Hey guys, for those of you who saw Sound all-kill NSH I'm sure you've seen set three where he takes apart Salvation with an extremely technical 2x medi hellbat drop build. If your a fellow Terran player like me I'm sure you literally bust a nut in set three.
Anyways I started to emulate this build and found its a fantastic opener in every matchup. In TvT it usually outright kills a no-gas opener, as the microed hellbats+medivac pick up micro just owns marines who will probably not have stim or CS at the time you are hitting. In TvP I find its fantastic offence because the current TvP meta has Protoss preparing for WM drops and thus will have either cannons, obs or oracle with envision preparing for your mines, and even if they scout your base, as long as they don't physically see the Hellbats, they won't know what hit them, allowing you to do massive damage. Same for TvZ with the added bonus that hellbats rips lings like no man's business. Also due to the 2 reactored mines you build, you are fairly safe with 2 mines and 4 marines in a bunker back home.
So here's the rough BO:
12 Rax 13 Gas depot @16, OC Factory 2 rines then reactor on rax take 2nd gas as soon as fact goes up bunker at ramp vs P(supply depots as necessary to keep production @ this point) when factory done, build armory factory>>>reactor, 2 widow mines @100 gas, starport build 2nd reactor on rax next to starport produce 4 hellbats soon as armory complete when reactor done on rax, switch to starport, 2 medivacs.
Basically if you haven't seen the game, the way you execute is your going to use your medivacs to chase down workers via boosters, avoid enemy troops, and to minimize damage to your hellbats by picking up damaged ones. Vs protoss you need to be a little bit careful and avoid fighting stalkers but vs T you can usually do a bit more straight up fighting VS marines/helions etc. so long as your micro is good. This build works great ATM because the opponents first reaction to seeing your medivacs is "mines inc, pull workers", you chase down workers easily with medivac+booster, drop the hellbats on them, do the damage then pick them back up to catch up the workers again. Also I like to split my medivacs so that it makes it twice as hard for the opponent to deal with as they need to micro their asses off.
I would post a replay of me doing it but frankly it would pale in comparison to the crispness in the VOD so just watch that if you want to see how deadly this build is.
Finally I know hellbat drops aren't new, been using em in Beta for ages. But the crispness of this build and Sound's Boxer-esque micro really impressed me!
That's a nice fun opening TvT for all those interested. 4 hellbat 2 medic drop. Used by ST_Sound I believe in GSTL, casted/walk through by mr Nathanias.
On March 31 2013 14:18 GaNgStaRR.ElV wrote: Nice video, perfectly details this build! BTW it's tried and tested in TvP too
Likewise. It's working for me, for some reason, so far. I just poke with hellions, marine, scv, and hellbat/medic and drop an expo and go into 3 rax stim hell bat timing.
Of course it's vs bad protoss players. I'm still new to hots, about 70 games so far at ~640 pts masters ATM
On March 31 2013 14:18 GaNgStaRR.ElV wrote: Nice video, perfectly details this build! BTW it's tried and tested in TvP too
Likewise. It's working for me, for some reason, so far. I just poke with hellions, marine, scv, and hellbat/medic and drop an expo and go into 3 rax stim hell bat timing.
Of course it's vs bad protoss players. I'm still new to hots, about 70 games so far at ~640 pts masters ATM
I'm about the same place masters and it works for me too. just one of those meta things that "shouldnt" work but it does.
I faced it twice, once before I read this thread (lost) and again after. Second game I absolutely crushed the drop by going siege expand.That being said, after I moved my xpo to my nat, I was quite scared about the next drop, I had 6 vikings and 3 AA towers and still felt scared, should have put up my sensor tower earlier. I got lucky and he dropped my main / where I guessed the drop might be, it actually lowered my scv count to match his. (I could have defended better though - especially with a sensor tower earlier)
I lost in the end, the player was top 8 Master terran, im not even top 8 Diamond, not even sure why I was playing him. Since siege expand is go to build, idc for this as much. I used it against a Zerg player who just wanted to go straight to muta! lol.
Next time I will put up my sensor tower and keep my army somewhere in the middle of my main and nat.
Thanks for posting it, gonna try it out. I think this build could be very deadly against zerg if they don't see it coming, and it's great for setting up a mech game. I love drops and multitasking so I'm gonna be doing this a lot. Thanks again.
I was just thinking about this. In TvZ, what do you guys think of this opening, into expand and then a marauder/hellbat timing attack. Can pretty much kill the zerg as long as he took enough early damage and possibly even if he didn't. I think the only problem would be mutas. The hellbat drop would delay them but do you think I could hit fast enough a hellbat/marauder timing?
On March 31 2013 23:27 LardMaster wrote: I was just thinking about this. In TvZ, what do you guys think of this opening, into expand and then a marauder/hellbat timing attack. Can pretty much kill the zerg as long as he took enough early damage and possibly even if he didn't. I think the only problem would be mutas. The hellbat drop would delay them but do you think I could hit fast enough a hellbat/marauder timing?
Possibly but it would be tight. I would recommend just adding some marines/marauders, combined with the 2 mines you built(and maybe another round) you might be able to work. However I would think you would need to save as much as you can from your drop!
On March 31 2013 17:39 ThisisRaider wrote: I faced it twice, once before I read this thread (lost) and again after. Second game I absolutely crushed the drop by going siege expand.That being said, after I moved my xpo to my nat, I was quite scared about the next drop, I had 6 vikings and 3 AA towers and still felt scared, should have put up my sensor tower earlier. I got lucky and he dropped my main / where I guessed the drop might be, it actually lowered my scv count to match his. (I could have defended better though - especially with a sensor tower earlier)
I lost in the end, the player was top 8 Master terran, im not even top 8 Diamond, not even sure why I was playing him. Since siege expand is go to build, idc for this as much. I used it against a Zerg player who just wanted to go straight to muta! lol.
Next time I will put up my sensor tower and keep my army somewhere in the middle of my main and nat.
I lost to a terran for the first time who did something similar. I made a plethora of mistakes(he had a money scan and i panic-cancelled my first two hellbats, then had to use them to crush a marine-helion attack which bought him time to prepare.) but he won because he had tanks out which meant I couldn't just kill him, then he countered with 3 tanks and i had 1...
On April 01 2013 00:19 ThisisRaider wrote: He dropped like 6 hellbats the 2nd time, that can kill 2 or 3 tanks still. I didnt feel safe pushing with my tanks and vikings. :\
Fair play, again I think my loss was down to cancelling my 1st round of hellbats. If I hadn't of done that, I would have dropped my hellbats on him when he had 2 helions a medivac and 8 marines leaving his base rather than needing to drop my hellbats on his push to save myself, and then arriving at a 2 CC Terran with a tank and a viking out.
On April 01 2013 01:15 LardMaster wrote: Anyone got any good reps of them doing this?
I'm laddering now doing it in every matchup I will post a couple when I'm done(though I'm nowhere near as crisp as sound, his lift micro is DUMB fast, makes it look so natural!)
I had a variation of this happen to me in TvZ. I just put a spine crawler at each of my bases and morphed in a handful of banelings. With some queen micro and pulling away drones, I managed to minimize damage until I had mutas out, then I just busted down his base with a huge ling/speedbling attack + 8 mutas. Still, a fairly difficult thing to defend against, especially if you don't scout your opponent until last base on a 4-player map.
