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For the lower leaguers who dont seem to understand the ability to micro hellions vs queens makes a huge difference in higher levels of play. It rewards skill and multitasking. It makes it much harder to deny creep, runby, and even if u do runby queens demolish the hellions because u cannot micro them away from the queen range. Its funny because my tvp has changed to marinetankmedivac whilst my tvz has changed to bio. Tvz for me is a fast expand into bio upgrades a quick third and then a timing push with medivacs as i powerup and take a third. Then i just mass out the bio as i expo and work on upgrades. A constant stream to the zerg.
One thing id like to add is the constant nerfs to terran has put me off watching and playing sc2. My opinion is that terran is greatly underpowered and its just sad that they arent allowed to macro. I find blizzards reasoning highly irritating considering that
a) the zerg buffs were barely tested on ptr,
b) they are trying too hard to create an esport
c) zergs were not having trouble in tvz compared to terrans in tvp and
d) blizzard censors its balance discussions when imo they should be having public balance talks with the high level pros and keeping things in the open. Censoring is very disrespectful to us the customers and assumes that we are idiots. Personally from the interviews ive seen i find david kim to be ok but i find dustin bowder to be very pretentious and very corporate and fake. I wish that interviewers would be more confrontational to bowder during interviews because he has made some very questionable decisions. Imo it would be best if blizzard started thinking about replacing this man.
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I think that a lot of the problem resulting from the patch has more to do with creep spread than actual defense.
The thing is, Zerg, by its nature, is able to pump out a whole bunch of units at once. Zerg has never had a problem defending terran pushes when they knew they were coming at any point in the game's history because they are able to mass up the appropriate units fairly quickly. Before the late game Terran armies must be in a good position when engaging because zerg will almost always have an advantage in the open field even with equal supply armies. When creep is spread across half the map at a very early stage is becomes nearly impossibly to get into a good position anywhere near the zerg base without allowing the zerg a whole lot of advance notice to prepare the proper defense. The zerg can delay you here and there and has the luxury of choosing just the right moment to engage since he sees exactly what your army is doing any any given moment.
Thus my proposal and contribution to this thread is that any new build or style should focus on preventing creep spread. I've seen pros that still go hellions but go up to 8 or 10 of them. Maybe that could work. I have to say that finding a place to mix in a single raven seems worthwhile to me. Maybe the hellions + banshee build except with a raven instead of a banshee. I haven't played with any of these, but to me I really feel like getting rid of creep should be high priority.
EDIT: Just saw that QXC post. I'm definitely going to try that on for size.
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On June 28 2012 10:02 Plethora wrote:
I think that a lot of the problem resulting from the patch has more to do with creep spread than actual defense.
EDIT: Just saw that QXC post. I'm definitely going to try that on for size.
Hello, where is the qxc post you are talking about?
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Yes, that is the post I was referring to. 
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I have a question about openings. IT seems that if you open with hellions, you are investing a fair amount to JUST get map control, as we cannot really harass creep tumors any more. We can still try to run by, but this is fairly risky, and not a good gameplan. If we do not make those hellions, it it becomes pretty hard to see all ins coming, unless we get a lucky scan(right when units pop, if we just see a roach warren it will be tough to know if zerg is making 3 roaches or 10). So if we do a greedy 3 OC off 1 rax we are running a pretty big risk of getting all-inned, but if we make hellions we are setting ourself back just to get a bit of map control, without being able to deny creep. So we can either be safe on 2 bases(and try to do a timing to kill the zergs third, proboably havign to walk across a fair amount of creep) or we go to 3 OC with some risk, but it is also going to be hard to out greed the zerg if the zerg plays real greedy.
Is this an accurate read? or am i overstating the investment of the hellions, the risk of the 3 OC?
Or should we just always be very aggressive/or always super greedy?
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I think it would be so sick, encourage micro, diversity, and not be imbalanced if Ravens could cloak. '
Imagine how fun that would be to use(harrasing mineral lines with seeker missiles, trying to snipe overseers ).
And ravens would be a more useful asset, and you would have to micro them well.
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On June 29 2012 14:07 Pandain wrote:
I think it would be so sick, encourage micro, diversity, and not be imbalanced if Ravens could cloak. '
Imagine how fun that would be to use(harrasing mineral lines with seeker missiles, trying to snipe overseers ).
