Scouter Apathy
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Scouting can be as simple as sending a single flash in to see what kind of defenses there are, rather than just rushing whole horde in only to find out you could have gone around that porc. Probably the two things that most distinguish expert players from everyone else (the nubs) are micromanagement of units to get the most out of them and good scouting to avoid wasting units on defenses when another way exists (a.k.a. giving metal to your enemy).
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SwiftSpear
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Jeffies aren't really scouts in BA any more as much as they are specialized raiders. Any defense, of even the smallest and most plentiful type will stop a jeffy like a brick wall. The point of the scout is that it gets a look at something the player can't see by just skirting the defensive line, IE, base workings/internals/weak points, whatever.Sleksa wrote:jeffies r good also)))
Spy kbots can be good, but vech doesn't have an equivalent, they are an ass hassle to micro in such a way they won't be seen, and it takes enough E to keep them cloaked that most players end up estalling at some point during their scouting run and getting raped.
SwiftSpear wrote:Jeffies aren't really scouts in BA any more as much as they are specialized raiders. Any defense, of even the smallest and most plentiful type will stop a jeffy like a brick wall. The point of the scout is that it gets a look at something the player can't see by just skirting the defensive line, IE, base workings/internals/weak points, whatever.Sleksa wrote:jeffies r good also)))
Spy kbots can be good, but vech doesn't have an equivalent, they are an ass hassle to micro in such a way they won't be seen, and it takes enough E to keep them cloaked that most players end up estalling at some point during their scouting run and getting raped.
1) get 15 jeffies together
2) run into a wall of 20 lasers
3) get a new bunch of 15 jeffies
4) run into a wall of 2 lasers and 20 flash
5) send 60 gater into point 4
6) ???
7) Profit.
other than that, if it is really critical to know what the enemy is doing, sacrifice the air card and spam some finks.
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SwiftSpear
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- Joined: 12 Aug 2005, 09:29
The problem is, jeffies WON'T get to the base no matter which path they take. A single gator standing still will stop a jeffy. 1 LLT is a brick wall. They aren't really so much scouting units, they don't go behind enemy lines and report vital information, they just raid weak mexes in the early game. This just doesn't leave you with alot of options, especially at T1. The spy kbot doesn't come in until T2, and being a T2 unit you can basically not have the unit unless you determine to go kbots. so you are restricted to having a useless T1 air fac that spams peepers, which is more res than T1 players want to spend on scouting that won't be useful anyways unless the enemy fails to establish sane defense lines. Uselessness compounds massively going to T2 air, as T2 plants are exorbitantly expensive (which solves other problems in BA, but causes this particular one) and is very cheap and easy to counter extremely effectively if you know it's comming, making regular air scouts infeasible.
Scouting is, generally speaking, more expensive to do properly than you can usually afford.
Scouting is, generally speaking, more expensive to do properly than you can usually afford.
Your assumptions dont really work for anyone butt he top end 5% of players.
95% of players tend not to build antiair intentionally untill they have a swarm of gunships in there base and their panicking.
And 70% of players defences have an easy totally undefended backdoor that even jeffies can exploit.
A single flash or gator is enough to probe a defence, and probing defences can reveal valuable information even fi the flash never gets past them.
If it does get past them you know you've hit a goldmine, but in life when you see a nickel or a dollar you dont say "pfft wheres my stupid gold mine" that'd be silly.
And lets be realistic, we build that much of our units using 1 to probe a defence isnt much is it?
In the latter situation where scouting doesnt really work in air, I'd argue that you shouldnt be scouting there, and should be searching for weaker spots. Should you really need to scout there, send in aircraft from several vectors along with a mix of gunships adv radar planes and tier 1 fighters. Sure most of the planes die but theres a big enough mix that they see something. And itll be late enough ingame that it won't particularly matter about cost.
But its only at lategame that any player can really secure a base well enough to prevent all scouts reaching in, and it is feasable that you can gain useful information without seeing the center of the enemy base.
Also, few people make an effort to hide things in games. Theyre not bothered about scouters or rogue units or hiding an airfac they builtand the units it built or that they went tier 2. Thus theres not as much surprise as there could be.
95% of players tend not to build antiair intentionally untill they have a swarm of gunships in there base and their panicking.
And 70% of players defences have an easy totally undefended backdoor that even jeffies can exploit.
A single flash or gator is enough to probe a defence, and probing defences can reveal valuable information even fi the flash never gets past them.
If it does get past them you know you've hit a goldmine, but in life when you see a nickel or a dollar you dont say "pfft wheres my stupid gold mine" that'd be silly.
And lets be realistic, we build that much of our units using 1 to probe a defence isnt much is it?
In the latter situation where scouting doesnt really work in air, I'd argue that you shouldnt be scouting there, and should be searching for weaker spots. Should you really need to scout there, send in aircraft from several vectors along with a mix of gunships adv radar planes and tier 1 fighters. Sure most of the planes die but theres a big enough mix that they see something. And itll be late enough ingame that it won't particularly matter about cost.
But its only at lategame that any player can really secure a base well enough to prevent all scouts reaching in, and it is feasable that you can gain useful information without seeing the center of the enemy base.
Also, few people make an effort to hide things in games. Theyre not bothered about scouters or rogue units or hiding an airfac they builtand the units it built or that they went tier 2. Thus theres not as much surprise as there could be.