On April 01 2013 01:30 padfoota wrote: Well someone definetely used this against me....my opening killed it:/
Looks amazing tho, not sure how this works consistently in TvT on ladder however - hits too late, stim already done etc...
Look at the video on the first page. It hits at 4:45, no possible way in hell to have stim.
Yeah you're telling me 4 medevacs alone is possible at 4:45....wake up dude its youtube video, look at the in-gamer timer its 7:30 for the first drop and 10:00 for the second - 7:30 stim is just done, depending on the build you go...
On April 01 2013 01:30 padfoota wrote: Well someone definetely used this against me....my opening killed it:/
Looks amazing tho, not sure how this works consistently in TvT on ladder however - hits too late, stim already done etc...
Look at the video on the first page. It hits at 4:45, no possible way in hell to have stim.
Yeah you're telling me 4 medevacs alone is possible at 4:45....wake up dude its youtube video, look at the in-gamer timer its 7:30 for the first drop and 10:00 for the second - 7:30 stim is just done, depending on the build you go...
Lol, oops. I actually completely forgot about Blizzard time for a second. Still, though, 7:30 is a really fast stim; something you see fairly rarely in TvT. I don't think stim will be a problem for this drop like 90% of the time.
On April 01 2013 01:30 padfoota wrote: Well someone definetely used this against me....my opening killed it:/
Looks amazing tho, not sure how this works consistently in TvT on ladder however - hits too late, stim already done etc...
Look at the video on the first page. It hits at 4:45, no possible way in hell to have stim.
Yeah you're telling me 4 medevacs alone is possible at 4:45....wake up dude its youtube video, look at the in-gamer timer its 7:30 for the first drop and 10:00 for the second - 7:30 stim is just done, depending on the build you go...
Lol, oops. I actually completely forgot about Blizzard time for a second. Still, though, 7:30 is a really fast stim; something you see fairly rarely in TvT. I don't think stim will be a problem for this drop like 90% of the time.
True...thought about it and realized 7:30 stim is from 3 rax....welp.. Gonna keep using my own build since it seems to work better...havent run into a terran who goes 1 rax FE tho - then ill steal this build 100%
The pre-medivac-storage-hellbat-nerf hellbats weren't in the game long enough for people to learn how to counter them. This build is hard-countered (using a gasless expand such as 1rax FE or 14CC) by stacking a ball of marines directly in your mineral line and stutter-stepping the ball out of hellbat range as the drop comes. This even countered the stronger drop in the beta. Grab a friend and try it.
This build won't be as devastating once this counter becomes common, although I do agree that it obliterates gasless epxands when this preparation isn't already made.
On April 01 2013 01:30 padfoota wrote: Well someone definetely used this against me....my opening killed it:/
Looks amazing tho, not sure how this works consistently in TvT on ladder however - hits too late, stim already done etc...
Look at the video on the first page. It hits at 4:45, no possible way in hell to have stim.
Yeah you're telling me 4 medevacs alone is possible at 4:45....wake up dude its youtube video, look at the in-gamer timer its 7:30 for the first drop and 10:00 for the second - 7:30 stim is just done, depending on the build you go...
Lol, oops. I actually completely forgot about Blizzard time for a second. Still, though, 7:30 is a really fast stim; something you see fairly rarely in TvT. I don't think stim will be a problem for this drop like 90% of the time.
True...thought about it and realized 7:30 stim is from 3 rax....welp.. Gonna keep using my own build since it seems to work better...havent run into a terran who goes 1 rax FE tho - then ill steal this build 100%
Yeah TBH if you rush stim that quick it's prob going to lose you the game against this.
Echoic: I remember the 4 hellbat drop, it was hell on Earth in TvT.
Obviously builds like this will lose their effectiveness at some point but it doesn't mean it will every be completely non-viable. And if I saw a ball of marines I would take 1 medivac north 1 south and get a surround off on the marine ball...
Im also seeing a trend in which its almost impossible to play 1 rax FE at a high level without dying against something flat out....makes me think we should all start opening gas...
On April 01 2013 01:30 padfoota wrote: Well someone definetely used this against me....my opening killed it:/
Looks amazing tho, not sure how this works consistently in TvT on ladder however - hits too late, stim already done etc...
Look at the video on the first page. It hits at 4:45, no possible way in hell to have stim.
Yeah you're telling me 4 medevacs alone is possible at 4:45....wake up dude its youtube video, look at the in-gamer timer its 7:30 for the first drop and 10:00 for the second - 7:30 stim is just done, depending on the build you go...
Lol, oops. I actually completely forgot about Blizzard time for a second. Still, though, 7:30 is a really fast stim; something you see fairly rarely in TvT. I don't think stim will be a problem for this drop like 90% of the time.
True...thought about it and realized 7:30 stim is from 3 rax....welp.. Gonna keep using my own build since it seems to work better...havent run into a terran who goes 1 rax FE tho - then ill steal this build 100%
Yeah TBH if you rush stim that quick it's prob going to lose you the game against this.
Echoic: I remember the 4 hellbat drop, it was hell on Earth in TvT.
Obviously builds like this will lose their effectiveness at some point but it doesn't mean it will every be completely non-viable. And if I saw a ball of marines I would take 1 medivac north 1 south and get a surround off on the marine ball...
No its was heaven on earth for three months because I knew how to sim city and dropping against everyone who doesnt was funny as hell
On April 01 2013 01:30 padfoota wrote: Well someone definetely used this against me....my opening killed it:/
Looks amazing tho, not sure how this works consistently in TvT on ladder however - hits too late, stim already done etc...
Look at the video on the first page. It hits at 4:45, no possible way in hell to have stim.
Yeah you're telling me 4 medevacs alone is possible at 4:45....wake up dude its youtube video, look at the in-gamer timer its 7:30 for the first drop and 10:00 for the second - 7:30 stim is just done, depending on the build you go...
Lol, oops. I actually completely forgot about Blizzard time for a second. Still, though, 7:30 is a really fast stim; something you see fairly rarely in TvT. I don't think stim will be a problem for this drop like 90% of the time.
True...thought about it and realized 7:30 stim is from 3 rax....welp.. Gonna keep using my own build since it seems to work better...havent run into a terran who goes 1 rax FE tho - then ill steal this build 100%
Yeah TBH if you rush stim that quick it's prob going to lose you the game against this.
Echoic: I remember the 4 hellbat drop, it was hell on Earth in TvT.
Obviously builds like this will lose their effectiveness at some point but it doesn't mean it will every be completely non-viable. And if I saw a ball of marines I would take 1 medivac north 1 south and get a surround off on the marine ball...
I didn't mean to imply that this build is useless, it will have its place. However, it's not the gasless-expand killer that this thread is making it out to be, the proper response just hasn't worked its way into the metagame yet.
I really don't think the surround-drop on the marines would work given that it would be very transparent and you could just move your (stimmed, at this point) marines towards one of the two medivacs and negate the surround, but this is too far into theorycraft-land now.
On April 01 2013 01:30 padfoota wrote: Well someone definetely used this against me....my opening killed it:/
Looks amazing tho, not sure how this works consistently in TvT on ladder however - hits too late, stim already done etc...
Look at the video on the first page. It hits at 4:45, no possible way in hell to have stim.
