A Tale of Two Turtles
You’ve sent out your SCV to do a little scouting. You’ve found your opponent, and he or she is fortifying heavily. You’re doing the same, focusing on building structures, protecting your entry points, and placing anti-air units at all the right locations. Your base is covered from all angles. Occasionally, there’s a skirmish in the middle of the map or around the edges of your bases, but no one seems to be pushing outside of their comfort zone. You look at the clock and realize -- this isn’t going to be as quick of a game as you had originally thought….
It’s easy to get caught up in a game of turtle vs. turtle, with both players choosing to build and mass up units, but that may not always amount to a quick or exciting match. It's understandable that newer players might feel apprehension about leaving their base to go after an opponent or trying riskier pushes while simultaneously learning build orders, unit counters, and more. It feels safe within the confines of the base, and there's less to manage. While a viable strategy at times, getting too comfortable in a base can also invoke a false sense of security. There are benefits to sitting tight and letting your opponent waste resources and units against your defenses, but there are also some risks such as being penned in with waning resources and units.
We thought we’d start a series of conversations around the types of matches players experience when playing head-to-head. What are some of the pros and cons of turtling and what advice would you give to those who are finding it difficult to break out of their comfort zone?
Comments (933)
Terran: Siege tanks + Scan the high ground
Zerg: Broodlords + Corruptors
Protoss: Voidrays/Carriers/Blink stalkers
Easy counters to terran turtle would be blink stalkers + void rays
Well... as I write this, I don't think this will happen, because your oppenent would come out as soon as his expansion(s) blows up or he sees your tank seige, so I recommend you make your own turtle(not too big) just in case
There is no such thing as in a 'perfect defense'----if it is built by humans, it ain't perfect! There HAS to be a hole in it!
And if there's none I'll punch one into it.
i didnt know about it though
walling and turtling are different.
But here is why turtling is bad... you give up map control. If you are stuck in one base, you have a 0% chance of beating a player with 3 bases. Fast expand or not, if I see a player turtling, I know I have map control, and will go for at least 3 bases and at least win through attrition.
Lower rank players: learn how to defend rushes. This may seem like turtling, but it is really not. Once you are comfortable at blocking or stopping early rushes, then work on map control. This is the single biggest difference I found as I moved up through the ranks. Silver and lower dont seem to take much advantage of map control.
tl:dr : wall off, learn how to defend rushes. After this, it is all about map control, and if you have one base and your opponent has 3 you will always lose.
I normally agree, but I played a game last night (although I was not trying to turtle) I was held to my base. Every time I tried to expand I was countered; zerg are just TOO fast sometimes and can replenish troops quickly. I won that game with just my main base while my zerg opponent had 4 bases at his peak. Because i was able to out kill my opponent, I eventually broke him in-spite of all of his bases. The thing I have found in this game is: There is NEVER any one strat that will guarantee victory. You have to be able to adjust to the circumstance and no matter HOW powerful your opponent is, there is ALWAYS a hole in the armor. If you watch replays on every loss I have had, I almost always see a way I "could have won" despite the dire circumstances. So, DONT give up...Play to the last man, remember usually they are leaving themselves open while they are attacking you or controlling a particular part of the map.
Certainly, there are plenty of times when a player gets overconfident from having that economic advantage and ends up losing the game. It's good to hold out to see if they make such critical mistakes. But any win you get under those circumstances, it's because they let you. Don't always hope for them to give you that win.
Never get a chance to turtle :(
Don't bank resources, spend them for an even better economy, army, etc. Keep your army on the move, keep a couple attacking units in your bases in cases of drops.
Turtling only worsens your chances of winning in the lower-tier ladder matches. During the early non-ranked matches, I always scouted at the start using a reaper. If the opponent seems to be good, I do a quick turnaround and go for a fast expansion since there're plenty of destructible rocks to slow the other player down. Usually, for newer players, an easy goal would be to get to around 40/43 supply at 5 minutes in the game (faster speed) if you went a tech-build.
Remember, (this is a quote from the SAT site:) practice makes perfect, so perfect your practice!
Usually turtle players leave some spot undefended or have a considerably weaker angle. I currently always play as Protoss which gives me the advantage of having a wider array of invading options.
But when they don´t, when they have turrets everywhere or react fast with they air units to counter my attacks, then it gets interesting.
I love deploying a blockade to a turtle player to prevent their expansion. Having a small force to prevent this while expanding yourself to the rest of the map usually ends up in a win.