On December 31 2010 01:37 4Servy wrote: By the time you have a 200/200 army with tanks/ghost protoss have like 25 gates and 4-5 robbos and 2 forges and will just steamrole you over. People that say that 200/200 mech beat toss ground army are mistaken really, if the immortals/collo and speedzeals are properly upgraded you will lose about 75%-80% of your army and toss just mass chronos all his production structures and runs you over after.
So what can a meching Terran do to a Protoss to prevent this build up of units? What do you do?
Some sort of harass but all I can think of is taking out clusters of warpgates to prevent warp-in-madness.
Any more words from pro's about mech would be really helpful and greatly appreciated.
On December 31 2010 04:24 terranghost wrote: Regardless of how many times you attempt to explain non believers will be nonbelievers.
On December 30 2010 16:10 Raiznhell wrote: I am NOT a good player by any means. I don't play very often and I'm only 1600-1700ish Diamond but everyone I play against is 1600-2400 for some reason because the matchmaking system is messed. That being said I am bad and still won against some pretty decent players so that defends the strategy and any criticisms you can note for the toss player i probably played worse so don't just be like well he didn't do this at this time because, I didn't do anything right by any good player's point of view lol.
Sure mech has its weakness but so does bio. Just because mech is weak against some things doesnt mean you can't account for these possiblities when you play.
I guess i am being misleading with this but I by no means think that Mech should be the new standard for TvP.
It's just so much easier for those abusive stim pushes to work and even if they don't and in the late game bio is weak head on against toss armies, but the ability to be everywhere at once with the drops and such and stim is too strong for the pro level not to do.
The reason I mech and am showing these is because i see a lot of low level bronze through to mid diamond calling all these strategies stupid and pointless just cuz the pros use bio and if they don't win in the first 15 minutes then all these people say it's imbalanced well no that's the sacrifice you made going bio in my eyes is that you wanted to win early but you didn't so at that point you're kind of paying the price.
Point is these low levels shouldn't be calling any strategy stupid because clearly in these replays Mech worked. Me and my opponents aren't the best players in the world but watch the replays they are definitely better players than me and i still beat them. Mech fits my slow pushing style I find my strength is in my patience not by ability to stim, kite and be up in his face. my style of slowly approaching them forces them into attacking ME on MY terms.
Bio is and always will be stronger in TvP because you never have to stay put your always moving (or should be). It's just i have more fun when i play Mech style and if i can win with it why not use it.
O don't get me wrong I enjoy mech play alot more too. Just commentary for all those other people saying o yea but mech is weak against build x or composition y. Sure mech is weak against those but the toss isn't the only one who knows that )
On December 31 2010 01:37 4Servy wrote: I read throug this thread and as probably one of the only ''pro'' player who used mech throughout tourneys vs toss I will have to say this. Mech can work because most other terrans play bio so protosses dont know to respond to it, mech on ladder works fine to bc its unconventional. Now the main problem I had with mech is that as soon the protosses know your doing it you are going to lose. They just double expand after 1 gate > fe > 3gate/robo and then slam down 4 robos or starports and will just abuse the fact that you cant really push. Observers give maphack so if you decide to push just mass chrono your robos to get 1m round of immortals out and thats it.
Helion harras can ezpz be stopped with good building placement so you cant equalise your eco with protoss and that is basicly the end of it. By the time you have a 200/200 army with tanks/ghost protoss have like 25 gates and 4-5 robbos and 2 forges and will just steamrole you over. People that say that 200/200 mech beat toss ground army are mistaken really, if the immortals/collo and speedzeals are properly upgraded you will lose about 75%-80% of your army and toss just mass chronos all his production structures and runs you over after.
I do get that you're a pro and all and are overall more experienced than me and such but i have a hard time believing that is toss knows you're Meching you're dead just cuz in BW you were 90% sure as a toss player T was probably going to do a siege expand or and FD and go mass tank and vulture and yet knowing that that was going to happen the terran was still able to win using vulture/tank.
