You the man 404 ERROR I appreciate the tips! I should add that I've also been reading the Terran help me thread over at teamliquid.net and it has been a huge help and it echoing a lot of what you are saying w/r/t the Zerg MU.
I've played practically every single day since that last post and have been steadily improving.
I am in the low silver now and will probably be there for a bit while I develop good macro/micro habits.
I've been spending more time training against the CPU to shore up build orders. I'm really just working on MMM 10min push with siege tanks and sometimes banshees if I feel confident enough against my opponent.
Getting a third base is honestly very difficult for me to do correctly so I'm really just sticking to two base builds and trying to end the game in 25 minutes. Really just trying to develop good habits. Scout better, especially against all the various BS Protoss all-ins available to them now. Nonstop training of SCVs and marines and avoiding supply blockage. Really just trying to get myself in an active mindset and avoid all the noob traps and bad habits.
Lately I've hardly fought any Zerg at all, just bookoos of Protoss and some Terran. Luckily bioball works fairly well against Protoss in silver leagues so I'm sticking with that.
I hear nothing, literally nothing but good things when talking about Widow Mines. But again I feel this is a micro-intensive unit that I am not ready to experiment with. I'm just sticking to siege tanks for defense and offense. Free siege in the new expansion is just SO awesome. I hope they don't patch that out!
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Yeah Bio works great vs Toss, with Vikings added in if they have Colossi. Maxed Terran slightly beats Maxed Toss when there's minimal micro, but one or two good storms completely turns the tide. Late game is pretty much all about Templars vs Ghosts. I find PvT somewhat boring, and TvP very fun, because it's hard for P to be the agressor most of the time (unless they do some sort of cheese). Whereas Terran can do lots of harassment without committing much - a couple dropships can wreak havoc if P isn't prepared.
You should try out mines, they're not as micro-intensive as you might think. I almost never target-micro them, just burrowing and unburrowing takes some management. A lotta the time I use them as defense against air harassment - they are incredible vs Mutas and Oracles, and fairly effective vs drops.
I play Random but my hotkeys are pretty consistent between races. For Terran I use 1-3 for units, 4 for Orbital Commands, 5 for Raxes, 6 for Factories, 7 for Starports (altho I almost always forget to hotkey my facs and ports).
I used to hotkey this way, but I've found my macro is a lot more manageable by keeping all my OCs and PFs on 4, and ALL production (including Engineering Bays and Armories) on 5. It's easy enough to TAB cycle through each of the facility groups, and you get the benefit of seeing the state of all your army production at the same time. I've found that I can keep all of my stuff cranking much more consistently. Keeping your upgrade buildings on the same tab helps you keep up on upgrade timing, so you don't accidentally stay on 1/1 for a minute or two when you should be upgrading to 2/2 or 3/3.
Right now I'm almost consistently opening with fast reapers against everyone, but I'm only in Gold/Platinum. It doesn't always work, but it is enough of a pain for them that I can usually keep them on the backfoot while I expand. The biggest concern is not falling behind on SCV production yourself while you're microing the Reapers around; you can end up doing more damage to yourself than your opponent if you forget two or three SCV cycles while dancing your units about his base. I just queue up three SCVs (and Shift Queue a few Depots) at a time while I'm harassing so that I have a few straight seconds where I can just micro without worrying about what's going on at home.
Maybe it's just me, but I've found TvZ has gotten a little easier since the expansion came out. Swarm Hosts are such a pain to deal with though, especially if they get a whole mess of them. The new anti-air modes for Thors and Widow Mines have made dealing with the Muta-into-Broodlord transition a lot easier. I haven't quite gotten the hang of Hellbats yet, but they're really beefy too.
Keeping all production on one key sounds interesting. I didn't know you could tab through facility groups like that, I'll have to try it out.
I like opening reapers vs Toss, it forces them to not get too aggressive with their Mothership Core.
Vs Zerg I tend to skip reapers and tech to factory asap, since every Zerg in Masters gets ling speed pretty quickly and their awareness and micro are good enough to keep them from losing drones.
I don't have much trouble against Swarm Hosts. I don't see them often but when they are used, I'm able to take them out while Locust spawns are on cooldown. If there are tons of them, consider a doom drop on main or multiple smaller drops on expos.
I've been experimenting with Mech against Zerg, with some success. Aside from Helbat and Mine drops, I pretty much take 3 bases and wait until max before attacking. A balanced army of tanks, thors, helbats, mines, and vikings usually wins the game. Helbats are really nice for dealing with lings, and can soak up a lot of damage. They're also quick and cheap to make.
