Countering porc

Is it even possible? I am not talking about 5 ddms and 10 annis type of porc, just faradays, stingers and llts. Artillery does not work because they will get their own artillery behind their porc. Getting a catapult does not work because they will just push you back by building longer ranged structures than yours until they reach your strider hub. Assault units do not work because they get destroyed by the porc. The only vaguely possible way to destroy it without spending 20x the cost of the porc in countermeasures is cloaked roaches/skuttles.

This leaves it in the position of countering every factory but 2. This was in a 2v2, not a 10v10.

First, try to go around go around, like ElTorero said. Check the heightmap and figure out of there's path that can be created with very little terraform (Centerrock is a good example, especially northeast). That's a general rule. Unless it's a small map or a 10v10 going around should not be too hard. Don't forget that a lonely LLT or missile tower does not pose a real threat. If enemies porc AND spam artillery, then you can spam more artillery, metal wise, so that should work too.


If you can't go around:
If enemies don't have planes, spam cheap artillery, it deals most damage per cost. If enemies have planes, spam more expensive ones or napalm could be a real problem. If enemies got shields, spam Racketeers or Tremor.

If enemy has porc and spams TONS of artillery, get assaults. You should be able to afford enough assault units to take out defense. Remember to deal with damage dealers first - Stardust and Faraday comes to mind. Stardust can be blocked by commander's terraform and Faraday dies pretty fast when focused on, as long as you don't clump units too much. Make sure you don't suicide your assaults (ie scout and have a plan to deal with counters), also make sure you REPAIR your assaults afterwards, so you can survive enemy attacks.

If both yours and the enemy team's porc ranges overlap much, you might wanna try skirmishers. Hit and run. Rogues are good for that.


There's much more you can do, but options really depend on what the enemy is building the most. Unsupported HLTs can be taken out by raiders, missile tower shots can be wasted by plopping nanos inside their range, Fore more info on that, When using Raiders for support, make sure to abuse bad placement of turrets (lack of free LoS). I think the [url=zero-k.info/Wiki/StructuresAndStatics]specific unit guide on statics[/url] could be useful.

Thank you Skasi, I will try more assault units next time. In the case I am specifically referring to, there was no way round it. With hindsight, by far the best way to have beaten it would have been to just build a wall and get a tremor or four.

It really depends on your style of play and of course the set of your's and enemy's factories. For example when you play as a cloak bots, the first and cheapest response to first enemy defenders is one or two hammers and (optional) a jethro to scout. I preffer immediate response to first defense lines, never let enemy trench their positions, you might never break it afterwards.
Others preffer assaults, so stack enough sturdy units and use their advantages to maximum (by microing).

Killing porc is pretty simple. You either go around or make a super weapon. If all they want to do is porc then you can focus EVERYTHING on resources. Thus giving enough money for something like an ultimatum. The problem arises is when they use porc properly(i.e. they use attacking units along with it). If they do attack you along with porc then you can still focus on resources, but provide enough defense to counter his(probably pathetic) attacks. It helps if you can predict how much of his resources are going into different projects. As an example let's say that he starts with 60% defense, 20% resource, and 20% attack. In this case your percentages would look like this: 20% defense, 80% econ, and 0% attack(never feed a porc). Now let's say that he porcs for a while then decides to go offensive. If his money supply stays the same then that means his percentages should look like this: 60% attack, 30% econ, and 10% defense. Once you know that he's doing this you can use a surgical strike to kill him(i.e. ultimatum, licho). I never attack a porc unless it was built poorly. Only attack when he attacks you. If he doesn't attack you use all that free time that he just gave you to build singu.

I watched that battle and the solution is less complex. Stop with the useless panther, banisher, and copperhead. Spam reapers for that situation. You could defenitely afford it, you simply didn't.

(if you cannot go around, which is ofc 1st choice:)
--nobody mentioned silo. maybe not the cost-efffective way but sucess
--nobody mentioned merl/imapler.
WHY????!!!

mean options:
1)
locate the point of your enemy where it hurts most: eco in the back and or strategical issues like antinukes and superweapons or superunits under construction (in general expensive stuff)

2)
find a way to get there, which is not going around in the meaning of "walking aroud"
this could be:
-teleport! way to unused. bring djinn to their base or build it there with athena.
-terraform a ramp to cross water/hills at a effective point, where the cost is reasonable to do so.
-massive drop! get transports and transport your army to thier back. air cover needed to not die the trannies.

building superweapons is not worth it at my opinion. nukes ingame are so boring...