But my build i do a 1 rax FE which leaves plenty of room to bunker rush or apply early pressure if i scout that he not only early expanded but double expanded. I get my 4 factories up so fast after the FE kicks in that it just seems like it'd be easy to push with the first 3-4 tanks a huge group of marines and hellions and take out his second expo. Also if protoss drops 4 robo and goes immortals that just seems super weak to an already marine/ hellion filled army that adding even 1 ghost would wreck the toss's day.
As for stargate well that was the weakness of vulture tank in BW and hence you pumped out a lot of Goliaths this is why i have 3 reator starports to get a ton of vikings and in any game where i knew he was going immediately for the air tech i would probably go for starport instead of extra factories.
But i dunno. ill have to get higher on the ladder and face much tougher players.
It just feels like it wouldn't be as ridiculously easy to counter as said cuz in BW you knew every TvP that terran was going to turtle, FE and mass tanks(which didn't have smart fire) and despite getting shuttles, reaver dropping, dt dropping, zlot bombing, arbiters, carriers. terran could still win TvP in BW. I mean to all the player's i faced in this it should have been ridiculously obvious early early on in all the games that i was meching some of them even got observers in my base without me noticing and yet they still couldn't win. Some did if i failed at scouting and missed his VR tech switch but that's my failure not mechs.
BW is a different game you cant compare them imo, mech in sc2 is weaker and protoss has alot better counters to it than in BW. Tanks did 70 + 5 damage in BW and spider mines and vultures were kickass. Also you had scanners and together with mines and vulutre roaming arround it was alot easyer to see what is going on and keep a toss at bay. Also goliaths and tanks/vultures had the same upgrades, unlike vikings/mech in SC2 wich is HUGE this is absolutly a killer blow to mech that you need 2 sets of upgrades for your only anty air. On top of that you need starports for vikings wich is another super exspensive tech route to get .
Anyway this is my experience why it doesnt work, if it works for you thers no reason not to do it especialy when you think its more fun.
Not to sound like an ass but IMHO zealots worked out alot better against tanks in BW than in SC2. Imagine fighting tank lines in BW with zealots without the speed upgrade... It would suck. Chargelots in SC2 are basically slowlots from BW accept they gain the leg enhancement upgrade after they have been bombarded on from range 13 and still had to slowly walk towards the tanks so their increased movment does go off. Zealots in BW could make vultures work against the terran meaning all it took is one hero lot from the group to have a couple of mines chasing him for it to spell instant doom for any small group of terran units. Also in SC2 keep in mind that zealot speed (charge) has a 10sec cooldown (which in game speed is probably closer to 7 sec but whatever) If the zealots on attack move happen to see a bunker or hellion pop forward then the charge will stop on these things giving the tanks more time to shell away at them. Lastly, Tanks in BW (like the ones in sc2) did 35 damage to zealots. This however was more of a penalty in BW because if you had an army of 20 tanks and 10 of them shot at one zealot 5 shot at another and 5 shot at another this would be 3 zealots dead (+ maybe some more that were near the one that was attacked by 10 tanks). This is significant overkill allowing the rest of the army to be basically in firing range by the time the tanks reloaded.
There are somethings that worked with mech better in BW however on the same token there somethings about mech that work better in sc2.
IMO i don't like the whole balance idea thing but for mech to actually become a standard it would take 3 things. 3 things that if implemented would cause TvZ imbalance i would think.
1) their damage. it would need to be 55 vs armored instead of 50 cuz then you really only have to wait till +1 weapons to be able to start your advance. 2) their cost. 100 gas i think would need to be necessary as right now every 4 tanks is the same gas as a potential 5 BW tanks. 3) their supply. 3 supply what with also needing the marines and hellions for support. as mentioned before the games i posted weren't 200 vs 200 supply (this I did not notice) maybe i did steamroll them with just better macro so perhaps equal supply vs equal supply the 3 supply of tanks would take up too much space and there wouldn't be enough tanks.
all these i think would make TvZ imbalance what with the Roach also being 2 supply (not that it's smart to use roaches in TvZ anyways) but yeah just my opinion on what it would take for there ever to be a "Standard" Pro level TvP Mech play.
watch that Kiwikaki vs Idra. Use the same build order you have 2 immortals in your base at 6 minutes. 8:33 in the Jade replay you have a wholesome army of 11 marines, now if you think you can fend this off with 11 marines, you are wrong. I'm giving you 2:33 seconds extra too so this should take into account the scouting factor.