3-base mech used to be my go-to strategy against Zerg; Reactor Hellions into Banshees into heavy mech right after that, but then Z started doing full Roach into Broodlords, and that was hard to deal with as mech. Now I've heard that Hellbat-Thor is a thing, with Mines initially as anti-Muta defense on the mineral lines and then pulled with your main push as pseudo-Siege Tanks. I'm just out of practice with Mech, to be honest. Drops are so hard to deal with now thanks to speed Medivacs.
Great discussion guys I feel like I've been in extreme sponge mode w/ this game for months.
That's a great tip Ferenczys about also hotkeying your upgrade structures to 5, I'm going to try that. A couple more questions for you guys.
Generally when do you build hellions and how much? In what MU? How important is the transition upgrade from hellbat/hellion and when/how is this useful in standard 1v1 play? I don't have much experience with this unit other than mixing it into my lategame push bioball. Any tips are appreciated.
My buddy who I play 2v2 with is also a Terran main and is preferred style of play (when we 1v1 each other) is marine/tank push with VERY greedy expand play sometimes. I'm wondering what a good counter to this type of play would be. In terms of our level of play we are pretty even--I know for a fact that I am a better scouter and (imho) a better tactician when it comes to micro engagements and playing off scout info. On the other hand he is probably a slightly better macro player than me and he is definitely much better at expanding.
I'm looking to hit him with something early that will fluster him. I have been looking up TvT proxy marauder builds (not necessarily all-ins, quick tech to banshee and some marines and then hopefully a GG) and these seem VERY solid (high diamond play). I still need to practice it thought against a CPU.
What else can I mix in with my occasional proxy marauder build that I will (hope to) perfect? Does anyone have a good link to a fast banshee in a TvT game?
I'm honestly looking for anything to exploit in the TvT matchup. Drops and doom drops are fun but I need some help here guys!
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Protoss is the easiest race to play because it is inherently stronger against splash damage, and because the cost/resilience of its units (which is a high number) (which is bad) encourages deathball play.
-Protoss units are expensive but squishy. Stalkers and Collosus, for example, are really squishy for the cost. This inherently causes the best method of play tend toward grouping all your units up and pushing out, rather than multiprong harass.
-Protoss units, while squishy for cost, are not terribly squishy themselves in regards to aoe damage. That is, we have no bread and butter unit that dies quickly to AOE, so the micro against AOE for our race is waaay easier. No splitting Marines vs. banes or dodging storms. No baiting widow mines with single lings.
of course, its still difficult to play well, just easier than the other races imo. Though, i admit that it might jsut seem that way to me because i play toss.
Exploiting the TvT matchup:
Make reapers man. I cannot emphasize enough how strong double rax reaper openings are in TvT in the ladder. As a mid-master, i accidentally clicked terran once, and i just double rax reaper-> 2 reaper ->2 more reaper followup, guy rage quitted after his opening 4 marines died, followed by an scv funeral.
If they don't have a lot of marines and/or multiple bunkers. Their worker line is toast. Just snipe all their existing marines (usually not that many) and you're golden.
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Haven't done many proxy marauder builds but I'd assume it's much like a bunker rush vs. Zerg, where your goal is to try and delay them while you're planning your next move.
Generally when do you build hellions and how much? In what MU? How important is the transition upgrade from hellbat/hellion and when/how is this useful in standard 1v1 play? I don't have much experience with this unit other than mixing it into my lategame push bioball. Any tips are appreciated.
Hellions work best against Zerg because they can't easily wall off their base to prevent run-byes, and until they get speedlings or roaches you can usually have free reign of their base (barring heavy Queen pressence). Just make sure you're careful with the hellions, don't lose them needlessly. It's enough to pop in and out of their base/natural just to force him to make zerglings/roaches to keep your hellions away. It sometimes helps to leave your scouting SCV somewhere nearby on auto-repair so you can park your Hellions, heal up any damage, and poke back in.
A standard follow up to 4 hellion early pressure is either Banshees (if you're going mech) or Marauders/Marine+tank if you'd rather go bio. I typically stop after 4 hellions against Z unless they're going heavy lings (get blue flame!) or I'm going mech; in which case you want to produce more hellions and reseach Hellbat mode to convert them all for your push on their third base, around 12 minutes in, accompanied by either Thors if you expect Mutas or tanks if you expect Roaches.
