Well, I was messing about in sandbox mode today and I discovered something interesting about siege tanks
They refuse to overkill.
If you target an scv with 12 sieged tanks, only 1 will fire and kill the scv. If you target a CC with 12 sieged tanks, they will all fire on the first volley, and on the second volley only enough will fire to finish the CC off.
I tested with many units, and it appears the group of tanks calculates how many will be required to kill the target in the smallest number of volleys, and only those tanks engage.
This is pretty cool, and I found that all units with instant hit attacks do this.(tanks,ghosts,rines,the flying think that's hotkey is v)
The new firing calculation shouldn't effect rines or the V things much, due to their high rate of fire (their firing gets out of sync anyway) but just by itself it should make siege tanks much more powerful in masses. The old tactic of mixing in workers and such as cannon fodder will be far less effective, as each one will only absorb 1 tank hit instead of the several they would in sc1.
SOOOOO, I was like, "how can I, take advantage of this?" Well, I found a new and handy trick. It turn out if you hold the shift key while queuing up a chain of attacks, the tanks will intelligently distribute their fire among them very fast. The game will check for how many tanks it needs to kill the first target, allocate this number, then move to the next queued target nearly instantly, allocate enough for that, then on to the next target...etc.
The result is that instead of unleashing 10 tanks shots on the first marine, cooldown, 10 tank shots on the second marine, cooldown...etc.. The tanks will instead allocate one tank for each shift clicked marine, and rape all 10 of them all in about 1 second.
Try it!
Siege 4-10 tanks up in a pile, within their range build a barracks and position 6 rines far enough apart that they wont be splashed, shift queue an attack chain starting with the rax and then going through each marine,
Result: Tanks fire a few volleys to kill the rax, then quickly gun down the marines like a machine gun with one shot for each . The exact same thing can be done with ghosts (replacing the tanks, not the rines lol)
I don't think any other races have instant hit attacks,maybe immortals? But I think this is going to be most effective by far with tanks due to their long cooldown and huge damage.
IF, you are being attacked and you DO NOT target your tanks at all THEN Tanks will semi-randomly attack units coming into their range BUT never overkill, if 10 units that take 2 shots each to kill are attacking 10 tanks. THE RESULT: Possible outcomes are the tanks target all ten and bring them all to 50% health (worst possible), they double target 5 enemies and kill 5 (best possible), or any semi-random combination in between these examples.
IF, you are being attacked and you NON-QUEUE target your tanks as fast as you can THEN Tanks will double target each unit you manually click and kill it.Obviously you will target five enemies and kill these five. HOWEVER, you cannot click nearly as fast as the computer can process targets, you will end up spamming right click moving from unit to unit for the entire battle, and if you are not clicking on the next unit you want killed by the time the first target is killed, the tanks will fire randomly. THE RESULT: You will end up killing 5 units guaranteed, BUT much slower than the computer can process targets, easy to mess up, and difficult. Try this, it really doesn't work well unless you have the mouse accuracy of Legolas.
IF, you are being attacked and you QUEUE target your tanks as fast as you can. THEN The tanks will cycle through your queued targets MUCH faster without any possibility of mistake. In order to get a head start on the tanks firing, it is easier to start on a target that will take at least a whole volley to kill (say, a colossus), then queue up a chain of units, this will allow you to get well ahead of the tanks during the cool down. RESULT: With the first volley 5 units are killed machine gun style (as fast as the tanks can retarget themselves), and 5 units are already queued up to be instantly killed on the second volley. MUCH better.
SUMMARY 1. With NO targeting tanks will not waste shots, and they will be very fast, but they will pick targets poorly. 2. With STANDARD right-click targeting tanks may waste shots based on human error, target slowly, but will pick targets correctly. Like I said, this really doesn't work,it's just frantic spamming due to the unpredictable cooldowns of large tank groups. Exactly like target firing tanks in Sc1, it was only done at the start of battle or to kill super high value units. Compare this to the efficiency of... 3. With SHIFT-QUEUED targeting tanks will never waste a shot, will switch targets instantly, and pick targets perfectly. raep
Video: Thanks JoshSuth! Here is the basic idea in demo. Keep in mind that with these 7 tanks he could have killed 4 more marines in the second marine volley + Show Spoiler +
As a Terran player, and having used tanks a lot, due to the mobility of the races (Chargelots + Blink + Zerglings moving at light speed, etc.), tanks have become support. In TvT though tanks see a lot more use, and it really becomes like TvT in SC1, if no one goes 2 Starport Banshee (Scan takes care of this).
Tanks are no where near as strong as they were in BW. If you go heavy Tank you will be hurting big time on gas, and won't have enough for Ghosts/Ravens/etc.
