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antisocialmunki's TvZ is a marine/raven combo. as previously mentioned due to the gas requirements, you're strapped for gas.
Just think of all the upgrades that make ravens the best they can be:
Recomended:
HSM (is it even called that anymore?) 150/150
Reactor (you'll want it if you're massing ravens) 150/150
Durable Materials 150/150
Optional but recommended:
Building Armor (+2 to turrets, pretty cheap for what it does) 150/150, that turns a turret into basically an immobile roach. Eng bay
Optional but slightly less recommended:
Hi-Sec Auto Tracking (+1 range turret/pdd) 100/100.
Of course there's also ship armor should you have anything left to build with.
Effectively that makes the raven one of the most expensive support units, with quite possible the biggest investment in skills to make them the best they can be.
Marine/Raven is sort of all you can do until you hit your critical mass of ravens assuming you've kept them alive. They're fun units and seeker missile can drive your opponents nuts by wearing their fingers off trying to out micro the missile. Against considerable lower ranked players you could probably get away with turtling and building mass ravens, but otherwise you'll be cracked before that.
And as the poster above me said, TLO did not do strictly ravens, a lot of other things happened in that game that eventually allowed TLO to do that. TLO can also get away with that because that's who he is!
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Only reason I can see using a raven en masse is when opponent goes muta heavy. Push and make him engage you, and drop 1-2 PDDs to make mutas worthless there, as you eat up the slings.
Then just push at your leisure and drop a turret to block their ramp on the way if you think it'll help.
I saw Lzgamer beat moonglade last night using only marine raven on scrap, actually went well for him..
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I dunno, the +2 building armor is one of the most crucial upgrades since I usually go for turret contain. It synergizes well with the mass of turrets you will be making against muta anyway. Your turrets become incredibly ling resistant with +2 since you're sapping 20-50% of the dps of a zergling depending on his upgrades. Not so good against heavy roach though.
Reactor is the most needed and Durable you can forget about since your turrets don't usually need to last that long unless you've already won. HSM is kinda a weird one and more psychological. You'll eventually need it and I get it after reactor.
The TLO White-Ra game was a weird game but it's TLO. It is interesting to note that Ravens are cheaper to produce constantly than ghosts though Might be good for mass PDD.
Edit: You got a link to a vod or a rep Jeff?
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On January 09 2011 03:17 Antisocialmunky wrote:
I dunno, the +2 building armor is one of the most crucial upgrades since I usually go for turret contain. It synergizes well with the mass of turrets you will be making against muta anyway. Your turrets become incredibly ling resistant with +2 since you're sapping 20-50% of the dps of a zergling depending on his upgrades. Not so good against heavy roach though.
Reactor is the most needed and Durable you can forget about since your turrets don't usually need to last that long unless you've already won. HSM is kinda a weird one and more psychological. You'll eventually need it and I get it after reactor.
The TLO White-Ra game was a weird game but it's TLO. It is interesting to note that Ravens are cheaper to produce constantly than ghosts though Might be good for mass PDD.
Edit: You got a link to a vod or a rep Jeff?
I wish. I was watching his stream last night taking bong hits and it amazed me really. It was all about his constant pressure more than the raven usage. He only threw out like 4 HSMs that I saw.
It was a constant drop on main, hit expo, take third, scoot to expo drop main and expo.
If anyone knows LZgamer, ask him, he saved the rep.
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On January 08 2011 18:46 pfods wrote:Show nested quote +On January 08 2011 05:47 Kimaker wrote:On January 08 2011 05:45 boblzer0 wrote:
by the time you had "mass ravens" you'd be rolfstomped Don't be so quick to discount it...TLO pulled off a pretty high Raven count vs White-Ra in recent Day[9] daily. It's doable. Clearly it'd be a later transition, not something you B-lined for and then made nothing but. that game was also like 40 minutes long and they were fighting the entire time with standard strategies.
Clearly it'd be a later transition, not something you B-lined for and then made nothing but.
Exactly.
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Mass raven can be super effective, I've seen somebody use it in a tournament and he won. Dunno who it was tho, maybe TLO? Can somebody give me a link?