Yeah you're telling me 4 medevacs alone is possible at 4:45....wake up dude its youtube video, look at the in-gamer timer its 7:30 for the first drop and 10:00 for the second - 7:30 stim is just done, depending on the build you go...
Lol, oops. I actually completely forgot about Blizzard time for a second. Still, though, 7:30 is a really fast stim; something you see fairly rarely in TvT. I don't think stim will be a problem for this drop like 90% of the time.
True...thought about it and realized 7:30 stim is from 3 rax....welp.. Gonna keep using my own build since it seems to work better...havent run into a terran who goes 1 rax FE tho - then ill steal this build 100%
Yeah TBH if you rush stim that quick it's prob going to lose you the game against this.
Echoic: I remember the 4 hellbat drop, it was hell on Earth in TvT.
Obviously builds like this will lose their effectiveness at some point but it doesn't mean it will every be completely non-viable. And if I saw a ball of marines I would take 1 medivac north 1 south and get a surround off on the marine ball...
I didn't mean to imply that this build is useless, it will have its place. However, it's not the gasless-expand killer that this thread is making it out to be, the proper response just hasn't worked its way into the metagame yet.
I really don't think the surround-drop on the marines would work given that it would be very transparent and you could just move your (stimmed, at this point) marines towards one of the two medivacs and negate the surround, but this is too far into theorycraft-land now.
Agreed I don't want to argue about whether it would work, it's just one of those "well if i saw that, i would do this, because doing what i was going to do wouldn't work".
only people who have held this off in TvT was the prev mentioned blunder and some1 who did it right back to me, but produced 2 extra hellbats for their mineral line, and i did 2 widow mines. My 2 widow mines died to splash and only killed 2 hellbats, we roasted each other's workers but he had 2 hellbats in my base and mine died eventually
Its such a crazy build because theres second/third drops in route while the first is doing its thing. Eventually theres like ~5 medivacs with 10 hellbats everywhere in the opponents base :D While in the meantime, a transistion into mech/expand although this is the part I need to work on. Floating too much resources due to slow hands.
just watch out, i played a guy who did a small variation on this where its 3 medivacs full of hellbats dropping literally right after your 2 medivac hellbat drop.
I cant remember all the details but you get 12 rax, 12 gas, delay your first scv after OC for fast 2nd gas... you effectively skip the 2 standard hellions in this build, and your starport makes one medivac while the reactor is building on the barracks before swapping and altogether it times so that 5th/6th hellbats pop as 2nd/3rd medivacs pop. Due to the 12 gas and so faster armory this is actually pretty much the same timing as 2 medivac drop.
edit: rewatched the replay, was one of the first times ive been trying this build so my execution meant my timing was off by just under 15 seconds. This other timing if both builds are executed well should be 25 seconds behind but with an extra medivac and 2 more hellbats
On April 01 2013 09:10 ThePianoDentist wrote: just watch out, i played a guy who did a small variation on this where its 3 medivacs full of hellbats dropping literally right after your 2 medivac hellbat drop.
I cant remember all the details but you get 12 rax, 12 gas, delay your first scv after cc for fast 2nd gas... you effectively skip the 2 standard hellions in this build, and your starport makes one medivac while the reactor is building on the barracks before swapping and altogether it times so that 5th/6th hellbats pop as 2nd/3rd medivacs pop. Due to the 12 gas and so faster armory this is actually pretty much the same timing as 2 medivac drop.
Sounds pretty nuts. How do you fit a CC in though and hit the same timing? Did you mean OC?
I was wondering, echoic has already given a possible counter but it seems you have to be playing bio for that instance.
Is there any other mech opener that is safe against this? as most mech openers rely on reactor hellion....and hellions seem to get smashed by hellbats with medivac support.
On April 01 2013 09:10 ThePianoDentist wrote: just watch out, i played a guy who did a small variation on this where its 3 medivacs full of hellbats dropping literally right after your 2 medivac hellbat drop.
I cant remember all the details but you get 12 rax, 12 gas, delay your first scv after cc for fast 2nd gas... you effectively skip the 2 standard hellions in this build, and your starport makes one medivac while the reactor is building on the barracks before swapping and altogether it times so that 5th/6th hellbats pop as 2nd/3rd medivacs pop. Due to the 12 gas and so faster armory this is actually pretty much the same timing as 2 medivac drop.
Sounds pretty nuts. How do you fit a CC in though and hit the same timing? Did you mean OC?
On April 01 2013 09:10 ThePianoDentist wrote: just watch out, i played a guy who did a small variation on this where its 3 medivacs full of hellbats dropping literally right after your 2 medivac hellbat drop.
I cant remember all the details but you get 12 rax, 12 gas, delay your first scv after cc for fast 2nd gas... you effectively skip the 2 standard hellions in this build, and your starport makes one medivac while the reactor is building on the barracks before swapping and altogether it times so that 5th/6th hellbats pop as 2nd/3rd medivacs pop. Due to the 12 gas and so faster armory this is actually pretty much the same timing as 2 medivac drop.
Sounds pretty nuts. How do you fit a CC in though and hit the same timing? Did you mean OC?
yeah, thanks edited
Ok yeah, I was wondering if you had some type of "show me the money" cheat going on haaha.
This build doesn't seem to work for me at all... I tried it for 6 games and lost all except for one against a zerg who had zerglings and couldn't get a surround. I have even gotten down to the timing that you attack at like 7:30 ingame time. So it is going pretty sleek, but it just wont work. Most of the time there are siege tanks and marines waiting for me or at least a widow mine that ruins my day.
Is my micro not good enough or has it become weaker? I really don't know. I am not trying this agian though I guess. I am in Gold League btw.
TBH if your in Gold League it might be the kind of thing where you are just getting the garbage end of the meta, due to play being a lot less standard then it would be a bit higher up. Siege tanks @ 7:30 are pretty unusual.
Might be down to your control too, being able to pick up/drop quickly is essential to do any real damage.
On April 01 2013 15:08 A Wild Sosd wrote: Could this effectively transition into bio/mine or bio/tank?
Yes but you need to do damage otherwise a counter will roll over you. I have been experimenting with following this up with 2 vikings, then building a techlab, pumping 1 banshee(havent had enough for cloak yet but wanna try too), and getting the burrow on mines, then getting stim and 3CC. Obviously you are going to die if they come with marine tank but the idea is
1. hellbats kill and weaken a ton of SCVS 2. 2 Vikings kill the viking he will produce to stop you lift microing 3. Banshee arrives defended by vikings who will be able to fend off his 1 at a time vikings; natural reaction to this is to build tanks since they are the unit sturdy enough to kill hellbats easy, but too bad can't shoot up. And your banshee will finish off a ton of weakened SCV's and delay mining further.
The idea is that with 9 units and greed you set yourself up to crush with a second timing attack if your opponent doesn't GG. Going to recommend tanks only because I feel like they will help you win the game easier if your opponent goes behind but is trying to hold out, since you can siege him slowly, whereas mines you are a bit more defensive, unless you want to drop the mines etc.
