how to beat early roaches as terran ?

hi, i'm imaekroaches,

i have a hard time defeating pure roach in the early rounds as terran,
marauders beat them but then you get eaten by zerglings on the next round,
and then maybe my timing is wrong but by the time i get to t2, and build medivacs, they have like 150 roaches

should i skip gas totally on the first rounds ?

tips would be great, thanks

imaekroaches

i dont know if it is cost efective, but i like to go mariens helions tanks vs zerg.

usual start
-8 mariens (4 barracks)
-tier 2
-2 hellions
-1 tank (never upgrade siege)

ad marauders + raven vs lurkers
ad ghosts vs queens
ad hellions/mariens vs zergling/baneling and broodlords (some tanky units needed) -> later thors maurauder
ad tank/mariens(+shield) vs roaching
ad more ravens + hunterseeker vs corruptor/lurker
ad mariens vs everything else -> stim + medivacs vs infestors

Go almost pure marauder (throwing in a couple of reapers to prevent you getting pushed back by lings. reapers kill lings amazingly fast, and even if they barely hurt roaches, they sit ahead of your marauders and sponge damage once the lings die.), don't take more than one gas until you have the advantage over to roach army. Marauders have more range so do better in large numbers than roaches, don't panic if you lose the first few battles. And if you're in first, don't get your gas till round two. Remember to get stimpack. Non-stim Marauders really struggle against mass roach. Marauders don't counter Roaches too cleanly, it will still be a fight, but you should have the upper hand.

You should not tech remotely fast against pure roach. Nothing on T2 is so exceptionally good against them that it's worth dropping behind on Marauders and losing the middle (banshees are too bad against queens to help much, tanks are expensive, ravens are not great 'cos splash hits only a few roaches/turrets die pretty fast and don't deal much damage to them, medivacs are nor really needed, etc..). Overpower with marauders, take mid. When you're dominant, take your gasses, then if still dominant, tech. By then they should be making other things.

thank you very much guys for these very complete answers,
now im having problems with lings/banelings/corruptors,
i think i just might stop playing that mod anyway,
thanks again.

ok hf x)

I might be a bit late with an answer, but here I go (it may be useful):

Starting:

Terran is probably the weakest starter, as T units rely on critical ranged mass for their power. Reapers are excellent starting units, but unfortunately, it is exactly the Roaches that beat the living hell out of them. Don't expect to win the first wave, but do whatever you can.

1st position:
- No gas, 1/1/1 (1 marine barracks, 1 reaper, 1 marauder) -> pretty safe opening vs zerg, it beats a decent amount of lings or if opened with few roaches
2nd position:
- Gas, 2 marine barracks, 1 reaper. If you KNOW for 100% that roaches are incoming, swap reaper to marauder. Otherwise I always go with the 2 marine 1 reaper, as it is a very versatile opening. Opening is always a bit risky, you never know what comes, but you should always build units to get mid or to delay the enemy getting the mid.
3rd positon:
- Gas, get as much marines as you can + 1 reaper. I sometimes go 1 marine and all reaper, but I can't recommend it vs roaches.
Anyway you will only realize after the second wave that you are facing roaches.

After you see roaches:
- Buy as much reapers as necessary to beat occasional lings (don't overdo it). Don't be afraid of buying reapers, they are very useful till the end game (kills any light, kills turrets)
- Mix marauders and marines. I cannot recommend massing marauders only, as late game broodlords will roll you. Marauders are quite useless vs infinite broodlings, while marine+reaper can get through them without that much problem.
- Get marine shield ASAP. It is one of the best upgrades, and makes Marines pretty good meat shields. Shield and +1 armor means that +1 attack roaches will not kill your marines in 3 shots.
- Get stim if necessary. Usually you do fine without stim. I really don't recommend getting stim early, as you need a healthy mass before stim actually becomes beneficial.

A tip for stimming: use the side panel (upper left corner, that little box there). Open the game by unclicking that annoying "ui animations" box, so you can bring it up quickly whenever you need it. Disable autocasting stimpack (go to marine - click stim to toggle it). This way you can avoid your forces getting split by some units stimming on remaining previous waves.
Stim your entire force at the same time (ctrl shift click marines and marauders and stim). This makes your units faster, and they will find targets more efficiently.

Addendum for Marauder:
They are pretty crap units in DS. Do not buy them, unless the enemy has plenty of armored units. Even then you might get by with pure marines. Marauders are mostly only necessary if the enemy knows what he is doing. In random public DS battles this is usually not the case.