Against Terran, the composition I see a lot in streams is actually heavy Hellbat + Tank: it obliterates an opposing ground army, but it's slow. You take advantage of the fact that an opponent who went marine/tank/medivac is going to have a lot of resources tied up in a unit that doesn't fight (medivacs) while all of yours deal splash damage.
I'm honestly looking for anything to exploit in the TvT matchup. Drops and doom drops are fun but I need some help here guys!
The aforementioned Reaper opening is really strong, and can really punish a greedy player who is relying on siege tanks to protect his stuff. The BO is usually:
Depending on how fast you get your 3 scvs in the refinery (it's tough because it happens right when you want to place your second rax), you will either have a few seconds to push out 1 marine while you wait for 50 gas, or you won't and will open with a reaper first. Rally him to your opponent's area (somewhere where you can jump up), and rally both your rax to this reaper. Jump in and out and harass/kill marines, leave if you get too damaged and heal up. He can't heal, so you can pick away at his defenses unless he gets a bunker.
4 reapers is usually enough. Expand behind this, keep up SCV/depot production, and drop a Tech lab and Reactor on barracks 1 and 2. Get a factory, E-bay, and maybe a third barracks with another reactor if you want to go marine-tank.
This build can be beaten by a 1-1-1 opening because hellions can chase reapers, and a medivac will eliminate your healing advantage. Go into standard play after this. Remember to keep up your upgrades (start with +1 attack, get a second Ebay and an armory, and go into 2/1; or get +1 armor, then the armory, and move into 2/2 simultaneously). You need lots of gas (4 geysers) to support the upgrades and to get medivacs/vikings.
If you suspect your opponent will open reapers, getting double rax marine production will stop him if you can position your marines on the ledges to catch the reapers when they jump up. Construct depots around your minerals to impede the reapers, preventing them from getting behind the minerals to snipe your scvs. Reapers are awful if you aren't in the mineral line, and are terrible in a straight-up fight unless you are in unit count parity or can run away to heal. Micro away low health reapers while the others keep shooting (kind of like burrowing damaged roaches) to take out high HP targets (you can kill stalkers this way).
The biggest challenge to the reaper opening is keeping up your macro at home. Queue multiple SCVs and depots so you can focus on microing around your opponent's base, and use the down time of healing to macro at home. It's a rhythm thing, so you have to get used to it.
If your opponent is going Marine/Tank, you have two choices: Get more tanks than him, or go full bio+mines and try to catch him in the mid-field before he can siege up. I can't emphasize how important this is: you HAVE to catch him unsieged, and preferably flanking him on both sides. If he gets to your base and sieges up, it's very hard to break with bio. You can lead with a few SCVs to soak up initial tank shots while your army stims in right behind, but it's dicey if you don't know where his tanks are. 5-6 tanks will destroy bio if they are sieged up. In this unfortunate position, you can try to build a few banshees to snipe his tanks from behind, or you can build Medivacs to drop his base while his army is out of position, but if he decides to push you might not have enough to defend.
Late game TvT, when you're on 4-5 bases, is usually all about who can tech to BCs faster. 3/3 BCs are almost unstoppable unless he has like 50 3/3 marines, or Thors in their new high-damage single target AA mode.
I actually had a string of wins tonight in 2v2 with my buddy and to be honest I have to attribute it to watching filtersc's channel on youtube, it is easily the most straightforward, thorough, and helpful youtube video I have watched for this game.
The way filter breaks down the opening 10 minutes of correct standard Terran play just put so much in perspective for me. In some ways I had to start over in terms of play and strategy, but now the wins actually come easier in some ways. You work REALLY hard in those first 12-15 minutes to build and time correctly and then simply train, upgrade and hotkey correctly to start poking the map and denying expos. I know this seems like a "duh" statement for some of you but I think "truly" understanding the discipline of a proper opening just goes so far in improving all around play, at least it did for me today lol.
All the wins came off the back of well time engi bay upgrades with constant marine/medivac production and basic marine/stim micro skills.
I coined something I called the "Johnny Appleseed" harass tonight, I'm sure there's a more orthodox name for it lol. Since I'm still in the noob leagues (Gold) where most people have poor mini-map awareness and very little worker protection in some games I just load a medivac up w/ 4 widowmines and proceed to drop one at the third, one at the natural, and two at the main. I then begin to take my third behind this and move my marine/medivac force (with a few factory units mixed in) out onto the battlefield.
I can't express enough how much I'm loving this game. I know this isn't the most active of threads but it's great to have at least some discussion going on this great game for mtgsalvation.
