I play Terran and my biggest problem is when I am up against Zerg and they have mutalisks. I just can't seem to find a good way to kill them.
Marines are too weak and susceptible to other units, Vikings get wrecked by mutas, and Thors, while good with splash damage, seem to always get out maneuvered by them and like the marines are susceptible to other units as well.
So, any advice on how to counter mutalisks? Honestly the only way I can win against Zerg at this point is to wreck them before they get mutas, and then afterwards it's a stalemate for like 40 minutes.
Thanks for any help. I don't really need any advanced strategies yet - I'm in high Bronze league, so generally "get a lot of mutalisks and attack with them!" is pretty much the extent of the strategy I'm up against.
Replay please, but generally, turrets, marines, thors, are good. If your macro is good enough and all the zerg does is go mutas, just go kill him with your army. Mutas are quite expensive.
As a bronze and youre REALLY having trouving with mutas, just make a turret for every 7ish mutas he has @ ur mineral lines, and u can just repair them with ur scvs.
If your army is in an aggressive stance, and you cant just go kill him, make some turrets to stop building harrass too, as a bronze player id say go ahead and spam turrets, but dont forget, turrets are always worse than army because they lack moblility
On August 14 2011 16:59 TrueZerG wrote: As a bronze and youre REALLY having trouving with mutas, just make a turret for every 7ish mutas he has @ ur mineral lines, and u can just repair them with ur scvs.
If your army is in an aggressive stance, and you cant just go kill him, make some turrets to stop building harrass too, as a bronze player id say go ahead and spam turrets, but dont forget, turrets are always worse than army because they lack moblility
Well turrets are only good for defense, and if I have a Zerg that's just covering his base with mutalisks, how do i attack? I really don't have a problem with defense. The turrets only fail when you're like 40 minutes into a match and the guy just builds up a billion mutalisks to go overwhelm you. But if I can find a good offensive counter then I don't have to worry about his turtle force there.
You're doing something wrong when you let him get mutalisks THAT easily. Make timing pushes and harass him in any way possible. He'll break eventually and go nuts. But yea upload a replay.
Whut. In equal number, I'd probably put my vote for the mutalisks vs marines battle in favour of the marines! Marines are mobile enough to contest the mobility, have tons and tons of upgrades (stim, combat shield, armour/attack and medevacs) that should all help them beat the crap out of the expensive mutalisks your enemy has floating around. Mutalisks should NOT be able to stand up against any decent number of marines, and if they -can- then either you're not making enough marines or are missing upgrades on your rise to the top.
As a Diamond Zerg, I can safely say that I steer my mutas well clear of marines sooner than I steer them clear of anything else. One stim and one second of me not paying attention could easily equal the death of half, if not more, of my flock.
If the guy's covering his base in mutalisks, go expand and outmacro him. If he's harassing a lot, you can hit his main while his forces are broken up and do some serious damage. He can't be everywhere at once. As for a counter, stimmed marines with +weapons tear mutas apart, and a couple thors can splash a lot of mutas down fairly quickly
First of all, be quick and edit a replay into your OP before a mod finds you and closes this thread!
As to beating Mutalisks, upgraded Marines work and 2-3 Thors as support can beat down any number of Mutalisks.
What's important is that you want Siege Tanks and Medivacs with those Marines. Marines trade very favorably against Mutalisks, what you need to do is keep the Banelings away from them. Do not move out until you have 4+ Siege Tanks, and after you hit the edge of his creep, start leapfrogging the Tanks towards your objective (usually his 3rd). Keep the Marines in between your two leapfrog locations so the Tanks and Marines protect each other mutually, and do not ever unsiege all your Tanks unless: 1. he just threw his army at you and you're now trying to maximize damage before his next wave shows up, or 2. you did what you wanted (ie. killed his expansions), are off creep, and want to back off to regroup. As the game goes on, make each push with more and more Tanks. ~40 Marines and 2 Thors can take as many Mutalisks as he can possibly produce, but they can pop easily to large Baneling numbers, unless you have 4-6 Tanks.
I recommend throwing in 2 Thors if your micro is not very good- keep them ahead of the Marines so they can tank Baneling damage.
During an engagement, run your Marines behind your Tanks. If at the end of the fight you only have Marine/Medivac and he only has Zergling/Mutalisk, you'll likely win the follow-up fight and have the time to go kill a base or two.
Also, macro-wise: after your 2nd base is saturated, make sure you have 2 tech lab'd factories, 1 reactor'd starport and 3+ reactor'd barracks. Another good habit is to hotkey all your upgrade buildings so you have higher upgrades than him. You want to hit 3/3 with Bio ASAP, for Mech, you want 1 attack first and then 3 armor: the 1 attack is so your Tanks 1-shot lings, the armor is to let your Thors tank.
