How to deal with widow mines in late game battles?

Zerg Discussion
1

Hello, I have not played much LOTV and I am not the greatest player, however, I find that widow mines have been hard for me to deal with. I am not talking about flying mutas into the main and getting blasted, my main concern is in a late game battle.

I may not have had the best unit composition or best micro, but here is the army set up:

Terran - thors, tanks, hellions/bats, and widow mines (2,2). (opponent)

Zerg - hydras, brood lords, viper (3,3 hydra) (1,1 bl).

Now I found out that thors completely wreck BL’s now with the maximum payload range attack, so this discussion is not about this, it is about how to deal with widow mines in a massive 200 supply battle.

When I engaged the terran, I had good clouds on most the tanks, but what I noticed, is when I A moved my hydras into the army, they would not attack the unburrowed widow mines. Now I can understand the first couple rows of hydras may focus the thors and bats, but when the widow mines moved right on top of my hydras, the 3rd and 4th row would not attack them. These hydras keep trying to move in attack range of the thors and bats, which they ended up doing nothing.

Now, what I am thinking, in a situation like this, am I suppose to place my back line hydras on hold? which would force them to attack whatever is in their range, which in this case would only be mines or are infestors the the best answer for fungal growth?

I noticed that blinding cloud does not work, which I read on another post that widow mines count as a spell caster (lol okay) which they are not effected by viper clouds.

My question, is how to best deal with widow mines in the late game.

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1 Like
2

Get some lurkers in here and use the vipers to pull things like thor into range, put em through the shredder

3

That’s extremely weird, normally units should attack if enemy is in the range. Are you sure you just A-moved and not A-clicked certain unit?

4

I know I A - clicked into their army because my hydras were shooting all the front line hellbats. I grab about 8 of them to pick off a few tanks. I just feels like unburrowed widow mines have that same threat level as passive workers.

I could try lurkers, I had the viper pulls, but it seems like the thors prioritize air units (vipers) over the hydras. The opponent might have been microing that though.

5

Widow mines have very low combat priority so your best bet is to pull away and pick them off from range.

Yes, in the situation you are describing you should kite back with your hydras and broodlord, using hold position + right click back.

1 Like
6

Thank you, I find it weird though that their combat priority is so low that even though they are the only units in range of my back line hydras, these hydras will still be aggroed towards the thors which are out of range.

I was also thinking infestors, but I know that I wont be able to use viper and infestors effectively, and I think vipers are better vs mech, unless you mass mind control the thors but thats extremely risky.

7

I always use Brood Loards to counter Windows Mines, and additional in the base some spore and spine.

In earlier game use some Roaches, and send 1-2 roach with space into mines. Then the Windows Mines has a delay and you can attack. Detection is of course needed. :wink:

8

Widow mines attack priority is next to nothing until they burrow because they cannot attack until they burrow, so it can make for some very strange interactions and battles. Pulling back is the best way to handle it unless you’re super good at shift attacking all of them before they burrow. Even so, pulling back let’s you pick off the mines while pulling out of range of the mech army, so it’s a free pick off.

9

if you can control hydras well they also trade good vs mines after you got their upgrades as they outrange them. U need an overseer rightclicked on an hydra and u can a-move them. Still you should watch at your hydra army during that time cause sometimes a mine could put their laser line still out depending on how they are spread. You should just go back then to cancel the laser and then go in and kill. Never take shots with with your hydras as they could get 1hkoed by them.

10

Not gonna deny, it is more ‘difficult’ because Z can no longer simply A move as we use to in the past haha. Here are a few suggestions based on your situation:

  • Micro attack the mines. It may seem APM intensive but know that the T will also need to spend more APM on moving and re-burrowing the mines during the fight.
  • Use banes, that is because even if they get taken out, they tend to take mines with them as well.
  • Send your army in waves. This will trigger some of the mines first before your main army goes in.
  • Surround your enemy. This will ensure that the mines will only hit a portion of the army from 1 side.
  • Micro prior to mines shot. This will be the craziest but every little bit adds up isn’t it? :slight_smile:
11

You can mass Ultras, who cares about window mines LOL. You can run through 15 liberators and it doesn’t even matter…