Hello everyone. I've been trying to find more ways to deal with the awesome protoss late game, and my experimentation has brought me to the Battlecruiser. Here is my take on why the Battlecruiser is a great option vs protoss, and I want to hear everyone's opinions and experiences with battlecruisers in TvP.
I'll go over what I've learned using Bcs in TvP.
First off, Bcs are air units, meaning they don't have to deal with the ridiculous dps that is the colossus, the anti armor capabilities of the immortal, and they aren't hindered by forcefields. In addition , their recent speed buff allows them to engage and not have to commit. They can easily disengage, and head home to cut losses/get repairs.
We know what can't hit battlecruisers, now lets look at the protoss things that can shoot up, and see how they fare vs battlecruisers:
Stalker. Probably the most common response you'll see. They will chrono upgrades and get blink. Blink stalkers actually do ok vs bcs in smaller numbers and are the most spammable response; bcs need at least scv support until their numbers start approaching critical mass. Ravens come into play here with PDD. If you have the gas(somehow), marauders work wonders since they tear through stalkers.
Sentry. Doesn't do much minus guardian shields for the other units.
Void Ray. Here is another common response. Best way to handle these is with yamato cannon. Having marine backup melts them as well.
Phoenix. Probably won't see these often since they don't do anything to armored targets.
High Templar. This is the most dangerous response to your bcs. They can feedback the bcs and storm any scvs/bio you may have. Your best bet is to either make sure you get yamatos off right away, or EMP your bcs or the HTs pre-engagement.
Archon. They have splash damage so watch out! Probably won't see them unless they are morphing from hts. Focus them down since you probably won't have yamato.
Carriers/Mommaship. Probably won't see these often, but same rules apply as void ray.I'm not too certain how bcs fare here. If you have experience vs carriers and motherships, please say how it went!
There is one major issue with this strategy. The protoss player can get his colossi ball faster than you get your critical mass of bcs. You need to somehow hold out and get enough resources to support bc production until you have enough bcs to fight him. The best I've managed to answer this problem is with a standard bio FE opening, to cloaked banshees to help defend/harass and keep his workers down, then go into bc production.
This is my take on the BC in this MU. Now I ask all of you. How do you implement Bcs in TvP? And what do you think of their effectiveness? Lastly, if your a player who uses them as a late game unit, how to you hold the line until you get the bcs out?
ive gone through the same logic as you have and i came to the conclusion that they are indeed viable in the matchup. you need to get somewhat a critical mass of them before you fight. i usually wait for about 6 or 7 and a fully charged raven. bc strats are best on big maps like terminus re or taldarim altar. expand alot and fast. i usually go 3 starports off 3 base then 4 starports off 4 base. and ofcourse make lots of rax units for mineral dump
I always find BCs hard to deal with as protoss, but I don't know if it's possible to get them without dying unless you already have 4+ bases. Once you reach ultra-late-game though, I see no reason not to build some starports and pump some BCs.
BCs are probably good against toss going zealot colossus phoenix. they just don't have enough aa and if you get yamato it will be good against colossus. I have no idea what to support the BCs with tho.
If your BC are caught out in the open, 4 stalkers can kill 1 BC quite effectively. I would recommend waiting till you have 5 or so BCs before pushing out. I'm curious to what units you'd back you BCs up with? They do cost 300 gas and they really need support so what unit goes well with them?
I think the BC will remain firmly a late game option but I do think that it will do very well at that role.
I've noted that in the late game even pros's go over 1k gas with bio, so BCs would work as an effective gas sink. If they have support then they will decimate protoss some good emps to eliminate feedback and weaken stalkers and I think the BCs will absolutely clean up.
Check this game out. 50 min+ game with everyones favorite mech terran Goody.
He goes for his token mech opening with 3 tech lab factories and 1 reactor factory. Using a lot of tanks to hold his expansions with a couple thors and some hellions mixed in for zealots and harass. A reactored star port pumps out vikings early game to keep the colossus back. On 3 base he adds 2 tech lab star ports and transitions into mass BC. The fire power and staying power of the mass BC is just too much even with good feed backs.