Low-mid diamond zerg here who loves to go mutas against terran. A big ball of marines with good upgrades + stim + medivac support will rip through mutalisks like butter.
If you see banelings or a large number of roaches along with them, get siege tanks to protect your marines, and use your marines to protect your tanks as you slowly push forward with them (try to engage off creep whenever possible).
If his support army is pure zergling, than make sure to keep your marines balled up to avoid surrounds (this also increases the amount of damage your marines are dishing out), going pure marine with medivacs deals with this composition (ling/muta) very well. If he has infestors AND mutas then you're doing something wrong because you shouldn't let him be getting that much gas. If that's the case maybe try doing a blue-flame hellion drop (search around i'm sure you'll find a good build on here, they've become rather popular lately) which usually hits right around spire completion time and can kill tons of drones devastating his economy making mutas much easier to deal with.
Thors are great vs. mutalisks, though you're right they are very immobile but are good at protecting bases and will punish any mistakes your opponent makes with his muta micro very quickly. And once you get a decent number of Thors (6-10 i'd say) to go with the rest of your army, in lower leagues you can pretty much just attack-move the zergs base (pull a few scvs to auto-repair them) and wait for the victory screen (as a former bronze zerg I can attest to this happening more times than I'd like to admit).
The building armor upgrade at the engineering bay although not recommended by most players will help protect vulnerable buildings like supply depots and tech labs, its also not a bad habit to build a few (or even spam a ton of) missile turrets around your base and expansion(s). If you suspect he's massing mutalisks, the Hi-Sec Auto Tracking upgrade (+1 range to missile turrets) is also useful.
TL;DR make sure to keep up with upgrades on your marines, try to do as much damage before spire completes (in all honesty this is probably the best way to deal with this, but obviously not always possible), MISSILE TURRETS MISSILE TURRETS MISSILE TURRETS, and most of all, just be patient and play it cool in your decision making. If he went straight for mutas the rest of his army is probably pretty weak, and mutalisks are more useful as harrassment units, ie. they tend to be rather lousy in straight up fights. The best advice I could give to a terran player who's having trouble vs. muta zergs are the words of the immortal Day9: "Just go @$#*%ing kill him!"
Mutas are only strong because of their mobility. If you cut off their wings and make them attack in big battles, they lose their usefuless. That being said, the key concept is to either make sure their mobility cannot be abused too much or try to limit their mobility. The first way is simply to just play defensive and then do a push which ultimately means that the mutas' mobility do not do a lot of damage. The second way is to control the mutas' mobility with drops, multi-pronged atks, etc like what MMA does.
First way is easy and everyone does it. I find it terribly ineffective after a while if the zerg is good at finding holes and knows how to counter attack once you move out. Also, by the time he has a large muta ball, it forces you to get thors and even then, you will have trouble moving out of your base.
On the other hand, doing what MMA does, which is to be extremely aggressive while attacking at different locations, keeps the mutas on bay and makes sure that those mutas do not have an opportunity to abuse their mobility. This is very APM intensive and takes hundreds if not thousands of games worth of practice to use properly
Once again, there aren't any real ways to counter mutas. Just remember that their strongest strength is their mobility and if you can somehow eliminate that, you are basically winning.
I really suggest you watch GOM and their games and see how terrans deal with zerg. I don't kno how many times have I seen the terran lose because the zerg's mobility got them, or how much times the terran won because the zerg's mobility got shut down. I am a Masters Terran.
On August 14 2011 16:59 TrueZerG wrote: As a bronze and youre REALLY having trouving with mutas, just make a turret for every 7ish mutas he has @ ur mineral lines, and u can just repair them with ur scvs.
If your army is in an aggressive stance, and you cant just go kill him, make some turrets to stop building harrass too, as a bronze player id say go ahead and spam turrets, but dont forget, turrets are always worse than army because they lack moblility
im sorry but i dont agree with this and think its shitty advice. Spamming turrets will put you behind. Where do you get the number of 1 turrets for 7 mutalisks? At bronze level they dont treat turrets like pros do. 7 mutas will rape 1 turret and the scvs trying to repair it.
Build a few turrets, fine. Too many and not only will you be behind, if he spams ground units what then? The easiest cost effective way to deal with them is to have your army spread out with easy access to your main and natural. Marines and thors work wonders but the most important thing is not to run after them with your whole army. Nothing you have will catch them. They will run circles around you. Try to anticipate where he will move then move to intercept. It takes practice to get right but in my experience its the most effective way.
On August 14 2011 16:59 TrueZerG wrote: As a bronze and youre REALLY having trouving with mutas, just make a turret for every 7ish mutas he has @ ur mineral lines, and u can just repair them with ur scvs.
