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Ravens are rarely used in any matchup, they popup every now and then in TvP for observer or DT detection as well as PDD placement vs stalkers. But in TvT and TvZ their use is almost inexistent, except for the recent gimmick strat of massing a critical mass of them.
These are a few points that I believe explain its underuse in TvZ, where a lot of its abilities could come in very handy. The raven is an extremely costly unit : 100m/200 gas, plus the starport w/tech lab addon which you would ideally trade for a reactor. Raven's are extremely effective against massed up groups of mutalisks and occasionally roaches. HSM can absolutely devastate a closely packed flock of mutas.
Here's the problem. If your enemy has mutas, you had better either have mass MMM or a few thors to counter. If you go the MMM route, you will need the starport and gas to pump out dropships and marauders. Additionally, MMM is an extremely mobile force with which the raven has a hard time keeping up. Additionally, the HSM is rather dangerous to use with such a mix of units as you will most likely blow up a fair portion of your own army. (Due to the small radii of marines and marauders).
The other army mixture you would use them in is mech. But no midgame T can really afford to have both ravens and thors.
Even despite all these disadvantages, Raven would be seen more if their abilities weren't so prohibitively expensive and drawn out. Your raven will pop out with just enough energy for a mobile turret (only decent in larger numbers). You need to get the 150/150 upgrade to start with 75, which still leaves you far short of PDD or HSM (which you also have to pay 150/150 for).
In matchups like TvZ, you can't afford to wait 3 minutes to get a raven up. It's all about macroing your forces back up and counter-attacking or defending.
The raven is a nice thought, but its combat readiness needs to be accelerated or the efficacy of its spells in small numbers increased significantly significantly.
To recap: the raven is not used because :
- sacrifice of dropship production
- ultra long charge up time for HSM and PDD
- high cost of upgrades (which make it barely useable)
- heavy gas investment (even though this is expected for such a techy unit).
Post your thoughts
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I agree, i want to use HSM's vs banelings, but i just can't because it's too much of a damned investment, and that HSM's take fucking 125 energy which should be reduced because right now it's fairly lolworthy, as HSM's take the second most useless skill, right after Thor's strike cannons
When they decided that "HSM's shouldn't be that good anymore" they might as well have lowered the energy cost a little.
edit: If hydra's where ever used i wouldve gotten a couple for PDD since it doesn't require a upgrade (lol, why not though, it's much better then HSM)
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Seeker Missile - "Let's make an ability that people can RUN AWAY FROM!"
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Ravens are great. Seeker Missiles are costly, but they're a great deterrent to the Mutalisk Ball of Death™. If the enemy is playing Muta/Ling/Baneling in the mid-to-late game, use the Seeker Missiles to scare off the Mutalisks and start harassing ground forces. I presume the reason Ravens aren't getting more play is that their application is much more complicated than anyone's wrapped their head around. Still think they're the next "omg imba" unit.
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First of all, "raven's" are used very often in TvT (I don't know what games you've been watching), both to detect cloaked banshees and as support against marauders with PDD. They are not underused in TvP either. Arguably they are only underused in TvZ.
They are a great support unit overall. PDD is a sick spell, autoturrets are great for harassing, and they detect. The reason they aren't as useful in TvZ is twofold: 1) most zerg units aren't affected by PDD, and the ones that are can be countered easily (hydras) or can pick off ravens too easily (muta); and 2) you don't need detection against zerg (unless they go burrowed roaches). HSMs could stand an improvement (or upgrade) that makes them never miss, but other than that I don't think they should be changed.
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On October 21 2010 17:01 MichaelJLowell wrote:
Still think they're the next "omg imba" unit.
Right now they're kinda like void rays. If you get enough to can wreak havoc. But if you have less than 6 their usefulness is iffy.
That's not to say that if you are lucky enough to have two ravens with energy for HSM you won't be able to do terrible terrible damage. It's just that there are so many better ways to use time and ressources right now
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When Zergs start getting really good about Creep Tumor spread, Ravens will get more popular to make contesting the spread of creep easier for Terrans. Terrans don't need many for this, but that's going to be a, probably the, major use for them as play gets more refined.
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Metagame metagame metagame.
They're already getting popular in TvT if you've been watching more recent matches.
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You're right imagist. I actually do use them for that when Z gets over zealous on the creep spread. As for their use in TvT, I haven't seen that many games where they have been used for PDD. vs banshees most people tend to use their dual OCs to scan.
Or perhaps I haven't been watching the right games 
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well yes they are not used because of the time investment and the gass cost.
