Shckwave versus Random Player (Yet another PvT story)

Motivation

This is no earthshattering battle report, but I'm reporting this game because there has also been a lot of discussion recently about rapid-expansion in PvT games so I thought it might behoove me to share some of my own Toss strats. I'll never forget the time I was pushing into a Toss base in early/mid game with well over a dozen tanks when a few carriers that he had been secretly constructing on an island while my attention was distracted plowed over my base...

NOTE: I've also included a lot of paranthetical comments where I explain the rationale behind my strat decisions. I'm hoping this will help make the report more educational, so please let me know whether this is useful or if you feel it instead breaks the continuity of the report.

The Stage is Set

It was a late Friday evening and I was looking for a couple of games to wind down before going off to bed. I resisted asking for a game in nohunters and instead went public since the former would have probably stressed me out and kept me up all night thinking about what I could have done differently to have avoided getting another loss on my account. I ended up in a simple 1on1 melee game on temple. My opponent was some random player with a random clan name ( [fib] or something?), his record was 300+/50/low so I dashed all hopes of a short game, injected myself with some caffeine, and we started it up. I was, sadly, too tired to take screenshots.

Early Game Builds

I started at the somewhat lamented 6 o'clock position as Toss. Just as an aside, this spot is a bit vulnerable because a Terran player can tank your main and hall from the low ground to the left of your base, especially when your opponent starts at 9 and can support with high ground tanks from his own base. It is also unfortunately one of the starts where your natural expansion mineral line can really be tanked from high ground, and as well those same tanks can keep you from leaving your base via your choke.

_	As a matter of practice, you should be aware of how different races, particularly Terran, can exploit map features, and in fact it would not be a bad idea to compile a common database of slimy strats for more well known maps.

Not knowing my opponent's race, I figured I would go with a 1-gate then gas and pump zealots until I could recon my opponent shortly. I actually find that in 1on1's, there are only a few situations where I actually need to pylon/double gate as a start versus a single gate.

9th probe went out to scout, and I remarked to my roommate who was watching that "everything depends on whether he's at the first place I scout". My entire game is usually determined by the decision I make in early game after I note my opponent's race and strategy.

_

Early scouting, in my opinion, is critical and often worth many times the economic setback because of the critical window of opportunity you have to mess around in your opponent's base before he has combat units. If I can get off an offensive assimilator against a Terran or Toss, e.g., the game is usually bagged in my favor. If I can stick down a pylon at my Zerg opponent's natural before he can start his hatch there, I get a pretty big advantage and can throw his whole BO out of whack. And if I see a six-pool in progress, I can rally my zealots and probes to my choke before the lings break through. Often I sneak a probe inside his choke and then hide it in some far-off corner to start offensive cannons, whereas if I wait until he has a military unit, he's usually more wary of chasing my probe out of his base.

Unfortunately, Terran was at the LAST place I scouted, going counterclockwise. My roommate practied his Homer Simpson "DOH!" impressions as my probe successively reached the empty start locations. But I think likewise was true, since his SCV came into my base at around the same time my probe went up his ramp. He was doing a single rax/depot-at-choke build with bunker on ramp. He was not front gating his ramp since he didn't know my race previously, so my probe slipped through and the bunker placement meant that he would not be able to close off his ramp. Gas was already up, so I make the usual decision to match tech. My next structures were gas, cyber, gate, citadel, and I stayed with just those 2 gates for the entirety of the game. Next zealot out of my gate has a deathwish and marches through his choke and into his base to send some recon back to Aiur. Unfortunately, my opponent has bats and marines and a vulture, so my zealot doesn't get to scout very far into his base. This is problematic: I want to see exactly how many factories and rax and such my opponent has, otherwise I need to commit to a fairly flexible build to be prepared for anything. Given the troop count, though, I assume he's either doing a 2-fact or wraith rush, so I guess the former, do a forge with single cannon in my mins line in case of the latter, and start playing goon containment.

