One of the more hilarious tools in the Terran disposal is the hunter seeker missile. For a painfully long duration, a unit gets chased by a slow moving high explosive. It deals a great 100 damage up front, and moderate damage that drops off pretty fast. The only downside is the risk of placing the Raven in range... or is it?
For the cost of one Reaper, you can direct a hunter seeker missile anywhere in the ability's huge range. Why reapers? Because they're cheap, they can jump cliffs to sneak anywhere, and have enough speed to stay comfortably ahead of the missile. It doesn't really matter if the unit dies, as the missile will still blow up its last location. So go take one of your convicts, launch a few hunter seeker's at it, and set him loose.
With reaper speed and durable materials, it is even possible to have the reaper come from one direction, and the missile from another. Talk about a one man pincer attack!
Unfortunately my micro isn't good enough to really show it off. If anyone can get a good replay of hunter reaper missiles, be sure to post it!
u cant use it on enemy units because it will kill the reaper, and reapers take forever to build so you are murdering your barracks trying to be cute. dont think self hunter seeker targeting will ever be viable
If you can run the reaper into their mineral line then you probably could have simply flown straight there with the Raven and used it on a worker... And you can't really use this on an army because they will just kill your reaper the instant it is in range and the missile will drop.
HSM will never be viable as part of an actual build or composition, in its current state its only good for when you get cute and land it on a badly managed muta ball or something, its to easy to avoid to ever be a staple upgrade.
I thought about this and a viking is the best unit to use for this as its flying so it can go directly over a unit and fairly cheap however hsm is terrible so this wont work.
A cloaked ghost or banshee however.. would be pretty hard to spot. Opportunity for some pimp play if you already opened cloak banshee, to use one as a HSM delivery tool while cloaked. It doesn't even kill the banshee.
Chance is however after such an opening your opponent will have detection by mineral lines and army.
Reapers are tougher to pick off than you give credit for. They can outrun most units with speed, and can take advantage of hiding on cliffs. Even if the reaper is picked off, the missile STILL LANDS.
On December 20 2010 13:39 bobucles wrote: Reapers are tougher to pick off than you give credit for. They can outrun most units with speed, and can take advantage of hiding on cliffs. Even if the reaper is picked off, the missile STILL LANDS.
The missile lands where the reaper died. IE usually at range 5 or 6 away from the enemy units (reapers aren't tough). Just keeping the reaper alive isn't very useful if they die in the corner of a base.
This could be useful against speedlings as the might end up clustered around the reapers corpse. But then again they might (most likely will be) attack moved somewhere else and they will continue to run away after the reaper falls.
The problem is as people have maybe less then clearly been pointing out, is that since the reaper has 50 HP, it won't die close enough to the enemy units for this to be much use. Maybe it would work better with a hellion (faster and a bit tougher). But I would still be worried that they would know what is going on and run their army away becuase of how dam slow missile is. You would be investing alot of resources into the ravens and the upgrade for a very flakey strategy.
Nice idea if it actually did any real damage. HSM only good vs badly microed tightly clumped air units (read noob mutas). There have been lots of attempts to make this spell useful after the beta nerf, but it's simply worthless in its current state.
The other day I faced some dude in a custom game who used this on my tightly packed bioball. I didn't even try to dodge just to see what damage it did. I nearly fell of my chair laughing as it hurt ONE marauder who got instanly healed afterwards. This spell is epic rofl.
I seriously think it could be boosted to 200 damage without causing imbalance... Its soooo bad right now.
One of the biggest problem with the HSM, apart from its range, is the retarded high energy cost. You need the Raven playing with its dick for quite some time, after the energy upgrade, to actually use the HSM. Mind you that this is after investing100/200 into the raven. Screw the HSM, its way better to build some banshees with the raven and put down two pdds. The only practical use of HSM is to get it after you are 200/200 against zerg and are massing a bunch of ravens.
Won a ladder game the other day by getting to seeker missiles off on a muta ball, when I was about to die. Raven had 20 kills when the second one hit. Was sickkkk. Game ended up mining out the almost the entire map, and at hte very end I had 0 minerals, 4 SCVs, 2 marauders, 2 vikings, 3 marines, 4 medivacs, and managed to float my CC to the last main in Meta. Stuck the marauders up front, he had ~35 zerglings and 3 banelings. He mined out all his gas. Was sick, he couldn't break the ramp because he had focused all on air upgrades and I had 3-3 marauders tanking all the dmg.
Anyways, I know that wasn't relevant whatsoever to seeker missile, but at that point I only had like 7 vikings and 10 marines vs his broodlords and mass muta ball .
On December 20 2010 13:07 uSnAmplified wrote: HSM will never be viable as part of an actual build or composition, in its current state its only good for when you get cute and land it on a badly managed muta ball or something, its to easy to avoid to ever be a staple upgrade.
