Terran bad at: map control, mobility, defense

[Gearvosh]

As a Terran player, I find these 3 things the hardest to achieve. Just wondering what you other Terran players do?

Map Control
By far the worst of the 3 races. It's so hard to constantly monitor and find out where and when the enemy is expanding. All we have is scanner sweep, but even than we can't use it constantly. What do the other races have?

Protoss - Observers patrolling all expansion zones. Dark Templar.
Zerg - Overlords/seers. Burrowed zerglings everywhere.
Terran - Sensor tower (Doesn't help for map control though)

Mobility
All Terran have are dropships, but those can easily killed by Turrets and AA units. Its extremely difficult to come aid a teammate or expansion, if your army is no where near by. What do the other races have?

Protoss - Warp in.
Zerg - Nydus worm.
Terran - Drop pods (PLEASE!)

Defense
This is kind of even playing field if you have a PF, but without one, Terrans can't do much for defense. Protoss always throw up like 4 photon cannons, and so does the Zerg + Queen.

Ideas? Help?

[paradox]

medivacs are transports...... also your buildsing friggin fly... build them in your main then fly them to where you want them

[Wingless]

Your mobile enough toss needs to invest quite a bit for warp in and its all lost if their pylon gets destroyed. Nydrs worm costs 100 min and 100 gas every time you use it and its exptremely fragile.

Ive also seen Terran hold map control with a sensor tower placed outside their base try it. Or just place marines all over like zerg do with zerglings. Overlords all over cant be done you make one viking and can go hunting all day costing zerg resources and time.

[Gearvosh]

medivacs are transports...... also your buildsing friggin fly... build them in your main then fly them to where you want them

Whats that have to do with anything I said. Seems you replied based on the title and didn't actually read the post.

[Wingless]

Lol I just read your thread title terran bad at defense. ><

Really your mobility and control are fine.

[Wingless]

Defense
This is kind of even playing field if you have a PF, but without one, Terrans can't do much for defense. Protoss always throw up like 4 photon cannons, and so does the Zerg + Queen.


What does this sentence mean what about zerg + queen equals defense.

[Gearvosh]

Meant zerg can throw down 4 defense as well as using a queen. Mainly defense refers to the early/mid game.

[Nori]

terrans bad on defense huh?

did siege tanks, turrets, and bunkers disappear overnight

[Gearvosh]

terrans bad on defense huh?

did siege tanks, turrets, and bunkers disappear overnight

Those aren't static defense. And I was mainly referring to ground defense, not air.

[Gemini]

Wow....

Terran have orbital command scan for "map control", which should be renamed to scouting. They also have reapers.

They have medivacs and vikings. Also one, if not the fastest unit in the game with ....that thing, can't even remember it's name.

As for defense: Siege tanks, bunkers, planetary fortress and missile turrets.

[Renj]

i think you might be a bit afraid to get out into the map and explore, all i can say is scouting=win.
sensor towers and saving up your command center's power for scanner sweep will help immensely. you can then adjust and position yourself to enemy troop movements and unit making/tech with such a critically greater speed.
my 2 cents

[Stephen]

I just tried sensory towers and the range is ginormous. Apparently it cannot detect stealth but then again that would be too OP considering its range.

[Anon]

Your mobile enough toss needs to invest quite a bit for warp in and its all lost if their pylon gets destroyed. Nydrs worm costs 100 min and 100 gas every time you use it and its exptremely fragile.

Ive also seen Terran hold map control with a sensor tower placed outside their base try it. Or just place marines all over like zerg do with zerglings. Overlords all over cant be done you make one viking and can go hunting all day costing zerg resources and time.

Warp Prism?

Shouldn't leave home without one!

[Gearvosh]

I just tried sensory towers and the range is ginormous. Apparently it cannot detect stealth but then again that would be too OP considering its range.

I did that once and placed 5 across the whole map, it was fun while they lasted :P

I guess ill try and get 2 orbital stations, 1 for scanner the other for mules.

[Sonanko]

Well according to an interview with Dustin Browder, Terran early game mobility is gonna be "looked at" so expect some tweaking to go on there.

[Stuff]

I'm inclined to slightly disagree.. I've found that I can establish - and maintain- a hard contain and near complete map control with a combo of M&M, Tanks, Scanners and Vikings.

