Prelude – Orders – Protoss – Zerg – Terrans – Wrapup

The planning phase is the first of the three phases the game round consists of, and probably the most important one – as most decisions are made here. You decide where you go, where you build, and others decide where they want to screw with your plans.

Order Tokens

Always keep the following things in mind when placing orders:

• Yes, orders are indeed executed in reverse order, don’t forget to place the orders you want to execute later before those you want to execute earlier. On the other hand, you can put some orders where you don’t care when you execute them as “fillers”, making it more probable that the order you want to execute as your first will be on top of the stack at the end of the planning phase because you placed it as your last.
• Orders can be conceived as a threat where you don’t want to threaten – make sure you don’t enforce the impression that you’re invading somebody when you don’t, and don’t block those people’s orders who nicely ignore that you’re their neighbour – unless you really do want a fight with them (or they can’t place an order after you anymore).
• Offense is the best defense. Everybody can only place four orders, even those with tons and tons of resources and troops, so an opponent that also has to keep up his defense because you poke him has a weaker offense against you. Also, the 2 additional units the offense can bring along can decide battles.
• Adaptation, improvisation. Depending on your fellow players’ actions, some courses of action might open up that weren’t available at the start of the planning phase. If you’re suddenly all alone on your planet, you can research or build more than you thought, or grab an area on another planet.
• You might want to spray-coat your order tokens, or they’ll be prone to wear out prematurely. I took Games Workshop Purity Seal, having it lying around from painting miniatures and all.

On we go to specific order types.

Order Types

Reading the rulebook reveals pretty much what the order types are about, but it might be worth looking into what beyond the obvious they can do. I’ll refer maneuvers occasionally here, they’re described below.

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  Build Orders

  First, the build order. Obviously, it’s what you need to build troops, transports, workers, bases and modules. This one is rather straightforward, there’s really not much beyond that that it can do – but it is a lot:

  • Teching (for buildings) and rushing (for troops) needs a lot of those early on, but everybody should put down at least one build order in their first planning phase, if only to be able to react to threats from others and because you don’t want your tech to be hopelessly behind later.
  • If you see an invasion incoming, try to be able to execute a build order before their mobilize order, to strengthen your defenses.
  • And keep in mind that during your turn, you can destroy units as you wish, for example for replacing them with stronger units. Also nice for a base save maneuver.

  However, keep in mind that you have to read the build order in sequence. Meaning, you can’t build a unit, worker or transport without a base on the active planet, nor can you build a base, building or module without a unit on the active planet.

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  Mobilize Orders

  Then, the mobilize order. The obvious things are movement within a planet, or movement towards another planet (or both). If you don’t know what to do when placing one of your earliest orders in a round, if you want to react to what others are doing, put one of those down on a planet you want to keep defended. It will allow you to make a detour maneuver later on, or a Terran base save maneuver – or if it isn’t needed, you can still choose the event card option and know you’ve been on the safe side. If you’re close to extinct, you can use it to spread your units, to avoid elimination. Anyway, having the last mobilize order on a planet is always a tactical advantage.

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  Research Orders

  The research order. It’s very handy to have executed a research order before you have the first battle in a turn, to refill your hand of combat cards, even if you don’t plan to research new tech. Later in the game, you can use it to advance the event card stack (game clock). You do need a base on the active planet to execute it, so further uses are limited. However, you will still need this order fairly often, as many units only start to really work once you have their tech fully unlocked and researched.

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  Defend Orders

  The defend order. It’s not just a +2 health token, but actually also a (limited to just one friendly area) mobilize order during the planning phase – with units also from adjacent planets as usual. It can be used offensively if you already have units on a planet, to establish your position there and strengthen the tip of the spear. Obviously, you can also use the order true to its name, to react to an enemy threat by reinforcing key areas with troops from the same and adjacent planets – and do that in the planning phase already, so you know you won’t be obstructed later on (like you could be with a mere mobilize order).
  Update 2009-03-01 11:30: Also see this rules answer regarding how the +2 health from the Guard Token stacks with various other things that give health.

