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Fun for Abathur:
- normal toxic nest expand - don't make any units other than mutas and spines for defence (a lot of drones and spines) - collect all biomass - upgrades +1 attack -> splash, regen, tech to hive, +armored dmg, +2,+3 and carapase - works against everything on brutal mutations (even against parasitic bombs and HSMs, just be careful at start) - it's not as OP as Vorazun, but very close. You can't carry everyone, but carry you can.
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On May 22 2016 05:56 monk wrote: After playing this mutator with all the commanders a few times, I've come to the conclusion of the following rankings:
6. Artanis: Immortal/Dragon/Reaver can do well here, but you'll need constantly good macro and a good build as well as some support from your ally.
As someone who basically only plays Artanis in Co-Op, I find building Tempest the far better tactic in Mutator.
The early game is going to be somewhat tough as you attempt to expand quickly, defend your base, and take out the train but this really holds true with Immortal/Dragoon/Reaver as well, so I can't really discredit the Tempest tech for this. But what makes Tempest works so much better, imo, is that I know full hardheartedly that my limiting factor for making Tempest will be Gas with excess amount of Minerals. You only need 1 Stargate as your gas income on 2 base is a bit higher then the Tempest cost whenever it becomes available to Warp-In + upgrades.
Early game tends to be warp-in 3-5 Zealots as quickly as possible to destroy rocks and take out the first train. During this time, if you time to spare minerals on Photon Cannons for the Main & natural base, that really helps. Make Dragoon only when necessary. During the early game, it's all about conserving gas to tech to Fleet Beacon while expanding.That may sound hard, but doable when you're not wasting Zealots.
The hardest challenge is the time period of the 2 & 3 train when you're in the middle of massing Tempest. For the 2nd train, I use Solar Bombardment to clear the enemy wave and deal as much damage as possible with around 2-4 Tempest (depending on upgrades & alley). During this time, you should never a lot of gas to use, but have excess minerals. So use that minerals on Zealots & Photon Cannon for base defense & assisting destroying Trains. If you can make it to the 3rd train with around 5-8 Tempests, you're basically set for the game. Just keep making Tempest whenever you can, get upgrades and make sure to get Disintegration.
The advantages of Tempest tends to be 4-fold:
1- Artanis BEST Anti-Air option, bar none This is actually my biggest issue with Immortal/Dragon/Reaver comp or HT/Archon comps. They aren't good enough to deal with the late game Mass Air (Like Mass Battlecrusier & Liberator or Carriers with Void Rays) without a lot of support from alley and great mirco/marco. If you get a lot of Tempest (12-20 Tempest), they can destroy all those air comps and those ground comps.
2 - They are Air Units who can attack ALL ground units This is important because they NEVER take any damage from the constant wave of units but can kill everything that comes along. 2-4 plus Photon Cannon Support is a good enough defense, but once you get 5-9, they can defend their side from any harassment. 10+ Tempest and they can support themselves most of the time. Warp-In Zealots when needed (only Warp in Dragoon if you really need to kill air units). The only time you have to keep an eye on them is when an attack/train is coming.
3 - Disintegration is Really Good at killing the Hybrid or the Trains or anything really tanky It does 500 damage over 20 seconds, with a range like 9 or 10. IT's really useful and makes killing Anti-Air units much easier or the train. And when you have a lot of Tempest, just spam that ability on anything with over 160 health, and you shouldn't see a lot of resistance against the Tempest.
4 - COST EFFICIENCY Unlike the Reaver, they don't keep costing minerals late in the game, meaning I can just make more defense or Zealots. And if you have the Guardian Shell mastery (which heals all units), this just makes them even MORE tanky when they are already the tankist unit in the game. Even Viper with Adbuct & Parasitic Bomb isn't good enough alone to kill all the Tempest if your half-paying attention.
These points are why I think Tempest tech is the best option. I personally don't really need the splash damage from the Reaver. If I really did, I would just get the whirlwind upgrade for the Zealot.
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Russian Federation1611 Posts
Btw, can anyone explain how to get that morph 50 Brutalisks or Leviaphans during one mission achievement?
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It's morph 50 Ravagers, Guardians, and/or Devourers in one mission, not Brutalisks and Leviathans. Just go pure roach and morph them into ravagers, you'll get it easily.