If your army is in an aggressive stance, and you cant just go kill him, make some turrets to stop building harrass too, as a bronze player id say go ahead and spam turrets, but dont forget, turrets are always worse than army because they lack moblility
im sorry but i dont agree with this and think its shitty advice. Spamming turrets will put you behind. Where do you get the number of 1 turrets for 7 mutalisks? At bronze level they dont treat turrets like pros do. 7 mutas will rape 1 turret and the scvs trying to repair it.
Build a few turrets, fine. Too many and not only will you be behind, if he spams ground units what then? The easiest cost effective way to deal with them is to have your army spread out with easy access to your main and natural. Marines and thors work wonders but the most important thing is not to run after them with your whole army. Nothing you have will catch them. They will run circles around you. Try to anticipate where he will move then move to intercept. It takes practice to get right but in my experience its the most effective way.
I think in Bronze extra Turrets is perfectly reasonable, where people do not have their eyes glued to the minimap, and hands on the hotkeys. A Turret is 100 minerals, if it kills 1 Mutalisk before it dies, you've made a profit. If it stalls the Mutalisks for long enough that you save 2 SCVs, you break even. If he makes a mistake and attacks into 2-3 overlapping Turrets, he's going to get mauled. ~2-3 per mineral line is not too much of a blow when macro isn't perfect to begin with, and I'd rather tie up 100 minerals than to lose my Reactors later on.
Which is better. Having extra turrets for in case he sends mutas to your base to kill 1 or 2 and possibly still lose all your scvs?
Or positioning your army better, saving minz on turrets, and with an ever improving micro and game sense, kill a shit load of mutas and put him far more behind than you ever could with turrets?
Spamming turrets in not offensive. Its defensive and thats not what the op is looking for. It tells me that he has gone the defensive route and it hasnt been successful. Geuss we wont know unless we see a replay.
You shouldn't rely on just marines or just thors to handle the mutas. Mix the marines with 1 or 2 thors and you'll have much more success with head on engagements where mutas are mixed with banes / lings / etc.
If he's attacking you with mutas as you leave the base, leave just a few marines (or a thor) with a couple of missile turrets. You don't want to overcommit to static defenses as they are useless until they're attacked.
1. Mutas usually dont come out until 9 minutes so scan his main at 9 minutes to see if spire is building or finished and then you know if you need to make turrets.
2. thors are great vs muta especially if you are attacking his base with tanks and thors and helions
TLO does a build where he reactor helion expands and with all his gasses taken he makes 4 factories. you make loads of helions, like 4 tanks and enough thors to kill the mutas - so long as you are ready for muta around 9 mins then you will be fine.
Personally i am realy starting to like to mix in 1-3 vikings with my marines and tanks and maybe thor (wich also helps against the inevitable broodlords if you manage to survive long enough) They make the mutalisk alot less mobile since they have to stay clear of the 9 range of the viking (asuming viking covered by marines) and they can also chase the mutas away a bit furter even as long as they dont move away to far from the marines so they can fall back 1 viking should definatly get enough shots in to make it worth its cost A thor should in theory also be able to do this but it just seems a bit to imobile in practise and vikings work suprisingly well, maybe in combination with 1-2 thor wich prevent muta from stacking and good focus fire Vikings can also spot for your tanks btw, 13 vs 11 range is quiet an atvantage against infestors and incoming ling/baneling,
On August 14 2011 21:13 lcl wrote: 2 things that helped me quite a bit:
1. Mutas usually dont come out until 9 minutes so scan his main at 9 minutes to see if spire is building or finished and then you know if you need to make turrets.
2. thors are great vs muta especially if you are attacking his base with tanks and thors and helions
TLO does a build where he reactor helion expands and with all his gasses taken he makes 4 factories. you make loads of helions, like 4 tanks and enough thors to kill the mutas - so long as you are ready for muta around 9 mins then you will be fine.
The first point is terrible advice. If you see mutas popping, and you have no turrets. Your fucked. Its too late. You need to know in advance if mutas are coming. Youll have an ebay anyways. Just put 1 turret in every min line at like the 830 mark. Thats 200 min, not a huge loss, esp in bronze. And it will save you from the, ah crap there are mutas i didnt know were coming.
Also yea offensive, just make some thors if hes massing muta. Thors are good in all levels, but in bronze where the muta micro will suck. 3 thors raaaaape a muta ball so hard.
To appeal to the title of the thread, I will tell you what I do in the case of mutalisks, as both P and T. If Z goes mutas, and is committing to them pretty hard (getting them early on 2-3 bases), you can just macro as normal and keep a lookout for either a spire or typical signs of muta play. When you have determined that he is going mutas, you move out asap. His ground army will be weak, and his mutas won't be able to take you head on (their mobility is null if he's trying to use them to fight your push). He has 2 choices: 1. lose his mutas to your army 2. play towards a base race
He's probably going to choose option #2, and when he does, you will win. His mutas will be far less efficient at killing your buildings than your army, especially if you throw up some turrets before moving out.
