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Alive showed us a breathtaking opener in the GSL in game 1 against MMA in the round of eight. You can watch the game for free here.
Alive v MMA game 1
Later in the set, MMA used a similar build against Alive:
Alive v MMA game 3 (not free)
MMA's version of the build was a bit more defensive, going for a bunker at the ramp as well as a second barracks. As MMA ended up losing game 3 and only game 1 is free, let's focus on game 1.
Disclaimer: I'm currently a Diamond player --- formerly Master's --- so view my analysis in that light. However the build orders below are simple facts.
Build Order
Start with standard 10 SD, 12 rax, 13 refinery, 16 orbital
only 2 marines until reactor finishes
on 100 gas: factory
on 50 gas: reactor and 2nd refinery
on 100 gas: starport
tech lab
2nd tech lab when hellion finishes
when 2nd tank close to being done: siege mode
at ~8:50: Command center
rax #2
Unit production
non-stop marine production once reactor is made
raven
hellion
raven
banshee
tank
viking
tank #2
Alive pushed out with 5 marines. The hellion and the rest of the army was rallied in to join the push.
Discussion
The main idea is to use the Raven aggressively by placing a turret by the opponent's ramp to bolster your marine/hellion force. This buys time for the siege tanks and banshee to make a very strong attack.
This feels like a fresh new take on TvT, a very aggressive 1/1/1 push. I think that it is reasonably well countered simply by a bunker. In this case I think a reasonable strategy is to use the raven and banshee to harass the mineral line and wait for siege mode to siege the bunker and push in.
I'm including a replay of myself executing the build for good measure. Gives a decent idea of how aggressive the build is although my execution was clearly suboptimal ---- I lost the raven after placing only one turret.
What are your thoughts on this build ? What is a good counter ? Anyone doing a similar build on the ladder willing to share their experience ?
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I don't think that Alive planned for the build to be an attack. He built the raven as a defensive unit, so that he could easily deal with a potential banshee from MMA. When he applied pressure with his marines and helion, he probably was just planning to clear watch towers and perhaps pressure the expansion if it was there. The thing that triggered him to be offensive was MMA losing quite a few of his first marines out on the map. Alive just took all the units he had, which included a raven, and attacked.
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On February 21 2012 11:40 scarper65 wrote:
I don't think that Alive planned for the build to be an attack. He built the raven as a defensive unit, so that he could easily deal with a potential banshee from MMA. When he applied pressure with his marines and helion, he probably was just planning to clear watch towers and perhaps pressure the expansion if it was there. The thing that triggered him to be offensive was MMA losing quite a few of his first marines out on the map. Alive just took all the units he had, which included a raven, and attacked.
This. As Tasteless pointed out, he would not have been able to break the ramp without MMA getting his marines caught out on the map.
However, it could have been used to establish a contain outside the ramp if the opponent was not getting fast siege themselves.
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I'm only platinum so don't take anything I say too seriously, and feel free to correct me but my theory is:
aLive has been experimenting with raven openers for awhile, and whether or not his initial plan was cloak banshee or an actual raven, is hard to tell. From what I can remember when I watched that game, the information I gathered was that, as scarper said, it wasn't initially supposed to be a direct attack like that. What happened was MMA lost his reaper, and aLive knew that MMA was probably going for reaper expand, and didn't have many units out, which initiated his attack. You'll notice as soon as he killed the reaper he went out to clear the towers with the 5 marines, while a few more marines and his hellion rally'd to them. As soon as the raven completed he pushed out to attack and yes, caught a lot of MMA's marines off guard and separated. Which allowed his attack to do a lot more damage that it probably should have. But it was still a well executed build by aLive and not just a spur of the moment thing, as you could tell by the fast seige tank followup for a contain to keep pressure on him on one base while he safely got his expansion up. But, even if he hadn't, you underestimate the autoturret.