Jeffies arent meant to scout the inside of his base and see where all his winds are at. If they could, you'd use them to kill his winds.
They are for seeing the weak spots in his front line- seeing how his llts are positioned and what all those little blobs are. Knowing exactly where all his defenses are positioned, you may then strike at the weakest points.
Granted on a porcy map there are often only so many points of entry- but even on divide, you can for example move sideways and attack the weakest of the 3 entrances. A lot of players play divide like a series of 1v1's, and only defend their exit against the enemy directly in front of them. They may not expect an assault from the side (but you can scout and find out!)
Scouting is always important, and jeffies cost little more than some buildtime.
As for planes, an airfac is always worth it mid game. Always always. Air reclaim econ is vital in getting you to t2 without stopping the momentum of your land push. Even if you dont build a single combat plane, it is worth it. It also gives you access to fighters (The best AA), and airdrops (Which on a map like altored divide can win the game), even if you never build bombers and gunships.
If he is a smart player he will see your airscouts and make some AA. If you are just using scouts, he will need to spend more in AA to stop you seeing his base than you will in scouts to see it. A defender costs almost 2x as much as a peeper (And a peepers cost is mostly energy). He will need to ring his whole base in defenders to stop your peepers, as a peeper has more LoS than a defender does range- he cant just plonk it on top of his vital spots and expect it to stop you scouting.
If you do this and go t2, a few very spread out defenders wont pose much of a threat to your gunships or bombers. If you do this and never make a single offensive air unit- you just made him waste his resources on defenders. Its win-win.
As for t2 air, its one of the quickest and easiest ways to end a game, and emp bombers/nuke bombers make defending against large masses of enemy land units utterly trivial. On the scouting front, radar planes have enough LoS to see his whole frontline well before you even get in range of his AA.
They are for seeing the weak spots in his front line- seeing how his llts are positioned and what all those little blobs are. Knowing exactly where all his defenses are positioned, you may then strike at the weakest points.
Granted on a porcy map there are often only so many points of entry- but even on divide, you can for example move sideways and attack the weakest of the 3 entrances. A lot of players play divide like a series of 1v1's, and only defend their exit against the enemy directly in front of them. They may not expect an assault from the side (but you can scout and find out!)
Scouting is always important, and jeffies cost little more than some buildtime.
As for planes, an airfac is always worth it mid game. Always always. Air reclaim econ is vital in getting you to t2 without stopping the momentum of your land push. Even if you dont build a single combat plane, it is worth it. It also gives you access to fighters (The best AA), and airdrops (Which on a map like altored divide can win the game), even if you never build bombers and gunships.
If he is a smart player he will see your airscouts and make some AA. If you are just using scouts, he will need to spend more in AA to stop you seeing his base than you will in scouts to see it. A defender costs almost 2x as much as a peeper (And a peepers cost is mostly energy). He will need to ring his whole base in defenders to stop your peepers, as a peeper has more LoS than a defender does range- he cant just plonk it on top of his vital spots and expect it to stop you scouting.
If you do this and go t2, a few very spread out defenders wont pose much of a threat to your gunships or bombers. If you do this and never make a single offensive air unit- you just made him waste his resources on defenders. Its win-win.
As for t2 air, its one of the quickest and easiest ways to end a game, and emp bombers/nuke bombers make defending against large masses of enemy land units utterly trivial. On the scouting front, radar planes have enough LoS to see his whole frontline well before you even get in range of his AA.
Radar is cheap and you can see where the enemy is expanding to or attacking from. That is usually enough to know.
HLTs and other big turrets reveal themself when they shoot.
On the supermegapro cc it doesnt matter which direction your army goes because the bases always look the same, surrounded with mex+llt.
Its not that complicated?
HLTs and other big turrets reveal themself when they shoot.
On the supermegapro cc it doesnt matter which direction your army goes because the bases always look the same, surrounded with mex+llt.
Its not that complicated?
Alright, shall I elaborate?
In Comet, the limited structure of play and the relative survivability of vehicle corpses seems like it would make a failed attack catastrophic, due to the remaining metal on the field. Not so, the absurd amount of metal spots on the map effectively reduces the value of sitting metal, particularly in contested zones.
However, your offensive units are also your primary defensive units - static defenses cannot hold such a flat and featureless map without extensive planning - funneling DTs, mine fields, intelligence denial, etcetera...
A failed attack makes you acutely vulnerable to somebody with superior knowledge of your defensive placement - somebody who scouted.
In Comet, the limited structure of play and the relative survivability of vehicle corpses seems like it would make a failed attack catastrophic, due to the remaining metal on the field. Not so, the absurd amount of metal spots on the map effectively reduces the value of sitting metal, particularly in contested zones.
However, your offensive units are also your primary defensive units - static defenses cannot hold such a flat and featureless map without extensive planning - funneling DTs, mine fields, intelligence denial, etcetera...
A failed attack makes you acutely vulnerable to somebody with superior knowledge of your defensive placement - somebody who scouted.
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SwiftSpear
- Classic Community Lead
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- Joined: 12 Aug 2005, 09:29
For about 800 reasons CC is not a map you want to get caught without scouts in. Knowing when and where to attack in CC is the difference between blowing up your opponents e-economy and builders, and just harmlessly smashing into a wall of flashtanks and LLT. That being said, it's not necessarily always benificial to scout with jeffies, a flash tank or stumpie will get farther under LLT fire...