I don't care about Jade's opening build order and whatever cheeses might kill it. It looks pretty solid, might have to be swapped around a bit, who knows, thats not what this thread is about. It's about mech as a midgame/lategame strategy in TvP, whatever it may take to get there.
You should probably watch the replays considering Jade was the protoss and I was talking about the weakness of this build. Second off, how would this work lategame when a stargate is almost guaranteed.
I thought in the first game he ended up getting a ton of vikings. Not sure just sped thru the replay but I think that's how it would be handled. I don't care what people think, but this is an awesome way to play TvP. Mech, it's pretty cool. I don't think anything else really matters.
On December 31 2010 07:52 Raiznhell wrote: IMO i don't like the whole balance idea thing but for mech to actually become a standard it would take 3 things. 3 things that if implemented would cause TvZ imbalance i would think.
1) their damage. it would need to be 55 vs armored instead of 50 cuz then you really only have to wait till +1 weapons to be able to start your advance. 2) their cost. 100 gas i think would need to be necessary as right now every 4 tanks is the same gas as a potential 5 BW tanks. 3) their supply. 3 supply what with also needing the marines and hellions for support. as mentioned before the games i posted weren't 200 vs 200 supply (this I did not notice) maybe i did steamroll them with just better macro so perhaps equal supply vs equal supply the 3 supply of tanks would take up too much space and there wouldn't be enough tanks.
all these i think would make TvZ imbalance what with the Roach also being 2 supply (not that it's smart to use roaches in TvZ anyways) but yeah just my opinion on what it would take for there ever to be a "Standard" Pro level TvP Mech play.
Thats the issue i think BLizz is facing with Mech. If the buff it then it may imbalence TvZ. Then Zergs will really need Dark Swarm.
On December 31 2010 07:52 Raiznhell wrote: IMO i don't like the whole balance idea thing but for mech to actually become a standard it would take 3 things. 3 things that if implemented would cause TvZ imbalance i would think.
1) their damage. it would need to be 55 vs armored instead of 50 cuz then you really only have to wait till +1 weapons to be able to start your advance. 2) their cost. 100 gas i think would need to be necessary as right now every 4 tanks is the same gas as a potential 5 BW tanks. 3) their supply. 3 supply what with also needing the marines and hellions for support. as mentioned before the games i posted weren't 200 vs 200 supply (this I did not notice) maybe i did steamroll them with just better macro so perhaps equal supply vs equal supply the 3 supply of tanks would take up too much space and there wouldn't be enough tanks.
all these i think would make TvZ imbalance what with the Roach also being 2 supply (not that it's smart to use roaches in TvZ anyways) but yeah just my opinion on what it would take for there ever to be a "Standard" Pro level TvP Mech play.
I don't think the Tank nerf was what balanced ZvT. Tanks own roaches just as hard with 50dmg as they did with 60. The discovery of "magic box" and the roach +1 range was the key i think.
I think what makes mech weak in TvP is that every single stargate unit hard counters mech in one way or another.
The 3 supply cost i think is fair due to the smarter AI but, Protoss just looks designed to fight mech. With charge, blink, immortals,all stargate units, archons, even colossus with it's high mobility... almost any tech choice is viable for Protoss.