Thanks for the find though! Against 'Toss I find tanks suck due to Immortal (Ghost cost is pretty prohibitive and bio seems to be a lot better). Against Zerg, they are important, but as support. If you get too many roaches will own them mid-game when they get burrow+movement (You will run out of scans), and zerglings are ridiculously fast ;/
Also, against zerglings you end up killing most of your marines with splash. So, I end up using only tanks against Zerg's who go heavy Hydra/Roach/Ultra.
I will say this....tanks are awesome to protect early FE on the high ground due to how the new mechanic works. Overall I look at the Tank like the Colossus/Reaver as support units.
On February 28 2010 07:02 RiGun wrote: It's the same as the snipe cast for the Ghost, you can shift+r with 3 ghosts and kill a pack of mutalisks in a second and a half.
not actually the same mechanic, the snipe queue is taking advantage of smartcast and skipping the retarget phase of the ability, while this trick is taking advantage of the fact that the game calculates damage to avoid overkill.
On February 28 2010 07:05 Rothbardian wrote:I will say this....tanks are awesome to protect early FE on the high ground due to how the new mechanic works.
Bingo. Finally someone's doing it right. As for the TvP match-up, you say Tanks aren't good vs Immortals but that's like saying Paper isn't good against Scissors. Immortals are designed to directly counter tank masses. You say Bio is better, but depending on how you build bio it can be mineral heavy or even. I would say you should try some medivac strats going marines and tanks. Medivac's heal and drop tanks, seems like an extremely solid strategy. With the new emphasis on cliffs and the fact that Colossi can't hit air, it just seems like 2 + 2 = 4 to me.
On February 28 2010 07:05 getSome[703] wrote: Does this work for units of other races as well? I know you don't mention it but I assume it should. Great find!
last paragraphs above:
I don't think any other races have instant hit attacks,maybe immortals? But I think this is going to be most effective by far with tanks due to their long cooldown and huge damage.
On February 28 2010 07:05 Rothbardian wrote:I will say this....tanks are awesome to protect early FE on the high ground due to how the new mechanic works.
Bingo. Finally someone's doing it right. As for the TvP match-up, you say Tanks aren't good vs Immortals but that's like saying Paper isn't good against Scissors. Immortals are designed to directly counter tank masses. You say Bio is better, but depending on how you build bio it can be mineral heavy or even. I would say you should try some medivac strats going marines and tanks. Medivac's heal and drop tanks, seems like an extremely solid strategy. With the new emphasis on cliffs and the fact that Colossi can't hit air, it just seems like 2 + 2 = 4 to me.
It's not even that, but tanks get taken out by blink and chargelots...since they are so gas heavy you won't have much support, and the little support you do have will be killed by your splash. One siege tank shot obliterates marines, and chargelots are on your MM in a sec. It's hard to support 2-3 Facs early before Toss gets up immortals/Colossus, and if you go heavy tank, Colossus will rape you.
You need that gas for Medivacs/Vikings and Ghosts. Gas comes much slower in SCII than in SCI.
Anyways, take that as you will from 55-31 Plat player. I actually find my Terran matchups the hardest since I have no fucking clue what I should do. Sometimes I 2 Fac if I don't see the opponent is going Banshee. Then it turns into SCI with mass siege tank lines and drops...which isn't exactly my strong point (Siege Lines) since I'm an Age/RA95 player :p
Once the game gets to that point drops are nullified by Vikings and Thors and Turrets which are a lot better in SCII than in SCI. What I've found if you can't kill off the Terran early/mid game it's going to be a long ass game 45Min-1Hr and end up in BC battles.
I think I might try some sneaky ghost nuke play and hellion harass....
You don't see how the game making micro decisions for you is dumbing down the game......? I hate this - it's a skill to not overkill units but instead split fire when you need to =/
Wow that sounds really misguided to have in the game.
I guess when you have masses of ranged units the thing to do is to shiftclick attack through every one of the enemy's units on your way to the battle and if your opponent didn't do the same thing you'll win?
jeez if everyone starts doing this it will be like whoever engages first wins
On February 28 2010 07:36 -orb- wrote: Wow that sounds really misguided to have in the game.
I guess when you have masses of ranged units the thing to do is to shiftclick attack through every one of the enemy's units on your way to the battle and if your opponent didn't do the same thing you'll win?
jeez if everyone starts doing this it will be like whoever engages first wins
hmmm, I'm not sure what to think about this one, the game is taking away overkill prevention micro (keep in mind this ONLY occurs in units whose projectiles do not take time to reach a target), but you can sort of use this tendancy as a micro trick in itself...we will see
On February 28 2010 07:36 -orb- wrote: Wow that sounds really misguided to have in the game.
