I have tried replaying/loading about fifteen times now. I have had no problem what so ever with any level before this one on brutal but how to beat this level when facing air just completely eludes me. I have tried Viking/Banshee/Science Vessel/Tank. Viking/Battle Cruiser/Science Vessel/Tank. Goliath/Thor/Viking/Tank. I have tried walling of with Planetary Fortresses. I have tried killing Kerrigan with Thors special ability, Yamato cannon, nukes etc. Has anyone beaten this level on Brutal vs Air (When choosing to destroy the nydus worms in the previous mission? If so, how?
My main problems are with Brood Lords and Kerrigan. I need to have long range anti air (vikings) all over the place all the time. Brood Lords keep attacking from every angle at every moment. If I don't have loads of vikings killing them of my planetary fortresses/tanks will die in seconds. When Kerrigan finally comes at 60% and 80% I have invested so much in anti air to stay alive that I have nothing that can effectively kill her. She just goes through 3 PFs, 10 tanks, 12 Battle Cruisers like its nothing even when I use the Nova to clear everything around her.
The same mission on Hard vs Nydus worms was ridiculously easy compared to this
*edit* I tried searching for another thread on this subject but I couldn't find one about All In vs Air. Only about three threads about All In vs Nydus.
If you go up against Air on this mission, you really need the mind control towers from the top tier Zerg research. Without being able to mind control the Brood Lords, the mission is insanely difficult. This will also help lots against Kerrigan, since she'll be busy with the broodlings (in theory).
That said, in my game (against Nydus), 12 battlecruisers have always been enough to kill her. Just start off with Yamato from all of them, and finish the rest with the normal attacks. You'll always lose a bunch, but you'll save your defensive line.
Kerrigan has hardened shields so you'd be better off just fighting her with stimmed marines. As far as dealing with all the air goes, what I did was (without MC tower) just mass goliaths with some science vessels + vikings to take care of broodlords. Build turrets in the back. Build Perdition turrets, bunkers with marines, then some tanks in your chokes. Turret up the area in front of the artifact. With sufficient perdition turrets, bunkers, and tanks you can stop most ground armies very very easily. So then the problem becomes air. Use your vikings to pick off broodlords, and just keep some scvs near missile turrets and auto repair em after the turrets kill the mutas. It's fairly easy until the very very end as long as you can macro up in the beginning, and stay at 200/200 with the buildings mentioned. Oh, and if you have extra minerals, just keep building perdition turrets in front of your barracks.
Hrm, yeah, without the MC tower the best units I can think of are sniping Ghosts and upgraded Goliaths. Vikings are great, but you shouldn't focus on them since they're useless for everything else on that mission (missile turrets with the AoE upgrade rip through the Mutalisks, too). Most of your supply should definitely focus on things that can shoot ground, too.
And upgrade your siege tanks with the friendly fire damage reduction, since they'll like shooting broodlings and blowing up your own stuff.
I don't have perdition turrets either but thanks for the advice. I didn't know that Kerrigan had hardened shields. That completely changes everything. I guess building marines will be necessary, at least until she gets her big storm.
i just did this building literally nothing but vikings, perdition turrets, and missile turrets (3/3 ship upgrades asap as well). obviously get all your mercs whenever possible, and just keep massing the turrets everywhere, esp making a wall of them at the chokes (you should constantly have 5+ scv's running around repairing and rebuilding and building more, and remember to rebuild scv's too). make sure to preemptively build turrets behind your minerals and around the artifact when you have the gold. if you don't have perdition turrets like the OP, a PF and mass turrets around it to wall seems like it should be ok, just make sure the zerg have to get through a lot of crap before getting to your siege tanks (i only ever had the 2 from the start and the 4 mercs).
i built 3 starports and rallied one to each of the chokes and the last to the artifact, and hotkeyed each group of those vikings. turning terrain off in the minimap really helps to see when and where there's incoming zerg, esp those slow moving broodlords so you don't lose too many buildings before responding.
against kerrigan i would preemptively land all my vikings and then yamato her with the 3 starting bc's and the merc bc. the vikes are pretty good at taking out kerrigan, just remember to get a good arc on her so that most of them are shooting. i don't see how 12 bc's and 10 siege tanks could fail to kill her, but in any case i don't think bc's are a good investment for this level esp on brutal since their air to air sucks compared to vikings. vikings+banshees would be better if you really need some air to ground.