On August 20 2011 02:40 Moosegills wrote: stimmed marines kill everything that zerg has except banes and infestors.
And ultras, and roaches.
Marines can rape ultras if you spread them out really well, and assuming you fighting with 0/0 vs 3/5.
0/0 vs 3/5. It wouldnt matter if you had the micro for MKP. You lose that. Its not even funny how hard you lose that. Cost for cost marines die so hard against ultras. Please dont post silly posts.
An offensive counter? Usually a marine tank turret push works wonders. Whenever you push bring three scvs for making turrets, They're great for killing mutas without drawing fire to/from the rest of the zerg army. If you don't have thors out, try making a sensor tower as well; it really helps making sure your units aren't caught out of position.
On August 20 2011 02:40 Moosegills wrote: stimmed marines kill everything that zerg has except banes and infestors.
And ultras, and roaches.
Marines can rape ultras if you spread them out really well, and assuming you fighting with 0/0 vs 3/5.
If zerg realistically gets a +2 carapace over infantry weapons, marines will do 3 damage a shot, in the case you gave marines will do a single damage. Are you sure you weren't mistaking marauders for marines?
This is sorta a situational solution ive found that tends to work well with mutas.
Best way ive found of dealing with muta's is to just push as soon as i see a spire going down. however your not going to always see that spire going down but if you do alot of zerg tend to be saving gas/minerals/larvae at that point so if you have been keeping a reasonable control of your macro you will either have a reasonable sized army. When you attack you can force them to spend their savings and if they dont you can tend to take out an expansion. If you see them spending alot of larva at that point on roaches/lings/etc its perfectly fine to go home with your army. It gives you more time to deal with the "eventual" muta ball rather then the "sudden" mutaball. If you dont see that swell of units push an expansion. They might spend the money on the mutas as your killing the expansion. Which just ends up with a small amount of mutas popping up at 1 base and the others trickling in. If you kill an expansion at this time go back home!
This is however situational and but its what ive found works quite well.
But when you dont spot the spire going up id say do exactly what these folks have said!
Also a few things about zerg and scouting. where is the gas going.
If you see lots of roaches you dont have to worry about mutas for a while. If you see almost exclusively zerglings without any upgrades start worrying about mutas/infestors etc
also small note the +armor upgrade for terran does wonders for reducing bounce damage of mutalisks.
Goodluck with your muta problems try not to freak out too much. Just remember ... like poop ... "mutas happen" lol
*edit* - replay specific
After watching the replay (i didnt see there was a replay till i went back through the thread) at 1 point you had 20 turrets. First of all thats 2000 minerals. Thats cost for cost 40 marines. More importantly the money spent on static defense reduces your ability to leave your base and makes your subsequent army smaller when you do attack. Also you didnt have stim or combat shields.
However if your going for a mech focused style you didnt have that many thors out and again no upgrades for your mech army. Leaving yourself with a massive hole when it comes to combating air with your army.
You would be suprised how well 40 ish marines stimmed can do against mutalisks.
However i want to point out for a bronze level player im quite impressed with your scv production in the early game keep that up it will help you get better as you progress.
Hope any of this helps! i went through many games with a friend of mine where he went heavily into mutalisks. Now i still lose to them occasionally but i dont freak out when i see them like i used to. Once you control the AHH MUTALISKS! aspect they are less threatening and you can think clearer.
fun fact, missile turret vs light (mutalisk, phoenix, banshee and I believe interceptors are the only light air units) is the highest dps per cost in the entire game, its dps/cost is even higher than carriers, broodlords, yamato cannon, 250mm strike cannon, stimmed marine, spore crawler and crackling.
hinthint missile turrets are good at defending, so that makes your army able to move.
edit:
On August 20 2011 03:26 Squigly wrote: Are you sure they do 1. I think they do half, as thats the lowest possible. I may be wrong though
in the example he gave the marines did X damage and the attacked unit had X-1 armour, in this case 1 damage will be done, if it had been X damage vs X armour, then it would have done 0.5 damage, same with X damage vs Y armour where Y>X.
a formula for you
*does not apply to spells *where X is the damage *where Y is the armour
I suggest the Enter keys as a good counter, with this method you can adapt your response to every situation possibles. You will probably use bad mannered words if the opposing player is good with the ''mutalisk'' but well placed sentences can even out the game. Its a common strategy for bronze player, and with a good timing attack before it, your way to silver is already done. I have this other advive, if you are in that stalemate position for 40 min your not in a losing position and since terran is imba, on an even game you will win, so try to extend it to 3 hours or 4, your gonna need good concentration to don't fall asleep but since this mechanics is mastered by playing terran wait the ''ZzzzZZzzz'' key chat of the zerg before attacking. Succes garanted. gl hf
On August 20 2011 02:40 Moosegills wrote: stimmed marines kill everything that zerg has except banes and infestors.