I'd like to see Phoenixs not able to lift sieged up Tanks for a start. Who knows what it would take to have mech as standard TvP?! I just hope Blizz wants it to happen and are working on it
Wow, this build's really cool. Even though I'm protoss, I been playing off-race to understand timings and such, and this build looks really hard to stop. I like this build because it's very similar to 1 Gate FE, and I really never knew that you can support 3-5 factories off 2 base. Looks like we can thank the mules.
edit: Wow, I just noticed how these diamonds players are bad, though. I only watched two, but one cannoned rush into 4 gate and the other just 4 gated. The latter 4 gated despite being in cross positions.. Wow. I despise them.
Ive actually been going alot of Marine/Tank/Banchee play in TvP recently. IF they four gate i like to try to throw in some thors as well, unless i start seeing immortals then ill try to go marine heavy if they are getting collousus ill throw some vikings in but mainly banchee/tank/marine. I like to start with a 2 port banchee haevy harass/contain that will some time end the game right there if they 4 gated with no detection then expand behind that will throwing up 2 more rax and factoires. Along with an armory and eng bay. Then just get center map control use banchees plus contain to keep him on 2 base and when he finally pushes out you should be able to easy crush it with bunkers/marine/seige tanks/turrents/cloack banchees/ a couple ravens and medivacs then it should be gg.
On December 31 2010 07:52 Raiznhell wrote: IMO i don't like the whole balance idea thing but for mech to actually become a standard it would take 3 things. 3 things that if implemented would cause TvZ imbalance i would think.
1) their damage. it would need to be 55 vs armored instead of 50 cuz then you really only have to wait till +1 weapons to be able to start your advance. 2) their cost. 100 gas i think would need to be necessary as right now every 4 tanks is the same gas as a potential 5 BW tanks. 3) their supply. 3 supply what with also needing the marines and hellions for support. as mentioned before the games i posted weren't 200 vs 200 supply (this I did not notice) maybe i did steamroll them with just better macro so perhaps equal supply vs equal supply the 3 supply of tanks would take up too much space and there wouldn't be enough tanks.
all these i think would make TvZ imbalance what with the Roach also being 2 supply (not that it's smart to use roaches in TvZ anyways) but yeah just my opinion on what it would take for there ever to be a "Standard" Pro level TvP Mech play.
I don't think the Tank nerf was what balanced ZvT. Tanks own roaches just as hard with 50dmg as they did with 60. The discovery of "magic box" and the roach +1 range was the key i think.
I think what makes mech weak in TvP is that every single stargate unit hard counters mech in one way or another.
The 3 supply cost i think is fair due to the smarter AI but, Protoss just looks designed to fight mech. With charge, blink, immortals,all stargate units, archons, even colossus with it's high mobility... almost any tech choice is viable for Protoss.
I'd like to see Phoenixs not able to lift sieged up Tanks for a start. Who knows what it would take to have mech as standard TvP?! I just hope Blizz wants it to happen and are working on it
Thats why pure mech doesn't work. But note that every "hard counter" to mech is also "Hard countered" by marines
Marines solve the following: The parenthesis shows what you'll need if you opt to not get Marines
Add some Vikings and your Marine Tank Viking ball look pretty strong. The only thing you have to worry about are templar. Which can be dealt with by using the vikings to spot and focus firing with tanks. Or making a few hellions to snipe the HT.
I kind of do this, but transition to Thors after I have upgrades so I can go in for the kill. I also drop on expos to keep my opponent as weak as possible.
Carriers are the anti tank late game though...if they go carriers you're screwed.
On December 31 2010 07:52 Raiznhell wrote: IMO i don't like the whole balance idea thing but for mech to actually become a standard it would take 3 things. 3 things that if implemented would cause TvZ imbalance i would think.
1) their damage. it would need to be 55 vs armored instead of 50 cuz then you really only have to wait till +1 weapons to be able to start your advance. 2) their cost. 100 gas i think would need to be necessary as right now every 4 tanks is the same gas as a potential 5 BW tanks. 3) their supply. 3 supply what with also needing the marines and hellions for support. as mentioned before the games i posted weren't 200 vs 200 supply (this I did not notice) maybe i did steamroll them with just better macro so perhaps equal supply vs equal supply the 3 supply of tanks would take up too much space and there wouldn't be enough tanks.
all these i think would make TvZ imbalance what with the Roach also being 2 supply (not that it's smart to use roaches in TvZ anyways) but yeah just my opinion on what it would take for there ever to be a "Standard" Pro level TvP Mech play.
