Mid-game Zerg Rush army?

[fоreskin feta]

I'm in need of an army that'll mobilize quickly and destroy a lab before their economy gets rolling. My strategy is to rush Level II (originally IV) research as soon as possible and put out many cheap, fast units that hunt together in a horde. I already have an Orca-Wasp and Wolf-Wasp to scout ahead for labs without the use of radar, and I have loners to harass players with poor economies in between rushes (as well as an anti-loner that can shut down anyone trying to loner me to death).
What are the six best combinations for a mid-game, Level II Zerg Rush-style strategy?

[fоreskin feta]

Woloon

[the2ndSign]

So... You want to rush the enemy before their economy gets rolling, but you also want to wait until level 4. Right.

This strat just doesn't make sense, so I can't really recommend creatures for it. By level 4, a decent player's economy will already be above and beyond "rolling", so while you're busy spamming your cheap level 4s, they'll be defending with better units (and probably more resources), and also teching to level 5. Once they hit 5, you're dead since your army is, for some reason, centered around level 4.

That is, if you even live that long. You might be able to pull this off on a bad player, but anyone who knows what they're doing will probably be able to kill you at level 2 or level 3. If you do survive past level 3, then strong upgraded level 3 units will be more efficient than cheap level 4s.

Your army shouldn't rely on a single strat or gimmick to win. A balanced selection of units is vital if you want to be a competitive force.

[fоreskin feta]

oh

[the2ndSign]

If you want to cripple a player before they can get an economy going, a fast level 2 rush is the way to go. This can be hard to pull off if you don't have a solid grasp on early game builds though. And if they see it coming, you're DOA.

I don't mean to be rude by saying this, but it sounds like you're not a very experienced player yet. For now, you should focus on balance and learning the basics. I actually recommend using a premade army while you learn the ropes. Once you become comfortable with expanding, attacking, and defending, and are able to hold your own in most games, then you can start experimenting with your army and trying out new strats.

I also saw that you've read Kevin's army thread. That's a great place to start.

[fоreskin feta]

tbh I saw the Jerma video on IC and wanted to replicate the Zerg Rush (keep in mind that the guy recording had 3 creature chambers and no extra henchmen by the 5 minute mark).

[Ruinae Retroque Rursus]

Originally posted by Stan:

tbh I saw the Jerma video on IC and wanted to replicate the Zerg Rush (keep in mind that the guy recording had 3 creature chambers and no extra henchmen by the 5 minute mark).

There's a very high chance that's not done with Tellurian.

IC vanilla is unbalanced as all heck & it is possible to spam-run to T4 / T5 and stomp the AI. (This was also noticed in War of the Ring, which had cheaper tier prices than some of your units).

Meanwhile in Tellurian the upgrade times are significantly increased and as such you can only "rush" in T2. Attacking in T4 is just that - attacking with a well-thought-out siege.

If you want to be able to spamstomp things go play vanilla IC. But if you want a balanced RTS install Tellurian.



"Zerg Rush" => attacking with earlygame units, REALLY REALLY REALLY earlygame
"Level IV" => Lategame
by definition you can't attack with early late game units

(I'd argue a T2 rush isn't even a Zerg rush, I'd call that a well-planned attack. Attacking with T1s is a Zerg rush)

[Esprit]

ic/ii vanilla was definately better. tellurian helped people turtle and drag the game out so people didnt have to think to quickly haha

[Avi]

I don't think lvl4 is really "mid game", maybe consider using lvl 2 or lvl 3 for what you're trying to accomplish

[the2ndSign]

Originally posted by Esprit:

ic/ii vanilla was definately better. tellurian helped people turtle and drag the game out so people didnt have to think to quickly haha

Vanilla and II also had very poor creature balance, the result being that only a handful of creatures ever saw frequent use (with occasional variations), as they were just straight up better than anything else. Besides, rushing is still quite viable.

[Ruinae Retroque Rursus]

Originally posted by Esprit:

ic/ii vanilla was definately better. tellurian helped people turtle and drag the game out so people didnt have to think to quickly haha

Somebody likes their RTSes where the solution to being attacked is to spam in the chat photon man pow e=mc2 trooper bigdaddy or indeed if things get disastrous, diediedie (Cheat codes from AOE1: spawn laser machine gun, spawn raygun, spawn nuke, spawn nuke on car, and kill all enemy players .... nobody ever types in harikari though)

Having played AOE1 (to death), AOE2 (two steps away from competitively), looked at AOE3 and Rise of Nations, as well as the more obscure War of the Ring (played to death) and Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds...

... IC vanilla is unbalanced as all heck. II is barely any better.

The reason I say this is because of the upgrade prices... in many cases it is much better to just create some "throwaway T2/3" creatures for defence and just pump out T5's ASAP. The fact that the prebuilt armies have a general lack of T5s is a further insult.

This ruins any midgame combat aside from scouting and makes the whole game a boom-run to T5 and then a spam-stomp (using my own terminology here, but "boom" is a valid term as is "stomp"). This could arguably be what you want for (& I suspect what you, Esprit, want) an RTS but the idea of balance is to achieve something that pleases the most people.

Tel is much, much better - mostly with the tier prices and nerfing Mooselobs (I have my gripes (T4 should cost exactly twice as much in my arrogant and uninformed opinion), but we all have our gripes and that's why I modded AOE2 :P)

[fоreskin feta]

So, what I got from asking was:

Vanilla: Don't both her rushing units, instead rush Research Level 5 and bum-rush the enemy base.

Tellurian: Researching levels takes a while, so turtle for a bit and send some units to scout out while building a base. Then, send out your units for a fast paced battle and never putting pressure on the enemy by incessantly deploying units.

[the2ndSign]

more like

Vanilla: make mooselobs = win
II: make mooselobs = win
Tel: who needs mooselobs

[Ruinae Retroque Rursus]

Originally posted by Klepty Snatchngrab:

more like

Vanilla: make mooselobs = win
II: make mooselobs = win
Tel: who needs mooselobs

Come on Klepty, moose aren't even a thing in vanilla. They were added in II.
EDIT: oops

Originally posted by Stan:

So, what I got from asking was:

Vanilla: Don't both her rushing units, instead rush Research Level 5 and bum-rush the enemy base.

Bang on. Run as fast as your eco can carry you to Level 5 and win.

Tellurian: Researching levels takes a while, so turtle for a bit and send some units to scout out while building a base. Then, send out your units for a fast paced battle and never putting pressure on the enemy by incessantly deploying units.

Pretty much yep, although you can often do a lot of fighting in T3 (I think it should be more though... T4 price should be increased, I'll probably PM Klepty at some point in time along with a rant about Sonic Boom). The Tel devs have decided to turn this into a very fast-paced micro-heavy RTS when the battling actually starts.

[Biggest ella fan]

Originally posted by aidenpons:

Originally posted by Klepty Snatchngrab:

more like

Vanilla: make mooselobs = win
II: make mooselobs = win
Tel: who needs mooselobs

Come on Klepty, moose aren't even a thing in vanilla. They were added in II.

No, the Moose was added with the Bonus Animals and are thus included with vanilla.