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Hi there,
with Mech gaining popularity lately (cheers mvp), I'd like to discuss several scenarios that are likely to happen in a late-game situation (you will often get there with mech) and a proper response from Terran point of view.
I think that 150-200 supply 3/3 mech with Viknig support is superior to nearly anything Zerg can throw at you and so at some point, you will face one of these situations:
1. Mass Mutas to magic box and overwhelm your Thors.
I think this is a big gamble, because it can work only if you really don't know, what is happening until it's too late. You should have turrets everywhere as you need to spend minerals with mech somehow and you should always have several Thors, as those are harder to deal with after NP nerf. Also, it's good to take several SCVs with your main army and build turrets along your push as even 1-2 turrets can do insane amount of damage while Zerg tries to magic box your Thors. Don't forget to set auto-repair on so your SCVs can repair Thors and turrets - this can often buy you enough time to swing the battle in your favor.
2. Broodlord/Corruptor + several Infestors to fungal Vikings.
This is the ultimate anti-mech late-game composition. I think this comes down to micro. You need to siege/unsiege correctly to avoid unnecessary splash and you can mix in several ghosts to emp/snipe Infestors or snipe Broodlords. The Zerg's goal here is to hit single good fungal on your Vikings, than chain it and eventually overwhelm you with Broodlords where you can't get Viking's count back fast enough. Mass NP is way too risky now I think.
3. Zerg will go for this crazy Ultra/Ling (Roach?) random runby style to ruin your economy.
This is probably hardest to deal with. This strategy abuses the immobility of mech the most I think as Drops and Nydus can be prevented, unlike this, with proper turret and ST placement. You really should build those in a late-game situation. There is no reason not to build them as it will certainly pay off in a long run. Key locations should be locked down or walled off completly with Planetary Fortresses, few Siege Tanks and turrets. I think Terrans need to start doing this a lot more, this way you can make the terrain friendly even on the worst maps. Just look at mvp vs Nestea set 4 on Dual Sight this week. See how Protoss secure 3rd on Metalopolis for reference also.
I'm aware some Zergs might try to mass Roaches + upgrades, but I think Roaches won't cut it anymore later where your mech's upgrades start to kick in.
I will leave here some room for your opinions. I'd like to hear how you handle all or some of these situations and to share your experience. I think some good ideas can be developed here. Just don't flame or whine about balance too much. :-)
edit: I will add replay to each scenario for better understeanding as soon as I get to my PC.
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United Kingdom10823 Posts
Its a good write-up, but i think you've missed a slight addition that makes things a bit simpler (in theory)
Ghosts
All three of your situations can also be solved with a few ghosts mixed in. They're good against mutas since they do extra damage vs light, and snipe helps a lot. They can snipe BLs and EMP Infestors, and they can snipe Ultras, with your mech army taking out the rest
They are super expensive, but you should have a decent amount of minerals going mech. May not have the upgrades, but getting cloak should be enough. Plus you can use that pesky barracks that was just being there
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"Rise of the valkyries" TLO mech aka Sky Terran. :D
Banshee Viking with Thors helions ...
Use cloak banshee to harass and kill expandsion. Terran use a lot of Units that is hard for zerg to counter ...
Check out TLO Stream, his TvZ mech is really good ^^~
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Watch BeastyQT's mech, he relies heavily on ghosts late game and it gets insanely hard for the zerg to handle the mech. It's even more effective than TLO's style imo.
Edit : To give more thought into the discussion instead of just telling you to watch a streamer, I really think ghost is the answer since they nullify the infestor, they are very good against broodlords as long as you don't let the zerg get too much of them at which point you'll need to add vikings, which you will protect from infestors with the ghosts (you only need a few ghosts to render a lot of infestors useless).
They also destroy ultralisks, they are bad against roach zergling baneling comps, where the zerg will try to crash his banelings into the hellions and overwhelm the thors. But at that point it's up to you to scout effectively and make more tanks than thors.