And ravens would be a more useful asset, and you would have to micro them well.
Cute but dont forget that HSM cost 125 energy and cloaking generally cost 25 and decay over time. That mean you need <150 energy just to be able to pull it off. Most raven dont even live long enough to have the energy to HSM. So as awesome as it would be to cloak, raven wont have the energy to ever do so.
I personally think 125 energy is outrageous amount of energy for a spell that has a potential to miss, small AOE, has to research and only doing decent damage from a really expensive unit. Of course I understand that they dont want 1 raven to spam to HSM but I think 105-110 energy would be good amount.
On June 29 2012 14:02 sdecker32 wrote:
I have a question about openings. IT seems that if you open with hellions, you are investing a fair amount to JUST get map control, as we cannot really harass creep tumors any more. We can still try to run by, but this is fairly risky, and not a good gameplan. If we do not make those hellions, it it becomes pretty hard to see all ins coming, unless we get a lucky scan(right when units pop, if we just see a roach warren it will be tough to know if zerg is making 3 roaches or 10). So if we do a greedy 3 OC off 1 rax we are running a pretty big risk of getting all-inned, but if we make hellions we are setting ourself back just to get a bit of map control, without being able to deny creep. So we can either be safe on 2 bases(and try to do a timing to kill the zergs third, proboably havign to walk across a fair amount of creep) or we go to 3 OC with some risk, but it is also going to be hard to out greed the zerg if the zerg plays real greedy.
Is this an accurate read? or am i overstating the investment of the hellions, the risk of the 3 OC?
Or should we just always be very aggressive/or always super greedy?
Yup, I think your pretty spot on. Dont forget, the new overlord buff also allows zerg to scout us better and if they see the triple CC, they can choose to all-in or not. I personally dont think it good to play greedy with this fast triple CC or going for a risky run by with the hellion. So I am rather lost as well :/. I was glad to hear Idra said that HSM was bad though lol and I agree with him that PDD + viking can work but I think fungal still rapes it.
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IM CALLING IT RIGHT NOW, RESEARCH BUILDING ARMOR INTO MASS RAVEN (FUCKING AUTO TURRETS WITH 3 ARMOR MOTHER FUCKERS), IM DOING IT NOW)
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On June 29 2012 16:25 cydial wrote:
IM CALLING IT RIGHT NOW, RESEARCH BUILDING ARMOR INTO MASS RAVEN (FUCKING AUTO TURRETS WITH 3 ARMOR MOTHER FUCKERS), IM DOING IT NOW)
I was also pretty excited about mass raven lategame (Daily # 472 Bomber TvZ) but in the last SotG both QxC and Idra stated that the raven was a bad unit I'M SO CONFUSED!
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On June 29 2012 16:25 cydial wrote:
IM CALLING IT RIGHT NOW, RESEARCH BUILDING ARMOR INTO MASS RAVEN (FUCKING AUTO TURRETS WITH 3 ARMOR MOTHER FUCKERS), IM DOING IT NOW)
One of my bnet friend used kind of this strategy but he's only Diamond Terran i have no idea how it is viable in higher leagues ( Master and GM )
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In my opinion the problem doesn't lie within the timing window. The timing window to punish a Zerg is still the same as before as it wasn't changed by a range-buff. The problem lies within creating that opportunity. Usually Terrans could slow down creepspread. Against a good zerg, you could never shut it down completely, as he had the option to either invest in another queen and spread it nonetheless or move his spinecrawler foward.
The alternative to that would be a few roaches. Nowadays the Zerg doesn't need to invest in anything but queens. Queens can block the ramp, fight effectively against hellions and if the terran wants to invest into more than 4-6 hellions, queens will probably have enough energy to use a transfuse as well. Given all that, taking an early 3rd base is possible and I'd dare to say not even risky for Zerg. With an early third, Terran is forced to play a more aggressive game, because taking your own 3rd base will put Terran behind.
Zerg can effectively drone up and he'll be capable of having a very cheap yet cost efficient army with well upgraded lings earlier than a Terran with a fast 3rd, because our economy producing structure isn't our army producing structure. So the situation you will find yourself in is either
a) be agressive and potentially set back Zerg or put him on even ground if he reacts properly, or overcommit and find yourself in a nearly unwinnable situation since you can't pressure zerg at all.
b) stay defensive and macro up - you will have to build up infrastracture before you can actually take your 3rd, unless you want to take it with a planetary or really fortify it. Even so in the macro case you will find 50-60% of the map covered in creep, denying basically all timings you can potentially do with marine'/tank play.
