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Yeah when I first played through the campaign I went tech reactor, but on my second play through I purposely got the opposite tech at each step - hence my delayed revelation

You pretty much got the theorycraft behind that idea. Execution wise it's difficult since we don't have BW like precision just yet. Oh well I'll keep at it and eventually do something about it...

And no, your posts didn't come off as that

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Original Message From DminusTerran:
Yeah I understand what you mean essentially you're using the mobile warp prisms to replace reinforcement pylons, as you can get the units directly into the battle. With enough warp gates, a broodwar like ability to read the opponents general game plan and the near unlimited information gathering of hallus you're timing pushes would almost always be as close to perfect as possible.

Honestly though I didn't even really think about just the general value of using warp prisms in that manner as a staple. Kinda blowing my mind here brother. I only off race as Brotoss so I'm not really an expert =/.

Also I hope my posts didn't come off as, "My opinion is correct edit that shit into the op right now rawr!" I just wanted to mention it, because it hadn't been brought up by anyone else in the thread really =] and it's worth thinking about for players who aren't really using them.

P.S. I totally did use the orbital drops in the campaign. Marine medic'd my way through brutal like I was on a Sunday stroll through the park heh =]. Though I think reactortechlabs would've been better for ALL IN.

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Original Message From Plexa:
On November 13 2010 07:20 DminusTerran wrote:
Show nested quote +
On November 13 2010 05:51 Plexa wrote:

On November 13 2010 05:21 DminusTerran wrote:
Excellent write up! I have a few questions about your seeming exclusion of my Zealot friends though? When discussing possible mineral dumps while going CSS, you didn't mention warp prism harass with zealots. It's an entirely mineral composition(or slight gas investment if you get prism speed) and can really put the pressure on the zerg.

Let me paint the picture for you. You're in one of those late midgame middle map standoffs that tend to happen where you're constantly poking with your army and the zerg attempts to hold off engaging as long as is possible. Warping a production cycle of zealots into one of his periphery expansions can really force a decision out of the zerg. He'll have to dedicate a decent number of units to defending or risk losing the hatchery. Allowing the Protoss player to perhaps get a opportunity to engage with his main army in some advantageous fashion, or clean up a decent number of drones/maybe deny a expansion with the drop.

Also zealots in the IST composition barely got a footnote which made me a little sad. Yes they definitely do not, "suck" against zerglings, but they also provide some other valuable functions as well. While storm is mostly the ling killer vs a muta linging zerg player. Zealots play a valuable roll of meat shield and escape mechanism. You don't really have any extraneous gas for sentries with force-fields when going any sort of Templar mix. Having the zealots to take hits while you pull back your valuable gas heavy units can usually pay out some sort of dividends.

Obviously against Roach Hydra they certainly aren't as good for the composition, but the still do play the roll of meat shield some what adequately, though cannons/expansion are probably the more valuable choice most of the time. Again though they deserve a mention in the warp prism harass category especially when going templar, as 2 templar and 4/5 zeals warping into a lightly defended zerg expansion can really put the hurt on.

Anyways, just my opinion, but I think warp prisms and zeals can be included a little more than was mentioned in the op. Especially since you already have the robo up and need some way to dump minerals. This seems doubly useful on maps where there is an island expansion, since at some point you'll want to build a warp prism to take advantage of that expo.

Edit: Holy shit I just noticed your icon is waffles damn I never saw that ><.

Well firstly, this is just an overview of the matchup not a complete guide I couldn't include everything. But I dislike warp prism zealot harass, even though I used to use it a lot in this matchup. It really is nothing mother than a minor annoyance. With good creep highways Zergs shouldn't lose anything more than a few tech structures at most (and with the HP buffs recently, don't count your chickens). 4 DTs are significantly better at killing things and doing what you want your warped Zealots to do. But of course, they cost gas... so you're back at square one.

Throwing them into an IST mix is certainly better than CSS, but even then, IST relies on forcefields early on just as CSS does. Typically the mineral surplus starts to accumulate around the time you have 3 bases running and are producing gas intensive units (templar, colossus etc). At this stage of the game you have to make a judgement call on where those minerals are best spent - throwing them into zealots may be just what you need or conversely, it may be better to try and get a 4th up. It completely depends on the situation. I generally try to avoid Zealots since they really are just supply hogs (much like roaches, except worse).


I get the feeling we're on the same page here, but I think I might as well elaborate on my point since you've given me the opportunity.

I wasn't really trying to emphasize that the drop needs to do serious damage. Around the point you're getting your 4th up as protoss in ZvP throwing 6/7 zeals into one of the zergs expansion while you distract him with your army movement can't really be bad. The zealots don't even have to be cost effective, because they're almost free units at that point. I also understand that this is an overall guide, but that's why I think warp prism needs a mention. They aren't actually all that good as a fundamental piece of your overarching strategy, but rather as a use for idle minerals and robotics facilities as you're waiting on gas income. They're harassing your opponents multi tasking abilities more than their actual infrastructure if anything.
I have theorycraft which wants to disagree with you! Rather than clog up the thread with half-baked theory, I'm working on what I like to call the ultimate protoss strategy.

I think that PvZ will become imbalanced in favour of Protoss - even with the current patch. Why you ask? Two things - hallucination and warp prisms.

Did you ever play the campaign? Tell me, did you get the drop pod research? If you did, then you would realise just how useful constantly having your reinforcements arrive in the middle of your army - that's exactly what the warp prism allows.

Then comes in part two, hallucination. Hallu is a maphack, and in time, protoss will be able to get an absolute read on the Zergs strategy and know exactly how many units he'll have at X time and can work towards a timing attack.

Then you combine the two, you do a timing attack with a warp prism constantly reinforcing and you shouldn't lose- ever. And if by some chance he is safe at every turn, then you will have a death ball which is unbeatable.

muahahahahahhah
xD

But yea, warp prism + attacking at the same time can be really good! Although I tend to prefer using that to reinforce my own army rather than use it for harass because I find that if you lose your main army then the game almost always ends in the Zergs favour unless you are able to do serious damage with it.