Lately, there have been plenty of people who have started to use tanks once again, most recently perhaps Mvp in his match today (2/5-12) versus Naniwa in two games (the only two games that went to that stage). Another player who have, in recent times, utilized tanks is Guminho. There have also been, albeit less relevantly, a fair amount of success with mech against toss lately (Illusion beating Oz 2-1 comes to mind, although I guess lastshadow should be mentioned aswell)
I can see a certain amount of potential in it. It allows you to be very greedy and still have a fair amount of defense. It also gives you a timing potential and you are not instantly screwed vs colossus if your viking count is low.
There is also the possibility that you could have a more marine-heavy army, rather than a marauder heavy, since the great range of tanks would allow you to focusfire colossus and templars down early. This would result in A LOT higher DPS potential.
However, it cuts into the main advantage that the terran army always have had versus toss; mobility. I am very hesitent to bring tanks into my play because I feel that they have a fairly early expiration date and other than early pushing power, they contradict one of the main strengths of pure bio.
Tanks have never been "submerged" and for that matter can neither be back in fashion or re-emerge. They are used in one of the main styles of TvP and appear occasionally, although not frequently enough throughout the gsl,
You also have to be more specific with the term "mech". Are you coining that term because of siege tanks being added into a mainly bio army? Or is he getting hellions and thors as well.
Having a marine-heavy army and relying on siege tanks will never let you get anywhere aggressive wise. You need mauraders to be able to pick off templar and be able to withstand colsi dps. Colsi will SHIT all over a marine/tank army.
The usage of siege tanks is primarily used as a defensive opening to stop any early-mid game aggression and to be able to take a third base safely to be able to hit a three base timing attack.
MKP used quite a few tank builds in the past, too.
I'm still not convinced that tank usage is solid play in TvP simply due to the fact that they have so low damage and nothing to really tank the damage. I think tank builds can be great for early pushes and contains but they don't stand a chance later on. Maybe with HotS and the battle hellion we will see a lot more tank usage, right now I'm just not convinced tank play offers a second playstyle. But we'll see.
(Incoming brood war reference) In brood war, tanks did a lot more damage, and chargelots didn't exist. Dragoons were retarded at walking, and no blink of course. I think collosus/blink stalker is too mobile against a tank based army. Trying to defend your 3rd and 4th? Protoss just cliffwalks and blinks your main and kills all your factories and supply depots, gg. Also chargelots are extremely good against tanks. Other less common strats are good against tanks too, phoenix play, mothership (vortex the ball of tanks, win)
I would love to see tanks, but I don't think its very good
On May 03 2012 01:34 decaf wrote: MKP used quite a few tank builds in the past, too.
I'm still not convinced that tank usage is solid play in TvP simply due to the fact that they have so low damage and nothing to really tank the damage. I think tank builds can be great for early pushes and contains but they don't stand a chance later on. Maybe with HotS and the battle hellion we will see a lot more tank usage, right now I'm just not convinced tank play offers a second playstyle. But we'll see.
As a protoss player, tanks scare the crap out of me. They are so much one way damage and can take the wind out of any zealot push. I think they are under rated in the match up and suffer from the idea that the terran has to either go Mech or Bio, but cannot split the middle. I am not sure they can make it all the way to the end game, but they are scary as hell in the early and mid game.
Tanks are great when tech is low... Once things like charge, blink, upgrades come into play, their effectiveness is drastically decreased. Also, bio rallies on kiting vs protoss. So you either kite and leave you tanks exposed or you don't kite and get killed by zealots and your own tank fire.
Yep, I agree that this is a trend - and MKP has showcased this several times as well. The advantage of tanks is that it helps safeguard against sentry all-ins. After that, it's useful for attacts for it helps control space.
Tanks are not re-emerging. They are only used in the sense that if a player goes for a cloak banshee build or a greedy build, they build 3-4 tanks to be able to hold off 5-8 warpgate all-ins that you normally would not be able to hold with only marine/marauder in bunkers.
