Replay Analysis Thread

[JaggedAppliance]

You need to grab all your mexes much much faster. Send out several engies and take all the mexes on your side. You didn't even try to take them it seems. You also need to build units. On this map, spam frigs. There's not much more to say beyond this tbh.

Watch replays of the best players.

[Zigatron]

A recent game I played. I played north rock and won navy. What should have I done after I won navy?

I am bad at eco. What should i have done to avoid early power stall and running out of mass mid t2?

At the end of the game, air left his com out and I almost killed him with a beetle drop, but I didn't scout and microed my transport wrong. Any tips on getting my drops off better?

[Tomalak]

I would really be interested in what I did wrong here. I gathered twice as much metal and still lost - I must have spent it poorly! Erk. Anyway, thanks for any advice on upping my game a bit!

[keyser]

you should scout your opponent and adapt your stratégie to his. you could have seen that he was doing turtle (a style that doesn't work in 1v1).
you should only have go T2 and get mml to out range his pd. (keeping tank close to your mml to defend them, in case he send tank of his own). or get T3 land, and go for T3 MOBILE arty. they are quite cheap.
you went for a T3 STATIC arty, that cost A LOT, and doesn't have a good dps/mass invested. this is why you never build T3 static arty in a 10x10 like this one. You may want to go for it in a 20x20 but with way higher eco.
you could also went for navy and create destroyer of your own and bombard his turtle.
or T2 air, and go for a corsair snipe.

Btw you builded only T2 HQ land facto. HQ does cost a lot, and you need only 1, so that assit T2 facto can build T2 tech unit. (T2 assist facto are really cheap). You want to build sometime 2 T2 HQ at safe position, so that i 1 get sniped, you will still be able to build T2 unit in your T2 assist factories. (it's similare for naval and air factories, and for T3 tech).

wagner and mantis are great raiding unit, they aren't fit for dealing turtle base. Btw if you want to attack a position, make sure that all your unit attack at the same time. And not like your wagner did. They were being shot one after the other. Only providing reclaim for your opponent.

so key is to use good unit for the differents situation. usually you will have to build mix of unit, since you will have to deal with multiple situation and there is some complementarity between unit.

[Tomalak]

you should scout your opponent and adapt your stratégie to his. you could have seen that he was doing turtle (a style that doesn't work in 1v1).
you should only have go T2 and get mml to out range his pd. (keeping tank close to your mml to defend them, in case he send tank of his own). or get T3 land, and go for T3 MOBILE arty. they are quite cheap.
you went for a T3 STATIC arty, that cost A LOT, and doesn't have a good dps/mass invested. this is why you never build T3 static arty in a 10x10 like this one. You may want to go for it in a 20x20 but with way higher eco.
you could also went for navy and create destroyer of your own and bombard his turtle.
or T2 air, and go for a corsair snipe.

Btw you builded only T2 HQ land facto. HQ does cost a lot, and you need only 1, so that assit T2 facto can build T2 tech unit. (T2 assist facto are really cheap). You want to build sometime 2 T2 HQ at safe position, so that i 1 get sniped, you will still be able to build T2 unit in your T2 assist factories. (it's similare for naval and air factories, and for T3 tech).

wagner and mantis are great raiding unit, they aren't fit for dealing turtle base. Btw if you want to attack a position, make sure that all your unit attack at the same time. And not like your wagner did. They were being shot one after the other. Only providing reclaim for your opponent.

so key is to use good unit for the differents situation. usually you will have to build mix of unit, since you will have to deal with multiple situation and there is some complementarity between unit.

Thanks - great advice!

[Tomalak]

What do you think about this one, folks? My instinct is I lost a game I was winning by e-stalling - but not sure what I could have done to prevent that exactly.

Thanks!

[Purelukk]

Tomalak,

You power stalled at min 5 when you upgraded four mexes to T2 at the same time. You kept right on building, including four radar stations, two of which you upgraded to T2 during a full on power stall (this is why the power stall continued after the mex upgrade completed). You did not fight your way out of that stall until minute 17 or so. Thats 11 mins of power stall. You can't let that happen. When you stall you must immediately take steps to stop it. Don't gut it out. Power stalls are by nature a catch-22 as building power requires power.

