Ghost/marine/hellion/nuke Opening in TvZ

On March 30 2011 19:52 Devlawl wrote:
I was messing around with ghosts early game in TvZ and came up with this:

Replay: Platinum level Ghost/marine/hellion/nuke push TvZ

The idea was that seeing as you need a factory to get nukes why not get hellions and use them to get some map control and force spine crawlers and roaches from the zerg. Snipe is very good versus roaches but ghosts, hellions and marines aren't so good versus spinecrawlers... but nukes are :D.

So I'd like to start a discussion about the potential of this sort of opening and perhaps you could give it a go and post a replay in this thread. Also I'd like to hear how zerg players would deal with this push. I'm in platinum league so yes my micro/macro isn't flawless but imagine a master league player with strong mechanics trying this sort of opening, in fact it would be awesome if a master league player tried it out and posted a replay here.

Please watch the replay before posting

(The Dr. Suess Nuke Funday Monday inspired me to experiment with this)

On March 30 2011 20:25 Newkid272 wrote:
Wouldnt't a high masters have roachs if he saw u getting hellions so he would just focus the ghost down and retreat back to spines the only way this would work would to have tanks protecting it or having cloak and also the player might evan move his spines to save them not sure if this would work in high leauges would be awesome to see a reaply

On March 30 2011 21:30 TibblesEvilCat wrote:
see's red dot, uproots and moves stuff, nice idea to contain though.

On March 30 2011 21:38 Hairy wrote:
Forcing spine crawlers to uproot is good though, as it means if you then charge in with your other units the spines are useless (as they take several months to re-root).

On March 30 2011 21:39 FireBearHero wrote:
I did this kind of stuff for awhile months ago in what was then mid diamond (before masters came). It works really damn well if your opponent goes speedlings. However these kind of builds fail pretty hard to roaches, which is why I stopped doing them (when roaches got +1 range eeeeevery zerg was making roaches). If a zerg matches your army size with roaches they can generally clean you up pretty easily (even if you have a few marauders).

Edit: To illustrate what I'm talking about a bit I'll take some numbers from your replay. When you attacked he had 12 lings and 2 roaches (10 food). You had 4 hellions 8 marines and 3 ghosts (22 food). If he had 22 food of roaches, he cleans that up easily. Which can be seen after you killed his natural. You're (albeit slightly damaged) army was almost cleaned up by I think it was 7 or 8 roaches. And the second similarly sized group finished what was left over.

The zerg might also have not lost his nat if he didn't leave just about every overlord he owned under the nuke causing him to majorly supply blocked. From there the game was over. The second engagement went so well for you just because your army was way stronger. 12 lings and 12 roaches against 7 marauders 8 hellions (you had 9 but one was rallying down across the map) 8 marines and 8 ghosts, 30 food vs 54 food.

I'm not suggesting you don't try to make it work, but I think you should start trying to mix more marauders in. I started about the same spot as you did and ended up peeling back ghost numbers (to 1 to drop the nuke) and adding marauders. That might be a good place for you to start.

On March 30 2011 23:17 Devlawl wrote:


Thank you very much for watching the replay.

True, snipe only takes care of so many roaches so equal food of roaches would probably take me out. I probably would be able to scout that many roaches with my hellions though and back off and expand.

I did want to put more marauders in but I was really just trying to balance my gas and minerals and since I had got such fast 2gas I ended up just making a lot of ghosts. I'll have to mess around with gas timings until it is about right I guess.

I've found most zergs do prefer the speedlings and only get roaches if forced to. However when they see an unreactorred factory and hellions on the field they tend to not go overboard with roaches but get enough to hold hellion harass while droning up. Also all they see is my hellions clearing their zerglings from the xelnaga towers so my push would normally come as a surprise and the reinforcing round of roaches would be a bit late.

If you have any replays of you doing this sort of thing, it would be awesome if you linked it.

On March 31 2011 00:49 FireBearHero wrote:


Unfortunately this was back in October, I think, so all the replays have long since disappeared from my recent folder. I think figuring out second gas timing will be key. I never quite figured out the best time to get it.

Going home if you see too many roaches will extend the game, but you'll still be significantly behind. The build as is (which is pretty similar to the way I did it) is pretty all in. The expansion is a bit late to set up an attack like this and not do damage. I never ended up winning a game where my attack got stone walled (even if I kept most my army alive)..

On March 31 2011 02:01 Unwardil wrote:
I've done this plenty too and what I actually find is that you can slot it right into a double hellion fast expand opening no problem, so long as you scout hatch before pool. You'll get your nuke around the 9 minute mark, which with most zerg builds is roughly this very awkward time where they're just about to gear up to do some muta harras and take their third, but the nuke hits just before they actually get any of that stuff out and they've still only got spine crawlers and zerglings for defense.

If they have anything more complicated than that, they're probably a little behind in everything else.

You do generally have to be ready to repel mutas imediately after the nuke, especially if it doesn't do a whole lot of damage or does none and roaches are an obvious threat but pretty easily dealt with by marauders in bunkers. The point is, you'll have your expo and you'll have landed a nuke. I call that winning Charlie Sheen style, no matter how you slice it.

On March 31 2011 02:43 FireBearHero wrote:
If it does indeed fit well with a fast expand build that could help the build by quite a bit. I'd also be interested in seeing that.

Ghosts do pretty well against mutas with a bit of marine support. Ghosts do about the same DPS to light that marauders to to armored (no stim). If you have a heavier ghost number (3+) and marines when the first wave of mutas pop out you can generally handle it.

On the transition side of things, I suggest biomech. I would throw down a techlab on my factory as I started to move out and use the gas i was using on ghosts on tanks. The composition will have touble with banelings (unless you have MKP style marine splitting) so tanks are a very welcome addition. Try to keep the few ghosts you have from the start alive. Ghosts will have their uses, but I wouldn't have more than a couple at any given time. The gas is generally better spent on upgrades or tanks imo.