I don't think the Tank nerf was what balanced ZvT. Tanks own roaches just as hard with 50dmg as they did with 60. The discovery of "magic box" and the roach +1 range was the key i think.
I think what makes mech weak in TvP is that every single stargate unit hard counters mech in one way or another.
The 3 supply cost i think is fair due to the smarter AI but, Protoss just looks designed to fight mech. With charge, blink, immortals,all stargate units, archons, even colossus with it's high mobility... almost any tech choice is viable for Protoss.
I'd like to see Phoenixs not able to lift sieged up Tanks for a start. Who knows what it would take to have mech as standard TvP?! I just hope Blizz wants it to happen and are working on it
Thats why pure mech doesn't work. But note that every "hard counter" to mech is also "Hard countered" by marines
Marines solve the following: The parenthesis shows what you'll need if you opt to not get Marines
Add some Vikings and your Marine Tank Viking ball look pretty strong. The only thing you have to worry about are templar. Which can be dealt with by using the vikings to spot and focus firing with tanks. Or making a few hellions to snipe the HT.
No matter what you do. Your gonna need marines.
I know, that is why mech does not work :p Not gona go in to it but this is why some other threads about mech got out of hand. You need marines and in late game carrier/ HT owns.
Meh.. the game is young and many things will change along the way. I am glad other people experiment with mech because i do to. Looking forward to the -10sec Phoenix build time
I used to exclusively ghost mech TvP ages ago...but I scrapped that when it turned out to not be viable anymore. A combination of protosses getting much better at this game, and the patch completely killed tank based mech.
Every time you do it, just like serv said, toss takes a free 4th/5th, and one of those might even be a gold. Then they just go carriers, mass immortal/templar/gates with collosus, and will re-max zerg style and kill you, while you're barely on one maxed out supply limit, and with Terran you cannot reproduce your army instantly, while P can.
So mech if you want to, but from my personal experience it got to the point where I had to ask myself: do I want to play this game for fun and win TvPs like this vs weaker players or do I want to start winning SC2 and get better? The choice was pretty obvious.
So if you play for fun, by all means, keep going for that mech TvP.
Mech TvP works if you play against Protosses that don't know how to beat it. But if they know how to beat it, you really shouldn't win many games at all.
Does terran mech actually work out later? I've faced this build a few times and I'm usually ecstatic as a protoss to face it. My favourite build, chargelot/ht/VR basically kills everything in mech. If you spam marines, i can plant two storms and faceroll them. You get thors, my chargelots will surround them. You get tanks, I'll abuse your lack of mobility, mass expand, and in fights your tanks will do just as much damage to your own army as mine, shooting my lots. VRs are usually for me used as a sudden surprise switch, when they don't have any vikings out. (and with about 3 bases at this point it's hard to scout everything). Banshees against mass hts will get demolished with feedback, and medivacs I don't even need to talk about. If you go standard stalker colossus though you'll get facerolled.
So was wondering. What do you guys think a terran can counter chargelot/ht/vr? Blink stalkers I don't ever usually have to pull out (only if they're literally spamming tanks and trying to turtle their asses off), but it's not like it's at all off of my tech tree. Even mass marauder doesn't do good against chargelots. Chargelots frankly own everything in mech, except marines (which are used just because they don't need gas), and banshees. But hts kill this, and VR masses are such an end game force. (Frankly they're just the finishing blow)
---- EDIT: I used to think the only counter was an early banshee rush, but I've changed my build to go standard up to 2 gate robo because otherwise you'll just always die to it. I take out my first obs, check for banshee rush, then I get warp prisms if turtle.
well in my eyes the main counter to Mech is basically the same thing that's demolishing other strategies which is HT carrier. I'm finding the combo tough to but you're going to regardless cuz HTs and Carriers are just AMAZING units.
