- Starcraft 2 Ghost Artwork
Table of Contents
1. Why Ghost > Marauder/Banshee in Most TvZ Situation
2. But Ghost costs 150 gas!
3. Build Order
4. How to Use Ghost
5. Counter Build for Zerg
6. Demonstrations
7. Replays
1. Why Ghost > Marauder/Banshee in Most TvZ Situation
First, let's look at Ghost's numbers;
Cost: 150/150
Time: 40 seconds
Supply: 2
HP: 100
Armor: 0 (+1)
Modifier: Biological, Psionic
Damage: 10 (+1), 10 (+1) against light units, 1.5 cooldown
Range: 6
Sight: 11
Abilities;
- Snipe - deals 45 damage, ignores armor, instant cast, 10 range, 25 energy.
- Cloak - become cloaked, drains 0.9 energy per second, 25 energy to cast.
- EMP Round - Removes 100 shield and all energy, and temporarily reveals cloacked units, 75 energy.
- Tactical Nuke - Call down nuclear missile, 10 range, 20 seconds cooldown, deals 300 (+200 against structure) in a large radius. Farther away from the centre, lesser the damage. Nuke can 1-shot Extractor, Spine Crawler, Spore Crawler, and Nydus Worm
Now, think of any units that can counter Marauders, Banshees, and Ghosts;
Marauder: Any AtG units, Zergling (hard counter), Hydralisk (soft counter)
Banshee: Any AtA units, Hydralisk (soft counter).
Ghost: Roach (Soft Counter), Broodlord, Ultralisk
And how about units they can counter against?
Marauder: Roach, Baneling, Ultralisk
Banshee: Zergling, Roach
Ghost: Zergling, Baneling, Hydralisk, Mutalisk, Infestor
You can notice that both Marauders and Banshees have limited usage once Zerg switches to Tier 2 units. However, Ghosts can counter BOTH Tier 1 and 2 units, except Roaches. Their 20 damage against light makes it so easy to deal with Zerglings once you have 3 or 4 Ghosts in your army composition. They can 2-Snipes a Hydralisk and 3-Snipe Mutalisk. With range of 10 and only 25 energy, Snipes can deal with Hydralisk and Mutalisk surprisingly well. A Ghost with 75 energy can deal with 2 Hydralisks at once. 2 Ghosts with 75 energy can take out 2 Hydralisks even before they get into the attack range and melt another 2 Hydralisks with additional Snipes and simple attacks.
Having Ghosts around the battefield also effectively denies Zerg player to make any Infestors thanks to EMP Round. What's more amazing is that Ghosts do not have any armor type, which makes even units like Roaches can only be soft counter to Ghosts. Effective use of Snipes and kiting can easily kill off Roaches as well.
Therefore, only reason not to use this strategy is when the opponent is going for Roaches. In this case, all you have to do is simply switch your strategy to Marauder heavy build. This should be no problem since both Ghosts and Marauders are produced from same building.
2. But Ghost costs 150 gas!
This is probably a reason why not many people are getting Ghosts even though they counter most of Zerg's early and mid-game units. Ghosts simply takes too much minerals and gas, so players might prefer having 6 Marauders than 9 Marines and 1 Ghost, as Marauders are spammable and more durable. While this holds true, that in a normal macro game pumping simple Marine/Marauders fair well against Zerg, I believe in TvZ you should never let Zerg do his regular macro build. Terran has so many arsenals in their hand that can effectively disrupt Zerg's economy, such as Reapers, Hellions, Vikings, Banshees, Thor drop, and so on, so why not use them at the fullest?
Now let's look at comparison between 6 Marauders and 9 Marines/1 Ghost. Instead of 9 Marines, why not 4 Hellions? Marauders, with their constant need for upgrades and fair amount of minerals to spam, make it harder for Terran to switch to other tech. With the extra minerals left over from pumping Ghosts, I tried a build to incorporate Hellions, and worked quiet nicely against Zerg. While Hellion harass disrupts Zerg's economy, you can safely accumulate enough Marines, Maraduers, and Ghosts to do following build order;
3. Build Order
First, start with regular Orbital Command build;
10 Depot
12 Rax - Pump 2 rines
13 Gas
15~16 OC
By the time OC is done, your scv should have scouted Zerg's base. If you are sure Zerg isn't going Roach build, follow this strat;
17 Gas (can be constructed later if scout isn't done properly, but the timing will be delayed a bit)
18 Depot
18 Factory
18 Reactor on rax
21 Switch Factory and Barrack and produce double Hellions - Start Harassing!
20~23 Depot - Continue adding Depots as you see fits.