I feel that unlike bio which gets weaker then the zerg composition lategame, mech only gets stronger up to the point where you can handle several maxed zerg armies. The point you made with turrets was smart.
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On October 13 2011 19:15 ShaSKiRa wrote:
"Rise of the valkyries" TLO mech aka Sky Terran. :D
Banshee Viking with Thors helions ...
Use cloak banshee to harass and kill expandsion. Terran use a lot of Units that is hard for zerg to counter ...
Check out TLO Stream, his TvZ mech is really good ^^~
Yes, I'm aware of TLO's air play. It looks awesome. :-) Only problem is I often see him running into some really good Zergs that can read his play and react acordingly and there he loses control of the game and gets overrun.
Those scenarios I mentioned are "safe" even if Zerg completly knows what you are doing.. I think SC2 will eventually end up like this, where you most likely know, what is happening and so safe macro play will be the way to go.
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I watch a lot of Avilo's, TLO's, Beastyqt's streams.. Those guys play mech very often, so my inspiration goes from there. Avilo for example uses ghosts as well to their limits with nuking everything, which is actually very good response to slow Broodlord/Corruptor/Infestor combo..
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the importance of ghosts for late game tvz cant be stressed enough, so ill do it again : D
ghosts are vital to prevent infestors from going berserk with fungal growth, aswell as help kill the broodlords with snipe...i guess you can go without them as long as your opponent foregoes infestors.
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TLO has some amazing mech play against Zerg. He uses thors, hellions, banshees and vikings. It is critical that your thors do not get wiped out by the mutas, as everything else can we wiped out with ease. This play style is also very micro intensive. In the end it just comes down to who has the better micro or macro. TLO also generally pulls a few scvs to keep the thors alive and repair.
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On October 13 2011 19:21 NeonFox wrote:
Watch BeastyQT's mech, he relies heavily on ghosts late game and it gets insanely hard for the zerg t
yesterday he said on his stream he still finds it worse than bio-centric builds
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thanks for this, I've been hurting hard in my TvZ and have been debating going mech a lot since my bio play gets utterly shut down way too easy at high levels but didn't have the motivation to do so.
can someone perhaps link to a good mech build and strat?
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On October 13 2011 20:25 humbre wrote:Show nested quote +On October 13 2011 19:21 NeonFox wrote:
Watch BeastyQT's mech, he relies heavily on ghosts late game and it gets insanely hard for the zerg t yesterday he said on his stream he finds it still worse than bio-centric builds
And he doesnt rely on ghosts.. he gets them to spam 10 nukes on the Z and he also completely outclasses most people he plays on his stream.
IMO you should watch some tournament games where people play for money and probably use whatever they think is the best instead of watching a favored player kill nerds in a funny way on his stream. From what I remember from MVP vs NesTea ro8 + Show Spoiler +MVP didn't build a single ghost while meching even when NesTea rushed for infestors, had 6+ all game long and had 10 broodlords in the end
I'm not a big fan of ghosts and when I play mech I just try to scout as much as possible and have the right thor:tank ratio in the fights.
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In my experience (noob experience :p) I think that vikings and ghosts are a bad idea. The thing is how well corrupters kill vikings. Either you should overwhelm with vikings or not have any, because any few vikings will be worthless I feel. I like just making ghosts in response to Zerg T3, and keeping everything else the same.
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As for the Ghost - I'm not completly sold on how good it actually is late-game. I mean, you invest a lot of gas into a very fragile unit, which is very micro intensive and dependant. Sniping Broodlords is very hard against a good Zerg. Your ghosts will die to your own Tank's splash and if you unsiege them, you will be swarmed and overrun.. Just count how many Vikings/Thors you could get if you surpass ghosts. Also, your investment will by multiplied by your 3/3 upgrades.. I think its at least for a debate.