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On January 09 2011 03:32 iAmJeffReY wrote:Show nested quote +On January 09 2011 03:17 Antisocialmunky wrote:
I dunno, the +2 building armor is one of the most crucial upgrades since I usually go for turret contain. It synergizes well with the mass of turrets you will be making against muta anyway. Your turrets become incredibly ling resistant with +2 since you're sapping 20-50% of the dps of a zergling depending on his upgrades. Not so good against heavy roach though.
Reactor is the most needed and Durable you can forget about since your turrets don't usually need to last that long unless you've already won. HSM is kinda a weird one and more psychological. You'll eventually need it and I get it after reactor.
The TLO White-Ra game was a weird game but it's TLO. It is interesting to note that Ravens are cheaper to produce constantly than ghosts though Might be good for mass PDD.
Edit: You got a link to a vod or a rep Jeff? I wish. I was watching his stream last night taking bong hits and it amazed me really. It was all about his constant pressure more than the raven usage. He only threw out like 4 HSMs that I saw. It was a constant drop on main, hit expo, take third, scoot to expo drop main and expo. If anyone knows LZgamer, ask him, he saved the rep.
Lol, well yeah, constant pressure is the name of the game with marine/raven. I never did mess with drops as much as I should have. It would have been pretty easy since you can't go 2 port Raven while building tanks. So you just build medivacs out of your 2nd port. So you go drop -> 1 raven + tanks + marines push. Don't forget to take your third (you WILL have the money lol). De-Creep the map and what not while dropping the main and attacking the third or setting up a contain.
Also medivac energy is good for this too because the Zerg's power units have silly burst damage so in-battle-healing isn't too effective but with the extra energy a small amount of medivacs is really nice for healing stim damage after a battle.
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On January 09 2011 06:15 Antisocialmunky wrote:Show nested quote +On January 09 2011 03:32 iAmJeffReY wrote:On January 09 2011 03:17 Antisocialmunky wrote:
I dunno, the +2 building armor is one of the most crucial upgrades since I usually go for turret contain. It synergizes well with the mass of turrets you will be making against muta anyway. Your turrets become incredibly ling resistant with +2 since you're sapping 20-50% of the dps of a zergling depending on his upgrades. Not so good against heavy roach though.
Reactor is the most needed and Durable you can forget about since your turrets don't usually need to last that long unless you've already won. HSM is kinda a weird one and more psychological. You'll eventually need it and I get it after reactor.
The TLO White-Ra game was a weird game but it's TLO. It is interesting to note that Ravens are cheaper to produce constantly than ghosts though Might be good for mass PDD.
Edit: You got a link to a vod or a rep Jeff? I wish. I was watching his stream last night taking bong hits and it amazed me really. It was all about his constant pressure more than the raven usage. He only threw out like 4 HSMs that I saw. It was a constant drop on main, hit expo, take third, scoot to expo drop main and expo. If anyone knows LZgamer, ask him, he saved the rep. Lol, well yeah, constant pressure is the name of the game with marine/raven. I never did mess with drops as much as I should have. It would have been pretty easy since you can't go 2 port Raven while building tanks. So you just build medivacs out of your 2nd port. So you go drop -> 1 raven + tanks + marines push. Don't forget to take your third (you WILL have the money lol). De-Creep the map and what not while dropping the main and attacking the third or setting up a contain. Also medivac energy is good for this too because the Zerg's power units have silly burst damage so in-battle-healing isn't too effective but with the extra energy a small amount of medivacs is really nice for healing stim damage after a battle.
Yeah I caught a few of those moonglade/lz games, the last one on meta didn't go Lz's way but he still had some pretty good HSMs, moonglade ended up kiting a lot of them underneath the ravens to kill them (not sure if that was by design, but i imagine it was).
ASM, the +2 armor I also think is worth it when going your build, but in regards to the OP, it seemed just kind of "mass ravens and that's it". As you've said before though, your requires a lot of triggers to go off before you can get to PLAGUU raven status, you need to have your expansion, your timing pushes at the right times, and not lose needlessly to banelings, etc.
Ravens are fun in general, but damn do they have a ton of upgrading required in addition to the tech buildings to get to them. Given the energy cost of HSM I wouldn't mind their cast range being a little longer (the range wouldn't feel so short if there wasn't that 1-second cast time it feels like).
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Well I believe the Raven is still largely underused, especially the HSM vs Zergs.
On my level (2kish diamond) I see many terrans having gas banked, because they cant spend every gas.
