[faithHunter]

I've been wondering why Carriers aren't that much used compared to back then in BW, I mean, they're more or less the same right? In fact, SC2 Carriers come out with 4 Interceptors by default and they can also be upgraded with the Interceptor Speed upgrade, so they should be better compared to their BW counterpart right?

I think the main reason why Carriers are so underused, or rather, isn't viable is because they are too easily countered by other units (e.g. Focus Firing Vikings, Voids, Corruptors...Marines?). But I don't play Protoss so I'm not so sure.

Might I add, inControl said in SOTG that the Carriers are, in his opinion, much weaker in SC2 than BW because you can't attack and focus fire on a target with Interceptors and make the Carrier retreat while the interceptors keep on firing even though the Carrier is out of attack range, since in SC2 if the Carrier goes out of range of the Interceptors, the Interceptors will fly back to the Carriers.

Thoughts?

[iVnStinger]

Yeah, so far only HongUn has been able to use em effectively. (I think) I guess maybe it's cause they don't deal enough damage till large numbers? And getting there takes time? I honestly not sure.

But as IdrA said in BW "Making carriers is a good skill toi have".

[Bash]

They're easily countered and from what i've heard they micro completely differently.
They're also hugely expensive compared to other, more useful units.

[Cute]

HongUn would've won that game in GSL with or without Carriers (if we're thinking of the same game)

It comes down to the fact that the Collosus (or bane of ESPORTS as its affectionately called) fills the same role, just better and its cheaper and builds quicker. + Toss is almost forced down the robo path for detection. Why would you make a carrier if you can have collosi?

[ROOTPetraeus]

White Ra has also used them effectively. I personally see a lot of potential for them in the ZvP matchup.

[Stallion]

Originally Posted by Petraeus

White Ra has also used them effectively. I personally see a lot of potential for them in the ZvP matchup.

where do you see the potential in them? the only time you can really make carriers atm is when you have the game won and generally you lose from it :P

[FaDeBadger]

Originally Posted by cruxStallion

where do you see the potential in them? the only time you can really make carriers atm is when you have the game won and generally you lose from it :P

I've heard carriers are like ultras. You only build them when you are so far ahead that even building them won't kill you.

[asdfSchnitzel]

I did a build for a while vs zerg to counter muta ling: 9 gate 2 carrier all in. It worked well for a while, until someone good beat it :> lol

[TCPLemminks]

I think it's the lack of AOE. Carriers actually have higher dps that Colossus, however Colo's have an AOE attack, which is invaluble considering that toss's often go up against large armies.

Liquidpedia states that it's because its hard to safely transition into them. However I think that if the Mothership is used for defensive purposes (i.e. getting your 3rd up and running) Carriers could be a possibility.

I recommend reading the liquidpedia page on carriers. But imo it's the lack of AOE, cost, and how easy it is to counter. That and interceptors don't have a lot of HP and it takes too long to build them.

[Meatex]

caerriers aren't that bad especially in PvZ

but i agree that given how strong colossus are there isn't a reason to not get them or rather get carriers over them.

[TCPKiaSu]

I've seen huk use carriers with storm and warprisms to demolish a terran once!

[Saberaus]

Im going to say carriers are still no skill at all lol

[nirvAnA]

i think its because sc1 didnt have that many "hard counters" for carriers that sc2 has. also in sc1 carriers could be "microed", the interceptors coudl still attack while u ran ur carriers away and they didnt die so easily

for terrans u had to get goliaths and for zerg mass hydra

in sc2 even marines/hydras beat carriers cause of the shitty interceptors lol! then u still have vikings and corruptors, both of which are easily produced.

[KAshadowz]

the aoe of other units allows them to be more useful than carriers, if they could be microed like nirvana said they would also be much more useful

[fray`Alpha]

I use Carriers in Most of my PvZ (I'm in Diamond League).

I think the main 2 reasons protoss dont like using them are as people have said:

1. Collosus do everything the carrier can do but do it better,
2. Too many hard counters to them (my biggest issue their is marines and vikings)

[Easy]

-Interceptors fly out of the carrier one at the time , in brood war they would all fly out the same time and that buys you some seconds.
-really slow to mass them up
-When carrier gets away of vision of the attacked unit interceptors come back to the carrier.
-They are expensive
-You can mostly end the game before you can mass up carriers unless you do a really weird build that will lead you to loose if the opponent knows how to play.

[Loach]

u really do need quite a few of them to make it effective.. like to the point where they their opponent cant target them down too easily.. in numbers, with a ground force to protect them a little (a bit like an army to protect BL's, but more of an army as interceptors dont block anything) they r ridiculously powerful. but i dont think that there is a use to getting carriers when u can get more COST EFFECTIVE units.

[DtorR]

Just poorly designed in my opinion. If interceptors could remain to target units until destroyed while the carrier can move freely then it might have some place. However there are a lot of units that can simply destroy them with ease.

