Can there really be "meatshields" in SC2?

[The_Blade]

Starcraft =/= Real Life

What's fun about starcraft is that you micro your forces to shield or cover other units. If you want your tanks to shield marine firepower away from your helions, you send them first. You want to nulify tanks as a protoss, you send in a couple of immortals to gain ground before attacking the tanks with stalkers. It is easy to learn and hard to master: timing, quantity, distance, and micro are all factors.

As an example: In progammer PvT StarCraft original matches, a protoss fighting mech was probably the most painfull thing to beat. A combined force of zealots and dragoons could not stand a chance against this force unless you send in your speedlots for a timed attack against the tank shells and then move in with the dragoons for support. Do it backwards and your dragoons get nailed by the tanks, do it together and you lose to many dragoons to take down the rest of the forces. Besides, if the terran uses mines your dragoons and zealots would clutter up and die to mines easier.

Starcraft is not about sending all your units into battle and let the player with the best army win. You deal with micro.

[Gt2slurp]

But you have to admit a Los blocker unit increase the room for micro. And Btw there is nothing random about it, place your unit well and not in the same ctrl group and you will pwn you opponent.

[Kacaier]

What made people want to shoot ultralisks in Brood Wars rather than the zerglings who dealt the real damage?

[Nicol Bolas]

So, I don't see how units like the Thor and Ultralisk can really be tanks.

And yet, Ultralisks worked just fine as tanks in SC1.

[RaxFaelo]

dunno bout meatshields but Marines, Zealots, Zerglings are natural cannon fodders.
not to mention the Immortal and the Ultralisk.

Point Defense Drones absorb some damage tho.

[flak4321]

We seem to be dealing with competing/overlapping definitions here. Tanks and meatshields are not one in the same, but some units can fulfill both roles.

A meatshield can be defined as:

One who spares others from damage

A tanking unit is:

A unit designed to take heavy damage while also dealing heavy damage.

That said, any tank unit can be described as a meatshield to the extent its "awe" factor redirects fire in its direction. Examples: Ultralisk, BC, Carrier, Siege Tank, Archon, Immortal, Broodlord. This indirect overlap is where we are drawing our examples and some confusion.

The idea of making these tank units true meatshields by design or ability requires a rebalancing to account for a new element of realism that is not really necessary. If they add any more micro to this game, they may have to pull a CnC 4 and eliminate macro so we can concentrate on all of this micro effectively.

[n00bonicPlague]

And yet, Ultralisks worked just fine as tanks in SC1.

And yet, you waste a perfectly good post by not even bothering to explain to us noobs how they worked just fine as tanks in SC1

[Pandonetho]

Because they did massive damage? 20 damage and a fast attack rate, they had one of the highest DPS in the game, besides the Zergling.

They raped things hard, and soaked damage at the same time. That's why they worked fine as tanks. If you ignore Ultralisks, it doesn't end up very good in your favour.

Also, even if you wanted to ignore them, units tend to target the first thing they see (as that theory was proven by whoever did that test). So, it's going to be impossible to target only Zerglings with all your troops, as a part of your army will always be shooting Ultralisks.

[Krikkitone]

Because they did massive damage? 20 damage and a fast attack rate, they had one of the highest DPS in the game, besides the Zergling.

They raped things hard, and soaked damage at the same time. That's why they worked fine as tanks. If you ignore Ultralisks, it doesn't end up very good in your favour.

Also, even if you wanted to ignore them, units tend to target the first thing they see (as that theory was proven by whoever did that test). So, it's going to be impossible to target only Zerglings with all your troops, as a part of your army will always be shooting Ultralisks.

I think that was the issue, you shot at the Ultralisks... so that you would Stop having to shoot at the Ultralisks.

[Norfindel]

Ultralisks are meatshields in BW and their damage output isn't nothing to write home about. What makes them meatshields, is that once a unit begins to attack them, they're going to be attacking him for a very long time, while the small units do their job. I don't know how the priorities are exactly, but i bet that higher dmg units have higher priority, no matter the real dps they can deal.

In other words, it works already. Good luck trying to force attacking the Zerglings.