UNSC
Cutters
ELEPHANT RUSH (1v1) - Immediately queue an Elephant at your fortress. Set a rally point directly in front of the enemy's base. Then queue at least 3 supply pads. Scout w/ hog. When your Elephant finishes, lock it down directly outside your enemy's base. Should be about 45 seconds into the game. When it locks, start pumping out units from it; preferably a few flamethrowers to start, especially if he's Covenant (take care of his leader). Then build marines non-stop; grenade his base as often as possible. If you're lucky and catch your foe off-guard, this can result in victory in 5-8 minutes.
ELEPHANT RUSH (2v2)
~Player 1 - Same opening as the standard elephant rush. However, this time when your elephant builds, don't lock it directly next to your opponent's base. Instead, lock it just outside their field of vision, so they don't know you're there. Jump back to your base and queue a reactor, then a barracks. Continuously pump out marines from your elephant (start with a few flamers if he's a covie leader), and after your reactor & barracks builds, research new blood. If you've scouted, and time permits, make some Spartans as well. After all, vehicles are one of the few counters to this strat. You should get at least 20 marines/flamers, then rush suddenly out of your hiding spot. Your sudden, overwhelming force will wreak havoc on what may be an undefended base, depending on what player 2 does.
~Player 2 - I suggest the partner of this strat user picks either a covie leader or Cutter. Either way you should rush hard - be it elephant or covie blitz. Do a traditional rush, so you'll be attacking before your ally. The goal is to aggro all enemy units to you. If P1 patiently drushes enemy A, and P2 quickly rushes enemy B, then enemy A will likely send any military they have to help defend B. This is where the delayed rush kicks in; P1 attacks A's base, which is totally undefended. When this strat is used effectively it leaves the enemy in total disarray; the best they can hope for is to thwart player 2's rush, which is futile because enemy A will have been eliminated at that point.
Last night me and my partner won on Terminal Moraine in 4 minutes and 40 seconds with this.
Forge
(2v2)Advent Eclipse
A good strategy that worked in 2v2 last night was a fast tech to grizzlies along with 3-4 cyclops to heal them. It sounds plain and what not, but if your partner masses infantry (ie. Cutter's marines -> ODST's) youre good to go for a while, your grizzly's can quickly take out any vehicles they have and take out any towers you need to worry about while your partner's swarm of ODST's are good to go for rolling through whatever they see. Obivously time is of essence as a straight tech is very prone to rush, but i felt with my partner pumping out marines at the rate he was i was secure even still. I built a reactor then supply pads, upgraded warthog gunner to secure a second base, and made a barracks to secure a reactor on the map, (free $$!) anything to speed up the process helps loads.
Anders
"Anders Warthog Rush and Boom"
~ Build Order - Reactor -> Supply Pad -> Barracks -> Supplay pad (x2)
~ Goal - to expand and pressur your enemy in the first 6-7 minutes of your game
~ At start, have your first hog gather supplies, you should upgrade gunner as soon as your reactor is done, train some more warthogs as you go, (maartendq recommended 8 or so as thats what he gets) You should get a second base as soon as you have enough warthogs. As soon as you secure your second base, leave one hog to build there, and take the rest on your attack run!
~You should get a second reactor while on the attack run and go for the "grenadier" upgrade and from there you should build your units according to your enemy. http://www.halowars....ead/487635.aspx for more info.
TECH 1 HOG RUSH (1v1) - Immediately build a reactor, then queue some supply pads. Scout w/ hog. As soon as the reactor's done, upgrade hogs to turret. Build as many as possible before the 4-5 minute mark (at least 4 hogs). Now, set a rally point outside your foe's base. Send your initial hog army to start the attack, then continuously queue up hogs at your main base. I recommend microing the hogs while at the enemy base. Again, if you catch your foe off-guard, you can very quickly overwhelm him and win in around 10 minutes.
Covenant
BLITZ (1v1) [Applies to all Covenant leaders] - Immediately build a temple, then queue 3-4 warehouses. Set a rally point outside your foe's base. After your leader appears and starts heading that way, move the rally point to the transport pad outside your base. Start churning out your leader's special unit (brute, elite, or suicide grunts). You should be attacking his base in less than a minute. Never stop building those special units - the goal is to overwhelm. Periodically switch to your leader, and use his special attack on any turrets he may try to build.
In the event of an emergency, where you need quick supplies for a leader's special attack, you can delete your temple for a quick 500 resources. It had better be for the sake of victory, though, because after that you're screwed.
