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Hi guys,
I'm a gold league toss player in sc2. Due to the nerf to roaches, certain Zerg players start using mutas now,and i lost two consecutive PvZ games today and both times got raped by muta
game 1. Z player blocked choke with roaches queen and spine crawlers, made me think that he was goin roaches so i did the standard timing push with immortal sentry zlot and stalker. but at the same time i cahrged into his base, a bunch of mutas came to my base and raped me
-now that one i thought i just got juked and didnt scout well
then game 2. on blistering sands, the zerg quickly FE and dfended with massive lings and couple sunkens, he then went mass muta and owned my cheese 3 voidrays, then he continued to pump out mutas and my cannons and sentries could not stop him.
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Above is a rep of game 2
I want to know what units i should mass to counter muta once i discover ? and what to do in a situation where theres mass mutas flying between ur main and natural while the zerg expands( i made 3-5 cannons in each base i think)? please tell me what i did incorrectly. Thanks
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A good counter to mass mutas is mass stalkers with blink, thing is you have to scout the mutas early or else chances are you will have a small number of stalkers, and it will be very hard to catch up with his number of mutas.
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Best bet if you think they are going for mutas is to attack with Zealots from a gateway at the beginning. Not to win but to force them to make Zerglings or Roaches, as a Plat Zerg player I can tell you there is a big difference between being harassed and being left to macro my eco up. Anyway do some Zealot harass from 1 gate with chrono boost, make him waste money building lings or even better roaches, that will slow his eco and tech right down.
Another thing you should do is expand Mutas are good spammable units but they aren't cost effective versus anything, if you have like 10 gateways spamming stalkers and sentrys with photon cannons then he won't be able to touch you with his mutas.
If he wants to sac his main to kill your main then not really much you can do about that, provided your army can beat his ball of mutas you should win the game in a base trade, either that or just place like a bazillion cannons at your nexus before you move out.
I'd avoid doing things like cheese voidray strats yes it works sometimes even against good players, but after like a day and everyone has had it done to them then they will expect it and simply counter you with hydras or mutas, like you said too if he goes mutas and and you go rays he is gonna roll you .
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Yeah I'm a protoss player and mass muta is such a pain... Their mobility is annoying to deal with but just start massing sentry/stalker, driving them away from your base, and basically you can push out with that huge force afterwards
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Ya stalkers well controlled with blink can really damage a muta army if the zerg isn't watching over carefully. I've seen many zerg players get too greedy with mutas, so definitely try to take advantage of when this happens. Blink behind them so the fastest way out is above your stalkers, and you can do a ton of damage as they run
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Mass sentries are listed as the "obvious" counter on the tech tree, tough they usually have not enough HP to live long enough for killing mass mutas. However, if you can afford it, get 1 or 2 sentries with your stalkers since the guardian shield greatly reduces the bounce damage mutas do.
One more note, it's is kinda the same as in SC:BW - scouting them is the key. Minimize his harras by blink-stalkers and try to sneak sth to his expos so he can not get to far ahead. Mutas are expensive and most of the time he cant afford more than a bunch of speedlings while massing mutas. Use that time window if you can and be prepared (scout!) if he is switching tech.
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I will disclaim outright that I'm no good protoss player, but I have had my own muties get raped more than once and I did play a good number of FFA games with protoss (which means a lot of mass units and although muties are rare, they are not unheard of in an early FFA game).
I think that phoenixes are a largely under estimated so far. Yes, they require starports, their build time isn't good either, clearly they are just not viable early game. But if you already have an expansion running and able to defend the first few harassment, you should definitely consider supplementing your stalkers with phoenixes. Main reasons why:
- They deal 3x the amount of DPS than muties vs light (which is Muta armor) (and 2.6x more than stalkers)
- They have 50% more HP than muties (if we combine Armor and Shield), for the same gas cost
- They are faster than muties and can take them down when they are retreating
And if the zerg decides to switch to ground based units, you can still harass him (overlords of course, but also workers) and/or neutralize key units with this particular one.
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in game one, if you went for early robo, why didnt you build an obs and see that he's going mutas... To me it sounds like your problem is poor ass scouting and just doing your own thing regardless of what you see him doing.
The answer to muta is simply stalker with blink and sentries mixed as guardian shield helps a TON.
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A few Stalker and Archon can kill lots of mutas. Or at least make them escape !!
And so, never be tight for cannons in ur base.