Special Orders

Special orders then, the change to the way they’re handled in Brood War (with the special order pool) makes them more flexible and, to some extent, more viable than before. You can now build an R&D module and, within the same turn, use it right away, giving you new tactical options. Which makes sense really. The first R&D module is very good because it allows you to have three orders of the same type (two normal, one special) for the first time, the second is still useful, the third rarely is worth it. Specific points:

• Special build order, don’t forget that it raises your build limit by 1 (so you can build 5 Zerglings with just 2 buildings, yay).
• Special mobilize order, wherever the battle really counts. Very useful for overcoming defend orders from your opponent, or taking back your home planet.
• Special research order, if you lead in conquest points but see the others catching up, getting 2 event cards is well wort it – particularly if you research something that will be placed in play.

Keep in mind that you can always use any order to obstruct enemy orders (on planets that have areas you control, and planets adjacent to any areas you control) and mess up their plans – you can always choose the event card option if the prerequisites for your order aren’t met (no base for the research order, no units for the build order, no transport for the mobilize order).

Maneuvers

Aah, the fun starts. StarCraft offers quite some tactical options within the order system. Let me describe some possible maneuvers. I named them myself, feel free to disagree, or add more in the comments.

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  Detour Maneuver

  Detour maneuver: Move your troops away to an adjacent planet (or spread them out on other areas on your last planet) before the enemy invades your home, and move them back later. Like that you’ll have the benefits of the attacker (establishing skirmishes, drawing more combat cards, increased unit limit) and still be able to defend your base – since it’s only destroyed in the regrouping phase and not immediately after its area falls to the enemy. It’s probably best if you leave one unit in each area still, so you’ll be able to stack your surplus units after the battle, and deny your opponent stealth withdrawals or further area gains. This is a favourite of mine.
  Requirements: One mobilize order on the planet you want to return to (in the picture, Braken), as bottom order of the stack, and one mobilize order towards the top of the detour planet’s stack (Torus)

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  Double Invasion Maneuver

  Double invasion maneuver: If you have stealth troops, you don’t want them to die – but if you invade an enemy planet and are able to gain just one area there, you won’t have the possibility to withdraw if they’d be destroyed. Particularly if the enemy is dug in with a defend order or bunkers, you losing the combat is also a possibility that has to be accounted for. So, invade with a smaller force first, getting one his weaker-defended areas, and only invade with the big force in a second mobilize order. Like that, you’ll have a place to go to if things go awry, particularly if you sacrificed the transport via your offensive module to invade his base. This will also allow you to establish a base next round, maybe with a defend order, and being a real nuisance on “his” planet. The downside is that it’s predictable and expensive in terms of used order tokens.
  Requirements: Two mobilize orders on the destination planet, preferrably towards the bottom of the stack.

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  Base Save Maneuver

  Base save maneuver: There are actually two variations of this maneuver – one of them only works with Terrans (and is rather trivial). They both aim for you keeping your base when the area it is in fell to the enemy.

  • Terran variety: Just move your base away from an area with enemy troops into one that contains troops of yours, so you keep it in the regrouping phase and are able to produce units again next round. Told you it’s trivial.
    Requirements: A mobilize order at the bottom of the stack.
  • Everybody’s variety: As a last order on a planet, execute a build order. You can then destroy your base (as you can at all times during your move) and build a new one in one of the areas that are still yours. This will cost you 2 minerals, however, unlike the Terran variety. (Also see here.)
    Requirements: A build order at the bottom of the stack.
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  Weasely Retrograde

  Weasely Retrograde: This hasn’t grown on my turf, but is well worth a note. Start an attack on an enemy planet where you have a transport to his undefended back turf, lose the fight and survive or win and overstack (so you’ll have to retreat), and retreat to the planet you didn’t have a mobilize order on. Surprise surprise, and described pretty nicely in this thread.
  Requirements: A mobilize order, maybe better towards the bottom of the stack, on the middle planet (here, Tarsonis). And, more importantly, a transport (maybe through a leadership or event card?) towards the planet you plan to retreat to.

I’ll be really happy to read about other sneaky maneuvers you pulled off in your games, I’ll also watch the FFG forums for more things that pop up.

The next posts will be about the individual races’ and factions’ strategies, and I’ll conclude with a wrapup that will touch some finer points and will also include much-needed acknowledgements and thanks.

Update 2009-01-27 08:43: Thanks to Mark T for pointing out the mistake in my defend order description – the area has to be friendly already! I played it wrong all along

Update 2009-02-03 08:53: Thanks to Wolverine (below) for pointing out the mistake in my research order description – there needs to be a base. Anything else I screwed up horribly like that with?

Prelude – Orders – Protoss – Zerg – Terrans – Wrapup