8
Jul
2009
Hornet Rushing with Forge
It seems a lot of people are looking for the fastest way to Hornet Rush with Forge, and after trying different tactics, here it is!
Knowingly to most, Forge builds upgraded Supply Pads straight away. Although they cost more to build, you’re saving time, supplies not having to upgrade them, and more importantly not needing a Reactor to do so. He’s really the only leader who can do this efficiently, as to get full population of Hornets this fast, you need a big supply count early game.
This guide is so far the quickest way to getting 15 hornets out, without using ‘hooks’ taking roughly 6:30 minutes.
The Double Pump:
So first of all, your build order should look something like this.
Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Reactor (Upgrade it) > Air Pad > Air Pad
Do your usual supply gathering, which is an absolute must with this as your going to need every last bit of crate available out there to afford to build hornets simultaneously. When you come to upgrade your reactor, you may have to wait up to 30 seconds for you to have enough supplies, less if you’ve been collecting a lot. Don’t worry about this wait, it pays off when you have 2 Air Pads building. Next step is to just que your Hornets up, and with practice you can max out at around 6:30.
Wingman ‘Fornets’:
There are 2 routes to go for Wingman, the first is to do the above, and when you’ve got about 12 or so Hornets, swap your second Air Pad for a Reactor, which will bring you up to Tech 3, while your other pad builds your last few Hornets. When your Reactors done just hit ‘Wingman’, and it should be near enough researched by the time you reach your opponent’s base.
The second way goes a little something like this:
Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Reactor > Reactor > Air Pad
Upgrade your second reactor to get to tech 3, and once you’ve hit ‘Wingman’ swap your single Reactor for another Air Pad so you can double pump. Essentially its just the first way, but back to front so you have Hornets with ‘Wingman’ building from the start.
There are a few things to watch out for. You’ll be moderately undefended for the first few minutes. If you’re scouted out, be prepared for a hard counter (destroying their scouts with a few rams can help prevent this). Locking down is an option, but if a scouts seen an air pad, it doesn’t take Einstein to work out what to expect. Once you’ve finished building your Hornets it’s a good idea to swap an Air Pad for a Vehicle depot, just incase your attack fails and you need to put out some different units.
We tried this on a few 2vs2 rounds with double “Horge”. First game, they weren’t expecting it and ended up resigning within 8 minutes. Second game though, they went Gauss. Now we’ve done a few Gauss rushes ourselves, I’m a big player of Anders so got the T-shirt; but until patch TU3 arrives, our Gauss hates were only strengthened. Air should be able to take out vehicles, provided they’re not wolverines, but a good 20+ gauss-hogs taking down 25+ hornets with Wingman? Seriously…
Until TU3 arrives in a few weeks, we’ll live in the shadow of the Gauss swarm. But provided you’re not the unlucky fly from which the hog-swatter splatters, Hornets provide a decent early attack force; and when lazy players fail to scout and assume as a Forge player you’ll be going Scorpions, it’s a nasty sting for them seeing Hornets arrive at their doorstep.
[...] more tanks than you would at the same time as the other methods. This build plot is the same as the Forge Hornet rush, just with Vehicle Depots: Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Supply Pad > Reactor [...]
very cool site .. excellent commentary .. need info on how to kill Hunters most efficiently. In Deathmatch mode the several thousand of these bad boys that show up are a real pain in the army.