Glorious Victory!

This story is almost a week old now, but it is a tale that must be told!

On Friday (Dec 2) Binks, Jordan and I decided to do some good old LAN style Starcrafting. Liam, you would have been invited, but we only got things decided at about 6:45 and I was getting picked up at 9:00, so it was pretty spur of the moment.

Anyway, this is a blow-by-blow account of the battle. (More or less, I saved the replay for those who wish to see it.)

We played on a six-person island map, it was me (Terran) against an allied front of Jordan (Zerg) and Binks (Protoss). Now, we had played with said alliance the week before, but Binks was pretty rusty on the game mechanics back then. In the time between he had apparently been practicing.

I started off with the usual tech tree climbing and scouting. My comstat station found Jordan first, and from what I could tell he didn't seem to have a lot of defense units yet. I established a second mining base (gotta love flying buildings) pretty quickly and was able to comstat Binks's base as well. All three of us were on the bottom half of the map. I was on the left, with Jordan on the far right and Binks sitting in between us. I like to start bugging my opponent as soon as possible in a Starcraft match, and I noticed a wonderful piece of elevated land between Binks's and Jordan's base that was just begging for some siege tanks.

As soon as I finished my Starport I pumped out 2 dropships and picked up 2 siege tanks and some infantry (2 medics, 2 firebats, 4 marines) to provide cover. I flew my dropships out into the middle of the map (which was a lake) and was immediately spotted. Jordan had placed some overlords out there for scouting, and it became apparent throughout the game that Binks watches the map like a hawk.

Not knowing if they had any air units (I didn't) I bee-lined it for the ridge. Unfortunately for me Jordan had already established a solid air defense and I flew right over it. My tanks' dropship
went down, and my infantry just barely made it. I dropped them off and went back to my base to pick up some replacement tanks. However, my infantry were not prepared for what greeted them. I figured Jordan and Binks would only be able to pick up ground units and drop them on the ridge for defense. Instead, Binks comes in with a carrier. This was a frightening sign that Binks had greatly improved since the previous week, and it served as a bit of a wake up call.

Not being one to give up on a good idea, I replaced my forces, this time returning with 2 tanks, 4 goliaths and about 6 or 8 wraiths. The plan worked well, and while my tanks rained death from the ridge my goliaths and cloaked wraiths inflicted some serious damage on the air forces of the zerg and protoss. I knew my ground forces wouldn't last too long, but I find these types of skirmishes are good for keeping your opponent "looking over their shoulder" and wondering where you'll hit next.

Next on my agenda was to establish myself in the north, and really start harvesting resources. I established two bases up north, and got nukes. However, my comstat scans had been revealing increasing disturbing intelligence on my enemies. Jordan had built about 24 guardians, and Binks's airforce was large and well upgraded. I knew the combination of corsairs, carriers and guardians was going to be hard to overcome, so I decided to try to nuke their fleet. As a precaution, I also prepared 12 valkeries, 12 wraiths, and about 16 goliaths. With growing apprehension I moved in my ghosts. However, Binks's aforementioned hawk-like watching of the map proved too much for me, and I was detected on my approach. I managed to fire off one nuke into a mining base, but the rest of my ghosts were found and killed. As I watched them die, I was reminded of a certain Star Wars scene...

Obi-wan: "That boy is our last hope"
Yoda: "No, there is another!"

From my comstat sweeps I knew that the combined fleet of Jordan of Binks was sitting over Binks's considerable photon cannon field, untouchable by nukes. I could do the math, and I knew my prepared defenses would not stand against the overwhelming numbers I was about to face. But as far as I knew Binks and Jordan didn't know about my northern base. I checked my stock of resources and I knew I could build 12 Battlecruisers if I had the time. In my northernmost base I quickly built 4 Starports and a new science building. Just as I cued up 3 battlecruisers in the building orders of each starport I saw the enemy fleet move in. I sent a lone SCV out in my last dropship in case I didn't make it, and braced myself for the hit. My strategy was set, I knew if I could destroy Binkle's air fleet the guardians (which are air to ground units) would be done for.