Vikings are absolutely devastating if used properly when holding a contain, unless people drop hundreds of minerals into static D (and in zerg's case, potentially thousands to counter both viking forms). And even then they have to go without being found long enough to actually build said static D at their budding expos, which if they do, then you weren't sustaining your containment very well.

Sensor towers can be of exceptional value in maintaining containment as well. Their range is enormous. You can surround a contained base with 3 of them and their ranges will overlap, guaranteeing that you will see anything going out of their main.

If you establish early map control, your first expo off this advantage should ALWAYS be Orbital Command. PFs should only be used on out-of-the-way expos that you can't get to quickly while maintaining containment. The extra scanner power is necessary to maintaining map control and containment.

Map control is something Terran can excel at if you make proper use of Vikings.. not sure I can really stress that enough.

[Fuglypump]

I like the drop pod idea, but at the same time medivacs do more than they should already, and the drop pod idea is in quite a bit of games, halo, and warhammer 40k are just 2 examples

[net]

Well according to an interview with Dustin Browder, Terran early game mobility is gonna be "looked at" so expect some tweaking to go on there.

I second that, but i agree with OP with the fact that the Terran mobility is not as good as what protoss and zerg got atm.

Even medivacs cant compete with warp in and nydus canal.

Drop pods would be awesome.

[Billymole]

Actually I find scanner sweep to be amazingly effective. Particularly given that it's totally unstoppable (aka, scout walled terran bases easily, something others have problems with).

The problem is not the orbital command, it's that people want the best of both worlds. They're burning all their energy on mules, then complaining they don't have enough to scan.

Personally, I think the benefit you get from sweeping enemy bases, possible expansion points, and even likely invasion routes, far outweighs the benefit I'd get in using that energy for a mule.

Couple it with a marine or SCV at the watchtowers, maybe hide a couple sensor towers in places, and you're golden.

[Michael]

This guy must trolling. Terran excels at these.

[Wingless]

Medivacs are better then warp in and nydas canal. Not only do they transport your troops multiple times in quick succession but they'll heal them.

A terran drops on a natural hits it and scoops his troops up 20 secs later moves up the cliff and hits another location finally picks his troops up and leaves healing the entire time. Highly mobile quick repeated mobility and built in healing.

Nydas canal drops as many troops as it can before the 200 hp runs out. Pylon is about the same protoss can only drop as many units as he has gateways before he has to eat the cooldown. Neither can re transport units. For the same effect that terran has. Zerg has to use overlords risking their max supply and toss has to use warp prisms neither of which heal units. Warp prism can be used to warp in reinforcements but its stationary and vulnerable to any kind of anti air 2 marines can probably take it down.

[Shinosai]

Terran are definitely bad at map control, and we do lack an equivalent to warpgates/nydus. It would be really nice if they put drop pods to the baracks (requires a starport or factory). Defensive wise terran probably is the best of all 3 races, though. I know in 2v2 the first race I attack is protoss, second is zerg, third is terran.

I don't really think drop pods would make the terran particularly stronger in 1v1, but would help us out in 2v2 a lot for helping allys.

[Comtrav]

Planetary Fortress > 4 Photon Cannons. Especially vs. Zerg. I've had PFs with over 60 kills.

Not so good against Immortals, though.

Zerg is known for expanding quickly, the way I see it Terran can expand more safely with PF, or get more resources out of fewer bases with Orbital Command.

Map control isn't that bad, it's easy to scout and shut down expansion attempts with Hellion, Reaper, Viking, Banshee--but it's not as good as Zerg's overlords spreading creep eveywhere, Zerg probably has the best map control atm. I'm going to give the much-maligned Sensor Tower a try and see if it helps. I've decided I don't like burning Scanner Sweep to check expansions under most circumstances, when I could use it to save my butt against cloaked units, scout their army, or pop a MULE.

MMM is pretty mobile, but warp-in and Nydus worm let you move units with much less risk then using a dropship.

Early game is really the biggest problem IMO. I feel locked in my base at first.

[Primoris]

This guy must trolling. Terran excels at these.

no i'm pretty sure you're the one trolling.

