"A fucking masterpiece"
-Phuckin-Retard
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| arbiters & darchons vs carriers | | | Author: | | | IP: | erbium-aXXXX | | Date: | 03/01/00 07:03 | | Game Type: | Starcraft | | Labels: | none | | Report Rating: , # of Ratings: 2, Max: 8, Min: 7
Lifetime Rating for tokenresistance: 6.6667 |   | The genesis of this battle plan had its roots in a game I recently lost, a toss vs toss struggle on Lost Temple where my opponent had gotten his reaver-and-zeal drop off early and succeeded in killing a lot of my probes, while my reaver drop literally never got off the ground. I stayed behind the whole game after that, and not too far into the future six carriers came over the ledge of my natural expansion and ended the game. I knew the carriers were coming and I made scouts, plus I had temp and goon support, but well placed storms by his supporting templar and good carrier management brought the game quickly to a close.
Having analyzed how I might have fought once at an initial disadvantage, I decided on the following plan, which I got to put into effect in a game a few days later.
Map: Lost Temple
Me: random toss, 9:00 start
Opponent: picked toss, 6:00 start
This game started with me powering at Gate 10, assimilator on 12, massing zeals to my choke while I made mad probes and teched upwards. Scouting was unlucky as the 6 o'clock start position was the last position I checked. By the time my probe got there he already had zeals at his ramp. My scouting probe died before I got a good look at what was in his base, but I decided he might be zeal or goon rushing. I wanted to reaver drop, but I also wanted to protect against the rush so I put up a couple of cannons at choke to support my zeals. As I was nearing the time when I would be reaver dropping, I also put 3 cannons near my mineral line to protect against drops from him.
The cannon to the south of my mineral line had finished warping in when he dropped. My attention had been elsewhere, on getting my drop ready, and I suddenly saw red on the minimap. Two zeals were hitting my cannon and the reaver had obviously been instructed to target my probes as its first shot killed several. The next shot took out my lone cannon in the area. I'd instructed my zeals and goons to run over to take on the invaders, but he still managed to get another shot at my fleeing probes, killing more. Right after his third scarab had found its target he picked up his reaver and left his zeals to their fate. Very nicely timed and executed drop.
"Great!" I thought. "Behind again". I picked up my reaver and two zeals and made my way towards his base, thinking to return the favor, and found goons patrolling his coastline. Probably what I should have done, in retrospect, but that was definitely to his credit.
Knowing I was now behind and my opponent was good, I focused on rebuilding probes, on getting mass infantry, and on working up to temps to support a quick expansion. We had a few cut and thrust infantry battles near the entrance to my base, as he obviously went hard goons after dropping me. He was clearly outproducing me. But, using dtemps and having (by then) three cannons on top of my choke, plus a couple down below in my natural expansion allowed me to defend.
He stormed a few times and I stormed a few times, telling me that so far I'd been following the path of "me to, only later than you". I'd long ago learned that mirroring what your opponent does when you're behind, where he has the whole map to expand into, and you're much more limited in your options is a path to certain oblivion. I also suspected that given my strong defensive position either sairs and dweb or (much more likely, in my experience) carriers would be arriving to ruin my day. So I took Steve Jobs' advice to "Think Different". :)
I morphed a darchon and started researching mind control. I made more dtemps and got 2 more darchons as soon as I could. I also slapped down a starport before I'd even got my natural expansion up and running at full speed. I got a fleet beacon as soon as the starport had finished warping in. I then got an arbiter tribunal immediately after the fleet beacon warped in. I also ensured I had 2 speed-upgraded shuttles for my darchons. I put tech over units even though that was dangerous if he rushed me because I was gambling on the seemingly standard 6-carrier-plus-support combo often used to break a turtled toss.
Yup. Stasis madness and mind control. A slim chance, but better than none I figured. I made zeals and goons out of four gates as cash allowed, being careful to reserve most gas for key upgrades and my arbiters, which I produced when gas allowed out of two stargates.
I waited and he came with 6 carriers and templar support, as expected. He'd been careful to work around the map and try to blindside my expansion, rather than trying to come at my main over the easy, quick route between our two start points. This also worked in my favor, as I had more time to build mana for my 4 arbiters and 4 darchons (by that time). He didn't spread his carriers out well enough and two castings of stasis froze his carriers and supporting temp on the ledge over my natural expansion. I brought my shuttle with 4 darchons to the ledge over my natural, dropped them off, and produced units and supply while waiting for stasis to wear off. I cast mind-control on three carriers (one darchon didn't have enough mana yet) when stasis wore off, then cast stasis on his remaining carriers and his temp. Knowing that he'd poured huge amounts of cash into his now-evaporating carrier army and suspecting that he was building more, whereas I had large numbers of speed-upped zeals and other support, I chose that moment to start laying down pylons and cannons to support an expansion to my mineral-only expansion. I got that up and running as I kept casting stasis on his remaining carriers when they came on-line from time to time. I ended up taking control over all six carriers and his temp on my ledge got killed by my new carrier friends. :)
Meanwhile, the other half of my plan was coming on-stream. I had made 4 corsairs and gotten dweb while the carrier-conversion ceremony was unfolding in slow motion. I'd also started patrolling with observers to see where he'd expanded and how well defended they seemed to be. I found to my surprise that he only had one more expansion than me and I didn't see many units at any given expansion. I suspect he'd responded to my arbiter / darchon strat by pouring even more cash into making carriers. Not a good move on his part because of what happened next.
Rather than just attack with my new carriers, I took my small goon army (about one hotkey at that point, if I remember correctly) and moved out towards his natural expansion. I dwebbed the leading cannons, cast stasis in and around his natural, and proceeded to annihilate it. I simply did a "rinse & repeat" on his expansion at the 3:00 start position and something similar with carrier support on his island expansion in the lower right hand corner. Game over. By the end of the game I had 6 arbiters to complement 6 corsairs and my 6 carriers (I never made any carriers of my own).
Lessons from this game:
1. Mirroring what your opponent does when you're behind leads to all but certain doom. Creativity *is* required.
2. Speed is essential when trying to break a turtled toss. If he'd moved more quickly, I probably would not have had enough mana to "convert" his attacking carriers with such ease.
3. In toss vs toss relying heavily on carriers and failing to make many other units is risky precisely because of the battle plan I put into effect. If he'd had lots of other units as well as his carrier army he could have toasted me.
4. Further to the above, waiting for 12 carriers instead of 6 would *not* have helped my opponent. I would have had more arbiters and more darchons fully charged with mana. He need unit mass to defeat my battle plan, not small numbers of powerful units I could easily cast stasis and mind control upon.
5. He could have also gone for arbiters and put a severe crimp in my plans. But he didn't because very few BW players use arbiters as much as they deserve to be used. Arbiters rock. Arbiters plus darchons rock even more.
6. Even used separately stasis and dweb are awesome tools for destroying expansions. Put together they are virtually unstoppable.
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