how a HIGH MMR player uses TARANTULAS - Mechabellum Guide

[@aletrnate24]

I just want to say, this strat is insane. I have now won every single game (4) i tried this. very fun attacking a different angle almost every turn. Thanks Ragin :D

[@Ragin08]

@@aletrnate24 that's awesome! Glad it's working for you :)

[@KoNine9]

everybody is playing tarantula at the moment, and im happy because for me its the easiest to beat :)

[@cornyboy750]

Great flick, i love the double feature with the analysis intro and smooth finish. I hard failed a match the other day with spiders pushing into marksmen, but this gave me some ideas for how to improve. Cheers

[@Ragin08]

@@cornyboy750 glad you liked the vid and found it helpful :)

[@jaenm.meledez6440]

Really like this playstyle! Tried in a few games and having allot of fun! Thanks again for the great video 🙌🏽✨️

[@johngreyskull1337]

Great content, ideas and detailed commentary as always, thanks a ton!

[@HeavyFootedMoa]

Thanks for the tips dude! I'm loving this game and I appreciate the help.

[@Ragin08]

@@HeavyFootedMoa that's why I make the vids :) glad you're finding it helpful!

[@gleblvov379]

Thanks for the strat, i have been testing it today and got great results, always had problems with playing tarantulas. Mech rage on them is soooo good.

[@Ragin08]

@@gleblvov379 mech rage is super underrated on tarantula imo. I almost never see people take it, but they really pack a punch! Glad to hear it's working for you!

[@YadaYadaMan]

Great video as always Ragin'! Your growth is well deserved - so we are the once that have to say thank you! Good day, Sir.

[@Ragin08]

@@YadaYadaMan My OG! You da man!

[@Tryptic214]

The opponent's AA Marks was particularly deadly for them, since I've found the best counter to Tarantula is Electro Marksmen. There only need to be a few of them in the back, and the rest of the army can be anti-chaff because the Marks will eventually lock down and slow down the Tarantulas. The moment they bought AA, adding Electro becomes way more expensive and less effective. Although, they might not have had it loaded at all.

[@simontollin2004]

Mechrage sure is underused in this kind of setups, quite interesting that you pretty much follow the same formula I use with both tarantula and sledge carry, very simple and effective

[@Ragin08]

@@simontollin2004 yeah I don't see many people taking mech rage on tarantula that much. Every time I click it, it seems to do really well. Sometimes mines are good first if you're facing something like scorps or sabers. I want to start using sledges more. They are strong with boats

[@InnocenceVVX]

Nice commentary, instant-sub for me. What do you think of the carry marksman/arclight combo?

[@Ragin08]

@@InnocenceVVX thank you :) I don't play much marksmen since I'm an aggro player for the most part, but I think arclights in general are probably one of the strongest units right now. It feels like whenever I make a few my game immediately starts going better

[@InnocenceVVX]

@@Ragin08 Thanks!

[@martinpoletti7845]

good video! any starting specialist you like when playing something like this? is speed specialist good?

[@Ragin08]

@@martinpoletti7845 I typically don't pick speed spec because I don't find it gives enough utility compared to something like one of the unit specialists. When starting with tarantula, my preferred specialists in order are Sabertooth spec (they pair well with HE ammo tarantula), Farseer spec (gives you some aa options and is tough to stop until round 5ish) and quick supply spec (allows you to buy phoenix round 1 and a chaff unit). I would really only grab speed spec if it's the only pack with chaff. All that being said speed spec can be the most fun :)

[@aiugiamos3057]

It's the only time speed spec is "okay", else it's a meme tier starter, all others have eco bonuses and you have two ways to get speed besides starting specialist. Thing is tarantula is bad without speed, it becomes okay with a speed boost and any boost you can get you'll need playing this unit.

[@groundhog-plays]

I'm at 1600 MMR and just had two aggro tarantula games earlier today. Both tarantula speed spec, best opener in my opinion. I went mines first because they rushed scorpion and other vulcans. Mines mess up scorpions attack and vulcans are too expensive so he had too little chaff/units and many open angles for mines to speed walk to his towers. Also in one of the games didn't have sab/phoenix card but did have wasp. I find that wasps do a really good job of straining their resources early game too. If they deploy stangs you can deploy deep tarantulas and that really messed them up.

[@Ragin08]

@@groundhog-plays the speed spec spider games are some of the most fun to play! I also really love the deep flank armored units if your opponent is running mustangs especially when the stangs are in response to wasps. They get completely hung up shooting the wrong units

[@simontollin2004]

I think the quick supply is the best spec for this kind of opening, much more flexible, you can get an extra chaff + tower speed, 2 extra spiders or 1 chaff + round one air unit + tower speed etc, depending on the opponents starting pack

[@aiugiamos3057]

My most played opener pre release, speed spec tarantula crawlers, but It's garbage once you hit 1600 MMR, too easy to counter and abuse.