[inFeZa]

There was a HUGE and fantastic well written post on the carrier on Teamliquid.
I think it is VERY relevant for this thread and accurate.

The Carrier Flaws
First I'll enumerate each problem and then I'll start building the arguments.
1. The carrier is too slow to build.
2. The carrier is not micro friendly.
3. The carrier is the most dependent unit on upgrades and hit hardest by enemy upgrades.
4. The carrier is too easy to counter.
5. The carrier's role and weaknesses seem to overlap that of other units
6. The carrier's interceptors are too fragile.
Now to put things into perspective.

1 Carrier is too slow to build

To give you an idea just how slow it is, in the time it takes to build a carrier without chrono you can almost build 6 vikings from a single reactored Starport. And even with chrono you can still get 4 vikings, which is more than adequate defense versus Carriers.

For zerg, in the time it takes to make carriers they can build dozens of corrupters thanks to the larva mechanic.

To put it into perspective, the build speed is so slow that, even the Tempest, the replacement for the carrier is supposed to have a build time of 70 seconds without chrono, and even the Battlecruiser, which started life in SC2 with a build time of 110 seconds quickly came down to 90 seconds.

Another way some people have approached this was trying to hide 4-5 SG and the Fleet Beacon, so they can get their carriers out in a reasonable amount of time. The downside to this is, the very big logistics needed. The SG cost 150 M & 150 G each, unless you have integrated protoss air into your build in some way you need to invest between 600/600 and 750/750 just to get the buildings, then another 300/200 for the fleet beacon. You'll also need to be on 4 bases for sure to have enough chrono boost to build all the carriers in a reasonable amount of time.
And on top of that you need to invest 350/250 per carrier per SG for a total of 2100/1500.

Not to mention that you'll have between 24 to 30 supply stuck for at least 90 seconds doing nothing, at a time in the game when each and every supply is vital to stay alive. I doubt protoss can hold of any army with that kind of a supply deficit. And if you lose all your army you lost your support for the carriers. And on top of that you'll have no chrono to support the rest of your army because it is required for the carrier.

In PvZ, against a mostly zerg ground army, it could be a roach, infestor composition that people still like, with maybe a sprinkle or zerglings and swarm hosts come HoTS. This composition could either be from the zerg player's choosing, or forced upon the zerg because of heavy use of a GW army from the protoss.

In this case, the Protoss has a window of time where he can do damage with Carriers if he had them. The carriers are slightly better vs this army then colossus, because they hard counters ground units, and they don't become vulnerable if all of a sudden forcefields are nullified or sentries get destroyed. The downside is, carriers can't be microed (I'll get to that in the next part), which leaves them open to being neural parasited and, if even one of them is spotted, then the zerg has all the time in the world to get enough anti-air and upgrades for when he will have to face the carrier threat.

Against a mech terrain in HoTS carriers could be another response, however the downside here is that, the carriers need to be massed to do any good, and again by the time you can get enough, you'll most likely be destroyed by the terran's timing push.

So there is no doubt about it, the unit is just too slow to build which allows a vast amount of time to counter them, or costs too much with too big of a logistics requirement if you want to power mass them fast.

2 The Carrier is not micro friendly

This is something more related to the AI of interceptors, how they worked in BW and how they work in SC2.

Basically in BW the carrier had the same range as in SC2, the main difference was that when interceptors where launched, they would continue attacking for a couple of seconds even after the carrier was issued a move command.

This is what ultimately made carriers such a loved and interesting unit in BW, you could micro them back and forth, across cliffs and chasms, keep them alive while inflicting punishment.

Let us remember that, even in Brood War, carriers, if you just A-moved them into a group of Goliaths, Hydras or Marines, would still die horribly. The difference between terrible carriers and incredible carriers came down to how well people could control them. There was a gradient of skill on using carriers in BW and that is always a good thing, it makes for exciting games when players can make the most out of their units and sometimes defy the odds based on how good their control is, it helps people shine when they have legendary control as opposed to someone who only has good/average control.

In SC2 that kind of AI doesn't exist, the interceptors return to the carrier immediately once you issue a move command, which makes carriers very un-interesting. They are basically just a big A move unit, and they are very easy to kite since you can hardly ever micro them.

In the current state of the game, a surprising amount of units can be microed, either they have a fast attack animation and turn rate, or they have some sort of ability that makes micro easy.

Marines and Marauders are great to micro because of stutter step thanks to the fast attack speed and turn rate, however Stalkers are equally great to micro thanks to blink. It is a bit unfortunate that Roaches aren't microed as well as they could be given the potential with burrow-heal, but the potential is there. Mutalisks are great to micro, not only for hit and run but also to magic box against the dreaded thor. Vikings can be microed well thanks to their long range.