Another quick Terran question. I've pretty much eliminated the option of Battlecruiser play from my games--I'd much rather continue to power my bio or just build banshees and vikings. Is it okay to continue this way or do some of you work BCs into you ladder matches?
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BCs are used pretty rarely in all matchups. They're great if your opponent isn't expecting them, but otherwise they can be easy to counter. Also, it's not common for Terran to upgrade air early on; usually you'll be upgrading either Bio or Mech and getting a whole other set of upgrades is very costly. They are sometimes used in TvT macro games, but they need to be accompanied by vikings so they don't get kited by enemy vikings.
BCs are used pretty rarely in all matchups. They're great if your opponent isn't expecting them, but otherwise they can be easy to counter. Also, it's not common for Terran to upgrade air early on; usually you'll be upgrading either Bio or Mech and getting a whole other set of upgrades is very costly. They are sometimes used in TvT macro games, but they need to be accompanied by vikings so they don't get kited by enemy vikings.
There is also an unconventional Air Terran TvP strategy that opens with Banshees and then goes into Ravens and BCs. It's very very gas intensive, and you need to be great at harassment with the banshees to get up to the BC count you need. The benefit here is that by eschewing the typical MMM composition, you negate the brunt of Protoss' ground army, and force them to either get Stalkers (bad damage output) or go air themselves. I'm not sure how this strategy works any more now that Tempests have been introduced though. The math used to be in Terran's favor, as it took two Stalkers to beat one Banshee in a straight up fight, so they needed DOUBLE your banshee count in stalkers to take out your armada. They can always go with High Templar and Feedback to wreck your day though, so be careful.
I've tried something similar, where I'd open with banshees and get a few vikings to scan/snipe observers. It used to be super effective, since observers were Toss's only form of mobile detection. Might not work as well now that oracles are an option.
There is also an unconventional Air Terran TvP strategy that opens with Banshees and then goes into Ravens and BCs. It's very very gas intensive, and you need to be great at harassment with the banshees to get up to the BC count you need. The benefit here is that by eschewing the typical MMM composition, you negate the brunt of Protoss' ground army, and force them to either get Stalkers (bad damage output) or go air themselves.
not to mention that if they're playing aggressive, you just roll over and die.
EX: 3 gate blink, 2 base 7gate, 4 gate, 2 base archons
also if they manage to move out safely (make cannons or something) when you are still at banshee, you'll be at a big disadvantage.
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Does anyone know some good solid resources for me to grab? I'm talking specifically about good downloads like maps and stuff to train on. I know there are micro/macro trainers and also unit generators to test stuff like 50 1/1 marines v 10 ultralisks or something like that. I think that'd be really useful in practicing stuff like marine splits v banelings and stuff like that. Does anyone know where to go for this?
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I played a single player map a while ago that's what you're looking for, but I can't remember the name. Anyway my opinion is that the best way to get better is to play more actual games. Micro trainers can improve your control but only in a controlled context where you know exactly what to expect; playing games improves your micro but also expands your overall game sense and introduces you to completely unknown situations.
Yeah that's a great point I shouldn't have clogged up the thread with a needless post and should've just spent 10 seconds searching the arcade in game but anyways...
I have been using the unit tester a bit to practice things like general smart unit movement but also to test specific scenarios such as siege tank and widow mine engagements and drops. I JUST learned how to have the medivac drop units as its moving instead of just being a sitting duck the whole time. Super useful I can't believe the actual game doesn't describe stuff like that better.
I find that most of my losses are coming from either giant screw ups such as building the wrong thing or getting supply blocked badly, OR and this is the more important one, from moving out my army at the wrong time and leaving my front door too exposed to counter attack.
This has happened especially vs Protoss when I fail to scout or locate proxy gateways/pylons which EVERY Protoss appears to do it seems
I will be ahead in economy and usually upgrades if not army value but I just make some poor tactical judgments that throw the game. I am forcing myself to scout better and be more proactive with my sensor towers. The gas investment is ball breaking on those things but they've saved my ass so many times I can't even count lol.
I love the Terran race for sure and will probably never change but man do they have some challenging aspects. One mistake big or small can oftentimes be GG against a better opponent. But I love all the micro and harass opportunities available to them and the versatility of bioball plus widowmine/tank.
Anyone hear that Blizzard will be testing changes to the warp prism? Giving it free upgraded speed like the medivac to encourage more diverse Protoss play. Protoss play is very sort of stagnant and predictable at the pro levels of play compared with Zerg and Terran.
