Starcraft 2 Opening Gambit Gold Medal Challenge Guide

Starcraft 2 Challenges Guide --> Opening Gambit (you are here)

Opening Gambit is one of the last challenges available for players in Starcraft 2 Wings of Liberty. This particular challenge tasks players with building up a large army in a short amount of time.

Opening Gambit is definitely the longest challenge, it takes about 12 minutes of game time to complete and it plays out under normal game speed. However, it also requires the least amount of micro and instead is the only challenge that really focuses on your macroing abilities.

In fact, with a little bit of defense, you never even have to worry about holding off enemy attacks - you get to spend your entire time focusing on building up your economy, infrastructure, and army.

Opening Gambit Gold Medal Video Walkthrough

The video walkthrough here for Opening Gambit shows you how to beat this mission with 50 seconds to spare on the game clock.

Build Order for Opening Gambit

Since very little micro is required here, really the strategy is all about the build order. Note that you should be constantly training SCVs out of both Orbital Commands until you are specifically told to stop.

10/11 (supply): Supply Depot #1 near entrance to base.

12/19: Barracks #1 near entrance to base.

15/19: Marine #1.

15/19: Supply Depot #2, completing the wall-off on the ramp to your base with the other Supply Depot and the Barracks.

17/19: Orbital Command. Naturally, you cannot build SCVs while this is upgrading.

18/27: Marine #2.

19/27: Refinery x2 - Build simultaneously. The reason we start hitting gas hard here is that gas is the limiting reagent here, not minerals, as 8 tanks and 8 ghosts cost a lot of vespene.

**3:30: At this point on the game clock, you get attacked by a wave of Zerglings. You should be safe thanks to the few Marines you have behind the wall of Supply Depots.

20/27: Marine #3.

21/27: Build an extra Command Center inside your base on the high ground. This lets it construct safely inside your base. If you start building it at the expansion, it will get attacked.

22/27: Marine #4.

22/27: Put extra SCVs on gas so that there is 3 SCVs on each of the two newly constructed refineries. As mentioned, you need to stockpile gas in order to afford all the tanks and ghosts.

24/27: Supply Depot #3.

26/27: Marine #5.

27/35: Bunker near entrance, slightly to the north.

27/35: Factory #1.

29/35: Marine #6.

30/46 (supply jump comes from the 2nd Command Center): Orbital Command upgrade for the second Command Center.

30/46: Supply Depot #4.

**6:00: At around the 6 minute mark, you get attacked by Roaches. Your Marines should handle them easily. Do not stand too close to the ramp as you do not want the Roaches to kill your Marines.

**6:15: As soon as the Roaches are dead, lift off your Orbital Command and move it towards the expansion.

32/54: Tech Lab add-on for the Factory.

32/54: Factory #2.

34/54: Bunker #2 near the first Bunker.

34/54: Marine #7.

36/54: Marine #8. Load marines into bunkers.

37/54: Refinery x2 at expansion. Be sure to ferry over SCVs harvesting minerals from your main command center so that you can put 3 SCVs on each gas the second the Refinery is done. As mentioned before, you will run low on gas, not minerals, once you start making your army.

37/54: Siege Mode technology. You need this for defense.

38/54: Siege Tank #1.

44/54: Tech Lab on Factory #2.

45/54: Supply Depot #5.

46/54: Ghost Academy.

48/54: Siege Tank #2.

51/54: Siege Tank #3.

54/62: Supply Depot #6.

**8:00: You get attacked by Roaches right at this point. They may ignore your Bunkers and start attacking your expansion. Do not panic! They will focus on the Orbital Command itself. About 10 seconds into the attack, Siege Tech should finish. You can then place your Siege Tank into Siege mode on the safe spot of the high ground. It will kill the Roaches from up here. You should not have to use any Marines and you should lose no units during this attack.

55/62: Build Barracks #2-#5. You can pull off 4 Barracks from the mineral line in your main base and have them all build Barracks at once. If you are low on minerals, remember to drop your MULEs.

56/62: Siege Tank #4.

59/62: Siege Tank #5.

62/70: Supply Depot #7.

62/70: Supply Depot #8.

66/78: Tech Lab x4 on the new Barracks. No add-on needed for your original Barracks.

66/78: Supply Depot #9.

67/78: Siege Tank #6.

70/78: Siege Tank #7.

73/94: Stop SCV production.

73/94: Build Supply Depots #8, 9, 10, and 11. Each one of the SCVs that had build your 4 Barracks earlier can make a Supply Depot and then return to harvesting minerals. This will set your supply count high enough to complete the mission.

73/94: Ghosts #1-4, Marine #9, Siege Tank #8, all simultaneously.

85/126: Build 15x Marines - 3 out of each Barracks.

100/126: Ghosts #5-8 + Marine #25.

**11:00 - Around the 11 minute mark, you face the biggest wave of Zerg units including several Ultralisks. You want to make sure all of your Siege Tanks are on the ledge of the high ground in Siege Mode so that they can kill off all the ground units. You should lose nothing in the attack if your tanks are in position.

109/126: Marine x5. This will complete the mission.

Conclusion

The build order and video guide on this page show a simple way to complete Opening Gambit. If you are having trouble with this mission, print out the build order. Follow it step-by-step, and pause the game by opening the menu after you follow each step. This will give you a few moments to plan your next move so you do not waste any time - you can follow it just like an instruction manual that way.