around 95% i started getting a tad overrun and just backed everything i still had (around 170/200 at that point) to the artifact. if you have anything above 100 food i'd say you should be able to hang on for the win at that point, esp if you still have some turrets down around the artifact. i think i finished around 120 or 130 food. you also shouldn't need the artifact as long as ur macro is good.
you def have to be constantly looking around the map to be successful against the air attack, and it def takes a few tries or more to get your strategy and execution down. i def think the key is to make sure to have 3 groups of vikings on the field, so you can (and do) quickly respond anywhere. i hope this helps.
edit: oh and i would just add that unless you're an unbelieveable sc player, there isn't a point in trying to build too many buildings/units that require extra meticulous micro. you need so much macro in this level to keep up, so try to keep the micro you need down to a minimum. the MC tower isn't going to help that much, and building bunkers means an extra few steps of populating them and repopulating them with ground when they go down. i think i built 2 extra at the beginning when it was slow just for the starting infantry and some mercs, but i didn't think about it after that. ghosts are cute but i would wait to try that until after your first successful attempt. the only "micro" i ever had to do was landing vikes and yamato.
I pretty much made 18 vikings or so, 16 tanks, bunker walled the north entrance with a PSI emiter closing the little gap left. I put about 5 bunkers going down from the ramp to the supply depots with a psi emitter. Then I spammed the rest of my food into medic and marines which deal with Kerrigan quite well, once you hit 90% make your rally up to the artifact and spam marines, medics and goliaths up there. If you have the flame turret put 4-6 up there as well. I had drop pods so the reinforcing the artifact was easy with all the zerg running up there.
Note: Use vikings to clear broodlords out first. You can eventually figure out where to send them after you fail so much.
16-18 vikings 16 tanks Bunker walls filled with marines PSi Emiters Max out food on marines and medics after you build the other units. Flame Turrets up by artifact, turrets also help up there. Make goliaths at the 90% mark and get them up by the artifact. Keep on macroing marines and medics to the artifact. Keep your viking count as high as you can. When the leviathan appears save the artifacts nova for when kerrigan is on her way so you can clear out the air units and kill the leviathan with the vikings. (Took me a while to be able to hold out this long)
I noticed in the video the player chose not to kill the leviathan... and that somehow prevented Kerrigan from attacking his base... maybe it's beneficial to just let the leviathan live?
Took out the nydus system in the previous mission. My strategy:
Buildings
I started off by adding on an engineering bay, an armory and 3 raxes. I got a tech reactor on my Starport, Factory and all my barracks. I constantly upgrade the infantry weapons and armor as well as ship weapons and plating.
At the two sides I build two Bunkers, two Missile Turrets, one-two Flame turret(s) and one Psi Disruptor . I prefer having 4-5 scv's nearby to repair my structures at both sides. At my mineral line I built two turrets (Sort of behind the line, near the edge) and a bunker with 4-5 marines in it.
(I have the hp-research for the bunker and all the credit-upgrades for both the bunker and the turret.)
At the main plateau I build two Psi disruptors at the cliff edges to slow down incoming zerg. Building more turrets at the edge of the plateau also helps, and I kept about 5 scvs to repair the turrets and ships that camped up there.
Production
Send SCV's to your sides, and the plateau. I like keeping ~5 at each location. Keep the SCV count at your sides up, or you will be overrun.
I spammed marines all the time possible, having one barrack rallied to each side and two to the main plateau. I'ts important to replenish the one tank at each side if it dies (tends to die when Kerrigan comes). Produce two extra tanks and place one at the back end of the main plateau in siege mode and one near the command center, to cover eventual "drop pods" by the Zerg.
From the Starport I built a lot of vikings, a few medivacs and a couple of science vessels (not many, 2-3) and kept them at my main plateau. It's a good idea to keep 2-3 vikings at each side to chase down brood lords (they will come). And keep one viking at the back of your base to take out the brood lords that appear in that direction.
(My vikings are fully upgraded.)
Kerrigan, the Leviathan and the mass of overlords
When Kerrigan appears, send all of your marines to attack her, just watch out for her "psionic storm" ability. She dies relatively quickly to the focus fire. I hardly had trouble with Kerrigan at all, but a careful eye on your marines is necessary.
The leviathan appears a bit later into the mission. You need to take him out or he will flood you with mutalisks. I use my 3 BC's, Vikings and Science vessels to take him down. Be careful though. I tend to use the artifact in a tough spot to damage him and clear out the other sides aswell.
The mass of overlords are not much trouble. Send vikings along the sides of your base to pick them off. If some overlords get through, clean them up with your marine force. Pretty simple.
