I haven’t been going as strong with Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer since I’ve been spending most of my time these last several days trying to accomplish two things: 3-star all Modern Warfare 3′s Special Ops missions and beat Gears of War 3 on Insane difficulty. I succeeded in the Special Ops missions (the last few were pretty rough), and am now trying to beat Gears of War 3 on Insane before 12/25 as per Tom Cruise. I’m trying to fulfill his Impossible Mission! But, other than that, I have been spending time with Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer, and am going to spend this week’s entry discussing my thoughts on my favorite (and sometimes least favorite) weapons, equipment, and attachments for Team Deathmatch play.

Primary Weapons
Assault Rifles
I’m an assault rifle player, so I use these for maybe 90% of my time in Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer. My favorite overall assault rifle is the Type-95. I’ve always been a burst assault rifle user since Modern Warfare 1, and my accuracy has generally been considered decent (I usually have an accuracy of 20%+ when I check Leaderboards). The Type-95 is great because it’s a more powerful weapon than the other burst assault rifle, the M-16. It’s so powerful that it kills in one burst, and unlike the other non-burst rifles, the Type-95 has a Rapid Fire attachment. Put this thing on and the opponent basically doesn’t have time to move in between the 3 rounds fired. I like the Type-95 at medium-far distance, so I’ll often equip a shotgun attachment and Acog scope on it so I’m covered near and far. The biggest problem with the Type-95 is its iron sights are terrible. I have to use a red-dot sight or an acog scope on it which forces me to use up one attachment slot anytime I want to use the Type-95. With the Type-95 being so good, why don’t I unlock it from the start with a Prestige token?

One answer: The M4A1. The good old M4 is an excellent, excellent assault rifle and is unlocked right away from the beginning of the game. It has very little recoil so it remains highly accurate, and is in general an overall good assault rifle. Its iron sights are very usable, giving me an attachment to use on other things. I prefer the M4A1 in short to medium engagements and even for CQC, so I’ll almost always equip a silencer on it. Without needing to put on a sight, I’m free to add on other various attachments such as a heartbeat sensor or grenade launcher while still keeping the silencer. Great overall weapon that can be used all the way until its “replacement” assault rifle.

The M4A1’s replacement, and my second favorite assault rifle weapon after the Type-95 is the ACR 6.4. It’s basically just like the M4A1 in that it has a great iron-sight, very little recoil for high accuracy, but it just feels like a more powerful weapon so naturally, it feels like the M4A1’s bigger brother. Just like the Type-95 is to the M16, is the ACR to the M4A1. No reason to go back to the M4A1 with the ACR.

The next assault rifle I will consider using after I complete the leveling of the Type-95 is the MK14. This thing is semi-automatic, so you have to press the trigger for every round you wish to fire. This seems like a natural progression from the Type-95’s burst fire, so I’m looking forward to checking out its powerful rounds and high accuracy.

Sub Machine Guns
I only use SMGs on a couple of levels if I feel like running and gunning (Underground and Arkaden). My favorite SMG, and maybe it’s just because it’s a carry-over from previous Modern Warfare games, is the P90. This gun overall has no real drawbacks, but it has one benefit that none of the other SMGs have: a huge clip. With SMGs having such high fire rates, the P90 allows you to fire longer and reduces the number of reloads you need. On other SMGs, you can be stuck reloading between enemies because your SMG fires so quickly, but the P90 reduces that probability, making it the most preferred SMG for me.

My second favorite SMG is the PP90M1. While it doesn’t have the clip-size that the P90 has, it fires faster and seems like a more powerful SMG than the P90. It all depends on playstyle. Perhaps running around with PP90M1 and Sleight of Hand for faster reloads just makes it an overall better choice. As for me, I usually switch over to the PP90M1 once I max out the P90.

This Prestige time around I may check out the MP7 as well. I hear that it gets some praises, but because it gets unlocked so late and the amount of time I spend with SMGs is minimal, I never got a chance to look into it.

Light Machine Guns
I don’t use Light Machine Guns in Team Deathmatch, and don’t recommend them since they limit your mobility. However, if I had to pick one, I think I would go with the MK46. It seems to provide the best balance overall after I’ve tried all five machine guns in both Team Deathmatch and Special Ops.

Sniper Rifles
Current maps in Team Deathmatch don’t provide for good sniping (you just won’t get that many kills with it) so I’ve since stopped sniping. My favorite sniper rifle though would be the L118A. The reason why it is so preferred by many snipers is that it has high mobility. Like the LMGs, sniper rifles are very heavy so they don’t allow you to travel as quickly around a map. I believe the L118A is the lighest sniper rifle, and this is beneficial because with the killcams you won’t be able to stay in the same place forever. If I could stay in the same place, I would probably stick with the starting sniper rifle, the Barrett 50Cal since it’s such a staple sniper rifle and unlocked from the start.

Shotguns
I’m not a shotgun player either, but if I had to choose one, it’s a very easy choice: the Striker. If you see anyone running around a map with a shotgun, it’s most likely this one in particular. I believe that there is some incorrect calculation with the number of pellets fired by it or something that allow for it to do more damage than it does. Add on the Range Weapon proficiency to it and you can see why people run around with it. I’m not a fan but won’t deny how effective it is.

Secondary Weapons
Machine Pistols
Personally, I think Machine Pistols should not even be allowed as secondary weapons. Why put automatic weapons as secondary weapons that rival those of primary weapons? For machine pistols, everyone knows by now which is the best one: the FMG9 – especially in Akimbo mode. Why does it kill so quickly and is still so accurate in Akimbo mode? No one knows, but try asking it to the players that run around solely with FMG9 Akimbo…

Handguns
Don’t bother with picking one of these for a secondary weapon with the much more useful launcher and more lethal machine pistol in the same slot.

Launchers
Stinger is obviously the best anti-air weapon since it has two rounds and auto-lock. I almost always have this as my secondary, since I don’t bother with using it against enemy opponents. Outside of the Stinger, I’ve seen the occasional Javelin user that tries (and sometimes succeeds) in using the Javelin on human opponents as well. Not my cup of tea at all, but it’s the second-most popular launcher I’ve seen in Team Deathmatch.

Weapon Proficiencies
Weapons have so many useful attachments that my preferred Weapon Proficiency is almost always Attachments. I love paring a Silencer with a sight, or a Silencer with Heartbeat sensor, or a sight with Rapid Fire, or Extended Mags with a Silencer, etc. Almost always I will use Attachments if I have the option. If I haven’t earned it yet, I’ll just stick with Kick since better accuracy seems to be more useful than the stronger bullet penetration of Impact. For run and gun SMG classes, since I fire from the hip and all I need is the silencer, I’ll usually go with Range as my sole Weapon Proficiency.

Lethal
All of them are pretty good (except C4 doesn’t really have much purpose in Team Deathmatch) so I will use each depending on the situation. If I’m being stealthy or camping, I’ll go with the Bouncing Betty or Claymore. Between the two, I prefer the Claymore just because it’s stronger, cannot be ducked, and for some reason, seems less easy to spot. But, at times if I’m using the Recon Perk and prefer to be more offensive, I’ll go with either the frag grenade or the Semtex. I am terrible with the Throwing Knife however, and fail to understand its usefulness. I guess it’s good if you’re in a situation where you’re out of ammo and cannot reload so you use the knife instead? Personally, I’ve had very little success ever killing with it, but for some reason, opponents can kill me with one from across the map. Maybe that’s my next equipment piece to learn and figure out.

Tactical
Usually by default, I’ll go with Flash grenades. I prefer Flash grenades over Concussion Grenades because with Concussion grenades, your opponents can still see you so they can still shoot at you. When not using Flash grenades, I also consider a few other tactical equipment as well. EMP grenades can take out opponent pointstreak rewards like the Assault Drone, Recon Drone, and even the Pavelow. The Scrambler and Portable Radar are also good devices when used correctly – especially so when several players are using it. I used to use the Scambler when I sniped without a silencer since I would often remain in solitary locations, so the Scrambler would conceal my location. Portable Radar is basically like a UAV constantly on for a certain location. If several players throw these down in key areas of the map, you may not even need UAVs.

Weapon Attachments
There’s quite a variety of weapon attachments and many of them have their own uses (even the shotgun) so I’m not going to go into each one. However, I personally have a strong dislike for the holographic sight and even the Hybrid Scope because both of them obscure too much of the screen when I aim down the sight. I hate the reflecting on the holographic sight; it blocks part of the sight itself in the sunlight or whatever and it generally just makes it more difficult to aim. I’m a huge fan of the Red Dot Sight of course, and now I’m liking the ACOG scope on larger maps. Suppressor is also one of my faves since it fits my playstyle more, and Extended Mags, Shotgun, and Thermal Scope can have their uses depending on your setup. I don’t like the Grenade Launcher just because kills aren’t so easy with them like they are against AI in the campaign, and it’s annoying to hit someone with a grenade launcher, then they turn around and just kill you because you’re stuck reloading when you could have just killed them with your assault rifle. I’m also not a huge fan of the heartbeat sensor, because it makes me pay too much attention to it rather than trust my instincts on the levels and the flow of the game. I like Rapid Fire a lot on the Type-95, but it sees very little use otherwise.

Summary on Weapons, Equipment, and Attachments
It’s always good to watch the killcam if you get killed by someone and are wondering what they are running. Often times, you will see these very popular weapons that I like: the Type-95, the ACR, the Striker, P90, PP90M1, etc. I guess they are popular for a reason? In any case, give them a try – they’re usually popular for a reason!

Skyrim, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, and Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 sit on my game shelf sealed. Uncharted 3 sits in my Playstation 3 and I’ve literally forced myself to play the game but always quit after completing one chapter. I’ve made it about halfway through that game. All four of these titles are big games that I would be totally stoked to play, if I wasn’t so into Modern Warfare 3.

It’s crazy – I cannot tear myself away from Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer – even knowing that I should be playing through and beating those other single player games quickly so I can sell them, but I cannot resist the allure of turning on Modern Warfare 3 any moment I have time to game. cmfl3x is probably the same way, since it seems like he’s playing it nearly as much as I am! (We’re each probably closing in on 40 hours logged in the multiplayer) In any case, since all I’m playing is Modern Warfare 3 these days, I’ll probably be posting Modern Warfare 3 themed entries through the rest of this month. For this week, I’ll share my thoughts on the Perks specifically from a Team Deathmatch point of view.

As I’m over halfway through my first Prestige, I’ve finally started coming into my own. When Modern Warfare 3 first released, I was doing fine, maintaining a decent K/D ratio (decent to me, at least), but as time went on, I felt like players were getting better and I was not improving so I continued to die more often and kill less. My K/D ratio had been steadily dropping for a while, but now it’s been moving up again consistently. I mentioned to cmfl3x over this past weekend when I played with him that I had this “epiphany” with regards to the game, and now I feel like I’m a lot better because of it. Of course, there are several reasons why I think I’m doing better nowadays, and one of the reasons is my refinement of how I am using the Perks.

Perks
I played around with several different Perks in my first “playthrough” of multiplayer before I Prestiged, trying to use them all and pretty evenly and unlock all the Pro modes. Now in my second playthrough, I am well aware of my favorite ones and made the right decision to stick to the ones that I feel are most effective in Team Deathmatch for my playstyle.

Slot 1
For the Perk 1 slot, I am a big fan now of Recon & Recon Pro. The other Perks probably have their own marginal uses, but almost always I will go with Recon/Recon Pro as the front-runner for slot 1. Just being able to tag opponents by throwing a grenade over a wall to see where they are and where they are facing is too valuable. Equip a grenade launcher on your assault rifle, flash grenades, and a regular grenade and that’s 5 times you can tag enemies in each life you get. Recon Pro allows me to tag opponents with just bullets, so by simply firing on someone, everyone else on my team can see where the opponent is and where he is facing for something like 12 seconds? It’s an absurd amount of time where if I don’t kill the guy, one of my teammates surely will so the Perk helps out my team considerably.

Two other Perks I’ll consider are Scavenger if I’m using a silenced automatic weapon (since that means more rounds fired and more rounds needed to kill so it’s definitely possible that I will run out of ammo) and Extreme Conditioning (if I’m going for a run&gun SMG CQC class on certain maps). Sleight of Hand is faster reloading, and I don’t think it’s necessary and cannot compare to being able to see where opponents are and where they are facing. Blind Eye is far too defensive – with the ability to simply shoot down air support with Stingers, I would probably never go for it.

Slot 2
Assassin/Assassin Pro blows everything else in this slot away in my opinion. Not showing up on UAV is ridiculously good compared to any other Perk out there in this slot. Maybe it’s just my playstyle, but not giving my opponents the ability to find me beats the benefits of any of the other slots. Put on a silencer as well and you can go around killing without opponents ever knowing where you are.

In second place I would consider Hardline/Hardline Pro for getting pointstreaks faster and Quickdraw for faster aiming, but to have either of those basically gives opponents the ability to find you and shoot you in the back so I would only consider them if I played against opponents who never used UAVs. Quickdraw allows you to aim down the sight faster, so it’s good when facing enemies point-blank, but if you’re doing that often you probably won’t be living very long lives. Plus, if you use Stalker in Slot 3, you can already move quickly while aiming down the sight so it renders Quickdraw kind of pointless. Hardline is decent, but because Killstreaks aren’t as devastating in Modern Warfare 3 as they have been in the past, I don’t think it’s as necessary. Plus, all of the good ones start at 9+ kills, so needing 8 instead of 9 isn’t something I’d rather have than Assassin.

