[D] Discussing the Siege Tank

On December 21 2011 22:25 Willzzz wrote:

TvT seems to be roughly 50/50 mech/bio atm, so I wouldn't say that mech is considered to be "FAR superior" by a majority of players.

On December 21 2011 22:17 frantic.cactus wrote:
Firstly this is a good discussion topic, thank you.

I too have played Terran since BW and now in SC2 (though defiantly not at your level in either game)

I spent some time playing around with mech before and after the tank nerf and really wanted to find a stratergy which centered around my favourite unit. Unfortunately the time of the tank as the sole backbone of a Terran army in TvP seems to have passed us by. This is like you said due to the myriad of ways in which the Protoss can punish a tanking Terran. With adequate support though the tank can be deadly, destroying everything on the ground.

I have to wonder, one of the main criticisms on the tank in TvP is that it created an army that is "to immobile". Why then is mech considered by many pros's to be FAR superior to bio in the TvT match up. Surly with the insane mobility of bio in dropships immobile mech should be torn apart.

I feel that through the intelligent use of Terran structures (Turret, Sensor Tower and Pfortress) and the excellent selection of support spell casters (Raven and Ghost) and units (Vikings and Banshees in particular) tanks can once again become behemoths that made the Protoss tremble in fear at the the thought of The Push. How that is to be done will have to be left up to better gamers than me~

On December 21 2011 22:32 frantic.cactus wrote:


I disagree, mech IS considered far superior by the top top Korean terrans. I don't care about the majority, just the likes of MVP, Bomber etc.

Also tanks in a head on engagement in the right composition can beat a 200/200 Protoss army head on. The drawbacks I always hear are, "too immobile" or "urgh, I make one mistake and I lose."

On December 21 2011 22:54 Willzzz wrote:



There are plenty of recent games where Bomber and MVP have gone marine tank in TvT, not to mention other Korean terrans like Top and Rain, etc.

Yes tanks CAN beat a 200/200 protoss army, but no more effectively than a bio army can. If you don't gain any extra fighting ability for your loss of mobility why bother? Surely a tank army should be MORE effective in a straight up fight?

On December 21 2011 22:43 Mehukannu wrote:

I believe it is because bio units tend to be smaller in size so they get more hurt from AoE attacks from tanks and more notably from hellions AoE, which is the fastest unit in terran arsenal and allows you to kill or stall the possible drops long enough for your tanks (and thors) to get there.
Edit: I also should mention that terran bio units have generally less health than protoss units, especially when they use stim which helps a lot units that do huge burst damage but has a slow attack speed like hellion or siege tank for example.

On December 21 2011 23:11 frantic.cactus wrote:
That was likely due the specific architecture of a particular map or situation in a BoX. Straight up, mech is better, but that doesn't mean other styles are automatically obsolete. Mech is ensdorsed by MVP.

Because you gain from having an army that can go head on with the protoss. Tanks and Hellions can defend a postition which is something that Bio cannot. (3/3 mech is still terrifying btw, that for one hasn't changed form BW)
With the addition of Ghosts and Ravens to support an appropriate amount of Tank/Hellion. The mech army can trade cost efficiently and have greater unit retention than the protoss deathball.

On December 21 2011 22:32 frantic.cactus wrote:


I disagree, mech IS considered far superior by the top top Korean terrans. I don't care about the majority, just the likes of MVP, Bomber etc.

Also tanks in a head on engagement in the right composition can beat a 200/200 Protoss army head on. The drawbacks I always hear are, "too immobile" or "urgh, I make one mistake and I lose."

On December 21 2011 23:56 sushichef wrote:
I would love to see a new upgrade for tanks which would give them extra damage but ONLY for the primary target. Make it expensive, make it late-game (require fusion core) - I don't care.

This would make tanks much more viable in TvP and would not affect TvT or TvZ that much. It would also introduce another interesting micro element - you'd want to target beefier units before smaller ones.

(Now that I think of it, isn't there an upgrade like that in campaign mode?)

On December 21 2011 23:25 Nihonjin wrote:
Tanks are good vs P. In High Masters, you see them a lot more since people learn to control/position them better. You need to know how to place them, have back bone army to go along with there unit composition(counter). You cant just mass tanks blindly.

Need some tanking units for the tanks (thors), spread tanks around and it will crush protoss units. If they go immortal, get Ghost. Simple as that.

But lets face it, more than half of terran players cant micro management that so they go to the easy blindly mass tier 1 units play style.

On December 21 2011 22:17 frantic.cactus wrote:
I have to wonder, one of the main criticisms on the tank in TvP is that it created an army that is "to immobile". Why then is mech considered by many pros's to be FAR superior to bio in the TvT match up. Surly with the insane mobility of bio in dropships immobile mech should be torn apart.

On December 22 2011 01:44 RyLai wrote:

...

With Bio against Protoss, you do relatively similar damage. A Tank does 50 damage every 3 seconds to Armored, and 35 damage to Light. A Marauder does 10 every 1.5 seconds to Light, and 20 every 1.5 seconds to Armored. With Stim, it's 10/20 damage every 1 second. Versus Light, you're short 5 damage per 3 seconds and you're up 10 damage every 3 seconds versus Armored (which is a majority of the Protoss army). But if you do it by supply cost, then it would be 3 Marauders to 2 Siege Tanks. That means its 70/100 damage per 3 seconds versus 30/60 damage per 1.5 seconds (1 with Stim). You'll ALWAYS engage with Stim, so you'll be up 20 damage per 3 seconds against Light and up a ridiculous 80 damage against Armored. Even with the damage that splash does (Protoss units don't clump up nearly as well as Terran units, or even Zerg units), you have the advantage of mobility in the army. You can kite Zealots all day, basically engaging only a portion of the army, then engage the Stalkers (which Marauders DEMOLISH). With Tanks, you take on the entire army at once, or else suffer dealing significantly reduced damage. Bio is simply vastly easier to play. Protoss and Terran basically switched their positions from Brood War. Protoss gets the deathball and Terran uses a bunch of mobile, low-tier units with support. But Protoss doesn't have to slow push, and instead just drops Force Fields...

On December 21 2011 22:32 frantic.cactus wrote:


I disagree, mech IS considered far superior by the top top Korean terrans. I don't care about the majority, just the likes of MVP, Bomber etc.

Also tanks in a head on engagement in the right composition can beat a 200/200 Protoss army head on. The drawbacks I always hear are, "too immobile" or "urgh, I make one mistake and I lose."

On December 22 2011 05:32 Morghaine wrote:
OK so let's get to it from a logical state of view.

