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February 16th 2015

Beginner's Guide

Your first stop to MA addiction

Marine Arena is an 8 player game with teams of 2 highly competitive RTS style custom map for StarCraft 2.
You and your ally must pit your armies consisting of a vast amount of diffrent type of units versus the 3 opposing teams to defeat all the other players Command Centers to achieve victory.
This guide is a basic introduction to the structures and units of Marine Arena and thier purpose.


The Marine Arena Map

Structures and Units of Marine Arena

Command Center

The command center is the players life source. Through the command center a player can purchase upgrades for units, provide scans for vision, provide defensive capabalities and even purchase heroes. Should your command center and your allies be destroyed you will lose the game. Take good care of your command center for it cannot be rebuilt.





You can increase your command centers health by upgrading to a Planetary Fortress. You can even increase it's armour. You can also purchase Bunkers to place marines in and if you end up in trouble you can place down Turrets or use a Savior that will kill all enemies within your base but be careful you only get one savior.

Most of your unit upgrades are through your command center. Marine upgrades, Mercenary upgrades and Hero upgrades.
Marine upgrades are located on the first command card. with options starting from left to right; Stim Pack, Health, Damage, Armour and Increased Marine Spawn Rate.

tip: An icon that is greyed out usually requires a certian number of upgrades to be purchased or is time based.

Mercenary upgrades also have an increased spawn rate option. Both mercenary and hero upgrades are located on the second command card. The first bottom left icon on the main card. or "B".

For every marine/mercenary/hero upgrade of health/damage/armour you will get an additional 50% for every other corresponding marine/mercenary/hero upgrade of health/damage/armour.

One Upgrade

100%

50%

50%

One Upgrade

100%

50%

50%

One Upgrade

100%

50%

50%


If you ever find yourself not spawning marines or would like to increase the amount of mercenaries you can have. You can find the marine stop and start options in the third command card. Second bottom left icon on the main card. or "V".

tip: Allies who leave the game before it starts will not have their marines spawn, you can manually turn their marines back on through their command center.

Phoenix

Commando

Odin

Infestor

Hunter Killer

Honey Badger

Tassadar

Zeratul

Colossus

In addition to all the wonderful things your command center provides you it also houses one very special unit that can give you the edge you just may need. Heroes are designed to be supplements to your army; They can be both a blessing and a catastrophe to your goals of ultimate victory. You may only have one hero at a time with the exception of Hunter Killers which provide you 3. Some heroes can even evolve into ultra heroes. You can find heroes in the fourth card. Third bottom left icon on the main card. or "Q".


DT Archon


Queen


Spectre


HT Archon


Mercenary Barrack

The mercenary barracks houses specific upgrades for your mercenary of choice. If you had already played the game you noticed when the match starts you have a choice between four tier-1 mercenaries, two melee style and two ranged style. The mercenary barracks can be rebuilt through the Mercenary Compound.

Mercenary specific upgrades vary upon the diffrent units available for purchase. Mercenaries can have specific upgrades targeted at increased health, speed, armour, range and damage that can be purchased up to three times for added effect. Some mercenaries can even be evolved into entirely diffrent units with new abilities and upgrades. If the mercenary barrack is destroyed after you had evolved a mercenary, rebuilding the original mercenary barrack you had prior will give you back the unit at it's evolved state.




tip: you can stop your mercenary unit build to increase the amount of marines you can have.


Mercenary Compound

The mercenary compound houses all the diffrent mercenary types avaliable for purchase. Through the mercenary compound the player can utilize marine arena's counter system using four diffrent tiers of units that specialize in focusing specific damage to certian unit types. The mercenary compound cannot be destroyed and is located directly behind your base on the island.

Mercenaries are grouped in tiers. The higher the tier unit is the higher the base health, armour and damage will be. The units grow more expensive with each tier while at the same time yield more minerals to your opponents when a unit dies. Mercenaries are designed to form a unique circle of balance and counter between them. Type of units and unit upgrades play a major role in how effective each unit will be towards it's intended counter.


tip: Effectively countering your opponents while maintaining essential unit upgrades is the very key to obtaining victory.


Below is a complete list of all mercenaries including the evolution morphs indicated by the additional .5 tier.

T - 1

T - 1.5

T - 2

T - 2.5

T - 3

T - 4



















Hovering over a unit will show the units they are intended to counter, Indicated by a

  
  

showing on dimmed units indicates you should avoid engaging these units.


Arena Shop

The arena shop contains additional upgrades for the marines, another location for starting and stopping your own marines and a unique purchase of Destroy All Bases as well as level ups for heroes. It is indicated by the green pylon. The arena shop is located just outside the main base next to the center hill in the middle of the map.