But they are not useless and it does not cost you much.
i cant recalll which game but at MLG DC(correct me on this one if im wrong) there was this pro using ravens and they won him the game versus a zerg so you shouldnt say that ravens need a buff to be useful.
Ravens are one of the coolest units ingame and is really usefull in all the matchups, and if you go the 111 build(destiny cloud fistbuild) you dont really have to commit to them,
They are a support unit so i woud recomend getting them on 2+ bases when you can support an army and ravens. Just having 3 ravens in an army is exceptional great if you micro them correctly.
and yes i belive you can wait to get a raven out in all matchups you only need to know timing windows and when you can afford to get the raven timingwise.
And yes a buff would have been cool for the ravens as the mana costs are a bit too much at times but its nothing critical for the ravens usage.
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If hsm was even remotely viable due to its upgrade and extreme energy cost i think they would be used more. As it is now though mutas can bait and run from the first one and know that unless t invest anoter 200 gas there will be no threat from it for quite some time. tvp it is quite amazing with the banshee push and in tvt if both are going vikings+tanks one can make the difference in air superiority for the whole game. I guess i dont understand why the ability costs so much energy and an upgrade and is easily dodgable if used alone. It's a pretty much useless ability in tvp since a templar can pretty much one shot a raven if they have enough energy to use the ability.
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you should watch poltprime play from GSL 1 and check out his TvP build.
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On October 21 2010 17:10 Celadan wrote:
i cant recalll which game but at MLG DC(correct me on this one if im wrong) there was this pro using ravens and they won him the game versus a zerg so you shouldnt say that ravens need a buff to be useful.
Check that game again and you'll see that HSM actually didn't kill anything.
HSM was extremely good in early beta, but then blizzard nerfed it and now it's useless. raven+upgrade are extremely expensive and then there is energy cost which is really high. Add to that range 6 on HSM and not that big of a damage and you get ability which will never be used.
As for ravens in general, they have their use. PDD against toss is really effective. In TvT if you get to air battle with mass vikings, you will want PDD.
Auto turrets aren't that bad either, they can be used either as defensive thing or in some cases to attack opponents mineral line for harrass.
Ravens aren't core units so they won't see that much use as some other units, but they have nice abilites (pdd is great), but HSM is completely broken now.
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On October 21 2010 17:01 Nazza wrote:
Seeker Missile - "Let's make an ability that people can RUN AWAY FROM!"
That's the whole point of the Seeker missile...set it on the pack of mutas that are magic boxing your thors and they have to run away most of the time, or get utterly destroyed. It's strength is in the ability to make them run away.
Although I do agree that the energy cost should be lessened by 25 or so.
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Trouble with seeker missile is not that it's bad, it's that it's redundant because siege tank (vs ground) and thor (vs air) splash essentially does the same thing with better range, far less micro and no energy cost.
Ravens are still useful vs Z, but mostly for spotting creep tumours and burrow, they're more of a situational unit with a couple of nice bonus abilities (PDD and turret)
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Ive seen some good use of seeker missiles on high level games, qxc vs IdrA most recently.
I think, because its so slow, it forces more of a "force Zerg out of position" purpose, unless the Zerg makes a mistake and you get a lot of kills with it. Either way, lategame it'll be most likely worth the cost.
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if anything, the ravens turret is OP, based on the infested terran
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I use ravens in almost all my TvZ and they are very effective until the zerg gets mass roaches and ultras with armor uppgrades because auto turrets are so useful for drops and harass or even to support a front attack.
I use a 1/1/2 build order with marine drop + 3 ravens on main ( or cliff on LT ) followed by a an expo and it is really powerful at my level i.e: 1100-1500 diamond, dunno about higher levels.
Turrets >> Lings / bannelings / Mutas
PDD >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Mutas. ( I'm so happy when the zerg makes mutas <3 )
My transition is an expo and more rax with tech labs if he is pumping roaches. Depending on his army composition i may build more ravens and get uppgrades.
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On October 21 2010 17:09 SovSov wrote:
Metagame metagame metagame.
They're already getting popular in TvT if you've been watching more recent matches.
Metagame has nothing to do with it.
And yes, they are very good in TvT, mainly viking fights and marauder fights
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Its worth noting that Point defense drone neutralizes attacks from: Queens, Hydralisks, Mutalisks, and Corruptors.
If you are choosing to go heavy air as Terran, PDD is invaluable, because it literally shuts down all Zerg Anti-air.
Theres a thread in the forums about a guy who does some Starship troopers knock off where he does 2 base turtle and eventually has mass BC/Raven and floats to the outside of the map. Zerg mines out the entire map and can't touch the BC's because of mass PDD.
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EPT
