|
Not sure exactly how good it is.
Did a simple 2-supply 1-rax wall-off (constantly producing 'Rines) with quick CC and Orbital, against a medium bot.
With lag and horrible micro I barely held the first push by pulling SCVs, although the second push favored me more. At that time I had a solid gas production with several Reactor Rax active. While supply blocking was never an issue, the enemy attacks were.
First test isn't too promising, but I'd say there's something to dig into.
I think later in the game where you've been stockpiling energy, it can even be used as a tool for harrassing. Imagine floating a CC into the expansion your opponent is most likely to go for, and then depleting it.
|
I dont think building CC's for supply works well early/mid game.
Late game with mineral float i suppose you could build a few extra and eat up expos / islands with mules.
Also when you saturate a expansion you dont make all the workers some of them transfer.
|
On December 02 2010 20:09 ABCSFirebird wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2010 19:48 Cryosin wrote:
You can 2 rax and then build a CC. instead of building supply depots use your orbital command.
Thats actually not cost effective. Although you might not want to build supply depots with this build it would still be more effective to build them instead of using supply calldown.
Ya i had to cut production like i said it was a dry run. You would want to 1 rax then build another CC. The nice thing is you can saturate your main very quickly and tech switch when you expand.
I think this is something that might be very powerful against Zerg but not so much against Terran. Possibly good against Protoss but it really depends on how you play it out.
More testing is needed but it is something cool. The really cool part is how the command center gives you 11 supply. Its obviously not cost effective to build a command center for just supply but if you time it right its actually very good.
You can build a sizable marine ball and then double expand around 9 minutes. I used marines because it would be simple to test. You could obviously tweak the build but leaving an early command center in your base to pump some SCV's is actually not a bad idea at all.
|
I think the main advantage of this comes in mid-late game, not at the beginning. The real issue I see with Mules is that you can increase your economy infinitely in terms of minerals compared to Z and P having to stop at ~70-80 drones due to the impact on their army size. And as mentioned before, you can sacrifice SCVs in late game as well to make your army 50-60 supply bigger than your enemy. I would like to see how this works if you start massing OC more less when you normally pop your third (with main and first exp saturated).
|
By the way, for hyper-economic openings, you might be able to CC-CC-Rax if you can wall in with the two initials CCs and then get a bunker.
Obviously you'll have nowhere near enough units to claim your natural, but I don't think that was the goal.
|
Yeah there are some mech heavy turtle strats against which you have nearly no chance to engange and want to make mass expansions yourself. If terran builds mass CC during that time it would be pretty good i think.
|
This would really shine late game since you can basically land one of your OC at an expo and spam mules, draining at all the minerals that you can to stop the opponent to try and take newer expos. 15 or so mules at a mineral line is going to eat it up so quickly that if your enemy finds out about it, half the minerals are gone and you didnt waste a single mineral and supply building a scv to mine minerals. Of course, gas is still a factor here so maybe 6 scvs per base/expansion to mine gas only could help
|
There is no way you can have 200/200 marines using this build at 14 minutes.
Let's suppose that is 150 marines, with 50 scvs. 150 marines takes 3750 barracks-seconds to build. If you have 6 barracks that is 11 minutes, 15 seconds of constant marine production. So you would need to have 6 barracks at 3:45 in game time. In practice you would have fewer barracks early, more barracks later, which is fine. But there is no way you can meet that much production time if you have 3 or more orbital commands, much less the 8+ that this build suggests.
|
how in the world are you getting that htis means they are broken. Terrans are already getting outmacroed by other races lategame, this is not an issue.
|
This is a very interesting post. To everyone replying to this, don't think of culminating this into a mass CC/OC strategy. Think of this more as something to keep in mind when you macro yourself. If the OP's math is really correct, it'll basically mean that adding a CC just to be able to get more mules out will be a viable option. That's kind of scary.
|
ask day9 to make it a funday monday..no depots after the first one
|
On December 02 2010 17:48 CortoMontez wrote:
This reminds me of the BM mules used during the iCCup extravaganza on Asteroid Field, where a player used about 10-15 OCs to completely deplete an enemy expansion.
that sounds absolutely brilliant. Is there a replay for this you know of?
|
|
|
I've done this with various permutations a dozen times or so.
The biggest issue is that you typically build a command center because you want the base, and the orbital command is just a bonus. It actually takes quite some time for the orbital command to pay for itself if you're relying on mules to earn back its entire cost. True, the flat value is 550 so 2 mules technically do the job. However that's terrible because you invested 400, and don't see any return on it until 135 seconds later, including an additional investment of 150 later. It comes down to how much you value money now vs later. 550 minerals now (assuming you're committed to the OC at CC construction) in exchange for +3 minerals per second, starting in 135 seconds. It feels like the OC doesn't really start being worth it until about 4-5 or more mules later, assuming you stop using the money to make more orbital commands.