I must say that i dislike this version of the strategy. it is too all in and it banks far too much on worker damage. i tried this out (at diamond level play) and i killed no less than 26 workers. however, that barely put me EVEN in the worker count against the FE'ing terran. (not to mention micro'd marauders hard counter this)
i use a variation of this build in TvZ; however, i play it with much more focus on macro. basically my BO is: 10 depot 12 rax 13 depot (pull worker off the depot before it finishes; use this worker to scout) 15 gas 16 start marine production (make 2 marines than build a reactor on the barrax) -make 2 more marines 18-21 expand after expo goes up build a factory at 100 gas when you start factory, make your second gas depot at 24 when factory finishes, start the starport - use barrax to get the second reactory tech switch factory and barrax make 4 widow mines - if the zerg went for a fats third, feel free to plant these in front of his base build armory while the mines are being made. tech switch rax and port start hellbat medivac production start an early third (in base) at around 7-7:30 build 2 e-bays and 4 more rax - transition into biomine with early hellbats.
if all goes well, it will set you up for the 16 minute 2/2 timing loved by flash and his bio-mine play.
On April 01 2013 17:47 Ozlo wrote: I must say that i dislike this version of the strategy. it is too all in and it banks far too much on worker damage. i tried this out (at diamond level play) and i killed no less than 26 workers. however, that barely put me EVEN in the worker count against the FE'ing terran. (not to mention micro'd marauders hard counter this)
i use a variation of this build in TvZ; however, i play it with much more focus on macro. basically my BO is: 10 depot 12 rax 13 depot (pull worker off the depot before it finishes; use this worker to scout) 15 gas 16 start marine production (make 2 marines than build a reactor on the barrax) -make 2 more marines 18-21 expand after expo goes up build a factory at 100 gas when you start factory, make your second gas depot at 24 when factory finishes, start the starport - use barrax to get the second reactory tech switch factory and barrax make 4 widow mines - if the zerg went for a fats third, feel free to plant these in front of his base build armory while the mines are being made. tech switch rax and port start hellbat medivac production start an early third (in base) at around 7-7:30 build 2 e-bays and 4 more rax - transition into biomine with early hellbats.
if all goes well, it will set you up for the 16 minute 2/2 timing loved by flash and his bio-mine play.
Couple of things, real fast. One, it hits as early as possible with 4 bats, 2 medivacs. If you do 26 workers damage, you won the game in TvT vs fast expoing terran. Hellbats are light, microed marauders do shit against them.
I've used this against Fe terran, 1-1-1 terrans, mine dropping terrans, hellion/banshee... it's worked well almost every time. It's not 'too all in' as you say. It doesn't cut scvs. It doesn't leave you with a worthless unit Hellbats are still debo at defending pushes, and can be used to continue to drop harass.
and 16 minute...2/2 timing.......16 minutes.....really? That's a bit late for a 2/2 timing dude.
On April 01 2013 17:47 Ozlo wrote: I must say that i dislike this version of the strategy. it is too all in and it banks far too much on worker damage. i tried this out (at diamond level play) and i killed no less than 26 workers. however, that barely put me EVEN in the worker count against the FE'ing terran. (not to mention micro'd marauders hard counter this)
i use a variation of this build in TvZ; however, i play it with much more focus on macro. basically my BO is: 10 depot 12 rax 13 depot (pull worker off the depot before it finishes; use this worker to scout) 15 gas 16 start marine production (make 2 marines than build a reactor on the barrax) -make 2 more marines 18-21 expand after expo goes up build a factory at 100 gas when you start factory, make your second gas depot at 24 when factory finishes, start the starport - use barrax to get the second reactory tech switch factory and barrax make 4 widow mines - if the zerg went for a fats third, feel free to plant these in front of his base build armory while the mines are being made. tech switch rax and port start hellbat medivac production start an early third (in base) at around 7-7:30 build 2 e-bays and 4 more rax - transition into biomine with early hellbats.
if all goes well, it will set you up for the 16 minute 2/2 timing loved by flash and his bio-mine play.
Couple of things, real fast. One, it hits as early as possible with 4 bats, 2 medivacs. If you do 26 workers damage, you won the game in TvT vs fast expoing terran. Hellbats are light, microed marauders do shit against them.
I've used this against Fe terran, 1-1-1 terrans, mine dropping terrans, hellion/banshee... it's worked well almost every time. It's not 'too all in' as you say. It doesn't cut scvs. It doesn't leave you with a worthless unit Hellbats are still debo at defending pushes, and can be used to continue to drop harass.
and 16 minute...2/2 timing.......16 minutes.....really? That's a bit late for a 2/2 timing dude.
however, that is around the time that terrans love to push against zerg with a HUGE 2/2 army and at that point its "drill baby drill" with drop harass and a lot or forces at the front. it hits right before hive tech is useful and it usually does massive damage if handled right and also wins games. the reason i say it is all in, is because if it is scouted, it can be shut down easily with any number of AA defense as well as simply splitting workers rather than putting them into a conga-line. it seems that the assumption for killing massive amounts of workers is that the opposing player pulls all the workers en-mass to a specific location (which the drop micro exploits). furthermore, the expansion is SO late that any self respecting player has bank advantage on you regardless of what you do. to paraphrase day[9], there is a difference between a trick and a strategy. this is most definitely a trick.
1. smart players (with decent apm) dont pull all their workers to the same place. ESPECIALLY since it is easily scouted. 2. marauders kill hellbats rather efficiently with about 4-5 of them so do roach, and stalkers. 3. if you fail to do absolutely crippling damage, you are instantly dead.
though this is all put through the lens of my play-style and experience.
edit - also, the 2/2 is, slightly, delayed due to the sheer macro style of the build, and the harass factor of the hellbat drops. with decent worker kills, the zerg opponent will be slightly delayed too
i actually find that heavy reaper play is quiet effective vs hellbat/hellion drop you can follow them easily and you outrange hellbat. i always defend those kind of drop very easy with that kind of play and with the mecanic of drop you are always vs few units so you pretty much fast kill everything that come out of the drop without taking much dmg
Reaper openers can scout this and building a bunker to mineral line and using defensive mines while ahead on eco because of faster CC is the best possible way to hold this.
and you can apply so much pression on weak time of this build applying constant pressure until you see the 7:00 mark coming when you back then your reapers defend just well and you were so annoying at the beginin that your opponent is completely behind you usually have 3 cc when ur hellbating opponent is only finishing his second cc and you control game with classic marine tank following abusing superior power of marine drop vs hellbat drop
On April 01 2013 22:02 SSVnormandy wrote: and you can apply so much pression on weak time of this build applying constant pressure until you see the 7:00 mark coming when you back then your reapers defend just well and you were so annoying at the beginin that your opponent is completely behind you usually have 3 cc when ur hellbating opponent is only finishing his second cc and you control game with classic marine tank following abusing superior power of marine drop vs hellbat drop
What league are you guys playing in? Reaper heavy/marauders @ 7:30 play vs a build like this? Don't mean to be insulting but I have played this build vs reaper openings and I actually prefer it to pretty much any other opening because everything else will be later then a factory opening; reapers may outrange hellbats but they don't outspeed medivacs and they don't hit air; so if you have 2-3 reapers, your going to take 30 damage a shot against the hellbats dropping on your reapers, and reaper DPS is so low that it's hard to kill 4 hellbats without your opponent doing massive damage. And while marauders may hold this, no one in diamond/masters/gm is building marauders before the 7:30 mark, because they are too gas expensive for what you get for them(which is safety against a build you really have no way of knowing is coming). Also as long as you prepare adequately for reapers and don't get completely caught out by the first two, your mines should be out in time to be able to defend your base and deny the reapers spotting the armory(assuming you dont just stick it next to the cliff).