Edit: Yamato targets seem to be immortals to prevent them from shredding your tanks and thors while still mixing in vikings to take out void rays and colossi. The only thing left to worry about is HT but as can we be seen with the huge HP of the BCs the feed back wasn't as deadly as you'd think. If he had mixed some ghosts in (lol gas) it would of been a joke.
On April 05 2011 17:44 FudgeMunkey wrote: If your BC are caught out in the open, 4 stalkers can kill 1 BC quite effectively. I would recommend waiting till you have 5 or so BCs before pushing out. I'm curious to what units you'd back you BCs up with? They do cost 300 gas and they really need support so what unit goes well with them?
I assume the support options would vary depending on what the Toss is fielding to counter you. Since they are so expensive, we'll assume primarily rax units, with a few medivacs. If the toss goes stalker heavy, you invest more into Marauders, while if they go voidray you make more marines. HT obviously mean some ghosts, but they are very expensive when already fielding BCs, so you'd want to balance that carefully.
On a side note, I assume you'd want the cannon upgrade asap, to burn your energy and to take out either voidrays or collosi/other ground demolishing units. Out of interest, is it worth the cast time to use the cannon on stalkers?
I'm not that good at macro (and hence I'm only gold league), but I found that against the regular Protoss Army that consists of usually Zealots/Stalker/Sentry/Colossus that I come up against in PvT can be countered with Marine/Marauder/Medivac/Viking, but since the change to the Battlecruiser speed, I tested in a few games if I could get battlecruisers with my army. And I found out that with battlecruisers and 5-6 vikings, you can demolish the colossus army really fast with Yamato cannon and the small number of vikings, and after that the battlecruisers are still useful unlike vikings who just die silly to ground army when landed, and also ofc, the rax units would demolish the protoss ground army without the colossus.
I dunno if this build would work on high levels, but for me when getting 3 bases, I used to just stay on 4 gas geysers and still be fine with MMM Viking, so I started taking the gas on the 3rd and still managed to afford upgrades, army and Battlecruisers.
It could be interesting to see those BC fighting. The problem is the time: if protoss see (obs) you are doing mass starports (3 is already uncommon), we are going to make mass stalks + obs and get a 3rd or 4 expo easy. I think the key of that BC's plan is to get as much time as possible without being killed with a big mass. I think making not-stop small medivac drops will give you the time you need.
On a side note, I assume you'd want the cannon upgrade asap, to burn your energy and to take out either voidrays or collosi/other ground demolishing units. Out of interest, is it worth the cast time to use the cannon on stalkers?
Indeed it is, Yamato got 3 Second cast time and will kill a Stalker outright, no matter what. When shooting, an unupgraded Bc would deal only ~100 Dmg, w/o Guardian Shield. So if there arent any other high favorable targets to Yamato, go get that Stalker.
I use Battlecruisers quite regularly in TvP, and in my opinion they are the absolute most powerful unit against Protoss. The only two units that can deal with them are Void Rays and Stalkers. Void Rays die to Yamato in 1 shot, and Stalkers vs upgraded BCs is just silly.
Protoss has crappy anti air so BC has always been a good unit. Only charged voidrays are nearly cost effective everything else is cost inefficient, as Terran you will need to find a safe way to transition into BCs.
i am very sure that Cloak banshees will play a huge role in that. they have just sick dps, and keep the opponent pinned for along time.
I think going BC heavy is too gimmicky and easily countered to be a reliable build - Carriers or VRs with HT support are hard to deal with, and if you're teching up to BCs in any kind of a speedy fashion you won't have a lot of resources to spare both on pressuring your opponent and defending your own bases.
Personally I found a combination of Vikings & Banshees with Marine/Tank on the ground to be much more effective. Hide Marines behind the tanks so they don't get stormed to death, and you can push the opponents army hard with viking / banshee sniping running back to your tank/marine positions every time he tries to shoot back at you. It sounds kind of silly when you put it like this, but it's really quite good, and gives you a very smooth transition into BCs later in the game should it go on to the point where you take 34348 bases and have the resources to spend on fancy stuff, since you'll have solid positions already and air upgrades done etc.