Blast Shield & Overkill can be useful in certain instances, but I would almost never use them. I might use Blast Shield on Dome, just because it’s so easy to throw grenades there, but that’s the only map.

Slot 3
I almost always go Stalker/Stalker Pro. Being able to move at normal speed while aiming down the sight is ridiculously powerful. You can correct your aim on the fly and move relatively fast so you are always ready to shoot. On top of that, Stalker Pro basically removes the ability for you to get killed by Bouncing Betties and Claymores so I’ll take this Perk every time I use an Assault Rifle (which is basically 90% of the time).

Steady Aim is really the only other Perk I would use instead of Stalker and that would be if I were running and gunning with SMGs. If I’m going CQC, I’m not going to even bother aiming down the sight. I just run around hipfiring with the SMGs and Steady Aim definitely allows me to play that way on maps like Underground and Carbon.

I would consider Marksman if I were sniping, but outside of that, it’s not as useful as Stalker for two reasons. The first is anyone with Assassin Pro doesn’t show their name, so it completely counters the Marksman Perk, so you’ve wasted it. The other issue I have with Marksman is that when you can see their names highlighted, they’re generally too far away for you to take the shot when you’re not sniping, so you can’t do much about it even if you see their names.

SitRep is terrible since most players won’t use Claymores/Bouncing Betties and Stalker Pro already nullifies them. Dead Silence has its possibilities for stealthy classes, but I would probably prefer Steady Aim over Dead Silence if I were going to be close enough to enemies where I would worry that they could hear me. Very situational, and I believe most of the time opponents won’t hear you anyway unless they are wearing headphones.

Summary on Perks
So yeah from a Perks point of view, for any assault rifle class I will almost always go Recon Pro, Assassin Pro, and Stalker Pro. Maybe for a silenced assault rifle I will go Scavenger instead of Recon, but Assassin and Stalker are bread and butter. If I were to go with an SMG class, I’d consider switching to Extreme Conditioning, but keep Assassin Pro in the second slot and pick up Steady Aim in the third slot. I used to snipe, but not much anymore since there aren’t really any good sniping maps in MW3.

Next week I’ll talk about my thoughts on the weapons, equipment, and maybe pointstreaks and deathstreaks. Stay tuned!

I still remember years ago how I first tried out the Call of Duty 4 multiplayer beta, and was completely blown away. I think I even ran around getting beta invites for friends because I thought it was so awesome. Modern Warfare 2, again, blew me away and I definitely had some good times with those. Now Modern Warfare 3 is here today, and I’m pumped once again. World at War and Black Ops? Forget it – Modern Warfare is where it’s at. Surprisingly, there’s a lot of things that have changed for Modern Warfare 3, so I compiled some information and wrote something up so those of you that are going to be getting into Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer can start thinking about how you want to best get into it.

Quick Summary of Major Changes
- Prestige is now at level 80 and Prestiging allows you to buy stuff at the Prestige store (such as double exp, stat resets, etc.)
- Each weapon has its own weapon level. Killing with a weapon raises its experience level, allowing you to unlock attachments, profiencies (also new to MW3), and challenges for the weapon.
- Killstreak System replaced with Strike Chain System and pointstreaks
- Pointstreak rewards are scrollable (you don’t always have to use the highest streak reward anymore) and pointstreaks restart after third poinsterak reward is earned

Weapon Proficiencies
Weapon proficiencies are sort of like “Perks” for weapons. Only one Weapon Proficiency can be put on a weapon at a time, but you can have a weapon proficiency equipped as well as a weapon attachment.

Kick – Reduced recoil (available for all weapons)
Range – Increased range (available for SMGs and Shotguns only)
Attachments – Equip two attachments (available for all weapons)
Focus – Reduced flinch when shot (available for all weapons)
Melee – Faster melee (available for SMGs and Riot Shield only)
Stability – Reduced sway (available for all weapons)
Impact – Better bullet penetration through walls (available for all weapons except SMGs and shotguns)
Speed – Faster movement with weapon equipped (available for LMGs, Sniper Rifles, and Riot Shield only)
Damage – Shells do more damage (available for Shotguns only)
Breath – Hold breath while aiming down the sights (available for Assault Rifles only)

Weapon Attachments
Weapon attachments have been present in Call of Duty multiplayer since Call of Duty 4, and Modern Warfare 3 will have some new ones added to the list:

Red Dot Sight
Suppressor
Grenade Launcher
Rapid Fire
Grip
Akimbo
Tactical Knife
ACOG Scope
Heartbeat Sensor
Hybrid Sight
HAMR Scope
Shotgun
Holographic Sight
Extended Mags
Thermal Scope
Variable Scope

Perks
Perks are back and for the most part, the same as in previous Call of Duty multiplayer games. Accomplishing the Perks tasks a set number of times unlocks the Pro version of the Perk, granting additional abilities on top of the core Perk’s abilities. Each player is able to equip one Perk from each of the three Tiers by default.

Tier 1 Perks
Recon – Explosive damage paints the target on the mini-map
Recon Pro – Bullet damage paints the target on the mini-map
Sleight of Hand – Decreases the reload time for all weapons by 50%
Sleight of Hand Pro – Swap weapons faster
Blind Eye – Undetectable by air support and sentries
Blind Eye Pro – Launchers lock-on quicker and extra bullet damage versus air support and sentries
Extreme Conditioning – Allows users to sprint for longer periods of time [Unlocked at Level 4]
Extreme Conditioning Pro – Climb obstacles faster
Scavenger – Pick up ammo from fallen enemies [Unlocked at level 39]
Scavenger Pro – Start with extra mags

Tier 2 Perks
Quickdraw – Allows faster aim down the sight
Quickdraw Pro – Recover from equipment and grenade usage quicker
Blast Shield – Increases explosive resistance
Blast Shield Pro – Increases flashbang and stun grenade resistance
Hardline – Each Strike Chain Reward requires one less point
Hardline Pro – Every two assists count as a point towards pointstreak. Deathstreaks require one less death.
Assassin – Undetectable by UAV, portable radar, thermal, and heartbeat sensors
Assassin Pro – Immune to Counter-UAVs and EMPs. Player name not displayed when enemy aims at the player
Overkill – Allows player to carry two primary weapons, but second weapon cannot have attachments [Unlocked at level 47]
Overkill Pro – Allows use of attachment(s) on secondary primary weapon

Tier 3 Perks
Marksman – Identifies enemy targets at a longer range by showing their player names at a greater distance
Marksman Pro – Longer hold breath
Stalker – Faster movement speed while aiming down the sights
Stalker Pro – Delays detection-triggered explosives
SitRep – Enemy explosives flashing red
SitRep Pro – Magnifies the sounds of enemy footsteps
Steady Aim – Increases accuracy of a weapon when fired from the hip by reducing the size of the crosshairs by 35%
Steady Aim Pro – Have weapons faster after sprinting
Dead Silence – Silences footsteps and reduces the effect of the Recon perk
Dead Silence Pro – Negates falling damage

Strike Chain System
The Strike Chain System replaces the Killstreak system from previous Call of Duty games. In those games, you were able to select your Killstreak rewards and when you killed the specified number of opponents without dying, a Killstreak reward would unlock. In Modern Warfare 3, Killstreaks have been replaced with Pointstreaks, because the developers wanted to give players the option to be rewarded for other tasks (such as objectives) in addition to simply killing without dying. I believe a kill is considered 1 point and an objective-related task is also a point. When you start Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer, you will be able to customize three Strike Packages but can only use one at a time. The rewards are also different for each of the Strike Packages, and I believe that only three rewards can be selected at a time.

Strike Package 1: Assault
If you decide to select the Assault Strike Package, this is the classic Call of Duty Killstreak system: you need to kill players without dying to unlock pointstreak rewards. If you die, your pointstreak chain resets. But like previous Modern Warfare games, the Assault class is the only Package that allows for Pointstreak killchaining. This means kills from one pointstreak count towards the next, so if you were to get two kills from a Predator Missile Pointstreak, you would then be able to use the Attack Helicopter pointstreak. Get 5 kills from that same Attack Helicopter and you can then call in the Pave Low!

Assault Strike Chain Pointstreak Options
UAV – Shows enemies on the minimap (3 points)
Care Package – Airdrop a random point streak or ammo (4 points)
IMS – The Intelligent Munitions System detects and eliminates enemy combatants (5 points)
Predator Missile – Remote control Missile (5 points)
Sentry Gun – Airdrop a placeable Sentry Gun (5 points)
Precision Airstrike – Call in a directional airstrike (6 points)
Attack Helicopter – Call in an Attack Helicopter (7 points)
Strafe Run – Strafing Run of 5 Attack Helicopters on a designated point (9 points)
Little Bird Guard – Get personal air support from a Little Bird Guardian (9 points)
Reaper – Laser missile targets remotely from the Reaper UAV (9 points)
Assault Drone – Airdrop an Assault Drone (10 points)
AC130 – Be the gunner of an AC130 (12 points)
Pave Low – Heavily armored assault helicopter (12 points)
Juggernaut Recon – Receive advanced armor via carepackage with M60E4 LMG and MP412 revolver (15 points)
Osprey Gunner – Be the gunner of a V-22 Osprey (17 points)

Strike Package 2: Support
While the Assault Strike package is the traditional killstreak system we’ve seen in Call of Duty multiplayer for the last several titles, the Support Strike package is completely new and different. The first of the major differences between the packages is that dying does not reset your pointstreak with the Support Class. This means if you get 3 kills, die, and then get 2 more kills after you respawn, you will be eligible for a 5 pointstreak Support Chain Reward if you had one selected. Another major difference is that with the Support Pointstreak kills, you cannot killchain to get higher level Pointstreak rewards. This actually works out fine due to the third major difference: most support Poinstreak rewards are not kill related. The Support Strike Package is more team-oriented and therefore more defensive based.

Support Strike Chain Pointstreak Options
UAV – Shows enemies on the minimap (4 points)
Counter UAV – Obscures enemy maps for 30 seconds (5 points)
Ballistic Vests – Deploy a bag of Ballistic Vests for your team (5 points)
Airdrop Trap – Kill enemies with a booby-trapped airdrop crate (5 points)
SAM Turret – Automated SAM turret that destroys aerial pointstreaks (8 points)
Recon Drone – Control a Recon Drone, targeting enemies for your team (10 points)
Advanced UAV – Call in an Orbital Recon that shows the position and direction of enemies (12 points)
Remote Turret – Deploy a small turret and remotely control it (12 points)
Stealth Bomber – Call in an Airstrike undetectable on enemy maps (14 points)
EMP – Temporarily disable enemy electronics (18 points)
Juggernaut Recon – Receive advanced armor via carepackage with M60E4 LMG and MP412 revolver (18 points)
Escort Airdrop – Have a V-22 Osprey airdrop and protect 4 Care Packages and 1 Airdrop Trap (18 points)

Strike Package 3: Specialist
The Specialist Strike Package is also very different from the other two packages – because it does not have any Poinstreak rewards at all. Instead, with the Specialist Package, the player gets an additional Perk (selected by the player) for every two, four, six, and eight kills. At eight kills, the player automatically gets all Perks except for Overkill (the ability to carry two primary weapons). This reminds me of Crysis 2; the player basically becomes stronger and stronger as he kills, and he himself is the Killstreak reward. Once the player is killed, all additional Perks are lost.

Deathstreaks
If you continue to get killed online without making any kills yourself, Deathstreak rewards get unlocked for you to give you a helping hand in trying to get a kill. Once you kill again, the Deathstreak counter is reset. You are able to choose from the following options:

Juiced – Gives player a 7-second speed boost upon respawning (4 deaths)
Final Stand – After lethal damage, fall onto ground but can still shoot sidearm (4 deaths)
Martyrdom – Drops a live fragmentation grenade upon death (5 deaths)
Revenge – See the position of the last enemy that killed you. Killer will appear with a bright crimson color (5 deaths)
Hollow Points – Extra bullet damage (5 deaths)
Dead Man’s Hand – After lethal damage, fall onto ground but can detonate C4 on self (6 deaths)

As you can see, Modern Warfare 3 has even more customization options for how you want to play online. Before you even start playing, you should definitely consider selecting the weapon(s) you want to specialize in, the attachments and proficiencies you want to use on them, the Perks you want to use, the Strike Package and Strike Package Rewards you want to use, and finally, the Deathstreaks you want to use. It’s a lot to take in at once, but it should be a lot of fun. See you online!

Up next in my series of Starcraft 2 strategy articles is how to attack and defend against Terran Reapers in the early game. Even with the recent patch that increased the amount of time to produce Reapers from a Barracks, they are still quite effective in the early game when used the right way. Hit the jump if you want to learn how to use the Terran Reaper unit effectively or to better defend against them in the early game for multiplayer matches.

