Turtles in RTS. Best tactic?

[Wolvaroo]

Turtling is only viable against AI in most situations. The only time it has ever served me well vs another human is in CoH victory point control. British are a hard nut to crack early with thier trenches. This also forces your opponent to invest in flame throwers and/or grenades for 0 resource cost to yourself.

 

[Kiahl]

My favorite tactic back in the old RTS days of C&C: Crapload of infantry and a couple of engineers, use the infantry as diversion, then steal their Construction Yard and destroy vehicle factory. BAM! ***** is useless now if you can keep him from taking a construction yard.

Then you can play SimCity: NOD edition

 

[Nikolaz72]

Except. In Dawn of War i usually play 2 v 2 with a friend trying to fend both off while i build an army then attack the weakest of the opponents (Looking at you Mr-Tau/Imperial/Eldar/Chaos) While avoiding stronger stuff like Necron/Orcs/Spacemarine savin it for later. Once i got a Librarian/Forcecommander and some reasonable vehicles that can easily take out most stuff. Plus the fact it doesnt cost a lot so if needed you can defend too.

So are we allowed talking twoplayer battle or just single Turlte V Rusher?

If the later im the steamrolling guy. Focus Tech and Army. Let Resources and Defense come in secondspot.

On a sidenote. Im Spacemarine and the friend is usually Eldar. Which means that if we are actually beaten it will be another 90 min before the foe gets his actual win!

(Nik thinks that DoW is more balanced than starcraft anyhow)

 

[zutagonecver]

I hate turtilg with a passion. It encourages slow, boring gameplay and theres no micro or skill invlolved on the turtlers part whatsoever.

Some games you cant turtle effectively like Company of Heroes. I swear to god the American infantry commander was designed to stop turtling. Anytime you try to build up a good defence, block off routes etc they just build a 105 howitzer and smash them to bits rom across the map.

Real turtling is obsolete in competitive CoH matches and countring a Medbunker camper is not that hard. Unless ofcourse you like playing on maps like The Scheltd, Viere River or any other Noob-fest map with 1 or 2 natural choke points that are insanely easy to defend.

BTW, here is a cool article http://www.gamereplays.org/portals.php?show=page&name=3-easy-ways-to-tell-youre-an-rts-noob

 

[Drefanator]

I miss turtling, it doesn't happen as well or as effectively as it used to in older RTS's like AoE/AoM, or WC2. The newer ones, involve rushing, small attacks that annoy your opponent, til you widdle them down. Their not made for those hour long epics. One major reason is the lack of the ability to build a wall around your base, yes SC2(the most recent rts) has the higher ground/ramps that make it easy to block off, but it's still not effective.

I used to love turtling, and now that I can't do it (as effectively), I've kind of stayed clear of RTS's.

 

[Nunny]

If your getting beaten easily when turtleing your doing things wrong.

 

[Nikolaz72]

I doesn't work in Total War. I was playing Rome online a long while back (before everyone's armies became the exact same) and came across a Greek player who had all of there hoplites in a circle around their archers. It was easy to see what his plan was, shoot me to death until I sent my dudes into his hoplites who would keep my men away with their spears. Unable to break the line of spears and get to the squishy people behind them, I would be defeated.
Problem is, it didn't work. I shot his dudes to death, then my army plowed through the few remaining goons. Why didn't it work? HERE [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuJXms-rgh8] isa video I found that explains it better than I.

Turtling works in build-type RTS like C&C or Supreme Commander, but not games like Total War were you have to use what you have and that is all you have.

Depends what Total War and what Map and what Units. Just because you played a Greek V Random and owned him in his own little square doesnt mean that a say.. Brittish Canon couldn't kill a regiment of French Lineinfantry from a far range or a castle with archers could not withstand a battering or two.

 

[Crazyshak48]

or 4. which I see most of the time, is "turtle until I lose".. or the "Hope for Allied Victory"

Lols if they do that, they've lost already in my mind.

The most important part of a proper turtling strategy (and I probably should have mentioned this) is knowing when and where to expand to, and when to go on the offensive. When you expand to a new resource zone, do so deliberately and install defenses there. They don't have to hold off the whole world, but they just have to hold long enough for reinforcements to arrive. Perform regular reconaissance, and adjust your plans accordingly.

I think it's also important to note that turtling doesn't necessarily mean staying exclusively in your starting zone. it just means picking your expansion points and fortifying them heavily. If someone turtles but doesn't leave their starting area, then you're quite right; they will most often lose. However, that's an indictment of the player not the strategy. I play defensive, and in many cases I win. I'm not super-badass, but I do well enough to think that turtling is viable.

 

[Crazyshak48]

I would define my style of RTS play as "teching" not "turtling". "Turtle" I have always understood to be a defensive style of play, relying on outward defenses and not engaging the enemy. "Teching" however, I believe to be about intentionally not engaging the enemy for a certain amount of time, until research has been done, resources have been collected and an army of superior units can be produced. It's playing smarter, not harder, and is often less wasteful of resourcs.

For instance, I play Supreme Commander; Forged Alliance with my boyfriend. He's a rusher, I'm a techer. He regularly runs out of resources and needs me to back him up. I will support him, and then when I am ready, will regularly single-handedly destroy all remaining enemy units. It's not to say either tactic is better; in fact we work best together and in a multiplayer situation are often nearly unstoppable with our rush/tech approach.

Some RTS games are more suited to teching than others. Warzone, Forged Alliance (actually, ALL the Supreme Commander games), and Age of Empires are among the most tech-friendly. Among the less would probably be C&C games and Starcraft.