[Shinosai]

Early game is really the biggest problem IMO. I feel locked in my base at first.

You'd be a lot more successful as terran if you attacked early game. Terrans strongest point atm is their early game, as their mid-late game techs seem weaker than toss/zerg.

[Gearvosh]

Planetary Fortress > 4 Photon Cannons. Especially vs. Zerg. I've had PFs with over 60 kills.

Not so good against Immortals, though.

Zerg is known for expanding quickly, the way I see it Terran can expand more safely with PF, or get more resources out of fewer bases with Orbital Command.

Map control isn't that bad, it's easy to scout and shut down expansion attempts with Hellion, Reaper, Viking, Banshee--but it's not as good as Zerg's overlords spreading creep eveywhere, Zerg probably has the best map control atm. I'm going to give the much-maligned Sensor Tower a try and see if it helps. I've decided I don't like burning Scanner Sweep to check expansions under most circumstances, when I could use it to save my butt against cloaked units, scout their army, or pop a MULE.

MMM is pretty mobile, but warp-in and Nydus worm let you move units with much less risk then using a dropship.

Early game is really the biggest problem IMO. I feel locked in my base at first.

Pretty much this.

We are limited on when we can use scanner sweep, and we must tech to multiple types of units for scouting, where as the other races get 1 unit to do it.

[Chasm]

This most me a joke post. If anything its the exact opposite and that is one of the strengths of terran

[Primoris]

This most me a joke post. If anything its the exact opposite and that is one of the strengths of terran

Really? How does a terran achieve map control when we're forced in to walling off and stay put till we get a decent sized MM ball rolling?

How are we "mobile" when the two other races can warp or ggnydus, not to mention the ridiculous speed boost most units are granted on creep.

[Enanomaldito]

playing as a terran myself I partly agree and partly disagree with the OP.

Defense: Terrans are the absolute best in defense, Zerg and Toss pretty much suck in this department.

Mobility: def. a weak point in Terrans, we have no Nydus Worm/Warp-in equivalent, but I guess it's fine, to counter out high defense. Makes Terrans pretty bad at 2v2 early game.

Map Control: I find this to be quite weak too, I usually have some problems expanding, but that may be just me, not sure...

[Tehschoolbus]

This guy must trolling. Terran excels at these.
+1

As a Terran player, I find these 3 things the hardest to achieve. Just wondering what you other Terran players do?

Map Control
By far the worst of the 3 races. It's so hard to constantly monitor and find out where and when the enemy is expanding. All we have is scanner sweep, but even than we can't use it constantly. What do the other races have?

Protoss - Observers patrolling all expansion zones. Dark Templar.
Zerg - Overlords/seers. Burrowed zerglings everywhere.
Terran - Sensor tower (Doesn't help for map control though)

Mobility
All Terran have are dropships, but those can easily killed by Turrets and AA units. Its extremely difficult to come aid a teammate or expansion, if your army is no where near by. What do the other races have?

Protoss - Warp in.
Zerg - Nydus worm.
Terran - Drop pods (PLEASE!)

Defense
This is kind of even playing field if you have a PF, but without one, Terrans can't do much for defense. Protoss always throw up like 4 photon cannons, and so does the Zerg + Queen.

Ideas? Help?
Defense: Terran have the best defensive units and buildings in the game. Viking have 9 range. Tanks have 9 range too (I think). Terran bio are the weakest physically so what do you do? Build bunkers. Upgrade the bunkers even. Hell, there's even a missile turret upgrade. What more do you want for defense? A battlecruiser to make them crap their pants when they come a knocking!? Then get one!

Mobility: Terran can lift off. I could stop right there, but in addition to that, they can pack SCVs in their CC and then send it over to an island and with a few MULEs they instantly have a fully-functional expansion. Terran's ability to build anywhere allows them to drop SCVs along with their troops and quickly build up bunkers in an enemy base if they want to. Unlike zerg or protoss, you can immediately build defensive structures while you're waiting for a CC at an expansion to build. Want to do drops? Medivac HEALS the troops it's dropping! Banshee do ridiculous damage and can knock out turrets in a flash, so if you're complaining that medivac die easily, then maybe you shouldn't be dropping them right into the middle of a stack of cannons lol. And you say "Its difficult to help an ally if your army is not nearby" but the only thing I can think of that would be faster than average support would be Muta+lings. Plus, terran can scanner sweep to save an ally from DTs or ghost.

