General Commanding Strategy
Starlude
Join Date: 2003-09-05 Member: 20576Members
Join Date: 2003-09-05 Member: 20576Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Offensive of Defensive?</div> Just as a general poll and response, I want to know if most commanders like to be offesnive or defensive.
I've seen a lot of different strats, but most of them boil down to taking a location, or defending a location sucessfully. (taking a hive, or defending chokepoints, resnode destruction, etc.).
Do you personally like to go on the offensive, or on the defensive?
From what I can see, these are the advantages and disadvantages for each method:
Offensive: you force the majority of the alien team to respond to YOU. You however, have lesser/no marines defending those key locations you need to hold. However you are hoping to occupy the alien team and force THEM to lose resources (through killing OCs, res towers, advancing into their territory). The only major problem with this is that you may be giving the aliens a lot of RES if your marines are not good enough, and die constantly. (this is why I believe hit and run esp. on res towers ia very good tactic: they usually aren't as highly defended as a hive, and it does really force the alien team to scramble to their next res tower and predict where the marines are coming to come). This may leave parts of your base(s) open to assault, but it puts you "in charge" of the game, by forcing the aliens to respond to your next move.
Defensive: Your team is behind their sentries and near their PGs. Their chances of getting killed are CONSIDERABLY lower, and their chances of killing things are CONSIDERABLY higher (gaining you res). However, you are forced to respond to the attacks of the ALIENS, meaning that you are basically in a response position, and the aliens are in an aggresive position. However, I believe it is much safter to give out equipment when people are on the defensive, as it is less likely they will lose it (someone else can pick it up if they die, and don't forget they arder harder to kill when that onos has to jump over 2 sentries and a TF to get to you). You can build up res and move out from here, usually the "heavy train" moves out from a defensive position, and then simply takes down their targets.
I've seen a lot of different strats, but most of them boil down to taking a location, or defending a location sucessfully. (taking a hive, or defending chokepoints, resnode destruction, etc.).
Do you personally like to go on the offensive, or on the defensive?
From what I can see, these are the advantages and disadvantages for each method:
Offensive: you force the majority of the alien team to respond to YOU. You however, have lesser/no marines defending those key locations you need to hold. However you are hoping to occupy the alien team and force THEM to lose resources (through killing OCs, res towers, advancing into their territory). The only major problem with this is that you may be giving the aliens a lot of RES if your marines are not good enough, and die constantly. (this is why I believe hit and run esp. on res towers ia very good tactic: they usually aren't as highly defended as a hive, and it does really force the alien team to scramble to their next res tower and predict where the marines are coming to come). This may leave parts of your base(s) open to assault, but it puts you "in charge" of the game, by forcing the aliens to respond to your next move.
Defensive: Your team is behind their sentries and near their PGs. Their chances of getting killed are CONSIDERABLY lower, and their chances of killing things are CONSIDERABLY higher (gaining you res). However, you are forced to respond to the attacks of the ALIENS, meaning that you are basically in a response position, and the aliens are in an aggresive position. However, I believe it is much safter to give out equipment when people are on the defensive, as it is less likely they will lose it (someone else can pick it up if they die, and don't forget they arder harder to kill when that onos has to jump over 2 sentries and a TF to get to you). You can build up res and move out from here, usually the "heavy train" moves out from a defensive position, and then simply takes down their targets.
Comments
drop rts, kill alien rts, pg up, hit hives. upgrade upgrade upgrade.
i find the defensive position to be good, but hard to micro and very very stressful to lose a heavy train to a skilled onos or somesuch.
The crux of the matter is, if you're defensive, you give the aliens nothing to do but attack and freely cap res. If you're offensive, you're denying them res, and fewer aliens can be spared to attack your stuff because they're trying to defend theirs/rebuild their lost infrastructure. ALWAYS go offensive if you can, because ultimately a fight on their turf will hurt them more while keeping the heat off your precious resources.
Use about half your team to attack, 1 or 2 to build, and the remaining ones should sweep your RTs and other holdings to make sure they're clean. If your attackers suck and keep dying, of course, there's nothing you can do. Just have them stay together and try again, and don't let them get split off if you can help it. Being a nazi comm helps there. STICK TOGETHER STICK TOGETHER.
Defense is just asking for your stuff to get attacked, and they will meet with SOME success in most cases. Enough to set you back, while their RTs slurp away happily.
That said, this is an ideal. Doesn't happen often. More likely, I end up being very offensive early on, with mixed squads of lmgs + shotties (those squads keep the shotties alive a remarkably long time!), and then switch to defensive as I move to finish with heavies/jps.