The thing is, if you use ghosts to kill Zerg's air, you will be weaker against ground and you can't just make this happen. Once you clear the sky and Zerg remass on ground, you risk losing all your ghost and you are left with significantly weakened mech army. I think it's just better to be superior on ground all game long and have the tech switch figured out.
One more think I'd like to add, its crucial to continue on air upgrades after you ground upgrades are done. This way, you can make it significantly harder for Zerg to fungal your Vikings. Not because of how many fungals Viking can survive, but because of Broodlords dying way faster and therefor you can keep your Tanks sieged most of the time. This results into many dead infestors and your Vikings will be free to clear the sky.
edit: Im mostly reffering to how counter Broodlord/Corruptor. Against Ultralisks, Ghosts are good enough. But still, I think you can beat any ground with enough supply of fully upgraded mech without loosing much as long, as you don't get caught out of position terribly.
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On October 13 2011 21:31 Everlong wrote:
As for the Ghost - I'm not completly sold on how good it actually is late-game. I mean, you invest a lot of gas into a very fragile unit, which is very micro intensive and dependant. Sniping Broodlords is very hard against a good Zerg. Your ghosts will die to your own Tank's splash and if you unsiege them, you will be swarmed and overrun.. Just count how many Vikings/Thors you could get if you surpass ghosts. Also, your investment will by multiplied by your 3/3 upgrades.. I think its at least for a debate.
The thing is, if you use ghosts to kill Zerg's air, you will be weaker against ground and you can't just make this happen. Once you clear the sky and Zerg remass on ground, you risk losing all your ghost and you are left with significantly weakened mech army. I think it's just better to be superior on ground all game long and have the tech switch figured out.
One more think I'd like to add, its crucial to continue on air upgrades after you ground upgrades are done. This way, you can make it significantly harder for Zerg to fungal your Vikings. Not because of how many fungals Viking can survive, but because of Broodlords dying way faster and therefor you can keep your Tanks sieged most of the time. This results into many dead infestors and your Vikings will be free to clear the sky.
edit: Im mostly reffering to how counter Broodlord/Corruptor. Against Ultralisks, Ghosts are good enough. But still, I think you can beat any ground with enough supply of fully upgraded mech without loosing much as long, as you don't get caught out of position terribly.
Ghosts are really good vs Broodlords and Infestors. Snipe just owns both and EMP nails infestors too. If you're good with micro ghosts > tier 3 zerg
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On October 13 2011 22:04 babo213 wrote:Show nested quote +On October 13 2011 21:31 Everlong wrote:
As for the Ghost - I'm not completly sold on how good it actually is late-game. I mean, you invest a lot of gas into a very fragile unit, which is very micro intensive and dependant. Sniping Broodlords is very hard against a good Zerg. Your ghosts will die to your own Tank's splash and if you unsiege them, you will be swarmed and overrun.. Just count how many Vikings/Thors you could get if you surpass ghosts. Also, your investment will by multiplied by your 3/3 upgrades.. I think its at least for a debate.
The thing is, if you use ghosts to kill Zerg's air, you will be weaker against ground and you can't just make this happen. Once you clear the sky and Zerg remass on ground, you risk losing all your ghost and you are left with significantly weakened mech army. I think it's just better to be superior on ground all game long and have the tech switch figured out.
One more think I'd like to add, its crucial to continue on air upgrades after you ground upgrades are done. This way, you can make it significantly harder for Zerg to fungal your Vikings. Not because of how many fungals Viking can survive, but because of Broodlords dying way faster and therefor you can keep your Tanks sieged most of the time. This results into many dead infestors and your Vikings will be free to clear the sky.
edit: Im mostly reffering to how counter Broodlord/Corruptor. Against Ultralisks, Ghosts are good enough. But still, I think you can beat any ground with enough supply of fully upgraded mech without loosing much as long, as you don't get caught out of position terribly. Ghosts are really good vs Broodlords and Infestors. Snipe just owns both and EMP nails infestors too. If you're good with micro ghosts > tier 3 zerg
Yes, I definitely agree. Only thing I find it pretty difficult to micro them correctly. Often I find myself in a situation, where terrain or just the possition of Zerg army is such that its really hard for Ghosts to snipe effectively. I'm trying to say you can also go the hard way, having just more metal stuff upgraded. This way you are less fragile and you just don't lose when Zerg decide to remax on ground. But overall yes, I agree, with some good control, you can use Ghosts and be very cost efficient.