Also Zergs nowadays learned a lot. They learned to use fast transitions and the real potential of their race. They now know they can crush timings with the more cost-inefficient muta/ling/bane because they will have the economy advantage early on and switch back into a more cost efficient army later on (infestor, ling + x) .
As a Terran, pushing when you see muta/ling/bane is unwise, because even though its not very cost-efficient, its very strong and hard to push in midgame. Earlier in Starcraft 2 Zergs sticked with that combo very long and it gets worse the higher the supply count gets, nowadays they know the switch timing and you can decide if you want to push and risk losing, or if you want to wait and potentially have to deal with an army nearly unbeatable without having 4 base and all given essential upgrades.
I'm not imbalance whining here, but right now it feels horrible to play against Zerg. An opportunity you see might be none or even come back at you. If you decide to macro up, you'll find yourself in a situation with a timing window that is probably less than a minute. You could play very well against Zerg and had options before that patch, but with the fact Zerg now has a good opportunity to
a) scout allins (faster overlords)
b) have better defence
you completely lose your ability to pressure Zerg midgame or create a threat with it even. Before the patch you could push and drop and Zerg either had to deal with it in a sequence OR at the same time.
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Just how cute the queen buff is was clearly demonstrated to me yesterday on TLO:s stream. Antiga close pos.
Played out like this:
4 Queens denied hellions.
One overlord used to spread creep in forward pos allowing a slow queen-roach push with creep spread denying the terran 3rd (spread up through the rocks from a low ground tumor).
Terran was unable to move out and establish a proper defensive tank line since the queen/roach army + massive creep spread created a situation where Z could spot every movement and effectively counter every T attempt to break out. Much like a TvT really where one Terran manages to set up a tank contain, only this contain was with queen/roach/overlord.
The new queen range makes a 10-15 roach + 6-8 queen army quite powerful, something like a roach/hydra combo with less DPS, more HP but also a lot cheaper on gas and larva. Once a decent amount of tumors are planted, transfuse makes this army a b*tch to kill since its quite mobile.
I remember reading somewhere that Blizz disliked mass Queen builds, but I suspect that is what we will see on some maps/spawn positions.
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After playing around with 2 typical TVZ late game armys in the unit tester the best way to fight of ravens is to fungle and then NP them. If you catch a nice ball of them you can simply kill them all with a hsm or spam a few pdds. If the terran is fast enough he can use up most of the energy first. It's kind of stupid that once again the infestor is the counter.
I would really like to see a hold fire command for tanks. That way tanks could still be used to zone infestors even with broodlords on the field. It would also make Tanks better in TvP.
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On June 29 2012 17:13 Type|NarutO wrote:
In my opinion the problem doesn't lie within the timing window. The timing window to punish a Zerg is still the same as before as it wasn't changed by a range-buff. The problem lies within creating that opportunity. Usually Terrans could slow down creepspread. Against a good zerg, you could never shut it down completely, as he had the option to either invest in another queen and spread it nonetheless or move his spinecrawler foward.
The alternative to that would be a few roaches. Nowadays the Zerg doesn't need to invest in anything but queens. Queens can block the ramp, fight effectively against hellions and if the terran wants to invest into more than 4-6 hellions, queens will probably have enough energy to use a transfuse as well. Given all that, taking an early 3rd base is possible and I'd dare to say not even risky for Zerg. With an early third, Terran is forced to play a more aggressive game, because taking your own 3rd base will put Terran behind.
Zerg can effectively drone up and he'll be capable of having a very cheap yet cost efficient army with well upgraded lings earlier than a Terran with a fast 3rd, because our economy producing structure isn't our army producing structure. So the situation you will find yourself in is either
a) be agressive and potentially set back Zerg or put him on even ground if he reacts properly, or overcommit and find yourself in a nearly unwinnable situation since you can't pressure zerg at all.
b) stay defensive and macro up - you will have to build up infrastracture before you can actually take your 3rd, unless you want to take it with a planetary or really fortify it. Even so in the macro case you will find 50-60% of the map covered in creep, denying basically all timings you can potentially do with marine'/tank play.