They started with my main base. The guardians hit my buildings like a tsunami running over a sandcastle. I moved in my goliaths, but I didn't even see how they did. I hit Binks's corsairs with the combined might of my wraiths and valkeries and destroyed them, but barely. The complete decimated my wraiths (which is what they're made for) and chewed up my valks something fierce. His carriers made short work of my remaining air fleet, ending my main base's resistance.

With my existing forces destroyed Binks and Jordan swept through the rest of my southern bases, destroying most of my supply depots and two mining areas. I didn't stay to watch, I was busy recovering. I built as many supply depots as I could in my "Battlecruiser base" up north, and continued scouting with my lone dropship and SCV. I found a bunch of enemy mining bases, but nothing for my poor SCV to establish a base beside. Binks and Jordan fanned out, searching for my remaining bases. My first northern mining base was found and destroyed, leaving behind only 2 SCVs that managed to run into a corner. I now only had one base left. Jordan moved in with one of his guardian groups and began bombing my supply depots, but my first 4 battlecruisers had finally finished production and I opened fire. He withdrew his forces, and regrouped with the other 2 groups of guardians and Binks's remaining carriers. I called back my battlecruisers and joined them with the next 4 that had finished being built, ready to rock.


As Binks and Jordan waited outside my base I knew they could taste victory. They had just rolled over 4 of my other bases and they knew I was hurting bad. They moved in, and I went straight for the carriers. 4 left, 3 left, 2 left... (c'mon!) 1 left, and bang! they were down. Jordan's guardians were completely exposed. I gleefully sent my battlecruisers after them, and told Jordan "You deserve every bit of this." as he watched his forces perish. The guardians are extremely effect bombers though, and they continued to cause considerable damage to my base as I killed them. As they finished off my supply depots and my starports it occurred to me that this base contained my last buildings. If he destroyed them, I would lose the game, whether I had battlecruisers or not. I quickly took my SCV out of of the dropship that was hovering a good ways away and started building a command center, hoping against hope that I wouldn't lose before I got him building. When I checked back on my battlecruisers they had finished off the last guardians. I had 1 refinery left, and one missile turret, both flaming badly. That was close.

So now I had: 8 battlecruisers, 1 dropship, 5 SCVs, about 2500 minerals, 5000 gas and the aforementioned buildings left. I was down, but not out! Never give up, never surrender! I started building some command centers, and decided to blast through as many enemy bases as possible before they took down my fleet. I cleared out 3 or 4 bases in the north-eastern portion of the map, all the while shooting down the fresh air units they sent at me. Luckily those air units only came in groups of 4 to 6 at a time, so I outgunned them by a large margin. After sweeping through these mining bases, I took my 6 remaining battlecruisers back to my own base for repairs.

At this point I overheard some interesting conversation. It seems that I had destroyed all of their active mining bases, and in trying to take me down both Jordan and Binks had spent their way down to less than 300 minerals. They had no mining bases left, and not enough resources to establish new ones! Meanwhile, I now had 2 mining bases on the go, and was rapidly reclimbing the tech tree to get more battlecruisers. Both Binks and Jordan had substantial base defenses that I didn't have the strength to engage directly just yet, but I knew if I could stop them from getting any more resources victory would be mine!

Luckily for me, when I attacked Jordan at his main base he quit, so I didn't have to deal with all that air defense. This allowed me to look for Binks, and good thing too, because he has one hell of a will to live. He had manual flown a shuttle of probes to a resource patch, mined, and flown them back to his base until he had the 400 minerals necessary to build a mining base. Luckily I nipped that one in the bud, but he managed to hit me with one last air strike that brought me down to 2 battlecruisers. I still had my resources pouring in though, and mopped him up with a new fleet of battlecruisers.

So how's that for pulling victory from the jaws of defeat? I was so proud of my comeback...

I did some interesting stuff on the weekend, but this post is long enough, so too bad for you!

-Danger