Zerg are a serious monster in terms of units and openings now. Roaches are such a mean unit to fight and a Roach/Hydra composition can get a Zerg easily through the midgame to where he can techswitch an unsuspecting opponent easily with swarm host or those freakign lighting fast mutas. Ling/Baneling into muta is still common as well. And I see all of this in bronze and silver play it's scary.
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If you're decent with drops (or even if you're not), you can often force an opponent to move his army back to his base by simply dropping somewhere -- not even necessarily his mineral line, if it's too well defended. Most players keep their armies on one hotkey, especially protoss and zerg. If you need to ensure a safe move-out, just drop first. You can evac as soon as he arrives, since you aren't trying to do damage really.
Against Zerg, it goes both ways: you can drop his base so that your army can encroach on his creep safely (particularly good if you have to hop siege tanks forward), or you can move onto creep so that your drop will do more damage. Zerg is terrible about splitting their army effectively because they need overwhelming numbers (something like 40% more zerglings to kill an opposing marine ball, for instance) to fight you. If they screw up the split, you can end up doing serious damage to their army while taking very few losses yourself.
I've been trying to incorporate more widow mines into my standard play, and so far they've been crazy fun (Plat 1v1, Diamond 2v2). I love dropping them at chokes, then moving them as soon as they get off their first shot. Against a terran opponent, they're often blow a scan where your mines USED to be, giving you a free 250 mineral lead since the scan cost them a mule. Dropping one at the back of their expo mineral lines is great too, because it won't stop them from building a CC, but it WILL hit transfered SCVs -- often repeatedly, since they can go undetected for a long time if your opponent isn't actively watching the worker line. The gas geysers are a great place to hide one too, since knocking out a few harvesters will often mean that your opponent will be mining at 1/3 or 2/3 capacity and never realize it (until he starts wondering why he's so gas starved, anyway).
They're cheaper than turrets for defending against Mutas (and more effective), they can blow up a banshee in one shot, and even stop Oracles. And unlike turrets, when it comes time to Go Kill Him, you can take them with you! I'm starting to fall in love with the stupid little things.
I'll be glad to answer more questions.
I've played practically every single day since that last post and have been steadily improving.
I am in the low silver now and will probably be there for a bit while I develop good macro/micro habits.
I've been spending more time training against the CPU to shore up build orders. I'm really just working on MMM 10min push with siege tanks and sometimes banshees if I feel confident enough against my opponent.
Getting a third base is honestly very difficult for me to do correctly so I'm really just sticking to two base builds and trying to end the game in 25 minutes. Really just trying to develop good habits. Scout better, especially against all the various BS Protoss all-ins available to them now. Nonstop training of SCVs and marines and avoiding supply blockage. Really just trying to get myself in an active mindset and avoid all the noob traps and bad habits.
Lately I've hardly fought any Zerg at all, just bookoos of Protoss and some Terran. Luckily bioball works fairly well against Protoss in silver leagues so I'm sticking with that.
I hear nothing, literally nothing but good things when talking about Widow Mines. But again I feel this is a micro-intensive unit that I am not ready to experiment with. I'm just sticking to siege tanks for defense and offense. Free siege in the new expansion is just SO awesome. I hope they don't patch that out!
You should try out mines, they're not as micro-intensive as you might think. I almost never target-micro them, just burrowing and unburrowing takes some management. A lotta the time I use them as defense against air harassment - they are incredible vs Mutas and Oracles, and fairly effective vs drops.
Lately I've begun recording and posting ladder games on youtube, check it out if you like first-person SC2 VODS: http://www.youtube.com/user/MidiStarCraft
I used to hotkey this way, but I've found my macro is a lot more manageable by keeping all my OCs and PFs on 4, and ALL production (including Engineering Bays and Armories) on 5. It's easy enough to TAB cycle through each of the facility groups, and you get the benefit of seeing the state of all your army production at the same time. I've found that I can keep all of my stuff cranking much more consistently. Keeping your upgrade buildings on the same tab helps you keep up on upgrade timing, so you don't accidentally stay on 1/1 for a minute or two when you should be upgrading to 2/2 or 3/3.
Right now I'm almost consistently opening with fast reapers against everyone, but I'm only in Gold/Platinum. It doesn't always work, but it is enough of a pain for them that I can usually keep them on the backfoot while I expand. The biggest concern is not falling behind on SCV production yourself while you're microing the Reapers around; you can end up doing more damage to yourself than your opponent if you forget two or three SCV cycles while dancing your units about his base. I just queue up three SCVs (and Shift Queue a few Depots) at a time while I'm harassing so that I have a few straight seconds where I can just micro without worrying about what's going on at home.
