help for illuminate tactics 1v1

I ve practised a bit and started playing some 1v1 games as illuminate, I usually try to go for a fairly quick urchinow rush with tanks and anti air support. However my opponents generally tend to do this but with their respective experimentals I.E. fat boy 2 and that giant laser tank of death. But when our armies clash i inevitable lose as their experimentals have more range and blow me to bits before they even get in sight. What can i do to get the upper hand? I've tried using air units but every faction seems to be stuffed full of anti air,
I've tried going gunships with AA (enemy AA destroys gunships and rolls over base)
I've tried getting experimental as fast as possible (just about hold of enemy then experimental gets overwhelmed by tanks ¬_¬)
My latest tactic is to build assualt bots with anti air upgrade then get the urchinow in as fast as possible (tanks blew assualt bots to bits, then despite destroying the enemy tanks with my defences my experimental urchinow lost to a fat boy i never saw till the replay)
Is there something im missing? should i rush in asap with my tanks? and why do the other experimentals need that much range, how can i counter something that can kite whatever i throw at it?|||Go for teleporting tanks. They own experimentals pretty well. If you have the DLC, shotjas are awesome units.|||Plain simple, Urchinows suck. If your opponent jsut kites, megaliths or fatboys both own them. Thats why bodaboom > teleport or chrome shields > teleport is a way safer path.|||Nephylim|||Gayeon asking for advice how to outgay others? My god, what has this place become?|||Get making yenzoo early and in large quantities. Make a few weebs too to scout. Don't worry about research labs until later. Adapt the strategy from there.
Things to note:
The cost and build time research for land is god. Don't even try to build tanks without these. Don't fight with the tanks without the range upgrade.
Bodoabooms give you a huge edge in combat and are well worth unlocking. Teleport is unmatchable in its tactical ability (Do make sure you make a few more power generators when you get this). It is also an essential in naval combat.
Scorch bombs and flares are totally overpowered, use, but only if you're investing heavily into the air. Otherwise use your weebs to add aoe damage to your land or snipe lone mass extractors.|||How did you ever get an urchinow rush to work in a 1v1?|||Against people without any kind of optimised Build order, you can get all kinds of crap to work. Transport rushes, Protobrain, Artillery spam, harvog rush, Wilfindja. It's kinda fun once in a while to play with your prey.
On a more useful note, you ideally need to be knocking on their front door Asap and playing tank attrition games, Shotja do well here too. Try to keep your RP reserved until you need it. As in, don't unlock a unit upgrade until it has a use then and there (Like Harvog AA, don't add it until there's planes flying over your harvogs). You will find that having that reserve RP to dump into a counter-unit to their strategy or something as simple as a training upgrade can really give you the edge.|||wow thanks for the great advice, wil try to use it all :)|||As others have hinted, experimental are rarely fielded in 1v1s on small maps. Most straight forward way to win on these maps is to just spam MOAR TANKS. Having your commander tank damage is also very useful.|||dawumyster|||Baron is right in this case. Unless we are talking about tiny maps (pretty much Spring Duel only) or weird maps (Finns, favors naval, or Seraphim, favors air or arty), you will see experimentals quite often - they are tie breakers, since the defender always wins a tankspam war. People hardly commit to a frontal attack in a tankspam war, because if it fails, your opponent gets to reclaim all the mass. Instead they fasttech to teleport/megalith/fatboy to long range the opponent, and cause attrition with PDs, mobile artillery and raids in the mean time.|||That's sort of a thing isn't it. I wonder how gameplay would be affected with no reclaim? T'would seem to encourage much more aggression|||Both reclaiming and the tech tree add into a snowballs effect - not only do you lose units, you also give your opponent resources and RP... It indeed forces you to carefully consider every attack..|||Oh and when you play on weddel isles, It's a perfectly feasible tactic to fast tech to space temples (it does go via mass conversion, which is doubly good). Build up a large land army whilst doing so. Just make sure you scout ahead and adjust your tactic to teleporting torpedo tanks if the situation demands.|||In that case its helpful to have a uef partner to spam subs in the meantime to prevent yourself from being killed by cruiser tml and battle ships.
Pullinsmashes can keep yor ally's naval facs safe while he holds off the enemy if you happen to be dropping colossi through the temple. However, Cyclonfury tried this against me and it ended badly for him as battleships outrange the pullinsmashes. It did slow my teammate and myself down a lot. He never got the chance to actually build colossi though. On that big map subs can easily kite non teleporting tanks early game so if your opponents both play aggressively you will have trouble defending and keeping your tanks alive. The subs will just submerge if you appear to be getting close.
In the 1v1 situation this is still true. I would say air is your best chance on Weddell's as aeon. A transport drop around the back of your opponent's base might work if they don't build air or aa.|||AngryMacrophage|||on any larger 1v1 map with water, It's always pretty hilarious to put your RP into a wilfindja, sneak it around through the ocean and pop it up right in the back of the enemy base. Suddenly there's like 2k worth of anti-structure DPS in the nougaty center of their undefended base, and when they try to move units back to kill it, you can use its speed to run out of the base before it dies and have your land units push their front.
Probably not the most pro 1v1 trick ever, but it's hilariously effective on trelleach. Just so long as they don't have a fleet of bombers ready to instagib it.|||All good tricks. I learned the hard way to make sure that I have radar coverage of the routes around the back of my base whenever possible. Nothing counters a drop or raid like the ability to see it coming.|||Z32