Sorry yes I do have P3 just accidentally read it as “Artanis” not P3 specifically.
For specific maps, Dead on Night and Miner’s Evac is factory for siege tanks, you can use starport instead if you know what you’re doing but factory is reliable.
Vs Zerg: Barracks for ghosts, yeah, any Zerg comp, do be carefull about vipers and banes tho.
Vs Air Terran: Factory for goliaths, still use marines, maybe add libs but only if you have defensive drone available, you can also start with starport and use mass Ravens but it’s not A-move welcome.
vs Terran overall: Factory because hellbats and siege tanks dominates ground, you can make it work with starport due to banshees, but Nova’s siege tanks are just good and has spider mines.
Vs Sky Protoss: same as vs air Terran.
Vs Protoss overall: Starport because libs hit hard, what libs struggles with can be solved with shotgun Nova.
If you’re still in doubt, Factory because it has all the tools to deal with any comp.
I’d agree with most of this except that versus zerg swarm I go factory for spider mines and hellbats.
I’m not super convinced about Goliath’s being that effective against some protoss air as they can get torn up if not careful. Ravens/liberators on the other hand evaporate them.
In general on defensive oriented maps where I intend to act as the primary defense force like on don i would take factory siegetanks to hold entrances and hellbats to help clear. Otherwise i would take starport there as her banshees are quite good for clearing.
Otherwise It depends on the enemy composition. Against any zerg comps barracks as ghost marines and marauders easily handle anything with a bio tag. when up against mass air i tend to favor starport with ravens and their seeker missile but goliath spam is abit easier micro wise. against ground heavy mechanically focused compositions i tend to go either siegetanks or liberators depending on mood.
tldr against bio go bio (against air zerg don’t make many marauders for obvious reasons)
against air either goliaths or ravens
against mech siegetanks or liberators.
also note when you don’t go starport first guard your ravens jealously as you will maybe get 2 for the whole game if your lucky
oh and you will also want to mix in some ghosts against protoss as emp will quickly deal with their shields. and have one set ready to take on hybrid casters to disable that pesky psi blast and psi storm. you don’t want that 1 shotting some of your units after all.
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You definitely don’t want any ground units (or as few as possible) against immortals, reavers, distruptors and colossi. Immortals aren’t that bad, just make light units. Starport should be the go-to against these.
Heavy siege tanks out range all of protoss mech and do significant bonus damage versus armoured making them a viable strategy (en masse) when supported by spider mines and, if colossi are present, Goliath. Not a bad strategy to drop firebats occasionally too if a distraction is needed.
That said, air is probably superior on most maps but it can be nice to have some variety to builds other than more Ravens.
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Air is amazing, but requires a lot of good micro to extract that power.
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Really? Seems pretty straight forward with rapid fire set up. The challenge is effectively microing Nova at the same time ime.
Yes, I was thinking of using Nova at the same time, but took it as a given. Rapid-fire is amazing for sure! Either way her air army alone takes more micro than a factory army. A simple lib/raven combo means microing up to 4 things - lib seige, missles, turrets, clump splitting. With a factory army it’s pretty much just spider mines.
I went almost entirely starport when I played nova P1. Her ravens are insane for their cost, especially after their 3 charge upgrade
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I personally almost always use Barracks as my first production facility, though I will sometimes do Factory when I face air-heavy and mech-heavy comps.
Generally speaking, bioball is just too good against just about everything else, and like someone said Nova’s air requires just too much micro to be useful. I almost never build a Starport, let alone as a first production structure.
You almost never build Raven’s? Ouchie
And Vs mech is one of the few occasions I actually consider barrack cause of marauders (I only go barrack P1 Vs Zerg, swarm and Thor’s)
Too much micro? Well dang that’s a tad exaggerated lol.
Have you got rapid fire set up for your Ravens and libs? Totally changed the game experience for me doing this.
I love how many different strategies people have for Nova P1, really tells me that it is a great commander/prestige.
So far I have:
Mass Marauders: terran mech
Mass Ghosts: heavy zerg ground/air
Mass Goliath’s: terran air
Mass Siege Tanks: terran mech/infested
Mass Ravens+libs: protoss ground
Mass Liberators+ravens: protoss air
Any units/compositions that I missed?
For me no matter which composition you are going for, these are essential.
- Mineral Dumps (Marine and Firebat)
- Ravens (You need to be Extra careful)
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Mineral dumps can also be Griffon airstrike (particularly if you go nuke/Holo cool down reduction), spider mines and turrets. Not necessary to spend any minerals on marines or firebats (firebats have their place on infested maps and as a call down but I rarely build marines now except on a barracks opener).
Ravens are great but can be skipped if strong enemy AA is present - keeping Ravens alive versus things like Goliath’s, Thor’s and Scourge can be more trouble than they are worth (especially as skipping them lets you focus on other units/Nova micro).
True but for me, I deploy them for extra fire and meat shields to protect my core death ball.
I also take caution that I don’t use the minerals too much,
Also since the unit cooldown is doubled I think spending some won’t be a hassle.
Ravens are yeah pain but manage to keep them alive with designating them with number keys and microing them, also deploying shield drones as protection and meatshields (especially against scourge)
To each their own I suppose.
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Against zerg comp with scourge (swarm or air) you can hard counter the comp by avoiding starport units altogether (though I still build the building of course to generate charges if a panic call down is needed).
Barracks with mass ghost will delete zerg air waves while mass siege tank/spider mine will delete zerg swarm and leave nothing for the scourge to bother. Either way the death ball will become unstoppable that much quicker if Ravens and their upgrades are skipped.
I’ve read a few posts that groups of missile turrets are quite effective versus air comps to draw out spells and break up enemy waves though I usually only build them on void launch.
I’m really loving this thread for discovering new strategies for countering certain comps.
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