Maybe it's just me, but I've found TvZ has gotten a little easier since the expansion came out. Swarm Hosts are such a pain to deal with though, especially if they get a whole mess of them. The new anti-air modes for Thors and Widow Mines have made dealing with the Muta-into-Broodlord transition a lot easier. I haven't quite gotten the hang of Hellbats yet, but they're really beefy too.
I like opening reapers vs Toss, it forces them to not get too aggressive with their Mothership Core.
Vs Zerg I tend to skip reapers and tech to factory asap, since every Zerg in Masters gets ling speed pretty quickly and their awareness and micro are good enough to keep them from losing drones.
I don't have much trouble against Swarm Hosts. I don't see them often but when they are used, I'm able to take them out while Locust spawns are on cooldown. If there are tons of them, consider a doom drop on main or multiple smaller drops on expos.
I've been experimenting with Mech against Zerg, with some success. Aside from Helbat and Mine drops, I pretty much take 3 bases and wait until max before attacking. A balanced army of tanks, thors, helbats, mines, and vikings usually wins the game. Helbats are really nice for dealing with lings, and can soak up a lot of damage. They're also quick and cheap to make.
That's a great tip Ferenczys about also hotkeying your upgrade structures to 5, I'm going to try that. A couple more questions for you guys.
Generally when do you build hellions and how much? In what MU? How important is the transition upgrade from hellbat/hellion and when/how is this useful in standard 1v1 play? I don't have much experience with this unit other than mixing it into my lategame push bioball. Any tips are appreciated.
My buddy who I play 2v2 with is also a Terran main and is preferred style of play (when we 1v1 each other) is marine/tank push with VERY greedy expand play sometimes. I'm wondering what a good counter to this type of play would be. In terms of our level of play we are pretty even--I know for a fact that I am a better scouter and (imho) a better tactician when it comes to micro engagements and playing off scout info. On the other hand he is probably a slightly better macro player than me and he is definitely much better at expanding.
I'm looking to hit him with something early that will fluster him. I have been looking up TvT proxy marauder builds (not necessarily all-ins, quick tech to banshee and some marines and then hopefully a GG) and these seem VERY solid (high diamond play). I still need to practice it thought against a CPU.
What else can I mix in with my occasional proxy marauder build that I will (hope to) perfect? Does anyone have a good link to a fast banshee in a TvT game?
I'm honestly looking for anything to exploit in the TvT matchup. Drops and doom drops are fun but I need some help here guys!
-Protoss units are expensive but squishy. Stalkers and Collosus, for example, are really squishy for the cost. This inherently causes the best method of play tend toward grouping all your units up and pushing out, rather than multiprong harass.
-Protoss units, while squishy for cost, are not terribly squishy themselves in regards to aoe damage. That is, we have no bread and butter unit that dies quickly to AOE, so the micro against AOE for our race is waaay easier. No splitting Marines vs. banes or dodging storms. No baiting widow mines with single lings.
of course, its still difficult to play well, just easier than the other races imo. Though, i admit that it might jsut seem that way to me because i play toss.
Exploiting the TvT matchup:
Make reapers man. I cannot emphasize enough how strong double rax reaper openings are in TvT in the ladder. As a mid-master, i accidentally clicked terran once, and i just double rax reaper-> 2 reaper ->2 more reaper followup, guy rage quitted after his opening 4 marines died, followed by an scv funeral.
If they don't have a lot of marines and/or multiple bunkers. Their worker line is toast. Just snipe all their existing marines (usually not that many) and you're golden.
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Haven't done many proxy marauder builds but I'd assume it's much like a bunker rush vs. Zerg, where your goal is to try and delay them while you're planning your next move.
Hellions work best against Zerg because they can't easily wall off their base to prevent run-byes, and until they get speedlings or roaches you can usually have free reign of their base (barring heavy Queen pressence). Just make sure you're careful with the hellions, don't lose them needlessly. It's enough to pop in and out of their base/natural just to force him to make zerglings/roaches to keep your hellions away. It sometimes helps to leave your scouting SCV somewhere nearby on auto-repair so you can park your Hellions, heal up any damage, and poke back in.