26 Tech lab on rax (immediately after switching) - Build 1 Marauder
26 Ghost Academy
Depending on the situation, you may build a bunker at the entrance and put 1 Marauder and 2 rines for possible Zergling/Baneling Rush. You should know this when after your Hellion sees either Baneling Nest or Speedlings.
32~34 Build first Ghost after Marauder. Research Cloak from Ghost Academy ASAP.
35~37 Build Starport - Pump 1 Medivac then maybe 1 Viking afterward. Contnue pumping Maraduers. Start researching Stimpack. By this time you probably had 2 or 3 harasses with 2 Hellions in the beginning and 4 Hellions afterward. Stop pumping Hellions and build Engineering Bay and Turrets in your base if your Hellions saw Spire going up. Otherwise pump more Hellions for Hyralisks.
47~50 Get Nuke right after Cloak is done. Nuke takes 60 seconds to produce. This is when you load 1 Ghost and 3 Marauders into your Medivac and head for Zerg's base. Also, build 2 raxes right after your medivac pops out.
Now here is the interesting math I can show you about how Nukes and 3 Marauders can easily take out Hatchery and even Lair! 3 Stimpacked Marauders deal 19 x 3 = 57 damage per second. Nuke deals 500 damage and takes 20 seconds. So in theory, 3 Stimpacked Marauders and 1 Nuke can deal (57 x 20) + 500 = 1640 damage to structure in 20 seconds! This is enough to take out 1250HP Hatchery, 1500HP Command center, 1500HP Nexus, and possibly 1800HP Lair after hitting few more shots.
When your medivac drops into the Zerg's base, both Nuke and Stimpack should be researched. Cloak your Ghost immediately and nuke Hatchery/Lair, while stimpack your Marauders immediately and attack Hatchery/Lair as well. Use remaining Hellions to distract Zerg! Psychology is a powerful thing, as getting harassed by Hellions during the entire game puts Zerg player to look out for Hellions first.
Chances are, your Zerg won't have an Overseer to spot your cloaked Ghost. This Nuke comes down usually at around 9:30 to 10:00 mark, which makes it extremely fast Nuke Rush!
Once your nuke is going down...
Use Hellions to distract and eat away any fleeing drones!
Continue producing Nukes afterward. You should have around 2 Hellions, 5 Marines, 2 Ghosts, 1 Viking, and 1 Medivac (if you manage to survive your first Medivac). If your Hellion harasses and Nuke Rush were even remotely successful, Zerg will have only about dozen of Zerglings and a few Mutalisks/Hydralisks remaining, since he is too busy pumping Drones, morphing Overseers, and getting static defense around the base. (Not to mention the total confusion he is having ) This is the timing window to attack the Zerg's base with your army!
You can choose to Nuke his backdoor again, or use it to destroy the static defenses at the front. Most of time with 1 Medivac healing Ghosts and other armies protecting it, it is extremely difficult to take down that cloaked Ghost nuking down Zerg's front base.
Even if your rush has failed, you can still pump Ghosts until Zerg gets Tier 3 units and deal with most of Zerg units while you yourself either go expand or complete your MMM balls.
4. How to Use Ghost
Ghosts are actually very easy to use. Since they can 2-shot Zergling, attack-move is sufficient enough to deal with Zerglings, right after you play fun rounds of sniping!
Like I mentioned before, Snipes can 2-shot Hyrdalisk and 3-shot Mutalisk. All you have to do is simply select all your Ghosts and press "R" and left click these units like crazy. You can shift-click Snipe ability to instantly take out all of Zerg's units as well. Whenever you see Infestors, just cloak your Ghosts and either Snipe or EMP them. They can also 1-shot Drone with Snipes, so you can quickly kill off Zerg's drones once you get into his base, similar to how Psi-storms on mineral lines can take out whole bunch of workers.
Dealing instantaneous damage of 45 at range of 10 effectively halves down Zerg's army even before the fighting starts. Spam as much as possible to cripple their forces, and attack-move to clear all Zerglings, and you will see "GG" soon enough. Have fun sniping!
5. Counter Build for Zerg
I've been using this strategy for myself quite a while, and I found out some of the counter build Zerg players can do against this build. Let's look at these counter build so Terran can counter them again!
Simcity: By using Zerg buildings like Evolution Chambers and Roach Warren, Zerg can effectively block off Hellion harass. However, Hellion drops work against this strategy.
Secret Expansion: The purpose of this build is to halve Zerg's economy, so any secret 3rd expansion negates this Ghost Build. Constant scout by Hellions can effectively end this strategy as well. Be very active with your Hellions!
6 pool: Because Ghost Build gets 2nd supply depot relatively slower than other build, Zerg can exploit this by going all-in and bypass the choke before 2nd supply depot has been built. Use early scv scout to find 6 pool build and IMMEDIATELY build 2nd supply depot, and you should be fine.
