"u know this channel has way less spam ever since i /ignored everyone whos name starts with 'abrasive' and ends with '-x'"
-:necrosausage!:\
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| A Lesson Learned [Almost] The Hard Way | | | Author: | | | IP: | ottawa-hXXXX | | Date: | 11/10/01 11:11 | | Game Type: | Starcraft | | Labels: | none | | Report Rating: , # of Ratings: 1, Max: 5, Min: 5
Lifetime Rating for Fenriz: 5.0000 |  | This was the third and final battle played by a friend and I last night, all of which were played on the map "The Hunters". We used the same race for all battles, him using Terrans, and I using Protoss.
The 1st battle had been easily won by me, as I prevented him from getting a single expansion throughout the entire game. Around mid game, I realized I had little chance of effectivelly penetrating his main (and only) base's defence (he had about 4 bunkers and some 12 seige tanks :P ). So I decided to make a huge Carrier fleet. By the time I attacked his base with the 12 or so Carriers, he knew he had no chance, and just tried sending the tanks to my base, but needless to say, he was unsuccessful.
The 2nd game was even more quickly and easily won by me, as he started out kinda slow, and I send all my zealots to destroy his expansion (he tends to under-protect his expansions), and proceeded to send them to his main. They bearely destroyed his defences (3 survived), and then moved on to destroy his single barracks (the last one dieing just after that to a new seige tank). I kept making units the whole time, and sent in the rest of my forces soon after that. The 8 zealots, 2 dragoons, and 2 archons had no problem dealing with the weak new defences, and he conceded the game.
The 3rd game was by far the best, and closest game. It was not so much close the entire time, but there was a very close call at the end.
I began pretty normally, with a pylon on the 8th probe, a gateway on the 11th, and another pylon on the 12th, and another gateway on the 14th. I continued to make zealots from them, and did not make an assimilator or forge until several were done. I stopped making them for a while, and then sent all 12 that I had to attack him. This was a mistake, as his position was fortified by 3 bunkers, and I only managed to destroy 1 and the marines in it!
At that point I started my expansion. Looking at the replay, I found that he did not start his until mine was well under way (Nexus finished, and some cannons in place). I then found his undefended expansion, and sent in 4 zealots to destroy it. I destroyed the bunker he had started just before I got there, and was attacking his CC, when he came in with 4 tanks and 4 marines. My speed upgraded zealots did quite a number on his tanks, and they managed to kill all 4, and 3 marines, the last damaged zealot dieing after killing the 3rd marine (if you think that was a great underdog victory, just wait till the Archon bit... :) . He quickly sent in 2 goliaths and another seige tank as reinforcements, but that was hardly enough against 12 level 2 weapons, speed upgraded zealots. The 11 which survived destroyed only his refinery (he flew away with the CC, and hid the SCV's before I got there [replay]). For some strange reason, I decided to send all 11 of them to his main (and they were slaughtered by 4 seige tanks and 3 bunkers). Luckly, I continued making zealots, I had 2 goons, and an Archon (I know this is dangerous against terrans, but this was still early in the game, and I love Archons [they kick major a**]). I made some more units at my expansion, and he restarted his, making a factory there. He started making Goliaths, and was sending in 4 tanks when I spotted him, and sent in 11 zealots and an Archon. They quickly took care of these defences, and started taking down his base, when 6 Wraiths showed up 8-{ and had the Archon's shields down to almost 200 before he go a shot at them. To my surprise, as much as my friend's, he managed to kill all 6 of them with a total of 8 hit points left (gotta love 39 splash damage [level 3 weapons] 8-). I then took him back to my base, and brought in the 2 goons, who finished off the CC.
That was when he started on his Battlecruiser fleet (those damn cruisers!!!). At that point, one of my observers spotted another expansion he had started as I finished off the other one. Unfortunately for him, it was undefended, and my guys were closer to it then his. I swiftly destroyed that expansion, and almost instantly he started another one. This time, however, he was smarter and made it right next to his. At this point he had 4 cruisers, but only slightly over 500 minerals (before making his CC), and no way to get any more until his expansion was done. If I had payed more attention to scouting in this game, as I had in the previous 2 games, I could have easily finished him off here. I had several observers, but I thought I had the game won (THAT was the big mistake I made, and one which I learned from). As they say: "It ain't over 'till the fat lady sings!"