Helions and Zerglings can be microed too, mostly because of their speed, even if it sounds odd, think of those hit and run scenarios where zerglings run in, do some small damage and then run out before they can die, especially in ZvZ, think of how zerglings can be pulled out just before they die when fighting zealots.

In short, this problem makes carriers a very boring, no skill and no depth unit and continues the trend of making them easy to kite and counter, this is the same reason why we all hated the tempest when we first saw it.

3 The Carrier is the unit dependent most on upgrades

The carrier has 8 interceptors, each interceptor has two attacks of 5 damage, that is a total damage output of 80, with an attack speed of 3. So the DPS is actually 26.6. It isn't too bad, the DPS of a Battlecruiser is very similar at 24. It is also more burst at fist which is good for hit and run.

However this leads to a problem, upgrade scaling. Each upgrade level improves each attack of the interceptor by 1, the damage from interceptor goes from 5 to 6, two attack. So a total of 96 damage. As you can see each upgrade improves the total damage of the carrier by 16, and raises the DPS by approximately 5.33.

However the reverse is equally true, for each armor upgrade the enemy gets damage of the carrier goes down by 16 and the DPS goes down equally.

This might not seem bad out of context since you will want to upgrade the carrier like any unit you get.

However, when you think about it, the carrier comes into the game at a time when most armies are running on 3/3 upgrades and at the very least 2/2. And to make it even worst, the carrier requires its own set of upgrades, which is a problem given that, in the current meta-game the rest of protoss air is hardly viable and its usually not worth getting.

So in most cases the carrier already comes from behind, the protoss needs to time things out in such a way that his +2 or +3 air attack comes out at about the same time the enemy's +2 or +3 armor and about the same time as the carrier comes out. All of this is hard to do and requires a steep investment given the viability of air at the moment.

Now this is mostly a meta-game problem, it is brought by the fact that in most MU's protoss air isn't viable, or its viable only for short periods of time, too short to warrant upgrades. It is unfortunate because this scaling is a bit of a unique characteristic of the unit and one of the things that makes it interesting.

4 The carrier is to easy to counter

This is, in a way the result and summary of all the above points but also merits its own discussion because of the counter units of the carrier, and their role in the meta-game.
The hard counters to the carrier are, vikings and corrupters and the soft counters are marines and hydras.

PvT
Viking
Range 9, acceleration 2.625, top speed 2.75. Those are the only stats that actually matter, because of the following thing stats of the carrier - speed 1.875 acceleration 1.063.

As you can see the viking out-ranges the carrier by just enough to hit and run, and they also move fast enough that carriers can't keep up. This is the same as Vikings vs Battlecruisers, Vikings have just enough range and are just fast enough that they can absolutely decimate BC.

In the case of the Viking, with proper micro you can take out carriers while taking minimal losses, and this is compounded by the problems noted above, like the interceptor AI problem, the upgrade problem and the production problem.

While marines have smaller attacks that are slightly less effective vs carrier base 2 armor, you must remember that marines by this point in the game will get at least+ 2 attack and +3 most likely or very soon while protoss are hard pressed to get weapon damage and armor upgrades are harder to come by.

Marines attack speed with stim is also great. However what marines counter hardest is interceptors.

The attack speed and damage from upgrades, combined with the lack of shield and armor upgrades for protoss air results in interceptors dying absurdly fast and then rendering the carrier useless and vulnerable. This also goes back into the problem with interceptor AI and them not getting healed when they return to the carrier.
However this also goes into a deeper problem, a meta-game problem.

In the current meta-game marines and vikings are all standard play for terrans. Bio terran is currently the only viable way for terran to play versus Protoss, which means they will always get marines, one of the easiest ground units to counter carrier. And because marines and marauders are very light on gas, the terran is free to spend his gas appropriately on medivac and viking. Viking is a core part of the terran army because of its anti-colossus capabilities.

PvZ
Corrupter
HP 200, armor 2, attack speed 1.9, damage 14+6 vs massive, speed 2.953 acceleration 2.625. Corruption +20% damage for 30 seconds.
The HP 200 and armor 2 are the real deal here. Because of interceptor attack mechanics the corrupters are really hard to kill, and with armor upgrades they become very resilient. Corrupters also scale very good from attack upgrades vs massive, getting +2 per upgrade. With Corruption the DPS output vs massive of the Corrupter can even out scale the Viking.

Because of larva mechanics zerg can re-max faster than protoss, if carriers lose their escort and they are left alone vs corrupters they lose badly. Cost effectively though the corrupter isn't so good, at 150/150, however given how zerg armies tend to be more mineral heavy for the lower tiers this can be balanced out somewhat towards the mid to late game and depending how many bases the zerg secures.