So in terms of the power stall you did two things wrong:
1) upgrading multiple mexes at once - in general don't do this. However, a nice trick is that you can upgrade all the mexes you own at one time and immediately pause them. Then send a group of four or so engineers around to assist the mexes one at a time. The mexes will auto unpause as the engineers get each one to T2.
2) you underestimated that power drain of T2 radar - each one drains 250e/sec, pretty steep. Your effort to maintain intel is admirable but you need the power to support it.

You may find a mod called "Supreme Economy" useful for helping identify whats draining your economy. It is strictly a UI mod so useable in all games. It is in the vault.

But lets face it, you lost that game because you marched your non-upgraded ACU (with no army in support) into 37 T1 tanks with sheilds. Odds are pretty low on that fight. You were behind but still in the game at that point.

It is not enough to have intel if you don't use it to aid in your decision making. When you moved your ACU into that army of tanks you had radar coverage, you knew they were there. The same concept applies earlier on when you lost a big army near his base. You had intel telling you that you were badly outnumbered.

On the plus side your early aggression is great 8) Infuriating actually. Keep that up all through the game. Consider trying jesters with interceptors assisting them. They are a big Cybran advantage that I don't think you are utilizing often.

That's just my newbie opinion 8) One of the pros will probably have a better take.

PS - You sent an engineer to each island apparently unaware that there was a cliff there that you couldn't get up. You can use the engineers to "distance build" a factory on the ledge above their head thereby gaining access to the island. Not sure if you knew that.

[Tomalak]

Tomalak,

You power stalled at min 5 when you upgraded four mexes to T2 at the same time. You kept right on building, including four radar stations, two of which you upgraded to T2 during a full on power stall (this is why the power stall continued after the mex upgrade completed). You did not fight your way out of that stall until minute 17 or so. Thats 11 mins of power stall. You can't let that happen. When you stall you must immediately take steps to stop it. Don't gut it out. Power stalls are by nature a catch-22 as building power requires power.

So in terms of the power stall you did two things wrong:
1) upgrading multiple mexes at once - in general don't do this. However, a nice trick is that you can upgrade all the mexes you own at one time and immediately pause them. Then send a group of four or so engineers around to assist the mexes one at a time. The mexes will auto unpause as the engineers get each one to T2.
2) you underestimated that power drain of T2 radar - each one drains 250e/sec, pretty steep. Your effort to maintain intel is admirable but you need the power to support it.

You may find a mod called "Supreme Economy" useful for helping identify whats draining your economy. It is strictly a UI mod so useable in all games. It is in the vault.

But lets face it, you lost that game because you marched your non-upgraded ACU (with no army in support) into 37 T1 tanks with sheilds. Odds are pretty low on that fight. You were behind but still in the game at that point.

It is not enough to have intel if you don't use it to aid in your decision making. When you moved your ACU into that army of tanks you had radar coverage, you knew they were there. The same concept applies earlier on when you lost a big army near his base. You had intel telling you that you were badly outnumbered.

On the plus side your early aggression is great 8) Infuriating actually. Keep that up all through the game. Consider trying jesters with interceptors assisting them. They are a big Cybran advantage that I don't think you are utilizing often.

That's just my newbie opinion 8) One of the pros will probably have a better take.

PS - You sent an engineer to each island apparently unaware that there was a cliff there that you couldn't get up. You can use the engineers to "distance build" a factory on the ledge above their head thereby gaining access to the island. Not sure if you knew that.

Brilliant, thanks - and great advice on the distance building and the economy mod.

[Tomalak]

Thanks to advice above and lots of playing, I seem to be improving fast.

This is one I won - just - but I'd be interested in any advice on what I got wrong. More anti-air ground units? Teching up faster?

[Purelukk]

Thanks to advice above and lots of playing, I seem to be improving fast.

This is one I won - just - but I'd be interested in any advice on what I got wrong. More anti-air ground units? Teching up faster?

I am not sure how I get this from a replay but it appears that you are having fun now. Making progress and getting better is that way If you don’t do anything else keep that up!

