Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty

[maxle]

Void rays can fire on the move, but only at things directly in front of them, and it also seems…inconsistent.

[Arbit]

Void Rays cannot fire on the move. I say this as a Protoss only player who has built his fair share of VRs. I’m not sure about carriers though, you don’t see those used too often unless it’s a 4v4 and one player just builds a massive carrier swarm. I’d have to load up SC2 and play around a little to verify that.

Maybe it’s different in the campaign? I’m almost 100% certain I’ve seen void rays chase after my vikings while firing. Carriers can’t follow you around the map puking out interceptors but they will follow and harass for a bit while the carrier moves so it’s kind of a pseudo fire on the move. It makes kiting with vikings very difficult, at any rate.
edit…

Void rays can fire on the move, but only at things directly in front of them, and it also seems…inconsistent.

Actually, I think they can move and keep the beam up for only a couple of seconds. It’s enough to kill the viking it was firing at, especially if there are multiple void rays.

[Staff_Sergeant]

Looking it up VRs attack while moving but they can only hit targets in a 40 degree radius in front of them and choose targets randomly, so they are useless for kiting. This move and shoot ability is pretty much only useful for keeping the prismatic beam charge up when moving through a base, or chasing down a retreating enemy that is slower than the VR.

[Jab]

I need to know the secret of how to beat mass stalker as the Zerg, as it seems every protoss player does the same thing against them. Zerglings don’t work, and neither do hydras. The only thing I’ve found is that ultras seem to take them down pretty well but if I get hit before I reach tier 3 I’m screwed.

[Shiroko]

I need to know the secret of how to beat mass stalker as the Zerg, as it seems every protoss player does the same thing against them. Zerglings don’t work, and neither do hydras. The only thing I’ve found is that ultras seem to take them down pretty well but if I get hit before I reach tier 3 I’m screwed.

Infestors with fungal growth? Assuming your problem is with blinking this can really narrow it down.
(I don’t really play Zerg, so this advice might be total BS)

[Equis]

I need to know the secret of how to beat mass stalker as the Zerg, as it seems every protoss player does the same thing against them. Zerglings don’t work, and neither do hydras. The only thing I’ve found is that ultras seem to take them down pretty well but if I get hit before I reach tier 3 I’m screwed.

BANELINGS!!

Followed by speedlings. Though honestly, I’m not sure how well it works. I’m assume some level of micro level play here, with burrowed banelings and him not having the foresight to go Observers. That, or so many banelings and the speed upgrade that a bunch of them are bound to get through to him and start wrecking lots of damage to his front line. It’ll be enough for the rest of your lings to swarm through.

Also, those magic troops really do turn the tide of battle so Fungal Growth might be worth a shot.

I hope you’re constantly larvaing your Hatch with your queen, even if you aren’t using the larvas. You can just build a huge larva army by continuously hitting larva growth on your hatch every 18 seconds.

[tomchick]

I need to know the secret of how to beat mass stalker as the Zerg, as it seems every protoss player does the same thing against them. Zerglings don’t work, and neither do hydras.

Yes, they do. All things being equal, these are fine counters to Stalkers. The problem is the “all things being equal” part. If the proper counters aren’t working, you’re probably falling behind in your economy and just getting outnumbered.

 -Tom

[Staff_Sergeant]

Yeah, it’s important to never say “X doesn’t work”, especially as Zerg. There’s just so many different ways to mix up your build order with Zerg, chances are you just haven’t deviated enough from your main strategy in terms of how long you power drones and how many early units you make. If you just say “oh well it’s impossible” then you’ll stop experimenting and never figure it out though.

[PeterGinsberg]

I need to know the secret of how to beat mass stalker as the Zerg, as it seems every protoss player does the same thing against them. Zerglings don’t work, and neither do hydras. The only thing I’ve found is that ultras seem to take them down pretty well but if I get hit before I reach tier 3 I’m screwed.

Hydras no, but zerglings? Speedlings work wonders on mass stalkers.

The problem is they often come with a zealot/stalker mix, so you need to be responding accordingly (roach/zergling I think) and manage to get the right units engaging each other.

[McKnight]

I need to know the secret of how to beat mass stalker as the Zerg, as it seems every protoss player does the same thing against them. Zerglings don’t work, and neither do hydras. The only thing I’ve found is that ultras seem to take them down pretty well but if I get hit before I reach tier 3 I’m screwed.

They don’t work by themselves however if you have Hydras and Speedlings you should demolish mass Stalkers. Speedlings are there to eat up the damage and stop the Stalkers from being able to micro, Hydras are there to deal the major Deeps (they are the highest damage unit in the Zerg army).

If he has Blink you may have to add an Infestor in for some fungal growth but other then that you should be owning him.

[Gordon_Cameron]

B.net down for me. Is there a definite correlation between this and WoW Tuesday server maintenance?

[Jab]

I keep trying with zerglings but when I do the stalker amount has reached such a critical mass they they one shot the lings and 2 shot the hydras. Unless I have the foresight to build 3 to 4 times the amount of lings they just melt away at the stalkers.

What hurts is that I was scouting him and didn’t see him expanding and I think he got everything off of one base while I was on my second base.

[Vincent19]

A Zerg player should pretty much always be one base ahead of his opponent. The extra hatch and queens are necessary to keep lots of larva and creep on the battlefield.

Speedlings become a lot more effective on creep, where they can quickly close the gap and surround enemies, so trying to bait the opposing force onto your creep where you can thin their ranks before counterattacking is a good strategy.

[Ender]

You can afford 6 zerglings for each stalker. Forget 3 or 4 to 1 odds. Shoot for 6 to 1. Oh and that cost doesn’t include the 50 gas that the lings don’t cost.

You can really have 2 lings + 1 hydra for the cost of 1 stalker. Also consider the tier 3 ling 20% attack upgrade, many people overlook that.

[Reldan]

Yeah, classically Zerglings become known as “Cracklings” once you get +3/+3 upgrades and the Adrenaline Boost tier 3. Their damage output literally becomes more than double while their per-unit cost remains the same.

It sounds like you are losing to a 4-gate Stalker timing attack. You’re expanding and he’s not, and he’s taking the resources he’s saving in the short-term from not paying for an expansion to gain a temporary military advantage.

The way to beat this is to only fight him defensively on creep for starters. Use a mix of speedlings and hydras. Ideally you’d do this on or near a couple spine crawlers. The basic idea is that if he hasn’t expanded and you have, you just need to hold off until your macro advantage overcomes his temporary advantage - you either force him to attack into your defensive position, or you take your resource advantage and regain the lead.

Get upgrades for zerglings. They can tear stalkers apart. If he doesn’t attack soon enough head for ultras which will really tear him apart. (bonus: the ultra and zergling upgrades are shared)

[Eric_T_Cheng]

I just got my signed Starcraft 2 Collector’s Edition box back from Blizzard! :D Thanks Jason!

(I guess I should stop playing WoW and MW2 to finish the campaign…)

[Mike_Cathcart]

Dear Terran bads,
Please continue to make marines, battlecruisers and thors when I pump out high templars.

<3

[Lorini]

One time free name change is coming. Do it right this time:) Next time it will cost you.

[PeterGinsberg]

One time free name change is coming. Do it right this time:) Next time it will cost you.

It’s nice of them, but I’m kinda sad in a way, I thought it was pretty cool how many people were using their real first names.

[rossm]

I use my first name as my character name. I don’t plan on changing it though, it was intentional.