I big time agree with your first paragraph. Typically when I refer to turtling, I think of what you refer to as teching. I suppose it's more a question for each of us in what we think of as turtling: Your "Teching", or sitting back and never engaging or expanding at all (aka suicide). I think we can agree the former is effective, the latter is not.

BTW, you get major style points for knowing about Warzone 2100 One of my favorite RTS games ever. I still want to punch out Eidos for putting Pumpkin Studios out of business, but that's life in the industry I suppose.

 

[MeltedGeneral]

I usually turtle long enough till I get some useful units to rush and win. My friend couldn't rush me early on in a Red Alert 3 match since my base had almost zero weak points. Rushed him after a bit and just realized he water turtled.

I believe the turtle fest lasted a few minutes before he rushed me and won.

 

[Nouw]

Company Of Heroes turtling is very easy. Just build mines, wires and Machine Gun Emplacements and slowly push forward.

 

[Jazzyluv2]

this is seriously stupid, if a game is so shallow that simple turtling wins games on high level(no one here is high level) then i dont even want to waste my time with it.

 

[NeutralDrow]

To be honest, I tend to rely more on boom tactics than turtle tactics (in other words, focusing on extensive economic and technological development, rather than defense-building). In other words, if you go by the somewhat oversimplified rock-paper-scissors arrangement, I have an easier time countering turtlers, but tend to be vulnerable to rushing. Which is why I also tend to favor static defense: it offers some measure of protection while still leaving my hands free to micromanage my economy over my military.

This is much more noticeable in the Age of Empires games, admittedly. I'm not all that fond of RTSs all told (including Starcraft), but AoE and Dune 2000 are a couple of the exceptions.

 

[IxionIndustries]

I like turtling, but in Starcraft and Starcraft 2, it's hard as shit to do..

But yeah, turtling is a good tactic in my opinion, and it's one I try to do a lot of the time, since I like building up my cities and whatnot, however, I seem to suck at it.

 

[Yokai]

I find turtling far more acceptible than rushing. Especially since turtling's the only thing I'm good at in competitive multiplayer. I generally stick to the "build core structures, build walls, build a fuckton of defensive towers, build everything else" strategy regardless of the game I'm playing. It's usually pretty effective.

 

[veloper]

Wonderful, another discussion where nobody can even knows what the other person is trying to say.

I've seen people redefine turtling as:

teching

offensive towering

anything that isn't early rushing

playing at your leisure against an even greater noob with the whole map covered with your own static defenses

That's a hoot.

 

[Petromir]

Wonderful, another discussion where nobody can even knows what the other person is trying to say.

I've seen people redefine turtling as:

teching

offensive towering

anything that isn't early rushing

playing at your leisure against an even greater noob with the whole map covered with your own static defenses

That's a hoot.

Pure turtling is rare theses days, most turlters combine it with other tactics, espcially in games where your resoruces hinge on controlling landmass like CoH.

I'd argue the brits in CoH:OP can effectively count offensive towering as a form of turtleing as their defensive structures are the only static things on their side, therefore almost by definition their base is where their towers are.

Many games have moved to a point where the base tactics are rarely the orignal pure rush, tech and turtle, as they try force you to use at least a hybred of two of them.

 

[FightThePower]

I would define my style of RTS play as "teching" not "turtling". "Turtle" I have always understood to be a defensive style of play, relying on outward defenses and not engaging the enemy. "Teching" however, I believe to be about intentionally not engaging the enemy for a certain amount of time, until research has been done, resources have been collected and an army of superior units can be produced. It's playing smarter, not harder, and is often less wasteful of resourcs.

For instance, I play Supreme Commander; Forged Alliance with my boyfriend. He's a rusher, I'm a techer. He regularly runs out of resources and needs me to back him up. I will support him, and then when I am ready, will regularly single-handedly destroy all remaining enemy units. It's not to say either tactic is better; in fact we work best together and in a multiplayer situation are often nearly unstoppable with our rush/tech approach.

Some RTS games are more suited to teching than others. Warzone, Forged Alliance (actually, ALL the Supreme Commander games), and Age of Empires are among the most tech-friendly. Among the less would probably be C&C games and Starcraft.

I big time agree with your first paragraph. Typically when I refer to turtling, I think of what you refer to as teching. I suppose it's more a question for each of us in what we think of as turtling: Your "Teching", or sitting back and never engaging or expanding at all (aka suicide). I think we can agree the former is effective, the latter is not.

BTW, you get major style points for knowing about Warzone 2100 One of my favorite RTS games ever. I still want to punch out Eidos for putting Pumpkin Studios out of business, but that's life in the industry I suppose.

Haha I thought no one else knew about Warzone 2100. Tough as nails that game, and so damn long. But fun nonetheless

I think they're two different strategies. Turtling is playing defensively, teching is more like playing passively. It's worth noting that you can change strategy mid-game - you might 'turtle' to start off with and stop an early rush, then start to tech/expand, like what you do.

It's like a rock-paper-scissors thing - Rushing beats Teching, Teching beats Turtling, Turtling beats Rushing. What I would call 'Pure' turtling however i.e. sitting in your original location with as many defenses as you can build will only work against AI opponents or complete idiots. If you expand though, you've changed strategies from turtling to teching.

 

[CLEVERSLEAZOID]

I never play RTS games online because the only viable tactic seems to be rushing. I never understood how people could build so many forces in such a short time. I'd much prefer to be playing the AI in skirmishes. Sure, its no challenge but RTS isn't my idea of fun either.

And I always turtle in RTS.

 

[DividedUnity]

Company Of Heroes turtling is very easy. Just build mines, wires and Machine Gun Emplacements and slowly push forward.

All of these can easily be killed by artillery though that was my original point.If you do build a wall of defences if the enemy uses artillery you end up having more holes in it than a big budget porno.