A standard follow up to 4 hellion early pressure is either Banshees (if you're going mech) or Marauders/Marine+tank if you'd rather go bio. I typically stop after 4 hellions against Z unless they're going heavy lings (get blue flame!) or I'm going mech; in which case you want to produce more hellions and reseach Hellbat mode to convert them all for your push on their third base, around 12 minutes in, accompanied by either Thors if you expect Mutas or tanks if you expect Roaches.
Against Terran, the composition I see a lot in streams is actually heavy Hellbat + Tank: it obliterates an opposing ground army, but it's slow. You take advantage of the fact that an opponent who went marine/tank/medivac is going to have a lot of resources tied up in a unit that doesn't fight (medivacs) while all of yours deal splash damage.
The aforementioned Reaper opening is really strong, and can really punish a greedy player who is relying on siege tanks to protect his stuff. The BO is usually:
10 Depot
12 Rax
12 Refinery (skipping an SCV)
14 Rax
Depending on how fast you get your 3 scvs in the refinery (it's tough because it happens right when you want to place your second rax), you will either have a few seconds to push out 1 marine while you wait for 50 gas, or you won't and will open with a reaper first. Rally him to your opponent's area (somewhere where you can jump up), and rally both your rax to this reaper. Jump in and out and harass/kill marines, leave if you get too damaged and heal up. He can't heal, so you can pick away at his defenses unless he gets a bunker.
4 reapers is usually enough. Expand behind this, keep up SCV/depot production, and drop a Tech lab and Reactor on barracks 1 and 2. Get a factory, E-bay, and maybe a third barracks with another reactor if you want to go marine-tank.
This build can be beaten by a 1-1-1 opening because hellions can chase reapers, and a medivac will eliminate your healing advantage. Go into standard play after this. Remember to keep up your upgrades (start with +1 attack, get a second Ebay and an armory, and go into 2/1; or get +1 armor, then the armory, and move into 2/2 simultaneously). You need lots of gas (4 geysers) to support the upgrades and to get medivacs/vikings.
If you suspect your opponent will open reapers, getting double rax marine production will stop him if you can position your marines on the ledges to catch the reapers when they jump up. Construct depots around your minerals to impede the reapers, preventing them from getting behind the minerals to snipe your scvs. Reapers are awful if you aren't in the mineral line, and are terrible in a straight-up fight unless you are in unit count parity or can run away to heal. Micro away low health reapers while the others keep shooting (kind of like burrowing damaged roaches) to take out high HP targets (you can kill stalkers this way).
The biggest challenge to the reaper opening is keeping up your macro at home. Queue multiple SCVs and depots so you can focus on microing around your opponent's base, and use the down time of healing to macro at home. It's a rhythm thing, so you have to get used to it.
If your opponent is going Marine/Tank, you have two choices: Get more tanks than him, or go full bio+mines and try to catch him in the mid-field before he can siege up. I can't emphasize how important this is: you HAVE to catch him unsieged, and preferably flanking him on both sides. If he gets to your base and sieges up, it's very hard to break with bio. You can lead with a few SCVs to soak up initial tank shots while your army stims in right behind, but it's dicey if you don't know where his tanks are. 5-6 tanks will destroy bio if they are sieged up. In this unfortunate position, you can try to build a few banshees to snipe his tanks from behind, or you can build Medivacs to drop his base while his army is out of position, but if he decides to push you might not have enough to defend.
Late game TvT, when you're on 4-5 bases, is usually all about who can tech to BCs faster. 3/3 BCs are almost unstoppable unless he has like 50 3/3 marines, or Thors in their new high-damage single target AA mode.
Good luck. TvT can be very stressful.
I actually had a string of wins tonight in 2v2 with my buddy and to be honest I have to attribute it to watching filtersc's channel on youtube, it is easily the most straightforward, thorough, and helpful youtube video I have watched for this game.
The way filter breaks down the opening 10 minutes of correct standard Terran play just put so much in perspective for me. In some ways I had to start over in terms of play and strategy, but now the wins actually come easier in some ways. You work REALLY hard in those first 12-15 minutes to build and time correctly and then simply train, upgrade and hotkey correctly to start poking the map and denying expos. I know this seems like a "duh" statement for some of you but I think "truly" understanding the discipline of a proper opening just goes so far in improving all around play, at least it did for me today lol.
All the wins came off the back of well time engi bay upgrades with constant marine/medivac production and basic marine/stim micro skills.
I coined something I called the "Johnny Appleseed" harass tonight, I'm sure there's a more orthodox name for it lol. Since I'm still in the noob leagues (Gold) where most people have poor mini-map awareness and very little worker protection in some games I just load a medivac up w/ 4 widowmines and proceed to drop one at the third, one at the natural, and two at the main. I then begin to take my third behind this and move my marine/medivac force (with a few factory units mixed in) out onto the battlefield.