OC farming is a huge down payment, but a big payoff in the long term. The most success I've had with it is taking a fast expand, thats 2 OCs already without needing to do anything too strange. The 3rd cc is begun when your two mules start being profitable. If possible, fly it to an island and missile turret the heck out of it.
Now things start getting weird. Firstly, after the 3rd is up and running, get the Neosteel Frame upgrade at the engineering bay. You could do this before the 3rd, but you would have to morph it to an OC when it reached the island, since orbitals have no scv storage capacity. The purpose of this upgrade is that you will be using command centers for your at-risk expansions. With this upgrade a CC has 10 scv storage, enough for 6 on gas and 4 additional workers. You can pick up all ten and lift off it the enemy shows up. Bases very far away from the enemy will get more orbital commands, and bases that are not on the front lines, but not especially far away either will be planetary fortresses. For example, mains in metalopolis get OCs, naturals get PFs, golds are CC's with only 10 scvs, relying on mules for mining. Move the OC originally built in your natural to another base and put a PF there.
It seems like the extra money gained from an orbital command greatly reduces the threshold of economy needed to justify building another command center. Command centers are just useful structures considering you can (with Neosteel) have limited mining at a base with almost zero risk.
Terran's options for serious map control are limited, but in order to seriously capture the entire map you're going to need to try hard. A siege tank contain is clearly the best possible option but this might be impossible.
|
this has potential.
let me cite a few limitations:
1. it is time bound, as there comes a time (is it 12 min OP?) when the "build" maxes its potential
2. it is extremely dependent on opponents scouting and reaction (but hey, if you're playing terran, what's one thing that you can do best: turtle)
3. it is also map dependent, as you need to have a good amount of space in your main and expos should be strategically near and defensible enough (steppes of war?)
without credible test to it yet, i can say that +1 roach or early bling 4min push will give this some trouble. or any early game effective aggression for that matter. needs to be tested tho.
just the same, i smell mule nerf coming.
|
On December 02 2010 20:09 ABCSFirebird wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2010 19:48 Cryosin wrote:
You can 2 rax and then build a CC. instead of building supply depots use your orbital command.
Thats actually not cost effective. Although you might not want to build supply depots with this build it would still be more effective to build them instead of using supply calldown.
Not entirely true.
fact 1: each base has a limited amount of resources
fact 2: you will more than likely mine out your main base
fact 3: you reap the benefits instantly.
so while the mule will make the money faster, you lose that money forever. mule is still better, but supply calldown is not horrible by any means.
to avoid supply cap id say for first cpl of ccs tp use supply cd instead.
|
Conrose December 02 2010 18:32.
Oh, also, since you aren't using your OCs for gathering themselves or unit production, it is possible to use them as a sort of "Mobile Wall-Off" depending on the situation.
OMG! Like a mobile reparable semi-permanent massive force field?!!
This is trully revolutionary. Praxis needed!
|
On December 02 2010 21:33 Lockindal wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2010 20:09 ABCSFirebird wrote:On December 02 2010 19:48 Cryosin wrote:
You can 2 rax and then build a CC. instead of building supply depots use your orbital command.
Thats actually not cost effective. Although you might not want to build supply depots with this build it would still be more effective to build them instead of using supply calldown. Not entirely true. fact 1: each base has a limited amount of resources fact 2: you will more than likely mine out your main base fact 3: you reap the benefits instantly. so while the mule will make the money faster, you lose that money forever. mule is still better, but supply calldown is not horrible by any means. to avoid supply cap id say for first cpl of ccs tp use supply cd instead.
Well this limited amount of resources argument comes only into play when you have no access to other resources - which happens when you don't or can't move out of your base - so your opponent usually can expand and mine more than you - or when the whole map is mined out. And comparing supply calldown with a virtual equal opponent who is using mules instead he would have mined more than you and you would lose anyway.
|
On December 02 2010 21:42 gongryong wrote:Show nested quote +Conrose December 02 2010 18:32.
Oh, also, since you aren't using your OCs for gathering themselves or unit production, it is possible to use them as a sort of "Mobile Wall-Off" depending on the situation. OMG! Like a mobile reparable semi-permanent massive force field?!! This is trully revolutionary. Praxis needed!
Every Terran building can do this. Barracks are the most natural choice since they're cheap and durable.
|
On December 02 2010 21:58 Severedevil wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2010 21:42 gongryong wrote:Conrose December 02 2010 18:32.
Oh, also, since you aren't using your OCs for gathering themselves or unit production, it is possible to use them as a sort of "Mobile Wall-Off" depending on the situation. OMG! Like a mobile reparable semi-permanent massive force field?!! This is trully revolutionary. Praxis needed! Every Terran building can do this. Barracks are the most natural choice since they're cheap and durable.
You need ALL your other building for production. Not so much with OC because you can land them and call mule anytime while they escort your army for the said purpose.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
