For the past several days I've been really focused on drop harrassment when I noticed something about the healing/dropping.
While Medivacs unload units, It can't heal and drop units at the same time. Your units are getting picked off while they unload, and you lose a few units until the healing kicks in, and you just don't have that extra firepower to snipe a building or take out a few extra workers.
Here's the trick, when dropping units, DON'T just click a spot and do a basic unload, issue a move command to the area, followed by a shift-click drop command on the Medivac itself.
It's just like issuing the drop command on the medivac causing it to drop units while on the move, however, while the medivac isn't moving, AND you've issued the drop command on the medivac, it ends up healing at the same time its dropping units.
Works great for unloading marines in a mineral line with a Spine crawler, once the first marine drops and starts taking hits, the Medivac is already healing before the rest of the marines have even finished unloading.
I agree that it seems like a bug but absolutely great find. Does make drops a little bit op at first and I think that you would end up committing to a lot of drops that aren't really feasible when the medvac doesn't heal while dropping.
I don't know if I'd call that a bug. I mean its definitely not as the game designers intended but on the other hand, its a little cheap that a medivac can't drop and heal at the same time. I mean.. is the healing beam operater (Private HealinBeamzor) pushing marines out the back when you tell the medi to unload?
On April 11 2011 05:46 Probe1 wrote: I don't know if I'd call that a bug. I mean its definitely not as the game designers intended but on the other hand, its a little cheap that a medivac can't drop and heal at the same time. I mean.. is the healing beam operater (Private HealinBeamzor) pushing marines out the back when you tell the medi to unload?
It should be able to do this o.o
On point: Great find!
Well, regardless of which way it 'should' be, there is a bug. Either medivacs should always heal while unloading, or they should never heal by unloading. Agreed, great find by the OP, it just seems more like finding a bug than anything else. Why should changing the way you order a drop command change whether or not a dropship can heal while unloading?
Great find indeed, though I would like to point out that when droppnig by clicking on the medivac you'll have the problem of not being able to stop dropping (I think?).
Also you do probably get the same effect if you just dropclick on the medivac and doesn't move it? (normally when you dropclick on the medivac you do it to drop as it goes)
On April 11 2011 05:46 Probe1 wrote: I don't know if I'd call that a bug. I mean its definitely not as the game designers intended but on the other hand, its a little cheap that a medivac can't drop and heal at the same time. I mean.. is the healing beam operater (Private HealinBeamzor) pushing marines out the back when you tell the medi to unload?
It should be able to do this o.o
On point: Great find!
Medivac uses up two supply. So we can safely assume the whole ship is being piloted by a minimal crew including two people. Obviously we must have a pilot to steer. Now we have an additional unit in there, he can either pull the lever and control the ability for marines to safely jump in or out of the ship or he can operate the healing laser!
On April 11 2011 05:46 Probe1 wrote: I don't know if I'd call that a bug. I mean its definitely not as the game designers intended but on the other hand, its a little cheap that a medivac can't drop and heal at the same time. I mean.. is the healing beam operater (Private HealinBeamzor) pushing marines out the back when you tell the medi to unload?
It should be able to do this o.o
On point: Great find!
Medivac uses up two supply. So we can safely assume the whole ship is being piloted by a minimal crew including two people. Obviously we must have a pilot to steer. Now we have an additional unit in there, he can either pull the lever and control the ability for marines to safely jump in or out of the ship or he can operate the healing laser!
Following this logic, the marauder is a robot crewed by 2 midgets (TLO and Huk?)
@On Topic Its a nice find though I would imagine its highly situational, most useful in TvT where the medivac can basically make your drop immortal to a similar sized force or late game TvZ.
Against Protoss, I would think being able to high tail it out of there quickly with your 4 marauders would be the worth more than unable stop loading under fire + healing.
good that u noticed that, but there is a place in forums in bnet that already have tips and tricks, that one included. I spotted it as of februari, I think =). Did u know unsieged tank does = dmg as a sieged tank? Splash makes the diffrence though. And that u can kill infinitive roaches with thor drop harras. Just be fast on the pick up right before they shot. Same thing with tanks, easier since they shot faster then roaches.