I've been working on a carrier build vs terran and I've seen battle cruisers a few times.
If the BC's come in the mid game the only support units the terran can afford is marine hellion and possibly a ghost or a few maruaders. The support for the few BC's absolutely melt to storms.
The problem with carrier vs BC builds is protoss is extremely cost effective against the units terran can build while trying to tech to BC's while terran has a very hard time breaking a protoss that is trying to tech to Carriers. So unless you cut some corners or get a hidden base up the protoss should crush before you hit critical mass or they simply will have to many carriers for you to deal with. In a straight up battle Carrier vs BC basically comes down to attack upgrades for the carrier vs yamato micro by the BC's.
I actually am curious to see if any sky terran styles develop... Especially since BC's are just as fast or faster than medivacs and banshees now...
I think BC's are much more viable if you slowly mass them off of one starport, unlike carriers that are more viable if you suddenly start pumping them 3 at a time.
On a side note, I assume you'd want the cannon upgrade asap, to burn your energy and to take out either voidrays or collosi/other ground demolishing units. Out of interest, is it worth the cast time to use the cannon on stalkers?
Indeed it is, Yamato got 3 Second cast time and will kill a Stalker outright, no matter what. When shooting, an unupgraded Bc would deal only ~100 Dmg, w/o Guardian Shield. So if there arent any other high favorable targets to Yamato, go get that Stalker.
And to add on to that, you'd definitely want to use the Cannon quickly if there are HTs on the field, so might as well use it on something that can attack it.
Battle Cruisers are now a viable option for late game Terran playing and a new tool for any terran player. The new speed allows for an easier follow up of the rest of the units while at the same time allows it to be microed more consistently.
Adding to this thread an example of a Battlecruiser build with Yamato Cannon at a high profiled matchup for anyone interested:
DignitasnAni -Naniwa- (P) VS ESCGoOdy (T) G2 [BDL]
There is a player named Debo who use to get BCs against protoss before the speed buff. They worked very well from what i saw. He won a lot of games with them. After he got his 4th base it seemed he would start pumping them out as well as marines. Since at that point in the game the marines already had the upgrades needed to be a sufficent support unit, it seems like after a 4th base pumping out BCs would be good. Especially since you have tons of SCVs already to help repair.
Upgraded gateway units perform quite well against unupgraded BC's which can make it really troublesome to transition into them. Their damage against 3/3 zealots isn't that spectacular for their cost and they actually die quite quickly against 3/3 stalkers. This making going into them from bio pretty difficult but if you already have a attack upgrade for your vikings anyway it does get tremendously easier.
The best way is probably to go into them by using a tank style first though, tanks help you turtle better to prevent dieing before getting them out and they also prevent the protoss from using mass blink stalkers effectively. Tank based terran is a pretty good style on some maps like xel naga where you can really set up well in the middle, on other maps like metalopolis it sucks and so do BC transitions imo.
The original problem with BC is that you can't actually mass enough of them faster than protoss can mass enough to kill them in the field. You need like 3 ports of pure BC to make an unbeatable blob and be able to actually attack Toss.
However, if you make BC and then fill out with Banshees for DPS, it feels like they work better together. (BCs tank and kill air while Banshees pssh psssh over every toss unit)
I don't ever see it being used too much in the meta game because HT's rape em and blink stalkers or VR will finish em. Not to mention if you're building 4-8 BCs toss already has 200 and can walk through your base with your pathetic defense you have while trying to mass BCs.
The supernova style marine/tank/raven/vikings transitions very well into BC tech if you're even or ahead in the mid-late game. The commentators actually missed this, but in game 2 of San vs MvP on Shakuras, MvP had +1 armor on his air units, and 2 techlab starports (1 reactor for vikings), which was a obvious indicator that he was going BCs (why else would u get air armor as BC's are the "ultras" of the sky"). San in his "deathball" attack hit a good timing as MvP was in the middle of the transition, which is why he killed him.
