morimacil Profile Joined March 2010 France 920 Posts #1

Its easy to do, and super effective, but I dont see that many players actually do it.



So heres a topic about it, and I also made a small video to show it, and its effects





If you already know about it, then I guess nothing to see here, move along.

If you dont, then start using this asap, and stop losing clumps of units to the first round of siege tank shots.



I use lings and roaches to show it in the video, but it works just as well with gateway units, bioballs, or whatever.

And you can do the exact same thing against colossus, just have a single unit ahead of your group, and the first colossus shot(s) will be against a single unit, instead of landing directly in a group of units.



Obviously, since it only really helps against the first shot fired, and colossus fire much faster, nullifying that first shot doesnt really make quite as big a difference, the colossi will usually shoot like 10 times in a fight against roach hydra, where siege tanks fire 2-4 times against ling-bling, so getting rid of splash damage on a single shot isnt quite as good vs colossi as it is vs siege tanks.



But yep, all in all, really easy and fast to do, very very effective against siege tanks, and no reason not to do it You can quite easily avoid siege tank splash altogether for the first round of siege tank fire, by simply having a few spread out units ahead of your group.Its easy to do, and super effective, but I dont see that many players actually do it.So heres a topic about it, and I also made a small video to show it, and its effectsIf you already know about it, then I guess nothing to see here, move along.If you dont, then start using this asap, and stop losing clumps of units to the first round of siege tank shots.I use lings and roaches to show it in the video, but it works just as well with gateway units, bioballs, or whatever.And you can do the exact same thing against colossus, just have a single unit ahead of your group, and the first colossus shot(s) will be against a single unit, instead of landing directly in a group of units.Obviously, since it only really helps against the first shot fired, and colossus fire much faster, nullifying that first shot doesnt really make quite as big a difference, the colossi will usually shoot like 10 times in a fight against roach hydra, where siege tanks fire 2-4 times against ling-bling, so getting rid of splash damage on a single shot isnt quite as good vs colossi as it is vs siege tanks.But yep, all in all, really easy and fast to do, very very effective against siege tanks, and no reason not to do it

PaleBlueDot Profile Joined January 2009 United States 263 Posts Last Edited: 2011-03-04 20:54:14 #2



User was warned for this post No reason to avoid siege tank splash now. I'm pretty sure the unit that is directly hit takes damage but everything else in the splash radius is healed instead. Gotta lab it, ill post results asap. Veteran of pre-Masters Medivac Alamo

Spekulatius Profile Joined January 2011 Germany 2308 Posts Last Edited: 2011-03-04 21:10:09 #3 On March 05 2011 05:53 PaleBlueDot wrote:

No reason to avoid siege tank splash now. I'm pretty sure the unit that is directly hit takes damage but everything else in the splash radius is healed instead. Gotta lab it, ill post results asap.



Sorry... What? Sorry... What? Always smile~

morimacil Profile Joined March 2010 France 920 Posts #4 Its just some guy trolling by posting random stuff that makes no sense.

.Enigma. Profile Joined January 2011 Sweden 1461 Posts #5 Pretty cool, haven't really focused on using this in my play so I thank you for bringing it to my knowledge. "Jupiters c*ck!" - Quintus Lentulus Batiatus

Kamais_Ookin Profile Blog Joined May 2010 Canada 4218 Posts #6 I already knew that you should split your force to minimize the splash of the tanks but I didn't know it made such a huge difference until watching this demonstration. Thank you for sharing man, need to practice getting into the habit of doing that myself. I <3 Plexa.

Johnny_Vegas Profile Joined December 2007 United States 239 Posts #7 You can do similar micro against Colossus by moving 1 or 2 roaches forward a little to cause the horizontal firing arc of the Colossi to be wasted on 1 unit.



This is the reason that Infested Terran can actually be decent versus tanks or Colossi btw. You can spawn them in such a way that none of them take splash damage. battlereports.com (co-founder/developer), Nohunters Discussion Forum operator

thesauceishot Profile Joined July 2010 Canada 331 Posts #8 I've always done this against tanks, it works really well. I would say it's even easier for Protoss to do, since we only need to lead with one unit. I just lead with one chargelot and that will take as many siege tank shots, splash free, as its life.

Xirroh Profile Joined May 2010 Canada 146 Posts #9 Yes I saw in a GSL match a zerg do something similar. He flanked the tanks with Roaches (like 7-10) then ran the bane/ling in on the other side. The roaches did some damage vs tanks but basically just drew the tank fire in the opposite direction of the ling/bane. It completely nullified the effectiveness of the tanks. Combined with this technique tank splash can really be reduced.



It should be noted however that Pro's seem to spread their tanks out in a long line, and not clump them. Probably to reduce this very effect. However it is still worth doing considering how little time/skill/apm is required.



Great Vid

morimacil Profile Joined March 2010 France 920 Posts #10 It should be noted however that Pro's seem to spread their tanks out in a long line, and not clump them. Probably to reduce this very effect. However it is still worth doing considering how little time/skill/apm is required.



Well it works the same way even if the tanks are spread out.

They will still all shoot the unit at the front as soon as it comes into range of them, until that unit dies.

If you look at my video, the tanks arent all shooting at the same time. But as soon as your front unit comes in range of the back tanks, they shoot it. If you have a clump instead, as soon as your clump comes in range of the back tanks, they shoot it.