Map control: Unless your enemy is using DTs, you can easily send out scouting units. I find it interesting that the majority of games I play, my opponent pays no attention to the Xel Naga towers. it costs 50min or even just 25 for zerg to take over one of these. Terran can create sturdy contains very easily (read the defense part), so their way to take the map is to contain the enemy. Terran units are weak physically, so if they're overwhelmed, they're doomed. But you can build bunkers, tanks, turrets, etc. So what you need to do is establish strong defenses wherever you're concerned about the enemy going. If you can keep them from expanding (contain them) then how are they going to get map control back?

These are just some ideas concerning your post. I probably lost because this is probably a troll, but hopefully someone will read this that actually agreed with the OP and go "hmm. good stuff!" Overall, I think this discussion is just based on people assuming that terran is a do-all race... but they aren't. They're more a do-all race than any of the others, but you have to learn how to play them before you can start to accomplish something with them.

[Nephrahim]

PT is a joke. You lose so many minerals without having MULE it's a huge handicap. it'd be like a Toss player needing to choose between boos and Photon cannons.

[Gearvosh]

I should of stated early static defense. Because well of course late game units will be better for defense -.-

[Renj]

PT is a joke. You lose so many minerals without having MULE it's a huge handicap. it'd be like a Toss player needing to choose between boos and Photon cannons.
i assume you meant PF, in which case, no, it's not a joke. it's great defense, and you don't need the mule compared to how much survival that gives you

[Scorcher]

Couple it with a marine or SCV at the watchtowers, maybe hide a couple sensor towers in places, and you're golden.

How exactly do you hide sensor towers when your opponent can see their range circle drawn on the mini map?

I think a good way to fix map control is to shorten the range on sensor towers and not broadcast their range circle to the mini-maps of opposing players. That would give terran players "invisible" scouts, just like burrowed zergs or protoss observers. The extra range the towers have over burrowed units and observers is offset by the fact that they only return a blip, so you don't know what the unit spotted is without further scouting, and by the fact that you can more easily find and kill the tower since they aren't cloaked.

Liftoff as a means of a "quick expansion" is a joke. Unless the mineral field is right next to where you're building the CC, the time it takes to fly the CC to where it needs to be is longer than what it would take a SCV to run there and build it.

Besides that, the mobility he was talking about is with combat units. Every race has a drop ship ability. Protoss and Zerg have warp-in and nydus canal on top of that. Out of all the games I've played, I've seen an overlord drop ONCE and a warp prism drop TWICE. I take this as evidence that canal/warp-in are much more effective at mobilizing units than using a drop ship. I don't think anyone could argue effectively against that claim.

Map control I see as a problem as well. Yes, sensor sweep is nice, but as a terran I feel it's almost necessary for my to use MULEs. Zerg and toss have a resource advantage resulting from my SCVs having to be present for the entire duration of building construction. Zerg can train another drone to gather while building is in progress at net food cost of zero. Protoss can drop buildings and run back to the mineral line. SCVs get stuck until the building completes. (To be clear, I'm fine with these mechanics.) MULEs help offset the difference. Having to choose between a better economy or scanning a single location for possible enemy activity is a sucky choice to make, and usually an easy one since I know what I'm going to get out of the MULE. The sensor sweep is hit or miss.

[Swiftaust]

If I could produce hellions from the rax at 50 minerals instead of marines, I'd feel less apt to wallin until I have at least marines+hellions+tanks or M&M.

Until scanner sweep or MULE drop is moved to something else so they're not overlapping in the early game when I've only got one CC I'd have to agree on scouting as well.

Terran mobility is awesome, once you've created an army and can escort everything everywhere.

[Tehschoolbus]

How exactly do you hide sensor towers when your opponent can see their range circle drawn on the mini map?

I think a good way to fix map control is to shorten the range on sensor towers and not broadcast their range circle to the mini-maps of opposing players. That would give terran players "invisible" scouts, just like burrowed zergs or protoss observers. The extra range the towers have over burrowed units and observers is offset by the fact that they only return a blip, so you don't know what the unit spotted is without further scouting, and by the fact that you can more easily find and kill the tower since they aren't cloaked.