Overview

One of the new Terran units in Starcraft 2 is the Reaper. The Reaper is an infantry unit that can be produced at the Barracks once you’ve added the Tech Attachment (which also allows you to research infantry upgrades and produce the other new Terran infantry unit, the Marauder). The Tech Attachment allows you to research the Reaper speed upgrade as well, which you should do as soon as you can if you are going to open the game with Reapers.

The Reaper unit itself is a very fragile unit – 50 HP. However, it is extremely mobile due to the fact that it can jump up and down cliffs, negating any chokepoints that are fortified on most maps. The Reaper does bonus damage against light armored units, making it very strong against Zealots, Zerglings, Marines, and workers. It also does extra damage against buildings with its grenades, making it a very aggressive unit. The combination of it being strong against early game units, workers, and buildings allows for two possible “openings” if you want to go with Reapers in the early game.

How to Open With a Quick Reaper Rush

The Quick Reaper Rush relies on you getting out a couple Reapers with the speed upgrade and attacking an opponent’s mineral line before they have units that can kill the Reapers. Protoss is most susceptible to this due to the fact that if they decide to open with Zealots instead of teching to Stalkers early, the Reapers can kill the Zealots without taking any damage by kiting them and then destroying the Probes afterward. With the speed upgrade (50 Minerals/50 Gas), they are also faster than Terran marines, making it easy to harrass the Terran SCVs and leaving the area before the marines can even make it back to the mineral line to engage them.

Both Reaper openings start the same way. I don’t really watch my food count when I build these, but I will try to mention them as I remember:

1. Supply Depot at your choke (at about 10/11 supply)
2. Barracks once the depot is finished (guess that means 12?)
3. Refinery after that (about 13 supply) and get 3 SCVs on it once it’s done
4. Supply Depot
5. Orbital Upgrade at your Command Center and use MULE asap
6. Second Barracks
7. Add Tech Lab attachment on first Barracks
8. Build Reaper & research Reaper speed upgrade
9. Build second Refinery

I haven’t really taken notes to figure out exactly when the timing is for everything, but it’s not a difficult build. For this build, you want to always pump out SCVs except when you finish your first Barracks (at that point you want to get the Orbital upgrade to make M.U.L.E.s). Your priority is to get 2 Barracks up with Tech Labattachments, and then get a second Refinery. The second refinery is not needed early on, because you only need 150 gas total to hit with 2 Reapers that have the speed upgrade.

By the time your second Reaper comes out, you should have the speed upgrade research so you can send them to your opponent’s base. Your priority is always the opponents’ workers. The Reapers do extra damage against them, so you want to pick off as many as you can. You will have the easiest time against Protoss and Terran due to Protoss usually starting the game with a Zealot or two and Terran starting with Marines. This allows you to kill SCVs, kite Zealots, and outmanuever Terran Marines while you circle around their main and pick off anything you can. The way to play with Reapers is to move them, then quickly hit the Stop or Hold Position key. At that moment they will attack whatever is chasing them or open (such as Zealots), then you have them move again. This is basically kiting in a nutshell – you move, attack when you are out of range of the melee units your opponent has, and then move again when they draw closer. Basically, you are flying them like a kite as they follow after you while you continue to stop, attack, and move again until they die.

A Quick Reaper Rush is not recommended against Zerg, since Zerg generally will have a Queen early (good defense against Reapers), and a combination of Zerglings or a Crawler that will protect their base. What you need against Zerg is the next option with Reapers – the Mass Reaper Rush.

Summary for Quick Reaper Rush

1. Block off your choke with supply depots and 1 or 2 Barracks
2. Add the Tech Lab Attachment
3. Make a Reaper and upgrade Reaper speed
4. Once your second Reaper is out, your speed should be upgraded so you can now attack
5. Hit up either a Protoss or Terran mineral line
6. Take out any workers you can, and kite the Zealots or avoid the Marines.

How to Defend Against a Quick Reaper Rush
Each Race has its own strategy for defending against the Quick Reaper Rush.

Zerg
Zerg is already relatively immune to the Quick Reaper Rush, since the Queen unit takes reduced damage from the Reapers and is relatively ranged. One of the things to keep in mind as a Zerg player when going up against a Terran opponent is the placement of your Spawning Pool. Always place your Spawning Pool behind your mineral line, sealing off that area. Reapers can jump up and down cliffs, but they cannot jump over mineral lines or buildings. The Spawning Pool seals off the area behind your mineral line, so if Reapers try to hit your mineral line, they will get stuck at the Spawning Pool and your Zerglings/Queen will finish them off quickly. In team games, since Zerg will usually get rushed early anyway due to the lack of an ability to block the choke, Zerg players will generally put down a Spine Crawler or two early – the placement of the Crawler can also defend against Reapers if placed close enough to the Hatchery.

Terran
The Terran Marine is the first unit you should be producing, and while it has similar range to the Reaper, it is a slower unit. Therefore, the way to combat against the Reapers is to already have your Marines at your mineral line – whether in a Bunker, or just out in the open. Most Terran players will rally their infantry to their choke, but it’s already blocked off so you are generally better off keeping your infantry around your mineral line. This is because any early game melee rush from Zerglings and Zealots will not be strong enough to destroy your wall once you send SCVs to repair the structures.

Protoss
Unlike Terran and Zerg where both races naturally already have builds that can be used to mitigate the Early Reaper Rush, Protoss has to make the decision at the beginning of the game to fast tech to Stalkers. Stalkers are the Protoss unit counter to Reapers – if you decide to open the game with two Gateways, you will only have Zealots by the time the Reapers arrive, and will probably lose everything because the slow Zealots cannot handle the Reapers. Therefore, against Terran, it is recommended that you always open with 1 Gateway, 1 Assimilator, and 1 Cybernetics Core as soon as the Gateway finishes. You basically want a Stalker out as soon as you can in the game, as that single Stalker can handle the two Reapers that will arrive in a Quick Reaper Rush. Like Terran, you want to keep your Stalker at your mineral line.

How to Open With a Mass Reaper Rush

Some players like the Quick Reaper Rush, but I personally am more a fan of the Mass Reaper Rush when I play team games. The strategy behind the Mass Reaper Rush is to attack with Reapers when you have 8-10 Reapers. Instead of relying on pure micro to do whatever you can in the Quick Reaper Rush, the Mass Reaper Rush allows you the advantage of pure surprise. If the opponent is not prepared, 10 Reapers can really tear apart their workers, and left unchecked, can easily destroy the opponent’s main building as well. The massive number of Reapers can also handle defensive structures with minimal loss due to their bonus damage against buildings.

The Mass Reaper Rush is very similar to the Quick Reaper Rush, but instead of attacking right when you get 2 Reapers out, you want to put down two more Barracks with Tech Lab Attachments as soon as you can for a total of 4 Barracks. Continue to build Reapers until you have a number you feel comfortable with (8+ Reapers is recommended), then send them at any opponent you want – it has strong results against any race.

With so many Reapers, your goal again is to take out as many workers as you can, but smarter opponents will run their workers away and send their units to come attack you. At that point, it is recommended that you destroy whatever buildings you can (such as a Refinery) before the opponent’s units get in range, then escape off the ledge. In team games, it’s worth sending your group of Reapers to the mineral lines of all your opponents as well, forcing them all to react to you. I’ve played 4v4 games where I simply make Reapers the whole game, and send dozens of them around each opponent’s base and disable their workers over and over again. Their bonus damage to buildings can be very effective.

Summary for Mass Reaper Rush

1. Same build as Quick Reaper Rush, but make 2 more Barracks
2. You must be on top of pumping out Reapers so hotkey all your Barracks
3. Once you get 8+ Reapers, hit the mineral lines of your opponents.
4. Don’t lose Reapers – keep them alive so that you can continue coming back and keeping your opponents defensive.
5. Consider starting an expansion and a Factory when you send your mass Reapers out – it’s the perfect time for it since you’ll be busy microing your Reapers at your opponents’ bases.

How to Defend Against a Mass Reaper Rush

There are no truly race specific strategies against a Mass Reaper Rush. Since you should have a good number of units already in your base when a Mass Reaper Rush occurs, the primary strategy is all execution: how quickly you can move your workers away from the treat and how quickly you can move your combat units to deal with the threat. That’s it. The moment you see Reapers at your main, get your workers out, get your combat units in, and if you’re Terran, lift your Command Center.

The Mass Reaper Rush exploits the reaction speed of an opponent. Remember that Reapers are weak and therefore cannot truly take on an actual army of units. Also keep in mind that if your opponent is massing Reapers, he probably doesn’t have any other combat units and one of your partners should probably go attack his base.

Final Advice

The Quick Reaper Rush is a very micro intensive strategy. I personally don’t like doing it because I’m not good enough to micro just two Reapers in an opponent’s base while still constantly building up at my own. I’ll get supply locked and stuff and by the time I’ve taken out maybe a few of the opponent’s workers, I won’t be much further myself. But, if you have strong micro, the Quick Reaper rush can cripple an opponent very early in the game.

I am a fan of the Mass Reaper Rush – especially when there’s a Protoss opponent in team matches. This is because with 4 Barracks, I can mass Reapers, do some harassment, and then easily transition into mass Marauders – the unit that pretty much destroys Protoss Stalkers. In fact, I actually recommend the Mass Reaper rush in general for at least one Terran player in team games since it doesn’t really set the Terran player back, allows the Reaper masser to keep the opponents on the defensive, and with 4 Barracks, allows Terran to easily transition into mass infantry afterward.

With Starcraft 2 still continuing to take up my limited gaming time these days, I decided that I would write up a few more strategy articles for the early game that can help some of you out. The first such article I’m going to kick off with today is how to perform and defend against a Protoss Proxy rush – be it Photon Cannons or Gateways. This article will apply to both 1v1 and team games. Hit the jump if you’re interested in learning more about this early game strategy for Protoss.

Overview

The basic Protoss worker is a unit called a Probe. While it can mine resources, it also has the ability to warp in any building and then go back to whatever it is doing. Since workers are often the primary unit used to scout opponents in multiplayer, Probes can be far more devastating than other races due to the fact that they can not only scout you, but begin warping in Photon Cannons or Gateways right outside your base without you being aware. This leads to both types of aggressive openings that can be seen in all game types – from 1v1 to 4v4.

I consider proxying a risky opening though because if an opponent successfully catches what you are trying to do, you will be so behind that you will most likely lose in 1v1 play. Some call it cheese, since it does not necessarily teach you to be a better Starcraft 2 player, but it’s still constantly used to bring players all the way up to Diamond level who don’t know how to do anything else in 1v1. In team games, it’s less of a risk, but at the same time, the strategy may not necessarily win your team the match either. If the target of your proxy attack has good teammates, they will attack your main, resulting in both you and your proxy target being taken out of the game.

I don’t support the idea of a partner proxying since it’s pretty much an all-in for that player, but others may feel differently so let’s get started. I will start with the Cannon Proxy first.

How to Proxy Cannon Rush

There are several different methods and timings involved with performing a proxy cannon rush, but one thing always remains constant: you want to get a Probe into your opponent’s base as soon as possible without them being able to see it. You are then relying on them not scouting all over their own base as they begin protecting their choke. While that happens, you warp in a Pylon, and either a Forge right there or back at your main (after a second Pylon) before you start warping in Cannons. As one cannon completes, you extend your reach with the next cannon so the one that already completes can cover it. It is nearly impossible for any race so early on the be able to take out the cannons once they are in. Continue building Pylons to extend your cannon reach to the opponent’s main building.

If the opponent rushes his units at your cannons, they have pretty much lost. A smarter opponent will send his built units to attack your main instead of your cannons to destroy your workers. Therefore, when you get the chance, it is important to warp in a cannon or two at your main once your proxy cannons are in range of your opponent’s primary structures.

Main Points of this Strategy

1. Sneak a Probe into opponent’s base without getting caught and warp in a Pylon.
2. Start warping in cannons close enough to opponent’s buildings so you can minimize how many you need to warp in to be effective, and yet far enough away that you don’t give yourself away before at least 1 cannon is up.
3. Cannon your main once you have enough proxy cannons out to destroy your opponent’s primary structures.

How to Defend Against a Proxy Cannon Rush

Like most bad things in life, the sooner you catch the proxy cannon rush, the easier it is to deal with. I will break up the different phases of the cannon rush into 3 different stages you can discover it in.

Stage 1. Infancy

The Protoss cannon rusher will send his probe to your base right away at the start of the match, hoping to get his Probe into your base before you begin building around your choke and noticing the Probe. There are a few tell-tale signs of when a Protoss player is scouting you versus when he is trying to proxy you.

Indicator 1: Probe tries to avoid your buildings instead of going to check your gas and main building.
Indicator 2: Probe enters your base even though one of his partners already is there scouting
Indicator 3: Probe enters your base, but you don’t notice it leaving.

Once you start creating your initial tier 1 building (Gateway, Barracks, or Spawning Pool), send a worker around your base and then to the opponent’s base. Scouting your own base will generally allow you to catch the enemy Probe before it finishes warping in a Pylon. At that point, send one or two of your workers to kill the enemy Probe. That is your number 1 responsibility.