I guess when you have masses of ranged units the thing to do is to shiftclick attack through every one of the enemy's units on your way to the battle and if your opponent didn't do the same thing you'll win?
jeez if everyone starts doing this it will be like whoever engages first wins
I mean, you already do this (at least if you have long ranged units), but this removes the step of making sure you don't overkill.
Meh, I don't see it as a HUGE deal but it's not something I like. Is the zergling vs probe problem still in the game? (I don't play zerg - but the one where if you told 6 lings to attack a probe in a mineral path, they would spread out and attack different ones)?
On February 28 2010 07:17 Rothbardian wrote:It's not even that, but tanks get taken out by blink and chargelots...since they are so gas heavy you won't have much support, and the little support you do have will be killed by your splash. One siege tank shot obliterates marines, and chargelots are on your MM in a sec. It's hard to support 2-3 Facs early before Toss gets up immortals/Colossus, and if you go heavy tank, Colossus will rape you.
You need that gas for Medivacs/Vikings and Ghosts. Gas comes much slower in SCII than in SCI.
Anyways, take that as you will from 55-31 Plat player. I actually find my Terran matchups the hardest since I have no fucking clue what I should do. Sometimes I 2 Fac if I don't see the opponent is going Banshee. Then it turns into SCI with mass siege tank lines and drops...which isn't exactly my strong point (Siege Lines) since I'm an Age/RA95 player :p
Once the game gets to that point drops are nullified by Vikings and Thors and Turrets which are a lot better in SCII than in SCI. What I've found if you can't kill off the Terran early/mid game it's going to be a long ass game 45Min-1Hr and end up in BC battles.
I think I might try some sneaky ghost nuke play and hellion harass....
But how do stalkers get sight of tanks on a cliff? Turrets > Observers. You say Chargelots > Marines, but are Chargelots > Helions?
I see tank strats being extremely effective in SC2, just no one seems to do them right. I don't know of any hybrid bio/mech strats for SCI yet people seem to think they can mass M&M and still make tanks.
This is probably due to units dying instantly instead of on the next frame, and since dead units can't be attacked the tanks simply choose another target.
great find, big tnx to u, altho im not using siege tanks so much
ye i thought the same thing as u chill :p the tanks will spread out even if ur not touching them? and same goes to all ranged units without projectiles?
On February 28 2010 07:17 Rothbardian wrote:It's not even that, but tanks get taken out by blink and chargelots...since they are so gas heavy you won't have much support, and the little support you do have will be killed by your splash. One siege tank shot obliterates marines, and chargelots are on your MM in a sec. It's hard to support 2-3 Facs early before Toss gets up immortals/Colossus, and if you go heavy tank, Colossus will rape you.
You need that gas for Medivacs/Vikings and Ghosts. Gas comes much slower in SCII than in SCI.
Anyways, take that as you will from 55-31 Plat player. I actually find my Terran matchups the hardest since I have no fucking clue what I should do. Sometimes I 2 Fac if I don't see the opponent is going Banshee. Then it turns into SCI with mass siege tank lines and drops...which isn't exactly my strong point (Siege Lines) since I'm an Age/RA95 player :p
Once the game gets to that point drops are nullified by Vikings and Thors and Turrets which are a lot better in SCII than in SCI. What I've found if you can't kill off the Terran early/mid game it's going to be a long ass game 45Min-1Hr and end up in BC battles.
I think I might try some sneaky ghost nuke play and hellion harass....
But how do stalkers get sight of tanks on a cliff? Turrets > Observers. You say Chargelots > Marines, but are Chargelots > Helions?
I see tank strats being extremely effective in SC2, just no one seems to do them right. I don't know of any hybrid bio/mech strats for SCI yet people seem to think they can mass M&M and still make tanks.
It seems that of those, only the Tank, Thor, and Immortal actually do enough damage for this to be of huge consequence, and even then, it's not necessarily worth using in all situations. Good to know about, but I don't think it will have an overly large impact on micro, especially since I haven't seen any of those units in large enough numbers that splitting damage manually would be especially hard.
Very nice. I don't think waypointing is needed tho is it? If an ally had the 10 marines in your tank range and broke alliance they would still not overkill and chain the whole lot down. Waypoint targeting key units in a wave will be very very good with this system tho, because lack of overkill will stop wasted shots. Exellent find!
On February 28 2010 08:04 PredY wrote: well it's better to target fire the hydras rather than let the tanks target the lings and kill half of your marines in the process
^^
Must watch battles closer instead of focusing on Macro :p
Would be cool if tanks were stronger but don't auto attack. Intense games ensued. Probably not going to happen with the current direction the game's going though.