Examples of tactics going wrong -
Marines shotty rush hive. ONE skulk takes down the one IP in their base. Shotty rush is stalled and wiped out piecemeal as ammo/armour deteriorate. Thats an attack with no defence.
Marines turtling in base and at 2 rts, hoping for the res to start the HA train. They do get the res, and HA appear, but at the same time so do 2 Onos, one of whom has regen and continually rushes the pg with several skulk friends. Marines are pushed back to base and despite a 30 minute endgame their tfarm is wiped out. Thats a defence with no attack.
Combine these events and you'll see positive results.
If you have a strong enough offence, they cannot divert attention to your weak spots.
Example:
You've got the whole team suited in HA/SGs, taking down a hive (not the last one).
The aliens figure the hive is lost and decimate the marine start. No problem, i relocate to the newly killed hive, and we move onto the next hive.
Is that a fair exchange? a petty marine base for a hive?
now, had they met the attacking force, they would be occupied with defence, rather than attack.
either way, its good for you, new hive, or defence with you in command of the game.
Obviously the big disadvantage of defensive is metioned here: You must respond to your enemy, not the other way around.
Another statement that's true though is if a large offensive assault fails miserabily (you lose 2 onos and 5 fades, or you lose your heavy train), usually the enemies "defensive" position suddenly turns into a grand offensive, and you find yourself losing RTs, ground, buildings, the works. If a defensive can not just successfully REPEL an attack, but ANNHILATE it, then the defenders are suddenly at a supurb advantage. (this is assuming res nodes are about equal, not the 1v9 we see at marine endgames, where onos dying can come back in a matter of minutes). But even if they DO try to come back in a matter of minutes, they are still slowed by having to gestate, allowing you to gain grond, secure new res and chokepoints, hunker down again, rinse and repeat.
They talked about it for about 5 pages.. and the end result everyone basicaly agree'd on was
'dynamic'
Pretty short huh?
No 1 strat will win every game. You have to react to each game differently.
If your marines are failing to take a hive because of lack of skill.. or lack of upgrades from the early turret farm.. Siege! If your afraid of onos slaughtering your HA's, Kill the enemys ResTowers early!
etc etc.
'Good defence is a good offence' <b><span style='color:red'>and </span></b> 'good offence is a good defence'
While it happens, and I've done it, I consider desperate late game relocations to a hive a risky trick indeed... You've lost your proto and upgraded armory, which means what you have is ALL you're going to have for a good 3 minutes.
In fact, I love nothing more than organizing a squad of skulks to rush marine start when there's minimum defense... Often it's not enough to take out the tfac and thus base, but it is enough to take out the upgraded armory, driving marine tech to a standstill.
Yes, I've won after such a last minute relocation, but no, it's not easy, and I was forced into this situation by a dual onos rush on base (this example being from yesterday afternoon). I'd avoid it at all costs (this being an example where a good defense will support your offense, in addition to an offense being the best defense).
I rest my case.
Armory - Taking out an advanced armory mid game or late game will be devistating. Though you can still drop shot guns, you wont be able to drop some key items like HMG, GL's , And im pretty sure protos will become null.
Observatory - Obs have very little life, and once destroyed all siege ping strats will stop dead in there tracks, if you plan on sieging <!--emo&::siege::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/siege.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='siege.gif'><!--endemo--> Always have atleast 2 obs in ceperate locations.
Prototype lab - Proto has moderate life, but once taken out all jetpacks/HA's will be un placeable. Can be very devistating mid game.
Turret Factory - Once a TF is down, all turrets will stop functioning (obvious) but if its advanced for sieges, it takes alot of res and time to rebuild. Can give the aliens that minute they need to finish off a phase gate to stop a siege expantion.
Phase Gate - Taking out a phase is one of the most annoying and deadly things that can happen to any expantion. Without the phase your troops wont be as organised, and will be forced to WALK there. This loss of time/area can give the aliens that few extra seconds they need to finish off your entire expantion. Waisting valuable res. Its always a good idea to backup a phase with a circle of turrets(3-6). This will keep skulks/fades from standing ON the phase while destroying it.
Arms lab - Once this structure is down, you loose ALL UPGRADES (note: you only loose them untill the arms lab is rebuilt) Loosing all your wepon/armor upgrades can be very annoying, especialy near the early/mid game.
Each building is important.. but none are as important as..
Resource Tower - Loosing to many resource towers will surely cause you to loose. If your rebuilding RT's faster then your making resource off them, Game over man.. Game over!
Hope this helps.. most of this is common knowledge, but its worth mentioning to any beginners that my read this thread. <!--emo&::nerdy::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/nerd.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='nerd.gif'><!--endemo-->