If you don’t see any proxy buildings in your base, it’s still worth checking out your opponent’s base as well. What you are checking for is to see if there is a Gateway or two warping into the opponent’s base. If it’s basically empty or only a Forge is there, that is a strong indicator that your opponent is proxying you (or a teammate if you are playing a team match). Time to go back and scout again around your base.

Stage 1 Summary

1. Scout your base
2. Kill probe with 1 or 2 workers if you find one hiding
3. Scout opponent’s base

Stage 2. Adolescence

If you fail to catch the enemy Probe early on with your initial scouting of your own base, you should know to catch the Probe in this next phase because you went to the opponent’s base to scout, but didn’t find any Gateways there. You return back to your base, and discover that a Pylon is already up, and a couple Photon Cannons are already warping in. What do you do?

1. Take two workers, follow that Probe and have it killed. If your first attack unit comes out, have it go after the Probe as well. Then take a decent number of your workers (6-8) and go surround attack the Pylon before the cannons finish warping in. With the Pylon destroyed and the Probe killed, the proxy is pretty much over and the opponent is finished once you destroy the remaining buildings that your opponent wasted money on warping into your base.

Stage 2 Summary

1. Kill probe with 1 or 2 workers and first attacking unit.
2. Send several workers to destroy the Pylon powering the Cannons warping in.
3. Destroy powerless cannons with attack units.

Stage 3. Adulthood

The final stage in the Protoss Proxy Cannon Rush means that the cannons are up and operational. You either ended up here because you didn’t scout at all and were completely surprised (you have to blame yourself on that one), or you discovered it in Stage 2, but were not able to destroy the Pylon powering the cannons before they warped in. In this final stage, you have to pull all Probes and attack units back since they will get shredded by the cannon(s). Remain calm and realize it’s not over yet. Here are your counter-measures.

The Defensive Counter-Measure: Get Your Own Defensive Structures Up

If at any point in Stage 2 you feel that you may not get the Pylon destroyed before the cannons get in, you must consider preparing your counter-measures. These will differ depending on the race.

Protoss
Get a forge up as soon as you can, and then warp in your own Cannons that are out of range of the opponent’s cannons. This makes it so the opponent cannot warp cannons in any further, and it will stop the proxy cannon push completely. Hopefully your cannons have stopped the push before your opponent has cannons within range of your Nexus.

Zerg
Zerg has it easiest when you see the cannons. Unlike the Protoss, you do not need to warp in a Forge first to begin your defensive structures since your Spawning Pool will already be built. Simply create a couple of Spine Crawlers out of range of the cannons and stop the advancement of the Proxy cannons. Also, the Spine Crawlers can be moved around, so if you already created one as soon as you finished your Spawning Pool, you can move the Spine Crawler to stop the cannons from getting any closer to your base.

Terran
As Terran, you have two options. The default option that many Terran players will consider is teching to Siege Tanks to blow away the cannons due to the larger range the tanks have. While this is an effective solution, you may not be able to get to tanks fast enough or the cannons may already be preventing you from getting enough gas to make tanks and research siege. The second option is to build a Bunker to stop the cannon rush. Bunkers add +1 range to infantry inside, and while Marines in a bunker do not have as much range as a cannon, a Marauder in a Bunker does. Therefore, building a Bunker and loading it with a Marauder will stop the bleeding of the Cannon rush, allowing you to build more Marauders or Tanks to completely destroy the Cannons later. Also remember that you can sell Bunkers as well, so feel free to build more of them to even contain the Protoss cannons.

The Offensive Counter-Measure: Attack Your Opponent’s Main

If your opponent simply has too many cannons up around your base and you are too slow building your own defensive structures to halt his advance, consider sending the units that you have been making straight for his base. While your opponent has spent nearly all his resources on the cannons, you have units that can attack. Entering his base and taking out his workers will halt his income, stopping his cannon push. The worst that can happen is that you both end up losing your bases to each other. In team games, I recommend the proxy target to go with the Defensive Counter-Measure while a partner attacks the proxy attacker’s main.

Stage 3 Summary

1. Cannons are operational in your base.
2. Decide whether you can create your own defensive structures to stop the advancement (generally if they are far away, this is the right choice) and start building them
3. Send your units at the opponent’s main (or ask a partner to)

How to Proxy Gateway Rush

The Proxy Gateway Rush is practically identical to the Proxy Cannon Rush, in that it relies on a Probe to sneak into an opponent’s base to warp in Gateways. The Zealot is the most powerful early game unit, yet they are slow and melee based. This makes it difficult for them to move all the way across the map to attack an opponent when they come out so slowly. Having Gateways right at the opponent’s base reduces the primary negatives of early Zealot play since they can attack almost right away, and no chokes to prevent them from being stuck.

Like the Proxy Cannon Rush, you want to warp in a Pylon as soon as you can, and then two Gateways. For extra brownie points, you want to warp in a Pylon in a corner of the ledge, and then the two Gateways outside it to basically block it from being attacked. That way, the Gateways cannot get unpowered since your opponent cannot go after the Pylon. Once Gateways warp in, begin pumping Zealots and attack as soon as you can. Even right when you get two Zealots out, it’s enough to do a lot of damage to both Zerg and Terran opponents since Zealots can take on Zerglings or Marines early on in the game. (Doing a Proxy Gateway rush against another Protoss is not as effective due to the units basically evening out.) Continue to pump out more Zealots and you should be able to overwhelm your opponent’s base.

Main Points of this Strategy

1. Sneak a Probe into opponent’s base without getting caught and warp in a Pylon
2. Warp in 2 Gateways and start attacking with the first Zealots that come out. (Do not proxy another Protoss player unless you have good reason to).

How to Defend Against a Proxy Gateway Rush

Defending a Proxy Gateway Rush is very much like defending against a Proxy Cannon Rush. It involves scouting the area around your main early enough and taking out the Probe and Pylon with your workers if there is a threat. Next, scout your opponent’s base to see if there is even a Gateway being built there if you didn’t find any proxy buildings in your base. If you miss it and the proxy Gateways are up near your base, you probably will not have enough early game forces to take them out before the first two Zealots warp in.

Here are my suggestions for the three races if your opponent’s proxy Gateways are already up.

Protoss
You either went double Gateway for your own mass Zealots or a Cybernetics Core early for faster Stalkers. Either way is fine – your double Gateway Zealots will even out against the proxy Zealots, and if you have Stalkers, you can micro to kite the Zealots around your base while you continue to make more Stalkers.

Zerg
6 Zerglings can do pretty good damage to two Zealots if surrounded properly, but you can decide at that point if you want to invest more with Zerglings or to throw down a Spine Crawler and/or a Queen. Continue matching his Zealots with your Zerglings and with the assistance of a Spine Crawler and Queen, you should be able to push back. Do not engage the Zealots with your Zerglings without your Spine Crawler and Queen backing them up. Use the Zerglings defensively.

Terran
Terran will have the biggest problem against Zealots due to the Marines being so weak and Zealots having so much life. Therefore, building a Bunker is essential the moment you feel that Zealots are warping in and you only have 1-2 Marines. Build a Bunker to defend your key structures, and be ready to repair it and continue loading it with Marines. Eventually you should have enough Marines to overwhelm his Zealots since you are killing his while he is not killing any of yours. I do not recommend kiting them with micro because your 2 or 3 Marines will eventually die anyway because they have to stop to attack. On top of that, more Zealots are constantly warping in. Instead, you want to build your Marines to a critical mass that the Zealots will basically die before they get in range to attack your Marines. A Bunker or two (you can even Bunker push to the Gateways) will get you there. Bunkers can be sold for cost, so why not use them?

Also remember that if the opponent’s Gateways are in your base, he doesn’t have any in his. Once you are secure enough in your own base and confident with your defensive structures (even if his Gateways still remain), you can send a small assault force to take out his Probes. Or, in a team game, ask a partner to hit your opponent’s empty base.

Summary of Handling Proxy Gateways

1. Consider building a defensive structure or two (especially Terran)
2. Use your defensive structure(s) to help take out Zealots or use micro with ranged units to kill Zealots before they get in range
3. Attack their main once you feel your base can handle the Zealots

Final Advice

As you can see, both the Proxy Cannon and Proxy Gateway rush can beat players (especially new or unskilled ones), but those that are better at the game can fight their way out of them. Proxying is definitely not an automatic win, and therefore not something I generally recommend due to its “all in” nature. If your proxy target fights his way out, you will be too behind and should lose the game after that. The risk of failure is very high against better players, so if you hope to play against them, such tactics will rarely work. But, if you want to just mix things up a bit or feel like playing super aggressive, consider proxying when you open a match as Protoss.

As someone with over 300 games in Starcraft 2 retail under my belt (and even more if you count the beta), I am still running into some friends and readers that are just starting out with Starcraft 2′s multiplayer and may wonder what’s the best way to start (and get better) at multiplayer: 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, or 4v4? In all honestly, all of these matchup types are  different, and can each be a great learning experience depending on the type of player you are. I have a general recommended order though, and I will discuss the positives and negatives of each mode if you want to start Starcraft II multiplayer.

#1 Recommendation: 1v1
For the more serious Starcraft II players, 1v1 is all that matters. Any of the other team-based modes in this game are silly and ridiculous. Starcraft 2 1v1 can be likened to a longer version of any competitive 1v1 fighting game – it’s hardcore, aggressive, and potentially stressful. But, some people love this and the thrill of crushing an opponent.

With just two players, each player is going to want to do whatever they can to throw their opponent off their game. This often means taking the fight to the opponent’s base, and therefore keeping up the aggression and pressure at almost all times. If you have a hard time figuring out timing, when to apply pressure, when to expand, etc., you may grow frustrated in 1v1 when you get beaten by better players that can do these things. Some people will learn from it, but sadly, some people also will not. However, if you want to play the game seriously and want to get better at the most important aspects of the game, 1v1 is the way to go. You’re in it all by yourself against an opponent that also wants to kill you so it’s sink or swim. The reason why I recommend 1v1 play first for new players of the game is that it teaches you how to be aggressive – something that the team-based modes don’t quite do. It also has the greatest potential for growth and securing strong Starcraft 2 fundamentals.

Positives:
- “Trial by Fire” right from the start, which can shock you into becoming good at the game
- Best way to learn fundamentals and timing
- Less units in the field compared to other modes, making it easier to learn each unit
- Easy to review replays to get better since you can easily tell how you lost
- Learn from opponent’s tactics and strategy
- Enforces aggressive style play

Negatives:
- Intense pressure and not for the faint of heart
- Can be too much learning involved for some
- Potential for running up against a lot of cheese builds, which won’t help your fundamentals
- Lonely affair since you won’t be playing with your friends
- Lack of teamplay/coordination experience

#2 Recommendation: 3v3
To me, 3v3 is the ultimate combination of competitiveness and fun factor. While 1v1 is basically jumping into the deep end, 3v3 is wading into the shallow end and getting into the game through a friendlier approach that can potentially have you winning more matches even if you are not good due to better partners. In 1v1, you are forced to be aggressive, scout, and counter or you will lose the match.

In most 3v3 maps, it is possible to play more passively and mass only a couple different unit types. Therefore, the mode becomes more about coordinating with teammates and simply having units as opposed to being aggressive and having the right units. If you’re simply massing all around “good units”‘ such as the Terran infantry or the Protoss Stalker units, you will be fine in 3v3 if you can coordinate with your teammates on when/where to attack and defend. If you like building up and not necessarily taking a more aggressive approach in multiplayer games, 3v3 will allow you to do that. For some reason or another, 3v3 seems psychologically the most number of players to keep track of in an RTS game – at least for me.

Positives:
- Probably the most enjoyable mode for casual players
- Good balance of competitiveness and fun
- Less about strategy and more about massing units and coordinating
- Often allows you to reach end game.

Negatives:
- Does not teach aggression as well as 1v1
- Does not teach fundamentals as well as 1v1
- Potential to not learn much due less accountability

#3 Recommendation: 2v2
The primary benefit of playing 2v2 is being able to play a highly aggressive mode like 1v1 but with a partner. 2v2 sits in between 1v1 and 3v3 in terms of balance for stress and fun, but it actually is a lot closer to 1v1 style play than 3v3. This is because with only two players per side, if one player on a side messes up, the game can be over. Just like 1v1, 2v2 is also primarily focused on the early game. Rarely have I played any 2v2 games that make it past the mid game due to the smaller maps, fewer players, etc.

Because 2v2 sits in between 1v1 and 3v3, it isn’t a recommended mode over the other two modes I mentioned earlier. You don’t get to learn as much as in 1v1, nor do you get to take as easy as much as in 3v3. In fact, when I play 2v2, it feels nearly as stressful as 1v1.

Positives:
- Enforces aggressive style play
- Allows you to play with someone else if you guys don’t want to play in bigger matches
- Teaches better coordination

Negatives:
- Is nearly as stressful as 1v1, but doesn’t teach as much
- Isn’t as laid back as 3v3
- The mode is still primarily focused on the early game
- If the skill level of both teammates is uneven, the match will generally be lost due to lack of teammate synergy

#4 Recommendation: 4v4
The sheer size of 4v4 games is the most difficult for a newcomer to get accustomed to, but due to nearly half the 4v4 maps being very 4v4 friendly, it also makes it so that weaker and newer players on these teams have more of a chance to get to mid and late game. The problem is that with so many players, a new player can get lost as to what to do or where to go because so much is happening at once. Like 3v3, coordination in 4v4 is vital. But unlike 3v3, 4v4 tends to draw the Starcraft 2 players with the worst fundamentals. Generally, the more players per mode, the poorer the average for the fundamentals of a Starcraft 2 player.