On February 28 2010 08:04 PredY wrote: well it's better to target fire the hydras rather than let the tanks target the lings and kill half of your marines in the process
Don't think that even works because tanks would autofire as soon as something's in range. Unless you can preset waypoints without getting the "out of range" message.
On February 28 2010 07:56 Chill wrote: Cool. If you just let them fire automatically wouldn't they do this anyways? What's the advantage to queuing manually?
Does the AI do it normally? It seems hard to believe it would, given that 1) it would have to work differently (e.g. if you make the units force-attack, it's just a slight modification to how smartcast works, while letting the AI do it means that every unit's AI needs to know what other units are firing at to avoid overkill) and 2) that removes all focus-fire micro altogether, since the computer would optimize A-moved units' attacks.
On February 28 2010 07:56 Chill wrote: Cool. If you just let them fire automatically wouldn't they do this anyways? What's the advantage to queuing manually?
If I understand the OP correctly, you could get scenarios like the following:
4 tanks sieged vs. 4 enemy units (which, for the sake of argument, die in 2 tank shots). The most optimal tank "volley" is for the tanks to focus fire and kill 2 of the enemy units. It's possible, however, that each tank will fire at a different enemy unit. This leaves you with 4 enemy units at half health, and it's pretty clear why this is worse than having 2 enemy units at full health. I think this is why queuing manually is important. 'Course I could have misunderstood. I have no way of testing it myself.
Marines aren't an ideal test subject because they die in one shot, I think.
On February 28 2010 07:56 Chill wrote: Cool. If you just let them fire automatically wouldn't they do this anyways? What's the advantage to queuing manually?
They do? When I have the unit autofire, it seems like they just fire on the closest unit then more on to the next. I don't remember the game ever attempt to do any focus fire.
On February 28 2010 07:56 Chill wrote: Cool. If you just let them fire automatically wouldn't they do this anyways? What's the advantage to queuing manually?
I was just thinking that too and wondering what the hell am I missing that others are so thrilled about...
Then I realized that it does make a difference to queue manually, because if you don't they could theoretically each target a different unit and spread their fire 'too thin'. So, if you had 10 tanks vs 10 tanks, those which are queued manually will kill the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and so on in the most efficient way, while those on automatic fire, assuming they're not imba-tweaked too, could each target a different tank which would be a bad approach.
Now, I pray to god they don't have a protection against spreading fire too thin That would seriously suck ass
This is surprising, last night when I was watching some streams and youtube videous, I realised something quite similar. I think units with splash damage prioritise clumped up units if the player doesn't give specific targets for attack. I.e if there is a lone roach at point A and 2 roaches hugging each other at point B, assuming both points are in the firing range of the colossus, colossus targets the roaches at point B first for its first attack cycle.
It can be just weird coincedence though and i might be wrong of course
Tanks will acquire the closest target first, and they will not change target until that one is dead.. then they will switch to the other closest one. Thats my experience with them.
On February 28 2010 08:30 CowGoMoo wrote: Just a result of tank damage being instant and there not being a projectile. They won't overkill a unit because they can't attack a dead unit...
It didn't work like this in SC1 and tank damage was damn near instant.
It seems that of those, only the Tank, Thor, and Immortal actually do enough damage for this to be of huge consequence, and even then, it's not necessarily worth using in all situations. Good to know about, but I don't think it will have an overly large impact on micro, especially since I haven't seen any of those units in large enough numbers that splitting damage manually would be especially hard.
If "this" refers to a no-overkill mechanic then you forgot about the unit it matters the most for: the baneling. 's one of the big reasons why banelings are much more masseable than scourge. Well, splash damage being the other^^
I actually do not really mind this feature, the only thing i am hoping is that shortened attack animation so that i can move between the attacks again.
IF, you are being attacked and you DO NOT target your tanks at all THEN Tanks will semi-randomly attack units coming into their range BUT never overkill, if 10 units that take 2 shots each to kill are attacking 10 tanks. THE RESULT: Possible outcomes are the tanks target all ten and bring them all to 50% health (worst possible), they double target 5 enemies and kill 5 (best possible), or any semi-random combination in between these examples.
IF, you are being attacked and you NON-QUEUE target your tanks as fast as you can THEN Tanks will double target each unit you manually click and kill it.Obviously you will target five enemies and kill these five. HOWEVER, you cannot click nearly as fast as the computer can process targets, you will end up spamming right click moving from unit to unit for the entire battle, and if you are not clicking on the next unit you want killed by the time the first target is killed, the tanks will fire randomly. THE RESULT: You will end up killing 5 units guaranteed, BUT, VERY much slower than the computer can process targets, easy to mess up, and difficult. Try this, it really doesn't work well unless you have the mouse accuracy of Legolas.