Spreading out the tanks is nice to allow space for marines to micro between them, and to not get them all blown up by friendly fire, or infestors, or banelings, and so on, but it doesnt stop the fact that if you have 1 unit in front of your clump, until that unit dies, thats going to be the first one to get shot by the tanks.

Well it works the same way even if the tanks are spread out.They will still all shoot the unit at the front as soon as it comes into range of them, until that unit dies.If you look at my video, the tanks arent all shooting at the same time. But as soon as your front unit comes in range of the back tanks, they shoot it. If you have a clump instead, as soon as your clump comes in range of the back tanks, they shoot it.Spreading out the tanks is nice to allow space for marines to micro between them, and to not get them all blown up by friendly fire, or infestors, or banelings, and so on, but it doesnt stop the fact that if you have 1 unit in front of your clump, until that unit dies, thats going to be the first one to get shot by the tanks.

iAmJeffReY Profile Joined August 2010 United States 4262 Posts #11 It's a trick every terran knows in TvT. You prespread, and flank from 5+ directions and stim a couple maras/marines first and send them just running into take auto volleys first. I've won MANY engagements in such a way.



But, honestly as zerg, if you aren't flanking at least both sides, or front and two angles at a time, you deserve to be wholloped by well placed tank fire.



Remember what people did in slow TvP tank vulture bunker pushes in BW? Just run 12 zeals STRAIGHT in, no attack move... the same thing goes for any race vs a tank pusher. Pull drones, or queens, or whatever and run some in first spread, and then the other behind it and try to keep spread as much as you can, within reason. Unbiased biased terran abuser Jeffrey. Sorry for the rage, friend!

morimacil Profile Joined March 2010 France 920 Posts #12 But, honestly as zerg, if you aren't flanking at least both sides, or front and two angles at a time, you deserve to be wholloped by well placed tank fire.

Well as shown in the video, even if you flank, its a great idea to have some spread out units at the front of your groups to tank the first siege tank shots. Well as shown in the video, even if you flank, its a great idea to have some spread out units at the front of your groups to tank the first siege tank shots.

djdoodoo Profile Blog Joined August 2010 United Kingdom 192 Posts #13 Very nice find. Although try it with tanks which are spread out because you won't find a good terran who clumps them up like that.

morimacil Profile Joined March 2010 France 920 Posts #14 Spreading out the tanks doesnt change a thing.

If something comes in range of a tank, the tank will shoot it.

That something can either be a single unit, or a clump of units.

The whole point here, is that you want it to be a single unit, and not a clump, so as to avoid splash damage.

Where the tanks are positioned, how far appart, high or low ground, how many of them, and so on, none of that actually matters.

The important part is that the unit at the front is the one taking all the siege tank damage for at least the first shot, and for the others too if your opponent isnt microing his tanks. So you want that unit at the front to not be next to other units that will get splashed, thats all.

djdoodoo Profile Blog Joined August 2010 United Kingdom 192 Posts #15 Its important because if 20 zerglings are running forward not all of the tanks will fire at that the first few spread out and will be able to fire at the front of the line. For instance, if I have 5 tanks and a clump of marines and I assume you have banelings. I will have a staggered line of tanks so that I can keep running back past them.



The first few in the spread out zerglings will die to the few tanks. For instance if you put 3 zerglings forward then they will die to the first 3 tanks instead of all 5 tanks being clumped together and all shooting at the first few.



The tanks at the back will get 2 shots off on the approaching army as a pose to one because they will be able to fire at them as soon as they are in range instead of having to wait for the cool down if you understand me. I'm not trying to argue. I think what I'm saying is correct though.

NB Profile Blog Joined February 2010 Netherlands 8110 Posts #16 TL should have a tumb up function for helpful thread like this ^_^ Im daed. Follow me @TL_NB

AlgoFlash Profile Joined October 2010 Canada 96 Posts #17 Your posts are always interesting morimacil, et bon accent pour un francais! "Fuck it, nerf rock and scissors." Paper

grumpyone Profile Joined January 2011 48 Posts #18 Thanks. I've been having trouble with slow tank pushes.

Nicodemusher Profile Joined November 2010 United States 184 Posts #19 Nice post, cheers.

erulabs Profile Joined April 2010 United States 41 Posts Last Edited: 2011-03-05 10:16:40 #20 On March 05 2011 11:49 NB wrote:

TL should have a tumb up function for helpful thread like this ^_^



Who's a redditor? hehe.



Also, good post and cool video. It seems to work better (imo) with roaches, just because you only have to sacrifice one to draw plenty of tank fire (takes less time to micro). Also, and maybe this is just how desperate i am when I'm fighting tanks, but typically hatching lings run in a line, segmented just slightly, which naturally helps when running into siege tanks. You can force units into a line by putting them uphill and around the 'edge' of a ramp. They'll all try to take the shortest path which squeezes them into a line formation. Who's a redditor? hehe.Also, good post and cool video. It seems to work better (imo) with roaches, just because you only have to sacrifice one to draw plenty of tank fire (takes less time to micro). Also, and maybe this is just how desperate i am when I'm fighting tanks, but typically hatching lings run in a line, segmented just slightly, which naturally helps when running into siege tanks. You can force units into a line by putting them uphill and around the 'edge' of a ramp. They'll all try to take the shortest path which squeezes them into a line formation. The high altitude bomber siren tolls for thee

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