Just let these few points sink in:

1. Can you imagine any composition where the addition of 1-2 tanks would not greatly improve the army composition?

2. Terran has 12 units to choose from, yet chooses to go marine / tank / medivac in like 90% of the games against Zerg. So either all 9 units are really really bad or tanks are just really good. This leads to

3. It is very likely that because of 2., buffing the tank in ANY way against P will result in the tank being OP against Zerg.

makes sense? Saying the tank is no good against P is like saying water doesn't help against hunger. It's like the Hydra. It is very debatable if it's of any use against P, but it surely is of no use against T. Do you hear any Zerg complain about that? no? might be because we're busy whining about it being of any use at all. And by the way, we have 9 units to choose from.

On December 22 2011 05:32 Morghaine wrote:
OK so let's get to it from a logical state of view.

Just let these few points sink in:

1. Can you imagine any composition where the addition of 1-2 tanks would not greatly improve the army composition?

2. Terran has 12 units to choose from, yet chooses to go marine / tank / medivac in like 90% of the games against Zerg. So either all 9 units are really really bad or tanks are just really good. This leads to

3. It is very likely that because of 2., buffing the tank in ANY way against P will result in the tank being OP against Zerg. Which is already debatable if you don't happen to have gosu micro pro skills with mutas.

makes sense? Saying the tank is no good against P is like saying water doesn't help against hunger. It's like the Hydra. It is very debatable if it's of any use against P, but it surely is of no use against T. Do you hear any Zerg complain about that? no? might be because we're busy whining about it being of any use at all. And by the way, we have 9 units to choose from.

On December 22 2011 07:26 Morghaine wrote:
So oneshotting infestors doesnt ring a bell in your balance departments?

On December 22 2011 07:39 ThomasHobbes wrote:
Tanks cannot be buffed because of the TvZ match-up, which no doubt was a significant consideration in why they were nerfed to begin with.

Ultralisks are already terrible enough in the late-game, such that Blizzard is planning a serious buff in HOTS, unless you intend this tank-buff to expire when HOTS is released (then what's the point?), Blizzard is not going to touch tanks.

On December 22 2011 07:39 ThomasHobbes wrote:
Tanks cannot be buffed because of the TvZ match-up, which no doubt was a significant consideration in why they were nerfed to begin with.

Ultralisks are already terrible enough in the late-game, such that Blizzard is planning a serious buff in HOTS, unless you intend this tank-buff to expire when HOTS is released (then what's the point?), Blizzard is not going to touch tanks.

On December 22 2011 09:25 theboyrmca wrote:
lets just buff zlings back to bw levels of dps just cause "it was like that in bw and they only do 5dmg with no
bonuses" while were at it

On December 21 2011 22:29 Sm3agol wrote:
I am still a major proponent of removing all "instant attack" animations(marine, tank, immortal...are there any more?) because smart fire is just leagues better than any micro a player can do most of the time, and makes things like actually spreading your tank fire out much more efficient, and enables tank/marine/etc damage to be bumped up even more, since really good micro will be required to maximize the damage output.

On December 22 2011 09:48 RoboBob wrote:
I think Tanks are fine the way they are now. Yeah they aren't very useful in TvP, but every race has units like that. Hydras in TvZ, Carriers in in TvP.

I think its pointless to compare BW Tanks to SC2 Tanks. Yes, they've gotten worse in terms of damage and supply. But they've also gained smartfire, faster rate of fire, and better dps in mobile mode.

More importantly, I think the main difference between Tanks in the two games is the warpin mechanic. In BW you know where the Gateway units will be coming from, and can siege your Tanks appropiately. But in SC2, the Protoss can warpin via a proxy pylon anytime, anywhere, so walking around unsieged is a much riskier. Thats why Tanks work in SC2 TvZ and TvT, but not TvP.

But I don't think theres anything Blizzard can do to fix that. Its stupid to nerf warpin because of one unit. Adjusting tank stats such as damage, supply, time to siege, etc might fix it for TvP, but unbalance it for TvZ and TvT. But thats okay; we don't need Tanks to fill the same role as in BW because we have Marauders instead. Its best to let BW be BW, and SC2 to be SC2.

On December 22 2011 07:45 [17]Purple wrote:
I'm wondering if changing the Tank's supply cost down to 2 would affect it in TvP at all. Since this would obviously be a buff to the late game potential of the tanks (more of them being out at one time), and it would also mean that a maxed mech army with around 15 tanks now would be something around 22 tanks if they cost 2 supply. I'm really unsure how this would affect TvP and would like to ask how much of an impact that would have.

Edit: I'm also unsure how a change like this could affect the early game (if it could have a large impact) or even the TvZ and TvT match-up, though I am only purely considering the change in TvP terms, I would also like to know how this would impact the other match-ups.

On December 22 2011 04:45 Morghaine wrote:
You'd like to see Tanks vs Protoss?

What about... me liking to see Hydras against... oh wait.

A unit with range 13 with sick splash without really needing micro, single handedly defending an expo in the midgame from the high ground looks fine to me.

Friendly splash is only really relevant when there are absolutely no medivacs due to combat shields.

I spent some time playing around with mech before and after the tank nerf and really wanted to find a stratergy which centered around my favourite unit.

i would definitely like to see strategies arise, that make tanks viable in tvp!

I think it is fine that the tank does make your army less mobile, but this ought to mean that in a head on fight tanks ought to be amazing, which they aren't

Love the tank,it should be improved though

On December 22 2011 11:46 PaleBlueDot wrote:
Smartfire
Smartfire was a big increase to tank DPS in the realy beta, where overkill would have actually been a problem. In TvP, there essentially is no overkill now, considering the size and robustness of their units. Looking at the Siege Tank vs. 10 Stalkers in the radial splash section I believe provides a good example of this, with ~5 stalkers taking damage out of 10 [grouped as close as possible], and only one taking the full 50 damage. In BW, if 10 dragoons ran into a line of 5 tanks, the first 4 goons would melt into blue-goo instantly, with many of the others taking splash. In SC2, if 10 stalkers run into a line of 5 tanks, youll get 1 kill with a bunch of [randomly spread] injured stalkers. Thats just not the kind of power I think something with those drawbacks can have, which is why I think smartfire was "overhyped" at the start.

On December 22 2011 12:20 Kyadytim wrote:
As a side note, the Missile Turret is the primary anti-air of BW mech style PvT. Turrets cost 25% more in SC2, and although they are stronger than their BW predecessors, they have the same coverage, so for the same minerals invested in Turrets, BW Terrans get 25% more area covered with detection and AA.