Siege tanks make great units to be able to hold protoss aggression whilst you tech to BCs. Only problem with MvP on that game was that he was a bit too aggressive with his biomech army which resulted him losing more than he should. Notice how in that game San attacked and retreated when all his zealots died keeping his stalkers and collosi alive, whilst MvP lost some marines + a few siege tanks multiple times during the game. Favourable trades for the protoss for the majority of the game and a very BW-esque approach - protoss players in BW pull back their dragoons against a terran mechball of vultures and tanks when all their speedlots die.
In terms of upgrades San was 3/3 by the end of the game and Mvp was +3 infantry weapons from 1 eng bay with +3 vehicle weapons being researched from his 1st armory, and air armor from his 2nd armory. He forewent armor upgrades, which imo is a good idea since terran when going this tech needs 3 sets of upgrades.
I've found that opening banshees is actually really nice if you want to transition into BCs. Off 2 base you can support 2-3 starports + a couple barracks so do whatever you can with your banshees to delay as long as possible so u can get some BCs out, and use your excess minerals wisely (bunkers marines, hellions for harass to buy even more time, extra CCs!)
In the past, If the protoss has let me get to 3 base where I can consistently build BCs my chances of winning late game have dramatically improved. One important thing to note here is that once you're on like 3-4 base, despite your best efforts u will have excess mins so u should have 3-4 (preferably more) orbitals to just spam mules/scans with as your army is not particularly mobile and u may lose expos due to it. One thing I noticed and I guess this pretty much applies to any TvP composition is that once u do have a good BC count, get ghosts regardless of what the protoss response is, they make a world of difference.
The best thing about going mass air vs P is that you don't have to fear that collosus deathball that Ts try to avoid at all costs.
The turtling mech opening sounds like it would have a higher survivability than going for banshee cloak out of the gate. My only issue is that it would be even more expensive to transition out of it. Also, how would you harass and prevent him from out macroing you? Blue flamer runbys?
On April 06 2011 02:12 -Mav- wrote: The turtling mech opening sounds like it would have a higher survivability than going for banshee cloak out of the gate. My only issue is that it would be even more expensive to transition out of it. Also, how would you harass and prevent him from out macroing you? Blue flamer runbys?
I just 1 rax fe into factory tech and make a few tanks then pump out 2 bc and push.. I am not going into detail of the build because it is not refined and most likely not viable on smaller maps. But BC + yamato on collosi are very delicious... I usually have two starports and maybe a 3rd one when i secure a third expo.
Been doing good with this, and I learned today delta quadrant is AWESOME for this build.
-main and 2 nats can be defended easily, so you can crank bcs AND turtle hard.
-If your going for the banshees into bcs route, Delta quad is a great banshee harass map.
I held today with mm + banshee vs colossi balls until my bcs were up, but I had a bunch of bunkers at my nat(Had up to 5) and pulled most of the scvs from the nat to repair bunkers/banshees each time he attacked. Your main, natural, and 3rd should be OCs, so mules can help off set the economic damage. You should be balancing out the econ damage by banshee harass. If you can take a 4th, take the gold as its fairly easy to defend as well(Make a planetary there).
If you go for mech into bc, the natural is an easy place to turtle/spread siege tanks with bunkers.
As mentioned, getting bc's is very hard, but once you mass them into a maxed army, they are almost impossible for P to stop. Population for population, the only thing that can take out bc's is voidrays, and they can be 1 shot by yamatos. So All that can stop you is voidray HT, which is also very hard to transition into, so if you are ahead, mass bc could be viable.
As Protoss you will need HT to force BC to be low on energy, or feedback them for huge damage. And you will need a lot of stalkers and/or voidrays.
But as Terran you will most likely have at least 2/2 on your flight upgrades and building some vikings will help take out those voidrays very quickly. Even if Protoss transition into the best counter as possible they will have a hard time stopping an army of 10 or more BC. Especially if they are sitting on 6-7 colossos and doesn't see it coming.
I think I found a winner guys(In diamond at least). I've won every single game I've been able to get a bc out, which is every game minus 1. (He proxy stargated me on delta quad, and I didnt even have my starports up yet for the midgame mm+banshee.)
