Thor vs Siege Tanks

So we have all unseen and most of us have used Siege tanks in the original Starcraft and we have now seen more of the Thor. Enough I think to start figuring out strategies at least alpha stage strategies.

The siege tank is quick moving and able to have a decent cannon that can rotate and kill vehicles and infantry in a decent matter of time. It can deploy into a howitzer that has te longest range and splash damage in the whole game and is able to suppress ground units and hammer bases into the ground if left unchecked. It fired rather slowly but the massive damage it does makes up for this as does the splash damage that an take out a whole infantry formation in one shot. A tank can be put two per dropship an ferried rapidly to a destination. There is a minimum range in siege mode that allows you to get in close and kill it without risking units or at the very least get the tanks to kill each other with the splash damage. The siege tank is also lower in the tech tree so is good for faster tactics

The Thor is big expensive but is undoubtedly the most powerful unit on the battlefield but with the reaver gone is also probably the slowest. It has two railguns that can take out singular units quickly but seems to lack the larger splash of the tank. Also the turn rate is atrocious so fast moving units spell its doom. So far no minimum damage has been mention but with those big guns it isn't hard to imagine it having one. It can hit the air which the tank cannot which gives it a one up on the tank and it might be a good GTA against capitol ships assuming you can catch one. The shining aspect of the Thor however is the bombard ability. This can takeout a command center in a matter of seconds better than a nuke can and the duration is a few seconds so it makes for better suppression fire than the siege tank due to sheer volume of fire. Also as of yet there is no know mobility option for getting it through the air but if there is it is bound to be slow for balance reasons. It is the end of the tree so is hard to get but is worth it if you can stick to the build path and not sacrifice tech level for earlier lower power units

The question now is "What will you use and how will you use it now?"

The Thor with its undeniable power and ability to level a building and suppress better than any other unit yet lack of mobility
The tank for its diversity and mobility while still maintaining a decent firepower and attack rate.
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I am more of a teacher and prefer to get a few high power units so I will probably tech up to the Thor. I will do what I can to build it outside of an enemies base and will make good use of it to take out clusters of defenses. Terrans will build a wall of depots easily taken out by bombard allowing me to bring in units. Zerg and 'toss usually cluster defenses to make room for units to pas and these clusters will make prime targets for a bombard and any pylons and leftover defenses will be short lived at the end of my railguns. Also the heart of any base is the command building take this out and no more gathering there plus no more unit production for the Zerg so I will take that out with the next bombard while Banshees take care of the smaller units that threaten the Thor once the CC is down the railguns will make short work of the production and tech buildings

 

In most games, I doubt that you'll ever tech up to the Thor. Many times an attack early in the game is more successful than an attack later in the game. I wouldn't say that the Thor's bombard ability is a huge plus. Due to its energy recharge, it will probably be never used in a game more than once or twice per Thor. We don't know how strong the bombardment is, either. In the demo, they used a special cutscene thing to show off the ability, and chances are they made the command center blow up on its own and not from the bombard alone. The bombard may be able to take out lesser buildings such as turrets, bunkers, possibly barracks, but probably not a CC. Mid-game is Terran's strongest point. A large percentage of Terran wins are during mid-game. While a Thor is certainly a good unit, the only thing it has that I really like better than a siege tank is its health. Even so, although the Thor has immense health, it still won't be as good of a unit in most situations as the tank. My best plan would be to start out with siege tanks, and if the game gets into late-game, tech to Thors and use them to support my tanks, but not the other way around.

 

Ideally if the game is balanced right it should take an equall amount of effort to win in the end as in the beginning perhaps less not the other way around sinc late game is when you get all the units and tech than hit hard.

 

Not necessarily, since the strengths of the units in each stage of the game for each race are different, a certain race has the upper hand in certain stages of the game. Generally speaking, it's Zerg for early game, Terran for mid game, and Protoss for late game. When you get to late game the other races get all the units too, but they might be stronger/weaker than those of other races.