It's a slightly new trend yes, but notice most games you'll see the Terran stop at 3-4 tanks and build no more.
The utility of tanks in TvP was demonstrated quite well in Mvp vs Nani. In Game 1, Mvp used the tanks to get a secure expansion (pros appear to be fond of this on cloud kingdom, probably because of how the main overlooks the natural) and to help with his push and they were useful against the colossus tech-based Protoss army.
The Protoss didn't have his upgrades since he went for a timing push that failed, so his tech was behind and Mvp's tanks helped a ton in aiding his MMM force in winning because they not only stopped Naniwa's attack, they aided greatly in the counterattack. Basically if the Protoss just turtles and techs, the tanks are a wasted investment. Not game ending, but they won't be very useful.
However, in the game on Antiga, Mvp did a similar build that revolved around a 2 base Marine/Tank/Banshee/Raven push that gets a 3rd and transitions to pure bio. The idea is to set up a contain and force the Protoss to eventually attack into bunkers and siege tanks, which usually isn't a good idea. However Nani had his tech this time (charge/blink) and the chargelots rolled over the attack.
That's the weakness of biomech going past the midgame: chargelots do not get handled well enough by marines, tanks, or marauders (the chargelots go in and don't die quickly, so the tank splash hits your fragile bio units in addition to all the other damage they take). You'll notice that every build pro players do that's not specifically a mech build will have them switch a barracks onto the tech lab the factory used after a while, because there's no use adding tanks after a certain point.
This is why mech can work; Blue Flame Hellions, contrary to the belief of many posters on this forum, in numbers of 6 or greater will WRECK chargelots. If you have 10-20 in front of your army, chargelots are simply a non-issue. But mech TvP is a whole different discussion and there are other threads for it.
The other two races rely on T2/T3 splash/AOE in the late game. Aside from EMP, apparently Ts don't think they need to. Tanks can be amazing. You can put maxed tanks versus any other ground unit in the unit tester and the tanks win every time, sometimes without suffering any losses.
I think a thor wall (because of their hp) might be more effective than a BFH wall in front of tanks. Also, banshees are a very nice addition, because they allow you nibble away on the P without fear of them chasing you, because you're covered by tank's siege range. Bunkers and turrets are also good for frontline tanking and serving as maze for the zealots.
I have been messing around with tanks a bit in TvP lately. But also I think banshees are complimentary to the tanks. I'm not cloaked banshees, not rushing banshees, not a 1/1/1 off one base, but a fast expo into 2 or 3 rax into factory and 1 or 2 starports.
Imo, the advantages to adding tanks and banshees are as such:
1) Protosses are good at using force fields to defend early-mid game pushes (e.g. If you go heavy MM (3+ rax after expo) early on and fail to do damage due to sentries, you can be far behind in economy/tech). They can also use forcefields to prevent you from repairing your own bunkers. Having a couple of siege tanks guarantees you to at least be able to trade with the toss. 2) Tanks do pretty good damage vs. Stalkers and Zealots too. Banshees are surprisingly good against stalkers. 3) If doing a early-mid game push, tanks and banshees can punish many different types of build. If they go fast colossus, the banshee can easily repel it and prevent it from doing much damage. 4) Even if they get a few immortals out, you will have more marines in your composition compared to normal tvp plus the banshees to deal with the immortals. 5) On some maps where the Protoss's natural is next to a cliff edge, tanks can severely punish that and deny mining. 6) The factory is often not used in tvp apart from scouting. It's only a small point but making tanks makes the factory a more useful building (and more efficient spending)
I haven't really had the confidence to try it on the ladder yet though, I've only been trying it in custom games. But it seems to work well!
On May 03 2012 01:33 Br3ezy wrote: Tanks have never been "submerged" and for that matter can neither be back in fashion or re-emerge.
