2nd Starcraft

A standard Terran attack is the use of marines, marauders, and sometimes medivacs (depending on how late the player decides to wait until he attacks). This attack can be incredibly effective against players who do not properly counter the attack.

To do a MMM rush, the Terran player will typically wall off his base. He will then build units with the Barracks that walled off his base and build another 2-3 barracks. These will constantly produce marines/marauders until he decides it’s time to attack. The addition of medivacs will take time due to having to add a factory/starport, but the medivacs can be produces fairly quickly with the reactor add-on.

Countering a MMM rush depends on your race:

Terran: To counter MMM, you can simply do MMM yourself. However, the best counter would be to employ some tanks and vikings (if they have medivacs).

Zerg: The key to fending off a MMM rush is to build zergling/banelings instead of roaches. MMM will destroy roaches all things being equal since marauders get an attack bonus against armored units (roaches are armored). If you see they are coming at you, a good move is to put your banelings out front and then burrow them. Then, as the Terran player comes out, unburrow them and immediately attack them. This way your opponent cannot destroy the banelings before they do the suicide damage. After destroying some of your opponent’s army with banelings, use hydralisks to take out the Medivacs and zerglings to pick off the rest of their army.

Protoss: A variety of approaches can work with Protoss. First, if your opponent does not have tanks, Photon cannons work well. However, do not build too many of these since tanks can outrange these units. If it is later in the game, the High Templar’s psistorm is effective. Otherwise, charged zealots work well, as do immortals and Colossi. Just make sure you do not overbuild on buildings and have plenty of units to counter the MMM build.

Your early rush failed and left you behind in macro. Perhaps you made a micro-related blunder when attacking your opponent and are now behind. Or perhaps your opponent has an extra expansion or two on you and you are behind at the macro level.

Your first thought may be to panic, and this emotional response is right in the sense that you do need to do something. However, mindlessly doing a last ditch attack is probably the worst thing you could do. Take a deep breath and figure out a strategy for how to come back.

Step One: Stay Alive

The first step when you are behind is to make sure you don’t get finished off. While this of course depends on the circumstances of the game, figure out how much you should invest in defenses. If your opponent launches an attack on you and fails, this may help you get back to even. Do some scouting to see if you think your opponent will attack and where he might attack. If aggression seems likely, invest in defenses to stay alive and hopefully counter-cripple your opponent.

Step Two: Figure Out Your Best Strategy To Gamble On

After doing your best to stay alive, figure out the way you think you may win. Perhaps your opponent is over-investing in land-to-land units and you should throw a last ditch effort into building a lot of air units that can attack land.

If you think your opponent is turtling, gamble that he won’t launch an attack soon and expand quickly. Sure, if you are wrong and he attacks you, you may lose. However, you are behind currently and won’t win unless you do something risky. By expanding quickly, you may get yourself a macro advantage in about 5 minutes time and can turn the tables on your opponent.

When you are behind, you can’t expect to do a standard strategy and beat your opponent. You will likely need to gamble one on strategy to take avantage of a mistake your opponent hopefully makes. It may be pursuing an aggressive expansionary strategy if your opponent is too hesitant to attack you, an air-based assault if he is too focused on land units, or perhaps a cloaked/stealth assault if your opponent is ill-equipped with detectors. Either way, you’ll likely need to gamble on a strategy and leave yourself exposed someway and just hope your opponent makes a mistake.

Each SC2 race has its own strengths and weaknesses. Here is a brief rundown of the positives and negatives of the Terran, Zerg, and Protoss. If you have any other ideas you’d like to add, please comment on the forum:

Terran:

Pros:

* Easiest race to play well. Campaign will help newbies familiarize with the race. Employing an MMM rush is one of the easier ways to get quick wins on battle.net
* Tanks, tanks, tanks. They are great for defense and they outrange opponent’s defensive units.
* Relatively small amount of micro is needed. Not much spellcasting is needed to be effective with this race.
* An expansion with a planetary fortress/missile turrets can defend against most small attacks (have your SCVs repair the planetary fortress while your opponent attacks it).
* Orbital Command scanner makes scouting easy for the lazy. Mules are great to get minerals quick.
* Can wall off initial base to defend against very early rushes.

Cons:

* Harder to move troops across the map. Cannot warp them in like Protoss or use a Nydux Network like Zerg.
* Ravens are the costliest/hardest mobile detector to make.
* Vulnerable to early game rushes (zerglings or zealots).

Zerg

Pros:

* Easiest race which to expand. Hatcheries are cheaper (only 300 minerals versus 400 for Command Center/Nexus)
* Provided you have sufficient hatcheries, you can instantly spawn a huge army to replace the one that is currently fighting in a battle.
* Lots of rush possibilities- zerglings, mutas, or roaches.
* Many interesting counter possibilities to the other races.
* Overlords/overseers makes scouting/control of map easier.

Cons:

* Very micro-intensive race. Queens/infestors are important units and are primarily spellcasters.
* Heavy reliance on small units make these armies vulnerable to splash damage. High templars and several tanks can wreak havoc.
* Small range for most units. Only units that can outrange most defensive units are brood lords and they are very late in the game/slow.

Protoss:

Pros:

* Strongest units of any race. Armies are generally less vulnerable to splash damage.
* Warpgates and a pylon allow an instant warp-in of army anywhere on the map.
* Observers are cheap/easy detectors and great scouts.
* Many rush possibilities- zealot or void ray. Both can work even against good opponents.
* Photon cannons work against both air and ground attacks. This makes setting up defense the easiest of any races- don’t have to guess if opponent will come with ground or air.
* One probe can warp in as many buildings as it wants at once.

Cons:

* Expanding can be cumbersome and expensive. Nexus is 400 minerals plus takes a good amount of time. Then have to build a lot of probes. In contrast, hatcheries are cheaper and quicker. Terran have the advantage of drawing down a few mules from other bases to quickly gather minerals from an expansion.
* Can be overwhelmed in early game. Units/buildings are expensive and take awhile, so an error in early game can be deadly.
* Land units are vulnerable to air attacks. Only the stalker can attack air units (besides archons, but those are rarely used). In contrast, Terran have marines/thors and Zerg has hydras/queens.