And ultras, and roaches.
go to unit tester, try equal resource marines with stim vs roaches and lemme know. Ultras are only good vs marines vs someone with no upgrades and or doesn't know how to micro/use sim city against them. Ultras at times seem like they have broodwar esque ai when someone knows how to micro vs them. It's why they really aren't good in zvz, ya they "counter" roaches but anyone how knows how to press t with their infestors can really neutralize their effectiveness
On August 20 2011 02:40 Moosegills wrote: stimmed marines kill everything that zerg has except banes and infestors.
And ultras, and roaches.
Equally upgraded Marines beat Roaches straight up, and beat Ultralisks if you are decent at spreading them. Against Banelings it's a question of micro in real play, but with theoretically perfect micro Marines easily are a counter to Banelings.
With decent micro Marines counter everything except Infestors and Banelings, and one of those is still a toss-up.
On August 14 2011 21:40 Buruguduy wrote: you are bronze.
sorry to break it to you, but it isn't mutas that are killing you it's your own self. defending mutas is the least of your problems.
Lol mega helpful bro.
In bronze you are going to see variations all over the place of muta pressure.
I suggest the following:
Scan his main base and see his tech, do so before 10 minutes or you are toast. Better players may use hellions/drops or that sort of thing to harass AND scout, but for now -- you have scans, need to scout, and probably aren't that great at it, use the scans. Later, when you are better, cut the scans for more money (mules). I doubt you are waiting for that awesome mule cash more than a few times early game anyway.
This is simple. Spire? Muta, especially if no infestation pit/hive tech. Later in the came you may come to expect the dreaded Broodlord/Infestor combo, but for now let's focus on mutas off lair tech...
When you see this (usually around 7-9 mins) you next need to now find out how many mutas.
Did he save tons of gas and go pure ling on 4 gases and he is about to pop 10+ (probably not, though bronze macro will slip enough that you may see huge bursts from z)? What about just 6 mutas. Is it late to mid game and he's still on lair and spire at 15-18 mins? 25+mins only lair tech with a spire?
You need to scale turrets in base with his muta count. Eventually, you'll see a massive ball of mutas (like that last scenario I mentioned above), and the 2 ways you can deal with it is:
1.) Turrets in base, mutiple, and a thor (or 2 thors). The mutas will melt a turret, hardly worth the micro you use to repair it. But the thor has tons of life, range, and dmg. Repair the shit out of that thor and he will be worth it. Again, thors, while really solid against zerg generally should be especially used for mutas. The multi-hit bonus to light is devestating with the splash dmg.
2.) Offense. Mutas just don't quite have the DPS your army does. They win with mobility. You can force the zerg in a position, where he may feel like if he leaves his base with his muta mass he will lose. You do this by pressuring him with marine/tank outside of his creep. If you see him run a ton of mutas in your base, that is your queue to up the pressure considerably (and pull workers, etc). You can force mutas to fight your army, instead of harassing your base like crazy. They're really good are trapping you in your base and making lower level players feel hopeless as far as moving out goes. They really suck when they hit a Terran army head-on.
Also, if you suspect or know mutas are coming, and you are in your base, with a safe wall and/or tanks. Split some marines to your mineral line (or just near the line). If it is early and 8 mutas roll in the side of your main, the 8 marines you stim and run at the mutas will make the zerg either: trade inefficiently or run. DO NOT OVER STIM, DO NOT STIM EVERY MARINE -- stim marines near the mutas that will, practically, hit the mutas. Losing 10hp of 13 marines on the other side of the map, because you stimmed every marine is a terrible mistake.
Other info provided in this thread should be implemented to your play.
I'd say 1 turret in each base for each 5-8 mutas on the field (estimate, you'll rarely know exacts). I like 2 if I know my opponent has committed pretty hard to mutas. One IN your mineral line, and one nearby. Make sure they're range overlaps a little. Once he was 20+ mutas, keep a thor in each base.
Don't over commit to turrets in base, make marines, generally, instead -- they will allow you to take a more offensive posture and open up your ability to, instead, pin the zerg and make him feel the pressure.
Mutas don't hold pressure quite like infestors do. (unless all your marines and thor go the way of dead).
Watch out of banelings. Shoot them with tanks, they evaporate.
On August 20 2011 02:40 Moosegills wrote: stimmed marines kill everything that zerg has except banes and infestors.
And ultras, and roaches.
Equally upgraded Marines beat Roaches straight up, and beat Ultralisks if you are decent at spreading them. Against Banelings it's a question of micro in real play, but with theoretically perfect micro Marines easily are a counter to Banelings.
With decent micro Marines counter everything except Infestors and Banelings, and one of those is still a toss-up.