Also Zergs nowadays learned a lot. They learned to use fast transitions and the real potential of their race. They now know they can crush timings with the more cost-inefficient muta/ling/bane because they will have the economy advantage early on and switch back into a more cost efficient army later on (infestor, ling + x) .
As a Terran, pushing when you see muta/ling/bane is unwise, because even though its not very cost-efficient, its very strong and hard to push in midgame. Earlier in Starcraft 2 Zergs sticked with that combo very long and it gets worse the higher the supply count gets, nowadays they know the switch timing and you can decide if you want to push and risk losing, or if you want to wait and potentially have to deal with an army nearly unbeatable without having 4 base and all given essential upgrades.
I'm not imbalance whining here, but right now it feels horrible to play against Zerg. An opportunity you see might be none or even come back at you. If you decide to macro up, you'll find yourself in a situation with a timing window that is probably less than a minute. You could play very well against Zerg and had options before that patch, but with the fact Zerg now has a good opportunity to
a) scout allins (faster overlords)
b) have better defence
you completely lose your ability to pressure Zerg midgame or create a threat with it even. Before the patch you could push and drop and Zerg either had to deal with it in a sequence OR at the same time.
Case b) is pretty much what happened yesterday to Avilo vs Moonglade on Daybreak (game 2). Avilo on 2 base attempted to hit the zerg third and get some drone kills, got completely denied by about 4-5 queens. Then, using his infrastructure, he got his own third but by that time zerg had creep half-way across the map, was on optimum drones and was putting on pressure constantly. In the end, the slower economy of the Terran was the death of him. But the thing is, queens completely stopped any pressure so the Zerg went into macro-overdrive with almost no risks to him.
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About Ravens, I think it could be an awesome unit if the energy costs were reduced. Every energy unit in the game that has an energy upgrade gets a direct benefit from it when it pops (fungals ready for infestors, EMP for ghosts). Not ravens. Even PDD is 100 energy, and ravens start at 50, + 25 from upgrade. So if you make ravens to use seeker missile, You have to spend the money on starports + techlabs, buy 2 upgrades at 150/150, build units that themselves cost 100/200, and then wait for the energy to build up. Even then you have only one SM per raven, and if they are not easily dodgeable in all situations, their damage can still be lowered a lot by just splitting a bit.
I don't really get what was the idea behind this unit. You don't use it for detection, because it's way too expensive and matchups currently force you to be super greedy. You can use it for PDD in certain situations. And if you want to use it for AOE, it's like a super cost inneficient high templar, HSM doing only a little more than storm while being easily dodgeable and requiring way more energy. But the three functions are very different, and you generally don't have use for all of them when you make ravens, and even if you have the opportunity (like vs bl/corruptor), energy cost prevents you to throw either enough PDDs or enough HSM.
Another thing that bugs me about Terran, is the build time on Barracks' reactors. It takes 200/50 and nearly 2 minutes to build a reactor rax. It allows you to build marines 2 at a time, and while I know marines are good units, it's still only 2 supply at a time. So you basically pay for every rax the cost of warpgate and double the initial build time, to only make your building equal? I'm okay with it on factories and starport as it makes them produce 4 supply at a time which is good, but on rax?
So bio must be agressive through the mid game they say. But when you add production, it takes so long to kick in that hitting timing windows is hard, and being safe while making addons is problematic too. I think it's also part of the current TvZ problem, as zerg will ramp up a crazy production once on 3 saturated bases, which they can now get easily, while if you go on a greedy 3cc build on your end, you'll be unsafe unless you make lots of bunkers, and your production will also be delayed a lot compared to his.
TL;DR : energy costs of raven spells prevents it from being used at his full potential; Reactors on barracks makes production too long to kick in for too little benefit, while making addons-less rax is of course not cost efficient.
I have nothing to back up what i'm saying about addons, that's just a feeling, I only play random at a diamond level and I did no maths or whatever to compare productions of the 3 races, but comparing for exemple the way gateway all ins work and their terran equivalents is quite shocking imo.
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im personally thinking mauder, hellion at the moment. Need to see how it works and though. I guess it would be alot to sink minerals into. so might feel a bit allin
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It might be because I'm a lowely mid diamond, but my troubles with z are only vs compitent zergs. I normally dothis b o and it works amazing because of it's strong macro and it's strong pressure options.