_

When scouting with a military unit, it's important to MOVE it through his choke such that it doesn't waste time engaging units and random buildings that would deter from its primary objective of scouting the inside of the base. To accomplish this, I attack-move the zealot to a position outside the choke, then (shift)-move it into the base. This way, the zealot will engage anything that it meets en route to the base but then ignore everything else once it gets there, so it can scout. You'll definitely want to use this when you are e.g. planting remote spider mines, or filling bunkers from afar: attack-move to the spot, then shift-mine the spot, then attack-move back to your base.

Facing the Inevitable Tank Push

My first 5 or so goons rally to his choke, take a few hits from his high-ground bunker en route, and settle on the north side of his natural. They're there to watch for any exiting troops and also are in a position to start backing up and stalling a tank push if one comes. It's tricky containing at the 9 o'clock because a well situated tank on the ledge with spotting can blast anything near the choke, so I take my chances. A dark templar then joins them soon afterward. Taking a risk, I keep an eye on my DT and march him up the ramp, past a firebat and bunker and some vultures... there are no spider mines, no turrets, so I get all the way into his base where a tank&bunker&two vultures are waiting for me. One swipe at an SCV, one comsat, there's a sound of spider mines too (but no explosions, darn it), and my DT bites it.

_

I wondered why he didn't have detect at his base. Perhaps he was a bad player, but that was unlikely given his play so far and I thought it was more likely that he was trying to present a target to bait me to committing expensive units that he could counter through more subtle means. In martial arts, we often speak of "invitational" stances that seem deliberately open but are really feints to encourage your opponent to overcommit to an aggressive move.

The recon is well worth the cost, however. I find that he's got a sci facility partially building, so I expect a delayed SV-assisted tank push. I briefly considered just overrunning him with goons, but I know that the 9 o'clock is particularly defensible with ledged tanks that can wipe out innumerable ground forcs.

_

Many people make the mistake of sieging their 9 o'clock tanks on the extreme edges of the ledge in order to maximize their coverage of the choke and expansion area. While it is not a bad idea to have one tank flush against the ledge, it is probably better to have the others recessed a little so that it is harder for goons to return fire. Similarly, when I turbo newbie, I'll keep my tank away from the ledge in order to make counters like psi storm and hydras difficult.

There are many traditional choies of what to do in this situation. One is to keep making goons and zealots and play containment or even defeat the tank push. Another is to go for a mass drop. But I decide instead to be a cheesy slime and rapid-expand on him. A robotics is planted, I make a few templar and start researching storm to station defensively at my main, and I expand first to my island, then to his island, then to the 3 o'clock start. I stop making dragoons and determine to just use the 6 at his choke w/ DT to at least force him to push starting from his base.

A comsat lights my dragoons, then a half-dozen speed-upped vultures race out, eradicate my DT, then dart back up his choke before I even knew what happened. Grr. Next come the siege tanks, backed by a few marines. My dragoons all die while I'm backing them up, but not without first putting up a fight and -- more importantly -- slowing his progress toward my base. Good thing he doesn't scout the other expansions spots at this point.

_

There is really no excuse not to have constant recon as Terran. Quite simply, you should take your first set of vultures once you're safe and clone them to mine different expansion sites and then return to the point of offensive containment. This takes mere seconds to do and will completely reveal a rapid expander. The steps are simple: Hotkey your vultures (e.g. to 1), clone them to mine different areas, then hit "1", hold down shift and attack-move to the return spot. The vultures will all go out, mine, then automatically return without any further micromanagement need. With zergling, e.g., again hotkey your control group, clone your zergling to move to different locations, wait several seconds so they have time to get there, then hit "1U" to select your control group and cause them to all burrow at once wherever they happen to be. This may sound kinda abstruse, but do try it; it's second-nature for me now to be able to get a dozen lings or mines burrowed all over the map so that nothing goes unnoticed.

Cowering in My Base

At home, I'm pumping templar out of my 2 gates and also slap down a couple of stargates and a fleet beacon at one of my islands (to avoid comsat detection in case he recons my main to see my tech). My 3 expansions have gas/mins and are totally defenseless because I'm counting on him not building any flyers and also saving his comsat to assist his push instead of expending it looking for expansions. My 3 o'clock is completely vulnerable, but I know his tanks are somewhat en route and I expect that the expansion will make up for its cost before he's able to eradicate it. I make a mental note to add some cannons and a HT later.

