I have returned: StarCraft II

[tornfleshofsoul]

The gold minerals on the left side

How do you protect the other resources once you build there? Not much room to build cannons

[geno]

Here are some of my tips for the final zeratul mission. I've done it on normal, hard, and brutal saving the archives every time and getting all the achievements for it (got over 1000 extra kills on a normal run).

First, if you really want the research but also want to beat it on brutal, there is no requirement to do both simultaneously. You can do the brutal run to win the mission then replay it in the mission bank on normal to get the research.

But, if you do want to get both at once, there are a couple things to consider, some of which Kaylia covered. Taking the expansion early can be powerful, cover it with a decent amount of cannons and keep a portion of your army on the bridge and jump in if they try to push it. By the time their armies get too powerful, you'll have gotten most out of the expansion anyways.

Second, mass colossus early with ground support, with a transition into void rays and phoenix for a more mobile vs. air and vs. hybrid army is a powerful strategy, particularly if you pair it with an insane amount of cannons (first around the archives then ALL over your base) to make sure Nydus's never really become an issue.

Maybe a more abusive strategy that can almost guarantee you the research is an instant dark shrine and bunch of warp gates at the start while you put the whole starting army at the top-right bridge. Warp in a constant stream of DTs to form hold position walls on the left, then right, then finally the top path and follow it up with a ton of phoenixes to pick the overseers when they finally start sending them. If you are quick to respond, you should be able to keep your DT lines up pretty much all the way til the research is done. Once again, follow up with insane amounts of cannons in base and pull all your DTs to them. Still pick off as many overseers as you can with your phoenix (+other air units at this point) army. This strat can cut it close at the end when they are sending 3+ overseers at a time, but I've beaten it with it.

[Kaylia]

How do you protect the other resources once you build there? Not much room to build cannons

Like I said, I put 2 gateway to block the choke point right next to the expand, than cram as many canon as I can behind (you can fit something like 15 canons. I summon templar behind these canon mostly, but other units can be useful at time. You can use your main army the first time since the first couple of wave are slow, but later , it has to be autosufficient.

You mine out gold mineral pretty fast...if you expand right away, it takes like 10 minutes. Once mineral are gone, you can abandon it.

[tornfleshofsoul]

Just beat it, didn't bother to get the extra base on the side, too much of a hassle. The dark templar trick worked nice, gave me time to upgrade everything and kept my Colossi alive for a good long time. Saved the archives too!

[GRT]

on brutal you need to pump out phoenixes to lift up the hybrids, especially the ranged ones

[Jefe]

First time playing an RTS here. Anyway, is there a way to select all of a specific class in a group? Say I want all my medics to be selected and exclude svc and other units.

[Syntex]

First time playing an RTS here. Anyway, is there a way to select all of a specific class in a group? Say I want all my medics to be selected and exclude svc and other units.

Double click said units and it will select all of that specific unit, if your talking about using specific abilities when you have multiple casters selected(like ghosts and marines) press tab to cycle through them without de-selecting the group.

EDIT: If you have 10 SCV's and 10 Medivacs selected(20 total) and you want to move just the medivacs without de-selecting the SCV's I don't think thats possible AFAIK but doing what I said above works.

[Kaylia]

First time playing an RTS here. Anyway, is there a way to select all of a specific class in a group? Say I want all my medics to be selected and exclude svc and other units.

Holding shift will keep the previous selection. So double click on medic, then double click on marine to get medic and marine only.

You can shift click a unit portrait to remove it from the selection as well if you got something unwanted.

[Bweigelt]

Double click said units and it will select all of that specific unit, if your talking about using specific abilities when you have multiple casters selected(like ghosts and marines) press tab to cycle through them without de-selecting the group.

EDIT: If you have 10 SCV's and 10 Medivacs selected(20 total) and you want to move just the medivacs without de-selecting the SCV's I don't think thats possible AFAIK but doing what I said above works.

Hitting Control + shift + the unit portait you want removed from the group will remove all of them. So in your example if you hit control+shift+SCV portrait it will remove all the SCV's from your group.

[Syntex]

Hitting Control + shift + the unit portait you want removed from the group will remove all of them. So in your example if you hit control+shift+SCV portrait it will remove all the SCV's from your group.