The combination of 4v4 being too much for a new Starcraft 2 player to process (it even took me a while) and too little accountability (resulting in players simply wanting to mass Ghosts or tech straight to Void Rays) makes this mode the last one I would recommend of the 4 “official” game types.

One caveat though is that nowadays, I actually enjoy 4v4 the most, due to the minimal level of stress that the mode provides because I consider myself to be a decent player. Therefore, in 4v4, I can play around a lot more and do sillier stuff like mass Reapers for an entire game and actually get results! This is of course because you’re only a fourth of the team, so you have less of an effect on the outcome of the game. I recommend 4v4 for messing around once you feel strong on your Starcraft 2 fundamentals, but treat the mode as more of a zoo compared to the playground that is 3v3 and the chess match that is 1v1.

Positives:
- If you are good at multiplayer already, this mode allows you to really have some fun
- Allows you to practice good macro (probably the most important skill required for Starcraft 2)
- Less accountability if you feel that you are costing your team every match in 3v3.
- Games are rarely over early, allowing you to make mid and late game units.

Negatives:
- Far too much going on to grasp for a new player
- Generally poor Starcraft 2 fundamentals for players of this mode
- You won’t learn much at all from playing this mode

Final Recommendation
Go with 1v1 first and see how it goes for you. Put some time into it and watch replays of matches you lose. Read up online about counters to things you lose to, or even try those tactics yourself against your next opponent to see how they respond. Once you feel comfortable with your fundamentals playing 1v1, considering playing some 3v3 so that you can apply fundamenatls you’ve learned in 1v1 to a less stressful game-type, and from there on out continue playing both modes. Spread to 2v2 and 4v4 when you feel ready for those.  If you have strong 1v1 play, you should be able to transition well to 2v2 and 3v3, and if you have strong 3v3 play, you should be able to transition well to 4v4.

Considering that several Starcraft 2 3v3 mid-game options can successfully carry into the end-game, I have consolidated the 3v3 end-game for all three races into this one article. I realize that it may be difficult to find the various Starcraft strategy articles that I have written up, so I will link them again here for your convenience:

Starcraft 2 3v3 Strategy – Some Basic Multiplayer Tips
Starcraft 2 3v3 Strategy: Defensive Early Game Builds
Stracraft 2 3v3 Strategy: The Protoss Mid-Game
Starcraft 2 3v3 Strategy: Terran Mid-Game
Starcraft 2 3v3 Strategy: The Zerg Mid-Game
Going Up Against the Protoss’s Overpowered Void Ray

If you’ve read through all of those articles already, hit the jump for my next article on the 3v3 end game.

Carrying from Where We Left Off in the 3v3 Mid-Game
The Starcraft 2 3v3 end-game opens up where all three races’ mid-game left off: you have an expansion, built up a mid-game army, but your army or team’s unit composition wasn’t strong enough to win the game outright. Therefore, you must transition into the end-game to go out with a bang.

As you move through the mid-game and continue to pump out units that require more and more gas, you’ll begin to start noticing a distinct lack of gas and excess supply of minerals as you get towards the end of the mid-game. It is at this point that you need to begin looking for a second expansion – not only to get more gas, but because the workers at your main base are also getting close to finishing off the minerals there and will have nothing to do after that. Starting a second expansion will make the transition easy for you to simply ferry your workers from your main to this second expansion.

Remember to set up defense for your second expansion. Because this is late game, everyone is scouting for those second expansions, so you need to put down cannons if you’re Protoss, both Spine Crawlers and Spore Crawlers if you are Zerg, and missile turrets and the Planetary Fortress upgrade if you are Terran. Try to lay down defense before making your expansion base.

With your second expansion out of the way, let’s see what remains among the choices available for the different races in the 3v3 end game.

Viable 3v3 Protoss End Game Options
1. Mass Mass Stalkers (8 Gateways)
4 Gateways and Mass Stalkers is the conservative mid-game Protoss option, since they do extra damage to Armored units, can attack air, and with Blink, can get in on the pesky Terran Siege Tanks. So, why not make more of them? Make sure to research the Forge upgrades and consider making 2-3 Forges to max out your Stalkers’ bonuses. Protoss players can counter mass mass Stalkers by massing Immortals (just 2 Robotics Facilities and a mixture of Stalkers and Immortals can decimate an army sole comprised of Stalkers greater in number). If a Terran player masses Thors, the Thors will eat up the Stalkers though, but due to the Thors’ slow speed, the Stalkers should rely more on guerrilla tactics to attack bases/expansions where the Thors cannot get to. Zerg’s mass mass Hydralisks can beat mass mass Stalkers in equal supply due to their smaller unit size (and therefore, greater damage output when clumped).

2. Mass Stalkers + Colossi (4 Gateways & 2+ Robotics)
Some Terran players enjoy making infantry all the way through end-game, so mass Stalkers and Colossi is still a very viable mid-game build that can be carried into the end game. If you go against a Zerg opponent in 3v3, their traditional end-game is mass Hydralisks, so the Colossi generally do well against them if you have enough Stalkers to give the Colossi a meat shield (and attack any Zerg air units that go after the Colossi). In general, it’s worth it to go this build against Zerg. Colossi are not really recommended against another Protoss player since they don’t tend to make units in the end game that are susceptible to Colossi.

3. Mass Stalkers + Immortals (4 Gateways & 2+ Robotics)
Against Protoss players that continue to pump out Stalkers or Terran players that primarily go Siege Tanks and Thors, the Immortal becomes your best friend. Because they do not have anti-air, your Stalkers can help some but keep in mind that the Immortals are set into play if you need to hard counter mass mass Stalkers, Thors, Siege Tanks, or even mass Roaches or Marauders. Don’t underestimate the power of Immortals against Armored unit types!

4. Carriers + Mothership (4 Starports + Fleet Beacon)
Carriers are the most expensive capital unit in the Protoss army, and while they see reduced use in Starcraft 2, they are still very strong against ground forces of any kind when enough of them are made. If you can mass 8-10 Carriers, you will most likely be able to take out any type of forces that a Zerg player can come up with for the end-game. However, against Protoss and Terran, it’s not necessarily the best idea to mass Carriers, as the Protoss can mass Void Rays, or the Terran can mass Vikings or Battlecruisers with Yamato Cannon to focus fire the Carriers down very quickly. If you commit to Carriers, make sure that Terran opponents have massed ground first (but I still wouldn’t recommend them since Vikings come out quickly). Carriers are great against ground units where ledges are a concern, because you can keep them far enough away to not get hit by ground but let the dozens of little Interceptors shred through anything on the ground. Throw in a Mothership if you have extra gas for cloaking.

5. Mass Void Rays (4 Starports + Fleet Beacon)
Why go for the more expensive mass Carriers option when you can go with the cheaper and more viable mass Void Rays option? I’ve written an article about how imbalanced the Void Ray is, and well, because Blizzard hasn’t fixed them yet, I will continue to take advantage of the Void Ray’s sheer power. I’ve played several 3v3 games now against Protoss opponents who will get 2-3 Void Rays out early, and then try to harass with them in the mid-game. I’ve never seen that work. For me, I mass Stalkers, get an expansion up, plop down 4 Starports and a Fleet Beacon and crank out Void Rays until I have like 16-20 of them. Generally speaking, if my opponent lets me stay alive long enough to mass Void Rays, it’s over. Their armies may all be rallied near the entrance of my team’s bases, but once my Void Rays fly over to their base and begin destroying buildings and getting the damage multiplier, anything the opponents throw at the Void Rays get destroyed – anti-air and all. My Void Rays will also shred through their bases faster than their armies can get through mine. There is basically no general counter to mass Void Rays that are already attacking someone’s base and have the damage multiplier going. They must be attacked between bases, out in the open, with huge armies of anti-air or Vikings to counter them.

Viable 3v3 Terran End Game Options
1. Thors and Tanks (4 Factories + 1+ Armory)
Most likely, as a good Terran player, you should have been using Tanks throughout the mid-game along with infantry. As you move to end-game, you’ll probably see that your infantry are simply not holding up against units like the Collosi and enemy Siege Tanks. That is where the Thor comes in. The Thor is a heavy ground-based assault unit that you can start adding to your Tank-based army to replace your infantry. With Thors also considered ground-based vehicles, they share the same upgrades as Tanks, so it may be worth it to research both attack and defense upgrades for your Factory units if you go this route. This army’s biggest weakness is its lack of speed. While it is very strong when set up, smarter opponents can attack your other partners instead and you won’t be able to get to them fast enough to assist.

2. Mass Thors (4 Factories + 1+ Armory)
This is similar to Thors and Tanks, but you give up Tanks in order to worry less about micro-ing the Siege mode of the Tanks and simply attack moving with your Thors all the way into your opponents’ bases. Thors can be quite effective, and will dominate anything on land when massed EXCEPT for the Protoss Immortal units. The Immortal unit is a hard counter to the Thor, since it takes reduced damage from the Thor and does extra damage to the Thor. Massed Thors will devastate mass Stalkers if they go toe-to-toe so that matchup is worth noting whether you are a Terran player or a Protoss player. Keep in mind, however, that while the Thor has anti-air capabilities, they are only really strong against light armor air units such as the Mutalisk. The Thor’s rockets do splash damage to grouped light armored units, and therefore demolish Mutalisks. However, heavy air such as Carriers, Void Rays, Battlecruisers, and Brood Lords will take out Thors and are considered their hard counter.

3. Thors and Marines (2 Barracks + 2 Factories + 1 Armory)
Thors take up a lot of gas. Often times you will have excess minerals, so why not just mass marines to go with the Thors? That way the Thors soak up the damage while the massed Marines freely attack. This army composition is situational, but works as a counter to a Protoss who decides to make Immortals among their Stalkers to counter your Thors. The Marines will do full damage to Immortals while the Thors pound the Stalkers. The Marines can also help somewhat against air-based armies as well that look to take out your Thors.

4. Battlecruisers (4 Starports + Fusion Core)
I don’t really see many Battlecruisers in end-game 3v3 as compared to Starcraft 1, but that’s most likely because of the current love-in for Terran’s other end-game unit: the Thor. The Battlecruiser has some great defense, but is so slow that you basically need to really commit with them and expect to win. If you take your group of Battlecruisers to an enemy base, you better make sure they can win because you won’t be able to turn around and retreat. Massing Battlecruisers is very situational – I like them against Terran since Terran tend to go with ground units for the end-game and assume that their Thors can handle capital air ships (big mistake). Against Protoss and Zerg, there’s even less of a possibility I will make Battlecruisers. More often than not, Protoss players will go with mass mass Stalkers and Zerg will go with mass mass Hydralisks – both of those flatten Battlecruisers very easily. It’s worth considering them to go up against mass Carriers though, but any of Terran’s air options can handle Carriers (hence I don’t recommend Carriers against Terran).

5. Mass Mass Vikings (4 Starports with attachment for 8x built at a time)
Mass Vikings was a viable mid-game build to deal with Mutalisks or early Void Rays. But if your opponents are insisting on sticking with a lot of air units in the end-game as well, then simply mass Vikings like there’s no tomorrow. Vikings have excellent range and can switch to become ground units, so they are great at establishing air dominance in the situation that you’d really need it. They’re cheap, effective, and potent. Of course, I do not suggest massing them if your opponents do not have air units.

6. Battlecruisers and Mass Vikings (4 Starports with 1-2 attachments for 2x Vikings, Tech attachment on 2-3 Starports for Battlecruisers)
This build is actually a pretty well rounded Terran air build and it’s starting to become my preferred Terran end-game build. The combo of Vikings and Battlecruisers can beat any combination of air units from any of the three races in the game. When going against a large ground based anti-air army such as Stalkers or Hydralisks, you can transform the Vikings into ground to do more damage while the Battlecruisers tank for you. A pure Battlecruiser squad may not fare so well against Stalkers and Hydralisks, but with Vikings in assault mode, you may have enough to handle them. For any ground dominant forces that have little to no anti-air, you can just keep your Vikings in the air and let the Battlecruisers take care of the ground units for you.

Viable 3v3 Zerg End Game Options
1. Mass Mass Hydralisks (Lair, Hydralisk Den, Nydus Worm)
The most viable end-game army type for Zerg is mass mass Hydralisks. Getting to 200 food cap with them at 3/3 for upgrades and a Nydus Worm is pretty much game over for your opponents. With enough expansions and Hydralisks, consider Nydus Worming all over the map to your various expansions or key areas. The Nydus Worm provides the mobility that your Hydralisks lack, and you can even set rally point from your Hatcheries into a Nydus Worm and a rally point from a Nydus Worm to another location, making the transportation of your dozens of Hydralisks relatively painless. With the exception of mass Siege Tanks, it is very difficult for anyone to deal with mass mass Hydralisks, as they have such great range that they are considered the main ground force to be worried about when going into the end-game in a team-based match that has a Zerg player.