Mutas are no problem. And they are weakier then they used to be in sc1. The fact is to notice that ur oppenent is going to muta. If you can counter it well, thats a huge advantage because mutas r soo expensive
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Stalker and sentry do alright countering muta, with cannons at your bases to keep your probes alive until you're ready to attack him. One thing that's important (and it was important in sc1 too) is to focus fire. Especially when the zerg runs in lings + muta, you have to make sure all your sentries and/or stalkers take the mutas down one by one. Otherwise they're alot less effective
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I usually can keep up with zerg muta numbers with my stalkers if i scout it properly, however i tend to get stomped afterwards because my opponent just makes a lot of lings very quickly when i push out. And the lings plus muta rape my stalkers, and i usually don't have enough zealots due to producing so many stalkers.
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On April 09 2010 17:04 Tamerlane wrote:
I will disclaim outright that I'm no good protoss player, but I have had my own muties get raped more than once and I did play a good number of FFA games with protoss (which means a lot of mass units and although muties are rare, they are not unheard of in an early FFA game).
I think that phoenixes are a largely under estimated so far. Yes, they require starports, their build time isn't good either, clearly they are just not viable early game. But if you already have an expansion running and able to defend the first few harassment, you should definitely consider supplementing your stalkers with phoenixes. Main reasons why:
- They deal 3x the amount of DPS than muties vs light (which is Muta armor) (and 2.6x more than stalkers)
- They have 50% more HP than muties (if we combine Armor and Shield), for the same gas cost
- They are faster than muties and can take them down when they are retreating
And if the zerg decides to switch to ground based units, you can still harass him (overlords of course, but also workers) and/or neutralize key units with this particular one.
On paper phoenix are a good counter. But I would discourage people from making them against mutas unless you plan on making something else from the starport too. So easy for Zerg simply to see you have 3 starports and keep like 10 mutas then simply stop building them and switch to mass roach/hydra then you make like 10 phoenix expecting muta spam only to find he has switched tech to something else.
Only time I'd say making a starport was a good idea is if you already had done a voidray cheese or something then ofc use the starport to counter his mutas but if he already has mutas better to stick with your gateway units rather than wasting gas on units that are totally useless against the zerg player except to kill his mutas.
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If they're going mutas their incredibly vulnerable to a timing push just as their before spire goes up. Force them into hydralisks.
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On April 09 2010 17:42 Necrosjef wrote:
On paper phoenix are a good counter. But I would discourage people from making them against mutas unless you plan on making something else from the starport too. So easy for Zerg simply to see you have 3 starports and keep like 10 mutas then simply stop building them and switch to mass roach/hydra then you make like 10 phoenix expecting muta spam only to find he has switched tech to something else.
Only time I'd say making a starport was a good idea is if you already had done a voidray cheese or something then ofc use the starport to counter his mutas but if he already has mutas better to stick with your gateway units rather than wasting gas on units that are totally useless against the zerg player except to kill his mutas.
Of course, making 3 starports simply to get pheonixes pumping is absurd, at most 2 will suffice, and I was not suggesting to mass them up to hard counter the muties, but 4 to 8 phoenixes (depending on how muta heavy he goes) should be more than enough to support very effectively your forces of stalkers and sentries.
And, again, those phoenixes won't be useless at all after he stopped doing muties.
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thanks guys, seems like i need to scout more is the main problem, and yea i tried to mass sentries and they just got microd down quickly by the mass mutas due to their low hp. (like how muta micro down marines in BW, hit one fly away)
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I feel that sentry/stalker is a good counter to muta and for base protection, but its not the best counter against ling/muta.
For zerg, the key is holding the attack until the toss is in the open field...which is generally doable since zerg are the ones expanding everywhere. In the open field, its much harder to FF to coral the lings, and ling/muta is pretty strong against stalker/sentry.
Its very much the same scenario as in BW. Dragoons did okay against muta, but against ling/muta they were hopelessly outmatched. But they had a stronger storm, stronger archon, and stronger corsair to back them up.
In SCII its a bit different. The sentry is a great addition, but the toss does have to contend with the loss of some of its big antiair guns (archons especially, which was the main ling/muta destroyer).
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First thing that comes to my mind is macro problem, either building too many gas units that aren't effective, or not matching the zerg in gas. Sentry(for shield and ownage), Stalkers(for efficient and power) and phoenix(for speed) are the counter, and so long as you don't waste your gas on the wrong units, in the right numbers will obliterate any muta attempts. In the i lose to mutalisk thread i actually explain why mutalisks are next to useless against GOOD play. Work on it, i think you'll begin to rape mutas shortly. I'm going to check out your replay though. I'd love to see i'm wrong and see mutas are super effective against a toss that doesn't make mistakes.
Update:
Ok i just watched your replay.
First of all you sent 3 void rays to his base and lose them to 7 mutalisk, while you build a mostly zeal/sentry army composition. Then you built up about 6 stalkers and 6 sentries against his 17-20 mutalisk...