On December 22 2011 07:49 PaleBlueDot wrote:


I do not understand.

"Tanks cannot be buffed because of the TvZ match-up, which no doubt was a significant consideration in why they were nerfed to begin with. "

Why not? The tank was nerfed back in beta where I can vividly recall close position mech pushes, and mass roach (being unmicro'd and thrown into tank lines) being the norm. As you can see, the situation has changed a LOT since the nerf. Your statement is vague, what specifics would a tank buff effect in ZvT that you are against? What would it break? Why?

"Ultralisks are already terrible enough in the late-game, such that Blizzard is planning a serious buff in HOTS, unless you intend this tank-buff to expire when HOTS is released (then what's the point?), Blizzard is not going to touch tanks."

I disagree that ultras are terrible late game. What I would agree on though is that they do get hardcountered particularly hard by its respective counter. The ultralisk has always had problems, but so has many units, so I do not get the comparison. As far as I know, tanks are not a good counter to ultralisks, dealing only 50 damage, and being either unable too or have massively reduced splash due to their size. Ultras carve through tanks, its the support that gets them. I do not understand why the ultra is brought up as a counter to why the tank cannot get some love, not only is it rarely used in favor of broodlords anyway, but the tank is hardly the reason it performs poorly. Why would a tank buff expire when HoTS is released? Why does the ultras new buff not make it fare better against tanks? I just dont see the comparison.

On December 22 2011 12:34 ThomasHobbes wrote:
Have you looked at race winrates? TvZ has been Terran favored for the past year, and when some form of racial balance is starting to form, you want to buff tanks? It's inane to discuss a tank buff and exclusively analyse its effect on TvP, it will effect TvZ, and that must also be part of the discussion.

On Roaches being thrown into siege lines -> Are you serious? I'm not interested in discussing whatever tactics were employed at the games release, but throwing roaches into sieged tanks is moronic when the Terran has good tank spread and units (hellions / thors) to distract the roaches and deal secondary damage. Zerg anti-mech compositions are effectively reduced to roach heavy styles, and roaches are countered by two of the units present in a mech army. Increasing tank damage against roaches will make what is already a dangerous and difficult composition to deal with even harder.

Ultralisks are already challenged in the late-game. Blizzard agrees on this, and is planning a substantial buff for them as a result. Increasing tank damage, however marginal, is not conducive towards making Ultralisks more effective, but rather works against that by making them less effective against a unit they're supposed to counter.

TLDR - Zerg is already challenged against Terran, Tanks were nerfed for a reason, and no buff will come because Blizzard will not risk upsetting a balance that is already in serious doubt.

On December 22 2011 16:07 Gamegene wrote:
The only thing to be discussed about the Siege Tank is it's role in TvP.

Tanks are effective in timing pushes, because you're able to pin the protoss down and slowly zone out the gateway units with range. Anything outside planned early game attacks, Tanks are pointless, since the protoss ball is extremely mobile once they actually get a "ball", and without a critical mass of tanks, the (woefully pitiful) damage does not justify the supply/time/resources invested. And if you do get a critical mass of tanks, the relative mobility between the two armies will fuck you up big time.

I remember a game with TLO vs HasuObs in the NASL Season 2 on Crevasse, Top vs Bottom, where he had MMM + 2 Fact Tanks, using his tanks to slowly leapfrog over as he took expansion along the siege path, until eventually he was able to have a position on HasuObs' ramp. It actually looked promising until HasuObs decided to break the tank line with surprising ease. TLO's bio ball was really small because of the fragile tanks that had been obliterated, and it was a complete one sided slaughter. The tanks did however kept TLO in the game, as he had really dug himself deep in his expansions. But HasuObs' stalker zealot collosi immortal ball just circumvented all of the defense lines, forced his way into the main and camped the production.

I don't like how Protoss players are claiming all of a sudden that tanks are good, they're just jumping on the hipster mech bandwagon. Artosis lied to you guys: Tanks are fucking bad in TvP compositions, ask any sane Terran player. Fuck even GoOdy, of all people admitted that mech TvP is DEAD.

DEAD. PEOPLE.

DEAD!!

On December 22 2011 13:28 PaleBlueDot wrote:


So let me get this straight.

You feel that because tanks just might actually make ZvT harder, that one matchup should be damned to stagnation? How noble. The goal here is to discuss why tanks are performing poorly TvP, and how it may be fixed, be that by strategy, damage increase, or unit comp. You seem to have your head fixated on an increase in tank damage making your life harder, and therefor want nothing to do with it.

"Have you looked at race winrates? TvZ has been Terran favored for the past year, and when some form of racial balance is starting to form, you want to buff tanks?"

Winrates are ineffectual for you personally (as you will never be Code S, which is where they are focused, at the top), but also have a lot of other factors that people like to ignore. Cheese counts as a win still, which means when MKP excutes flawless marine micro to end a TvZ in the early portion of the game, that increase in winrate should most definitely be used as proof that tanks are fine. Makes sense. Want a higher personal winrate? Cheese every game. Want a balanced game? We must think beyond that.

"On Roaches being thrown into siege lines -> Are you serious? I'm not interested in discussing whatever tactics were employed at the games release, but throwing roaches into sieged tanks is moronic when the Terran has good tank spread and units (hellions / thors) to distract the roaches and deal secondary damage. Zerg anti-mech compositions are effectively reduced to roach heavy styles, and roaches are countered by two of the units present in a mech army. Increasing tank damage against roaches will make what is already a dangerous and difficult composition to deal with even harder."

Not interested in comparing tactics that at the time was the entire basis for the nerf? Bad policy.
How often do you see pure mech vs. Z at the top level. Not so much. It isnt exactly as daunting as mech vs. P, but there is a reason why it isnt used as much as bio. You seem to not understand the matchup really well if you think you can only go roach vs. mech. Until thors hit absolutely large numbers, 5-6, mutas will ROLL them while magic boxed, enjoy killing a 150 supply army with nothing but mutas. Situations come up where tech switches and different units are used to destroy mech balls really well [ex. First engagement all the hellions are killed off, so you remax on zerglings], stuff like that.

You are seeing this the wrong way. We arent saying "Lets buff tanks, regardless what it does to other matchups", we are saying "Lets test the idea, and see how it works in relation with the other matchups". How do you absolutely know a damage buff will wreck the matchup again? Do you have a secret PTR server? Because I would like to test it myself. No one wants imbalance. Tanks seem weak and ineffectual PvT, while in my eyes carrying the key to a macro lategame terran in their arms, so I ask if there is a way to bring them up to speed while keeping the game balanced. Work with me here, not against me.