 

I'l start by just listing stats from blizzcon

food damage (vs armoured) cooldown range hp cost
Siege Tank 3 100 4 seconds 12 200 200mins/125gas
Thor 6 aprox 40 2 seconds unknown 700 300mins/300gas

If you need high firepower than siege tank is the winner, Thor just soaks up damage like the ultralisk

 

is the damage you listed for the thor is the normal attack? how about the artillery strike of the thor? i think its 5x more powerful than the siege tank.

anyway i love the thor. ^^

thor>all other starcraft 2 units.

 

the 40damage is for its double laser attack. I've got no idea how much artillery does, but seeing as it was designed to be used against tough targets like planetary fortress its probably the most powerfull ability other than plague.

 

yup, i think artillery strike is quite a base devastating attack but no 1 really knows if the command center was full in hp or already damaged.. that makes the thor a terrifying unit to face with if that really is its bombarding ability....

dont you guys think thats the thors quite abit affordable for its porpose?? i mean its just like having 2 siege tanks.. and 2 tanks cost a lil more but IMO is quite weaker than a single thor..

 

i believe i will use the Thor as a blockade breaker,because i believe artillery strike has a pretty long range.i will use the siege tank for the other things.

 

personally i believe thor is just a gimmick to please the new and somewhat younger fans, most experienced sc players i've talked to are not excited about the thor because they know unless there's dramatic overhaul, it won' be used much in competitive games

 

The Thor will come in handy to for stopping large clusters of enemys to, like when a Zerg opponent stars a Zergling rush or two at your base, you just bombard the entrance while they are already moving, this will maybe sestroy a bunker or two, but you will probably kill dozens if Zerglings in the process without sending a single unit to the rushing units.
But using it for taking out enemies base defences like others have sayd before rulez to of course.

And when you say that the Thor is just for younger fans to let them thinck "oh this rockzzzz", then what about the collosus and the mothership, I bet most people would like to see the coolest units at the most advanced side. :-/

 

i don't think the Thor is not just there to please the younger fans.i am sure it has it's uses,and that it can be useful.we just have to wait and see...

 

Hopefully that will be the case as i really don't want the thor (or any of the units) to turn into another over priced, 80% of the time useless ultralisk......

 

i would use both for better strategy just to get pwned by immortals

the question is...how will you use them?

 

Well i guess i would use them in an assault force late game by bringing along 1 or 2 and maybe 3 if i feel like it and they would be supported by a marine medic and viking group. So basicly i use them as a late game version of the tank (assuming it isn't over priced in minerals and gas)

 

The thor takes 8 supply and has 900 hp.

900hp. Thats the HP of two Ultralisks + 100 hp more. Any ideas ?

Thor is the best tank in the game, it can absorb ridiculous amounts of damage, and will most likely be supported by nano repair and SCV repair, making it a great tank and probably the greatest tank.

So the way i'll use the thor is like you would use an immortal, get it in first to take the damage, and then send the rest of the army. Its also a tank, and a command building destroyer + it deals good damage.

 

900 HP!

Well that changes things.....

 

It's pretty obvious that the Thor is going to be both a strength and a weakness for the Terran.

He's going to give you an immense strategic advantage as soon as he comes in range of a major enemy bottleneck, but until he reaches that point he is going to be a major liability because of the requirements necessary just to keep him alive. He's going to tie up a lot of units in keeping him safe. So the Thor will really only have a very few possible uses.

One will be heavy base defense, and the other will be taking out massed units at an enemy bottleneck. At all times in between these uses, the Thor will be a difficult adversary, but will also be a huge burden to players who use him. He will be even more vulnerable if given the liftoff ability as we've suggested.

 

Remember though immortal shielding can only take so much pounding I am sure bombard would take them out.  Also we don't know if the Thor activates their shields.  If it is calculated as two strikes of 20 instead of one strike of 40 it might not even activate the hardened shield and thus would make it very effective against Immortals.

Also as I have stated it takes a few seconds for bombard complete so it makes a great suppression technique that you can use to contain units to a part of the map by doing things such as bombarding a choke while your unis move into position

I can see the Thor as one of the units that will separate skill levels because an unskilled player just won't be able to control the Thor effectively

 

I believe that you want thors built somewhat close to the enemy base. Around the middle of the map or so, and it really isnt THAT slow moving forward.