So now I had 2 mineral supplying base, while he had 1. Also, he had about 200 of each gas and minerals, while I had over 4000 minerals and over 2000 gas. This was the main reason why I thought I had the game won. In the end, however, it was actually this resource abundance that won me the game, as I used to make several stargates, which in term made many scouts. But getting back on track... I attacked his expansion with a number o zealots, and encountered little ground resistance. He did, however, have 6 cruisers protecting that base. Again, I should have paid more attention to this and made more scouts, but all I could think was: he has almost no resources, and I have a whole lot of reavers with which to destroy his bases. So in a sense, the roles of the first game were reversed, except I was still the one with plentiful resources.
This was when I did a massive, but very quick reaver drop on his expansion. This did little other than kill a few SCV's, as his 9 cruisers were near by, and I ran my reavers and shuttles to safety unharmed. Soon, his fleet was numbering 10, while I only had 7 scouts. While my air fleet paled in comparison to his, it was essential in buying me time to construct a greater fleet, as well as reducing his numbers. The biggest help, however, were my 3 arbiters, who bought me immense amounts of time by putting most, but not all cruisers in stasis. At this point, he had just finished his 12th cruiser, and I was planning on recalling my 14 reavers into the heart of his main. I made 4 hallucinations of one of my Arbiters, and all 4, as well as the real thing were promptly slaughtered by the cruisers (though he used up most of his yamato attacks! ;). Desperate, I put most in stasis with another near by arbiter, and attack the cruisers with my scouts. I did not, however, do nearly as much micro-management as I should have, and the scouts managed to only severely wound 2 before being destroyed. A heroic newly built scout and dragoon stepped in here, and with the help of my 2 near by shield batteries, they managed to finish off 2 of them. Unfortunatly, the scout was killed, and although another was completed right after, the stasis wore off before a 3rd could be destroyed. His fleet then overwhelmed my scout and dragoon. I put most back in stasis again, but had nothing other than 3 goons and 3 templars (one of which was KIA by 2 yamato gun shots) to deal with the remaining cruisers. I manage to destroy 1 more and severely wound 2 more after another stasis field, but once that wore off I was wounce again slaughtered. Another 3 brave dragoons managed to kill another before perishing to this massive fleet (7 of the remaining cruisers were at my base, the other 3 were being repaired).
The turning point to that struggle was to take place now, as he killed my last remaining Arbiter, who was concealing by massive reaver force. He than started to target these reavers, and I scrambled to get them in shuttles and out of there. This is when I decided to sacrifice my main base, and used those reavers to destroy him (or divert the attention of the cruisers). A mighty cannon finished another cruiser off, helping my shuttles escape. Some cannons and 2 new dragoons kept the remaining 9 cruisers bussy, while my reavers demolished his only source of income. Now, he could no longer manufacture more cruisers, and soon, he would not be able to repair them. I put my resources to good use, as I built more scarabs to demolish his main, and made my 4 new stargates (for a total of 5 now), and made scouts from them. I also manufactured some goons. When he started to attack my second base, I had 6 goons and 2 templars there, and 8 scouts and an Arbiter on the way. The goons manage to do little damage, but by the time my air-force arrived, 3 psi storms had been laid on the cruisers. They killed one off without taking any damage (as the arbiter cloacked them). I unintentionally put the remaining 8 in stasis, but that allowed for 2 more scouts to join them.
When the stasis finally wore off, the 9 cloacked and 1 [accidentally] uncloacked scouts greatly overwhelmed the cruisers. He was now left with no units to defend himself with, while I was left with 3 reavers, 8 scouts, 1 arbiter, 2 zealots, and some valuable experience and lessons learned. He then conceded the game rather than wait for his base to be demolished. This unexpectadly [on my part] close match took just over 47 minutes to conclude (mainly, IMHO, because we were 2 players on an eight player map). Two of the most important lessons I learned were that continuous scouting is always necessary, and to keep a balanced force, that can deal with whatever comes my way (or use great scouting to build a force to counter your opponent's).
That's it. Hope u enjoyed it, and I look foward to the comments.
Fenriz.
PS.: Just in case u were wondering, this was not a broodwar match (were are the dark archons when u need them heh?) |
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