HSM in its current state could be useful in TvT against sieged tanks. if you already have air superiority you launch a hunter seeker missile or 2 at sieged tanks and force them to unsiege and move in
To me the worst part about the HSM is its atrociously small splash radius. Not to mention the splash isn't even the full 100 damage, it trails off really quickly outside of the initial unit it hits.
just went into a replay to try and show it off to you but the poster above me is right.. it has a super small blast radius and it doesnt follow TOOO far if you dont have durable materials
On December 20 2010 13:07 uSnAmplified wrote: HSM will never be viable as part of an actual build or composition, in its current state its only good for when you get cute and land it on a badly managed muta ball or something, its to easy to avoid to ever be a staple upgrade.
HSM in its current state could be useful in TvT against sieged tanks. if you already have air superiority you launch a hunter seeker missile or 2 at sieged tanks and force them to unsiege and move in
How would you force them to unsiege with seeker missile? An unsieged tank can't even outrun it, let alone the time it takes to unsiege. A single seeker missile won't even kill one. And if you're trying to maintain air superiority, you'd be most likely using it for PDD. If they forfeited air, still use PDD vs marauders. Or simply brace for an attack as they won't last long on tank/marine without vision ahead.
It's costly, high-energy requirement, high unit cost, it's damage is pretty pathetic for the amount of effort and it's easily avoided by outrunning the missile for it's duration. People would get more creative if it was actually a spell worth researching.
The damage drop off is probably the worst part. It's pretty typical for units to take one half or less damage from the explosion. I was launching 4-5 missiles only to see that it barely did any damage around the edges.
About ravens, I've tried to produce ravens in order to mess with mass siege and it's effective but it's unsafe and risky and can easily turn out to expensive. You basically need to know that you will have the opportunity to hsm several times with the same raven for it to be worth it.
On December 20 2010 13:29 Reason.SC2 wrote: the reaper is very easily picked off.
A cloaked ghost or banshee however.. would be pretty hard to spot. Opportunity for some pimp play if you already opened cloak banshee, to use one as a HSM delivery tool while cloaked. It doesn't even kill the banshee.
Chance is however after such an opening your opponent will have detection by mineral lines and army.
Why doesn't this get quoted more? I think OP's idea is a great one, but as many already pointed out it might be hard to get the reaper in range before getting taken out, and if he dies before reaching your opponents main army then it will be a waste (and yes I do believe this should be used vs main armies, not mineral lines as there are too many other options vs the latter). A cloaked ghost on the other hand would probably not be spotted, and if its on "hold fire" mode it would not be spotted before taking the hit either. I think this could do some serious harm. Anyone know if this actually works on cloaked units? Imagine if you do this with two ghosts at the same time. Cloak, target with HSM, then run into the main army and wait for missile on "hold fire"-mode. Then you get off two huge missile blasts without giving any "nuclear launch detected" warning, no dots on the minimap and no "your forces are under attack" messages. Follow up with a huge 200 vs 200 food army clash and you're pretty much ensured victory.
Stimmed Marines save you on gas, while also drawing less attention, so in Army vs Army the cheapness and 'cover' of the Marine might be better than a Reaper.
Sounds like a great GTFO the game is over, stop hiding pylons taunt ^^. Like building scouts in BW or making a heart with pylons. Other then that....I honestly can't say how a reaper beats a flying unit in mobility =.=...
Haha, I remember the beta days where people complained about the HSM being Op.
This doesn't seem THAT viable, quite honestly for that investment (not to mention the reaper/cloaked banshee/ghost you need to gift wrap your HSM) I'd rather just get ghosts and nuke. Or, you know, make a real army.
The worse thing about hounterseeker missile is that it follows a target for hours. It is so slow, there is no way you will let it hit but it follows it and is annoying.
On December 21 2010 02:16 xixecal wrote: Sounds like a great GTFO the game is over, stop hiding pylons taunt ^^. Like building scouts in BW or making a heart with pylons. Other then that....I honestly can't say how a reaper beats a flying unit in mobility =.=...
The two big things are cost and movement speed. Reapers are faster than terran flying units, and aren't hindered by most terrain like flying units. It's also a cheaper investment than vikings or banshees.
Cute Idea. I'd like to see a vid of this in action.
TBH I would like to see Blizz make some changes to make this a more useful spell.
Nerf damage and increase range or nerf damage and decrease mana cost? I'm sure both ideas have been considered elsewhere on TL. But, anything to have a spell I can actually use. Kind of a shame to have a spell that no one uses...I can't think of a correlative (unused, underused spell) for any other race.