10 depot
16 cc AT RAMP (where barrax is normally placed)
17 rax (at ramp, next to cc, complete the wall off)
18 depot
marine
double orbital
THIRD CC at ~21 supply, when double orbital is mprphing
lift off cc, land in natural, wall off again withanother rax, so your wall looks like depot/rax/rax
make a bunker at natramp
make only four marines
after that, wall in COMPLETELY in your nat with 4 barracks, total of six
make marine, andat around 8 minutes, push out with 20ish marines, rally your rax
take the center, clear creep, kill queens, and normally they wouldn't have speed yet (in diamond)
you CAN kill the third with this
even if you don't you get alot of drones, 3+ queens , and potential creep
not here's te thing: doup all four gas, double evo, get double upgrades, and ADD MORE RAX, for every 4 naked rax, you want 2 tech lab
transition into bio
get medivacs
and PUSH OUT every other minute with a seasonable force
if you keep your money low and your macro high, and if you have decent micro (pull mariens back, split) then this build would work well.
when you are pushing out, you can drop with reinforcements
this is just my take
the wall makes it so the zerg wont all in as much (4 1.5k health buildings and a full wall off)
when the zerg sees cc first they will double expand into their third and mass drones, not expecting pressure
7-8 minutes is when you push, andthat time they are still droning
with thispush, you have to have your multitasking ON POINT, landing your cc, getting upgrades/addons/medivacs all wghile microing your push
the wall off in your main, you lose around 3~seconds mining time from second cc but you guarentee no lngs coming in and mesing you up, or a four drone pull, etc
when i talk to other people about this build, they just say its stupid and they zerg wil make 20 lings and a mvoe me
thats why i get the wall up asap
critisism and discussion is desired
thank you
slur.918
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On June 30 2012 04:09 ColonelSlur wrote:
It might be because I'm a lowely mid diamond, but my troubles with z are only vs compitent zergs. I normally dothis b o and it works amazing because of it's strong macro and it's strong pressure options.
10 depot
16 cc AT RAMP (where barrax is normally placed)
17 rax (at ramp, next to cc, complete the wall off)
18 depot
marine
double orbital
THIRD CC at ~21 supply, when double orbital is mprphing
lift off cc, land in natural, wall off again withanother rax, so your wall looks like depot/rax/rax
make a bunker at natramp
make only four marines
after that, wall in COMPLETELY in your nat with 4 barracks, total of six
make marine, andat around 8 minutes, push out with 20ish marines, rally your rax
take the center, clear creep, kill queens, and normally they wouldn't have speed yet (in diamond)
you CAN kill the third with this
even if you don't you get alot of drones, 3+ queens , and potential creep
not here's te thing: doup all four gas, double evo, get double upgrades, and ADD MORE RAX, for every 4 naked rax, you want 2 tech lab
transition into bio
get medivacs
and PUSH OUT every other minute with a seasonable force
if you keep your money low and your macro high, and if you have decent micro (pull mariens back, split) then this build would work well.
when you are pushing out, you can drop with reinforcements
this is just my take
the wall makes it so the zerg wont all in as much (4 1.5k health buildings and a full wall off)
when the zerg sees cc first they will double expand into their third and mass drones, not expecting pressure
7-8 minutes is when you push, andthat time they are still droning
with thispush, you have to have your multitasking ON POINT, landing your cc, getting upgrades/addons/medivacs all wghile microing your push
the wall off in your main, you lose around 3~seconds mining time from second cc but you guarentee no lngs coming in and mesing you up, or a four drone pull, etc
when i talk to other people about this build, they just say its stupid and they zerg wil make 20 lings and a mvoe me
thats why i get the wall up asap
critisism and discussion is desired
thank you
slur.918
Since you're pushing at 8 minutes, what do you do if the zerg players goes for a roach/ling/bling all-in with a heavier roach composition, aiming to outrange your bunkers and break down your wall? What if your opponent goes roach/ling defensively because they see so many raxes? What if your opponent just scouts you with overlords, sees you're going pure naked marine, 3 OC?
I, for one, would like to see a replay of this working because while you go through some possible Zerg replies with your analysis at the end of the post, I think there are more nodes that you may not be taking into account.
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EPT