On April 11 2011 06:33 SvartSol wrote: good that u noticed that, but there is a place in forums in bnet that already have tips and tricks, that one included. I spotted it as of februari, I think =). Did u know unsieged tank does = dmg as a sieged tank? Splash makes the diffrence though. And that u can kill infinitive roaches with thor drop harras. Just be fast on the pick up right before they shot. Same thing with tanks, easier since they shot faster then roaches.
Wow, that spelling made me cringe.
Back ontopic- would it be possible to post a video of this in action? I think I understand what you mean by dropping on the move because I do it all the time with my carpet bombing overlords, but are you saying that the medvac heals while moving/dropping in this fashion?
Guys, the point of this thread isn't that you can drop while on the move (which is true, and yes it works with overlords and with warp prisms), but that while dropping on the move, medivacs can heal units, even though they can't heal while dropping normally.
Medivac uses up two supply. So we can safely assume the whole ship is being piloted by a minimal crew including two people. Obviously we must have a pilot to steer. Now we have an additional unit in there, he can either pull the lever and control the ability for marines to safely jump in or out of the ship or he can operate the healing laser!
Not trying to butt in, but are you trying to say there're two little men hiding in a marauder's suit? *squick*
On April 11 2011 06:23 CookieMaker wrote: Interesting, so it actually ends up healing units while dropping on the move? I need to test this out!
No, It Still can't heal + move at the same time, but if you do the "drop while moving" trick, but don't actually have it move around, It will heal surrounding units while dropping at the same time.
Just by clicking on the ground and having it unload, the medivac beam stops working while it's dropping units. However, by doing the "drop move" trick, it will still unload the units, and heal surrounding units at the same time.
On April 11 2011 05:46 Probe1 wrote: I don't know if I'd call that a bug. I mean its definitely not as the game designers intended but on the other hand, its a little cheap that a medivac can't drop and heal at the same time. I mean.. is the healing beam operater (Private HealinBeamzor) pushing marines out the back when you tell the medi to unload?
It should be able to do this o.o
On point: Great find!
Medivac uses up two supply. So we can safely assume the whole ship is being piloted by a minimal crew including two people. Obviously we must have a pilot to steer. Now we have an additional unit in there, he can either pull the lever and control the ability for marines to safely jump in or out of the ship or he can operate the healing laser!
zlots use two supply so......
@ op: Hmm i was aware of the dropping while moving techinque, but didn't know that it also healed. Great find
On April 11 2011 05:44 joheinous wrote: I agree that it seems like a bug but absolutely great find. Does make drops a little bit op at first and I think that you would end up committing to a lot of drops that aren't really feasible when the medvac doesn't heal while dropping.
If I'm not mistaken, it was mentioned in a patch about this. Before, it wouldn't heal, but rather drop all the units then heal if necessary. I'm not 100% sure though.
Anyways, great micro tip. I feel bad for those terrans who could have beaten me with this kinda micro.
how about dropping rines in an enemy terran siege line? does the extra bit of health cause them to fire an additional shot? can't test cause i'm at work
Thanks for posting this... but does anyone know if this is by design or a bug?
Also, are you sure this is even really applicable in any situation?
Any time you do a drop, wouldn't it be better to unload them as soon as possible, rather than wait for them to be in the middle of a mineral line?
As soon as the dropship can drop a marine in range of a worker, you should begin unloading, and if you do this, you will have an empty dropship before or at the time that your medivac would have started unloading the ship.
Against an aware player, I feel like this tactic would be more likely to result in the death of your marines via faster ground army movement or possibly the death of your partially loaded medivac. (more likely than unloading manually while en route to the final destination drop point...)
On April 11 2011 05:16 Cooth wrote: For the past several days I've been really focused on drop harrassment when I noticed something about the healing/dropping.
