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Air Switch in 1v1

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USrankCrazyEddie
8 years ago
In most 1v1 games, after a while one or both players make an airstrip or a gunship fac. Why? What's the strategic benefit?

If air switches are good, why are there so few air starts?

Why is switching to air so common and switching to a different land fac so rare?
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PLrankOrfelius
8 years ago
Play against anybody that switches and observe as you are get rapiered to death.

Air units are fast and highly resiliant to most ground units so they open new area of the game.
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EErank[ISP]Lauri
8 years ago
(edited 8 years ago)
Air factories have significant weaknesses which limit their viability as a starting factory. Fragile cons, limited ammo on bombers, whole fac getting countered or zoned out by one unit type are some of them.

On the other hand, air factories offer supportive qualities that no land factory offers. Some examples include units with unparallelled mobility and forcing the enemy to make otherwise useless unit types.
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DErankChesti
8 years ago
USrankCrazyEddie cannot you use the search? This topic...
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BErankFlipstip
8 years ago
Also: forcing a response in AA will decrease their regular army production, which can give you an advantage.
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USrankdorsh
8 years ago
the support units of the air/gunship facs for a relatively modest investment have huge payoffs. super fast cons to fill out the hard to reach expansion (and make mountaintop windfarms without pathing issues), vultures giving unparalleled recon and thunderbirds giving you almost unstoppable aoe and even anti-heavy (three will leave a dante helpless for 20 seconds or whatever), even phoenix can save you when you don't have anything else to stop a ball of 20 hermits or whatever coming and mowing down your flanks. expensive but a single wyvern gives you slow but steady aoe that can wipe out shield balls and other annoying massed units as well as snipe firewalkers and things that are too well protected for lighter air units. you only need one microed black dawn and the enemy has to pump out a bunch of AA to stem the losses it can cause. and of course there are possibilities beyond support like the rapier ball and overwhelming raven spam
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Skasi
8 years ago
(edited 8 years ago)
USrankCrazyEddie the answer is pretty simple: It's all about the early game expansion.

Most air units are OP. They were buffed repeatedly over the last few years (the only exception being Raven which was nerfed recently). One big advantage over other units is that they don't suffer from completely broken pathfinding. The only unit that stops air factory starts from being OP is Crane - Crane is super fragile, relatively expensive and has low buildpower; All of these attributes hurt early game growth and expansion, but this is not an issue if you already have access to a different builder.
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LVrankSenaven
8 years ago
Skasi - swift was nerfed to after its 50x buff. 450hp -> 300hp.
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LVrankSenaven
8 years ago
Air start is weak because enemy can build just aa and kill you fast. Older times when raven was fast dive some player start with air.
Switch to air is good because enemy is forced to build ground aa or air aa. If you managed get banshee ball before enemy can get aa you just punish his back lines. Other units like rapier is op vs standart ground units with its slow.
Many new players cant react on that switch and they loose game even they micro awesome. I see many games when air switch win game when player almost is defeated.
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BErankFlipstip
8 years ago
Spamming AA is not the right response to an airstart btw.
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DErank[2up]knorke
8 years ago
quote:
In most 1v1 games, after a while one or both players make an airstrip or a gunship fac. Why?
In early game units can go anywhere because the map is empty- You can even drive right next to enemy factory.
Eventually map is full of stuff and ground blobs do not penetrate deep enought into enemy aereal anymore because the player sees your blob coming and intercepts with his own blob.
The more the game progresses the fatter the bases get, bigger windfarms, more high-value targets like fusions, but by then their positions are often not reachable by ground anymore.
Air flyers can fly right over all the defense lines and blobs, avoiding useless army-vs-army fights and kill stuff that is worth destroying. Air is harder to intercept with units because it moves fast, also it can use over paths over unpathable terrain that are not as porced up yet. (for example over water or mountains)
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USrankdorsh
8 years ago
when you see enemy starts air/gunship start spamming cons usually, maybe riots if it's a banshee rush
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GBrankAdminDeinFreund
8 years ago
quote:
BErankFlipstip
Spamming AA is not the right response to an airstart btw.

From my experiences I'd say the same. Static AA might work on small maps, whereas flying counters and aggressive expansion are often the only option.

Is this intended behaviour?

PS: Jethro is a scout, right?
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AUrankAdminSaktoth
8 years ago
It's like playing with rock and scissors. Which factory do you select next? Paper, of course. Since you have both invested in nothing but rock thus far, if he doesn't make scissors fast enough he dies. If he makes too much scissors, you just crush him with all the rock you already have (And his scissors, his AA, can never damage your economy or static defenses: You cannot win with AA).

It opens up a whole new element of the counter structure. I never really liked this, it's why defender fires at ground, but that's it's own bag of problems.
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