"Ultralisks are already challenged in the late-game. Blizzard agrees on this, and is planning a substantial buff for them as a result. Increasing tank damage, however marginal, is not conducive towards making Ultralisks more effective, but rather works against that by making them less effective against a unit they're supposed to counter. "

Are Ultralisks challenged in the late-game? Yes I agree they are. But the game does not revolve around the Ultralisk. There is no evidence that tanks getting an increase in damage will absolutely shut down all ultra play, not even in theorycraft. They counter tanks just fine as it is, and are getting a buff to help them cope with the massive bioballs that you can lose 4-5 ultras to just approaching. These are seperate cases, there is no reason we cant have ultras getting better and tanks getting better at all. You can have the cake and eat it too.

" TLDR - Zerg is already challenged against Terran, Tanks were nerfed for a reason. "

TLDR - If you yourself state that the winrates have nearly balanced out, then there is no reason not to revaluate the situation to help better the other matchups as well. Tanks were nerfed in what was essentially the stone ages of SC2, back when absolutely nothing was developed, and as such I believe it was premature.

"and no buff will come because Blizzard will not risk upsetting a balance that is already in serious doubt"
See I know you are joking when you say this while referencing the new units and abilities that will come out untested [in beta of course] by anyone other than blizzard staff.

On December 22 2011 11:56 TangSC wrote:

I think if they changed tank supply cost, MMM would still be the norm in TvP. It's not that tanks aren't at all effective in the matchup, it's just that they aren't mobile enough - in macro games terran has to pressure the protoss with drops, and dropping tanks to pick off probes and structures just isn't as effective. It's also difficult to do "pokes and prods" at the front with tanks: If a battle is going poorly with MMM, you can often stim or pick up your units with minimal losses. If a battle is going poorly with tanks, it takes too long to unsiege and retreat so you end up losing your whole army.

Also, it would crush my zerg spirits if tanks were 2 supply lol they're just too strong to be the same supply cost as a marauder.

On December 22 2011 18:24 Cyro wrote:


As stupid as it sounds, i think 2 supply tank would break team games, where turtling is encouraged (shared bases etc) As it is, it is really damn hard to beat someone with an orbital focused economy who just builds a ton of tanks, at 2 supply very tank heavy play would be unbeatable from any of the 3 races even in 1v1 i think.


Why not reduce ROF and increase damage? Brood war tanks shot notably slower than sc2 tanks i think. With game to real time conversion sc2 tanks have about 2.16 second ROF.

It could get nasty in 1-1-1 variations with a ton of tanks though, one in particular that hit me a few weeks ago, he went gas first, and produced constant tanks with only 1 or 2 banshees and hit quite late, it was on shakuras, he threw down a pdd and started to siege on low ground in range of my nexus so i ran down my big natural ramp with like 20 zealots and he instantly killed some 70-80% of my army with the splash damage from the first volley.

Avoidable with flanks, pre-splitting etc, but the clumping on sc2 units moving up/down ramps is already devastating with this tank damage, increasing it would hurt a lot.

On December 22 2011 18:40 Mobius_1 wrote:


But lower ROF and higher damage make Immortals more effect counter to the Tank. Not sure if that's good.

I haven't tried it yet in a real game, but maybe it's viable to make a few Tanks and roll them with your MMM army and siege them up when all Chargelots are all dead since that way it does no/less friendly splash in a battle? Just a random thought, might try this if I get better at the game to actually try stuff.

On December 22 2011 18:11 ThomasHobbes wrote:
No.

The Tank is an important unit in the TvZ match-up, a match-up which has, traditionally, been Terran favored.

This has nothing to do with whether or not my life is harder, it has to do with balance.

The Tank was nerfed because of imbalance as perceived by the Blizzard balancing staff. That is all. Blizzard will not buff the unit because it will wreck the balance they tried to impose by instituting the nerf in the first place.

I'm sorry if you want to use Tanks in every match-up, it isn't going to happen unless you find a method of using them outside of a buff by Blizzard. The Tank is a powerful unit, it pretty much defines the TvZ matchup after the marine, and in the case of mech instead of the marine. It is not going to be buffed because it would require additional buffs to Zerg units, which in turn would effect Protoss units and require additional buffs on their part as well.

In short, it would be a mess, a mess Blizzard does not want (This is David Kim's stated reason for not wanting to touch the marine, the balancing would be a nightmare).

Please stop directing this towards me, I'm irrelevant in this. The Tank will not be buffed because Terran would be imbalanced with a stronger Tank, they already border on imbalanced as is (no, not according to me, according to winrates at the highest level, especially in Korea, where you see to believe balance should be made).

Q. A lot of the people says that Marines in general are way too powerful. Are you guys planning to balance the Marines?

A. (David Kim) In the patch 1.4, Bionic units were very powerful. We are trying to make it so that Terran players play bio half the time and mechanic the other half the time. Marines are the basic foundation of the Terran units and tweaking such a unit will create a lot of problems. Therefore we are trying to avoid it.

On December 22 2011 11:22 Tropical Bob wrote:
You forgot to mention smart-fire AI:
Tanks don't have anywhere near the overkill as they did in BW. Making it so that a Tank line doesn't need to be watched so that all your Tanks unload on only a few units and waste an immense amount of damage.

If Tanks were to get any buff, they'd need to remove smart-fire AI for them. Not that any unit should have it anyway.

As far as any sort of viablity in TvP goes, that's just a result of Protoss being designed around countering the Tank. It almost feels like it was all done intentionally to avoid more Mech TvP like in BW.

On December 22 2011 20:22 Mehukannu wrote:
I just have to say that there isn't smart fire AI in the game as stated by Dustin Browder over a year ago. It only has a little delay between attacks which makes it so that tanks (or any other unit in the game) won't waste shots on a unit that is already dead.
Link to the Q&A thread. It is in the multiplayer section.

-- Browder on why they can't remove tank overkill: "To help with perfomance, units do not fire all at once. There is a tiny offset between different units firing their weapons. From the users perspective it is almost simultaenous, but the shots are actually 1/8-1/16th of a second apart. Since units cannot target units that are already dead and since Siege Tanks hit their targets instantly, this creates the situation you are describing, where Siege Tanks waste fewer shots."

On December 22 2011 20:42 ThomasHobbes wrote:
PaleBlueDot -> I'm going to break this down one last time.

