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Devil's Advocacy:
Being a fan of this and in before the Day9 exposure, I've had a chance to be on both sides of this.
Last night I went into a TvT match on Scrap. I had *that feeling* like this build was coming, so I went with a vanilla 1-1-1 opening with two goals in mind: get lots of Marauders with concussive and lots of Vikings to never lose the air.
I snuck my SCV back into his base just as the tech lab switch was occuring on his two factories, confirming the build. At that point I had just dropped my own starport and had: 2 marines, a handful of marauders, and a hellion. I trained a single viking, built another starport and waited...
I made a defensive ring of marauders close to my mineral line in case I couldn't catch the drop incoming. The timing works out quite nice: the viking you make comes out almost exactly when the dropping medivac pops and I was able to kill it before it could drop on me (he unloaded the hellions). At that point he sent 7-8 hellions by land to my mineral line: but by then my marauder count was about 7-8. It was some hairy micro, but I killed off most of his hellions with a few SCV losses and a couple marauder losses.
Now for the payback: after killing the medivac and during the battle at my mineral line I made 2 more vikings and a medivac. As soon as the battle was over I loaded 4 marauders into the medivac and sent it and the vikings to his line. I dropped the marauders *and* landed the vikings. He had two vikings out, a single banshee, and a couple hellions. The combination of the marauders being healed by the medivac and the landed vikings cleaned up his ground forces, leaving the single banshee. Even though my vikings died on the ground, I had rallied new ones to the battle and simply loaded up my marauders in the medivac to avoid needless damage. After some SCV cleanup with the marauders, gg ensued.
TL;DR: if you scout it (and there is a window), a 1-1-1 commitment to marauder-viking can catch this build before it gets out of control. If there is a desire to see my crappy gold-level play, I will post.
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On February 14 2011 07:18 DoctorDan wrote:
Devil's Advocacy:
...
TL;DR: if you scout it (and there is a window), a 1-1-1 commitment to marauder-viking can catch this build before it gets out of control. If there is a desire to see my crappy gold-level play, I will post.
Please post! Always good to see both sides of a strategy.
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OK. Gold-level attempts at build/counter-build:
![[image loading]](http://www.gamereplays.org/community/uploads/repimgs/repimg-33-188923.jpg)
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Just wanted to thank you for this build, i´m like 10-1 now with this in TvT.
The one who won against it built too many vikings before i could scout them, so i lost air control : /
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People are becoming damn good at scanning my base, even though using 2 or 3 put me at quite an advantage early game, I have to bolster my mechanics if I want to compensate for it being "scouted" so early.
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On February 14 2011 01:26 wherebugsgo wrote:
What happens when you encounter a player who does a hellion opening into a marine/tank transition?
Jinro vs Ensnare, for example: Jinro went for a blue flame hellion drop, and then switched into marine/tank.
IMO at this point the marine/tank player has the advantage because both players have equal opportunities to do economic damage, but the marine/tank player clearly has the better ground force. Banshees aren't nearly as effective in killing tanks as marines are in killing banshees, so I would imagine the situation would be rather difficult to deal with if the "standard" player decides to do an aggressive contain.
You would think the marine/tank player has the advantage, but that's not the case. Mass hellions will roast marines faster than marines can shoot down banshees. Also, while the marine/tank player needs to eliminate most/all the banshees to win the battle, the hellion/banshee player only needs to weaken the marines to a point where the banshees can clean them up easily. Marines are supposed to counter banshees, but once there are a large number of banshees out, you need thors to deal with them.
The hellion serves the same role as the baneling, but it's far more cost effective because they don't get one shotted by tanks like banelings, plus they can chase down stimmed marines more easily.
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I've been hitting this build a lot on the ladder, and in my attempts to counter it I've started leaning towards ghosts. One ghost will kill 2 blueflame hellions, and it takes 2 ghosts to kill 1 banshee (and if they go cloak you can emp them out). Basically every unit in this build is "light" and ghosts get a bonus against it. I mix in conc shell marauders (to slow the hellions from running) and normally throw up 1 reactored barracks to dump minerals and help defend against banshees at home. When pushing, keep your marines back quite a bit and only move in when you've cleaned up most of the hellions (you tend to lose alot of marauders to banshees though). Best way I've found to afford the gas ghosts take is to 1 barracks fast expand and throw up some turrets for early security. Here's a replay: http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/139297-1v1-terran-lost-temple
I'm only Plat, so its very possible my opponent didn't execute it perfectly (he did start transitioning into tanks at the end), but I think the general theory behind the counter is pretty sound. What do you guys think?
Also feel free to comment on any mistakes that I made (even unrelated to the specific build, I'm always looking to improve).
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OK I tried this for the first time on ladder on the EU Server. I'm a mid lvl masters, and I played vs a 2600 masters (with 300 bonus pool). The map was even Steppes of War, and Boy did I crush him. It was so one sided it was just hilarious. And as I said, it was my First ever time doing this, so I'm sure I made loads of mistakes. I seriously hope not many people in EU know about this yet, cause I'm gonna have a lot of fun with it xD
After my first hellion dropped killed like 10 of his scvs he decided to do the feared marine/tank push to my base that so many of you seem to fear. Well.. he had 1 viking which died instantly to my 2-3, and when he got his marines closer to my ramp to shoot my 1st banshee they all got roasted by hellions so he had to back.