Cool so if they dont make infestors make pure marines. Thatll def work. Just micro against dem banes.
You built turrets too fast. You don't seem to have the micro to pull off a fast blue flame hellion attack, just go bio as it is easier to control (3 rax for instance).
You need to build more units, your buildings are often not doing anything.
At 13 minutes, you have 2 banshees with cloak waiting in your base. Use them ! By 15 minutes 30 seconds, you have 4 banshees. You then move them out at 16 minutes 30 seconds only to lose them right away since you 1) move them right into the middle of battle and 2) don't cloak.
At 16 minutes, you lost every one of your marines in a terrible engagement. You move clicked the marines so they all died without ever shooting the zerglings. Learn to always always attack move. Also in this case you should have backed off to use the cover of your sieged tanks.
You are relying on marines to take care of the mutas but you only have 1 rax at 16 minutes. Your marines have no combat shield and no stim. In this case, you just can't move out against a decent number of mutas. Sit back, get some more anti air units (marines or Thors) --- you can try to secure another expansion before you go for a big assault.
Here is my advice. Stick to the 3 rax build for now ---- much less confusing and much less hard micro. Learn to A move. Focus on macro. Welcome to diamond league.
Edit: This is from a former Master league player, currently in Diamond...
i find it very hard to believe that marines are "too weak against mutas" split up your rines into like 2-3 groups and use smart positioning. if you are still haveing trouble add in some thors to work as area denial AA
On August 14 2011 16:40 RU206 wrote: I play Terran and my biggest problem is when I am up against Zerg and they have mutalisks. I just can't seem to find a good way to kill them.
Marines are too weak and susceptible to other units, Vikings get wrecked by mutas, and Thors, while good with splash damage, seem to always get out maneuvered by them and like the marines are susceptible to other units as well.
So, any advice on how to counter mutalisks? Honestly the only way I can win against Zerg at this point is to wreck them before they get mutas, and then afterwards it's a stalemate for like 40 minutes.
Thanks for any help. I don't really need any advanced strategies yet - I'm in high Bronze league, so generally "get a lot of mutalisks and attack with them!" is pretty much the extent of the strategy I'm up against.
M-- M...Marines.. T-t--oo weak..... O.O
Altho, just marines and 1-2 thors to keep the zerg on his feet while controlling his muta's and punish him HARD if he doesn't. There arent many other options, let alone better ones, marines DESTROY muta's in a fair fight.
Mate, how you are tackling the problem is really not great at all. First you list all of the units that counter mutas in todays play and say they are not really counters at all, then ask for any other options. In reality, marines are actually the best counter to mutalisks. They are seriously not that weak, only to banes. That is how zerg came up with muta/bane, to counter marines which countered mutalisks.
Here is what you do: most good zergs (if you did not pressure them at the start) will have their mutas out at about 8-10 minutes and will start looking to harass you. You will need a turret at each mineral line and maybe one or two more at each base near important structures. If mutas come to your mineral line, make sure you get your scvs to repair the turrets and it should repel them. after about 12 minutes, add a couple more turrets, as the flock will be getting bigger. Then later, add about 2-3 thors into your army. As zerg this is actually a huge pain, because when you are moving across the map, swooping in to kill some tanks is so risky because a clump shot may hit any time with a thor and all will do culmative damage of 1000+.
These are just some tips but at the end of the day: you are still only in bronze. Keep practicing and getting used to the feel of when the zerg will have mutas out, and see how you like to defend: ie more turrets, thors, stim marines. Keep trying and you will improve
The thing I think, I've been playing around with the idea for a while, and Idk if its any good, probably isn't, is offensive turrets/bunkers.
if 3 marines kill 1 muta, and marines are weak to banelings, build bunkers at your contain. Not too many, but a few. Get the bunker storage upgrade, and you can nearly autodial 2 mutas for free. Similarly, turrets are really good to deter movement in an area, and supported by thors and marines, will make it hard to get within a contained area or outside of a contained area.
The thing is, in Starcraft, nothing has a "counter". Sure, that term is thrown around a lot, and it makes a lot of sense in a lot of situations, but IMHO, SC2 is more a game of balancing your units against his (composition-wise). Not only that, but SC2 is a game of positioning. You need to be prepared with how your units are positioned. Ive won a bunch of games by scouting a force moving out and catching it out of position. Its important that you don't say I want A SINGLE UNIT to counter ANOTHER SINGLE UNIT. A better way of saying the concept of "how do i deal with Unit X" is what units do well together, and how can my utilization of those units be made to deal the best with Unit X or Unit composition X.