If Terran, in the TvZ matchup, is either balanced or overpowered, how on earth is buffing the tank, an essential unit in both of Terran's main TvZ compositions, a good idea in terms of balance?

If the change in damage is small, how does this change TvP? If the damage buff is sizeable, how does this not effect TvZ (both in terms of the roach, ultralisk, and speedlings before tanks get +1)?

Can you answer these questions? Yes or no?

You keep going on about how the Ultralisk does fine against tanks. Great, but how does making the Ultralisk less effective (by increasing tank damage) help its already signifcant problems against bio units?

You keep talking about the changing metagame, that isn't relevant. If TvZ is balanced now (and lets, for your benefit, assume it is), buffing the tank will not help maintain that balance due to the factors already mentioned (roach, ultralisk, and pre-upgrade speedlings).

I'm sorry that you don't get more powerful tanks because you want them. Too bad. The TvZ match-up often centers around tanks as a key unit. Making tanks more powerful adds another buff to what is an already very powerful unit / race. It would require counter-buffs which would make the entire balancing act hopelessly complex.

It will not happen, it should not happen, and time will continue to demonstrate this. Stop what amounts to blatant race pandering . Your reasoning (We don't know if we haven't tried it, so lets try it) can be extended to any change, regardless of magnitude. Yes, I want to try out some hydralisks with no light tag, additional range, and twice the speed. Sucks to be me.

On December 22 2011 20:42 ThomasHobbes wrote:
PaleBlueDot -> I'm going to break this down one last time.

If Terran, in the TvZ matchup, is either balanced or overpowered, how on earth is buffing the tank, an essential unit in both of Terran's main TvZ compositions, a good idea in terms of balance?

If the change in damage is small, how does this change TvP? If the damage buff is sizeable, how does this not effect TvZ (both in terms of the roach, ultralisk, and speedlings before tanks get +1)?

Can you answer these questions? Yes or no?

You keep going on about how the Ultralisk does fine against tanks. Great, but how does making the Ultralisk less effective (by increasing tank damage) help its already signifcant problems against bio units?

You keep talking about the changing metagame, that isn't relevant. If TvZ is balanced now (and lets, for your benefit, assume it is), buffing the tank will not help maintain that balance due to the factors already mentioned (roach, ultralisk, and pre-upgrade speedlings).

I'm sorry that you don't get more powerful tanks because you want them. Too bad. The TvZ match-up often centers around tanks as a key unit. Making tanks more powerful adds another buff to what is an already very powerful unit / race. It would require counter-buffs which would make the entire balancing act hopelessly complex.

It will not happen, it should not happen, and time will continue to demonstrate this. Stop what amounts to blatant race pandering . Your reasoning (We don't know if we haven't tried it, so lets try it) can be extended to any change, regardless of magnitude. Yes, I want to try out some hydralisks with no light tag, additional range, and twice the speed. Sucks to be me.

On December 22 2011 21:11 attwell wrote:
My thread about the bipolar nature of muta vs thors and archons and the use of magic box was closed at 2 pages after it got hijacked by people claiming balanced or imbalance.

How is this still open at 5 pages?

On December 22 2011 21:11 attwell wrote:
My thread about the bipolar nature of muta vs thors and archons and the use of magic box was closed at 2 pages after it got hijacked by people claiming balanced or imbalance.

How is this still open at 5 pages?

On December 22 2011 21:24 stinger_ro wrote:
Beeing a protoss player i haven't tried this but what about in TvP:

Tank + Ghost + Marine .. sure its costly but you emp the incoming forces and that should 1 shot zealots with fewer tank numbers...

On December 22 2011 20:42 ThomasHobbes wrote:
PaleBlueDot -> I'm going to break this down one last time.

If Terran, in the TvZ matchup, is either balanced or overpowered, how on earth is buffing the tank, an essential unit in both of Terran's main TvZ compositions, a good idea in terms of balance?

If the change in damage is small, how does this change TvP? If the damage buff is sizeable, how does this not effect TvZ (both in terms of the roach, ultralisk, and speedlings before tanks get +1)?

Can you answer these questions? Yes or no?

You keep going on about how the Ultralisk does fine against tanks. Great, but how does making the Ultralisk less effective (by increasing tank damage) help its already signifcant problems against bio units?

You keep talking about the changing metagame, that isn't relevant. If TvZ is balanced now (and lets, for your benefit, assume it is), buffing the tank will not help maintain that balance due to the factors already mentioned (roach, ultralisk, and pre-upgrade speedlings).

I'm sorry that you don't get more powerful tanks because you want them. Too bad. The TvZ match-up often centers around tanks as a key unit. Making tanks more powerful adds another buff to what is an already very powerful unit / race. It would require counter-buffs which would make the entire balancing act hopelessly complex.

It will not happen, it should not happen, and time will continue to demonstrate this. Stop what amounts to blatant race pandering . Your reasoning (We don't know if we haven't tried it, so lets try it) can be extended to any change, regardless of magnitude. Yes, I want to try out some hydralisks with no light tag, additional range, and twice the speed. Sucks to be me.

On December 21 2011 22:07 PiPoGevy wrote:
I too would love to see Tanks in TvP
Hopefully people figure out something

Edit: OMG my Pic is a marine now YEEH!

On December 22 2011 20:22 Mehukannu wrote:

I just have to say that there isn't smart fire AI in the game as stated by Dustin Browder over a year ago. It only has a little delay between attacks which makes it so that tanks (or any other unit in the game) won't waste shots on a unit that is already dead.
Link to the Q&A thread. It is in the multiplayer section.

On December 22 2011 21:06 PaleBlueDot wrote:


Yes yes TvZ just got balanced, absolved you of any former difficulty, and changing anything in the game from this point forward will damn us all to stagnation. You dont contribute, your points were invalidated twelve posts ago, and you throw out claims of "race pandering" [bias], when you are absolutely covered in it. I do not know if you will ever get this message, as you apparently have great difficulty reading the other ones. Lets not read that a buff to +armored would not effect speedlings at all and would be negligable against something with 500HP that is made en masse and is getting a charge upgrade. Lets not read that I am not a pro player and do not have the forsight required to absolutely know that increasing tank damage will straight up break the matchup (how did you aquire this ability? bitten by a radioactive idra?).

Here is my question. By your own words, you believe TvZ at this point in time is balanced. Cool.
So the logic goes:

Balanced TvZ ---> Buff to tank changes balance ----> game is irreparably broken and cannot be reverted if it is to much.
but also:

Balanced TvZ ---> Buff to ultralisk because it was "underperforming" ---> no change in matchup balance. game is fine.