Prophet
Build Order: Temple, Supply, Supply,
First build Temple then set your ghost out searching for $.
Set the rally point somewhere near the enemies base.
Once prophet is out reset rally to the grav lift in front of your base.
Send both ghost and prophet looking for minerals around the opponents base.
Keep spawning honor guards and they'll go straight to the proph via the lift.
If the opponent is UNSC 3 to 4 Honors is enough to begin the assault
If Covie (especially arbiter) wait till you have 6 and beam him with the prophet before he takes out all your troops.
As resources come in get 2 honors in line then build a summit.
Add another Supply pad to your base and spawn banshees and honor guards alernatively.
They should take out pretty much any infantry that your opponent can spawn and uprising turrets. Remember to group target the largest threat and remove the most important buildings first from your enemies base. (Temple, Barracks). To prevent from anti infantry troops and especially another arbiter being sent in.
Arbiter
I've heard Arbiter rushes are ridiculous if used correctly. Would love to test this out today. (Need a covenant build order if anyone can help)
Arbiter's Banshee rush
- Build orders-Temple -> Warehouse(x4) -> Summit(x2).
- Goal-Beats the enemy from the first 10 minutes of the game(if use quickly,maybe the first 5 MINUTES).
- At start,have your Ghost gathers supplies,then after the warhouses are complete,make your arby go to a second base while the ghost gathers supplies,when finished with the second base(all of the building are warehouses) build up to 4 Banshees and upgrade them with Boost,then build up to 8 Banshees and upgrade the Temple to Age of Doubt,then build Banshees until the population cap is complete and upgrade them with Repeating Cannon,then attack your enemy with the 25 Banshees and Arby,make Arby uses his Rage ability at the base.
~Reason of building 2 summit, cause its faster ex.when building 4 banshee click on ne of the summit and select the Banshee 2 times and do that on the other Summit,s you can get 2 BANSHEES POPING OUT IN THE SAME TIME INSTEAD OF 1.
~As for the ghost,donte forget to scout with him when your banshees are up to 8,so yu can see whats your enemy built and get rid of the ghost.
~Dont forget to upgrade the arbiter too if you want.
Arbiter - suicide grunt rush
Time to win: 5-15 minutes depending on how efficient you are.
Build order: Warehouse(x3-x4) -> temple -> summit
The summit is just for backup: From there you can build engineers to heal arbiter and banshees to boost your rush. It is up to you whether you make it or make 4 warhouses rather than 3.
When you have Arbiter collect resources with him too if you find any. Now upgrade some or all of your warehouses if you feel like it, you can do this at this point or later. Now build 5+ suicide grunts. Just before you attack, send the ghost to see where the supply pads are, are there turrets to attack to, what kind of troops your enemy has etc. Then send your suicide grunts and use the Y ability to destroy enemy turrets and some buildings (Try to destroy supply pads/warehouses if possible) / damage the base or infantry. And this is really important: If the enemy has a leader unit blow him up first! Then instantly after that come with arbiter and kill the enemy infantry/warthogs if there is some. It is unlikely at this point the enemy would have vehicles. Now set all your units to attack the base and if your enemy tries to build new buildings or turrets destroy them. If you still have suicide grunts, it is more efficient to make them shoot the base and then blow them up.[b]It is extremely essential that arbiter survives to this point. If he is really weak you can build a summit and an engineer to heal him or protect him really well.[/b] Meanwhile you can:
1. build more suicide grunts
2. research upgrades for arbiter
3: Upgrade the warehouses or upgrade the base and build more warehouses
And when you have enough resources destroy the base using rage. This will work only if you are really fast; speed is critical here. This will work especially well if the enemy is human, since the leader power at the beginning is not nearly as dangerous as the covenant leader unit.
Brute
Brute chieftain - Brute rush
time to win: 5+ minutes depending on efficiency and amount of bases
Build order: warehouse(x4) -> temple
After you have started building the buildings, go search for resources with the chopper. When the temple is ready, you should have about 300+ resources, and now you can research the tsunami and upgrade so many warehouses you can afford. (for what i tell you later). Now start building brutes. When you have 5, attack the enemy base. Now set your rally point to the enemys base. Use the brute chieftain and brutes to detroy the turrets first. Now kill enemy units if there is any. In this rush you can win even if the chieftain dies, because brutes are so strong. Now just destroy the base and the other bases if there is more.
Edited by L337 Box, 08 April 2009 - 01:18 AM.