Every hellion drop killed at least 8 scvs, and after the first there was a tank next to his OC the whole time, but that didn't help too much. After 2-3 drops in his main he tried to move most of his SCVs to his Natural, but I just hit them with 3 banshees from the edge. When the marines came next to the edge to kill em it was fun times for my 10+ hellions.
I'll be sure to try it again, and maybe post some replays as well.
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Looking for a diamond/masters player who feels they can execute this build competently, who would be willing to play as many practice games as it takes for me to have a grasp on playing against it. If nothing else than helping a fellow TL poster, you get to burn my SCVs for what could be hours.
EU server
Baggiez
135
(or send me a pm on here)
<3
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I guess I just don't see why someone can't just make reactored starports and outproduce vikings to hard-counter this. You won't be able to drop easily if he has air control, and even if you switch to mass vikings he already has the initiative because you were spending money on hellions, dropship, banshees, etc.
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like already said THANK YOU iEchoic for "thinking outside the box" and sharing your creative ideas !!!
also ty for your TvP hellion drop (I registered on tl just to thank you, at the time)
and ty for this awesome TvT build, which makes TvT so fun, it's a new style !
it is improving my play by forcing me to get better mechanic.
i just tried to summarise it on a french speaking BO website (and also for ur TvP  btw)
hope u don't mind.
edit here's the link http://www.starcraft2-bo.com/builder/view-bo?boid=5CQO10
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I dunno I feel like this build is good because people aren't used to it, but can be beaten fairly easily by a prepared player. I saw pokebunny try it vs mvr in the first or second round of the recent tlopen, and he got raped by a push with some marauders, marines, a few tanks, and 2 thors.
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So, TvT was previously all about maneuvering Marines, Tanks & Vikings with Medivac drops here and there while trying to seige and expand. Both Terrans would use the same unit composition and the battle would be about who understands and executes the subtle positioning better.
Now that this build has come out and it's getting popular, I am genuinely curious what happens when both Terrans go the same build? How many of you have gone the same 2 Factory 2 Port build and duke it out against each other? Hellions flaming each other? Banshees picking off each others Hellions? Viking wars?
@iEchoic You're awesome for coming up with this build! Keep the creative strategies coming for whatever matchup!
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On February 15 2011 03:40 Poiuytr wrote:
I guess I just don't see why someone can't just make reactored starports and outproduce vikings to hard-counter this. You won't be able to drop easily if he has air control, and even if you switch to mass vikings he already has the initiative because you were spending money on hellions, dropship, banshees, etc.
Yup. You aim your build precisely at getting a reactored starport, and you won't be spending gas on tanks. Unless you think banshee play and you want to rely on scans to fight if off rather than a raven, I don't really see the point.
Also, since he'll have 2 starports and an idle barracks, nothing prevents your opponent from getting a reactor on the rax then switching with the addon-less starport for 3 vikings per cycle.
As already stated, the opening is designed to get air dominance (except perhaps if you use a build specifically aimed at countering this one, which is never a good thing). Why isn't the build already crushed by vikings/marauders? Because even then, it'll rely on the defender not only to prevent banshees, but also to capitalize on that. At best.
There are multiple situations where this build bites the dust. What people have to ponder now is how to reach them, not what they are.
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So I love this build. Thanks iEchoic for the sweet build.
The few times that i have lost doing this has been to a really fast Marine marader push. I wasn't scouting as well as i could have, and my banshee didn't come out nearly fast enough. But my question is about the helions. i scout with my Helions right away. but when is the best first push with them. I peak up the ramp, and then back to the towers or my base, and don't really harass untill i have a medivac. Should i be heading up his mineral line and up his ramp before medivac, or even before the blue flame finishes? any thoughts on the first push?
Thanks
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As a big fan of the PVT hellion drop, I wanted to congratulate iEhoic on another great finding... gj !
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love this build...lost to a thor rush though...i think that pretty much counters this....
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Explain something to me, do you go for a blue flame drop the moment you have 2 helions + 1 medivac?
After this drop, depending on what you see... you start making whatever counters what you see? Would you ever transition back into Bio with this build, since you'd already have 2 factories and 2 starports, buying more barracks would seem like it isn't worth it since you sunk all that money into the other 4 buildings?
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Tried this a few times with great success (around 3k masters EU).
Just played another guy going for the same strategy o.o It was really strange, though I won by making a delayed wallin and go for the drop instead of runby. It ended up being an air supremacy battle that I won easily.
Very fun strategy and will definetely be my stable on maps where bio strategies aren't good.
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On February 11 2011 06:37 GinDo wrote:Lol poeple who complain about tank viking is because your not attacking enough so it turns into turtle fest. Notice how Korean TvT is very different from the average NA EU TvT. Any how back on topic. Its nice to see how TvT has evolved and has so many styles. Mech MMM Marine Medic----> My personal Favorite ^^ Marine Tank Hellion Banshee I want to see a Hellion Banshee Mirror Match though 
You can say that. I will counter-argue that notice how in Korean TvT they build turret-rings very late and minor drops always tend to do a lot of damage because koreans play very aggro.
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EPT