I'm sorry, I should have said: Tanks as a part of a macro game. Tanks are used in 1/1/1 builds and similar, but you can't really disagree that tanks are not commonplace in your average PvT macro game.
On May 03 2012 01:34 decaf wrote: MKP used quite a few tank builds in the past, too.
I'm still not convinced that tank usage is solid play in TvP simply due to the fact that they have so low damage and nothing to really tank the damage. I think tank builds can be great for early pushes and contains but they don't stand a chance later on. Maybe with HotS and the battle hellion we will see a lot more tank usage, right now I'm just not convinced tank play offers a second playstyle. But we'll see.
As a protoss player, tanks scare the crap out of me. They are so much one way damage and can take the wind out of any zealot push. I think they are under rated in the match up and suffer from the idea that the terran has to either go Mech or Bio, but cannot split the middle. I am not sure they can make it all the way to the end game, but they are scary as hell in the early and mid game.
Nice, I like how you offer your perspective, now here is mine as a T.
True are all the things you said, but Tanks mean slower upgrades, slower Medivacs, more passivity. But I have been doing a couple of Tank Openings on the ladder just because of 2 things Toss love doing right now: Super Greedy Nexus First builds and gateway agression around the 9ish minute mark. Tanks are pretty good in both scenarios so yeah early game no more than 4 or 5 can be good but after that just dedicate your gas too the essential things (upgrades etc). Would be really cool if Thors with the 250MM cannon could counter Colossus (like they said so on the game guide on B.net) that way you can get vehicle weapons and use mech units for support much like in TvZ. But alas these are the feeble dreams of an old BW veteran D:
On May 03 2012 01:33 Br3ezy wrote: Tanks have never been "submerged" and for that matter can neither be back in fashion or re-emerge.
I'm sorry, I should have said: Tanks as a part of a macro game. Tanks are used in 1/1/1 builds and similar, but you can't really disagree that tanks are not commonplace in your average PvT macro game.
Tanks are and have been used in macro games as well, which does not include going pure mech. It's been around, but just not looked at as much because in Bo3s they only do this once while doing bio builds twice and so you would think of it as a weird startegy but really it is one of the major styles in tvp
On May 03 2012 01:34 decaf wrote: MKP used quite a few tank builds in the past, too.
I'm still not convinced that tank usage is solid play in TvP simply due to the fact that they have so low damage and nothing to really tank the damage. I think tank builds can be great for early pushes and contains but they don't stand a chance later on. Maybe with HotS and the battle hellion we will see a lot more tank usage, right now I'm just not convinced tank play offers a second playstyle. But we'll see.
As a protoss player, tanks scare the crap out of me. They are so much one way damage and can take the wind out of any zealot push. I think they are under rated in the match up and suffer from the idea that the terran has to either go Mech or Bio, but cannot split the middle. I am not sure they can make it all the way to the end game, but they are scary as hell in the early and mid game.
Nice, I like how you offer your perspective, now here is mine as a T.
True are all the things you said, but Tanks mean slower upgrades, slower Medivacs, more passivity. But I have been doing a couple of Tank Openings on the ladder just because of 2 things Toss love doing right now: Super Greedy Nexus First builds and gateway agression around the 9ish minute mark. Tanks are pretty good in both scenarios so yeah early game no more than 4 or 5 can be good but after that just dedicate your gas too the essential things (upgrades etc). Would be really cool if Thors with the 250MM cannon could counter Colossus (like they said so on the game guide on B.net) that way you can get vehicle weapons and use mech units for support much like in TvZ. But alas these are the feeble dreams of an old BW veteran D:
For me tanks mean faster upgrades, as the OP said, tanks allow you to be greedy early on because as you say that 9 min gateway aggression is just stopped dead. With tanks I can get my 4 gases really quick, I can delay stim/combat sheild, so I am actually ahead on upgrades compared to a standard bio build. I'm talking 2/2 at 13-14 minutes.
It does mean passivity, but I don't find you can do much against most protoss until they take a third anyway.