For those of you who say this build is easy to scout, try hiding your armory better. Most people I speak to after I crush their bones into the dirt with this build will be like "WTF I thought it was widows", because the build looks like a widow mine drop if they do end up hitting a money scan. You can make the illusion worse by setting up your units/mines at your natural ramp so that they can't just stroll in to see you haven't expanded. Also hiding your production at the periphery of your base is highly recommended.
On April 01 2013 19:07 LardMaster wrote: Anyone tried this with success against protoss?
It worked a few times but I wouldn't recommend it as a "go-to" as 1-2 stalkers, a zealot and the nexus cannon will make it very hard to outright kill a Protoss in the same way that you can a Terran. I would recommend doing this build if you were doing a gas build and you see your opponent only taking 1 gas then nexus. you are very open to oracle openings/early gateway timings, especially with an oracle because your base defence is 2 marines and 2 widow mines, and in order to get a CC you probably won't have an ebay in time. Although I have tried rallying those first two vikings over my mineral line so that if the reaper comes in i have atleast 1 widow and 2 flying units to shut it down with minimal losses.
doing 3 rax reaper opening in master league never loose vs hellbat drop ever and at 7:30 if you got 2-3 reaper you basically openend 1 rax reaper which is not what i call a "heavy" reaper opening at that time i usually have more than 9 reapers and you dont have 4 hellbat as you have to defend first. and with hellbat opening u will definitively trade not cost efficient early on vs heavy reaper opening
i would be glad you precise what you called reaper opening to be sure we are on the same foot here . because you can open reaper from 1 ,2 ,3 or even 5 rax / reactored rax and this number of production facility will change everything because reaper will evolve from scouting / map control to early damage to early allin Note : on one base you can produce 4 /5 reaper at the same time with two gas
On April 01 2013 19:07 LardMaster wrote: Anyone tried this with success against protoss?
It worked a few times but I wouldn't recommend it as a "go-to" as 1-2 stalkers, a zealot and the nexus cannon will make it very hard to outright kill a Protoss in the same way that you can a Terran. I would recommend doing this build if you were doing a gas build and you see your opponent only taking 1 gas then nexus. you are very open to oracle openings/early gateway timings, especially with an oracle because your base defence is 2 marines and 2 widow mines, and in order to get a CC you probably won't have an ebay in time. Although I have tried rallying those first two vikings over my mineral line so that if the reaper comes in i have atleast 1 widow and 2 flying units to shut it down with minimal losses.
I did that exactly earlier. On Whirlwind I saw a one gate expo with scout and did this build. I lost due to terrible control and they saw it coming because they went ungodly fast robo, but it defo could have caused a lot of damage, especially dropping one in each mineral line, which I think may be more effective.
On April 02 2013 00:39 SSVnormandy wrote: doing 3 rax reaper opening in master league never loose vs hellbat drop ever and at 7:30 if you got 2-3 reaper you basically openend 1 rax reaper which is not what i call a "heavy" reaper opening at that time i usually have more than 9 reapers and you dont have 4 hellbat as you have to defend first. and with hellbat opening u will definitively trade not cost efficient early on vs heavy reaper opening
i would be glad you precise what you called reaper opening to be sure we are on the same foot here . because you can open reaper from 1 ,2 ,3 or even 5 rax / reactored rax and this number of production facility will change everything because reaper will evolve from scouting / map control to early damage to early allin Note : on one base you can produce 4 /5 reaper at the same time with two gas
People do that many reapers at this level? Never seen it myself, obviously going to change my build if I see such a fat all in strategy coming at me..probably would just produce straight widow mines + a cloakshee and laugh straight to the bank.
On April 02 2013 08:00 PinheadXXXXXX wrote: What do you do when playing this build and your opponent does a 1-1-1 marine tank viking (or banshee) push?
Haven't played anyone who did the old school 1-1-1 but mines Marines and Vikings would work ok, obv hellbats would be an epic fail.
People. You boost the medivac around and drop on top of the accompanying units. Roast the marines and get out. What's a marine tank banshee or viking push with little to no marines? Uh, pull a few SCVs, split, and focus fire and bounce around, and clear his high investment and you're ahead or on even ground. When I do it, and I suspect air play coming, I get a viking or two of my own to zone out some counter drops or banshee harass.
i have been coming unstuck with this build a few times but i think its my execution rather than a problem with the build, not utilising boost to drop onto units enough and getting kited.
do you guys after the initial 4 hellbats and 2 medivacs what do you make next, do you make as well as 2 more hellbats 1 medivac and 1 viking, 2 medivacs or 2 vikings?
On April 02 2013 16:34 ThePianoDentist wrote: i have been coming unstuck with this build a few times but i think its my execution rather than a problem with the build, not utilising boost to drop onto units enough and getting kited.
do you guys after the initial 4 hellbats and 2 medivacs what do you make next, do you make as well as 2 more hellbats 1 medivac and 1 viking, 2 medivacs or 2 vikings?
I'm just watching Nathanias' stream and he just kept making medivacs and hellbats and dropping over and over again. He made CCs when he got the minerals and then just threw down more factories once he was finally done with the harass.
On April 01 2013 02:23 iEchoic wrote: The pre-medivac-storage-hellbat-nerf hellbats weren't in the game long enough for people to learn how to counter them. This build is hard-countered (using a gasless expand such as 1rax FE or 14CC) by stacking a ball of marines directly in your mineral line and stutter-stepping the ball out of hellbat range as the drop comes. This even countered the stronger drop in the beta. Grab a friend and try it.
This build won't be as devastating once this counter becomes common, although I do agree that it obliterates gasless epxands when this preparation isn't already made.
Eh, they were in the game for too long i'd say. 4 hell bat drops were OP as hell. Just looking back at 4 hellbats in a medivac...every TvT was whoever hellbat dropped the most. It didn't matter if you were up a base, just hellbat drop, kill 20 workers, you're back in the game or just won it. And no marines did not counter it like you are saying, you'd just boost on top of them and get your freewin.
One guy that I faced held it pretty well with a ton of marines that he split so I could only hit one at a time, he eventually finished stim and ended the push. This was even after I landed on his marineball killing most of his army. Didn't look easy though.
Eh, they were in the game for too long i'd say. 4 hell bat drops were OP as hell. Just looking back at 4 hellbats in a medivac...every TvT was whoever hellbat dropped the most. It didn't matter if you were up a base, just hellbat drop, kill 20 workers, you're back in the game or just won it. And no marines did not counter it like you are saying, you'd just boost on top of them and get your freewin.
agreed, the 2 hellbat medivac allow terran to counter it with some composition because the difference between having two hellbat and 4 is pretty huge. You can deal with smaller defend troop and you can actually save SCV and defend effectively 2 base whereas with 4 hellbats it was a true nightmare.
People do that many reapers at this level? Never seen it myself, obviously going to change my build if I see such a fat all in strategy coming at me..probably would just produce straight widow mines + a cloakshee and laugh straight to the bank.
Love theorycrafting but you should experiment vs a strategy before talking about it. First, going 3 rax reaper before CC is not allin and you have plenty minerals to expand sooner that any 1/1/1 build. And second reapers are pretty effective for scouting purpose so it's actually quiet easy to see banshee/otherstuff coming. Not saying you are ahead vs banshee but you can defend it with proper reaction/scouting. I wouldn't be so arrogant using theroycrafting as the metagame is not figured out yet.