The arena shop plays a vital role in upgrading your marines and heroes to vastly improve thier performance on the field. While these purchases are optional you will find depending on your choice of play style and army build that these upgrades can mean the diffrence between winning and losing a battle.




Most marine arena shop upgrades have minimum requirements that have to be completed before they can be purchased.


Items such as Marine Range Upgrade require atleast 3 of any of the basic marine upgrades to be purchased, such as the Marine Damage or the Marine Health or Armour before aquiring this Marine Range Upgrade, you can then purchase an additional Range Upgrade once more after another 3 Marine basic upgrades have been purchased.



Marines also have some unique upgrades in the form of Epic and Minor upgrades, altho these are like the Range Upgrade and require a minimum amount of basic upgrades to be purchased to obtain. You are also restricted to ONLY having one Epic Upgrade and two Minor upgrades. Once you have purchased one of these upgrades you cannot go back and change which epic or minor upgrades to a diffrent one so choose wisely.




The marine Anti-Hero upgrade which adds an additional 20% damage to hero units can be purchased at anytime with no minimum requirements and will stack on any additional upgrades you may have already purchased from the arena shop.

Hero level up upgrades through the arena shop upscale in cost with each new level. Heroes have seven level up upgrades with the exception of the commando which only has six. The four possible ultra heroes listed above also require all level up upgrades in order to morph into ultra. Leveling up a hero increases alot of thier base stats from health, to damage to even range, plus it increases thier abilities significatntly.


Elite Mercenary Shop

The elite mercenary shop houses a special diffrent type of units called elite mercenaries. These units have a wide range of diffrent abilities to help aid your army against your opponents. Elite Mercenaries count against your total max count of units you can have on the map and cost will vary between them. The elite mercenary shop is the blue pylon located just outside the main base next to the center hill in the middle of the map.




Elite units are much stronger than your normal mercenaries. Many elites are suited for specific roles rather it be Reapers for aiding in countering zerglings or Corruptors for countering other elite air mercenaries. They all have abilities designed to further improve your armies effectivness against your opponents. Some elites you can even have more than one. Elite Mercenaries utilize your basic Mercenary upgrades.

Elite Mercenaries also have two direct upgrades for them that can be purchased one after the other.
United We Stand and Divided We Fall.

Below is a list of all the current Elite Mercenaries available for purchase.

Corruptor

Viking

Dusk Wing

Raven

Medivac

Overseer

Sentry


Reaper


Siege Tank


Ghost


Mothership


Battle Cruiser


Observer


Tal'Darim


Radar Tower

The radar tower is completely optional and is purchased through the command center. You can find the radar tower from second bottom left icon on the main card. or "V" of the command center. The radar tower initially comes with ability to detect non-cloaked enemy units outside your vision as well as able to provide additional scans but can be upgraded to further increase it's abilities in three seperate flavors. Support Tower, Anti-Unit Tower and Anti-Hero Tower.

Support Tower

The support tower is mainly used for supporting your army, it auto heals units around it as well as can Transfuse specific units for a boost of health. It has Mass Recall, the ability to shield units within proximity as well as a unique ability called Chrono Boost that can be casted on to your command center to hasten the build speed for Heroes. You can even drop merc marines anywhere on the map you have vision.

              

Anti-Unit Tower

The anti-unit tower is a defensive tower used against enemy units within your base. You can EMP Round shielded and energy based units, place down force fields and even do damage with abilties like Yamtao Cannon and Psionic Storm. The anti-unit tower even has a unique ability called Consumption that if used on one of your own units will gain back more energy for the tower.


Anti-Hero Tower

The anti-hero tower is as the name implies. This tower comes jam packed with abilities to help counter enemy hero units that enter your base. Abilities such as Graviton Beam and Feedback. Do damage against enemy units and heros with Ragnarok Beam and Snipe. You can even Vortex enemy units and armies. This tower also comes equiped with an additional cloaked detector.

           

It is important to note that many of the abilties on both the Anti-Unit Tower and Anti-Hero Tower can be upgraded in effectiveness and damage either through basic mercenary upgrades or through hero level upgrades at the arena shop.

Upgraded through

Upgraded through

Upgraded through

Upgraded through

Upgraded through

Upgraded through

Upgraded through

Basic Merc Upgrades

Tassadar Level Ups

Phoenix Level Ups

Colossus Level Ups

Infestor Level Ups

Tassadar Level Ups

Commando Level Ups


Xel'Naga Tower

The Xel'Naga Tower lies between each teams base on the side hill and provides two functions, the main function is to provide vision for you and your ally as well as your units. The second function is a teleport ability that will allow you to teleport a small number of units from one Xel'Naga Tower to the Xel'Naga Tower directly across from it.

To capture an Xel'Naga Tower you must place a unit in close proximity to the tower. If you and an enemy both have units at the tower neither you or that player will have vision.



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