EPT[D] Tankless Mech in HOTS - Page 2
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Pookie Monster
United States303 Posts
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EvilContrarian
United States26 Posts
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Crawdad
614 Posts
This is still positional play. | ||
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ZjiublingZ
United Arab Emirates439 Posts
The other thing I'd like to throw out there ties in with the extra reactored factories: reinforcing with Widow Mines during an attack. Usually you will get one wave of them out if you start them as you move out, they really help allowing you to retreat safely from a fight, and preserve that Thor count. Even if you win the fight and kill the expansion, often times the Protoss can snipe some Thors as you retreat with their warp-ins. On top of that, they are just good against everything and can help buffer for you if you get into an engagement and the Protoss surprises you with a bit more anti-air than you thought he had. Let me know what you think. | ||
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Fyrewolf
United States1533 Posts
On December 14 2012 09:10 ZjiublingZ wrote: Please let's just nip this whole "discussion" in the bud right now, I've seen it a million times. People call it Mech because it relies on a core army of Mechanical units. That IS what people mean when they say Mech - that much is completely clear by OP calling it "Tankless Mech". If you want to make a comment on the lack of Tanks making for a very bland style of play because of the lack of emphasis on positioning and space control, that's perfectly all right man. I don't think you will get many people who disagree with you. But please don't go around correcting everyone saying that they aren't aloud to use the Term Mech for Mechanical based army compositions that lack Tanks. This is a fallacy. Mech also happens to be an abbreviation for mechanical, but the term mech play isn't using it as an abbreviation, but rather as a label for a specific kind of playstyle that arose in bw around the positional characteristics of tanks (just as another poster mentioned muta play, the use of muta's fast speed to harass and pin the opponent back while expanding and teching. You can get mutas without using them in muta playstyle, just as you can get tanks and not use them in a mech playstyle i.e. biomech). I'm not saying that you can't play a mech playstyle without tanks, but rather that using any mechanical factory units in a composition doesn't automatically make it mech play because mech play is not about the secondary definition of mech as an abreviation of mechanical. On topic, I'm looking forward to going through these replays and seeing how op uses and deals with the issues of thors in mid-to-late game, reminds of Thorzain's breakout games in tsl. Widow mines seem like they would help a lot, along with the recent thor changes. Do you emphasize armor upgrades or weapon upgrades in this style Pookie Monster? | ||
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SolidZeal
United States393 Posts
What I'm wondering about this Thor/Hellbat/WM style of mech, is if a later transition into Ghost/Tank would be good? Even with only 8 tanks and a few ghosts, I think it would be stronger than just pure Thor/HB when pushing into enemy bases. | ||
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ZjiublingZ
United Arab Emirates439 Posts
On December 14 2012 12:38 SolidZeal wrote: So I'm a primarily a protoss player, but I'm considering playing terran a lot more in HotS. Widow mines look like so much fun, and I like the new Thor. What I'm wondering about this Thor/Hellbat/WM style of mech, is if a later transition into Ghost/Tank would be good? Even with only 8 tanks and a few ghosts, I think it would be stronger than just pure Thor/HB when pushing into enemy bases. This is something I want to try to experiment with, I've been playing the Thor/Hellbat/Ghost/Widowmine/Raven, but I do feel as though Tanks are indeed stronger in the maxed out big engagement situations (which are what really decide games at that point), so I've been thinking trying out going tanks once you get up 4 tech Facts and can quickly get to a high count. The problem I've had is there is rarely a good opportunity to do it. Most Protoss transition to air in the late game at which point of course Tanks aren't great to start spending gas on. And even when they don't and it's ground vs ground, it's hard to get a good opportunity for a Mech player to control the pace of the game which allows you to trade your army, and the Protoss is usually out on the map threatening expansions and the such, at which point slowing down your army is a scary thing to do. Tomorrow I will probably just make a rule for myself: once I get 4 bases and 4 tech facts, just start making Tanks (basically) no-matter what. Hopefully this will allow me to see when I truly can do this and when I can't. And of course if it's even a good thing to do ever. Ill post again after trying this out for a while tomorrow (I am Masters MechvsP player in WoL if that matters to you). | ||