On August 20 2011 08:04 Hossinaut wrote: The thing I think, I've been playing around with the idea for a while, and Idk if its any good, probably isn't, is offensive turrets/bunkers.
if 3 marines kill 1 muta, and marines are weak to banelings, build bunkers at your contain. Not too many, but a few. Get the bunker storage upgrade, and you can nearly autodial 2 mutas for free. Similarly, turrets are really good to deter movement in an area, and supported by thors and marines, will make it hard to get within a contained area or outside of a contained area.
The thing is, in Starcraft, nothing has a "counter". Sure, that term is thrown around a lot, and it makes a lot of sense in a lot of situations, but IMHO, SC2 is more a game of balancing your units against his (composition-wise). Not only that, but SC2 is a game of positioning. You need to be prepared with how your units are positioned. Ive won a bunch of games by scouting a force moving out and catching it out of position. Its important that you don't say I want A SINGLE UNIT to counter ANOTHER SINGLE UNIT. A better way of saying the concept of "how do i deal with Unit X" is what units do well together, and how can my utilization of those units be made to deal the best with Unit X or Unit composition X.
Zerg here, TvZ is actually my worst matchup. This is bronze league so I'm not sure how much strategy your opponents are using, but let's look at the main idea behind people even using Muta. Mutalisks are pretty frail units unless you allow your opponent to obtain a critical mass of them. To my knowledge, there is no way your opponent can have Muta until the 9-10 minute mark. You need to pressure the Zerg, even if you don't fully commit to an attack, to make units instead of drones, thus delaying the muta. Turrets usually scare them away, as mutas are intended to attack and flee before taking any damage. Look up good ways to position your thors and marines so you can quickly respond to the pack. Also, I realize it's tough to maintain vision on the map with Muta out, but try to track their movements as much as possible. All of this is easier said then done, and I dread the day that you make it up to my league and shut down my harass, but I'm happy to help!
After watching the replay I think you should think hard where you want to spend your gas. You can't really get banshees with cloak, upgraded marines, tanks, thors and upgrades from 1.5 base. Also for me mech play against zerg who goes muta,zergling, baneling feels really hard. I'm just gold so that might be it.
I Would make more barracks (maybe 3-6) and get combat shield and stim. Get 3-4 siege tanks from one factory and try to attack before he has lots of mutas (before 10 minutes?) with tanks and marines. Keep making units from hotkeyed barracks & factory while moving/watching your army. Keep marines behind tanks so you dont lose them to banelings. Maybe use naked starport to make couple medivacs or one viking if you can afford it.
theres a good offensive tactik that works really well is mmas drop play with lots off marines in medi why do u have to have the mutas at ur base if u can have them at hes base and he have to def and fear he can get attack on another flank at any time this is a really good play i pretty much never lose only if im out off position and u have lots off map control and get a really fast 3rd
On August 20 2011 21:58 Hook829 wrote: Zerg here, TvZ is actually my worst matchup. This is bronze league so I'm not sure how much strategy your opponents are using, but let's look at the main idea behind people even using Muta. Mutalisks are pretty frail units unless you allow your opponent to obtain a critical mass of them. To my knowledge, there is no way your opponent can have Muta until the 9-10 minute mark. You need to pressure the Zerg, even if you don't fully commit to an attack, to make units instead of drones, thus delaying the muta. Turrets usually scare them away, as mutas are intended to attack and flee before taking any damage. Look up good ways to position your thors and marines so you can quickly respond to the pack. Also, I realize it's tough to maintain vision on the map with Muta out, but try to track their movements as much as possible. All of this is easier said then done, and I dread the day that you make it up to my league and shut down my harass, but I'm happy to help!
Well technically you can get 6 mutas out before 7 min. But thats kinda all in muta rush when not being pressured.
Mate, there's nothing insane about a few mutas in TvZ. Get used to it. There are numerous replays of effective defense against muta harass. There are also standard responses. You want units that counter mutas - marines, vikings, turrents, ravens with HSM and thors as the above posters have mentionned. I would hazard a guess that you don't like marines, as your replay showed that after spotting zerg's air units u build.... more tanks and banshees! You need to build more marines, and by that I mean more barracks and lots of marines, with stimpack. Remember that while the flappies are fast and annoying, they are rubbish at direct engagements so if they have invested in lots of mutalisks you should build some defenses and be aggressive. The mutas will melt under pressure.
They may or may not fit in the build you're using, but Ghosts are godly against Mutas. Actually, Ghosts are godly against Zerg. Then again, they are more of a late game option.
if your bronze league, you just need to focus on your build order. I didnt watch the replay but i can almost 100% guarantee that if you can get a 3 rax build order down you wont have to worry about mass mutas. 3 rax can carry you all the way up to platinum league if you do it right. Just my 2 cents
On August 21 2011 06:57 topeg__ wrote: if your bronze league, you just need to focus on your build order. I didnt watch the replay but i can almost 100% guarantee that if you can get a 3 rax build order down you wont have to worry about mass mutas. 3 rax can carry you all the way up to platinum league if you do it right. Just my 2 cents
Prepare for your warning/ban
However getting a build order down isnt a bad shout.
so just spam turrets, take a fast third, and push maxed 200/200 marine/tank and 2-3 thors. If he made 30 mutas there's no way he's going to beat you because the mutalisks are going to die instantly.