IF, you are being attacked and you QUEUE target your tanks as fast as you can. THEN The tanks will cycle through your queued targets MUCH faster than humanly possible without any possibility of mistake. In order to get a head start on the tanks firing, it is easier to start on a target that will take at least a whole volley to kill (say, a colossus), then queue up a chain of units, this will allow you to get well ahead of the tanks during the cool down. RESULT: With the first volley 5 units are killed machine gun style (as fast as the tanks can retarget themselves), and 5 units are already queued up to be instantly killed on the second volley. MUCH better.
SUMMARY 1. With NO targeting tanks will not waste shots, and they will be very fast, but they will pick targets poorly. 2. With STANDARD right-click targeting tanks may waste shots based on human error, target slowly, but will pick targets correctly. Like I said, this really doesn't work,it's just frantic spamming due to the unpredictable cooldowns of large tank groups. Exactly like target firing tanks in Sc1, it was only done at the start of battle or to kill super high value units. Compare this to the efficiency of... 3. With SHIFT-QUEUED targeting tanks will never waste a shot, will switch targets instantly, and pick targets perfectly. raep
On February 28 2010 08:30 CowGoMoo wrote: Just a result of tank damage being instant and there not being a projectile. They won't overkill a unit because they can't attack a dead unit...
It didn't work like this in SC1 and tank damage was damn near instant.
I noticed this with turrets, who in BW, would keep firing until the thing disappeared from existence, now they just shoot enough and move on to other targets, or stop firing.
On February 28 2010 07:56 Chill wrote: Cool. If you just let them fire automatically wouldn't they do this anyways? What's the advantage to queuing manually?
If I understand the OP correctly, you could get scenarios like the following:
4 tanks sieged vs. 4 enemy units (which, for the sake of argument, die in 2 tank shots). The most optimal tank "volley" is for the tanks to focus fire and kill 2 of the enemy units. It's possible, however, that each tank will fire at a different enemy unit. This leaves you with 4 enemy units at half health, and it's pretty clear why this is worse than having 2 enemy units at full health. I think this is why queuing manually is important. 'Course I could have misunderstood. I have no way of testing it myself.
Marines aren't an ideal test subject because they die in one shot, I think.
xactly, not to mention good targeting for maximum splash damage.
The marines are used for the example just to show off how fast the tanks chain through and rape them, its pretty sick if you try it.
On February 28 2010 08:30 CowGoMoo wrote: Just a result of tank damage being instant and there not being a projectile. They won't overkill a unit because they can't attack a dead unit...
It didn't work like this in SC1 and tank damage was damn near instant.
near instant =/= instant
I am just saying this is a result of the damage being applied instantly, and not some super AI ez-mode micro feature.
On February 28 2010 09:25 EximoSua wrote: Things like these are the elements that will continually get discovered that shut up all the morons saying "this game has no micro". Good find, man.
They will just change the complaint to something even lamer like "OK, we admit it has micro but it's not the kind that we enjoy!"
On February 28 2010 08:30 CowGoMoo wrote: Just a result of tank damage being instant and there not being a projectile. They won't overkill a unit because they can't attack a dead unit...
It didn't work like this in SC1 and tank damage was damn near instant.
near instant =/= instant
I am just saying this is a result of the damage being applied instantly, and not some super AI ez-mode micro feature.
I bet you could do this with Marines in SCBW.
That's OK then. I'm only really against my units doing things for me, even if the end result is the same.
IF, you are being attacked and you DO NOT target your tanks at all THEN Tanks will semi-randomly attack units coming into their range BUT never overkill, if 10 units that take 2 shots each to kill are attacking 10 tanks. THE RESULT: Possible outcomes are the tanks target all ten and bring them all to 50% health (worst possible), they double target 5 enemies and kill 5 (best possible), or any semi-random combination in between these examples.
IF, you are being attacked and you NON-QUEUE target your tanks as fast as you can THEN Tanks will double target each unit you manually click and kill it.Obviously you will target five enemies and kill these five. HOWEVER, you cannot click nearly as fast as the computer can process targets, you will end up spamming right click moving from unit to unit for the entire battle, and if you are not clicking on the next unit you want killed by the time the first target is killed, the tanks will fire randomly. THE RESULT: You will end up killing 5 units guaranteed, BUT, VERY much slower than the computer can process targets, easy to mess up, and difficult. Try this, it really doesn't work well unless you have the mouse accuracy of Legolas.