Well, that's how I did it. I did specifically upgrade my troops aimed towards this final mission so that did make it a bit easier for me.
To the people mostly relying on flame turrets & bunkers for base defense...
What do you do about the ultralisks and roaches? I can get 80% no problem with bunkers/flame turrets/vikings, but then at about 80% charge a flood of roaches and ultralisks come in and smash the defenses as the flame turrets do crap vs armored units. (Psi Disruptor & no Siege tank friendly fire by the way)
My strategy was pretty similiar to that of Athrun's.
Build psi-disruptor at the 2 chokes, along with mass perdition turrets (I had around 10 at each choke) and a few tanks (3 at each). Line your base with missile turrets. Build scvs non-stop and set them to auto-repair around base perimeter.
Build 2 "kill-teams": - Mass vikings (I had around 18~20) - 5BCs and 5Thors (this is all you need)
Use the vikings to patrol your perimeter to kill brood lords / leviathan Use the BC and Thors to kill kerrigan. Utilize thor special ability to stun kerrigan - BC fire doesn't get negated by harden shields because the lasers are individual low damage volleys. The only micro really is dividing up and managing your vikings to cover all directions of attack.
On August 11 2010 03:09 DrainX wrote: I tried the thors on kerrigan. They didn't seem to stun her. I had upgraded my thors though so they did aoe damage. Does this remove the stun?
I said "FUCK IT" to the 2 chokes, and just consolidated my entire ground force to the area behind the plateau. I then walled hte area in with my production facilities and some extra depots (you will lose outlying depots with this method, but it's not a big deal since depots are cheap. I used mass upgraded, stimmed marines to kill kerrigan really quickly (you have to micro out of storms). I massed turrents with AOE (but no health upgrade) which are excellent muta killers and I massed vikings with Range and AOE upgrades. I flew those goddamn vikings around the entire place killing off broodlords, and left a few behind my mineral lines. I did not buy sci vessels (I should have) and I killed the leviathan with 15 well microed vikings (the air waves he spawns will defeat you with this method). I just kept spamming turrents as best as I could, let reduced the size of my ground force by consolidating it into 1 position and used viking packs. This was not an easy win. I lost the artifact once at 98.5% and I won the second time with only 500hp remaining on it by saving the artifact nova wave.
I did not build psi disruptors, MC towers, or science vessels, or planetary fortresses. I wish I had, because it took me hours to get through this mission.
I had a ton of trouble with this, but eventually managed to pull it out. I basically bunkered off instead of PF, filled them with marines, turreted top platform, massed a marine/marauder and had about 10 or so ghosts for spamming kerrigan once her shields dropped with snipe, and a huge viking fleet. I sent the BCs out to kill the broodlords, and basically parked them at the main locations (behind mineral lines, one to the left choke and one to the right choke). Also spamming the air mercs as much as i could, at the end i had a save where i had to move all my units and buildings up to distract for about 5 seconds so the artifact could finish cooling down.
On August 11 2010 03:09 DrainX wrote: I tried the thors on kerrigan. They didn't seem to stun her. I had upgraded my thors though so they did aoe damage. Does this remove the stun?
The stun has a radius of 0.5, while the damage has an AoE of 2, so the target has to be in the middle.
I did this a while back, it is definitely the hardest mission, and a lot harder then the nydus option, at least in my opinion.
Notable tech: tech reactor psi disrupter science vessal weapon speed planetary fortress both gas techs +100 energy tech
double scv repair rate auto-repair to 50% orbital command
both viking upgrades both turret upgrades both tank upgrades
mercs: viking tank BC
Start: set all scvs to mining, grab 4, send 2 to each choke tech reactor both the fact and the port begin vehicle weps salvage both bunkers, send all troops at chokes to high ground Build 1 planetary fortress on the north, just right of the ramp so it's entire left side is against the cliff. Build a psi disrupter in front of it build 2 planetary fortresses on the south, one 2 spaces south of the cliff edge to the right of the ramp, this is to allow thors/tanks to easily path past it to the high ground. and the 2nd PF below the first, 2 squares right. Build a psi disrupter in between the 2 PFs When the CCs finish, use each of their 50 energy on mules before transforming them into PFs Build a wall of turrets in front of each PF Make 2 sci vessals once the tech reactor finishes Macro up tanks and vikings, with SCVs off every CC/PF, keep about 4/side to repair at any time. Build a few turrets on the sides of your base to kill overlord wave easier hire vikings/tanks/BC mercs whenever they are up. get Once you have 6 or so tanks on the high ground, start pumping thors so you always have 4-6 on the highground ready to use their special on kerrigan. Once you get the air from the back warning send 1 sci vessal and 3 vikings to that corner and make sure the vessal is the furthest away, but in range to heal each of the vikings. This will kill everything that comes from there till the end of the game, so you never even need to look at the bottem right again.