On April 02 2013 18:48 MHT wrote: One guy that I faced held it pretty well with a ton of marines that he split so I could only hit one at a time, he eventually finished stim and ended the push. This was even after I landed on his marineball killing most of his army. Didn't look easy though.
On April 02 2013 18:48 MHT wrote: One guy that I faced held it pretty well with a ton of marines that he split so I could only hit one at a time, he eventually finished stim and ended the push. This was even after I landed on his marineball killing most of his army. Didn't look easy though.
Eh, they were in the game for too long i'd say. 4 hell bat drops were OP as hell. Just looking back at 4 hellbats in a medivac...every TvT was whoever hellbat dropped the most. It didn't matter if you were up a base, just hellbat drop, kill 20 workers, you're back in the game or just won it. And no marines did not counter it like you are saying, you'd just boost on top of them and get your freewin.
agreed, the 2 hellbat medivac allow terran to counter it with some composition because the difference between having two hellbat and 4 is pretty huge. You can deal with smaller defend troop and you can actually save SCV and defend effectively 2 base whereas with 4 hellbats it was a true nightmare.
People do that many reapers at this level? Never seen it myself, obviously going to change my build if I see such a fat all in strategy coming at me..probably would just produce straight widow mines + a cloakshee and laugh straight to the bank.
Love theorycrafting but you should experiment vs a strategy before talking about it. First, going 3 rax reaper before CC is not allin and you have plenty minerals to expand sooner that any 1/1/1 build. And second reapers are pretty effective for scouting purpose so it's actually quiet easy to see banshee/otherstuff coming. Not saying you are ahead vs banshee but you can defend it with proper reaction/scouting. I wouldn't be so arrogant using theroycrafting as the metagame is not figured out yet.
I'm not being arrogant I'm just saying I stopped seeing stats like this once I finished my placement matches. I also fail to see how spending 200+ gas and 600 minerals on a tier1 scout unit is not all in. Unless you kill or seriously disable someone doing a 1/1/1 expand the tech advantage is enormous...
On April 02 2013 08:00 PinheadXXXXXX wrote: What do you do when playing this build and your opponent does a 1-1-1 marine tank viking (or banshee) push?
I had something similar happen to me, was either diamond or a masters terran, cant remember off the top of my head. He went Rax, fact, rax, like the old school marine/tank push super early. Assuming he doesn't push until he has his second tank, with his third rally'd, you should be able to drop anyways, do significant damage, and pull his army back to try to defend... unless he doesn't i guess and just goes for it as all-in. Basically if you scout it, swap the barracks back onto the reactor and build a tech lab on your factory and start seige tanks, map dependent you should be able to get at least one out before he hits your base. Or even make 2 widow mines as your barracks makes a tech lab for your factory. It's a very flexible build considering you're also 1/1/1. I had scouted his build, and right as he started to move out I dropped his scv line. After killing as many scv's as I could quickly, I boosted back to my base with my 4 hellbats, right as my first tank completed he got to my ramp, walked into 2 widow mines, and between my scv pull, and my marines, combined with dropping my hellbats right onto his army as well, it was a pretty easy hold. After that, boost away and drop him again while you get your economy going again. If there's a banshee, having those extra widow mines, and a viking right after your medevac should be able to deal with it easily as well.
I'd imagine due to the flexibility of your own 1/1/1 you should be just fine as long as you know what's coming at you.
On March 31 2013 14:18 GaNgStaRR.ElV wrote: Nice video, perfectly details this build! BTW it's tried and tested in TvP too
Likewise. It's working for me, for some reason, so far. I just poke with hellions, marine, scv, and hellbat/medic and drop an expo and go into 3 rax stim hell bat timing.
Of course it's vs bad protoss players. I'm still new to hots, about 70 games so far at ~640 pts masters ATM
Isn't it kind of coin flippy vs toss? Do you alter it vP or are you sticking to it?
How do you account for the MsC+stalker poke?
How do you respond to double gas before nexus when you don't scout the tech (proxy oracle is still pretty popular)?
I've had moderate success with this build TvT and TvZ too. Held two different games vs hatch gas pool baneling busts, and one game vs a proxy 2 rax reaper on Neo Planet.
On March 31 2013 14:18 GaNgStaRR.ElV wrote: Nice video, perfectly details this build! BTW it's tried and tested in TvP too
Likewise. It's working for me, for some reason, so far. I just poke with hellions, marine, scv, and hellbat/medic and drop an expo and go into 3 rax stim hell bat timing.
Of course it's vs bad protoss players. I'm still new to hots, about 70 games so far at ~640 pts masters ATM
Isn't it kind of coin flippy vs toss? Do you alter it vP or are you sticking to it?
How do you account for the MsC+stalker poke?
How do you respond to double gas before nexus when you don't scout the tech (proxy oracle is still pretty popular)?
I've had moderate success with this build TvT and TvZ too. Held two different games vs hatch gas pool baneling busts, and one game vs a proxy 2 rax reaper on Neo Planet.
I can say that when I do this versus Protoss(not my fav), if I scout 2x gas before tech my first two widows go to the left and right of my mineral line to snipe any oracles and proceed as planned. Also I automatically build a bunk so that zealot/stalker dont kill my 2 marines and end me.
On March 31 2013 14:18 GaNgStaRR.ElV wrote: Nice video, perfectly details this build! BTW it's tried and tested in TvP too
Likewise. It's working for me, for some reason, so far. I just poke with hellions, marine, scv, and hellbat/medic and drop an expo and go into 3 rax stim hell bat timing.
Of course it's vs bad protoss players. I'm still new to hots, about 70 games so far at ~640 pts masters ATM
Isn't it kind of coin flippy vs toss? Do you alter it vP or are you sticking to it?
How do you account for the MsC+stalker poke?
How do you respond to double gas before nexus when you don't scout the tech (proxy oracle is still pretty popular)?
I've had moderate success with this build TvT and TvZ too. Held two different games vs hatch gas pool baneling busts, and one game vs a proxy 2 rax reaper on Neo Planet.
I can say that when I do this versus Protoss(not my fav), if I scout 2x gas before tech my first two widows go to the left and right of my mineral line to snipe any oracles and proceed as planned. Also I automatically build a bunk so that zealot/stalker dont kill my 2 marines and end me.
ah ok; so you make mines instead of the first 2 hellions vs Toss and get a bunker at your ramp? I was wondering what changes you needed to make vs toss for this to work~
On March 31 2013 14:18 GaNgStaRR.ElV wrote: Nice video, perfectly details this build! BTW it's tried and tested in TvP too
Likewise. It's working for me, for some reason, so far. I just poke with hellions, marine, scv, and hellbat/medic and drop an expo and go into 3 rax stim hell bat timing.
Of course it's vs bad protoss players. I'm still new to hots, about 70 games so far at ~640 pts masters ATM
Isn't it kind of coin flippy vs toss? Do you alter it vP or are you sticking to it?
How do you account for the MsC+stalker poke?
How do you respond to double gas before nexus when you don't scout the tech (proxy oracle is still pretty popular)?
I've had moderate success with this build TvT and TvZ too. Held two different games vs hatch gas pool baneling busts, and one game vs a proxy 2 rax reaper on Neo Planet.