I can't express enough how much I'm loving this game. I know this isn't the most active of threads but it's great to have at least some discussion going on this great game for mtgsalvation.
Another quick Terran question. I've pretty much eliminated the option of Battlecruiser play from my games--I'd much rather continue to power my bio or just build banshees and vikings. Is it okay to continue this way or do some of you work BCs into you ladder matches?
There is also an unconventional Air Terran TvP strategy that opens with Banshees and then goes into Ravens and BCs. It's very very gas intensive, and you need to be great at harassment with the banshees to get up to the BC count you need. The benefit here is that by eschewing the typical MMM composition, you negate the brunt of Protoss' ground army, and force them to either get Stalkers (bad damage output) or go air themselves. I'm not sure how this strategy works any more now that Tempests have been introduced though. The math used to be in Terran's favor, as it took two Stalkers to beat one Banshee in a straight up fight, so they needed DOUBLE your banshee count in stalkers to take out your armada. They can always go with High Templar and Feedback to wreck your day though, so be careful.
not to mention that if they're playing aggressive, you just roll over and die.
EX: 3 gate blink, 2 base 7gate, 4 gate, 2 base archons
also if they manage to move out safely (make cannons or something) when you are still at banshee, you'll be at a big disadvantage.
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I have been using the unit tester a bit to practice things like general smart unit movement but also to test specific scenarios such as siege tank and widow mine engagements and drops. I JUST learned how to have the medivac drop units as its moving instead of just being a sitting duck the whole time. Super useful I can't believe the actual game doesn't describe stuff like that better.
I find that most of my losses are coming from either giant screw ups such as building the wrong thing or getting supply blocked badly, OR and this is the more important one, from moving out my army at the wrong time and leaving my front door too exposed to counter attack.
This has happened especially vs Protoss when I fail to scout or locate proxy gateways/pylons which EVERY Protoss appears to do it seems
I will be ahead in economy and usually upgrades if not army value but I just make some poor tactical judgments that throw the game. I am forcing myself to scout better and be more proactive with my sensor towers. The gas investment is ball breaking on those things but they've saved my ass so many times I can't even count lol.
I love the Terran race for sure and will probably never change but man do they have some challenging aspects. One mistake big or small can oftentimes be GG against a better opponent. But I love all the micro and harass opportunities available to them and the versatility of bioball plus widowmine/tank.
Anyone hear that Blizzard will be testing changes to the warp prism? Giving it free upgraded speed like the medivac to encourage more diverse Protoss play. Protoss play is very sort of stagnant and predictable at the pro levels of play compared with Zerg and Terran.
Zerg are a serious monster in terms of units and openings now. Roaches are such a mean unit to fight and a Roach/Hydra composition can get a Zerg easily through the midgame to where he can techswitch an unsuspecting opponent easily with swarm host or those freakign lighting fast mutas. Ling/Baneling into muta is still common as well. And I see all of this in bronze and silver play it's scary.
Against Zerg, it goes both ways: you can drop his base so that your army can encroach on his creep safely (particularly good if you have to hop siege tanks forward), or you can move onto creep so that your drop will do more damage. Zerg is terrible about splitting their army effectively because they need overwhelming numbers (something like 40% more zerglings to kill an opposing marine ball, for instance) to fight you. If they screw up the split, you can end up doing serious damage to their army while taking very few losses yourself.
I've been trying to incorporate more widow mines into my standard play, and so far they've been crazy fun (Plat 1v1, Diamond 2v2). I love dropping them at chokes, then moving them as soon as they get off their first shot. Against a terran opponent, they're often blow a scan where your mines USED to be, giving you a free 250 mineral lead since the scan cost them a mule. Dropping one at the back of their expo mineral lines is great too, because it won't stop them from building a CC, but it WILL hit transfered SCVs -- often repeatedly, since they can go undetected for a long time if your opponent isn't actively watching the worker line. The gas geysers are a great place to hide one too, since knocking out a few harvesters will often mean that your opponent will be mining at 1/3 or 2/3 capacity and never realize it (until he starts wondering why he's so gas starved, anyway).
They're cheaper than turrets for defending against Mutas (and more effective), they can blow up a banshee in one shot, and even stop Oracles. And unlike turrets, when it comes time to Go Kill Him, you can take them with you! I'm starting to fall in love with the stupid little things.