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So recently I was playing a TvT, known for it's very long match duration and gas intensiveness, and realized I had an over-abundance of minerals with nearly no gas. I was trying to find a usefullness for marines when tanks dominated the current matchup, but decided it probably wouldn't be a very good idea. I already had 2-3 expansions, so with about 1200 minerals I quickly made 3 command centers in my base (and kept them there) and proceeded to upgrade all of them to orbital commands.
Now when you think of it, this actually might not be a bad use of minerals. With each orbital command you have access to a MULE every 90 seconds or so. so if MULEs give you 290 minerals each, an orbital command will pay for itself in about 2 MULEs, and then add to that as the game goes on (considering you have a base to mine from, as technically it just gives you minerals FASTER). But more importantly, having so many orbital commands gives you access to almost limit-less scans for scouting and detecting. In a matchup where minerals are only really useful so long as you have gas or need to spam turrets, I think this may actually be a good use of minerals for scouting and even economy all-around, since you're basically just trading minerals for free scans and free SCVs (MULEs), which will get your money back anyway. This worked really well for me and I will probably always spend excess minerals on OCs in this matchup. What do you think?
EDIT:
Note: For people saying I should spend the minerals to expand, yes, I am trying to take as many expansions as possible, but I have more than enough minerals to make OCs for each expansion and then extra in my base. You're always trying to expand as much as possible, but the point is, spend your spare minerals on OCs, especially when you have nowhere left to expand.
Note: With this strat, in late game, you can cut SCVs and rely purely on MULEs for a stronger 200/200 army.
Question: How many minerals would you be willing to spend on a MAPHACK, when you don't even need them?
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It seems preferable to just macro better: you could skew your unit composition to be less gas-heavy, you could build marines and hellions, you could expand more.. Orbitals commands are a bit of a waste in that regard.
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I think spending your money on units and winning the game is a better idea.
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Sure. If you are making Tanks just hide somewhere 4-5 Raxes and make surprise with some Medivacs drops. I think it's much better.
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Like I said, there were no units that would be useful to make with minerals. Marines and hellions are not very useful against tanks and air, waste of minerals. And this is considering I don't need to/would be foolish to expand at the time, in which case I would STILL have an excess of minerals even if I did.
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So because you didn't know what to spend your minerals on you made lots of orbital commands, giving you the ability to harvest minerals faster?
Brilliant^^;
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If you have enough minerals left to throw down 3 orbital commands in your base you might as well build them at expansions. Will give you a much better bonus if you are able to defend them. If not, just fly them to island expansions or try to hide your expansions. I can't think of any reason to just build them in your base.
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On March 18 2010 00:37 Feefee wrote:
So because you didn't know what to spend your minerals on you made lots of orbital commands, giving you the ability to harvest minerals faster?
Brilliant^^;
Haha, that's what I said to myself reading the first post xd.
Funny idea but I agree with all, use your mineral in expand and making some drop harass.
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On March 18 2010 00:44 DrainX wrote:
If you have enough minerals left to throw down 3 orbital commands in your base you might as well build them at expansions. Will give you a much better bonus if you are able to defend them. If not, just fly them to island expansions or try to hide your expansions. I can't think of any reason to just build them in your base.
What if I already had 2-3 expansions and Did not want to create more SCVs using supply. I could also lift them to bases later and use purely MULEs to act as SCVs. I would be lifting some of them and sending them to expansions, but there's only so many expansions, and i would end up just having some in my base.
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Calgary25989 Posts
I think spending the minerals on almost anything else would be a better use. You are spending minerals you deem useless to get more minerals more quickly. How is that productive?
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On March 18 2010 00:54 Chill wrote:
I think spending the minerals on almost anything else would be a better use. You are spending minerals you deem useless to get more minerals more quickly. How is that productive?
Does everyone ignore the fact that you can use them for scans also? And spending your minerals on them isn't useless cause you just get them back anyway from MULEs. It's just like a trade for free scans and free SCVs (MULES).
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I'm going to use this actually, but for scan.
I was recently playing kawaiirice in a 50 minute tvt where i had just about 100 gasish, but I had around 17,000 minerals. I think the additional scans will allow me to see what's up better, and if necessary bait fire of tanks with mule drops.
Thanks for the idea :-)
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Actually, late game this sounds like a great idea, lowering SCV counts in order to make way for a bigger army while having a lot of intel sounds at least somewhat viable... and scan + offensive mules (mining from the opponent's last base) would be hillarious.
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Do you really need more than 3 orbital commands to scan though? If you're not spending your money on mules anyways 3 comsats should be more than enough. At least in SC1 they were for me.
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You shouldn't be getting more than one, maybe 2 OCs in TvT. PF protects against harass and makes bio 100% worthless. I've lost a lot of bases I didn't have to because I had OCs. I also have like 3000 minerals all the time and can't spend them usefully (hellions are pretty worthless past earlygame). I often just expand 3-4 times at once because I have so many minerals. You can just get 6 scvs and a PF and mine the gas if you want.
My TvT does need work though. I still lose to a lot of stupid stuff. I think it's probably the hardest MU mechanically and strategically for terran. However, TvZ is insanely difficult to win even though it's easier mechanically =/
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On March 18 2010 01:57 Floophead_III wrote:
You shouldn't be getting more than one, maybe 2 OCs in TvT. PF protects against harass and makes bio 100% worthless. I've lost a lot of bases I didn't have to because I had OCs. I also have like 3000 minerals all the time and can't spend them usefully (hellions are pretty worthless past earlygame). I often just expand 3-4 times at once because I have so many minerals. You can just get 6 scvs and a PF and mine the gas if you want.
My TvT does need work though. I still lose to a lot of stupid stuff. I think it's probably the hardest MU mechanically and strategically for terran. However, TvZ is insanely difficult to win even though it's easier mechanically =/
Read the OP more carefully, that's why your OCs are sitting in your base, away from danger ^^. In your case with 3000 spare minerals it sounds like it would have been perfect. I guess you can choose to either expand with OCs or PFs but the point is to spend your spare minerals on spamming OCs for scans and MULEs.
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In TvT i just open save and start expanding like crazy . if you have excess of minerals try expanding more and turret whore the whole map . All gas goes to tanks and vikings and medivacs and upgrades for them . Sometimes i build Thors and BCs . I don't think you need that much scan it's better to just expand all over the map and get the gasses going , turret whore and build extra factory for hellions if you really feel like you should keep your minerals down . I for one feel it's normal to have excess of minerals in TvT only . 2 maximum 3 orbital commands for scans seem enough , and have them mining at safe bases . More seems like wasting minerals just for the sake of keeping your minerals low , if you want to spend minerals spend them on hellions , but don't overdue it , because you'll probably be just wasting minerals again just for the sake of it .
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I agree with the OP actually. Even after you turret up all your expos and your base, you still have massive amounts of unused minerals because TvT is limited by gas. 5-8 Orbital Commands allow you to scan constantly, as well as MULE bomb/repair anywhere on the map.
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If you're 100% sure he's not going to switch to air, in which case, you can spam Q up turrets and blow through money easily, maybe?
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I have to disagree that building extra OC's that aren't used for taking a new expansion is a waste. Not that I'm pro because I'm in Plat league... but to me it is common sense to not make OC's that aren't being used for taking expansions.
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EPT
