A Starcraft Question

[yaroslav]

Well, a friend and I have played Starcraft some days ago. Well, the game is fun, very fun. We recover it from time to time, and play 'Direct Cable' multiplayer games.

But I have a problem, my friend always plays Terran and I want to play Protos. This is normal Starcraft without the later expansion and without any patchs.

How can I counterattacks those terran siege tanks? They are quite poweful, with an impressive long range...

What is the most effective anti-tank tactic with Protos?

Thank you in advance

[Felch]

High Templars with the Psi Storm thing, maybe.

I don't play too much.

[Dauphin]

Carriers are always fun.

Failing that a few zealots with mobility upgrades should do the trick.

[yaroslav]

Thank you all-
Those are things to test, but Psi Storm range is not as large as tank shoot is, so I must find the way to reach the tank. Maybe a drop, like SDolphin suggest, but he always build turrets...

[Juggernaut]

20+ upgraded Carriers always slaughter everything on the ground, that's why me and my friends stopped playing, it got so predictable. Just make sure you got that cloaking ship (forgot its name) assisting, to protect the carriers from air attack.

[SnowFire]

Lots of things you can do.

Early in the game, and if your friend is slow on building a comsat, nothing will beat Dark Templar. They'll slice & dice the tanks before they can run away.

If your friend isn't building lots of marines/goliaths, Scouts & other Aerial units can wipe 'em out totally unopposed.

If you must use Zealots, try and spread them out so that splash damage is less an issue. Carting them in with Shuttles so that they drop right next to the tanks is fun too, and can seriously annoy opponents.

If your opponent is tank-happy, this is probably obvious, but don't waste money on photon cannons then. That can be used on your fleet.

Juggernaught: Erm, well, that's what I thought at first too. It's an early strategy that works well even for beginners. That said, don't think you can get away with it against better opponents. On small maps, if you aren't using your money to build defenses and expand, you won't have the resources to build 'em; and if you are using your resources for that, then you aren't buildling carriers. On large maps, the carrier horde is most useful in team battles where one person is quietly ignored on the team, and bang! Hordes of carriers appear from nowhere in your enemies base. But it's still risky. Hordes of hydralisks will take carriers down while being useful themselves; Plauge is absolutley wonderful against them; and by far the worst thing to happen is a good micromanager with ghosts- he'll lock down you're entire fleet and waste it. Almost as bad, and easier to do, are some arbiters that stasis field your fleet again... and again... and again. And while your carriers sit there useless, your base burns. Suffice to say, massed carriers are good, but not invincible, and if you lose your fleet you're in big trouble.

[loinburger]

If my opponent kept using massed siege tanks, then I'd switch to Zerg. Guardians outrange all anti-air defenses, and can lay waste to siege tanks in short order. (This also holds true for the massed bunker defense that terrans often employ.) Plus, Queens can be used as hit-and-run tankbusters, while Defilers can negate the siege tank attacks for a brief period with their spore clouds, allowing your Ultralisks to close in for the kill.

If you really want to stick to Protoss, then try sneaking some Archons into range under an Arbiter cloak. It's expensive, but if your opponent is bunkering down then you'll have plenty of time to prepare your Archon/Arbiter counterattack. (Be wary of any Science Vessels if you do this, since one EMP missile can lay waste to an entire army of Archons. Include a couple of Dark Archons in the group to either Mind Control any enemy Science Vessels or to Feedback them to death.) If your opponent's not bunkering down, then just rush him with Zealots with maybe a coupla Reavers for backup.

[H Tower]

dark templar and dark archons aren't available to him, he doesn't have Brood War

[loinburger]

Hmm, in that case he should support his cloaked Archons with some Scouts. Hopefully they'll be able to take out any Science Vessels before their EMP's go off. Keep an Arbiter in base just in case you need to perform a rapid Recall. (Don't use Carriers as Science Vessel support, since they're not very useful in targetting specific units and don't have the Scouts' speed advantage. If you wind up going with cheaper units than Archons, then I recommend that you still go with Science Vessel support--an army of Zealots might not be so severely crippled by EMP as an army of Archons, but you still want to avoid EMP at all costs.)

[Footie Mad]

Scout his every move, put pressure on him constantly. Keep him from expanding. As for the tanks, there is nothing in the game that cannot be countered. Use a combination of groundforces, attack from two or more directions at the same time, race a shuttle full of zealots into the sieged tanks. Storm is essential especially against sieged tanks.

[Urban Ranger]

Don't the Protosses have these catipillar things that have a very long range? Or are they not long enough?

I reckon massed aerial attacks will do the job.

[Dauphin]

Scarabs are uselss, I never use them.

Haven't played in a while, and I'm having a mental block - is it Scarab or Reaver?

[Dauphin]

The best ploy is to be a different race. If a horde of zealots is expected and you invade with a horde of hydralisks it will confuse them, at least in the first opening conflict.