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On October 13 2011 21:31 Everlong wrote:
As for the Ghost - I'm not completly sold on how good it actually is late-game. I mean, you invest a lot of gas into a very fragile unit, which is very micro intensive and dependant. Sniping Broodlords is very hard against a good Zerg. Your ghosts will die to your own Tank's splash and if you unsiege them, you will be swarmed and overrun.. Just count how many Vikings/Thors you could get if you surpass ghosts. Also, your investment will by multiplied by your 3/3 upgrades.. I think its at least for a debate.
The thing is, if you use ghosts to kill Zerg's air, you will be weaker against ground and you can't just make this happen. Once you clear the sky and Zerg remass on ground, you risk losing all your ghost and you are left with significantly weakened mech army. I think it's just better to be superior on ground all game long and have the tech switch figured out.
One more think I'd like to add, its crucial to continue on air upgrades after you ground upgrades are done. This way, you can make it significantly harder for Zerg to fungal your Vikings. Not because of how many fungals Viking can survive, but because of Broodlords dying way faster and therefor you can keep your Tanks sieged most of the time. This results into many dead infestors and your Vikings will be free to clear the sky.
edit: Im mostly reffering to how counter Broodlord/Corruptor. Against Ultralisks, Ghosts are good enough. But still, I think you can beat any ground with enough supply of fully upgraded mech without loosing much as long, as you don't get caught out of position terribly.
With mech you have the choice in investing in 1 fragile unit that costs gas to counter T3 tech. Vikings can't really attack ground too well, and die if fungaled before or after they killed some broods. If ultras come they are empty supply. And imo the gas spent on air upgrades unless you're looking for some weird air trans could be better spent on...well, ghosts.
Ghosts are good vs broods, the micro is not ridiculously intensive as your mech can do pretty well on it's own. Ghosts are good vs infestors, emp clumps and snipe of loners and they just lost all of their infestors. Ghosts are good vs ultras, and roaches with some decent micro (letting thor/tank take the damage while you snipe the shit out of everything). Ghosts have an amazing late game harass potential with nuke, if you doubt this try getting 10 GAs late game on a med/large map and go to town.
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On October 13 2011 22:12 Badfatpanda wrote:Show nested quote +On October 13 2011 21:31 Everlong wrote:
As for the Ghost - I'm not completly sold on how good it actually is late-game. I mean, you invest a lot of gas into a very fragile unit, which is very micro intensive and dependant. Sniping Broodlords is very hard against a good Zerg. Your ghosts will die to your own Tank's splash and if you unsiege them, you will be swarmed and overrun.. Just count how many Vikings/Thors you could get if you surpass ghosts. Also, your investment will by multiplied by your 3/3 upgrades.. I think its at least for a debate.
The thing is, if you use ghosts to kill Zerg's air, you will be weaker against ground and you can't just make this happen. Once you clear the sky and Zerg remass on ground, you risk losing all your ghost and you are left with significantly weakened mech army. I think it's just better to be superior on ground all game long and have the tech switch figured out.