Tank builds are blind counter to gate aggression, and sometimes OK vs slightly early 3rds.
It doesn't look too viable to get a 3rd with tanks, since you let the P catch up and crush you in infrastructure with expo/tech/upgrades. Better to two base, as MVP demonstrated.
It's similar to when P does 2 base and turtles to a really late 3rd at 14m+. If there is no opportunity to end the game, then you will 2 base and then take a late 3rd at/after the reset that removes your tanks.
Since then we have seen more players make use of tanks not just defensively but also for quick 2 base pushes like MKP. This is definitely a new trend. The point of this is that you can be safe from frontal attacks with a lot of sentries early on so it is sort of a blind counter against some of the Protoss 2 base all ins and it allows you to be aggressive against quick thirds. The problem is that the early gas you have to use delays either starport, techlab bio upgrades or engineering bay upgrades which would normally all be completed entering the mid game. Against expansion into 3 gate robo double forge builds you will end up way behind because the observer scout will allow Protoss to react perfectly. So it definitely is a gamble to go for this build from my perspective.
On May 03 2012 01:34 decaf wrote: MKP used quite a few tank builds in the past, too.
I'm still not convinced that tank usage is solid play in TvP simply due to the fact that they have so low damage and nothing to really tank the damage. I think tank builds can be great for early pushes and contains but they don't stand a chance later on. Maybe with HotS and the battle hellion we will see a lot more tank usage, right now I'm just not convinced tank play offers a second playstyle. But we'll see.
As a protoss player, tanks scare the crap out of me. They are so much one way damage and can take the wind out of any zealot push. I think they are under rated in the match up and suffer from the idea that the terran has to either go Mech or Bio, but cannot split the middle. I am not sure they can make it all the way to the end game, but they are scary as hell in the early and mid game.
Nice, I like how you offer your perspective, now here is mine as a T.
True are all the things you said, but Tanks mean slower upgrades, slower Medivacs, more passivity. But I have been doing a couple of Tank Openings on the ladder just because of 2 things Toss love doing right now: Super Greedy Nexus First builds and gateway agression around the 9ish minute mark. Tanks are pretty good in both scenarios so yeah early game no more than 4 or 5 can be good but after that just dedicate your gas too the essential things (upgrades etc). Would be really cool if Thors with the 250MM cannon could counter Colossus (like they said so on the game guide on B.net) that way you can get vehicle weapons and use mech units for support much like in TvZ. But alas these are the feeble dreams of an old BW veteran D:
For me tanks mean faster upgrades, as the OP said, tanks allow you to be greedy early on because as you say that 9 min gateway aggression is just stopped dead. With tanks I can get my 4 gases really quick, I can delay stim/combat sheild, so I am actually ahead on upgrades compared to a standard bio build. I'm talking 2/2 at 13-14 minutes.
It does mean passivity, but I don't find you can do much against most protoss until they take a third anyway.
I use a similar build from time to time but it's also a gamble. Some protoss players go for quick blink from 2 bases and you have no way of defending something like that because of no stimpack and tanks being so immobile. And 1 base all ins will also kill you easily.
While it is clearly awesome vs stuff like the Parting build that Day9 looked at:
(Can I link this without embedding the video?)
You are hardly behind vs other protoss builds, as you say you can punish a quick third. What is so scary about 3 gate robo double forge, what makes you behind?
On May 03 2012 03:23 Baum wrote: I use a similar build from time to time but it's also a gamble. Some protoss players go for quick blink from 2 bases and you have no way of defending something like that because of no stimpack and tanks being so immobile. And 1 base all ins will also kill you easily.
On most maps you can position your tanks to cover blink stalkers. Depends how many different points of entrance there are, I certainly remember a game on Tal'darim where a terran player used tanks very effectively against a determined blink stalker attack.
And obviously you still scout with this, so I'm not sure how you are any more vulnerable to 1 base attacks than with standard.
EPT