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Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On December 14 2012 09:10 ZjiublingZ wrote: Please let's just nip this whole "discussion" in the bud right now, I've seen it a million times. People call it Mech because it relies on a core army of Mechanical units. That IS what people mean when they say Mech - that much is completely clear by OP calling it "Tankless Mech". If you want to make a comment on the lack of Tanks making for a very bland style of play because of the lack of emphasis on positioning and space control, that's perfectly all right man. I don't think you will get many people who disagree with you. But please don't go around correcting everyone saying that they aren't aloud to use the Term Mech for Mechanical based army compositions that lack Tanks. The core of "mech" is the SIEGE TANK and this immobile unit defines the playstyle. Not using this unit just gives you another slow version of the same "move around a lot" stuff you get from everything else. The core is being IMMOBILE and slowly/methodically attacking. Even using Siege Tanks in WoL isnt really mech, because its a lot of sieging and unsieging with your whole force and you get kicked in the butt when the Zerg swarms you the second you have made your own units useless for a few seconds by clicking that unsiege button. The playstyle is the important part and not which building makes them and thus Hellions and Widow Mines and even Thors are only the supporting cast in this ... On December 14 2012 06:38 Acritter wrote: Kind of sad to say, but tankless mech isn't mech. It's just slower bio with factory upgrades and Widow Mines, and if this is the only way to have your factory units be viable, then Blizzard has seriously messed up. So in accordance with Acritters description I would suggest finding a new and easy term to describe "tankless mech" ... my suggestion is "SlowMech". On December 14 2012 11:51 Crawdad wrote: The Thor is very slow and the WM is a stationary threat... This is still positional play. The Widow Mine is positional, but it cant really hold a position due to its slow rate of fire ... only scare away/kill smaller forces and it is easily killed if you leave it alone. "Holding a position" doesnt mean anything if you arent clearly visible and scare your enemy away. The Widow Mine is a poor "replacement" for the SIege Tank, because Blizzard doesnt want to buff it (as can be seen by their ZERO changes to the Siege Tank during the last two major HotS patches, which buffed a lot of units). They KNOW that buffing the Siege Tank will show why their stupid movement system with super tight formations is terribly bad for the game, so they added in a replacement unit which has a somewhat similar job but looks and works differently. And I thought that adding units which perform "somewhat similar jobs" was bad for game design - at least I think something of this sort was mentioned by "them" in an interview somewhere - by adding too many units to the game. | ||
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ZjiublingZ
United Arab Emirates439 Posts
On December 14 2012 14:49 Rabiator wrote: The core of "mech" is the SIEGE TANK and this immobile unit defines the playstyle. Not using this unit just gives you another slow version of the same "move around a lot" stuff you get from everything else. The core is being IMMOBILE and slowly/methodically attacking. Even using Siege Tanks in WoL isnt really mech, because its a lot of sieging and unsieging with your whole force and you get kicked in the butt when the Zerg swarms you the second you have made your own units useless for a few seconds by clicking that unsiege button. The playstyle is the important part and not which building makes them and thus Hellions and Widow Mines and even Thors are only the supporting cast in this ... So in accordance with Acritters description I would suggest finding a new and easy term to describe "tankless mech" ... my suggestion is "SlowMech". The Widow Mine is positional, but it cant really hold a position due to its slow rate of fire ... only scare away/kill smaller forces and it is easily killed if you leave it alone. "Holding a position" doesnt mean anything if you arent clearly visible and scare your enemy away. The Widow Mine is a poor "replacement" for the SIege Tank, because Blizzard doesnt want to buff it (as can be seen by their ZERO changes to the Siege Tank during the last two major HotS patches, which buffed a lot of units). They KNOW that buffing the Siege Tank will show why their stupid movement system with super tight formations is terribly bad for the game, so they added in a replacement unit which has a somewhat similar job but looks and works differently. And I thought that adding units which perform "somewhat similar jobs" was bad for game design - at least I think something of this sort was mentioned by "them" in an interview somewhere - by adding too many units to the game. Please go away, this isn't relevant to this thread. You don't get to decide what people are referring to when they say Mech and you don't get to invade any thread with the word Mech in it and start "telling everyone how it is" with your bullshit. You are only distracting from what this thread's trying to discuss. | ||
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Qwyn
United States2779 Posts
They would rip ultras apart if you increased their damage to armored...I wonder if Blizzard will ever consider buffing the tank to help in TvP? | ||
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pOriishan
45 Posts
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DeCoup
Australia1933 Posts
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larse
1611 Posts
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Belha
Italy2850 Posts
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Everlong
Czech Republic1973 Posts
The question is when and how many tanks to get. I feel like I can get 2-3 tanks with siege mode (+few widow mines) at the start to hold of all the gateway allins and to secure natural. Then I switch to Hellbats/Thors and dual upgrades. Once my 3rd is secured, I add Ghost Academy and add few more Tanks. I'm going to experiment with Ravens instead of Ghosts today. Seeker Missile seems promising vs Immortal/Collosus and it's also very good vs Tempests, wich a lot of Protosses are switching to.. Also, once I kill a good number of Immortals with Seeker Missile (say 4-5), i think there is no reason to get Ghosts, but I might be wrong here. Both Ghosts and Ravens are good against most Protoss units. | ||
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Pookie Monster
United States303 Posts