[Ari Rahikkala]

SD: The units are called reavers, their ammunition is scarabs. Building them is a major PITA but they're fun for big ground attacks, especially against bases (reavers + a few observers and scouts, and zealots if the enemy has swarms of ground units is a pretty effective attack force - note that I only have SP experience, though). If your enemy isn't quick, you might be able to use a combination of speed-upgraded zealots and well managed reavers (IIRC scarabs never hurt friendly units so your zealots are safe- not sure of this) to take down his front line of siege tanks. The zealots will, however, be in danger if he has a line of tanks behind the front, so if you expect that you should use air units.

OTOH, you should try using the zerg, or even the terrans... Burrow task forces of zerglings around choke points around your base and group them into hotkeys according to the chokepoint. Siege tanks are very susceptible to attacks from several fronts, and it doesn't sound too much like your friend would use science ships or comsat religiously so you could well be able to surprise him a few times.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by LightEning
(IIRC scarabs never hurt friendly units so your zealots are safe- not sure of this)

That's correct, which is why I usually build at least a coupla Reavers even though they're pain in the ass units to use. Reavers are also immune to the hit-and-run attacks by Zerg Queens (since they're completely inorganic, unlike Siege Tanks), and the Defilers' Spore Cloud ability is useless against them (since Scarabs are technically melee weapons). Nothing's better at taking out a Marine Stimpack rush than a couple Reavers. (Reavers are also one of my pet Starcraft peeves, since I hate hate hate that they can't automatically build Scarabs.)

[Garth Vader]

Try and get the tanks when they are moving. I like a mixed force of zealots and dragoons.

I am a big far of Archons, but if a human player is using EMP Archons bite.

[Footie Mad]

The protoss "slugs" are called reavers and scarabs are the missiles they fire.

[DinoDoc]

Reaver drops are the best way to deal with a Terran in vanilla SC.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by Garth Vader
I am a big far of Archons, but if a human player is using EMP Archons bite.

That's why I love Dark Archons. Feedback will pretty much take out a Science Vessel, and even if it doesn't destroy it you'll still be safe from its EMP for awhile.

[Dauphin]

Using mind control to take over an SCV and a Zerg Drone (?) is wonderful. You can have three armies for the price of one.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by loinburger
That's why I love Dark Archons. Feedback will pretty much take out a Science Vessel,

Mind control will net you the Science Vessel though.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Mind control will net you the Science Vessel though.

Sure, but then my Dark Archon is useless and vulnerable. Science Vessels usually aren't worth it, IMO--their abilities aren't very effective against Terrans (though Defensive Matrix is nice for Reaver drops), and I don't need another unit that can detect cloaked units (since mine are cheaper and better). The only time I'll take any kind of risk to snag a Science Vessel is when there are also Zerg on the map, since Irradiate is killer against them; usually I'll save my Dark Archons for real prizes, like Battlecruisers, SCV's, or Dropships.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by loinburger
I'll save my Dark Archons for real prizes, like Battlecruisers or SCV's.

SCVs? What good would they be? If anyone lets you tech your way up past marines, you've won already.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
SCVs? What good would they be?

They're useful for repairing my stolen Battlecruisers.

[DinoDoc]

Good point.

[monolith94]

"Using mind control to take over an SCV and a Zerg Drone (?) is wonderful. You can have three armies for the price of one."
Wrong. You get three armies for the price of three armies, albeit it's still nice to have three armies.
I only play as Protoss! It just makes me feel oh so civilized. Those pathetic fuzzies and scalies can't stand up to our combined military forces!
The favorite things I like about the Protoss:
Flexible defence, Cannons are really cheap and easy, terrifically mass-produceable. Nothing quite like seeing a row of 20+ photon cannons.
Observers. Information is critical too success. Know your enemy, and you can counter him.
Basically everything about the protoss rock. Reavers are the ultimate anti-invasionary weapon. I'll never forget being mass-rushed by countless numbers of zerg grunt attackers, and watching them be slaughtered by my small amount of cannons, zealots, and especially reavers.

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by monolith94
"Using mind control to take over an SCV and a Zerg Drone (?) is wonderful. You can have three armies for the price of one."
Wrong. You get three armies for the price of three armies, albeit it's still nice to have three armies.

Doesn't each "army" have its own supply limit of 200. Therefore you can have an army three times the size of anyone else.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by monolith94
Nothing quite like seeing a row of 20+ photon cannons.

You're the reason why I hate playing on Big Game Hunters.

Doesn't each "army" have its own supply limit of 200.

IIRC, no.

[SnowFire]

Yeah, each army has a supply limit of 200, but it's rare enough that you hit even that on most maps. The "steal another race and use their supply" strategy is generally only useful on massive huge 8 player Free For All maps with tons of resources. Team games, or smaller maps, go too fast for it to be even remotely profitable.

[loinburger]

Battlecruisers and Ultralisks also take up so many supplies that most of the time even if I steal some drones/SCVs it's not really worth it to build up the enemy's tech tree. It's not so bad with stolen Zerg units (since Overlords are useful in their own right, and Ultralisks take quite a few supplies but not an ungodly number), but I've got to build a supply depot for each stolen Battlecruiser before I can begin churning out any Marines, and by that time the game's probably over.