Even if you think putting too many turrets down is expensive, you're wrong because MULEs mean everything that doesn't cost gas is free.
Ignore everybody that hasnt watched your replay or quoted your replay because they are just venting about their own losses.
Your problem is that you are building missile turrets too early. Missile turrets shoot air and detect burrowed units. Before lair tech zerg cant have burrowed or offensive flying units. You should only go for turrets when you see lair and a spire or you see lair and you are suspicious of burrowed roaches. The 400 minerals you spent on turrets before the 7 minute mark should of been spent on another command centre or additional barracks to make marines with. The Other 6 turrets you built before 12minutes you should of spent on units and even more barracks if you think the zerg is going to commit heavily to mutas. The zerg got mutas at 13 minutes. You could start building turrets at 12 and still be safe when the mutas arrive.
What strong terrans do is commit the minimum amount of resources to turrets and just defend with marines until they are willing to push. Then they put up extra turrets at their base when they move out. As for when to move out to attack the zerg I cant really say because you always have the choice of expanding or attacking depending on how many offensive units the zerg has made.
On August 21 2011 06:57 topeg__ wrote: if your bronze league, you just need to focus on your build order. I didnt watch the replay but i can almost 100% guarantee that if you can get a 3 rax build order down you wont have to worry about mass mutas. 3 rax can carry you all the way up to platinum league if you do it right. Just my 2 cents
Prepare for your warning/ban
However getting a build order down isnt a bad shout.
On August 21 2011 06:57 topeg__ wrote: if your bronze league, you just need to focus on your build order. I didnt watch the replay but i can almost 100% guarantee that if you can get a 3 rax build order down you wont have to worry about mass mutas. 3 rax can carry you all the way up to platinum league if you do it right. Just my 2 cents
Prepare for your warning/ban
However getting a build order down isnt a bad shout.
haha why??
I think he meant cause you didn't watch the replay but idk.
I think everyone is thinking too much about 'counters'. The real thing you need to work on is your macro. Practice your build against a computer till you feel like you are constantly making scvs, not getting supply blocked and spending all your money. I think you'll find you will have no troubles once your play becomes more smooth and you'll find that it's not really mutas that were the trouble in the first place, but rather your macro and mechanics etc.
ill try to give some tips from what i seen in the replay:
1) expo faster, getting an expo greatly increases your income, if your not doing an all in or getting a specific tech you generally want to expand as fast as possible(and be safe) generally, especially when your just massing up units your better of getting your expo faster and after that adding more production facilities so you can mass those units alot faster, also you dont need a double gas if you dont plan to tech quickly, especially not if you intend to build a just large number of helions and marines(as opposed to getting siege tanks/medivacs/ banshees out quickly). instead of all that gas you mined but not used till way later could have been used to put up an expo way earlier and then got more gasses as your about to start producing thors/tanks/medivacs/upgrades (and if your afraid of expoing just make the cc in your base while making some bunkers at your expo before you transport it).
2) transfer workers to your expo, above 2 workers a patch(16) the mining efficiency of extra workers greatly diminishes.
3) make orbitals out of your cc's as fast as possible(and hotkey them in a group so you can use all the mules), as the money from the extra mules is better then the extra svcs you build in that time
4) when you engage you often are just moving without shooting, if you dont have the apm to miro properly just a +click on the ground just behind your enemys also when moving around the map a move where you are going to so your units attack the moment they get in range instead after the lings start hitting them
5) biggest problem i think was his 3 base economy to your 1.5(barely) base economy, take more expansions, and make sure they are saturated with workers(that is getting near 16 workers on minerals)
6) vs mass mass muta you gonna want some thors to support your marines vs the mutas(as their long anti air range can cover alot of area and they do splash damage, wich either wrecks the whole muta ball if he clumps off or forces him to magic box(a technique that makes sure they keep spread out) but magic boxed mutas are alot less effective vs marines then a really clumped up muta ball). 7) upgrade your marines vs enemy units without armor a weapon upgrade increases the dps output with about 20 percent, a stimmed 3/3 marine with shields upgrade beats 2 marines without upgrades
8) you only had 1 baracks without reactor building marines and all your factorys where building tanks wich werent even covering your marines from the zerglings when you fought with him, either make more rax(get stim and shields also) or produce thors, as 1 rax worth of aa just is never going to be enough(3 is more appropriate). 1 muta is more expensive then 6 marines, i am not sure you even had 2 marines for each mutalisk, so he spend alot more resources on his air then you invested in your anti air.
EPT