I have a corsair out of my stargate and patrol it along his attack route. Sure enough, he has a bunch of tanks and vultures outside my ramp, SCVs bunker crawling with turrets toward me. If he had used spider mines, I would have been in a lot more trouble; but as it is, I was able to use my 3 dark templar and dragoon support and corsair support out of my choke and suicided them against his forces to keep him honest. The corsair chased the SV away while a couple of goliaths pounded on it, then the DTs and dragoons got an insignificant siege tank kill off before he could comsat. As this was going on, I storm two of his tanks from high ground and manage to kill one and severely weaken the other.

I'm losing the unit war big time, note that up to this point he's only suffered a couple of casualties. I'm really counting on my carriers to turn the tide, in the meantime my two most important goals are 1) hide the fact that I'm making carriers, 2) delay his tank push so that it doesn't wipe out my main before my carriers can arrive.

A couple of batteries at my choke, along with a few more dragoons and zealots, guard me from the inevitable onslaught. My cyber and forge are both spinning with wpns/shields upgrades. I consider building cannons on high ground to eat his tanks as they come in, but decide against it. I want his tanks to be close to my ledge and feeling safe so my high templar can storm them from high ground. Soon, there are tanks pounding on my high-ground cannons. Then the carriers come...

The Cavalry Arrives

I have 3 carriers and one corsair w/dweb when I finally make my first cost-effective strike. I've during this time added another couple of stargates at my main, so I'm pumping carriers fast enough to make any cheese carrier rusher proud. Dweb clears the tanks so they stop causing damage to my ramp, the carriers easily take care of the goliaths at my choke. His whole force turns tail and starts running back to his choke, I get a few more kills. I don't bother dwebbing the bunker or turret: My batts will recharge my carriers. I just don't want to lose any structures from tank fire, so I use it against those instead.

From here, it goes gradually downhill for him. He's established his natural (note: I have not), but I have 4 fully operational bases. The game would have been bagged no matter what I had done: I could have gone mass corsairs instead of carriers and just dwebbed his attack force (I truly believe that corsairs, even without their air attack, are oftentimes just with dweb alone more useful than templar against factory Terran wars) while making dragoons to clean up, or I could have brute forced with more carriers, or done surgical scout hits and played containment... A 3-base Toss with fleet beacon research and air weapons/armor upgrades is truly a scary site to behold. This situation reminds me of pre-1.04 when the best counter against guardians was, "Don't let him get that far."

As it is, I'm focused on more immediate concerns. I need to decide whether to chase those tanks back to his base and win some more kills, or go for the mother lode and attack his main. I figure I'll go for the quick kill and charge his main with my carriers, but he's erected a few turrets and is pumping goliaths so there's no opportunity to destroy anything. Wrong decision on my part, but at least I know those tanks will be useless in later game because I'm going completely air at this point. His mechanicals, BTW, are 2/2 at this rather early stage of the game, whereas my carriers are still 1/1/1 with further research in progress.

I retreat my carriers to middle, but a control group+ of angry stimmed marines along with one goliath start chasing after them. I lose one from inattentiveness and start flying the other two toward high ground. I flee to the 3 o'clock start near the ramp and start to pick off the marines off one by one since they no longer can assault my carriers without geting up the ramp. More carriers are on the way. My next target is his natural: If I can take that out, he's down to one depleted base and will probably have to surrender.

Cleaning Up

I start rallying my carriers to his natural's high ground. I know I'm meat if he counters with goliaths, so I bring a few corsairs for good measure. Unfortunately, a whole slew of goliaths starts returning fire once I assault his natural and I can't get a good storm off. Attacking from the ledges against ground units is extremely effective because the carrier bodies do not light up, and hence the ground units can only return fire to the interceptors unless there is some sort of uphill spotting. But using comsat for that purpose, he quite nearly takes out my whole attack force before I can retreat further out of range. Then this cat and mouse game begins: I bring a shuttle with 4 templar to the cliff and start attacking. He attacks with his goliaths, I try to storm, he runs away. I bring my templar to low ground to chase him, his goliaths don't reappear. I bring my carriers, he shoots several volleys and then runs them away before my templar can get into range. It's quite frustrating, and perhaps I should have just brought along a probe and cannon/batt'd off the ledge completely. Actually the better thing at that point would have been to switch strats to mass zealots and plow his main over, given that all of his units were now primarily anti-air.

