Rushes - good or bad?

wtf....ur cc builds the fortress doesnt it?
like a comsat, but on top 0.0

 

More or less. I personally see no issue with rushes; and I'm not going to lie when I first started RTS games I HATED them with a passion. However when I got better at whatever specific game (Halo Wars/Starcraft, I know the former isn't much of one but nevertheless) I learned that Rushes are a valid strategy.

First and foremost many people misuse the word rush, and more than often they confuse with the term harassment. I'll just briefly define both, for the sake of the few people who may not know what they are.

Rush - Going in very early into the game with low cost and low tier units with few/mid amoutns trying to crush the enemy early. Instead of investing in setting up a defense or an economy, all your money goes right into forces. -HOWEVER- if the rush gets repelled for whatever reason, you are FUBAR. You just lost all you spent on, and depending on how early on in the game it is that can be catastrophic for a few minutes in terms of economy.

Harassment - Going in with low-mid cost units / low-mid tier and annoying the opponent. You are not going in there to die, you are not going in there to win the game by any means. You are there (in context of Starcraft) to destroy their economy units (whatever faction it may be) and/or stop expansions, unit production, so forth. You also generally are there for only a bit (if possible). Not staying for a finishing blow as said before; just to annoy them and cause some damage to give you a small lead.

Now, back to the original point. What exactly is the issue with rushing again? "Waaah they outplayed me and attacked me before I was ready!" My philosophy with rushing is this: If they have the money and time to build a force strong enough to destroy you; you have the time to build a force to protect yourself. Plain and simple.

There is no excuse to losing to a rush unless you just flat out got outplayed with some very few exceptions. (IE: Major lag on your part). This is another thing I notice when in RTS games (Halo Wars and Starcraft) that whenever a rush gets pushed back; they never counter attack. Or even when the rush is going on.

One of my favorite things to do when I see someone coming for a rush is I head for THEIR base ASAP. If I can get to their base first, I can start ravaging their economy and a good amount of the time (as a Protoss player) I will have some turrets up to at least hold them back. So they either retreat and recross the map to save their own skin, or they attack me and not do nearly as much damage as I and get destroyed by my defenses as I keep pumping stuff out.

Although the above was the most risky; when you destroy a rush why dont people just run in? They are defenseless (most likely) for the most part. It's easy to go in and harass them a bit and such.

Just a quick real life analogy after my ranting binge there. Let's say you are a force of 10,000 on one side of a mountain and on the other side your enemy; a very vital city stands. They only have about 1,000 guarding it and another few regiments are a few days away. I think anyone with half a brain would attack now, to set up defenses for the upcoming forces while the town was weak instead of "playing fair" and letting them get that extra few thousand men in the city.

Same with an RTS, why should I wait for you? I'm ready to attack so I'll attack; plain and simple.

 

Fruscainte is so cool that i coudnt even read past his first paragraph. now, this might be due to my extremely hurt-filled astigmatism-plagued godforsaken painstaken eyes, but i still say he/she/it's cool

 

Whoa, the Fortress is BUILD by a SCV? It's not an upgrade?

 

It's an upgrade.

 

I meant building the extra CC + upgrading after that. My bad.

It's just a bad idea to use the PF right away. At least from what we've seen so far, especially since there are now a lot more ways to enter a base. Think of cliff jumping, warping, etc. Setting up a static defence just isn't as effective in Starcraft as it is in other games. Not even against a cpu. In most games you can hold a base with just some form of turrets. In Starcraft, you're screwed without units to support you.

 

Rushes ruin the game

i personnaly think rushes always ruin the gama. Like when i play starcraft over battle.net it really pisses me of to get rushed by a 15 year old that plays the game 10 hours a day. There should be a balance of all teams so that the zerg rush doesnt end the game straight away. its much more fun and exciting when you get into the midgame or endgame.

 

How is that ruining the game? Rushes aren't impossible to stop because people have been doing them for what, 10+ years now? And they still get pushed back. If they were unstoppable they would've been stopped by patch or something YEARS ago.

Why do people who beat them always classify people as people who are either 'young' or spends all day playing the game (or both)? Just because you got beaten by a relatively easy to beat rush, doesn't mean someone's an addict who plays 10 hours a day.

There's nothing wrong with rushing, and it's much more exiting to be in a constant battle of harassment between two people (or whatever) and teching up at the same time; not knowing what's going to happen than sitting around for 15 minutes teching up and amassing a huge army.

