SC2 Team strategies

Topic for team strategies:

Post the races included and the amount of players (minimum 2, maximum 4) first then a name fitting to the strategy:

ANY/2, 3 or 4: Gay rush: Each person makes a rush squad, then as a group they use the larger mass to rush kill 1 or 2 players. This really is a boring way to win and it sucks for the person who gets attacked first by this because its almost a guarantee they will die. Also while a 3 man group that had teched up can beat the rush team more often then not 1 or 2 more people will leave after their first mate gg's.

ANY/ 4 preferably: Early push: Similar to the gay rush but with a very important piece of being different, teching up alittle bit. This does not mean making 4 factories and only using one to pump out thors (that person was an idiot) and does not mean teching up to colossi or gates. It means tops going up 1 level of tech (protoss stalkers, zerg roaches, terran tech labs). maybe 2 or 3 barracks/gates. Takes a bit longer but the extra tech can be vital or use the extra time to mass more basic units. This is likely to wipe out 3 to 4 of them uneless they use some major defense or they early pushed as well. Timing is more important for this one than for the rush because to early can become a waste of units and too late and the enemies will have gotten strong enough that they can hold out.

Protoss + Protoss / 2 : Send in the spy : one protoss player will dark templar rush while the other makes some kind of mass, stalkers + colossi, carriers, void rays, whatever. Dark templar guy is going to use either a phase prism or some proxy pylon power to warp in his units (I found a cool trick for that to be explained next) - you can use the scan/los warp trick for this to be more effective. He will go in a and screw around with the base try to cripple economies, etc. While the enemy handles the dt's the fleet guy will have made a fighting force go in and finish the more damaged player. And in a 2v2 where the enemy loses his partner and both his enemies are at full force they will usually gg.

*The corner trick, I saw this from someone who tried to use a gay photon in the enemy base trick but I thought this could work for warp in too. Warp in a pylon on the lower ground outside the enemy base so some of the matrix goes into their base, then with a team mate or an observer get the high ground revealed and warp in units, also the enemy is probably never going to see it in the earlier part of the game so it makes for a nasty surprise.

Terran + Protoss / 2 : Earth and Sky aflame : Terran goes spam-tastic on vikings and protoss gets heavy on powerful ground units, you can tell where this is going: The terran vikings will own the sky clearing the way of any nasty carriers, void rays, battle cruisers, banshees, mutalisks or brood lords (which is a very odd unit). Vice versa the ground units will clear out anything and everything. When anti air and flying units in an area are killed the mass vikings can land and help add some serious damage.

* I know its out of place but I want to rant about the broodlord really quickly : This is a really cool units, but also very weird, and very counterable if you are expecting them. brood lords have great distance and their damage can stack up to crazy high numbers, but the issue is in the nature of the attack. Since the broodlord spawns units that die over time for its attack that means said units can be killed, and maybe you are thinking "They will still do alot of damage", not really, against splash damage attackers and just about any medium level unit that focuses on said broodlings, the broodlings will get killed and do very very little damage, of course an army that just focuses these guys down will eventually die from little bits of damage but they will quickly shoot you broodlords out of the sky. But before I am done, think about stuff like this, broodlords against a defended terran wall, terrans will shoot down the broodlings after they do something like 4 damage, protoss can use the sentry to block the path of the broodlings. In short yes the broodlord can do crazy damage but it must be used properly and with back up, and obviously out of the way of vikings and phoenixes.

wow early rush is really gay, but if the rushers are stupid they can still lose because they don't tech. Oh, and also if they keep searching for the destroyed enemy's runaway probes and keep losing troops to makeshift photon walls, instead of concentrating on the other player who is slowing massing thors for a buzzkill. Kind of like a certain game that happened recently.

lol yeah we were the winners there, wayne went toss and got gay rushed, in the mean time they decided to try massing marines, zealots and rauders outside of my base, every now and again i would send my thors down to clear em out. At some point I found out the protoss were going to void ray spam so I decided to attack, and low and behold, they had lost.

oh we should also tell them about that terran guy who called me a brian that rushes, with 30 some vikings, like 20 minutes into the game.

whats a brian, maintaining topic (kind of) is zergling rush still reasonably effective?

bleh you can rush as anything, in 1 v1 someone who hasnt made counter measure for a rush of any kind will die. zergs jsut seem more intimidating because there are more of them.

and its easier and faster to do a rush with zerg than most other races. although a zealot rush is nigh unstoppable unless you can keep your units from being surrounded. Also, I have found that a simple zergling spam fails miserably against terrans if they go marine spam, the depot wall allows the zerg to lose their entire force while terrans still have all their marines, 6 usually, 12 if you are me. If you're smart you'll know their base is almost completely wide open and do a reinforced charge.