While Medivacs unload units, It can't heal and drop units at the same time. Your units are getting picked off while they unload, and you lose a few units until the healing kicks in, and you just don't have that extra firepower to snipe a building or take out a few extra workers.
Here's the trick, when dropping units, DON'T just click a spot and do a basic unload, issue a move command to the area, followed by a shift-click drop command on the Medivac itself.
It's just like issuing the drop command on the medivac causing it to drop units while on the move, however, while the medivac isn't moving, AND you've issued the drop command on the medivac, it ends up healing at the same time its dropping units.
Works great for unloading marines in a mineral line with a Spine crawler, once the first marine drops and starts taking hits, the Medivac is already healing before the rest of the marines have even finished unloading.
I am really ashamed, but I don't understand how exactly this is getting executed. Guess I don't understand the bolded part. Could you give some more newbie-friendly explanation? (Yes, I know, I should work on my macro! )
I seted up an scenario with droping 8 marines over 2 sentries and up to now 1-2 marines are dying, which I guess shouldnt happen if I do it right.
I thought this is how every one did drops. Back when I played Zerg in beta there were more than a few videos on youtube showing how to doomdrop using this method.
On April 11 2011 05:16 Cooth wrote: For the past several days I've been really focused on drop harrassment when I noticed something about the healing/dropping.
While Medivacs unload units, It can't heal and drop units at the same time. Your units are getting picked off while they unload, and you lose a few units until the healing kicks in, and you just don't have that extra firepower to snipe a building or take out a few extra workers.
Here's the trick, when dropping units, DON'T just click a spot and do a basic unload, issue a move command to the area, followed by a shift-click drop command on the Medivac itself.
It's just like issuing the drop command on the medivac causing it to drop units while on the move, however, while the medivac isn't moving, AND you've issued the drop command on the medivac, it ends up healing at the same time its dropping units.
Works great for unloading marines in a mineral line with a Spine crawler, once the first marine drops and starts taking hits, the Medivac is already healing before the rest of the marines have even finished unloading.
I am really ashamed, but I don't understand how exactly this is getting executed. Guess I don't understand the bolded part. Could you give some more newbie-friendly explanation? (Yes, I know, I should work on my macro! )
I seted up an scenario with droping 8 marines over 2 sentries and up to now 1-2 marines are dying, which I guess shouldnt happen if I do it right.
Thanks in advance
Step 1: Move-command the medivac to the location you wanna drop.
Step 2: Hold Shift and D-click (unload) on the medivac itself. When the medivac reaches the drop spot, it'll start unloading while healing the units that have been unloaded.
This does not work with moving drop! Seems a lot of people in this thread aren't taking their time to read the OP properly...
On April 11 2011 05:16 Cooth wrote: For the past several days I've been really focused on drop harrassment when I noticed something about the healing/dropping.
While Medivacs unload units, It can't heal and drop units at the same time. Your units are getting picked off while they unload, and you lose a few units until the healing kicks in, and you just don't have that extra firepower to snipe a building or take out a few extra workers.
Here's the trick, when dropping units, DON'T just click a spot and do a basic unload, issue a move command to the area, followed by a shift-click drop command on the Medivac itself.
It's just like issuing the drop command on the medivac causing it to drop units while on the move, however, while the medivac isn't moving, AND you've issued the drop command on the medivac, it ends up healing at the same time its dropping units.
Works great for unloading marines in a mineral line with a Spine crawler, once the first marine drops and starts taking hits, the Medivac is already healing before the rest of the marines have even finished unloading.
I am really ashamed, but I don't understand how exactly this is getting executed. Guess I don't understand the bolded part. Could you give some more newbie-friendly explanation? (Yes, I know, I should work on my macro! )
I seted up an scenario with droping 8 marines over 2 sentries and up to now 1-2 marines are dying, which I guess shouldnt happen if I do it right.
