Starcraft Terran Strategy - Beating Dark Templar  | read this item

If you’ve ever faced a Protoss player into the mid to late game, you may had a time where your harvesting SCVs are suddenly exploding.  Despite the urge to blame poor design standards at the command center, they may actually be falling victim to Dark Templar.  These units are the Protoss nearest comparable unit to the Ghost.  While lacking the ability to call a nuclear strike, they will do just as well in wrecking havoc with your economy.

The Dark Templar is a small 3rd tier melee unit deployed via Gateways (or Warpgates).  In addition to a devastating melee attack, they’re equipped with a permanent cloak.  In their non-upgraded form, they are capable of killing a harvester of any race in a single hit.  The downside to this high-end damage is lower health and shielding.  This makes the unit very fragile when their cloak is nullified.

Keys to Victory:

The first order of business is detecting them.  Terran currently have three options to accomplish this.

First, the Orbital Command’s Sensor Sweep ability will nullify the cloak of any Dark Templar.  The ability is quick and can be deployed anywhere on the map.  The downside is that you will have to sacrifice summoning a M.U.L.E. for each scan used and the effect only lasts for a few seconds.

Next, you can build Missle Turrets near your most vulnerable areas.  For example, your resource line to cover your SCVs or any chokes that the Dark Templar would have to pass through to reach your base.  These buildings have a permanent detector, thus nullifying the cloak of any unit near it.

Finally, the Raven.  What it lacks in the ability to attack normally it makes up for with a permanent detector and an option for deploying Seeker Missles and Defense Turrets.  This is a powerful combo against Dark Templar.

Choose Your Weapon:

As you may notice, none of the detector options will be able to destroy a Dark Templar on their own.  At best you’ll need to use upgrade abilities.  At worst, you’ll need to bring in some additional firepower.  Your best choice is to pick a unit that can move in fast and avoid the hard hitting attacks of the opponent.

Banshees are a great choice to use.  They’re a flying unit, making them extremely mobile and also protecting them from the Dark Templar’s attacks.  Their attacks are also very effective against ground units.  Be sure to have other air support as the Banshee can’t defend itself against flying units.

Ghosts are also quite effective against Dark Templar.  One of the abilities they can gain access to is the EMP Round.  This will nullify the cloak of units for a few seconds in addition to causes high damage against shields.  This will leave a dark templar (and any of his nearby friends) cloakless and shieldless.  Using this in combination with a Sniper Round will kill any Dark Templar.

Other options which will require addition micro-management to continue to avoid attacks include the marine, the maraduer (especially with concussive shell upgrades), reapers,  and seiges.  While not able to detect a cloaked unit on its own, a Planetary Fortress can effectively defend an expansion against this threat with the aid of a well-placed missle turret.

What sort of strategies do you use to combat Dark Templar harass and assault?