IF, you are being attacked and you QUEUE target your tanks as fast as you can. THEN The tanks will cycle through your queued targets MUCH faster than humanly possible without any possibility of mistake. In order to get a head start on the tanks firing, it is easier to start on a target that will take at least a whole volley to kill (say, a colossus), then queue up a chain of units, this will allow you to get well ahead of the tanks during the cool down. RESULT: With the first volley 5 units are killed machine gun style (as fast as the tanks can retarget themselves), and 5 units are already queued up to be instantly killed on the second volley. MUCH better.
SUMMARY 1. With NO targeting tanks will not waste shots, and they will be very fast, but they will pick targets poorly. 2. With STANDARD right-click targeting tanks may waste shots based on human error, target slowly, but will pick targets correctly. Like I said, this really doesn't work,it's just frantic spamming due to the unpredictable cooldowns of large tank groups. Exactly like target firing tanks in Sc1, it was only done at the start of battle or to kill super high value units. Compare this to the efficiency of... 3. With SHIFT-QUEUED targeting tanks will never waste a shot, will switch targets instantly, and pick targets perfectly. raep
You are all missing the most important point, the tanks waste a huge amount of damage if you let them fire on their own! Why? You know, tanks do splash damage! By firing on the nearest unit you waste half of the splash! But, with manual targeting you can get them to really take advantage of that splash! 6 tanks can theoretically kill somewhere around 30 marines in one volley but they don't since their targeting sucks!
On February 28 2010 07:19 rA.BreeZe wrote: *waits for someone to complain about how this will make sc2 suck*
Personally I believe that this makes the game suck; because this is a thing that required some micro/decision making/time consumption. If we believe that this is good, then why not have "auto-muta micro" or hurt units auto run back?
IF, you are being attacked and you DO NOT target your tanks at all THEN Tanks will semi-randomly attack units coming into their range BUT never overkill, if 10 units that take 2 shots each to kill are attacking 10 tanks. THE RESULT: Possible outcomes are the tanks target all ten and bring them all to 50% health (worst possible), they double target 5 enemies and kill 5 (best possible), or any semi-random combination in between these examples.
IF, you are being attacked and you NON-QUEUE target your tanks as fast as you can THEN Tanks will double target each unit you manually click and kill it.Obviously you will target five enemies and kill these five. HOWEVER, you cannot click nearly as fast as the computer can process targets, you will end up spamming right click moving from unit to unit for the entire battle, and if you are not clicking on the next unit you want killed by the time the first target is killed, the tanks will fire randomly. THE RESULT: You will end up killing 5 units guaranteed, BUT, VERY much slower than the computer can process targets, easy to mess up, and difficult. Try this, it really doesn't work well unless you have the mouse accuracy of Legolas.
IF, you are being attacked and you QUEUE target your tanks as fast as you can. THEN The tanks will cycle through your queued targets MUCH faster than humanly possible without any possibility of mistake. In order to get a head start on the tanks firing, it is easier to start on a target that will take at least a whole volley to kill (say, a colossus), then queue up a chain of units, this will allow you to get well ahead of the tanks during the cool down. RESULT: With the first volley 5 units are killed machine gun style (as fast as the tanks can retarget themselves), and 5 units are already queued up to be instantly killed on the second volley. MUCH better.
SUMMARY 1. With NO targeting tanks will not waste shots, and they will be very fast, but they will pick targets poorly. 2. With STANDARD right-click targeting tanks may waste shots based on human error, target slowly, but will pick targets correctly. Like I said, this really doesn't work,it's just frantic spamming due to the unpredictable cooldowns of large tank groups. Exactly like target firing tanks in Sc1, it was only done at the start of battle or to kill super high value units. Compare this to the efficiency of... 3. With SHIFT-QUEUED targeting tanks will never waste a shot, will switch targets instantly, and pick targets perfectly. raep
You are all missing the most important point, the tanks waste a huge amount of damage if you let them fire on their own! Why? You know, tanks do splash damage! By firing on the nearest unit you waste half of the splash! But, with manual targeting you can get them to really take advantage of that splash! 6 tanks can theoretically kill somewhere around 30 marines in one volley but they don't since their targeting sucks!
I didn't forget..
On February 28 2010 09:18 sob3k wrote: xactly, not to mention good targeting for maximum splash damage.
The marines are used for the example just to show off how fast the tanks chain through and rape them, its pretty sick if you try it.
I actually wonder if this could be a much needed boost for tanks, with a little bit of practice you should be able to literally get tanks firing perfectly, which could be pretty ridiculous. Sux that my actual beta time is limited to mooching off of a friend...
I haven't tried this myself, and I won't get to try this untill the game is out, but I don't really like how this sounds. I don't want my units to make clever decisions on my behalf, I want to be able to prac my ass off so I can do this better than my opponents and get an advantage by learning this.