Thanks in advance
What he ment is this
normally when you go do a drop you: 1. load up some rines 2. select the medivac and press 'd'. 3. click where you want to drop
the medivac now flies to the location you selected and starts droppin the marines, however he doesn't heal them at the same time.
with the OP's method here's what you do: 1. load up some rines. 2. select the medivac and give a move command to where you want to drop 3. now as it is flying to the location where you want to drop, hold shift, click 'd' so you queue the command (so that it doesn't execute it till after the medivac has flewn to the location) and click on top of the medivac as though you were just trying to select it.
and voila, the medivac will fly to the drop destination, start dropping and heal the units in the process.
someone mentioned that in this fashion it doesn't do the drop animation, does this make the drop quicker?
On April 11 2011 22:46 michaelhasanalias wrote: Thanks for posting this... but does anyone know if this is by design or a bug?
Also, are you sure this is even really applicable in any situation?
Any time you do a drop, wouldn't it be better to unload them as soon as possible, rather than wait for them to be in the middle of a mineral line?
As soon as the dropship can drop a marine in range of a worker, you should begin unloading, and if you do this, you will have an empty dropship before or at the time that your medivac would have started unloading the ship.
Against an aware player, I feel like this tactic would be more likely to result in the death of your marines via faster ground army movement or possibly the death of your partially loaded medivac. (more likely than unloading manually while en route to the final destination drop point...)
This doesn't have to a be drop right in the middle of the mineral line with static defense, your Medivac full of marines are being chased by Mutas, you could just do the "drop move" but the Medivac is so slow compared to Mutas and its going to die in about the same whether its moving away from them or not, so by doing this, Medivac starts dropping and healing the marines that are hit by the ricochet.
Or consider players like Jinro, I've seen him drop sometimes and he'll stim the marines one by one as they drop, with this trick, the Medivac is able to heal the stim damage while it drops the rest of the units.
nice one! now if only people will withdraw the dropships after the units have been unloaded. no need to let the medivac continue to support the ground troops in case of a suicide drop, it'll just get killed without great significance most of the times (there are times when it's useful, against workers for example). Multiple medivacs more in the endgame can be a huge difference for a bio-force.
On April 11 2011 05:16 Cooth wrote: For the past several days I've been really focused on drop harrassment when I noticed something about the healing/dropping.
While Medivacs unload units, It can't heal and drop units at the same time. Your units are getting picked off while they unload, and you lose a few units until the healing kicks in, and you just don't have that extra firepower to snipe a building or take out a few extra workers.
Here's the trick, when dropping units, DON'T just click a spot and do a basic unload, issue a move command to the area, followed by a shift-click drop command on the Medivac itself.
It's just like issuing the drop command on the medivac causing it to drop units while on the move, however, while the medivac isn't moving, AND you've issued the drop command on the medivac, it ends up healing at the same time its dropping units.
Works great for unloading marines in a mineral line with a Spine crawler, once the first marine drops and starts taking hits, the Medivac is already healing before the rest of the marines have even finished unloading.
I am really ashamed, but I don't understand how exactly this is getting executed. Guess I don't understand the bolded part. Could you give some more newbie-friendly explanation? (Yes, I know, I should work on my macro! )
I seted up an scenario with droping 8 marines over 2 sentries and up to now 1-2 marines are dying, which I guess shouldnt happen if I do it right.
Thanks in advance
What he ment is this
normally when you go do a drop you: 1. load up some rines 2. select the medivac and press 'd'. 3. click where you want to drop
the medivac now flies to the location you selected and starts droppin the marines, however he doesn't heal them at the same time.
with the OP's method here's what you do: 1. load up some rines. 2. select the medivac and give a move command to where you want to drop 3. now as it is flying to the location where you want to drop, hold shift, click 'd' so you queue the command (so that it doesn't execute it till after the medivac has flewn to the location) and click on top of the medivac as though you were just trying to select it.
and voila, the medivac will fly to the drop destination, start dropping and heal the units in the process.
someone mentioned that in this fashion it doesn't do the drop animation, does this make the drop quicker?
Excellent explanation, so even a stupid one like me can understand it! Thank you sooo much!
EPT