Fast Baneling... I mean REALLY FAST: If Zerg can get Banelings before first 2 Hellions pop out, they can swarm through the wall and win very easily. This is why early scv scout needs to see if Zerg is getting gas or expansion. Extra wall-in can deter this attack very well, as shown below;
You kinda feel sorry for banelings with walls like this
Nydus Worm: Similar to Baneling, you need to scout properly and see whether Zerg is going Baneling or Nydus, since two builds require completely different placement of supply depots. Spread your supply depots on your base to reveal and fog of war.
Build supply depots at places like here, to find any Nydus Worm activity
1-Hatchery Fast Muta: this build can make 5 or 6 Mutalisks extremely fast, leaving Terran no time to react at all. If your early scouting scv does not see any expansion and even find early Lair-teching, get engineering bay ASAP and delay Ghost Build a bit, and place turrets on your mineral lines and production lines. Once you get 2 or 3 Ghosts, 5 or 6 Mutalisks won't be a problem with proper sniping. O, and don't forget to tighten your choke as well, sine alot of Zerglings are going be with Mutalisks.
6. Demonstrations
As always, here are some of demonstrations I did against Platinum Zerg players!
1. John (T) vs. Rigid (Z) at Desert Oasis
+ Show Spoiler +
12 Terran went standard 12 rax,
While 6 Zerg went 14 hatchery to take advantage of the map.
T followed the Ghost Build, building Factory after 2 rines and getting reactor at the same time.
Hellions were immediately pumping out while Ghost Academy and Tech Lab were being built.
First wave of Hellions did fair amount of damage to drones. This forces Zerg to produce more drones and build spine crawlers, which forces him to produce even more drones.
Next wave of Hellions simply bypassed the static defense and goes for the main base...
And wrecked havok on drones while scouting Spire.
T buillt Engineering Bay immediately and prepared for Mutalisks
Mutalisks tried to snipe a lone Ghost but instead sniped back by Ghost and retreated as a Medivac completely heals Ghost.
T decided to use the map in his favour as well, and send 1 Ghost, 1 scv, and 5 Marines along with 1 Medivac and 1 Viking to the outskirt of Zerg's base.
T initiated Nuke on Extractors while building turrets and bunkers. Zerg had no way of stopping the Nuke as he lacks detectors.
Z tried to retalitate with Mutalisks, but 1 Turret and rounds of sniping from Ghost were too much for them.
Nuke was continuously called down to deny any saturation of resources at main base.
Z tried to expand on high yield, but discovered by Hellions.
T didn't let Z to recover his wounds as Ghosts, Marines, and Hellions rushes to his base.
Mutalisks were quickly sniped down and Zergling were easily taken out by Ghosts and Hellions.
While T destroys Z's natural...
Yet another Nuke was called upon Z's main...
And Z was forced to GG.
2. John (T) vs. Balrog (Z) at Metalopolis
+ Show Spoiler +
6 Terran went for standard 12 rax.
While 12 Zerg went for 14 pool...
And went for fast Lair for T2 units.
Again, T followed Ghost Build and goes for Factory and Reactor at the same time.
Buildings were switched and Ghost Academy and Tech Lab were built.
While Z was building Spire...
Hellions raided drones and discover Spire and killing fair amount of drones.
While Hellion harass continued, T's Medivac loaded 3 Marauders and 1 Ghost for Nuke. You can see Nuke is underway and Stimpack is almost finished, while Engineering Bay and 2 Barracks were started construction.
While Hellions distracted Z's attention... (Which I kinda failed to do any damage this time )
Nuke was initiated in Z's base. Notice how much damage can 3 stimpacked Marauders can dealt in mere 20 seconds! Although T failed to take out this Lair...
Boom! Precarious Z didn't see Nuke going down as he was too preoccupied with Hellions and Marauders!
Z tried to counter-attack with Mutalisks, but again Ghost's snipes were more than enough to fend off these Mutalisks.
A lone Ghost hiding under the fog succeeded in second Nuke, killing Queen and Spawning Pool, and almost taking out Lair before he died.
T rushed in with offensive Nuke,
But Z barely managed to take out the Ghost before the calldown was finished. But by then all of his armies were sacrificed.
T stormed through Z's undefended base and killed off Zerglings' last attempt for defense.
The game ends with a big bang. GG.
7. Replays
Patch 8
John vs. Rigid
John vs. Balrog
Patch 10
John vs. Pop
Patch 13
John vs. Rhyme
I hope you can have as much fun as I did with this strategy. This is still in developing phase, so I think there are tons of ways to improve this build. Try them out, post your replays here, and discuss among players! Thanks for reading!