Is there an easy way to pick up all the Tanks at the same time. Currently haven’t found a way other than selecting all intercessors and right clicking one by one on each tank. And while that is happening all the intercessors group over the tanks so I then have to move them out of the way and start right clicking again.
Any advice appreciated.
Ive seen pro players instantly pick up like 50 marines in a split second and Ive always wondered how they do that.
What you want to do is right select the units and right click the medivac, rather than select the medivac and right click the units. Actually, you can select both the medivacs and the units and right click the medivacs, but the point remains. The secret is to right click the transport.
But since it’s one per medivac only one gets picked up.
That technique works fine for Swann and his Herc transport, but since it’s a 1:1 ratio for tanks to transports I’m stumped
It’s still somewhat faster than clicking the tanks since the medivacs are on top of each other, and since it lets you spam click without really worrying about overwriting commands.
Have your Intercessors on a separate control group and then put Load on a hotkey that is easy for you to reach, and then just use Rapid Fire to load by simply holding the key down and sweeping your mouse over the Shock Tanks. Since tank lines tend to be clumped together, especially after dropping them, it’s easier to pick them up as quickly as possible for relocation.
That’s what I use, and I find it works pretty swell when I want to rapidly pickup and drop tanks for anti-air and ground sieging swaps on the fly.
I haven’t properly tested flying tanks, how do you find them? Which situations are they best/worst for?
They’re perhaps Mengsk’s best anti-air option against armored ships. So against air comps, they are king, blasting down those ships from 15 range, which is well out of counter range. I don’t know if and when it will get patched, but the Shock and Awe ability even works on Heroics and Map Objectives, such as the Arks on Void Launch. The only thing to really watch out for is Zerg air, against scourges, due to the slower firing rate sometimes letting a couple fly through if your troopers are distracted with ground threats, but that requires just a bit more paying attention to not lose the Intercessors.
If worst comes to worst, and the expendable Intercessor takes a yamato hit or blasted down by Scourge, the tank will fall to the ground, giving it a fighting chance to survive.
Granted, the Pride of Augustgrad can clear waves instantly when it ranks up, but flying tanks have the advantage of continued sustain damage from long range, and once you get used to drop play with the tanks, are just far better autoattackers.
They are just as strong against air targets as they are ground. But they can move. So imagine being a poor marine getting chased by a mobile, firing seiged tank. That’s what you can do to scourge and it’s glorious.
What about the faster, tanker, cheaper, and more supply efficient vikings? Not to mention rocket troopers.
The Sky Furies are faster and slightly cheaper, but they sure aren’t tankier. Shock Tanks have more health straight up, and that doesn’t take in account that the Intercessors take the damage first, adding further durability with the Intercessor health and regenerative shielding serving as the meatshield.
That, of course, only matters when you don’t take in account the 15 range Tankivacs over 9 range Fighter Mode Furies, so rarely will the Tankivacs come under fire unless one seriously, seriously misplays. On the other hand, 9 range Furies are guaranteed to take Yamato or Plasma Shot hits from enemy BCs and Big Hybrid, and potentially get shot down if you aren’t quick to pull back the damaged Furies or get off a pre-emptive EMP.
Sky Furies also suffer from the same issue the Deimos Vikings have, in that the ‘Stock’ Raynor Vikings are simply better, pound for pound, by virtue of having extra range and splash. It doesn’t matter how great one’s stats are when one can only focus one air unit at a time, while a critical mass of standard issue Vikings with the extra range can just one-shot entire clumps of capital ships per volley because of the power of splash damage.
I feel like the Sky Furies are the least useful unit in Mengsk’s arsenal. There isn’t anything they do particularly well that other Royals don’t do better, in my opinion.
Rocket Troopers are nice, but why go Rockets when you can go the LMG, which synergizes better with the Tankivacs, by virtue of the hitscan? No overkill, thanks to the combo of tanks and LMGs efficiently blasting any and all targets. They are a very mean combination of units. If you don’t go Tankivacs, then yeah, Rocket Troopers are very good, and outperform Mengsk’s other anti-air options, including Sky Furies.
Ive tried each of Mengsk AA options several times in multiple Brutal+ games and I’d rate them like this from worst to best: SkyFuries < Blackhammers < Rocket Troopers < FlyingTanks < LMG Troopers.
And yes I think LMG troopers are better than Rocket Troopers since they’re have more dps and much much less overkilling. Rocket troopers are amazing in bunkers though for AA.
Honestly, that whole flying tank AA thing is clunky as hell in general. It’s not really worth using. Swann gets away with it because Hercs can hold 8 of them at a time and the Hercs themselves are beefy and can take some punishment. Putting a tank in a squishy Medivac just for anti-air when Mengsk has plenty of other strong AA options, just doesn’t seem worth it.
To each their own opinion, I suppose, but I find it really hard to believe anyone could call Tankivacs not worth using.
The Tankivacs have a regenerating 100 shield on top of their 150 health, 13-15 range, a Stun that works even on Heroic air targets and slows massives, and the ability to Fire On The Move, thus allowing you to kite infinitely while running away in case of aerial threats that somehow got past your ground soldiers.
When you factor in that they can fight from such distance behind your Trooper/Bunker lines, or behind your allies’ army, you basically have to try to lose your Tankivacs.
Thanks @Kirena, I’ll definitely have to give them some more screen time. It’s a pity about Sky Furies as I still can’t find a good situation to use them. At least one Blackhammer is good for it’s armour boost and rocket troopers are great for spawn camping air on TotP.
I haven’t done the maths yet, but what about factoring in the dodge ability?
30% dodge chance is really low. It’s hard to see value from it, and I have never seen it proc on a Yamato or Plasma hit, the things that tend to cost me the most Sky Furies.
I admittedly dislike RNG mechanics in RTS games, be it masteries or unit abilities, so I am kind of biased against it. Maybe if it was higher. If it was 45%, like Zagara’s mastery, then that would be at least, to me, perhaps worth counting on making a difference in a battle.
But as it is now, despite how cool it looks and sounds in game when it procs, it feels kind of trash. I would honestly prefer it replaced with out of combat life regeneration to reinforce the idea of retreating with them in hit-and-away tactics, healing off any damage they sustain as they harass oncoming attack waves.
Yeah, the harass idea is a good one. Life regen might actually give them a use.
The only thing I dislike about Tankivacs is that the Medivac has none of its abilities outside its shield. I’ve played around with them quite a bit, and in nearly every game I’ve felt that having the Medivac healing Troopers is a far better investment than lugging around the tanks. Especially since the Medivacs have extremely dumb AI and love getting stuck on terrain, random doodads, and anything with a health bar even if said health bar is mechanical and can’t be healed anyway. They also have stupid slow acceleration, you sometimes have to command them to move twice before they’ll finally register that command, and almost all the time you have to give them an unload command two or three times before they finally unload their cargo.
This is my chief complaint. I understand giving the tanks a nerf to their attack speed, as well as losing the cloaking function, but I think it is a bit unnecessary for them to lose the ability to heal and use their afterburners.
At the very least, they should keep the ability to use Afterburners but lose the ability for the tank to shoot until the effect ends, to allow one to cross large distances with the tanks more easily at the cost of losing the ability to fire while active.