Liftoff as a means of a "quick expansion" is a joke. Unless the mineral field is right next to where you're building the CC, the time it takes to fly the CC to where it needs to be is longer than what it would take a SCV to run there and build it.

Besides that, the mobility he was talking about is with combat units. Every race has a drop ship ability. Protoss and Zerg have warp-in and nydus canal on top of that. Out of all the games I've played, I've seen an overlord drop ONCE and a warp prism drop TWICE. I take this as evidence that canal/warp-in are much more effective at mobilizing units than using a drop ship. I don't think anyone could argue effectively against that claim.

Map control I see as a problem as well. Yes, sensor sweep is nice, but as a terran I feel it's almost necessary for my to use MULEs. Zerg and toss have a resource advantage resulting from my SCVs having to be present for the entire duration of building construction. Zerg can train another drone to gather while building is in progress at net food cost of zero. Protoss can drop buildings and run back to the mineral line. SCVs get stuck until the building completes. (To be clear, I'm fine with these mechanics.) MULEs help offset the difference. Having to choose between a better economy or scanning a single location for possible enemy activity is a sucky choice to make, and usually an easy one since I know what I'm going to get out of the MULE. The sensor sweep is hit or miss.

You have to consider that all the races have hit-or-miss abilities. The overlord naturally is hit-or-miss because it is so slow and easy to kill. Terran have scanner. All the races have hit-or-miss offensive abilities. So you could say "well, I don't like to use EMP because then I can't use Snipe" but you just have to know how the races work. Terran has mobility - you just have to figure out how to take advantage of it and how to supplement it. They can easily set up a defensive line for a contain. So what do you do when the opponent harasses your main? You set up turrets next time and have some forces there to tide an enemy attack over until you can supplement your defense otherwise. Tanks are AMAZING in every aspect on the ground... if you're worried about drops, build some of those. When you're attacked, take this opportunity to scrap your bunkers and push forward and dig in a little closer with your contain. There's SO many possibilities... and there are so many reasons why CowGoMoo's record is like 120-10. Terran is at no great disadvantage in any of these areas.

[Namhcir]

Your mobile enough toss needs to invest quite a bit for warp in and its all lost if their pylon gets destroyed. Nydrs worm costs 100 min and 100 gas every time you use it and its exptremely fragile.

Ive also seen Terran hold map control with a sensor tower placed outside their base try it. Or just place marines all over like zerg do with zerglings. Overlords all over cant be done you make one viking and can go hunting all day costing zerg resources and time.

well the lead designer of sc2 just said terran mobility sucks, so i think your wrong here!

[net]

Medivacs are better then warp in and nydas canal. Not only do they transport your troops multiple times in quick succession but they'll heal them.

A terran drops on a natural hits it and scoops his troops up 20 secs later moves up the cliff and hits another location finally picks his troops up and leaves healing the entire time. Highly mobile quick repeated mobility and built in healing.

Nydas canal drops as many troops as it can before the 200 hp runs out. Pylon is about the same protoss can only drop as many units as he has gateways before he has to eat the cooldown. Neither can re transport units. For the same effect that terran has. Zerg has to use overlords risking their max supply and toss has to use warp prisms neither of which heal units. Warp prism can be used to warp in reinforcements but its stationary and vulnerable to any kind of anti air 2 marines can probably take it down.

Are you serious ? Medivacs better than warp in and nydus canal. ??? These things can actually teleport your troups from the point A to B... Medivacs is a transport troups unit that every races already got.

And btw, your healing argument fails when you transport mech units.

[Primoris]

Lots of trolls in dis thread trying to honestly make the case that terran mobility is "good." You guys are doing a pretty good job of getting people to bite though. But when you said "lift off" i knew you were trolling.

[Willie]

Errr... Reapers/Hellions to scout map and hold expansion points? Build CC at main base, liftoff, and land at any of said expansions? Sounds pretty mobile to me...

Edit: If it's hard for you to see/scout the map, have you tried Ctrl+# your CCs? That way you press that number and hotkey for scanner sweep and there you go. Easy enough right?