2. Mass Hydralisks + Ultralisks (Hive, Hydralisk Den, Ultralisk Cavern)
If you are going up against heavy ground opposition such as Collosi, Thors, and Siege Tanks and feel that you want some extra protection for your Hydralisks, throw in some Ultralisks to soak up the damage. Ultralisks have great defense, and while they can’t attack air, their ground-based attack does splash damage so they can tear through enemy infantry. The role of the Ultralisks is to soak up damage so your Hydralisks can go after the key opponent units that would do a lot of damage to the Hydralisks such as the Siege Tank and Colossus. Plus, the Ultralisk can do splash damage!

3. Mass Hydralisks + Infestors (Lair, Hydralisk Den, Infestor Pit)
If you want a little more micro with your massed Hydralisks, consider adding in Infestors. These guys have three spells that are all useful in the end game for the major battles ahead.

The first of the Infestor abilities is Fungal Growth. This is an area of effect spell that holds the enemies in place (revealing cloaked or burrowed units as well), and does 36 damage to each unit in the area over 8 seconds. The ability devastates Marines.

The second of the Infestor abilities is Terran Infestation. In my Zerg mid-game article, I discussed how some Zerg players like to make Infestors and sneak them into opponents’ bases to spawn dozens of Infested Terran. The Infested Terran last for about 12 seconds and are very slow but ranged. When sent out in mass, they are very formidable. Against mass mass Stalkers or Hydralisks, sometimes just throwing out dozens of Infested Marines on the battlefield will turn the tide in your favor due to the increased temporary numbers. If the opponents are using Colossi, Tanks, and Thors though, forget about this spell since the Infested Terran will get killed far too quickly. You’re better off saving your mana for the Infestor’s third ability.

The third ability for the Infestor can be quite the game changer for end-game: Neural Parasite. This ability you have to research at the Infestor Pit, but it allows you to take control of any enemy unit except for the Ultralisk (I believe) for something like 10 seconds. While 10 seconds doesn’t seem like a long time, it may just be enough to turn the tide for your ground army. Think about it: your mass Hydras move to engage your opponents that have Colossi and Thors. The Infestors mind control the Colossi and Thors, and work with your Hydralisks in those 10 seconds to take out the rest of the opponents’ army. It’s very potent, but keep in mind that after the time is up, you will have to engage the previously mind-controlled units. If the opponents start running as soon as you’ve started mind controlling their big units, consider simply having your Hydras kill off the mind-controlled units. I’ve whittled away several Colossi in a match this way as my Protoss opponent kept running away with his Colossi because he didn’t want them to get Neural Parasited. Well, the Neural Parasite has very long range so he was bleeding free Colossi to me every time he ran into my army and decided to run.

4. Broodlords (Hive, Greater Spire)
Going Broodlords for end-game 3v3 is very rare due to the enormous amount of gas they take up, their slow speed, their inability to attack air, and the high probability that one of your opponents will have air units. This makes your 1000+ gas investment quite a risk if your opponent simply takes them down with air-based units so I generally advise against Broodlords. Having said that, if you have partners that go mass ground anti-air like Stalkers or Hydras to cover your Brood Lords, they can have some devasting effect off of ledges – especially against a heavy ground-based Terran army. But, this army type is very situational and only worth it if you really have an excess amount of gas and don’t have a Terran or Protoss partner that can make their “better” end game units. As any Zerg player will tell you, it is nearly impossible to have an excess amount of gas as Zerg.

5. Mass Mutalisks and Corruptors (Lair, Spire)
While massed Vikings are the scariest to see if you want to go air, mass Mutalisks and Corruptors still do a decent job against capital air ships as long as you can get the Corruptors to use their ability on the opposing ships for a 20% bonus in damage. With the debuff, Mutalisks definitely have an easier time taking out Battlecruisers, Carriers, and Void Rays. If a Terran opponent masses Vikings, it’s time to forget this army type and go with something ground-based instead since Vikings are too cheap and effective against Zerg air forces.

6. Mass Mass Roaches (Lair, Roach Warren)
I never thought I’d be using Roaches in end-game until I came across Terran opponents that massed Siege Tanks and Vikings. The Hydralisks were far too slow to go against so many Siege Tanks on high ground, and the Vikings would not let me go with an air option. Mass Roaches with burrow became my best friend, as I was able to send my burrowed Roaches up to the Tanks’ blind spot and destroy them. When the Vikings landed in assault mode, my Roaches also easily took them out as well. Sometimes you just need beefier armored ground units, and because they share the same upgrades as Hydralisks, it’s an easy transition.

Summary of End-Game for All Races in 3v3 Matches
0. Mid-game draws to a close with a stalemate
1. Secure second expansion
2. Determine what the opponents are making
3. Make end-game army that counters their units
4. Attack
5. Win

This article should conclude my series of 3v3 strategy articles for Starcraft 2. Now that you’ve read through them all, perhaps you can now play Random as well in your 3v3 games. I’m a strong advocate of playing Random, since you still have to learn each of the three races anyway with regards to how to play against them if you were to stick with just one race. Good luck!

For my series of mid game Starcraft 2 team strategy articles, I’ve saved my most difficult race to play for last: Zerg. Protoss is easy for me to understand, Terran was tough at first but now I understand, and Zerg…well Zerg I now understand as well but like most Starcraft players, feel that even after understanding the Zerg race, it’s still tough to play with them – especially against Terran. But, don’t let that dissuade you as a Zerg team player. Read on for different army types you can go with Zerg in the mid game.

When Does Mid-Game Begin?
This particular text I will most likely paste into each one of the three races’ mid-game entries since it’s important to know when mid-game has begun. Early game consists of the initial quick rushes, followed by a build-up of initial mineral only and minor gas requiring units: Zealots and Stalkers, Marines and Marauders, and Zerglings and Roaches. Once one side has felt that they have built up enough of this early game force, that side will attack the other. If the attacking side is stronger, they will win the game right then. However, if the attack fails (both sides are even, the defending side has too much defense, etc.), that is when the mid-game begins.

The Primary Characteristics of Mid-Game
Unlike the early game when all three races basically have one conservative build to make it into the mid-game, mid-game is where strategy comes most into play. Early game was all about execution: who could rush the best, who could defend the rush the best, etc. The variety in unit types was very little and therefore made the early game more predictable.

Beginning of Mid-Game for Zerg
Zerg have to upgrade their main base in order to have access to more advanced mid-game units. Therefore, once you feel that you are through the early game, you should have definitely teched to Lair by then.

After upgrading your Hatchery to Lair, your next macro activity in mid-game is securing an expansion. This is vital because you should have an excess number of workers by this point as well as a need for more gas to start producing more powerful units and upgrades. Also remember to keep making drones, because you lose drones when you make buildings. One of the reasons why I have difficulty with Zerg is that the Drones and your combat units all spawn from the same larvae. Therefore, it is nowhere near as easy to pump drones continuously while still making combat units.

Anyway, on expanding: consider using the Overlords’ spawn creep ability around an expansion area so that you can lay Spine Crawler defenses down before you start the Hatchery. Also begin laying out creep tumors from your main to the expansion, so that your ground units can move faster between your main and your expansion. I am a fan of creating a second Queen from my main when I have the excess minerals so that the second Queen is a dedicated Creep Tumor layer. Once the expansion is up, the second Queen just goes to the expansion to infuse Larvae.

Carrying from where we left off in the Zerg Build
At the end of the Zerg early game, the Zerg player secured his main with a couple of of Spine Crawlers: one in the front (for Zergling rush/Spine Crawler rush) and one in the back (to protect against Reapers), and created a Queen in order to spawn more larvae. You should have most likely also researched the Zergling speed upgrade, as Zerglings with the speed upgrade (commonly referred to as “Speedlings”) allow them to move quite fast and strongly increase their effectiveness in the early game. But now with a well fortified base and Speedlings, what can you do as a Zerg player for mid-game?

1. Mutalisks (Lair, Spire)
With better Terran and Protoss players walling off their chokepoints, Speedlings don’t work out so well in the early mid-game. Therefore, it is more common to see Mutalisks in the early game from better Zerg players, just because their speed allows them to easily harrass opponents. Many players will dedicate their defense to their chokepoint, so Mutalisks allow the Zerg player to attack their defenseless mineral lines. Mutalisks are the fastest air unit that can come out among all three races, so early Mutalisk harassment can be quite potent and throw your opponents off their game in a defensive stance as your teammates continue to build/expand unfettered. It takes a lot of patience and control though to be able to use Mutalisks effectively, and the amount of micro required for them makes it difficult to work on your macro at the same time. Using Mutalisks for harassment effectively to all your opponents and wrecking their mineral lines without losing them is an art. Sending them right into the opponents anti-air units and structures only to lose them all is not.

2. Speedlings & Mutalisks (Lair, Spire)
Generally if you decide to go Mutalisks, you will be very gas starved and therefore, all of your excess minerals can either go towards making more drones and expanding, or making more Speedlings to provide your Mutalisks with more of a balanced assault if you want to win the game with just one base. Mutalisks by themselves may have trouble against anti-air units like Marines, Stalkers, and Hydralisks, but if you engage them with Speedlings, the anti air units will often attack the Mutalisks and this allows your Speedlings to get in and do a lot of damage without dying. Mutalisks and Speedlings are the fastest units the Zerg have, so both can be used together quite effectively for guerrilla tactics and light skirmishes. The Speedling/Mutalisk combo is classic and comes from the first Starcraft game. You sort of evolve to this combo if you cannot or don’t choose to secure an expansion in the mid-game and can engage the enemy in open areas.

3. Mass Hydralisks (Lair, Hydralisk Den)
This is the most conservative Zerg mid-game approach, and the one I tend to favor as a player that isn’t 100% on top of my Zerg game. Hydralisks are slow, but do a lot of damage and have very good range with their range upgrade researched. This allows them to pretty much stand toe to toe against basically anything in the mid-game, provided you have a good number of Hydralisks. Consider simply massing Hydralisks and researching the range upgrade and damage upgrade when in doubt over what to do since it really does not have any disadvantage against any other infantry units and can hold its own against larger ground and air units as well. The main drawback of the Hydralisk is its reduced movement speed off creep, making it difficult to attack without a Nydus Canal. They also can’t keep up with other Zerg ground unit types – hence, it is often easiest to just focus on only Hydralisks for a mid-game army.

4. Mass Roaches (Lair, Roach Warren)
I specify Lair for this build because you need to get to Lair so that you can research all of the Roach upgrades at Lair as well as the ability for them to burrow from the Lair. This build is situational, and the primary reason you would mass Roaches in mid-game is to deal mass ground infantry from all three races in the early mid-game. Mass Roaches does very well against mass Stalkers when they go toe-to-toe, and does very well against Terran’s massed Infantry as well. Speedlings will fall very easily against both of those general army types. However, the Roach’s biggest problem is that it lacks anti-air. Therefore, if you decide to go mass Roaches, make sure that one of your partners is going anti-air/air or else Mutalisks will demolish your Roach army or early Void Rays will do some damage to your base.

Roaches are also pretty good against Terran mech as well. The Terran mech build is pure Factories pumping out Hellions, Siege Tanks, and eventually Thors. All of these are powerful ground-based Terran units, and when used together, can make a typical Zergling, Mutalisk, or Hydralisk masser experience some definite pain.

If Terran has committed to ground forces with the mech build, you may want to consider committing to mass Roaches (and later throw in Ultralisks) if you want to beat his mech build back. The Roach is armored, and therefore, the strongest mid-game ground unit that the Zerg have, and on top of this, has the researchable ability to move while burrowed. Moving while burrowed is the strongest counter you can have to Terran tanks in siege mode, as they cannot attack anything near them so you can burrow your Roaches, move them to the Siege Tanks, and unburrow to destroy everything.

5. Mutalisks & Corrupters (Lair, Spire)
This army type is very low on the Zerg army totem pole since it is only meant to handle one thing in mid game: Void Rays. When Mutalisks go up against a Void Ray rusher, they will generally get shot out of the sky. However, throwing a few Corrupters into the mix significantly allows for stronger Mutalisk damage.

Against the stronger Void Ray, you will have to use the Corrupter’s special ability that increases damage taken by the affected unit by 20%. Find where the Void Rays are, grab your Corrupters and have each of them cast their ability on a different Void Ray. Since the Corrupters are casting the ability and moving within range of the Void Ray, they will get attacked first. This allows them to tank for a bit, and this is ideal since they are stronger than Mutalisks. Your Mutalisks will then be able to attack and do most of the damage to the Void Rays with the 20% damage bonus. Keep in mind that Corrupters are not the main damage dealer in this army type – the Mutalisks are. Make sure you have 2x or 3x the number of Mutalisks to Corrupters for maximum effectiveness. I have seen Zerg players that just make lots of Corrupters if they perceive an air threat is imminent. You really need to have both unit types (with more Mutalisks than Corrupters) to handle air threats.