I think stuff like this will make SC2 less appealing to the pro Koreans as it will take less practice to achieve gosu micro, and they will be less ahead of us mortals despite the massive amounts of time they put into it.
Sure there might be some aspects of Siege Tank micro left like maximizing the use of splash damage, but that was there to be learned in SC as well.
After learning about this, I tried to put it into practice in a couple of matches, but perhaps I'm still just not good enough to do it quickly and effectively. It takes a fast hand to be able to do this with moving units in a raid or assault setting.
I decided to mess around with the siege tank as well and see what other "new" things it had. It was a bit interesting to see the siege/unsiege being two different hotkeys. But the more interesting mechanic was the ability to queue up the tanks commands. For example... you have a tank that is sieged but you want to move it up a bit and re-siege. You can basically unsiege, shift move, shift siege and the command is done correctly.
I am currently posting in this thread that I didn't read; voicing my SC1 elitist concerns that were already addressed. Read what I say and continue to respond with the same answer even though my complaints have already been addressed. I will now continue to be a shit poster while not reading anything before I speak. Thank you for your time.
I must be missing something because I cannot see how shift+queuing attacks can be practical in the real game. You can do it once units to be shot at are in tanks' range. But by the time they are in range and visible, tanks will already have started firing. When exactly do you have time to order tanks to attack specific units in a real game?
On February 28 2010 08:30 CowGoMoo wrote: Just a result of tank damage being instant and there not being a projectile. They won't overkill a unit because they can't attack a dead unit...
It didn't work like this in SC1 and tank damage was damn near instant.
near instant =/= instant
I am just saying this is a result of the damage being applied instantly, and not some super AI ez-mode micro feature.
I bet you could do this with Marines in SCBW.
Units die on the next frame in BW, so you can't do this with any unit, even the ones that hit instantly. Start the game in single player and slow the game speed to the minimum and attack some units, you'll see every unit with 0 hp when the deathblow hits and the unit will explode after that. You won't notice this while playing, since it's for 0.04 of a second.
In SC2 you won't see an unit with 0 hp, they die instantly.
Banelings also deal damage instantly and they would pretty useless if they overkilled like in BW.
I might be in the minority on this but...I don't really like this mechanic from a "realism" perspective. IE I like how turrets will fire nonstop at an observer until it's dead and over-kill because you would imagine that's what would happen in real life- not a line of tanks knowing and firing exactly enough to kill a target and no over-killing.
GAMEWISE- I don't think this mechanic "dumbs" the game down at all. I actually think it's the opposite, and as an "advanced micro trick" it's something that a better player will use to gain an advantage. As people have been suggesting- it seems like it will be very very difficult to pull off correctly in a real game situation.
tbh i find it hard to believe that the tanks split up their fire automatically even if 1 target is the closest
so if 10 zealots attack 10 tanks i dont think each tank will attack 1 attack on each and every zealot, that doesnt make any sense at all. the tanks should just keep fireing the closest target to himself. most logically the zealots in front will die first
the only difference between sc1 and sc2 is if a zealot is within range of sc1 tanks all tanks will fire (they react slower that the unit is dead) and in sc2 they react instantly that the unit is dead so they dont overfire
my main point is queing up all attacks sounds really stupid unless as mentioned before in this vod "vs hydra + ling"
now if OP really wanna prove to us that 10 siege mode tanks split their fire on all 10 different zealots then make a vod of that plz
On February 28 2010 20:17 MorroW wrote: tbh i find it hard to believe that the tanks split up their fire automatically even if 1 target is the closest
so if 10 zealots attack 10 tanks i dont think each tank will attack 1 attack on each and every zealot, that doesnt make any sense at all. the tanks should just keep fireing the closest target to himself. most logically the zealots in front will die first
the only difference between sc1 and sc2 is if a zealot is within range of sc1 tanks all tanks will fire (they react slower that the unit is dead) and in sc2 they react instantly that the unit is dead so they dont overfire
my main point is queing up all attacks sounds really stupid unless as mentioned before in this vod "vs hydra + ling"
now if OP really wanna prove to us that 10 siege mode tanks split their fire on all 10 different zealots then make a vod of that plz
The OP didn't claim that the tanks would split their fire evenly. All he stated was the lack of overkill, and expanded on the reason for queueing attacks instead of letting tanks autofire. Go and read the post again.
As for queueing up all attacks, this isn't stupid at all: if done correctly it gives a huge advantage to the terran player, as his tanks are now operating perfectly, assuming correct targeting. However, it'll take a lot of micro/eapm to pull off in an extended battle, so people with better mechanics can get more out of their tanks.
On February 28 2010 22:19 Catch]22 wrote: Doesn't look like its any different to SC1 here. Sounds more like shots being instant rather than having an AI that calculates who to shoot.