Hydras are in the same boat as marines regarding their interaction with carriers, they do double the damage of marines but they attack slower which balances them out. The hydras are even less affected by the carrier base armor because of their higher damage, and they become deadlier with attack upgrades and the lack of armor upgrades from carriers. And again because of their damage output and speed the hydra counters interceptors.

This is another meta-game problem. Currently protoss air, actually encourages the exact follow up units they want to avoid if they go carrier. A protoss air pressure with phoenix and void ray backed up by warp prism and sentry FF, can be very deadly on its own, but it can be held. If the zerg holds, the primary way they do so is with hydra and then adds roaches for an attack. The protoss knows he has forced hydra so he transitions out of air play into colossus, the zerg, knowing this, transitions into corrupter, which is a great follow up because it both counters colossus and sets up for the brood lord follow up.

The biggest problem here is that, Carriers are countered by some of the most common units in the meta-game. Marines are the backbone of terran armies in a lot of situations and match-ups. Vikings are practically a requirement due to the current meta-game being bio oriented vs protoss.

As for zerg, while the hydra wasn't the most popular unit for a long time it has started to make a comeback in certain strategies and as a response to certain builds. Same as the corrupter, in most cases the corrupter is a natural transition for zerg armies so they can later get brood lords.

5 The carrier's roles and weaknesses seems to overlap that of other units

I think people, to a large extent, see the carrier as a sort of ultimate late game tech unit, and because it is so late game it must share the same role as the colossus and so the two cancel each other out. This isn't entirely true, while carriers and colossus do share some similarities, when you look at them in depth you'll find they are worlds apart, and I'll talk more about that later on.

However to a large extent the very hard counter of colossus, the viking and the corrupter are also hard counters for the carrier. This is a big problem because the protoss has almost no opportunity to make a viable tech switch to Carrier.

Terrans need to get Vikings by default because of colossus, which also works in handy against warp prism micro and hard counters carriers.
Corrupter is a natural choice for late game zerg to transition into Brood lords later.

Given the current meta-game this doesn't look like it will change.

The role of the carrier might seem like it over-lapses that of the Void Ray as well. Void rays could be used to wreck terran mech or zerg ground. However this is mostly a result of how poorly the carrier was handled till now.

With some changes the carrier could fit a newer more interesting role that is distinct from both that of void rays and colossus. However in its current state it just doesn't deliver.

I assure you, this problem is actually not as large as you may think, this is something that could fix itself a long with the fixing of the carrier in the points I touched upon above, and along with a meta-game shift.

The biggest issue here is the meta-game, it is just too one dimensional in regards of PvT, and PvZ in the late game, however this won't always be so.

6 The carrier's interceptors are too fragile

Another key change that took place in the transition from BW to SC2 was the removal of the interceptor's heal once they returned to the carrier. Basically interceptors where always weak to marines and hydra's, even in BW, but at least they could be healed once they returned to the carrier. And they needed to be healed since they also spent more time fighting due to the different AI as explained in point 3.

Also note, the HP and shields of interceptors have not changed from BW to SC2. Interceptors have 40 HP and 40 Shields. However they did have 4 range. This 4 range was important because interceptors would spread out more and be less vulnerable against splash and be more easily protected.

If carriers could be microed the way they used to in BW, then interceptors would spend more time fighting, however if they spent lots of time fighting they take damage and eventually get destroyed.

I believe that given how fragile interceptors are, if the game where to drag on long enough after carriers were made, the costs to maintain the interceptor fleet could outweigh the benefits of the carrier, the costs could ramp up way beyond what you payed to get carriers.

A carrier costs 350 minerals and comes with only 4 interceptors, so you need to invest another 25 minerals per interceptor to make the max 8 that the carrier can hold. Now, if you lose all interceptors from say 6 carriers, you just lost almost 50% of the value of the carrier, or 1200 minerals. If you lose all interceptors again you lost a bit more than 100% the value of the carrier, or 2400 minerals and so on.

Interceptors absolutely need some extra survivability, it is bad enough that you wait a long time to get carriers, you don't want to have to wait another two minutes to re-max on interceptors.

I think this cost is too prohibitive on the carrier, a unit that already takes too long to build and is too easy to counter with not enough ways to micro. There is no equivalent in game to this

Quick Comments

	faithHunter:	Very informative post! Thx mate :D
	EXCL:

[Synizta]

Only time i personally find carriers useful is late PvT, if for some reason the terran decides go full on mech, and they don't have any vikings left/stopped producing, even then that's only not at a Masters/GrandMasters level, so of course carriers will sometimes be useful for lower non-pro levels of play.

But i can't comment on a pro/high level of play, but if there is a use, i see it being VERY situational tbh, but as i said, difficult to micro, so many easy counters.

I would love to see a strat that can be used consistantly at most levels of play with carriers, but fairly unlikely, more so with the removal of carriers in HoTS. ah well.

Edit; also sorry if my post isn't QUITE on target for the thread. =O