1 Raven means very very weak creepspread
2 Raven can totally shift battle big time, if they are cast under the Magicboxing Mutas, also dropping turrets is nice here and there.
3+ Ravens need HSM. Wait until Mutas come in force em out again with HSM, while ure marines/thor may take free shots at them
I've got to admit, HSM needs to much energy, but it can also turn the game
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I don't get why people get Ravens for HSM.
They won't hit unless your opponent is bad and sit under range 3 of a Raven or units are flying or running at the ravens. The only thing HSM has for it is that each missile does AOE damage. So unlike storm and EMP, HSM damage can be stacked to evaporate a ton of units at once(see TLO vs White-Ra).
You get Ravens for detection, turrets, and mobility with bio. That and you get 3 ravens for the same supply as 2 tanks except it flies, detects, and spams a pretty good free unit... and invincibility in certain cases and the threat of HSM.
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I almost never use turrets if I raven. I almost never raven anymore. Vs zerg I've found a healthy unit mix is just the key. It's sad how wide spread you have to be to have a chance.
I only ever use ravens vs toss, for some reason. Even in TvT. I don't make vikings, so why make ravens to stop vikings.
I think HSM is maybe the only reason to get a raven vs zerg, but maybe thats me. When a zerg commits to battle, he isn't going to retreat because of a HSM shot off. They almost can't. The problem laying in that AoE damage hurts you as well =/
If you face a morrow like zerg, that has 5000 creep tumors, get a raven out asap. Take out the creep, take out the vision and mobility
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On January 09 2011 10:32 Antisocialmunky wrote:
I don't get why people get Ravens for HSM.
They won't hit unless your opponent is bad and sit under range 3 of a Raven or units are flying or running at the ravens. The only thing HSM has for it is that each missile does AOE damage. So unlike storm and EMP, HSM damage can be stacked to evaporate a ton of units at once(see TLO vs White-Ra).
Well the HSM doesnt need to hit to be effective in my eyes. As I said if u can force Mutas hovering over u flee and take additional popshots, its already paid of.
Also I saw som HSm use against attacking baneling.
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On January 09 2011 10:35 iAmJeffReY wrote:
I almost never use turrets if I raven. I almost never raven anymore. Vs zerg I've found a healthy unit mix is just the key. It's sad how wide spread you have to be to have a chance.
I only ever use ravens vs toss, for some reason. Even in TvT. I don't make vikings, so why make ravens to stop vikings.
I think HSM is maybe the only reason to get a raven vs zerg, but maybe thats me. When a zerg commits to battle, he isn't going to retreat because of a HSM shot off. They almost can't. The problem laying in that AoE damage hurts you as well =/
If you face a morrow like zerg, that has 5000 creep tumors, get a raven out asap. Take out the creep, take out the vision and mobility
The Raven is only really super great imba when you're being aggressive. This is because the Raven as a unit is really designed to prepare a defensive position. It is quite good at it. Thus may seem counter intuitive but it is the only way to economize Raven energy effectively. Judging by your previous statements you're not really convinced about Terran being able to economically contest map control due to the cost effectiveness of speedlings. I don't really have a feeling either way about that except to say that there is a window between speedlings and factory units where Terran cannot move out if he went for an expansion.
The effectiveness of the Raven depends highly on map position. In TvP for example the difference between a PDD in the field and PDD on top the the natural nexus. If you put it in the field, Protoss just backs off and the raven has just become 100% useless. If you put it on the enemy nexus, then you're marine/banshee push just won the game barring some sort of crazy base trade because Protoss has to engage or lose his nexus and the game anyway.
It is even more crucial in TvZ due to higher zerg mobility, you need the ravens to push up to somewhere that Zerg has to attack most often up to hatch creep. Otherwise, you'll end up like...
+ Show Spoiler +
...Hei in the Reddit Invitational where he had ravens in his base, trying to fight muta except the muta could just run to somewhere without auto turrets or just run around until the HSM expired. To be fair, if you go Ravens, you need Tanks and Ravens and not a reactor port of medivacs.
Thus you need to force the zerg into attacking you at a specific for Ravens to be useful... at all. A Raven mid-late gameplan should come down to constricting the Zerg's movement by eliminating creep and forcing them to attack a forward position that is guarded by Ravens... preferably with tank support.
That way you can use your Raven Shotgun and turret placement effectively.
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EPT