Eventually, I manage to force his CC to abandon his natural and I'm able to take out a bunker, a couple of tanks, and assorted SCVs that are at his choke. He's against the ropes now. In the process of taking out his natural, though, I find that he's discovered my 3 o'clock and is plowing it down with marines. Too bad, I forgot to defend it after all.

End Game

But life is going good regardless. He's taken all of those goliaths to my choke and again is trying to break into my base. There is quite a complicated battle involved including some shield battery+carrier shelling from the high ground at my ramp, but in any case I don't believe that any number of goliaths can take down a stacked control group of carriers.

_

Air beats ground in large numbers because while air can all take up the same physical space and thus all attack at once with concentrated fire, ground can only get into range a bit at a time, even if ground outranges air. This was the cause behind the whole overpowered scout phenomenum in pre-1.04 where as soon as you had a control group worth of scouts, you could wreck just about anything on the ground. As well, carriers perform admirably with shield batteries because interceptors will continue to attack regardless of what the carrier is doing so long as the carrier remains in range of the interceptors. Thus, you can have your carriers attack a target, then madly right-click your whole group on a nearby shield battery. The carriers will constantly recharge while the interceptors continue to attack. It is indeed very difficult to assault carriers on defense.

I repel his attack force and start en route to this base. At this point, there is no point continuing. He leaves while providing an excuse, as expected. However, his excuse is somewhat interesting:

"GG. I'm stoned and more."

I'm about to send him my condolences, but he leaves immediately afterward. I always thought that stoning had been restricted to middle age Draconian methods of punishment, and farbeit for me to imagine how someone who was recently stoned could 1) survive, and 2) find his way to a computer and play a good game of Starcraft .

Lessons Learned

1. Rapid expand can be a good response if you're confident that you're dealing with a micro-intensive Terran player. While it undoubtedly won't work against all good players, I remember back in pre-1.04 when outresourcing your Terran opponent in PvT through expanding early was one of the only ways known to stop a well executed tank push. I do not recommend it as a general strat because it is very easy to counter if your opponent recognizes this as your strat and builds appropriate response units.
2. Patrol those starts. Always send one marine or SCV to patrol between empty start locations. If you don't have a spare unit, send a peon and use the patrol trick to get it to patrol (peons don't have a patrol command; but if you select them and a military unit, you can tell them both to patrol, then just cancel the command for the military unit. This leaves you with a patrolling peon). Catch those early expanders. Always use a couple of mines or burrowed zergling or what not. There has been much talk about how to handle rapid expansions with minimal micro. There are two favorites that I have come to enjoy:
   • Use Heartcutter's suggestion of a highly mobile pack of vultures to respond to fledgling expansion attempts. When you see an expansion starting, simply run your vultures to the choke, mine it, then run into the base and start firing away. Any relief force is likely to get severely decimated by the mines such that your vultures are cost-effective whether they succeed in eliminating the expansion or not.
   • Use a dropship or two of marine/meds. These do admirably against cannons and are cheap and re-usable enough as a quick response.
3. Support carriers with shield batteries. Build not just 1, but 2 or 3 in a cluster near attack points. If you save even one 350/250 carrier, it's worth your 6 shield batteries.
4. Note that while this game seemed one-sided, it was really a do-or-die proposition to rapid expand. I would definitely not have tried this on a ladder game because it's very risky. The game was only one-sided because when my investment paid off, there was really nothing great he could have done in response.

Other Notes

1. If I play against any of you, I will definitely not rapid expand on you, despite using this in my last 3 PvT battle reports here. I give you this with enough confidence that you should definitely NOT waste your time checking to see if I'm rapid expanding if we ever play...
2. I promise that my next BR here will not be PvT and will not be about rapid expanding...

S hckwave ___________XPOW