I've been using a very slight variation of this build on both North American and Korean ladders, and the autoturret tanks a lot of damage, allowing your marines to wreak quite a lot of havoc on the natural if they fast expanded, or supply blocking them if they walled off. If MMA had gotten fast seige as well, aLive probably would have backed off after he killed the first depot, and safely secured his own expansion with his two seige tanks while MMA was busy trying to not die. After the seige tanks, you'll also notice there was a banshee rally'd to MMA's base as well, to continue harrassing. Most likely, the autoturret and marines/hellion and 1-2 blasts from his seige tank would have killed most of MMA's anti air while supply blocking him and he could have done quite a bit more damage as well with the banshee. If MMA had gone banshee, no problem, aLive probably would have delayed his banshee and gotten a viking instead, and with his raven, it wouldn't have even been a threat. It really is an excellent build, and the potential to do damage is really good, even if MMA had a few more units. If you scout some sort of all-in, or something like a 2 rax/3 rax push coming, it's easy enough to hold since you are getting fast seige, and you can always throw down a bunker if you feel like you're in danger.
My slight variation to the build (which I've had pretty good success with so far...) I get a reactor on my barracks after my first marine, to make it look like I'm going for reactor'd hellions. (To the average player that is what they would assume unless they scouted your second gas.) Giving them this false information allows me to be quite a bit more aggressive on my push and makes it a bit more effective against zerg, and against terran I can choose between cutting a round of marines and making another hellion if I have to. I've played a number of games where the opponent would see my reactor and a factory, and instantly produce primarily marauders. Which is a big mistake considering I have PDD and a banshee on the way, and as long as I have a bunker, or my seige tanks positioned well, he can't do any damage to me at all. Same thing with roaches (although the raven feels a little less useful against a roach rush). Against zerg, I always send my first marine to try to find that initial scouting overlord to try to get a early supply block, then after my raven and banshee, I get a viking to try to snipe any other overlords about the map. The build flows really well and since it's a 1 1 1, and expand as you can afford it, you can transition to pretty much anything you want. I usually throw down two more factories after my expansion, and seige is completed, and start blue flame and an armory. If I did manage to get a solid contain, I throw down a fast third as well.
I'm still working on trying to adapt it to TvP, but the only luck i've had so far is teching straight to sky terran and only leaving two bunkers worth of marines at my natural. Use the raven and a viking and a cloaked banshee for your first little poke/push to snipe any observers, autoturret their mineral line (primarily at their gas geyser probes) and then you get free reign on their base for awhile with your banshee while you can make a third command center and a few more starports. After that, its really just blue flame hellion runby's for mineral dumping and tanking damage while you tech up your banshee/viking (battlecruisers for mid-late game?) with a few ravens for pdd and hsm against their zealots/probes etc, (plus a random autoturret drop every now and then can't hurt)
I've got to give it to aLive, this is probably my favorite opener now, and I give props to him for coming up with such a viable unique strategy that even someone as bad as me can use effectively.
Note again, I'm only platinum so most of this is just random theorycrafting based off the understanding and impression I got from watching the Ro8. I can submit a few replays or a video of me using it if people are interested. Also there was another thread on this like a week ago. I think there were some pretty useful posts in there too regarding the raven opener if you can find it.
Edit** I didn't remember seeing the reactor in aLive's game, so ignore the whole variation thing, as that's how it is supposed to be done.
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United States7483 Posts
On February 21 2012 11:40 scarper65 wrote:
I don't think that Alive planned for the build to be an attack. He built the raven as a defensive unit, so that he could easily deal with a potential banshee from MMA. When he applied pressure with his marines and helion, he probably was just planning to clear watch towers and perhaps pressure the expansion if it was there. The thing that triggered him to be offensive was MMA losing quite a few of his first marines out on the map. Alive just took all the units he had, which included a raven, and attacked.