I really don't see seeker missiles ever being truly practical, though it would be cool if someone figured out a way. That said, if you aren't worried about ledges, then hellions would be better. They're faster to build, not to mention just plain faster, and they don't cost gas. Considering how expensive Ravens are in gas, that's a plus.
One of my favourite ways to screw around with people is to seeker missile their buildings. You can't target buildings, but the splash affects them so you can target one of your own units with a dozen or so missiles and run it up to them. Best pylon-killing method ever. Also Nexuses.
On December 21 2010 02:36 Durp wrote: Haha, I remember the beta days where people complained about the HSM being Op.
This doesn't seem THAT viable, quite honestly for that investment (not to mention the reaper/cloaked banshee/ghost you need to gift wrap your HSM) I'd rather just get ghosts and nuke. Or, you know, make a real army.
To be fair they used to have like 9 range and did as much damage as a nuke.
Cool idea. Tried it with a reaper, hellion, then cloaked ghost on a group of hold position marines. Just using the raven was more effective and killed by far the most marines than the 3 combined.
I know that this was a very small test, but I really, truly, don't see how this is viable in any way shape or form.
if they don't have detection but range 6 anti air use a cloaked banshee hehe dunnow if the banshee survies ... really should check hp some times... if she doesn't nevermind hehe. In team games it should be fun. Place some on changelings ^^ enemy units will not attack them on their own..
How about scanning the enemy army, find some units that are worth killing then send a couple of HSM? Isn't viable but good idea to use on enemy detectors to bring in your ghost.
Off the top of my head :/, HSM isn't good otherwise.
currently HSM is just too costly, the only current use is vs mutalisks, but id rather use PDD when thats guranteed help vs a slight slight chance ill hit anything
On December 21 2010 04:03 Addishuns wrote: How about scanning the enemy army, find some units that are worth killing then send a couple of HSM? Isn't viable but good idea to use on enemy detectors to bring in your ghost.
Off the top of my head :/, HSM isn't good otherwise.
That would work if the casting range of HSM wasn't so short (6 range!) and if the Raven was a little faster. This strat would be a one way trip for the raven.
if the hsm explodes where the target died maybe u could target for example an enemy marine and instantly snipe it so u have at least a guaranteed explosion at a location of ur choice not that thats especially useful but... :D
I like how to this day Blizzard refuses to buff HSM. If it was actually a usable spell it would give T the late game threat against Z that they desperately need.
i think in tvz, it would be a good idea to HSM a few maurauders, with good timing, you can blow up a lot of banelings.
if you HSM the banelings, they can run away and they'll usually be faster. If you HSM say a 3 seperate maurauders, they can keep up with the baneling ball, and the zerg will probably not suicide the banelings into a maurauder wall, and then BOOM you get 12 baneling kills
Bring an SCV into battle. HSM him behind the line. Run him forward (not attack move). Enemy units won't attack him due to target priority. Boom, no risk to Raven (they may not even see it).
Probably still impractical, but could be fun at least.
On December 20 2010 13:07 uSnAmplified wrote: HSM will never be viable as part of an actual build or composition, in its current state its only good for when you get cute and land it on a badly managed muta ball or something, its to easy to avoid to ever be a staple upgrade.
HSM in its current state could be useful in TvT against sieged tanks. if you already have air superiority you launch a hunter seeker missile or 2 at sieged tanks and force them to unsiege and move in
Or you can nuke or build a banshee. nuking is the best option.
1) Nuke 2) Enemy unsieges 3) Stim and Kill 4) Move Tanks up
now that i think about it, hunter seeker missile damage really isnt that incredible unlike storms which hit instantly and are alright and the tempars get to turn into beefy archons after
maybe the fix to hunter seeker missile is to simply let it be used without research. that way a fresh raven will be able to use hunter seeker missiles right out of the box. i bet it definitely would be useful in that scenario, anyone agree?
im sure if hunter seeker missile could be used without needing the upgrade it would see some play
On December 21 2010 05:11 Tynan wrote: Here's an unformed thought.
Bring an SCV into battle. HSM him behind the line. Run him forward (not attack move). Enemy units won't attack him due to target priority. Boom, no risk to Raven (they may not even see it).
Probably still impractical, but could be fun at least.
This is a much better idea than the other uses I've seen or heard.
hellion seems bettter at this in every way shape and form tbh, except cliffs
hellion has more hp, costs only minerals instead of gas, is much faster than even a speed reaper.
to me it seems if you are doing something like this the most important factor is raw speed rather than trying to be clever with cliffs or something.
since the missile explodes at the location of target death i could see this being handy on say, lt. the factor would be speed. get unit as close as possible to good spot before dying, and be cheap. hellion lol. i say lt because of the xel naga tower, it's a very open space.
even so, hsm is shit. costs too much energy and has a ridiculous projectile speed. just using the spell *FEELS* like a gimmick.
EPT
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