On December 14 2012 12:20 ZjiublingZ wrote: Hey PookieMonster I watched the replays I would just like to throw out 2 ideas and see what you think. We play the style pretty much the same, but these are somethings I like to do. When I get my third I like to add 2 reactored facts (for a total of 4). As you saw you end up floating Minerals, and hellion runby's become a lot stronger as the Protoss is usually going up to 4 bases. Not to mention Hellbat's are generally just pretty good units now. The other thing I'd like to throw out there ties in with the extra reactored factories: reinforcing with Widow Mines during an attack. Usually you will get one wave of them out if you start them as you move out, they really help allowing you to retreat safely from a fight, and preserve that Thor count. Even if you win the fight and kill the expansion, often times the Protoss can snipe some Thors as you retreat with their warp-ins. On top of that, they are just good against everything and can help buffer for you if you get into an engagement and the Protoss surprises you with a bit more anti-air than you thought he had. Let me know what you think. Yes i still need to get in the habit of making more widow mines, they really are great units. raven/thor has a great habit of sniping observers too even if by accident and they always need thier robo to get out immortals. i think its better to build them as hellions and transform them to hellbats for combat so runbys are always on the table immediately. | ||
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Pookie Monster
United States303 Posts
On December 14 2012 12:21 Fyrewolf wrote: This is a fallacy. Mech also happens to be an abbreviation for mechanical, but the term mech play isn't using it as an abbreviation, but rather as a label for a specific kind of playstyle that arose in bw around the positional characteristics of tanks (just as another poster mentioned muta play, the use of muta's fast speed to harass and pin the opponent back while expanding and teching. You can get mutas without using them in muta playstyle, just as you can get tanks and not use them in a mech playstyle i.e. biomech). I'm not saying that you can't play a mech playstyle without tanks, but rather that using any mechanical factory units in a composition doesn't automatically make it mech play because mech play is not about the secondary definition of mech as an abreviation of mechanical. On topic, I'm looking forward to going through these replays and seeing how op uses and deals with the issues of thors in mid-to-late game, reminds of Thorzain's breakout games in tsl. Widow mines seem like they would help a lot, along with the recent thor changes. Do you emphasize armor upgrades or weapon upgrades in this style Pookie Monster? I tend to emphasize weapon because your main damage dealers ive seen are immortals and tempests these are high damage single hit units so the armor upgrades dont factor the way they do for zerg. | ||
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Pookie Monster
United States303 Posts
On December 14 2012 12:38 SolidZeal wrote: So I'm a primarily a protoss player, but I'm considering playing terran a lot more in HotS. Widow mines look like so much fun, and I like the new Thor. What I'm wondering about this Thor/Hellbat/WM style of mech, is if a later transition into Ghost/Tank would be good? Even with only 8 tanks and a few ghosts, I think it would be stronger than just pure Thor/HB when pushing into enemy bases. problem is once you start getting past 3 bases the toss starts making tempests or void rays, thats been my expereince. i only uploaded one tempest game because i didnt want to be redundant but they are many more and ive only won with high Thor counts the tanks just get destroyed once your anti air is killed. | ||
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Pookie Monster
United States303 Posts
On December 14 2012 15:15 pOriishan wrote: Thors are Mech but not really Mech play style :/ Nice builds from OP thought, but thor hellbats is boring I disagree its never just thor hellbat, i always have starports for ravens, banshees, dropships, i make ghosts. You can do hellion runbys, widow mine drops, banshee harrass, expo nuking. Its only as boring as you want it to be, if you just make hellbat Thor and 1 A, not only is that boring but you will likely lose vs a good toss. | ||
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CYFAWS
Sweden275 Posts
roughly: in main exp at 4 marines, factory techlab, double gas, tank, switch tech lab to starport, raven + armory, take natural. Thor. 2 factories, thor nr 2. armory nr 2. now at two bases, 3 fac(2 tech 1 reactor), 1 techport not doing anything, 2 thors, a couple of hellions and a raven. He cannot kill you at this time. Go hellion harass until 4 thors, blueflame, 1/1. get and fortify third. You cannot hold a third with your immobile metal chunks before this point. (you want ONE raven early for energy build up and planting the occasional pdd. If he shuts down hellion harass completely, get 1-3 banshees to divert attention and hellion harass anyway) Now you're set. against colossus play you scrap mech attack for air attack and get a reactorport. Keep active with hellions for scouting so you can position your retards(thors) in time. Don't let your heroraven die, it's awesome. if it dies, get ONE new. you never need more than one, it's like a mothership but good. Against tempest/ht play you ragequit. also build ~16 reactorports. If he forces a fight, all is good. keep 50% of hellions in speedmode for chasing, plant pdd. zealots fry from the hellbats, hellions chase sentries and HT, colossus melts to vikings since he doesn't have stalkers to defend them. If he has stalkers to defend them, he's dead cuz stalkers suck dick. Immortals lose their shields in one hellion/hellbat splash volley. Seriously, hellions kick ass against immortals. then the retards gomf the immortal HP. defend 4gate and similar timings with bunker + a tank with mass repair. one base immortal all-ins fuck you up, luckily noone does these and also they are easily countered once identified with more marines and bunkers. /Shitty diamond guide that probably doesn't work jack shit. Also too tired to write properly | ||
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