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On May 22 2016 23:50 The Bottle wrote:Show nested quote +On May 22 2016 15:00 Rizare wrote: Hmm, seems I suck really hard as Kerrigan on brutal diff. I have a really hard time snowballing her off the beginning my units don't live to be part of the next group of units. I'm currently lvl 13 and it doesn't help that I'm not sure what to go against the AI despite guessing their comp.
The worst is when I fight a zerg AI who goes ling/banelings/scourges/vipers because they have a lot of unit and toward the endgame, I end up with constant 1 fps. It's at least slightly more bearable on lowest gfx settings but using lurkers and burrow is hard because of it or splitting units vs irradiate or fungal growth. The best way to keep Kerrigan's army alive is to know when Kerrigan can take on a wave by herself, and then doing so while leaving the army behind. You pretty much only want to do that for the first bunch of waves. Though you not being level 15 might make it a hell of a lot harder, since you don't have that 50% energy regeneration buff at level 15. It also helps to keep your army alive by keeping the creep spread. They regenerate very fast on it. If you have queens in your army to keep that spread (which you should) they can also transfuse weak expensive units, like lurkers or even hydras. Kerrigan as the one woman army early game helped me a lot, thanks. Even before lvl 15, she does OK. For queens, it's hard to use them because fps takes a dip down with so many units around, especially when it's a zerg AI going ling/bling/scourges/vipers. That's why I avoid lurkers even if I can just hotkey them to a different key for burrow. Now that the mutation has been done, I don't feel like trying again cause of how many units there are.
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Playing as Raynor, I've noticed that on the brutal mutation you've gotta keep up in upgrades otherwise your marines will do nothing but tickle the high tech units sent at you later on. Also, pray you don't spawn on the left base cause you'll have liberators and bcs bombarding you non-stop. I've mainly won with Vorazun and Kerax allies. Zerg allies seem to taper off later on leading to lost games with one or two trains remaining.
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For abathur..
Are brutalisks or leviathans better?
Also should you prioritise armour or attack upgrades. It's so gas heavy getting both. Especially if upgrading both ground and air.
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Brutalisks are usually better because of their AOE and deep tunnel, but harder to keep alive since almost everything can hit them (especially vs liberators, they melt really quick). Attack upgrades are better because you can stack tons of health on your important units to keep them alive, so you don't really need armor that much. I usually end up upgrading everything though because Abathur is easy to max out and you end up with extra gas in the bank.
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@The Bottle : OK, just did a couple of Mech Raynor missions. It works really really well on some maps. Pretty terrible on others though 
I concede that sometimes, the mass vulture (20+) can indeed work
I am closing in on finishing a quick Aba guide, but I am sad to say that I didn't discover anything extraordinary (yes, Vipers or OP, etc...)
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I really like mech raynor on temple, it's extremely powerful on this map as long as i don't get paired against an air composition. Once the timings are figured out, the temple will most likely lose 0 hp with those widow mines.
Other maps just feel like too fast paced, maybe it's because that i can't macro/micro properly while planting mines everywhere. So I still go bio and pray a non air comp.
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On May 23 2016 10:26 fezvez wrote:@The Bottle : OK, just did a couple of Mech Raynor missions. It works really really well on some maps. Pretty terrible on others though  I concede that sometimes, the mass vulture (20+) can indeed work I am closing in on finishing a quick Aba guide, but I am sad to say that I didn't discover anything extraordinary (yes, Vipers or OP, etc...)
Like I said I only do it for the temple, train, and lock & load. For every other map, yeah, it sucks, but it's great on those. The train may be the one for which it's the hardest (and it would probably fail miserably on the train mutation), but it's still really strong as long as you're on top of your multitasking, and get the right units (don't solely rely on spider mines for your anti-ground on that one).
On May 23 2016 11:02 heaveshade wrote: I really like mech raynor on temple, it's extremely powerful on this map as long as i don't get paired against an air composition. Once the timings are figured out, the temple will most likely lose 0 hp with those widow mines.
Other maps just feel like too fast paced, maybe it's because that i can't macro/micro properly while planting mines everywhere. So I still go bio and pray a non air comp.
It's still really strong against an air comp, as long as you get your vikings & turrets quickly, and stay on top of them for defense. Air compositions still get a lot of ground, and you'll still trivialize that ground with mines. You just have to focus less on planting mines and more on your AA. Vikings are still amazing for that. On maps where I do get bio, I still get vikings to complement them if the AI goes air.