One more think I'd like to add, its crucial to continue on air upgrades after you ground upgrades are done. This way, you can make it significantly harder for Zerg to fungal your Vikings. Not because of how many fungals Viking can survive, but because of Broodlords dying way faster and therefor you can keep your Tanks sieged most of the time. This results into many dead infestors and your Vikings will be free to clear the sky.
edit: Im mostly reffering to how counter Broodlord/Corruptor. Against Ultralisks, Ghosts are good enough. But still, I think you can beat any ground with enough supply of fully upgraded mech without loosing much as long, as you don't get caught out of position terribly. With mech you have the choice in investing in 1 fragile unit that costs gas to counter T3 tech. Vikings can't really attack ground too well, and die if fungaled before or after they killed some broods. If ultras come they are empty supply. And imo the gas spent on air upgrades unless you're looking for some weird air trans could be better spent on...well, ghosts. Ghosts are good vs broods, the micro is not ridiculously intensive as your mech can do pretty well on it's own. Ghosts are good vs infestors, emp clumps and snipe of loners and they just lost all of their infestors. Ghosts are good vs ultras, and roaches with some decent micro (letting thor/tank take the damage while you snipe the shit out of everything). Ghosts have an amazing late game harass potential with nuke, if you doubt this try getting 10 GAs late game on a med/large map and go to town.
Definitely. I don't doubt that you can do crazy stuff with ghosts. What I'm curious about is why I do see very skilled players (Beastyqt, Avilo, etc..) loseing to some funky ground transitions from Zergs after they get this Ghostmech going.. You clear Zerg's T3 and then you lose to just swarm of units, I don't like that. Once I dominate ground by having 3/3 mech, I don't want ever to give my ground dominance away.. I see this happening with ghosts.
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On October 13 2011 22:21 Everlong wrote:Show nested quote +On October 13 2011 22:12 Badfatpanda wrote:On October 13 2011 21:31 Everlong wrote:
As for the Ghost - I'm not completly sold on how good it actually is late-game. I mean, you invest a lot of gas into a very fragile unit, which is very micro intensive and dependant. Sniping Broodlords is very hard against a good Zerg. Your ghosts will die to your own Tank's splash and if you unsiege them, you will be swarmed and overrun.. Just count how many Vikings/Thors you could get if you surpass ghosts. Also, your investment will by multiplied by your 3/3 upgrades.. I think its at least for a debate.
The thing is, if you use ghosts to kill Zerg's air, you will be weaker against ground and you can't just make this happen. Once you clear the sky and Zerg remass on ground, you risk losing all your ghost and you are left with significantly weakened mech army. I think it's just better to be superior on ground all game long and have the tech switch figured out.
One more think I'd like to add, its crucial to continue on air upgrades after you ground upgrades are done. This way, you can make it significantly harder for Zerg to fungal your Vikings. Not because of how many fungals Viking can survive, but because of Broodlords dying way faster and therefor you can keep your Tanks sieged most of the time. This results into many dead infestors and your Vikings will be free to clear the sky.
edit: Im mostly reffering to how counter Broodlord/Corruptor. Against Ultralisks, Ghosts are good enough. But still, I think you can beat any ground with enough supply of fully upgraded mech without loosing much as long, as you don't get caught out of position terribly. With mech you have the choice in investing in 1 fragile unit that costs gas to counter T3 tech. Vikings can't really attack ground too well, and die if fungaled before or after they killed some broods. If ultras come they are empty supply. And imo the gas spent on air upgrades unless you're looking for some weird air trans could be better spent on...well, ghosts. Ghosts are good vs broods, the micro is not ridiculously intensive as your mech can do pretty well on it's own. Ghosts are good vs infestors, emp clumps and snipe of loners and they just lost all of their infestors. Ghosts are good vs ultras, and roaches with some decent micro (letting thor/tank take the damage while you snipe the shit out of everything). Ghosts have an amazing late game harass potential with nuke, if you doubt this try getting 10 GAs late game on a med/large map and go to town. Definitely. I don't doubt that you can do crazy stuff with ghosts. What I'm curious about is why I do see very skilled players (Beastyqt, Avilo, etc..) loseing to some funky ground transitions from Zergs after they get this Ghostmech going.. You clear Zerg's T3 and then you lose to just swarm of units, I don't like that. Once I dominate ground by having 3/3 mech, I don't want ever to give my ground dominance away.. I see this happening with ghosts.