6. Mass Speedlings (Hatchery, Spawning Pool with Zergling speed upgrade)
The easiest thing you can do going for Zerg mid game is to keep pumping out Zerglings in mass, and hope that the sheer size of your Speedling army can overwhelm your opponent. Unfortunately, most Starcraft maps have natural chokepoints/ramps, allowing non-Zerg players to fortify them and make it difficult for a large number of Speedlings to be most effective. There are some maps however, that have open areas and if you are able to catch and surround opponents out in these areas, the Speedlings will do their duty. Just keep in mind that they don’t have a lot of life at all, so the more ranged units your opponents make, the less effective massed Speedlings become. Basically, you would only do this if you were passing your excess gas to another Zerg player so he could mass something gas heavy (such as Mutalisks) out of one base, for example. However, as the Zerg player, it’s probably more effective that your non-Zerg partners pass you gas you can mass Mutalisks and they spend all their excess minerals massing Marines or Zealots.

7. Infestors & whatever you can build with little gas (Lair, Infestor building)
I’ve saved the “cute” Zerg mid-game army build for last. And once again, I will define “cute” army builds as those that will work against lower quality opponents, but will simply cripple you against the better ones because your strategy will not work. In the mid-game, Zerg will always be hurting for gas unless they mass Zerglings. If you want to make Infestors early enough, you will have to give up Mutalisks and Hydralisks – two of Zerg’s main mid-game unit types.

The reason why a Zerg player would want to build Infestors so early is due to the Infested Terran ability combined with the fact that if you research the Burrow ability at the Lair, Infestors can automatically move while burrowed. This makes them basically cloaked units, and they can sometimes slip their way into an enemy base. Once in, these Infestors can spawn dozens of Infested Terran – slow moving units which stay alive for 15 seconds but have strong ranged attacks that can eat through basically an entire base when massed. It’s fun to watch, but basically, by investing in Infestors so early, your base will be completely empty and ripe for getting destroyed. While your Infestors are trying to take out an enemy base, yours will probably be taken out as well. Is this worth the trade off? Better players will be have detection at their bases, so the Infestors will get killed before they can even spawn a good number of Infested Terran.

Infested Terran can be fun to use in the late game once you’ve put together a strong army, but to forgo the strong army when mid-game starts to make some Infestors may not be the wisest decision (although, spawning Infested Terran for defense can be quite effective too). It’s fun, but it’s the equivalent of a Terran player wanting to go Ghosts for nuking in mid-game – doable against bad opponents, but better ones should have detection at their bases.

Summary of Zerg Mid-Game for team-based matches
0. Early game draws to a close with a stalemate
1. Upgrade to Lair
2. Decide whether to go air or ground
3. Create required buildings to form your mid-game army
4. Expand
5. Protect expansion
6. Research upgrades
7. Attack!
8. If unsuccessful, read my next article on the end-game

Stay tuned for Monday when I put out the last of my 3v3 strategy articles on the end-game for all three races!

Up next in my series of Starcraft 2 strategy articles is how to play Terran’s mid-game effectively for team-based play. Back in the beta, Terran was the hardest race for me to learn, since I felt that the Terran units changed most considerably from the first game to the second compared to the other races. I also didn’t quite embrace the power of tanks back in the beta. But now in retail, playing as random, I think I have more wins as Terran than either Protoss or Zerg, so I have to say I’ve come along way. Hit the jump to read up on the viable strategies for the Terran mid-game.

When Does Mid-Game Begin?
This particular text I will most likely paste into each one of the three races’ mid-game entries since it’s important to know when mid-game has begun. Early game consists of the initial quick rushes, followed by a build-up of initial mineral only and minor gas requiring units: Zealots and Stalkers, Marines and Marauders, and Zerglings and Roaches. Once one side has felt that they have built up enough of this early game force, that side will attack the other. If the attacking side is stronger, they will win the game right then. However, if the attack fails (both sides are even, the defending side has too much defense, etc.), that is when the mid-game begins.

The Primary Characteristics of Mid-Game
Unlike the early game when all three races basically have one conservative build to make it into the mid-game, mid-game is where strategy comes most into play. Early game was all about execution: who could rush the best, who could defend the rush the best, etc. The variety in unit types was very little and therefore made the early game more predictable.

The first thing you need to be aware of for mid-game is securing an expansion. This is vital because you should have an excess number of workers by this point as well as a need for more gas to start producing more powerful units and upgrades. Therefore, the first order of business once the final attack of early game fails is to expand.

Terran have one of the easiest times expanding due to two reasons:

1. The Command Center can be built at home, loaded with some SCVs, and flown to an island expansion or your natural. Being able to create an expansion Command Center in the security of your own base is a definite bonus. Just don’t forget that you can load a few SCVs into the Command Center as well if you are flying it to an island expansion.

2. The Terran have a very strong defensive upgrade for the Command Center. I highly recommend that the first thing you do when you land/build your expansion Command Center is start the Planetary Fortress upgrade (an Engineering Bay is required). This upgrade makes it so you can no longer lift your Command Center, but it outfits the Command Center with a defensive turret that attacks ground-based enemies. If your expansion gets attacked, you can take all of your SCVs mining and repair the Command Center and you can enjoy watching the turret plow through enemies. Of course, it’s not impervious, but it may buy you just enough time to get your forces to your expansion.

Carrying from where we left off in the Terran Build
At the end of the Terran early game, the Terran player has walled off his choke, bunkered his mineral line, started on gas, and has two barracks. You’ve either successfully held off a rush with your marines behind the depots, sent your marines to protect one of your teammates, or your team was unsuccessful in defeating your opponent in the early game. Unlike Protoss where you can easily transition into Stalkers, the Terran player must decide very early on (before mid-game even starts) whether to go mass infantry or marines and tanks. Allow me to explain why as I step through the various Terran mid-game armies, in order of viability/popularity.

1. Mass Marines, Marauders, and Medivacs (3 Barracks, 1 Factory, 1 Starport)
This the most popular Terran army type for those inexperienced with Terran and commonly referred to as “MMM” or “bio”. For new players to Terran, this is also the build that I recommend. Marines are weak yet ranged units, while Marauders are armored ground-only range units that can slow opponents down (with the applicable upgrade). Both units compliment each other strongly, and researching the Stim Pack upgrade allows for both the Marines and Marauders to attack and move faster at the cost of losing life. With no medic infantry units in Starcraft 2 like the first game, the Terran infantry is healed from a Starport unit called the Medivac, which functions as both a dropship and a healer, which also allows for the Terran player to do MMM drops on unsuspecting opponents’ bases/expansions.

After the initial Zergling/Zealot rush period wears off, you should add one of each type of attachment to your two barracks. Pump out Marauders out of one barracks and double the marines out of the other while researching Stimpack, the Marauder concussive shells, and the marine HP upgrade. Once you’ve massed a decent sized army, create a Factory so you can create a Starport to make Medivacs. With excess money, consider starting on a third Barracks as well to pump out more infantry. I recommend about a 1.5 to 1 ratio of Marines to Marauders.

This build is strong in the early mid-game, as it can beat the Protoss Gateway army and Zerg ground units. It is highly recommended if you want be aggressive in early mid game. However, as the game drags on, the infantry units lose their luster due to the introduction of mid-game and late-game units that destroy them. One thing is for sure though: pumping mass Marines, Marauders, and Medivacs is still the most well-rounded and newbie-friendly Terran strategy. It is recommended if you believe that you are going against opponents that are sticking with only early game units for the mid-game such as mass Stalkers.

2. Marines and Siege Tanks (2 Barracks, 2 Factories)
This is my current Terran bread-and-butter build for team-based play, and it is generally what is expected among Platinum and Diamond level Terran team players. Unlike the first army type where you are using gas to make Marauders, researching infantry upgrades, and wasting gas on making a Factory just to get the Starport for Medivacs, this second army type is all about tanks and ground control.

For this build, you will have two barracks with no attachments in the early game. As soon as you save up 100 gas, build your first factory, followed by a second one after that if possible. Then build the attachments for both factories, research the siege mode upgrade, and begin pumping out tanks. With extra gas, build the attachments to your barracks to allow for two marines to build at once. Tanks are very gas heavy, so your excess minerals will be spent simply making marines. The combination of tanks in siege mode and marines surrounding them make it difficult for melee or air to attack this army type since the marines will handle anything air or up close while the tanks destroy any ground forces within range. The extra marines can also defend your main against Mutalisk harassment and such.

I consider the Terran Siege Tank to be the best ground unit in the game. Its range and powerful damage in siege mode allow the Terran player to assert ground control for nearly all of mid-game. Pumping tanks out and having marines cover them while in siege mode makes this particular army type very very difficult to beat for any ground-based army.

The biggest issue with tank usage is that they are an advanced unit that requires pre-planning. Due to the time spent getting them into siege mode, Siege Tanks are not ideally meant to be moved around all over the place. Your goal as a Terran player that makes Siege Tanks is to have them in the right place at the right time in Siege Mode. This means you need to be able to predict the enemy attack patterns and movements so you can have your tanks already sitting in Siege Mode before the enemy gets there. (This may be why tanks aren’t used as often among newer Terran players – they don’t have enough experience with the multiplayer game to have a good grip on timing and attacks.) Tanks on ledges are extremely deadly.

One of the major negatives that can sometimes be a positive is that the Siege Tank has greater attack range than its visibility. It can shoot further than it can see, and therefore, you want to have spotters that extend its visibility. Even a simple scan from your Command Center can give it that extra visibility needed. The reason why this negative can be a positive is that because if your tanks can’t see far enough, they won’t attack, which in turn allows you to set up all of your tanks in siege mode and position your army before you begin attacking – very useful for attacking a defending opponent since your scan or scout determine when you wish to actually begin firing with your tanks that have completed setting up in siege mode.

The strategy of “tank stepping” or whatever it was called in the first Starcraft still remains here. If you are in territory where you feel that you can be attacked at any time, keep half of your tanks in siege mode, while unsieging the other half and moving them forward. Then put those tanks in siege mode, unsiege the other half and move up. You are basically advancing with at least half of your tanks in siege mode to protect your army. Also keep in mind that siege tanks do bonus damage against Armored units (like Stalkers) when they are not in Siege Mode. Sometimes it’s worth it not to siege them up (i.e., if Stalkers get the jump on you before sieging up, don’t go into siege mode, but rather, just attack.)

With two factories, this army type is VERY tank oriented – your goal should be to make around 8 tanks, and set them up with your marines (don’t stop building marines) in key areas that you want to defend, or to simply push into opponents’ bases to blow away their fortified choke points and defensive structures to win the game outright. Anything more than 10 or so tanks that are actually in combat is overkill. (10 tanks is enough to assert ground dominance – after that, you should probably move to air units for the end game since your opponents will probably go air if they can’t go up against your tanks.)

Once you know enough about the game to use Siege Tanks effectively, there are very few joys you will have in life as your Siege Tanks completely devastate armies of infantry units. My favorite is when you can find an unsuspecting enemy with his army grouped and you go up close enough and go into siege mode without your opponent aware. Then you scan to get yourself that extra visibility so your tanks can see, and your tanks obliterate half of his infantry in that first round of shots. THEN the enemy’s infantry moves towards your tanks to engage because they were fired upon, so your tanks get a second round of shots in. All that’s left of the enemy’s army is a gaping hole in the ground.

3. MMM & Tanks (2 Barracks, 1 Factory, 1 Starport)
This third army type is a combination of the two army types above, and while it seems like this would be the best of the three, it’s too gas intensive to allow you to do much. You honestly have to make a decision between tanks or infantry. Not being able to come to terms with marines not getting healed while still wanting tanks is what I consider this build for. Yes – I am making fun of this army type because in the heavy tank build, marines are fodder and should be a mere after-thought compared to the tanks. As a Terran player who masses tanks, I’ve come across Terran opponents who will drop some infantry and two tanks at my base. Then I blow them all away with 5-6 tanks. “Thank you, come again!”

You have to think with this army type: you’ve basically spent several hundreds more gas just to research siege mode and pump out two tanks for the mid-game. Two tanks is not going to make a major difference going against another ground army, and the two tanks will only slow down a more nimble MMM army. You will definitely be gas choked if you want siege tanks, Marauders and infantry upgrades. I don’t really recommend this army type, since it lacks the effectiveness and direction that either of the first two Terran army types provide. With reduced infantry, the enemy forces can swarm your tanks before you kill them, and with reduced tanks, your tanks won’t be able to kill most of the enemy forces before they rush into the tank’s “blind spot” when in siege mode. However, those that are good at doing drops may welcome the range that a couple of Siege Tanks can provide for surgical strikes. This unit combination would probably excel in 1v1, but team games is a different story.

4. Mass Vikings (2 Barracks, 1 Factory, 2 Starports)
This build is situational, but less so than the Protoss’s mass Phoenix build. The Viking is a new Terran Starport unit that is air-to-air only, but can transform to a ground unit for ranged ground-to-ground only damage. With the ability for them to transform to ground-based attackers, it is not the end of the world if you get a Terran teammate who decides to mass Vikings (certainly better than the Terran player who decides to mass Ghosts).

