I know is very situational and mostly defensive but I've never seen anyone using it. Also, I think that before you get +3 attack you should invest in +1 shields, the cost is the same but any +1 upgrade takes significant less time than any +3 upgrade.
One last idea for PvT when T does 14 CC, bunker at nat and you start shooting the bunker with ranged goons (3 or 4) why don't you build a pylon and a shield battery behind your goons and start sniping SCV's, retreat, recharge damaged goons and engage again, 3 or 4 dead SVC's plus cost of repairing the bunker could be an advantageous trade.
On March 20 2011 14:47 Mystlord wrote: Shield Batteries are really only good for certain defense situations, and not much use for any sort of offense maneuvers. And they're pretty much useless for Carriers because of EMP, so... As a general rule, shield batteries are only useful in defensive situations with only a few key units. Otherwise they really aren't worth their cost.
They cost like 150 mins and can heal a single batch of EMPd carrs. It's handy I'd say but not really cost effective.
On March 21 2011 23:33 antrax wrote: OP didn't mention that recharge sequence can be interrupted at any moment if you command move or attack to the unit, meaning that you can attack-recharge (some shield points)-attack-recharge-... with zealots, goons or archons, could be useful in defensive situations.
I thought this was discussed already, like the post about a reaver benefitting a lot due to the long cooldown between shots.
Another point is if you invest in shield upgrades (let's say middle or late game) now your shield regeneration is more meaningful due to upgrades, could be useful in PvZ or PvP. Don't forget the fact that when your shields are almost depleted the next attack will activate your shield upgrade + your armor upgrade, at this moment you can perform a multiple minirecharge, so several units could use again this protoss property. I know is very situational and mostly defensive but I've never seen anyone using it. Also, I think that before you get +3 attack you should invest in +1 shields, the cost is the same but any +1 upgrade takes significant less time than any +3 upgrade.
The reason people generally get attack upgrades first is because they provide the biggest bonus. Armor and shield upgrades always give +1 to each, but a +1 attack upgrade actually increase damage by +2 for zealots/dragoons and +3 for archons/dts, meaning they scale better. The reason armor is favored over shields is that shields do not benefit from damage types/unit sizes. For example, a dragoon does explosive damage and a zealot is a small unit. Normally, explosive damage vs a small unit is reduced to only 50% of its original damage (so a dragoon would do 10 damage). For protoss units, however, this only applies to hp damage and not shield damage. So a dragoon shooting a zealot would do the full 20 damage to the zealot's shields, but once the shields were gone it would only do 10 damage to the zealot's hp. Hence, the armor upgrade would be much more beneficial.
Another reason armor is better is because a lot of protoss units start with some base armor value and generally have more hp than they have shields. For example, a zealot has 100 hp with 1 base armor and 60 shields. Here are some comparisons of how many hits it takes for them to die with different upgrades:
+1 armor: 35 shots from marine 15 shots from dragoon
+1 shields: 32 shots from marine 14 shots from dragoon
One last idea for PvT when T does 14 CC, bunker at nat and you start shooting the bunker with ranged goons (3 or 4) why don't you build a pylon and a shield battery behind your goons and start sniping SCV's, retreat, recharge damaged goons and engage again, 3 or 4 dead SVC's plus cost of repairing the bunker could be an advantageous trade.
This is an interesting idea. It would certainly be cool to try out, but remember that you're investing in the pylon + shield battery + probe that is sent out. I think even if the benefit is slightly more than the cost, the other common responses to a 14 CC are probably even more cost efficient, meaning it won't see much use.
For interesting usage of defensive shield batteries in PvP, check out the recent ICCup Attack with Shauni. The VOD isn't up on blip yet (I'll do it ASAP I promise!), but you can see the recordings on my Ustream page.
The way recharge is described in previous posts is that you recharge your unit, wait to complete the process (full shields or empty battery) and then you go back to fight, in the meantime your unit does nothing; none of them mention that you can recharge just a bit of shields and then command something else, specially with goons: right click on battery-hold-rigth click-hold-... or right click-focus attack-right click-attack-... very micro demanding but could help in defensive positions.
About the TvP opening, use your scouting probe to build the pylon, make sure the timing helps to raise your psi cap, so the real cost for the moment is 100 min for the battery. Later you will have a better income to replace the lost pylon. One battery with good energy can cause troubles to the first siege tank, if you spread well your goons the siege tank shot will only hit one goon and you will have enough time to recharge its shields completely.
If you are doing a PvT and the game is even/you are in a slight advantage at the point of you being close to max say with 2 arbiters and enough NRG for recall. The turtling terran may have 1-2 vessels and defending recalls, so you can place 1-2 shield batteries in a proxy location near his base (where it wont easily just die). Next, you go for the recall and what normally happens? EMP! Ahh that sucks man... but wait, what did you do? Shield battery? No... that doesn't recharge NRG for recall... but wait it does recharge shield, will terran know it's the same arbiter? Oh... wow he just might not... Let's see (recharge same EMP'D arbiter)... Continue for the "recall" with 0 NRG... Damn he used his other vessel to EMP this arbiter too so I guess I will just have to use my second unused arbiter to recall :D
Clearly it's situational but sometimes people don't think like this.
EPT
so I guess I will just have to use my second unused arbiter to recall :D