If you did that in BW, all siege tanks would shoot the first marine AT THE SAME TIME.
Doesn't look like its any different to SC1 here. Sounds more like shots being instant rather than having an AI that calculates who to shoot.
wtf are u talking about? tanks NEVER did that in sc1bw and its humanly impossible to manual fire each individual marine that fast in such succession. whether its a result of atks being instant or not show me a vid of tanks doing that in sc1bw pls.
Doesn't look like its any different to SC1 here. Sounds more like shots being instant rather than having an AI that calculates who to shoot.
wtf are u talking about? tanks NEVER did that in sc1bw and its humanly impossible to manual fire each individual marine that fast in such succession. whether its a result of atks being instant or not show me a vid of tanks doing that in sc1bw pls.
cause tanks in SC1 didn't have instant damage o_O and apparently in SC2 units can't hit another unit at very same time (you can see it that youtube video above. edit: or may be you can't ) as somebody said already unit can't shoot dead, so 1st tank shoots, hits and kills marine, 2nd tank can't shoot simulteneously, so he waits till 1st one shoot, then he sees that mariner is dead and shoot something else.
why on earth are people having such a tough time understanding the concept of this.. should be pretty damn easy, especially with the VODs showing that. Nice find.
I might be in the minority on this but...I don't really like this mechanic from a "realism" perspective. IE I like how turrets will fire nonstop at an observer until it's dead and over-kill because you would imagine that's what would happen in real life- not a line of tanks knowing and firing exactly enough to kill a target and no over-killing.
Why? It makes sense to me that in a tank/artillery battle, commanders would coordinate their fire to maximize effectiveness.
On February 28 2010 22:19 Catch]22 wrote: Doesn't look like its any different to SC1 here. Sounds more like shots being instant rather than having an AI that calculates who to shoot.
If you did that in BW, all siege tanks would shoot the first marine AT THE SAME TIME.
Doesn't look like its any different to SC1 here. Sounds more like shots being instant rather than having an AI that calculates who to shoot.
wtf are u talking about? tanks NEVER did that in sc1bw and its humanly impossible to manual fire each individual marine that fast in such succession. whether its a result of atks being instant or not show me a vid of tanks doing that in sc1bw pls.
He's acknowledging what a previous poster said, that this exists with other units in SC1 that do instant damage. It's not a product of a smarter AI, but simply the fact that tanks now do instant damage.
This is something I wanted to test but I'm not in the beta. Imagine if scourge were in sc2. Or rather, this is why they really couldn't be in starcraft 2..
On March 01 2010 03:47 TheYango wrote: He's acknowledging what a previous poster said, that this exists with other units in SC1 that do instant damage. It's not a product of a smarter AI, but simply the fact that tanks now do instant damage.
Like was said, this is probably a product of destruction being calculated instantly. IOW the tanks shoot sequentially on processor-level (to us it looks instantaneous ofcourse) and when enough have fired to destroy a building/unit, the next tanks will already see it as destroyed and pick different targets.
So the AI isn't smarter but the conclusions that this is very different from sc:bw is still valid.
On March 01 2010 09:21 EsX_Raptor wrote: Hell the code must be fucking fast to determine what to shoot given that tanks have instantaneous attacks!
Is that sarcasm? In case it is not, it looks like instantaneous to our slow-ass human brains but the tanks shoot in sequence in the code that is why they don't shoot at targets that are dead already anymore. An average CPU these days does like 50 billion computations per second.
On February 28 2010 20:17 MorroW wrote: tbh i find it hard to believe that the tanks split up their fire automatically even if 1 target is the closest
so if 10 zealots attack 10 tanks i dont think each tank will attack 1 attack on each and every zealot, that doesnt make any sense at all. the tanks should just keep fireing the closest target to himself. most logically the zealots in front will die first
the only difference between sc1 and sc2 is if a zealot is within range of sc1 tanks all tanks will fire (they react slower that the unit is dead) and in sc2 they react instantly that the unit is dead so they dont overfire
my main point is queing up all attacks sounds really stupid unless as mentioned before in this vod "vs hydra + ling"
now if OP really wanna prove to us that 10 siege mode tanks split their fire on all 10 different zealots then make a vod of that plz
So this is a bad feature for you?
Get real man, stop living 100 years in the past and stop whining, this is a great feature.
It used to be a skill to draw tank fire in the right way with reaver and templar drops. Just put an extra 2-4 tanks at a base and you have nothing to worry about. Positional play will also be less relevant. Dumb 'em down please.
That's pretty neat. I'm probably too slow to utilize this most of the time (and I generally don't have that many tanks) but it's definitely something to consider.
EPT
)