Vikings are a fantastic air-to-air based unit. With the Starport attachment that allows the Starport to pump out two Vikings at once, two Starports will get you 4 Vikings at a time. It is very easy to mass 20+ Vikings in a short period of time and gain air superiority in the mid-game. With the quick ability to pump them out, it is also recommended for the Terran player to switch to mass Vikings if the team is caught with its pants down against opponents massing Mutalisks or Void Rays in mid-game. Vikings will easily tear them apart with enough numbers.

Of course, by going mass Vikings, your role is to dominate the air and land in opponents’ unfortified expansions to shut them down The opportunity cost of losing the ability to have ground control through Siege Tanks is major though, and therefore should be carefully considered before massing Vikings.

5. Banshees (2 Barracks, 1 Factory, 2 Starports)
This particular army type is even more situational than mass Vikings – and by more situational, it means basically limiting your scope considerably in order to take apart a Zerg base. Banshees are Starport units that are only air-to-ground, but you can research Cloaking for them. Their damage is actually pretty good, but again, the problem is, anything air will destroy them, and if anyone has detection, their use drops dramatically.

However, they can be quite effective against Zerg main bases though. Often times, Zerg will not have detection at midgame, because early game they made spine crawlers for defense – which only attack ground. Most zerg players are lazy and will not also put down anti-air towers as well going into mid-game nor with they spend 50 minerals and  100 gas to upgrade an Overlord to an Overseer. Therefore, it is quite possible to send in 6-8 Banshees to destroy all the Drones and even the Zerg player’s Lair before they finish upgrading their Overlord to an Overseer. The problem with this build is that once you’ve done it and the enemies decide to build air and/or detection to counter this, you probably won’t be making many more Banshees and your current Banshees will become useless. In big team games – would you rather have 8 Siege Tanks on the ground or 8 Banshees in the air? If the Zerg player still has an army, he can go with his partners and just overwhelm your side’s land-based army because all you have are Banshees.

6. Mass Marines (4+ Barracks)
Believe it or not, this army type can be effective at times. Since marines are ranged and so cheap, they can be produced by the dozen and can, to a degree, handle opponents that decide to mass Void Rays, Mutalisks, or Stalkers. I’ve played matches where I’ll make tanks, and a smart Protoss opponent will mass Immortals to counter the tanks, and Stalkers to provide the Immortals with support and anti-air. I would have to counter that counter with mass mass marines, since Immortals don’t do bonus damage against Marines, nor do they have bonus defense against them. You primarily need to watch out for tanks and Collossi.

7. Mass Marauders (4 barracks)
Mass Marauders is even more situational than massing Marines, only because Marauders are ground attackers only so you are just asking for an air-based army to attack you if you go that route. However, with them doing bonus damage against armored units, they would be good against opponents that continue to mass Roaches or Stalkers well into the mid-game. Some Protoss players do nothing but power Stalkers out of 4 gateways, so if you have a partner or two that is making air, you may want to consider massing Marauders to simply combat the mass Stalkers while your partner handles anything air-based.

8. Mass Hellions (2 barracks, 2 factories)
Like the Roach’s Lair upgrades, the Hellion unit comes out too late to really be a viable unit in team-based play since most players already move away from light infantry units once the mid-game begins. The Hellion is a Factory based unit that has a flamethrower with pretty good range and excels against light units such as the Zergling, but does not do well against anything else such as Stalkers and enemy buildings. The Factory also allows for an attachment that lets you pump out two Hellions at a time, so it’s possible to mass them. But why would you?

The main reason I would ever go mass Hellions is if I went up against a team consisting of opponents that continue to just mass Zerglings, Zealots, and Marines all the way through the mid-game. Since the Hellion is strong against light armored units, it’s strong against workers as well. Good Terran and Protoss players will wall their choke so you won’t be able to run them into the mineral lines, but you may have success against Zerg if you drive your speedy Hellions into Zerg mineral lines to take out the Drones. But why not just Reaper rush instead of making Hellions to attack your opponents’ mineral lines instead?

Summary of Terran Mid-Game for Team-based Matches
0. Early game draws to a close with a stalemate
1. Decide whether to make Siege Tanks or not – and if not, have a good reason why not.
2. Create required buildings to form your mid-game army
3. Expand
4. Protect expansion
5. Research upgrades
6. Attack!
7. If unsuccessful, read my future article on the Terran End Game

Remember that as Terran, you start the early game by walling off. This buys you the time you need to tech to whatever mid-game strategy that you want to do. On top of that, you are able to scan opponents’ bases if you want to sacrifice some bonus income (from using a M.U.L.E. instead) in order to determine what to mass. Tanks are strong against all early game units. It’s the Immortals and Mutalisks that you need to be more worried about.

Your mid-game as Terran should be to assert ground dominance with tanks and then from there, see if you can win by pushing into your opponents’ bases with them. If it’s not possible, you will have to wait until end-game when you gain the power of Thors or Battlecruisers to give your tanks some massive escorts. Stay tuned for my end-game article to see what to do as Terran if you’ve gone through mid-game and still haven’t won the match yet.

Originally I thought that I would fit my 3v3 mid-game strategy writeup for all three races in one entry, but because I have so much to say about each race (and little else to blog about these days), I’ve decided to spread the races out to different entries.

With Protoss being the easiest race for me to play as well as a few buddies interested in learning how to play the Protoss, I decided to write about the Protoss mid-game first. If you’re interested in how to play the Protoss mid-game, take a look!

When Does Mid-Game Begin?
This particular text I will most likely paste into each one of the three races’ mid-game entries since it’s important to know when mid-game has begun. Early game consists of the initial quick rushes, followed by a build-up of initial mineral only and minor gas requiring units: Zealots and Stalkers, Marines and Marauders, and Zerglings and Roaches. Once one side has felt that they have built up enough of this early game force, that side will attack the other. If the attacking side is stronger, they will win the game right then. However, if the attack fails (both sides are even, the defending side has too much defense, etc.), that is when the mid-game begins.

The Primary Characteristics of Mid-Game
Unlike the early game when all three races basically have one conservative build to make it into the mid-game, mid-game is where strategy comes most into play. Early game was all about execution: who could rush the best, who could defend the rush the best, etc. The units were all practically the same.

The first thing you need to be aware of for mid-game is securing an expansion. This is vital because you should have an excess number of workers by this point as well as a need for more gas to start producing more powerful units and upgrades. Therefore, the first order of business once the final attack of early game fails is to expand.

Carrying from where we left off in the Protoss Build
By the end of early game, the Protoss player should have two Gateways, a Cybernetics Core, a Forge, and the ability to make Zealots, Stalkers, and Sentries. I always advocate a double Gateway opener in team games, so I will always assume that you have at least 2 Gateways going into mid-game. Once you get to mid-game, you need to make a decision on what you want to build. Scouting is very important. Starcraft and its sequel is a game of counters, so if you can determine what your opponents are making, you can make the appropriate counter going into mid-game.

Once you get your expansion up (the first thing you should do in mid-game – and make sure you place a few cannons to defend it too!), you have a decision as to what buildings to make next.

I will share the viable Protoss mid-game army compositions available for team-based play, in order of viability (which also correlates to popularity):

1. Mass Stalkers (4 Gateways)
Since you’re already making Stalkers from your two Gateways in the early game, it’s pretty easy to just get 2 more Gateways up and continue massing Stalkers. With the Blink ability researched, Stalkers are beefy anti-air ground units and are actually relatively tough to counter when there’s so many of them. I generally advocate that if you’re in doubt as to what to make, keep building Stalkers.

Many players simply mass Stalkers because there are very few things that actually counter them, and with some players turning to air in the mid game (Mutalisks, Vikings, and Void Rays), mass Stalkers still remain quite strong.

2. Zealots, Stalkers, and Sentries (4 Gateways)
If you simply want a well-rounded army and are unsure what to make but expect to win the game in mid-game, simply making more Gateway units is perfectly reasonable. The Protoss infantry units can be massed and used to win the entire game. While it doesn’t particularly excel versus a particular opponent type, it doesn’t have a real weakness either based on its mixed army.

After you expand, you should create two more Gateways and a Twilight Council in order to research both the Zealot Rush upgrade and the Stalker’s Blink ability. Consider warping in a 2nd or even a 3rd Forge to research multiple upgrades for your ground units at once.

Also, it’s probably worth researching the Warp Gate upgrade at the Cybernetics Core and upgrading all four of your Gateways to Warp Gates so that you can warp your units in at any of your structures on the map (such as a Pylon).

3. Stalkers + Collosi (2 Gateways, 2 Robotics Facilities)
One of the things that Mass Stalkers can have trouble with in an open field is mass Zerglings, mass Hydralisks, and mass Marines. Therefore, some Protoss players opt to build a couple of Robotics Facilities and a Robotics Support Bay in order to create Colossi.

The Colossus unit does devastating damage to light units in mass such as Zerglings and Marines, and are definitely worth considering to counter anything ground based that is unarmored. The Colossus’s main drawback is that it cannot attack air, but air-to-air units can attack it. This is often why Colossi are accompanied by Stalkers – so that the Stalkers can cover any air threats.

4. Stalkers + Immortals (2 Gateways, 2 Robotics Facilities)
This build is very situational, and is actually a counter to opponents that rely on armored units too much. Immortals are interesting units: they take very little damage if they still have shield, and get 20 bonus damage on armored units. Therefore, they are ideally suited to go up against Terran’s Siege Tanks because they do extra damage to the tanks and receive reduced damage from them. Also, their bonus damage allows them to do extra damage against Stalkers, Roaches, and Marauders. You should consider making two Robotics Facilities and Immortals if you suspect that your opponents will be massing any of those heavily armored ground units. I cannot emphasize this enough: Immortals tear apart Stalkers.

5. Void Rays (2 Gateways, 2+ Stargates)
Everyone probably knows about Void Rays by now, and how effective they can be. While some players will skip straight to Void Rays to get them out sooner, a more conservative build order will allow you to make Void Rays without any risk due to a strong ground army up to the point when you want to make Void Rays.

Once the early game comes to a stalemate, you can quickly warp in a couple Stargates, begin cranking out Void Rays, and getting a Fleet Beacon out to research the Void Ray movement speed upgrade. Keep in mind that to use Void Rays effectively, you don’t want to engage enemy units out on the open. Void Rays get beaten by massed anti-air units and Vikings, so their use should be either to assault enemy buildings or as a counter to opponents building capital ships such as the Battlecruiser.

The use of Void Rays should be precision based – moving from base to base and taking out your opponents’ key structures. They should not really be used for fighting smaller infantry anti-air units – a mistake that some newer players make since they think that Void Rays will automatically win the game for them.

6. Zealots and Phoenixes (2 Gateways, 2+ Stargates)
Phoenixes are again a situational unit for the Protoss. With the Blink upgrade, the Protoss Stalker is already a very powerful anti-air unit that makes it tougher to go with Phoenixes.

The primary reason why you may want to go Phoenixes is if your opponent is massing Void Rays, Mutalisks, or Vikings, and you think they can handle guerilla tactics such that your Stalkers cannot ever really engage them. Again, this is very situational and therefore it is very rare for Phoenixes to be made – especially since they cannot attack ground. With all the gas that the Phoenixes take up, you will have an abundance of minerals, so mass those Zealots so you can at least have a ground force as well.

Note, however, that the Phoenix has a very interesting ground unit based ability: it can pick a unit up off the ground, float it in midair while rendering both the unit and itself unable to do anything. Other air units can then engage the suspended enemy unit. Against massed smaller enemies, this ability is not worth it, but against bigger ground units, it can potentially turn the tide.

Higher level Protoss players will opt to make about 8-12 Phoenixes against Zerg players in team games. They are very fast, can go after Overlords, can take on Mutalisks, and hit mineral lines by lifting up drones with their ability and killing them in the air. In fact, I recommend only really making Phoenixes against Zerg, which will then allow you to transition into Carriers for the end game.

7. Dark Templars (4 Gateways)
Dark Templars are cloaked melee-only units that can be warped in from the Gateway after you build a Twilight Council and a Dark Obelisk. They don’t have a ton of life, but do very good damage. However, because the unit is cloaked, these guys are more like a “hail mary” type of unit that should only be used once because once the opponent knows you have Dark Templars, they will pursue detection and the time of your use for Dark Templars will end.

Some players like to make a couple Dark Templars and send them to an opponent that doesn’t have detection at their mineral line. But against good players, you can’t really expect them not to have detection, so I prefer to just power Dark Templars and use them on the battlefield. I like going 4 Gateways, making about 10 Dark Templars, and using them on the mid-game battle. They are very effective when brought to the field, and can cut through dozens of the opponents’ units before they can do anything about them. But once they do, consider the Dark Templars’ time over. Hopefully they made enough of a difference that you won the mid-game skirmish and were able to push your army into the opponents’ bases.

The Summary of Tasks for the Protoss Mid-Game
0. Early Game Draws to a Close with a Stalemate
1. Continue to make units
2. Expand
3. Protect Expansion with defensive structure(s)
4. Scout & coordinate with partners to decide on who is making what
5. Pick an army type from the 7 I have mentioned above
6. Create required buildings and pump units to form your mid-game army
7. Research upgrades
8. Attack!

If your side’s army and coordination is better than your opponents, it is possible that you will win the game after step 8. If the mid game battle turns into another stalemate, you will next enter the End Game – something I will discuss in a future entry.