Enjoy the thread, im done wasteing my time talking to someone who does not wish for any improvements, just the intent to spread his opinion that any change to terran is a bad change for you zerg.

On December 23 2011 04:42 phisku wrote:
siege tank become less and less effective in the late game in tvz.

On December 22 2011 12:26 PaleBlueDot wrote:



He also gets to absorb damage, be instumental in actually moving out against really anything air related late game, and being pretty cheap to boot.

I gotta take a break from watching this thread, too many points and counterpoints make you tired :/

On December 23 2011 05:11 Scila wrote:
One thing I've been thinking about is giving tanks bonus damage versus massive could help. This would make them a real "counter" to archons and Colossus. The only side-effect would be increased damage against ultralisks, but I don't think that would affect TvZ that much. Something like 20% extra damage versus massive like Blizzard gave to void rays.

Also, I really really wish they would remove Colossus and give Protoss the Reaver which would solve so many issues. Colossus is just the tanks retarded brother with better damage and mobility right now :/

It's too bad Blizzard makes things based on appealing to the most players rather than weighing good game design as well.

On December 23 2011 05:44 Markwerf wrote:
Pff why this nonstop whining about why the tank should play a pivotal role in PvT. BW and SC2 are just not comparible. Why do people never whine that bio was unplayable in BW TvP but do they whine about mech being bad in SC2 TvP??

On December 23 2011 05:44 Markwerf wrote:
Pff why this nonstop whining about why the tank should play a pivotal role in PvT. BW and SC2 are just not comparible. Why do people never whine that bio was unplayable in BW TvP but do they whine about mech being bad in SC2 TvP??
.

On December 23 2011 06:26 keglu wrote:



For me from spectacor point of view because right now TvP is really boring matchup to watch.

On December 23 2011 10:31 Willzzz wrote:
The other problem with biomech, is that it makes your whole army as slow as the tanks. This negates the primary advantage of the bio army in TvP, mobility is the key to defeating the protoss army.

Do you really have much luck sniping colossus? I mean it takes 7 tanks to 1 shot a collosus, assuming at least +1. Does that not give the rest of the colossus too much time to deal damage?

Vikings work because you can snipe one and then kite back, you can't kite back with tanks..

On December 23 2011 09:38 attwell wrote:
Pretty sure this was or has devolved into a balance thread, which probably should be in battle.net forums.

On December 23 2011 10:56 Tactical_Tim wrote:


This is definitely true, but I think I like tanks (at least late game) much more, as I feel they give my army much more "staying power" in a sense. When I go straight bio+viking, I tend to be doing more of the running. However, having tanks in my army, in my opinion, forces the protoss to be much more careful how they engage, otherwise they could lose an entire army very quickly. I find that their deathball evaporates much faster than mine does, due to the added splash of tanks (as long as you target fire correctly on unit clusters/colossus) in conjunction with the raw power of stimmed bio. Furthermore, I think Bio + Tank discourages HT, which I find to be the most difficult to deal with. You can make vikings if you'd like, but personally I'd rather just have more tanks or marauders.

Also, I don't find the loss of mobility to be that much of a problem because you still have medivacs and bio, so drops are still do-able. In fact, you can do some fun stuff like dropping a third, and when they move over to address it, move your main force between the third and natural and siege up. As long as you're mindful of flanks and play cautiously, I think biomech is pretty strong.

In the end it's all personal preference/playstyle, IMO.

On December 23 2011 19:26 Zarahtra wrote:

The main thing is that with bio you should *never* fight the main army heads on. If you are, your opponent likely hasn't been teching/playing correctly(assuming you haven't done crippling drops), because just simply with chargelots he can run over you if you don't kite via rauders.

If you do kite with rauders, the tanks will just die after you've stuttered twice or so and will not have been cost effective. You can still do your drops with medivacs, but tanks will be cutting into rauder, medivac, viking and/or ghost production. Will they make your main army beefier? I suppose, but you are kind of going middle of the road of "I will not engage your army heads on" and "I can take you heads on" which comes out at "I can almost take you heads on". More importantly, when you are actually going to take the opponent heads on, you don't really want to have a drop out there, since every supply matters. For bio it's fine if you are dropping and stutterstepping away from the main force, since you aren't really engaging the ball and after you've got x many units, more units stutter stepping doesn't really help that much.

On December 23 2011 20:13 Big J wrote:
And Terrans play this style all the time vs Zerg with the exact situation you described (can't fight baneling/zergling head on with marines, if kited backwards the tanks will be exposed to ling/muta) and "somehow" make it work, so it might work vs Protoss as well.
Also it comes down A LOT to positioning if you are able to fight "heads on" or not, with bio alone and with tank/bio as well/even more.

On December 23 2011 21:28 PaleBlueDot wrote:


There is a huge difference here. In TvZ, marines are kited back so that banelings kill the least amount possible, allowing marines to actually get a head on fight with just the zergling/muta remains. Tanks are used incredibly specifically to snipe baneling numbers. If the tanks kill the banelings, no terran is going to complain that they died, because they ensured victory for that fight. This is directly opposed to TvP where there is nothing with few enough hitpoints to "snipe" without 6-7+ tanks, and thats quite an investment to just lose after what might be only one volley killing one colossus. Once tank numbers start reaching 6-7 then they are becoming a big component of the army, not the 3-4 tanks usually seen in TvZ that are just used to snipe banelings.

On December 23 2011 22:05 Big J wrote:
Low numbers like 3-4 tanks are exclusivly used in some form of 2base Tank/Marine all-in in ZvT. For any form of stable macro compositions every terran builds way more than those.
Furthermore:
if you have 6-7 tanks, you also need only one volley to kill a colossus AND everything under it, while the unit doesn't become useless after the colossi are down.
if you have 3-4 tanks, you can just snipe templar and sentries all day long.
Also another comparison: you don't build tanks vs roaches to "snipe" them, but they are straight up good when they target them, just like against stalkers and partially against colossi.

Imo the situation is not so different as long as you shift queue the tanks attack commands on the right units.(even though that wasn't even my original argument, which was as simple as: "Zarahtra's argumentation is wrong because his argument implies that siege tanks are useless in TvZ against ling/bling/muta"

On December 22 2011 05:27 Chaosvuistje wrote:
All these passive perks that Protoss has are just boring compared to for example, Blink. If Charge wasn't an autocast ability it would already be far more interresting decisionwise. And if they nerfed the Immortals hardened shields to deflect up to 20 instead of 10 passively, and give it an active ability to reduce the damage to 5 for 0.5 seconds on a 2 second cooldown would already massively increase the fun in microing Protoss when moving through a tank like and increase the watchability.