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Australia18228 Posts
New mutation is up, I think Raynor's the best for this week since scan+medics kind of nullify the mutations
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On May 23 2016 11:02 heaveshade wrote: I really like mech raynor on temple, it's extremely powerful on this map as long as i don't get paired against an air composition. Once the timings are figured out, the temple will most likely lose 0 hp with those widow mines.
Other maps just feel like too fast paced, maybe it's because that i can't macro/micro properly while planting mines everywhere. So I still go bio and pray a non air comp. Whoa, mech Raynor has some of the best anit air! On temple don't waste gas on siege tanks, your mines can easily handle all the AoE you need for just minerals and APM. Spend all gas on vikings with the + range and +AoE damage upgrades.
My Raynor build is 1 factory with tech lab for the vulture upgrades, 2 starports (one tech lab for the viking ugprades, the other reactored), then I have my barracks keep floating around building reactors and eventually switch to 1 reactored factory, 2 reactored starports just pumping out vultures and vikings. Works great on temple and shuttles if you know the spawn patterns.
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United States8476 Posts
Please use the mutation-specific threads to discuss each week's mutation from now on!
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I've been trying out muta builds with Abathur recently and I really underestimated them. If you get a few mutas out early to suck up biomass while getting the rapid regeneration/6x bounce/2x armored upgrades you can get by without needing roaches or ultimate evolutions at all. 100 biomass mutas are basically invulnerable (620 HP with 100% damage leech), are extremely fast, and do insane damage. I've soloed most of several maps with just 8-16 mutalisks. There's nothing the AI can do to stop you either. Scourge can be kited and killed, Parasitic Bomb only does 90 damage and Seeker does 100 while Mend heals for 150, and storm can be easily dodged. The only problem you'll really run into is mass Thor and Battlecruisers with Yamato, but the first can be magic boxed and the second can be killed before they get the shot off most of the time. I turn off the auto-cast morph into Leviathan for my mutas, they're simply that good.
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United States8476 Posts
On May 25 2016 11:15 Xsyq wrote: I've been trying out muta builds with Abathur recently and I really underestimated them. If you get a few mutas out early to suck up biomass while getting the rapid regeneration/6x bounce/2x armored upgrades you can get by without needing roaches or ultimate evolutions at all. 100 biomass mutas are basically invulnerable (620 HP with 100% damage leech), are extremely fast, and do insane damage. I've soloed most of several maps with just 8-16 mutalisks. There's nothing the AI can do to stop you either. Scourge can be kited and killed, Parasitic Bomb only does 90 damage and Seeker does 100 while Mend heals for 150, and storm can be easily dodged. The only problem you'll really run into is mass Thor and Battlecruisers with Yamato, but the first can be magic boxed and the second can be killed before they get the shot off most of the time. I turn off the auto-cast morph into Leviathan for my mutas, they're simply that good. Yea, I think I probably went through the same progression as you did. First I went Queen/Ravager and thought: ok, this is pretty good. Then I got Vipers and thought Ground/Viper would be Abathur's imbalanced unit composition. Devourer/Guardian was my next unit comp and that seemed really good as well(especially the Devourer part). But like you I think tried Mutalisks and never looked back.My standard Abathur build is Roach/Queen into Mutalisks now.
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I played a bit differently. It was mostly roach/swarm host with a bit of roach/muta experimentation until level 8, then viper/anything else, then a few devourers to trivialize air plus a few queens to heal my brutalisks, then mass queen plus roach, then muta/anything else. That's the thing about Abathur; none of his units are situational or useless. You can make basically anything you want and still win. He's the first commander that feels really complete and functional, no cyclones or battlecruisers with him.
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It's the second mutator in which Zagara underperforms a bit (when compared to my ranking)
I think I am starting to agree with people who says that she is at her limit in Brutal
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Is there a bug in the Chain of Ascension map? I think it happened to me twice, once in the mutation and once in regular, where the second attack wave (the second one that's aimed at your base, not at the center) is the kind of attack wave you expect near the end of the game. Once was against terran infantry, where the wave was what looked to be like over 150 supply of infantry, tanks, and ravens. The other time was against protoss robotics, and the second wave had over 10 colossi, and a bunch of scouts and immortals, and I think a few disruptors, though I'm not sure. Both happened around the same time as the first hybrid interference. Maybe I'm just a scrub, but normally the second wave in that map is barely an afterthought for me while I'm preparing for the hybrids, without any need for help from my ally, but in these two cases they absolutely demolished me.
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