[@aiugiamos3057]

@@simontollin2004 Tarantula is desperate for speed, so while you're correct in theory, if you plan to invest in tarantulas speed is better because it gives you an useful boost in early game, if tarantula don't get to level up it's garbage (and most people will tell you the unit is garbage anyway).

[@dannythomson5239]

Mechabellum is EASILY the most addictive game i have ever played! over 800hrs of play on steam since i joined it on early access, 650- 700 MMR

[@Ragin08]

@@dannythomson5239 Mecha love! Mecha life!

[@Pacanskiytazraduetglaz]

In first game enemy placed fort in front fangs lol

[@aiugiamos3057]

This guy was terrible and was in no way "high MMR" lul, to start with you can tell that he doesn't know how to react to aggro, but that's far from the only issue. Also do mind that having forts in front of fangs is the vanilla version of carry fang comps.

[@kiveynen]

Fire and laser or hackers are the way to go against this. Worked just fine the other day.

[@Ragin08]

@@kiveynen yeah oil/fire can definitely clear crawler chaff and hackers taking the mines can help slow the push a little bit. You still need to answer the phoenix with something if you go hacker. Multi melt with fire from maybe incendiary vulcan might make most sense, but it's expensive to get going. The reason I play it this way is to win before they can afford all of those fancy things

[@JohnDS11]

what if your enemy would be a little bit more at the back? only a little. Then your tarantulas would be in front of your fangs and the whole enemy units would focus your tarantulas. So you would need extra chaff in front instead of flanking your opponent. So you loose the momentum. At least that is my problem very often when i play tarantulas. at the start it is good when they are the focus but later i need to place chaff in front to protect them

[@Ragin08]

@@JohnDS11 this game is very situational so if you need to beef up your chaff to protect your units then definitely do that. When adding any major unit they typically need to be accompanied by chaff. Don't forget to add late arriving chaff as well so that you have a constant stream of it. My advice would be not to add flanking units until you are confident in your front line or if you believe that your flank will be able to win even if your front line fails

[@JohnDS11]

@@Ragin08 Yeah i do this. But then i get myself under pressure and loose later. I will watch more vids to get better :D Thanks!

[@Ragin08]

@@JohnDS11 if you want to send me a replay of a game and let me know your MMR I can review it and try to give you more specific advice if that would help. If you're in the official Mechabellum discord feel free to @RaginJMG in the #share-your-replay section with the game file you want me to look at. Also say what your in game name is so I know who to focus on

[@JohnDS11]

@@Ragin08 That sounds great!! Before i read your comment i had a loosing streak withouit knowing why.... Since your comment i played ~25 games. Only two of them where tarantulas where offered. And i won both of them and most of the other ones. ^^ I But i would come back to this offer next time when i don't know why i lost ! Thank you very much!

[@aiugiamos3057]

Easy counter : storms. You're welcome. If you want to be fancy and have a good laugh hackers will feed on this. Also, don't play tarantulas if you don't aggro, and prefer crawlers as starting chaff. It's fun bellow 1400 MMR though, definitely try it out at least to learn to counter it.

[@KrisRoxas]

Storms won't get the job done if you're against a good player. I'm still beating 1800-2100 players in a similar way.

[@mazagu-crow]

do you ever go standard with tarantulas?

[@Ragin08]

@@mazagu-crow I am primarily an aggro player so I almost never play standard positions. I imagine the techs I run are good in a standard position though. Might want to prioritize range more on standard instead of mech rage early

[@aiugiamos3057]

Don't do it unless you plan to sell your tarantulas before round 4.

[@mazagu-crow]

@@aiugiamos3057 why? I played around with tarantulas but without any luck. I don't know why and it kind of bugs me. They look like they should be "fine" against chaff and not awful against sledgies

[@abbot1]

Thanks to your videos I was able to get into platinum rank ty sir ! 💕

[@Ragin08]

@@abbot1 you're welcome! Glad to help :) Congrats on Plat!

[@jackplisken4738]

ok bro , you owe me 150 mmr XD, i tried this strat 5 times and no chance at all

[@KoNine9]

tarantula is probably the weakest shit. they need long to level and theyre nothing without level. so just beat them before.

[@aiugiamos3057]

Yeah it's really weak currently, it would at least need a speed boost. It's slow (vulnerable to missiles), it's big (vulnerable to AoE), it's a single unit (there's a TON of high single target damage options), and it struggles to clear chaff if you face loose formation. It's highly vulnerable to the most popular unit in standard games : stormcallers. It relies on techs and levels so that's a lot of money to invest, especially since said techs are quite expensive!