It isn't so much as the Tank being bad against Protoss. Its about the Protoss race being designed to plow through tank lines unit for unit bar the Sentry and unblink Stalkers.

On December 23 2011 22:05 Big J wrote:


Low numbers like 3-4 tanks are exclusivly used in some form of 2base Tank/Marine all-in in ZvT. For any form of stable macro compositions every terran builds way more than those.
Furthermore:
if you have 6-7 tanks, you also need only one volley to kill a colossus AND everything under it, while the unit doesn't become useless after the colossi are down.
if you have 3-4 tanks, you can just snipe templar and sentries all day long.
Also another comparison: you don't build tanks vs roaches to "snipe" them, but they are straight up good when they target them, just like against stalkers and partially against colossi.

Imo the situation is not so different as long as you shift queue the tanks attack commands on the right units.(even though that wasn't even my original argument, which was as simple as: "Zarahtra's argumentation is wrong because his argument implies that siege tanks are useless in TvZ against ling/bling/muta"

On December 24 2011 00:53 avilo wrote:
I dun think a lot of people understand. Brood war tanks were good because they did the same amount of damage to all units. It was 75 iirc? There was none of this hard counter non-sense where suddenly your entire army became obsolete because your opponent built 3 "counter units."

Can you imagine having a siege tank vulture army and your opponent built 3 reavers and suddenly you are auto-raped? Well, that is how SC2 is in TvP - you build siege tank + hellions and the opponent build like 4 immortals suddenly you're army is worthless in comparison.

But now imagine you can build mass of almost any protoss unit to make siege tanks worthless...that's SC2. Every protoss unit counters the tank, and the tank is given no chance to counter other units because they mistakingly changed it to make it a specific counter to "armored." So instead of actually being able to kill stuff like zealots and blink stalkers when you already have a pre-sieged army, the opponent instead 1A's into you without thought and comes out ahead.

In beta, and when tanks had damage strong to all, and they didn't stupidly change zealot armor type to make it easy mode versus mech, tanks could actually kill stuff before they closed in.

What happened was a certain balance designer got very afraid when he started to see mech was completely viable, especially with ghosts, so he pre-emptively nerfed it before it even had a chance to be used and pre-emptively before everyone actually learned how to play SC2.

Tanks with beta damage vs protoss would actually be fine right now, mainly because the overall skill level of protoss has gone waaaaaaay up since that time, when all protoss knew how to do was 1A collosus. It took a year for protoss to use warp prisms, just wrap your heads around that guys. An entire year (ok except white-ra cause he was smart) for warp prisms to be seen as "useful."

It just seems to me like every time mech has ever shown viability they immediately nerfed it into the ground asap. The series of MC vs thorzain got thors nerfed right after that series...a knee jerk balance design reaction...and that reaction has always happened with MECH. It took MONTHS for infestors to even be considered needing a nerf when people were making 40 a game lol.

I just thought i'd add this to the "siege tank" discussion, because they were in fact viable over a year ago, but blizzard purposely changed it so they weren't because of some irrational fear that SC2 would...become like brood war...the greatest game ever...pretty crazy i know.

I wrote a guide about ghostmech in beta, and i'm completely convinced it would have been very standard in macro games by now if mech hadn't been gimped patch after patch. Instead, we're all currently stuck with the marauder.

On December 24 2011 00:53 avilo wrote:
I dun think a lot of people understand. Brood war tanks were good because they did the same amount of damage to all units. It was 75 iirc? There was none of this hard counter non-sense where suddenly your entire army became obsolete because your opponent built 3 "counter units."

Can you imagine having a siege tank vulture army and your opponent built 3 reavers and suddenly you are auto-raped? Well, that is how SC2 is in TvP - you build siege tank + hellions and the opponent build like 4 immortals suddenly you're army is worthless in comparison.

But now imagine you can build mass of almost any protoss unit to make siege tanks worthless...that's SC2. Every protoss unit counters the tank, and the tank is given no chance to counter other units because they mistakingly changed it to make it a specific counter to "armored." So instead of actually being able to kill stuff like zealots and blink stalkers when you already have a pre-sieged army, the opponent instead 1A's into you without thought and comes out ahead.

In beta, and when tanks had damage strong to all, and they didn't stupidly change zealot armor type to make it easy mode versus mech, tanks could actually kill stuff before they closed in.

What happened was a certain balance designer got very afraid when he started to see mech was completely viable, especially with ghosts, so he pre-emptively nerfed it before it even had a chance to be used and pre-emptively before everyone actually learned how to play SC2.

Tanks with beta damage vs protoss would actually be fine right now, mainly because the overall skill level of protoss has gone waaaaaaay up since that time, when all protoss knew how to do was 1A collosus. It took a year for protoss to use warp prisms, just wrap your heads around that guys. An entire year (ok except white-ra cause he was smart) for warp prisms to be seen as "useful."

It just seems to me like every time mech has ever shown viability they immediately nerfed it into the ground asap. The series of MC vs thorzain got thors nerfed right after that series...a knee jerk balance design reaction...and that reaction has always happened with MECH. It took MONTHS for infestors to even be considered needing a nerf when people were making 40 a game lol.

On December 21 2011 22:32 frantic.cactus wrote:


I disagree, mech IS considered far superior by the top top Korean terrans. I don't care about the majority, just the likes of MVP, Bomber etc.

Also tanks in a head on engagement in the right composition can beat a 200/200 Protoss army head on. The drawbacks I always hear are, "too immobile" or "urgh, I make one mistake and I lose."

On December 24 2011 02:56 weikor wrote:
On topic id say that the tank is one of those awkward units. Tanks arent imbalanced at all in my opinion. My guess is that tank play is so extremely unforgiving. I dont have a clue though how to buff it to make it more user friendly.

Adding damage, siege time reduction or anything else would just break other matchups.

I also think a problem is, players havent really experimented with timings and strategies enough. Bio play vs protoss is so much more explored and refined, if you just decide your going to be "the guy that makes mech from now on" your going to lose a lot.

Extenz:
Tanks aren't supposed to be good vs Protoss late game (and they're still great early game), what do you want, emp to remove shield and tank to finish the protoss army?

On December 22 2011 18:17 TheDwf wrote:

Then wake up, because Hydras are used in ZvZ and ZvP.