btw as for protoss turtling, its pretty damn easy, photon cannons work great, 2 can stop like 8 to 10 zerglings or 6 zealots. also some advice for cannon defense. If the ramp down from your base is a long distance from your base (relative to other maps) dont put cannons at the ramp against terran, instead plop 1 or 2 by your economy and buidlings. Against protoss and zerg you just want to cover that ramp.

btw to all of you thinking you will abuse reapers, it won't work. Yes they make awesome raiding unit and great scouts but they die so easily that the speed doesn't matter and it is very hard to get into a dominating situation using them. Against terran just about anything will stop reapers. Against protoss anything beyond zealot will destroy the reapers and against zerg, while effective early, it is a pain to kite roaches and even more of a pain to kite zerglings considering they are a fast unit. And then later its pathetic, thors, void rays, battle cruisers, brood lords, mutalisks, hydralisks, immortals, stalkers, darktemplars, tanks, marines, marauders, banshees, vikings, ultralisks, photon cannons, carriers, mothership, just about every viable unit will dominate reapers. and in the late game you wold much rather drop in a ghost from a medevac considering the nuke will be much nicer then the reapers.

Next calling out some strategies that just won't win the game, sure they can do damage, but they won't make a killing blow:

dark templar spam - straightup terran and zerg will have detection around for free use, then with protoss it takes some very cunning use of warp in and phase prisms to finish the game off with dark templars. And even then if they just swing in an observer its all for naught.

Nydus worms - maybe in 1v1 this can make someone gg if used early enough and correctly but in larger battles this may only help in a turtle fest but not for good offensive and defensive use. The reason being that while the nydus worm is super awesome for being able to be spawned anywhere in los and can carry something like 255 units it takes time to load an unload units, and nydus worms are not high in health so any smart player will just take out the nydus worm before your zerg mass can make it through.

countering void rays - no, it doesn't work, once it reaches 25 void rays and keeps churning its just about gg. vikings wont make an impact, battlecruisers wont work, nothing will.

rushing in a game larger than 2v2 team map play (means you share a starting zone). in 3v3 or 4v4 if your side rushes you may take out one guy, and thats 50/50. the other players will turtle out and be at a higher tech and economy then you pretty much leading you to your defeat.
NOTE: against inexperienced teams the other 2 or 3 players might just quit out when you take out one of their team mates, but decent players will just take the economy and tech advantage and win.

mass infestors - great support power but infested terran ability wont finish someone off.

most of the strategies mentioned above are great for support (the infestors, nydus worms, dark templar massing) they can add the power needed to change the game, but by themselves will not change anything - and no these strategies put together will not win the game. They need a solid base to support something like thors, rays, mutas, brood lords or etc in order to win.

The Definitive Anti-Reaper Turtle Tactic: Save your teammates the trouble of rescuing your slave miners from nubs with jetpacks! Here's how it works-
Protoss: Easiest countermeasures, you put a pylon in the middle of the mineral forest(in a gap or behind it), then 2 photon cannons at the least. If a terran is going reapers there's no point in making an anti-cheese photon ramp wall, put your static defense where you know they're going to attack. Raiding missions are guaranteed to fail with this. Unless its a Thorship. Well, you didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition either.

Terran: This will be a pain and detract from your main force, but station a few marines around your mines. Marauders work better because of their longer range, you may think concussive grenades would be good against reapers too but usually by the time you've got that its a bit too late into the game for the opponent to be playing around with raiding. Build bunkers if you want to prove how rich you are. See if I care.

Zerg: Your enemy will probably be too scared of you cheesing them to try, but you can still get 0wned if you're doing the Husky Roach strategy. Make sure you have enough zerglings to trap raiders. Oh wait hellions eat zerglings for breakfast. Well this is just for reapers so it's all good.

comment on the anti reaper rush for zerg, for real your fvcked, you need the spine tentacle turret things, pretty easy to make, but a good terran (higher then decent) will just kite your zerglings asses and then fry your economy. as for terran, reapers will run away at the site of equal or more marines and beyond that they just flee.

but seriously if we do hamachi games, GOD HELP YOU if I or wayne have to save your asses, now look if you, wayne, I or anyone else gets rushed in a 4v4 or a 3v3, thats a one thing - that is something the whole team has to be prepared for. But if you get beat by 8 zerglings or 2 reapers cripple you, I will have your head on a plate.

oh yeah and also here is a great one: IF YOU KNOW THE OTHER GUY HAS INVISIBLE UNITS MAKE EFFING DETECTORS, because i will painfully cut off your head if you get gangraped by dark templars THAT WE KNEW THEY HAD.