Fly your fleet of vikings around to kill any broodlords, stopping overtop of the mash of BCs(3 you start with+merc, don't build more)+thors+tanks+sci vessals that you have stacked on the artifact.
I never build any more production facilities, instead if I had extra minerals I built more CCs, using them for mules, and then landing them in place of any PF that dies. When kerrigan comes chain stun her until she dies. I didn't know about the hardened shield effect she had, so I just went at her with everything I had. She'll lift(instakill) a thor or so every time she comes before getting stunlocked, just rebuild it.
The hard part is the leviathan, Go in with all your remaining BCs and queue up yamatos, as the BCs engage, go in with your viknigs, as spread out as you can to avoid his suped up FG. Right as the second yamatos are powering up hit the artifact to clear out the mass of mutas he's made already, and to do a decent amount of damage to him (I think anyways)
Once you kill the leviathan it's smooth sailing to the win, as long as you're on the ball with flying around killing broodlords with vikings.
I got all ground weps before getting air weps, simply because the vikings 1-volley broodlords anyways, and thors+tanks get very very sickening with upgrades.
Extra money just throw down turrets, the turrets you have in front of the PFs will die regularly, just replace them.
as i didnt have some of the better anti air research, and tank splash dmg reduction. But I had the MC tower which is required for how I beat this mission.
I started off with reactor marines and reactor hellions to deal with the early mass ling threat. then(asap) I sent 3 scv's to each choke to build a CC to start my blocked wall. (note I did not turn them into PF quite yet) Instead what I did was when the CC would finish id spam mules and build more command centers with more scv's. I think I had around 8 extra command centers and just used the artifact to kill off any early threat of a zergling bust. (if you dont have tank splash reduction make sure to unseige your first 2 tanks)
While all that is going on proper MC tower placement is needed and needs to be done quickly as you need to save up energy. I make 3 asap near the artifact. And 2 in the back of my base for the muta/broodlord that comes in. (note you need to bring those BL's up to a choke so they get used) and hotkey all mutas into a control group to fly around and pick off BL's that are outranging your MC towers. 2-3 more MCtowers on the high ground in the top right of your base and another 2-4 close to the supply depots towards the bottom entrance. Hot key all your MC towers to an easily used number for you.
Make sure your command centers are built in a way that will make a good wall(doesnt need to be unit tight) I had 4 up top and 4 at the bottom left entrance area. This will make it easier to defend the early pushes without many units(just MM and hellions) Around after kerrigan goes back under the first time your wall will start to fail with just some marines and hellions so you will want to make sure to use all your mules and turn into PF's. (try to hold out as long as you can) Buy mercs as you havnt been making production buildsings* its also good to be making scv's to repair the wall and if needed to remake a fast Command center if one dies.
Dealing with Kerrigan. in the early stages it is easy, but once you are able to get a decent amount of broodlords you can keep kerrigan at bay if you watch her path and meet up with her with the BL's. easy peasy. The first 2 you will have to prolly deal with her normally(stimmed rines). make sure to spread your broodlords out as storm can kill them off. you can also use your mutas to kill her off, but dont lose them to storm. **MC the hydras with kerrigan they are pretty buffed and why not.
with my money i built a decent viking army just like 12 or so to hunt stray broodlords that are out of range of mcing. then switched to mass BC to deal with the big flying unit and to just have a beefy unit. eventually your wall may or may not fall, but at that point I had 20+ broodlords and like 80 mutas with 15+ BC/viking and yah sit on top of the artifact. Last kerrigan make sure to send your bl's up some so she cant one shot your bc and llitterly the broodlings will just keep her stationary.
just some of my random thoughts and ideas of how i built it, sorry if it isnt to well organized.
Just made another attempt with marine/medic/viking/tank. I still only get to around 90% then my supply starts dropping below 100 and by then I am too outnumbered and can't replenish my losses fast enough. I think I might just load from before the second last mission and to the mission vs nydus worms instead.
Get like 6-7 thors and use 330mm Strike Cannon against Kerrigan. The easiest way to take here out is to spam some kind of special ability on her. Thors are also helpful against air.
EPT
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