I can say that when I do this versus Protoss(not my fav), if I scout 2x gas before tech my first two widows go to the left and right of my mineral line to snipe any oracles and proceed as planned. Also I automatically build a bunk so that zealot/stalker dont kill my 2 marines and end me.
ah ok; so you make mines instead of the first 2 hellions vs Toss and get a bunker at your ramp? I was wondering what changes you needed to make vs toss for this to work~
if you read the BO, it calls for 2 widow mines while your armory is building as a standard. Thus why I don't feel as threatened by the offensive options so much because between a bunker and mines either on the ramp or mineral line based on what you scout, it should be hard for really anything to properly damage you in TvT or TvP as bad as you are going to damage THEM.
Usually what happens wheen I get oracled is i love 2-3 SCVS then use my scvs to lure the oracle into one of the mines. Move the mine slightly next time and do the same trap if they come back.
On April 01 2013 02:23 iEchoic wrote: The pre-medivac-storage-hellbat-nerf hellbats weren't in the game long enough for people to learn how to counter them. This build is hard-countered (using a gasless expand such as 1rax FE or 14CC) by stacking a ball of marines directly in your mineral line and stutter-stepping the ball out of hellbat range as the drop comes. This even countered the stronger drop in the beta. Grab a friend and try it.
This build won't be as devastating once this counter becomes common, although I do agree that it obliterates gasless epxands when this preparation isn't already made.
Eh, they were in the game for too long i'd say. 4 hell bat drops were OP as hell. Just looking back at 4 hellbats in a medivac...every TvT was whoever hellbat dropped the most. It didn't matter if you were up a base, just hellbat drop, kill 20 workers, you're back in the game or just won it. And no marines did not counter it like you are saying, you'd just boost on top of them and get your freewin.
To be specific, we're talking about the 4 medivac hellbat rush build back in beta - I'm not debating the strength of 4 hellbats in a medivac in general.
That's what I thought too, and I said and tried the same thing, but it doesn't work. If you haven't tried the exact counter yourself, you won't understand. You have to have perfect marine production and have to have all of your marines sitting in the center of your mineral line when the attack comes. The amount of marines you can have by time the attack hits off a FE kills a medivac before you can unload hellbats within range to attack them, and any that are dropped out of range just get kited to death.
I ran hellbat drop in TvT throughout beta until I discovered this counter, and then I collected free wins from everyone who did it against me afterwards at GM level. That's not to say 4 hellbats in a medivac shouldn't have been nerfed (hellbat drops in the midgame were still stupid strong), but the hellbat rush was very counterable.
On March 31 2013 14:18 GaNgStaRR.ElV wrote: Nice video, perfectly details this build! BTW it's tried and tested in TvP too
Likewise. It's working for me, for some reason, so far. I just poke with hellions, marine, scv, and hellbat/medic and drop an expo and go into 3 rax stim hell bat timing.
Of course it's vs bad protoss players. I'm still new to hots, about 70 games so far at ~640 pts masters ATM
Isn't it kind of coin flippy vs toss? Do you alter it vP or are you sticking to it?
How do you account for the MsC+stalker poke?
How do you respond to double gas before nexus when you don't scout the tech (proxy oracle is still pretty popular)?
I've had moderate success with this build TvT and TvZ too. Held two different games vs hatch gas pool baneling busts, and one game vs a proxy 2 rax reaper on Neo Planet.
I can say that when I do this versus Protoss(not my fav), if I scout 2x gas before tech my first two widows go to the left and right of my mineral line to snipe any oracles and proceed as planned. Also I automatically build a bunk so that zealot/stalker dont kill my 2 marines and end me.
ah ok; so you make mines instead of the first 2 hellions vs Toss and get a bunker at your ramp? I was wondering what changes you needed to make vs toss for this to work~
if you read the BO, it calls for 2 widow mines while your armory is building as a standard. Thus why I don't feel as threatened by the offensive options so much because between a bunker and mines either on the ramp or mineral line based on what you scout, it should be hard for really anything to properly damage you in TvT or TvP as bad as you are going to damage THEM.
Usually what happens wheen I get oracled is i love 2-3 SCVS then use my scvs to lure the oracle into one of the mines. Move the mine slightly next time and do the same trap if they come back.
Yeah; the BO in the OP does call for 2 widow mines. I missed that because everyone else's analysis of the build has it getting 2 hellions, not widow mines. Although, imo, it does make more sense to get the mines vs Protoss.
On April 01 2013 02:23 iEchoic wrote: The pre-medivac-storage-hellbat-nerf hellbats weren't in the game long enough for people to learn how to counter them. This build is hard-countered (using a gasless expand such as 1rax FE or 14CC) by stacking a ball of marines directly in your mineral line and stutter-stepping the ball out of hellbat range as the drop comes. This even countered the stronger drop in the beta. Grab a friend and try it.
This build won't be as devastating once this counter becomes common, although I do agree that it obliterates gasless epxands when this preparation isn't already made.
Eh, they were in the game for too long i'd say. 4 hell bat drops were OP as hell. Just looking back at 4 hellbats in a medivac...every TvT was whoever hellbat dropped the most. It didn't matter if you were up a base, just hellbat drop, kill 20 workers, you're back in the game or just won it. And no marines did not counter it like you are saying, you'd just boost on top of them and get your freewin.
To be specific, we're talking about the 4 medivac hellbat rush build back in beta - I'm not debating the strength of 4 hellbats in a medivac in general.
That's what I thought too, and I said and tried the same thing, but it doesn't work. If you haven't tried the exact counter yourself, you won't understand. You have to have perfect marine production and have to have all of your marines sitting in the center of your mineral line when the attack comes. The amount of marines you can have by time the attack hits off a FE kills a medivac before you can unload hellbats within range to attack them, and any that are dropped out of range just get kited to death.
I ran hellbat drop in TvT throughout beta until I discovered this counter, and then I collected free wins from everyone who did it against me afterwards at GM level. That's not to say 4 hellbats in a medivac shouldn't have been nerfed (hellbat drops in the midgame were still stupid strong), but the hellbat rush was very counterable.
Wrong. It was not very counterable because the entire metagame was 100% based off of doing this drop or miracle defending it with a widow mine or hoping the person didn't know where the booster hotkey was on their keyboard.
You could boost into marines and kill them because the medivac could go from any angle. I suggest you try the unit tester or make your own map vs a GRANDMASTER/PRO player if you want to see your "marine counter" fail terribly.
Blizzard nerfed it because it was too powerful, it was too powerful TvP/TvZ, but it basically broke TvT, whether it was the "rush to hellbat drop" or mid-game hellbat drops. It was broken, hence why blizzard balanced it out by making hellbats take up more cargo room.
You may have had a magical counter on the NA server that worked against low masters Terrans, but everywhere above that level it was ridiculously broken and when the entire game is revolved around doing one thing, that is when you know it's "imbalanced." It's a moot point, they fixed it already.
On March 31 2013 14:18 GaNgStaRR.ElV wrote: Nice video, perfectly details this build! BTW it's tried and tested in TvP too
Likewise. It's working for me, for some reason, so far. I just poke with hellions, marine, scv, and hellbat/medic and drop an expo and go into 3 rax stim hell bat timing.
Of course it's vs bad protoss players. I'm still new to hots, about 70 games so far at ~640 pts masters ATM
Isn't it kind of coin flippy vs toss? Do you alter it vP or are you sticking to it?