[Frozen]

As a Terran player, I find these 3 things the hardest to achieve. Just wondering what you other Terran players do?

Map Control
By far the worst of the 3 races. It's so hard to constantly monitor and find out where and when the enemy is expanding. All we have is scanner sweep, but even than we can't use it constantly. What do the other races have?

Protoss - Observers patrolling all expansion zones. Dark Templar.
Zerg - Overlords/seers. Burrowed zerglings everywhere.
Terran - Sensor tower (Doesn't help for map control though)

Mobility
All Terran have are dropships, but those can easily killed by Turrets and AA units. Its extremely difficult to come aid a teammate or expansion, if your army is no where near by. What do the other races have?

Protoss - Warp in.
Zerg - Nydus worm.
Terran - Drop pods (PLEASE!)

Defense
This is kind of even playing field if you have a PF, but without one, Terrans can't do much for defense. Protoss always throw up like 4 photon cannons, and so does the Zerg + Queen.

Ideas? Help?

in 1v1 what I usually do, depending on the enemy race:

Zerg - MM own Early game Zerg, you can park your army outside his base and now you have map control.

Protoss - Their biggest strength is their rolling ball of death army. Most protoss players move their army as a whole and it's power makes it hard to keep under control.

As terran, I rush 1 reaper. Never more than 1 at a time. If you hurry, you can seal your base and get a reaper out about the same time their first zealot sees action (without chrono). Even with zealots in play, a reaper can run circles around the base and kill probes one by one. While doing this you can be building your MM army up and Factory.

After he gets a stalker or two out, You should have your factory done, a couple helions produced, and working on a starport. Next step in harassment is dropping hellions onto the mineral line. 4 hellions will kill about 10 probes in 2 flame attacks. Usually faster than a person can respond if they didn't detect you incoming. Just drop them, fire, pick them up and run. Rinse repeat.

After the initial 4, I never build hellions again. By this point, you should have a Raven or two out. Running these units around dropping turrets on expansion mineral lines where you can.

Conclusion: By slowing down protoss (either they are forced to split their army or spend money on cannons), you can get the time to not only build the MMM you need to win, but tech for support units like Tanks, Ghosts and Vikings. these 3 units supporting MMM is nearly unstopable. Focus firing on the Collsi with Vikings will reduce the dmg the only decent protoss counter to MMM can do. Tanks in mobile mode are much more powerful than they were in SC1. Ghosts EMP makes Protoss units as squishy as zerg units.

[Primoris]

Errr... Reapers/Hellions to scout map and hold expansion points? Build CC at main base, liftoff, and land at any of said expansions? Sounds pretty mobile to me...

Edit: If it's hard for you to see/scout the map, have you tried Ctrl+# your CCs? That way you press that number and hotkey for scanner sweep and there you go. Easy enough right?

Blowing energy on Comstat hurts an already lackluster terran economy because we can't FE. If anything we save Comstat for when we scout his DT but haven't completed tower coverage. MULE is the only thing keeping terrans in the game up till the 10 minute mark when we are forced to expand or lose.

[rock]

Map control?

Man, do you know how fast you can knock out an expansion with 8 reapers?

Get em fully upgraded and bam, you are off to the races. If you managed a tier 1 upgrade on the weapons and got their jet packs upgraded, they can take out main buildings in 4-5 volleys. That's faster than most people can respond.

You can also destroy their supply line before the opponent knows what the hell you're doing.

Undefended expo, you have 6 vikings? Put em on the ground and shred their workers.

Terran excel at defense and have enough harrassment tools at their disposal to keep map control, if you're willing to micro a bit.

Try this neat trick:

Get a raven and a cloaked banshee. Get behind the opponents supply line. Aim a seeker missile at the banshee then move the cloaked banshee to your opponents supply line.

Yes, you sacrifice a banshee, but you also take out damn near every worker they have.

[Taerix]

You're right, Terran does have quite a few weaknesses, but they have strengths too which makes them worth playing imo =)

As far as mobility goes, I've started using mostly infantry in all my matchups. MMM with some Ghosts depending on the situation is very threatening and mobile if you play it right. You can attack the front while dropping in the back, or hit 2 places at once to confuse & overwhelm.

Terran mech is just so slow that I can hardly stand using it though.