If you listen to Artosis and Tasteless cast the games later on, Artosis says he talked with Alive's coach, and that he was going banshee first during practice for an attack, and it wasn't working well. Then he tried raven instead of banshee and all of the sudden the build worked very well, so perhaps not.
The turrets are very hard to deal with early on in the game, high hp, armor, good dps, and they last for a stupidly long time. They're amazing for re-inforcing tank positions and slow pushes. Getting the raven fast also makes mech follow-ups much stronger, and it accumulates a ton of energy for use.
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On February 21 2012 23:04 DaemonX wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2012 11:40 scarper65 wrote:
I don't think that Alive planned for the build to be an attack. He built the raven as a defensive unit, so that he could easily deal with a potential banshee from MMA. When he applied pressure with his marines and helion, he probably was just planning to clear watch towers and perhaps pressure the expansion if it was there. The thing that triggered him to be offensive was MMA losing quite a few of his first marines out on the map. Alive just took all the units he had, which included a raven, and attacked. This. As Tasteless pointed out, he would not have been able to break the ramp without MMA getting his marines caught out on the map. However, it could have been used to establish a contain outside the ramp if the opponent was not getting fast siege themselves.
It's hard to tell because in one game you're only ever seeing a fraction of a build's potential. If it was opportunistic aggression, though, it was very well planned opportunistic aggression - as in, he knew exactly what he was going to do if X happened.
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Even so, I think the game makes apparent that turrets are a great way to control space early game. They last forever and kill off marines/reapers, while holding off hellions, which almost every play builds early game.
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the thing is what would happen if mma goes for reactor marine + tank could he stop it ?
a tank should be there in time
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On February 23 2012 09:45 perser84 wrote:
the thing is what would happen if mma goes for reactor marine + tank could he stop it ?
a tank should be there in time
Generally a marine-tank build doesn't research seige until after the third tank is started. (at least the builds I've studied and had played against) aLive should still be able to at least temporarily contain him, present a threat, and for MMA to think a little bit, force some extra units and delay his command center, and when he feels uncomfortable, or suspects something, he can always pull back into a defensive position himself. By the time any sort of counter push comes, aLive would have had a third tank, a viking or medevac, a second banshee, and would have had plenty of time to put up defensive structures at his expansion. Plus MMA would have been denied any additional scouting so he wouldn't know if there were a lot more 1 basey reinforcements for an all-in or if there was indeed an expansion. He'd have to be really careful and scout or scan before he pushed out leaving his own base unattended.
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I'm rank 2 diamond so hopefully my advice can be helpful contextually. First just to put it out there, this build SHOULD not end games. If MMA didn't lose those 5 marines, he holds for now.
When this build would be strong:
- You scout gas first, cloak banshees are a pretty good possibility
- The CC is being built on the low ground, you can kill the SCV and delay or potentially force a cancel if he can't break you by the time tanks are out
- You want to transition to mech. There are countless similar builds to put on early pressure and most of them provide the flexibility to choose marine/tank or mech depending on what you scout and how much damage you can do. If you want to mech, cloak banshee or raven look like better options (espcially gas first). If you prefer marine/tank, there are still deadly builds to pressure 1/1/1 early.
- Close air (meta, shattered temple). Ravens are slow, you won't want to do this cross spot entombed or tal'darim, banshees are better options if you're set on doing this type of pressure on a big map. It also lets you use auto turrets through the game to harass mineral lines and force them to lose mining time.
- If your opponent is doing a similar 1/1/1 WITHOUT tanks. Auto-turrets get more effective the scrappier the siutation is. They devastate low marines counts, they can be repair, they hit air, and they last what feels like forever.
Personally, my build of choice is gas first banshee with hellion/marine/2 SCV pressure, expand, rally viking and then raven while adding reactor on the rax, 2nd gas, and 2nd fact. If it gets scouted, they usually assume cloaked banshee. A good reference is forGG's round 1 code A game on tal'darim from last season... I can't remember who it was against.
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EPT