How do you account for the MsC+stalker poke?
How do you respond to double gas before nexus when you don't scout the tech (proxy oracle is still pretty popular)?
I've had moderate success with this build TvT and TvZ too. Held two different games vs hatch gas pool baneling busts, and one game vs a proxy 2 rax reaper on Neo Planet.
I can say that when I do this versus Protoss(not my fav), if I scout 2x gas before tech my first two widows go to the left and right of my mineral line to snipe any oracles and proceed as planned. Also I automatically build a bunk so that zealot/stalker dont kill my 2 marines and end me.
ah ok; so you make mines instead of the first 2 hellions vs Toss and get a bunker at your ramp? I was wondering what changes you needed to make vs toss for this to work~
if you read the BO, it calls for 2 widow mines while your armory is building as a standard. Thus why I don't feel as threatened by the offensive options so much because between a bunker and mines either on the ramp or mineral line based on what you scout, it should be hard for really anything to properly damage you in TvT or TvP as bad as you are going to damage THEM.
Usually what happens wheen I get oracled is i love 2-3 SCVS then use my scvs to lure the oracle into one of the mines. Move the mine slightly next time and do the same trap if they come back.
Yeah; the BO in the OP does call for 2 widow mines. I missed that because everyone else's analysis of the build has it getting 2 hellions, not widow mines. Although, imo, it does make more sense to get the mines vs Protoss.
My mistake in not seeing how the BO in the OP is slightly different~ Personally, I would advocate the hellions over the widow mines in TvT.
@iEchoic: I'd kill to have a replay of Avilo (or anyone else) doing this build vs your marine counter off a FE. I'm kind of skeptical myself
Helions would be interesting actually. I usually goes mines because I find the meta usually dictates some type of pressure before just as your first hellbats pop up. I find alot of T doing either widow/mine drop or helion/marine pressure; i guess for the mine pressure the helions would be better as you can kite the mine activation to pick off marines and pull the helions back to repair amonst your pulled SCVS while your are free to send your drop off to test his multitasking. Probably better than trying to defend that with just less marines and no medivac.
watching forggs stream it seems like his opener is safe against this and has such a fast expansion that it offers a really cool macro way to play early hellbat drops that doesnt leave you far behind if you manage to fuck up and not do a good deal of damage.
His tvt looks so so solid anytime Ive seen him you should definitely check out his stream sometime. Its like a "reactor hellion" expo but with 2 hellions then 2 mines and then your armory is done so hellbats....he does hellbat drops like crazy whilst taking a 3rd cc and then adds on extra factories for mech play with a really early +1 attack from the armory
someone tried this build on me. I shut it down pretty hard with gas first banshee. I spotted the armory, double gas and reactors, built bunkers back at home in my mineral line, and went 2 vikings before raven. any kind of medivac opening would also let you see the armory and get vikings out in time. I wonder what cheese terrans will think of next
On April 03 2013 19:13 SHODAN wrote: someone tried this build on me. I shut it down pretty hard with gas first banshee. I spotted the armory, double gas and reactors, built bunkers back at home in my mineral line, and went 2 vikings before raven. any kind of medivac opening would also let you see the armory and get vikings out in time. I wonder what cheese terrans will think of next
Well, it sounds like their build accomplished way more than it should have because 1 bunker + 4 marines + 2 vikings and whatever else you had their equals one command center for the player with the medivacs.
If you can get someone to overbuild defense, then that basically is justifying the effectiveness of this build.
On April 03 2013 19:13 SHODAN wrote: someone tried this build on me. I shut it down pretty hard with gas first banshee. I spotted the armory, double gas and reactors, built bunkers back at home in my mineral line, and went 2 vikings before raven. any kind of medivac opening would also let you see the armory and get vikings out in time. I wonder what cheese terrans will think of next
Well, it sounds like their build accomplished way more than it should have because 1 bunker + 4 marines + 2 vikings and whatever else you had their equals one command center for the player with the medivacs.
If you can get someone to overbuild defense, then that basically is justifying the effectiveness of this build.
did you even watch the fucking replay? yes, I make 2 bunkers. with salvage that's a total of 50 minerals to stop a hardcore all-in. how can you say 50 minerals is an over-investment? and yes, I put them slap bang where they block half my SCVs from mining. It may sound extreme to you, but it's no different than pulling most of your drones to stop an 11/11. Sound's build is a very specific all-in that can only be stopped with a very specific defense. If you don't have a bunker/viking and your opponent has perfect pick-up micro you will lose the game.
I played against this strategy again. I shut it down the same way as before, bunkers in the mineral line then counter-attack with hellions. for what it's worth, my opponent was GM for the past few seasons his execution was good.
Yeah I shouldn't have posted haha. I've started to use this less on ladder as people tend to just blind-counter it with marine tank compositions...actually now i like to go back to banshee builds because a cloakshee owns marine/tank, you can kill so much, waste a ton of scan too.
On April 05 2013 19:49 Garmer wrote: i still think that mines drop is miles ahead of this, much faster and force detector
i think mine drops have really been losing strength against people whove played enough hots, you just have your army in you mineral line.
when doing this build you only have one mineral line to defend so mine drops shouldnt really be a problem, pretty sure you have enough stuff to even kill before burrow (or maybe just some of my opponents have not burrowed quick enough?)
Against mine drops I think you get the advantage that you lock down his mines with your hellions so when you move out with your hellbat drop he won't be hitting you any sooner, and you can always just micro around his mines if he does get them down, activate them with 2 scvs then surround pound.
Below high masters I think you can just keep making hellbats and medivacs off one base. Doing so relies on surprise, but its always fun to watch the enemy army melt under pure hellbat. Without medivac speed hellbat drops wouldn't be that good, but when you can outrun any ground unit it becomes easy to take the fights that you want.
So my one question would be about the 6:30 scan; if they see exactly what you're doing is it too late to stop or not? Also for the other side, if I scan at 6:30 and see this, how am I to deal with it?
I actually played a grandmaster on korean server and he did this exact same build vs me except he skips the 2 widow mines and i got crushed and Im still stump as to stop this build as protoss.
Diamond Terran here, and having the same problems against this build. Even if scouted, I find it very hard to stop unless you get good mine hits on the medivacs.
But will try that bunker in the mineral line though. I'm only Diamond so a solution(somewhat?) that doesn't require me to micro a sh*t ton or change my build drastically will definitely help. I prefer opening 1/1/1 into bio-tank btw.
On April 20 2013 05:16 Marcus Arcadia wrote: Diamond Terran here, and having the same problems against this build. Even if scouted, I find it very hard to stop unless you get good mine hits on the medivacs.
But will try that bunker in the mineral line though. I'm only Diamond so a solution(somewhat?) that doesn't require me to micro a sh*t ton or change my build drastically will definitely help. I prefer opening 1/1/1 into bio-tank btw.
With 1/1/1 can't you just build marines tanks and a raven, go to his base and kill him? All he is going to have is a couple marine/hellion/hellbat/mine, I dont think he can do anything to stop your tanks from destroying literally everything.
On April 20 2013 08:01 TheNumberE wrote: hellbat builds are too gimicky in my opinion if your not going into mech...you just go really behind if you dont do damage
Everything isn't gimmicky if you need to do damage with it; you get better playing these builds as you learn to mask your strat more, and also how to execute more.
EPT
