So whenever I run into this sorta Ball rush strategy they seem to do reasonably well for the first 2-3 rounds because of the element of surprise but then as the match progresses it becomes worse and worse for them. I feel like in order to play this successfully you would have to be an absolute madman and do things that no sane person would ever expect and overwhelm your opponent as early as possible through just sheer confusion.
@@TheGrouch91 the only situation where you don't sell the balls is vs tarantulas, but even then, it's not unbeatable unless the tarantula player has a chaff problem.
Must be really frustrating from his side, that his usual tactic didn't work. He tried really hard to confuse you. I bet it works well most of the time at lower MMR.
Did he though? I think what he did was pretty text book Ball rush. Except that he sprinkled in some strange choices like putting Balls and a level 1 Vulcan in a flank next to a level 2 Scorpion.
@@TheGrouch91 Agreed, I play this sort of rush a fair bit with ball starts, the key is actually to focus on getting balls and chaff instead of wraith spam unless your opp has an obvious weakness to them, alongside switching sides when your opponent overdefends one to rush that tower instead for an easy round win. Tempo is the name of the game here. The part where he went wrong the most was spamming wraith too early into his offence as opposed to winning the chaff battle, which meant his balls kept dying to scorps and he couldn't get the levels needed to overcome that. He also failed to properly answer the marks-crawler-sledge formation, a rhino flank with some crawlers bottom left earlier would've decimated his backline. In fact, his absolute lack of rhinos is part of what lost him this, they're what typically makes marksman defence bad into aggro, since they're too fast and bulky and can be very easily spammed on flank with little downside. Hell, he gets whirlwind rhino and it clears a bunch of chaff in the process too, weakening his entire backline easily, it's very hard to kill a rhino fast that early on in the game with no giants or levelled single target and the tempo and level advantage gained from that play would be huge, once he's disincentived to use marks by the rhino push, THEN you go wraiths alongside the rhinos, resulting in an offensive setup that clears chaff rapidly, allowing the balls to lock on the big stuff faster and burn it down. Another thing he did that cost him was not protecting his balls on round 2 with a chaff pressed up against the bottom right part of stoney's left flank, which is to defend against missiles to start with. Had he done that, the balls would've gotten in faster, drawn the fire of the sledges and allowed his now-alive crawler pack to distract the marks. Sure, the fangs would've slowed them a bit, but with the sledges locked onto the level 2 ball pack, the crawlers would have cleared them fast and then stoney lost badly and the balls would've almost definitely gotten a third level, allowing them to act as a constant threat, then he could've pivoted in the means THAT, is what I'd have done, personally. Then again, I'm only 1500 so I'm a bit worse than these guys at an objective level, so there may be some things I'm not seeing. Plus, hindsight is 20/20 and we all have off days, fuck knows I've done some stupid shit in my time XD.
I always lose when I try to follow a specific build. Reacting to opponent and fixing issues is what works better. But it's hardto resist it when Stoney shows some fun build that worked in his game.
Early sell (as soon as he notices the scorp) on balls to give nano to wraith would make it survive and level faster, forcing either an other tech, more marksmen, or even phoenixes... front wraith facing AA marksmen and range tech is an obvious waste. If you're gonna tech wraith facing low level MM take regen, the range was totally useless. Good job Stoney nevertheless and thanks for your videos!
At the beginning you say you have to "pick a side", but is that the case really? If you guessed wrong, how would you defend your weak side later on? With slow tanks you can't really trade towers easily either.
If I picked wrong, at least most of my army is together and I can just level the tower or hard counter on that side. In the early rounds, they'd get tower but by the time they arrive at my tanks the debuff would've been worn off. If you go even sides, then they'll overrun one side, get tower, then face only half of your remaining army.
So whenever I run into this sorta Ball rush strategy they seem to do reasonably well for the first 2-3 rounds because of the element of surprise but then as the match progresses it becomes worse and worse for them. I feel like in order to play this successfully you would have to be an absolute madman and do things that no sane person would ever expect and overwhelm your opponent as early as possible through just sheer confusion.
Yea, I think you really need to optimize your placements so well. You cannot be inefficient in any way as the counter will just overpower you.
@@TheGrouch91 the only situation where you don't sell the balls is vs tarantulas, but even then, it's not unbeatable unless the tarantula player has a chaff problem.
Must be really frustrating from his side, that his usual tactic didn't work. He tried really hard to confuse you. I bet it works well most of the time at lower MMR.
Did he though? I think what he did was pretty text book Ball rush. Except that he sprinkled in some strange choices like putting Balls and a level 1 Vulcan in a flank next to a level 2 Scorpion.
@@TheGrouch91 Agreed, I play this sort of rush a fair bit with ball starts, the key is actually to focus on getting balls and chaff instead of wraith spam unless your opp has an obvious weakness to them, alongside switching sides when your opponent overdefends one to rush that tower instead for an easy round win. Tempo is the name of the game here. The part where he went wrong the most was spamming wraith too early into his offence as opposed to winning the chaff battle, which meant his balls kept dying to scorps and he couldn't get the levels needed to overcome that. He also failed to properly answer the marks-crawler-sledge formation, a rhino flank with some crawlers bottom left earlier would've decimated his backline. In fact, his absolute lack of rhinos is part of what lost him this, they're what typically makes marksman defence bad into aggro, since they're too fast and bulky and can be very easily spammed on flank with little downside. Hell, he gets whirlwind rhino and it clears a bunch of chaff in the process too, weakening his entire backline easily, it's very hard to kill a rhino fast that early on in the game with no giants or levelled single target and the tempo and level advantage gained from that play would be huge, once he's disincentived to use marks by the rhino push, THEN you go wraiths alongside the rhinos, resulting in an offensive setup that clears chaff rapidly, allowing the balls to lock on the big stuff faster and burn it down.
Another thing he did that cost him was not protecting his balls on round 2 with a chaff pressed up against the bottom right part of stoney's left flank, which is to defend against missiles to start with. Had he done that, the balls would've gotten in faster, drawn the fire of the sledges and allowed his now-alive crawler pack to distract the marks. Sure, the fangs would've slowed them a bit, but with the sledges locked onto the level 2 ball pack, the crawlers would have cleared them fast and then stoney lost badly and the balls would've almost definitely gotten a third level, allowing them to act as a constant threat, then he could've pivoted in the means
THAT, is what I'd have done, personally. Then again, I'm only 1500 so I'm a bit worse than these guys at an objective level, so there may be some things I'm not seeing. Plus, hindsight is 20/20 and we all have off days, fuck knows I've done some stupid shit in my time XD.
I always lose when I try to follow a specific build. Reacting to opponent and fixing issues is what works better. But it's hardto resist it when Stoney shows some fun build that worked in his game.
Or almost worked, like in this game. I can imagine myself in his shoes.
Early sell (as soon as he notices the scorp) on balls to give nano to wraith would make it survive and level faster, forcing either an other tech, more marksmen, or even phoenixes... front wraith facing AA marksmen and range tech is an obvious waste. If you're gonna tech wraith facing low level MM take regen, the range was totally useless.
Good job Stoney nevertheless and thanks for your videos!
Jokes on you, I’m left handed
God damnit 🤣
At the beginning you say you have to "pick a side", but is that the case really? If you guessed wrong, how would you defend your weak side later on? With slow tanks you can't really trade towers easily either.
If I picked wrong, at least most of my army is together and I can just level the tower or hard counter on that side. In the early rounds, they'd get tower but by the time they arrive at my tanks the debuff would've been worn off. If you go even sides, then they'll overrun one side, get tower, then face only half of your remaining army.