As usual your early pressure is excellent. I am sure he was cussing your name at several points. Try to prioritize engys and mexs on the outskirts of his base. Run bys/thru his base are great but you probably don’t want to hang out there as his production continues to spawn on you. Try to keep those mantis moving, hit and run is the name of the game. Work on denying his harass while continuing yours. Achieving that = win. These are totally my opinions. You are doing a great job, keep developing it your way.

Sorry to say this but it’s time for some cold hard facts. If you opponent was just a tiny little bit better then you would have totally lost this game.

At minute 10 you have 9 mantis and 9 interceptors on the field. That is the entirety of your army at that time. I believe against any other opponent you would have been toast! Why did this happen? <oops you did it again> At minute 6ish you stall power and let it continue for several minutes. This results in a severe drop in unit production. This power stall started when you upgraded the following simultaneously: Land factory to T2, mex to T2, building mass storage in two locations at once. Unless you have a very strong economy you must do these things one at a time. You have to respond to economy stalls immediately or they will cost you the game!

You started your mass storage surrounds too early. Get all of your “safe” mexes to T2 first then start the storage surrounds. Surrounding a T1 mex with storage is a FA sin 8)

I think you missed a big opportunity at minute 16. You had a huge army (40 mantis, 11 vipers) within striking distance of his commander. It seems you were content to let the vipers bombard his factories from range and the mantis do nothing. The result is that a small group of pillars decimated your entire army from range with little response from you.

Diversify your unit production. Looks like you build only vipers out of the T2 land factory. A couple of bangers in each of your bases would have mitigated his gunship harass entirely. T2 mobile AA is hell on gunships (direct counter). In general you want to have a lot of tanks and a mix of all other units. Ignoring some units or unit types can create a weakness in your army that your opponent can and will exploit.

Explore the use of the Deceiver. With your harass mentality I think you will have some fun with it.

At minute 31 or so you launch a nice attack on his primary production base with your fighter/bombers. You destroy three or four factories but leave the T2 air HQ unscathed. You always want to prioritize the HQ’s. Killing the T2 HQ stops production of all T2 out of non HQ factories until a new HQ is reestablished. You should have regretted this mistake later (see below).

At 39:40 he rolls into your expansion base with 18 gunships. GG no re! For some unfathomable reason he hovers over your commander and kills several mexes before finally bugging out. Wow you got lucky there! From paragraphs above, if you had killed that air HQ then these gunships wouldn’t exist (at least not in these numbers) and if you had a few Bangers in your base then these gunships amount to nothing more than a mass donation (assuming you are reclaiming ).

General Notes:

Rebuild destroyed mexes asap. Don’t leave mass points unclaimed in your territory.

Rebuild factories on top of the wreckage of destroyed factories. This causes the construction bar to start at ½ full or thereabouts.

RECLAIM! RECLAIM! RECLAIM! Start early and never stop. You spent the entire game fighting for mass when you had a God knows how much laying on the ground all around you! Late in the replay push <shift> <ctrl> at the same time and watch as your computer bogs down trying to calculate how much mass is lying around. Watch some of the pro replays and you will see that when they push across the map with an army they have a smaller army of engineers following behind vacuuming up mass. A battlefield is a goldmine!

You are not using T1 mobile artillery at all. They are extremely powerful and essential to getting past pd’s (direct counter). An army of ten mantis will get eaten alive by an opposing army of six mantis, three medusa and one mole. The mole is pretty important because the artillery can shoot further than it can see so it needs intel to make full use of its range.

More T2 factories. Once you upgrade a factory to T2 it becomes a HQ. Once this is accomplished the T2 support factory is unlocked as an upgrade from the T1 factory as well as buildable from any T2 engineer at a substantially reduced cost. Take advantage of this and get more T2 factories going. Mantis are great little units but after a certain point they are just cannon fodder.

As long as this game went on you should have had all of your factories to T2 and at least one to T3. OK maybe that is overstating it but you get the point. You should play each game as if it is going to the T4 (experimental) stage. That means never stop upgrading your economy and subsequently your production. Once you have the T2 mexes surrounded with storage it is time to start upgrading them to T3 (ONE AT A TIME!)

Happy Hunting!