This is where scouting is really REALLY important late game, ghost supply in a mech army is a really fine balance and is very map dependent. Generally ghosts allow you to be in the clear when your opponent remaxes on T3 tech like ultra/ling or bl, but if you see a bazillion roaches spawning just get in a defensive position and harass with hellion/ghost to free up supply for more tanks while buying time to get situated.
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On October 13 2011 22:24 Badfatpanda wrote:Show nested quote +On October 13 2011 22:21 Everlong wrote:On October 13 2011 22:12 Badfatpanda wrote:On October 13 2011 21:31 Everlong wrote:
As for the Ghost - I'm not completly sold on how good it actually is late-game. I mean, you invest a lot of gas into a very fragile unit, which is very micro intensive and dependant. Sniping Broodlords is very hard against a good Zerg. Your ghosts will die to your own Tank's splash and if you unsiege them, you will be swarmed and overrun.. Just count how many Vikings/Thors you could get if you surpass ghosts. Also, your investment will by multiplied by your 3/3 upgrades.. I think its at least for a debate.
The thing is, if you use ghosts to kill Zerg's air, you will be weaker against ground and you can't just make this happen. Once you clear the sky and Zerg remass on ground, you risk losing all your ghost and you are left with significantly weakened mech army. I think it's just better to be superior on ground all game long and have the tech switch figured out.
One more think I'd like to add, its crucial to continue on air upgrades after you ground upgrades are done. This way, you can make it significantly harder for Zerg to fungal your Vikings. Not because of how many fungals Viking can survive, but because of Broodlords dying way faster and therefor you can keep your Tanks sieged most of the time. This results into many dead infestors and your Vikings will be free to clear the sky.
edit: Im mostly reffering to how counter Broodlord/Corruptor. Against Ultralisks, Ghosts are good enough. But still, I think you can beat any ground with enough supply of fully upgraded mech without loosing much as long, as you don't get caught out of position terribly. With mech you have the choice in investing in 1 fragile unit that costs gas to counter T3 tech. Vikings can't really attack ground too well, and die if fungaled before or after they killed some broods. If ultras come they are empty supply. And imo the gas spent on air upgrades unless you're looking for some weird air trans could be better spent on...well, ghosts. Ghosts are good vs broods, the micro is not ridiculously intensive as your mech can do pretty well on it's own. Ghosts are good vs infestors, emp clumps and snipe of loners and they just lost all of their infestors. Ghosts are good vs ultras, and roaches with some decent micro (letting thor/tank take the damage while you snipe the shit out of everything). Ghosts have an amazing late game harass potential with nuke, if you doubt this try getting 10 GAs late game on a med/large map and go to town. Definitely. I don't doubt that you can do crazy stuff with ghosts. What I'm curious about is why I do see very skilled players (Beastyqt, Avilo, etc..) loseing to some funky ground transitions from Zergs after they get this Ghostmech going.. You clear Zerg's T3 and then you lose to just swarm of units, I don't like that. Once I dominate ground by having 3/3 mech, I don't want ever to give my ground dominance away.. I see this happening with ghosts. This is where scouting is really REALLY important late game, ghost supply in a mech army is a really fine balance and is very map dependent. Generally ghosts allow you to be in the clear when your opponent remaxes on T3 tech like ultra/ling or bl, but if you see a bazillion roaches spawning just get in a defensive position and harass with hellion/ghost to free up supply for more tanks while buying time to get situated.
Fair enough, I guess you need to figure out what works better for you and go from there.
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When i play mech i usually don t siege my tank cause they end up doing more damage to my own tropps than to the ennemy and unsiege tanks have a pretty good dps as well.
This is especially true vs broolords.
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EPT