On December 24 2011 09:36 Bippzy wrote:

Then let's start a thread about how we should be able to use the hydra in ZvT and how blizz could change the game because some of us want to use the hydra. So what if the hydra beats marines? It won't necessarily mess up game balance. In fact, you're just complaining because it will make the game harder for you, just like how stronger siege tanks would make the game harder for a zerg.

Satire Rant

In other words: I think this thread is stupid. If you want siege tanks to be possible in TvP, make about 10 rax and float them with your army and land them so zealots are worthless. Or, use them for an early game contain to set up your economy as seen in Inca vs someone in the up and down matches. But, there is a designated balance discussion thread, and this isn't it. Proposing changes is balance discussion.

On December 24 2011 11:14 iaguz wrote:
Huh? If someone is making stalkers to counter your mech play, then you should probably write to Websters and inform them you have just discovered a new definition of the word Justice.

On December 24 2011 11:02 PaleBlueDot wrote:


Complaining about something that makes the game harder for you, isn't that exactly what you are doing? If it does not break balance, which you do not know if it will or not, why do you care? This is a thread of Terrans saying from experience that tanks are ineffectual, and how can it be changed. If you want to discuss the intricacies of the Terran race, maybe you should actually play them some time, or at least give some actual reason why they should be, instead of this "it would make it easier for terran and we have no reason to give them that" crap. Zerg has multiple ways to play every single match-up with a variety of units in each one, each with its own benefits to different parts of the game. Why can Terran not have this? Instead of blatant race hate, how about you actually consider the position first? You would be for or against PTR tests of this? Why would it make the game easier in TvZ, really, I want to hear it, lets get something constructive in here.

If you mass of zergs really think there is a fatal flaw in the design of the hydra, spit it out, make your own thread. I think there is something wrong with tanks, so I made this thread. I did not go into every thread about Zerg complaining about it.

For tvp: 1-1-1 is already a cheese that has better stats then a lot of macro strategies (so it may already be considered as standard play). +10 more dmg vs stalkers and immos in that scenario is not a small buff. it might cripple protoss into one or two superspecific openings if it is not straight up broken. (notbto mention that there are also 2base tank allins in tvp etc)
Im not seeing how this kind of buff would not lead to some other buffs for P/Z as well or other nerfs for T. And after all that work it might just turn out that terrans still wont use tanks in tvp...
Its really not worth to gamble with whole parts of the balance, just forbthe chance that the one matchup that is not at least partially developed around the tank might develop some tankplay

On December 24 2011 11:09 iaguz wrote:




The problem with reverting the tank nerf is that you also affect TvT. Some people like how mech isn't the default go to thing in that matchup, but 50 damage tanks will put us back to that boring tank/viking vs tank/viking mu from the beta. Dull.

On December 27 2011 21:13 Scila wrote:



Pretty sure beta tanks were 60 damage, actually. I think Avilo's interpretation of what happened is exactly correct. I would just like to add that for whatever reason Blizzard is willing to almost instantly nerf something that people don't like about Terran, where as Protoss and Zerg don't get the same treatment. Tanks, Thor energy, Hellions, 5 second barracks extra build time, etc...these nerfs were done very quickly in response to recent developments. I don't even think 60 damage tanks would be "op" in any way. 60 is overkill on lings and blings anyway, and the extra +10 versus armored would actaully be a fine buff versus ultras. For TvP ofc that would be an amazing buff that would go a long way in addressing Colossus and Chargelots versus tanks in particular. TvT...well, Mech is already viable on a lot of maps (like Metalopolis).

On December 24 2011 02:01 terranghost wrote:

On topic I think the primary reason that tanks are not as good as they were is they do not have very good meat shields with the addition of the collosus. Vultures did very well against light and could still buffer pretty well against armored due to mines. Hellions can still buffer a bit vs armored but not as well but they are better vs light units that tanks are not supposed to be good against the real problem however is that a critical point of collosus just kills everything in one hit so your meat shields move forward to take the hit they all melt in one hit and then zealots move in and kill everything. I always thought that instead of getting rid of KA they should of gave storm like a 5-10 sec cooldown after warped in and then changed the collosus like they did the tank make it do reduced damage to light or something so the collosus wouldn't be good against everything.

On a side note ive been experimented alot more with mech and instead of getting vikings as my AA I'm getting ravens and is strangely affective at least against the people I play against. (Note a reactored starport pumping out vikings for and a techlabed starport pumping out ravens will use the same amount of gas after factoring in the build time.)
The ravens are useful against not only the air units they would build but can sit behind your army and occasionally throw down turrets in front of your tanks to bait charges and act as meatshields and they can throw down pdds behind your army which will still reach your tanks which makes them harder to feedback. If no templar are in the battle you can be more aggressive with your ravens and seeker missile key units. Of course I am not pro so I obviously not only is my micro and macro not good but neither is my opponents. And yes I know ravens can be fedback but as long as you keep them in the back of your army when templar are present they shouldn't get fedback too much.

My personal opinion is that mech is not bad its just many pro terrans are too stubborn to play with it long enough to figure it out. Plus HOTS should be solving some of the mech problems hopefully.

On December 28 2011 02:09 Resistentialism wrote:
Many people seem to gloss over the fact that protoss could often fly dropships and sometimes even arbiters over top of a terran army with general impunity. Any factory time spent making goliaths was factory time not spent making tanks, which sort of would defeat the point up until you saw a carrier switch. In SC2 terran always has a ton of barracks that are always making marines and they always have a reactored starport. Mech TvP balance in SC1 depended on weaker air units and weaker anti air, especially on the terran's part.

If you want to rebalance the tank you need to take a long hard look at the marine, viking and banshee.

On December 28 2011 19:47 kyllinghest wrote:
I think the introduction of the battle hellion in HotS will be a massive buff to the tank, as we will finally have a unit that can take care of those pesky zealots. Tanks already do well against stalkers and colossus. I think the main problem with the tank is that it requires sooo much target fireing to be effective. This can be very hard when you have to micro your bio aswell. Oh, I look so much forward to the battle hellions!

On January 06 2012 13:00 frantic.cactus wrote:
Watching the mech TvP daily right now.

Day9 seems to be saying that mech isn't just about the siege tank. More like its the sum of its parts.

This is really interesting as its well known that factory units are crap against any air play so ikings are essential. Seems to me like Banshees are just as essential for the mech composition

On January 06 2012 20:11 Machiavellii wrote:
i dont know much about the tanks in tvp, but from a gold league zerg standpoitn they are far too easy to use, place some tanks marines and thors in the middle of the map and you are pretty much untouchable, requires no control what so ever.
that is just from a gold league zerg POV though im guessing it changes in the higher levels of play.