General tips:
- Buying gas actually puts you behind, if you are not past the middle. Cut gases for more units if you have trouble holding the middle line. Only get gas once your forces have no trouble dealing with what the enemy throws at you. Yes, this'd mean in a perfectly even match you'd never get past the first gas. This is very rarely the case (in fact almost never). Whenever you see your enemy forces stagnating too much (no new units/upgrades), it probably means he is either: teching, getting gas or saving for tech units. This is a window of opportunity to get the middle line and secure your lead.
- Teching is the same deal. Only tech if a higher tech unit is absolutely necessary, or if you are in the lead. Since terran T1 is so very good (and T2 is so very bad), you probably don't need to tech at all until quite late. The upgrades are nice, though, but secondary to unit mass.
- Some players like to hide their intention and only get roaches the the second, third or even later rounds. This might sound like something really scary, but in fact it is very advantageous for YOU. In a situation where you see no units, buy marines. Marines are good vs anything, pretty much, so you are not risking anything. You will easily hold the middle (and thus get the free +15% income), and will help your allies with their waves. Be sure to "/dance" one marine behind the line to hold it longer.
By the time you see the Roaches, you'll have plenty of marines and a few marauders will murder them.

BTW I see you wrote having problems with ling/bling/corr

Solution:
- Infantry cannot beat bling/ling. The sooner you accept it, the better. There's one catch. It will not be YOU, who beats them. Ling/bling is utterly useless by the end game. As I like to say, speedzerg is dead. First, this style is only good vs T. Second, it is only good on one wave vs one. If your ally manages to beat his wave, and will have leftover units, you can easily beat ling/bling with mass stim marines.
- Use Vultures. Their mines clean up after you, so you'll trade even.
- Troll him with up to 2 cloak banshees. No more than that, as banshees are super cost-ineffective. I actually never do this, and rely entirely on ravens.
- Put some Ghosts and Marauders into the bioball. They absorb quite a few banelings. Pre-stim a few marauders to act as baneling bait. The more spread out you are, the better.
- For late game: Ravens (with HSM and PDD) + Yamato Battlecruisers (research energy too) beat Corruptors. If you fall behind add 4-5 vikings. Never mass vikings as they are actually quite bad besides offering a little air support.

Zee wrote:

Solution:
- Infantry cannot beat bling/ling. The sooner you accept it, the better. There's one catch. It will not be YOU, who beats them. Ling/bling is utterly useless by the end game. As I like to say, speedzerg is dead. First, this style is only good vs T. Second, it is only good on one wave vs one. If your ally manages to beat his wave, and will have leftover units, you can easily beat ling/bling with mass stim marines.

Remember our first game :p. You can have the upper hand vs speedzerg 1v1 as terran going infantry for a fairly long time, it's just really hard. And you need to avoid getting too many marines. Reaper/Marauder all the way . Though it's not exactly beating, most of your army will die each time, only danced at the back things will last. Reapers can take the middle and hold it until there is a fair number of banes+kill infinite zerglings, you need to get as far forwards and dancehold a lot of marauders one by one out back each time to absorb banes. If zerg gets to your side, you pretty much straight up die. You'll lose your army every time, but can hold the middle indefinitely. With teammates it's less simple, but same principle. Spread enough and some of your army is likely to survive as as a meatshield dancing on the line, at least. T2 does do much better though, and your advise is good. Just popping by to say it is possible to hold mid and gain an advantage vs speedzerg with terran T1.

In 1v1 because you can have leftover infantry dancing, so once you gain the upper hand you keep the upper hand. However he is likely talking about normal pub games, where he might face a diverse force.

In 1v1 it's all about you keeping the middle. In 3v3 it's about keeping the middle AND being versatile enough to switch to a different wave.

The good thing about banelings is that they will never ever stack up with other units, since they are suicidal. IMO it is a good mindset in pub games to start with not trying to beat the banelings, but trying to just clean them up as much as possible. Leftover lings are mostly not a problem, and speedzergs leave plenty of space behind them, so you won't put much burden on your teammates, and you'll still be useful if the tides turns. Ling/bane based speedlings will be pathetic if THEY have to kill leftovers.

EDIT: addendum for the "i won't beat it" mindset: it is not about not trying. Not trying is = loss. It is about not trying too hard to counter. Do your usual stuff.

stimpack marauders, helions vs lings, banshees (if they go queen, u go cloak, if they overseer u viking)