He also got his expand up more quickly, which gave him more gas. That's a no-no. He actually played horribly. He had like 1k minerals he didn't spend.
First of all opt to expand faster with protoss. When i play protoss, the first thing i think of is get more gas!, which means expand asap. And get way more stalkers and phoenix in your composition. to beat 17 mutalisks, by that time you need 10 stalkers and 4 phoenix, or 17 stalkers, or 6 phoenix and 5 stalkers.
Better play and you will run over zergs like that ridiculously, and hopefully then zerg mutalisks can be buffed. Gl with your games man !
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On April 10 2010 00:30 thez wrote:
First thing that comes to my mind is macro problem, either building too many gas units that aren't effective, or not matching the zerg in gas. Sentry(for shield and ownage), Stalkers(for efficient and power) and phoenix(for speed) are the counter, and so long as you don't waste your gas on the wrong units, in the right numbers will obliterate any muta attempts. In the i lose to mutalisk thread i actually explain why mutalisks are next to useless against GOOD play. Work on it, i think you'll begin to rape mutas shortly. I'm going to check out your replay though. I'd love to see i'm wrong and see mutas are super effective against a toss that doesn't make mistakes.
Update:
Ok i just watched your replay.
First of all you sent 3 void rays to his base and lose them to 7 mutalisk, while you build a mostly zeal/sentry army composition. Then you built up about 6 stalkers and 6 sentries against his 17-20 mutalisk...
He also got his expand up more quickly, which gave him more gas. That's a no-no. He actually played horribly. He had like 1k minerals he didn't spend.
First of all opt to expand faster with protoss. When i play protoss, the first thing i think of is get more gas!, which means expand asap. And get way more stalkers and phoenix in your composition. to beat 17 mutalisks, by that time you need 10 stalkers and 4 phoenix, or 17 stalkers, or 6 phoenix and 5 stalkers.
Better play and you will run over zergs like that ridiculously, and hopefully then zerg mutalisks can be buffed. Gl with your games man !
Thanks for your time and advice man
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On April 09 2010 17:42 Necrosjef wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2010 17:04 Tamerlane wrote:
I will disclaim outright that I'm no good protoss player, but I have had my own muties get raped more than once and I did play a good number of FFA games with protoss (which means a lot of mass units and although muties are rare, they are not unheard of in an early FFA game).
I think that phoenixes are a largely under estimated so far. Yes, they require starports, their build time isn't good either, clearly they are just not viable early game. But if you already have an expansion running and able to defend the first few harassment, you should definitely consider supplementing your stalkers with phoenixes. Main reasons why:
- They deal 3x the amount of DPS than muties vs light (which is Muta armor) (and 2.6x more than stalkers)
- They have 50% more HP than muties (if we combine Armor and Shield), for the same gas cost
- They are faster than muties and can take them down when they are retreating
And if the zerg decides to switch to ground based units, you can still harass him (overlords of course, but also workers) and/or neutralize key units with this particular one. On paper phoenix are a good counter. But I would discourage people from making them against mutas unless you plan on making something else from the starport too. So easy for Zerg simply to see you have 3 starports and keep like 10 mutas then simply stop building them and switch to mass roach/hydra then you make like 10 phoenix expecting muta spam only to find he has switched tech to something else. Only time I'd say making a starport was a good idea is if you already had done a voidray cheese or something then ofc use the starport to counter his mutas but if he already has mutas better to stick with your gateway units rather than wasting gas on units that are totally useless against the zerg player except to kill his mutas.
I used to have a lot of problems against mutas in PvZ, but since I started getting phoenix at the right time PvZ has become my best matchup. It's really important to get the starports down before his mutas do damage to you and also only when you are fairly certain that mutas are coming. For example, if you scout a fairly early pool with gas and/or your scouting probe gets killed by some zerglings, it is almost certain that the zerg will be going speedling into muta, so you can get out the stargates earlier. At least at my level (currently 2nd in plat div 39, though I'm sure I am not nearly as strong as the lower division players who are lower ranked), I find it very easy to tell when the zerg player is likely to go (muta/ling vs. roach/hydra)
I really think that if you ever make 3 starports you are getting too many, though. Typically against a 2 base zerg 2 starports is plenty, and once you get 6-8 phoenix they techswitch and don't pump mutas much anymore. But even once they stop making mutas, your phoenix are very good. They give you insane map control, since you can scout every expansion and pick off any overlords which are trying to scout, which hurts the zerg a lot. They also are really good at picking off drones and small (1-4) groups of hydras.
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PJA is onto the strategy that will own mutas and make them useless. Well done PJA. I'm luvin hearing people wake up to realize how weak mutas are, because it's been my most hotley contested claim yet.
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EPT
