Critical Mass: why the Carrier does not work

Can't stay and chat, so I'll get right to the point.

You sure 'bout that? Keep in mind that about four Void Rays are dead by the time they get their first attack off, and, for each Carrier that dies, the Void rays have to start over from the beginning. On top of that, the Void Rays have to take out two Carriers before they stop losing two ships per round of attack.

 

For the Void Rays who are not targeted at first
Start: Void Rays close
Round 1: Void Rays deal 8 Damage
Round 2: Void Rays deal 80 Damage
Round 3: Void Rays deal 176 Damage
Round 4: Void Rays deal 176 Damage, Carrier destroyed

In each Round plus the start, 2.5 Void Rays are destroyed. By Round 4's end, 12.5 Void Rays will be dead, as will 4 Carriers, reducing the loss rate to 1.5 Void Rays.

Status of remaining Carriers at Round 4
Carrier 1: 136 HP/Shields
Carrier 2: 224 HP/Shields
Carrier 3: 224 HP/Shields
Carrier 4: 360 HP/Shields, including recovery
Carrier 5: Full Health, including recovery
Carrier 6: Full Health

Not sure where it goes from there. By Round 9, if none of the Carriers are destroyed, the Void Rays are wiped out. Its dependent on whether or not the Rays targeting the weaker ships are destroyed first.

 

The carrier deals a total of 80 damage (8 interceptors 5x2 with a 10 damage go around at each units which is rather fast and that's more then they used to use) simple put that's why there hard to place because of there high damage output high cost and unique way of attacking there really hard to balance, but as i see it if there not used as support units then they will get demolished if amass because of sc2 focus on the "zerg" way of playing as a players i sent supposed to sit around anymore to build mass defensive structures. (would be a huge loss of materials if 12 where lost).

you must also take into account that most battles won't play out in a 1v1 battle more or less many types verse many types aka more chaotic.


a immortal and a skalker
zealot and a stalker
1 archon 4 stalkers 5 zealots and 3 immortals
3 nullifiers 8 zealots 2 immortals
3 carriers 1 mother ship and 7or 8 phoenixes
2 carriers 3 archons 1 mother ship 4 nullifiers 6 stalkers 10 zealots 4 immortals 2 warp rays 5 phoenix
ect

It all depends on what your using, what your opponent is useing, and i can't see the reason to want to amass the units anymore or at least that's what Blizzard is trying to go for (i hope) and it seems that there going more for the more units way to playing.

Like this for example a player would try to push with his siege tanks a counter to that would be the immortals and also some zealots with a couple of stalkers to blink to take key units out that would try to kill the zealots such as hellions but would have trouble with marauders if they stood back and focuses on the stalkers.

 

The Carrier is not hard to understand. It attacks via 8 Interceptors. Interceptors have 8 Range and may move up to 4 away from the Carrier. Interceptors have an attack that deals 5*2 damage, which has a long cooldown, at least double that of an average unit like a Viking. Hence, in the time that a Viking takes to do 18*2=36 damage, the Carrier deals (5*2*8)/2=40 Damage, after applying reductions for both, the Viking deals 28 Damage and the Carrier deals 32 Damage. In short, the Carrier does only marginally better damage than the Viking when they fight each other, even though the Viking costs 200 resources rather than 650.

Also, I did the math now. 20 Void Rays will beat Carriers if they split into groups of 3 per Carrier. Only 4 Void Rays survive though. Frankly, I suspect that the Carrier fires at less than 1/2 normal rate, and the Void Ray fires at greater than normal rate, but even without it, the Void Ray wins.

Also, frankly, if you build up a fleet of Carriers, assuming your opponent doesn't just raze your base with a conventional army before you hit "critical mass", they will have more time to build up air superiority, and perhaps just raze your Carriers before they're all finished.

Vikings beat Massed Carriers, as do Void Rays. I suspect the same is true of Corruptors. Battlecruisers and Nukes can match them effectively. Motherships can severely screw up massed Carriers but will be less able to do so to the Void Rays, whose focused attack encourages them to spread out.

 

Im not really worried about the carrier its more the colossus that needs the most work out of all the other units and i really don't have a problem about it.

id say get rid of the interceptor cost or lower the cost so when you build the 4 remaining one it equals about 500 550 minerals i think thats something blizz is forgetting about the cost of the interceptors.

I compared the cost to the Thor both have 400 health respectively but at a base cost the carrier without interceptor cost = 550 (with interceptors 650) and the thor costs 500 minerals
the thor can be brought back to life and the carrier has 150 health that regens in about 1:30 seconds give or take and without scourge and other protoss abilities its easier to save one from dieing.

id always have like 4-7 phoenixes with them because there very cheap (something different then in sc1 the phoenix is a better sub because of it cost) so that will defiantly help with there anti grav ability.

Im not worried just needs a bit of balancing of the cost personally and i think people are looking at it like it used to be but its probably going to have a different role then it did in sc1.

Also remember the ground force and warp in works, so this means they won't have to rely on there air force as much as the other factions.