MMM, Banshee marine, Banshee thor, tank based Mech. hell even just mass viking banshee you will always find HTs and Carriers tough as hell. Although however easier it is to storm or micro carriers i still am not convinced it's very imba.
On December 31 2010 11:30 sas911 wrote: Does terran mech actually work out later? I've faced this build a few times and I'm usually ecstatic as a protoss to face it. My favourite build, chargelot/ht/VR basically kills everything in mech. If you spam marines, i can plant two storms and faceroll them. You get thors, my chargelots will surround them. You get tanks, I'll abuse your lack of mobility, mass expand, and in fights your tanks will do just as much damage to your own army as mine, shooting my lots. VRs are usually for me used as a sudden surprise switch, when they don't have any vikings out. (and with about 3 bases at this point it's hard to scout everything). Banshees against mass hts will get demolished with feedback, and medivacs I don't even need to talk about. If you go standard stalker colossus though you'll get facerolled.
So was wondering. What do you guys think a terran can counter chargelot/ht/vr? Blink stalkers I don't ever usually have to pull out (only if they're literally spamming tanks and trying to turtle their asses off), but it's not like it's at all off of my tech tree. Even mass marauder doesn't do good against chargelots. Chargelots frankly own everything in mech, except marines (which are used just because they don't need gas), and banshees. But hts kill this, and VR masses are such an end game force. (Frankly they're just the finishing blow)
---- EDIT: I used to think the only counter was an early banshee rush, but I've changed my build to go standard up to 2 gate robo because otherwise you'll just always die to it. I take out my first obs, check for banshee rush, then I get warp prisms if turtle.
i was just playing someone who went this and then into a mass carrier at the end i ended up losing but my nooby self had 3k/2k at the end and he had 1k/800 and just lost his 5th expo whereas my 5th expo was still up a running fully saturated and surrounded by turrets with a PF. All that lost it for me was bad end game macro.
On December 31 2010 11:30 sas911 wrote: Does terran mech actually work out later? I've faced this build a few times and I'm usually ecstatic as a protoss to face it. My favourite build, chargelot/ht/VR basically kills everything in mech. If you spam marines, i can plant two storms and faceroll them. You get thors, my chargelots will surround them. You get tanks, I'll abuse your lack of mobility, mass expand, and in fights your tanks will do just as much damage to your own army as mine, shooting my lots. VRs are usually for me used as a sudden surprise switch, when they don't have any vikings out. (and with about 3 bases at this point it's hard to scout everything). Banshees against mass hts will get demolished with feedback, and medivacs I don't even need to talk about. If you go standard stalker colossus though you'll get facerolled.
So was wondering. What do you guys think a terran can counter chargelot/ht/vr? Blink stalkers I don't ever usually have to pull out (only if they're literally spamming tanks and trying to turtle their asses off), but it's not like it's at all off of my tech tree. Even mass marauder doesn't do good against chargelots. Chargelots frankly own everything in mech, except marines (which are used just because they don't need gas), and banshees. But hts kill this, and VR masses are such an end game force. (Frankly they're just the finishing blow)
---- EDIT: I used to think the only counter was an early banshee rush, but I've changed my build to go standard up to 2 gate robo because otherwise you'll just always die to it. I take out my first obs, check for banshee rush, then I get warp prisms if turtle.
I like the Goody mech, marauder/tank/viking openings are solid to defend an expo from a one base attack by the toss give you the chance to be aggressive and practically win vs a 1gate FE. (or at the very least punish the greedy protoss.)
Please note that warpgates dont INSTA warp in units, there is a 5 second warp in time. a few hellions in your probe line can screw it over in that time.
nor does 1 cannon stop 7 hellions. if you focus on hellions>tanks, thats worth it. its like vulture harass in BW. your vultures/hellions can be thrown away (not really thrown away... but dont hurt you that badly?)
EPT
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