Cool.

[rithridan]

If you want to select all units in the same control group without deselecting the others you can just use TAB to cycle between them. This is useful if you want to stim Marines in a control group of MMM when marines aren't the ones that are currently highlighted.

[Kurp]

I've started to use Ravens. The defense drones seem really good against a bunch of stalkers. I drop three or so down as soon as I engage a stalker heavy army and I've been doing really well. After I use my other abilities, I'll try drop a couple more if my Ravens haven't been destroyed. What else are they good against?

Also, what are some good uses of the missile upgrade? I've taken it a few times, but mostly forget to use it so I haven't really been able to see what it can do. Are there specific situations where the rocket kicks ass?

[Ferien]

I've started to use Ravens. The defense drones seem really good against a bunch of stalkers. I drop three or so down as soon as I engage a stalker heavy army and I've been doing really well. After I use my other abilities, I'll try drop a couple more if my Ravens haven't been destroyed. What else are they good against?

Also, what are some good uses of the missile upgrade? I've taken it a few times, but mostly forget to use it so I haven't really been able to see what it can do. Are there specific situations where the rocket kicks ass?

The missile is really good against Zerg, especially if they're going muta-heavy. It does a huge amount of splash damage so that clump would get annihilated pretty quickly. Believe there was a replay posted earlier in this thread of that exact thing.

[Kurp]

Oh nice, I'll keep that in mind. Is it safe to assume that defense drones are really good against Hydralisks?

Can your own Mothership's Vortex hit your units?

[geno]

Oh nice, I'll keep that in mind. Is it safe to assume that defense drones are really good against Hydralisks?

Can your own Mothership's Vortex hit your units?

Drones are good against hydras, but its kind of a tossup as seeker missile is actually quite good against them too. Hydras take more damage from them than stalkers and tend to clump up more. Ravens in general are very strong end game units once you get comfortable mixing in their spell casting in big fights, much like Science vessels were in Brood War.

Yes vortex can hit your own units, except the mothership itself. There is a particularly funny strategy that works in 2v2s regarding this. You vortex their army and have a zerg partner run a handful of banelings into the vortex. When the vortex ends, all the units inside are stacked for a second and start to expand. But not before the banelings go off

[Kurp]

Drones are good against hydras, but its kind of a tossup as seeker missile is actually quite good against them too. Hydras take more damage from them than stalkers and tend to clump up more. Ravens in general are very strong end game units once you get comfortable mixing in their spell casting in big fights, much like Science vessels were in Brood War.

Yes vortex can hit your own units, except the mothership itself. There is a particularly funny strategy that works in 2v2s regarding this. You vortex their army and have a zerg partner run a handful of banelings into the vortex. When the vortex ends, all the units inside are stacked for a second and start to expand. But not before the banelings go off

That's pretty cool. I was just doing a few random 4v4s to work on hotkeys and such and one Protoss player used vortex and sent about half of his carrier fleet away. lol

He seemed surprised, so I wasn't sure if it was normal. He's was probably just a new player like me. I don't know what half of these abilities do yet.

That baneling strategy seems evil!

[Kaylia]

I've started to use Ravens. The defense drones seem really good against a bunch of stalkers. I drop three or so down as soon as I engage a stalker heavy army and I've been doing really well. After I use my other abilities, I'll try drop a couple more if my Ravens haven't been destroyed. What else are they good against?

Also, what are some good uses of the missile upgrade? I've taken it a few times, but mostly forget to use it so I haven't really been able to see what it can do. Are there specific situations where the rocket kicks ass?

Marine balls, zergling balls, muta. I destroyed like 30 viking with 4 raven the other days in 2v2. My friend lured them with his muta and when they where packed... BOOM.

[Aero]

Has anyone found a way to TvT vs the insane AI without doing cheeses? I simply cant keep up to his army size before he rushes in.

[Kaylia]

Whats the point of killing Loki battle cruiser in the first mission with Odin?

also, how do you unlock the space tauren portrait and that chick with the pink face. There is a few portrait I see that arent on my list.

[SamanosukeShiva]

i think u get research point for bonus objectives?