I generally do 1 or 2 rax FE pending map.
MM+cloaked Banshee midgame.
Once my 3rd's up I transition into 3 port Bc,
Otherwise, im 5-0. Of course I would love to see master league players try this to see if its indeed viable at the highest levels of play, but its been functioning perfectly in diamond.
I do super-heavy macro style TvP. My midgame is usually rine/rauder + banshee and a few tanks. Once on 4 bases (I expand quick) I transition into rauder/ghost/bc + leftovers. Works wonders.
Bio + starport is really good imo, pump air upgrades instead of vehicle upgrades to help your banshees and later on your BC's. HT's got severely nerfed so you are not as likely to see them as early.
One person went straight to ht tech on me, you just have to respond with ghosts and make a couple less bcs that's all. If your already at the point of near critical mass bcs, you can just yamato as fast as possible and use scvs to repair. the hts wont be able to do enough damage to all the bcs. Plus they will have to choose between feecbacking bcs and storming your bio with the bcs.
On April 05 2011 21:39 Escapist wrote: Battle Cruisers are now a viable option for late game Terran playing and a new tool for any terran player. The new speed allows for an easier follow up of the rest of the units while at the same time allows it to be microed more consistently.
Adding to this thread an example of a Battlecruiser build with Yamato Cannon at a high profiled matchup for anyone interested:
DignitasnAni -Naniwa- (P) VS ESCGoOdy (T) G2 [BDL]
Are you stupid? This game isn't a battlecruiser build. The game was decided 4 minutes in when Naniwa went 16 Nexus against a proxy reaper/bunker build. This isn't a "battlecruiser build," and does nothing to prove one way or another the viability of battlecruisers in TvP. Goody could have done whatever he wanted to win the game after taking out the nat.
In my experience, the viability of BCs is highly dependant on the upgrade situation. If toss is doing any kind of double forge build - or for any other reason already has +2/+3 upgrades when you start getting BCs, they will be quite weak.
If you notice your opponent not getting quick upgrades, BCs will be a very potent option - especially if you can get some air upgrades to help your case.
Remember that BCs do a high-frequency but low damage attack (similar to marines) that is highly depending on the targets armor.
A 0/0 BC does 35.56 DPS vs a 0 armor. A 0/0 BC does 31.11 DPS vs a 1 armor (practically all protoss ground after losing shields). A 0/0 BC does 26.67 DPS vs a 2 armor (0/1 stalker at armor). A 0/0 BC does 22.22 DPS vs a 3 armor (0/2 stalker at armor). A 0/0 BC does 17.78 DPS vs a 4 armor (0/3 stalker at armor). A 0/0 BC does 8.89 DPS vs a 6 armor target (0/3 stalker at armor with guardian shield).
TL;DR: Don't get BCs if the protoss already has a lot of (armor/shield) upgrades and you don't have air upgrades.
For such an expensive unit , BCs have very shit DPS. I find it completely useless to even get BCs against protoss, since all it takes for protoss to counter them is just mass blink stalkers. Not to mention HTs and void rays destroy BCs completely.
The thing about BC's is whilst they are good in a lot of ways (mainly that, they have yamato, huge armor and protoss lacks any 100% reliable air counter), they are very counter intuitive to the way terran is traditionally played, and deliberately avoid the strengths of terran
That is, small engagements, high cost efficiency units which have specific roles and are abused to do specific things. You want to create niche engagements where you are really pushing the particular strength of whatever army you are using. Marines and marauders, ghosts, medivacs etc. all have very distinct, clear defined roles and by creating engagements where the focus is the strength of these units you get a clear advantage (i.e, MM kiting, medis vs gateway, tanks holding positions etc.)
BC is more like a protoss unit in that it does "alot" of things and doesn't necessarily do any one thing "really well". In a way, you are playing directly into the protoss strength in its ability to create a strong, supply efficient army that does "a bit of everything" and often, other races have a hard time countering
I would say, if you ever get the chance, nothing wrong with BC's, but depending on what you are trying to achieve, there is usually a more specific composition which is easier gotten to perform the role that you want.
EPT