Think about it. If you were a general of a battlefield IRL (again with this analogy, sorry) and there was a town a few miles out that was vital to the war; and you had 10,000 soldiers and they only had 1,000; would you wait for them to get reinforcements before you attack? No, it's strategically more sound to attack when someone isn't ready.

I usually don't rush anyways to win, I go in to cripple your economy (or try to) as to give me an upperhand.

TL;DR: Stop complaining and spend the time you spend complaining to figure out how to beat these rushes.

 

I learned rushes early on and practiced on CPU's but I suk when I'm against some one, maybe I should stop playing fastest posible map whenever I'm borad.

And rushes would probly be a strat that a player that isn't good in late game would use, (usually noobs)

 

whoa... a simple post and so many responses and links. My apologies for not doing the search first, that was stupid of me. Thanks for all the pointers, though!

 

Or it's a 15 year old who plays 30 minutes a day and just happens to be better at the game than you are. I've seen people who play religiously and are still awful. Honestly, most solid players aren't playing 10-hours a day from thier parent's basement; that just makes people who are in playing ability denial feel better about themselves.

 

I don't see what's wrong with doing what it takes to win a game....


It's not like C&C where the same strategy is used in virtually every game.

 

You don't improve a game by deteriorating its tactical choices. If the rushing doesn't exist, then there'll be other tactics that people will learn to hate. But rushing (i.e. "Blitz") is, and will always be, a fast and effective form of attack that has a number of caveats that you can learn to exploit. Regretfully, most people rarely bother to actually look at the solution. Instead, they just want the problem to go away by some meta-game change. They see a glass as half-empty rather than half-full.

The good thing about SC2 is the emphasis on skill match-ups and similar. It should help you against better players. Furthermore, Blizzard have said that a number of training missions and guides will come with the game, including those of various playstyles etc (rushing being a likely part - how to master and defend against it). Also, you can already choose to disallow the zerg race (in SC1, but also very likely in SC2).

The reason why Rushing is hard to withstand is because of SC1 mechanics, which is being addressed in SC2. I'm also personally gonna design a few "Early Rush"-resistant maps, by implementing certain intuitive in-game features.

The bottom line is that rushing is as valid a tactic as any other, and the Zerg is more or less dependent on it. It's the whole point of playing the zerg. If you don't like it, then either Learn2Play or don't play against the Zerg. You'd be surprised how hard it is to even play the Zerg if you don't rush.

Starcraft is a competitive, action-paced RTS. You're not supposed to build a perfect base, trade resources and dance Rumba. You're supposed to kill the other side, by ANY MEANS necessary.

Ultimately, "for every action there is a corresponding reaction". Become a master at antirushing, and Bob's your uncle.

 

Watch starcraft pro gaming at its highest level of play.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdlDhqm60Iw&feature=sub

Barely 1 in 10 games are ever decided by a rush or "cheese" as they call it. In most other games players strike a balance that takes the game into tech and expanding. I call that excellent variability.

Only if you make a fatal mistake or are greatly outmatched can a rush can end you, and that is as it should be.

 

re

Early rushes can be risky. If it fails then not only did you throw away allot of resources, but your opponent will know what you are up to and will build a tough defense and future rushes are out of the question.

 

I have never ever ever rushed someone, I prefer teching and massing powerful units. I've been rushed a few times, but usually by that time, I have some cannons out ready to meet them

 

Losing on a rush throws you out of the competition and makes you 'bad'.

 

If you have a moderately successful rush you and your opponent should the game make it into "the long run" will be equal, but if you are unsuccessful, I would say to just keep calm and spend money on tech and defensive measures because now your opponent knows what you're doing and how you are doing it so it might be better to take on a little bit defensively until you know you are safe. Although there is always a chance that you might actually win from a rush, but that is really only possible if your opponent either isn't expecting it in the least or just sucks.

 

I think Dustin Browder summed up perfectly what rushes should be in an interview.

And I really like this idea. Very easy to rush and win if you oponent is turtling or teching and not prepared for the rush. But if prepared the rush should be easily defeated. So rushes if balanced as they should be according to Dustin, (and I agree with dustin 100%) are only there to tell your oponent, wake up stupid, you're playing SC2 now and be unprepared and you lose. But be prepared and ready and we can have a long and good game.

So in short not prepared for rush = lose and probably GG
But prepared for rush = very easy defeat of rush and continue on with the SC2 match.
And yes SC2 does = a rush or 2 at some point of each match.

That's how rushes should be in Dustin's opinion. And I agree with Dustin.

 

So does this mean they're going to get rid of the proxy pylon warp-in rush? 'Cause that crap is still OP