As a protoss, I have nightmares about the damage that mutas and speed vultures can do to a worker line despite defenses (cannons, simcity, defending units). They're fast and comparatively durable (although maybe mutas aren't as cost-effective at vultures, due to their high gas requirement). As a low-level P, any T that makes good use of vulture harass is almost impossible for me to beat.
What is the equivalent unit for the protoss? Is there one?
DTs don't seem to fit the bill. If undetected, they can wreak havoc, but with detection (turrets, cannons, spores) they can't do nearly as much damage as a pack of vultures or flock of muta. And they're fragile and slow, compared to mutas and vultures, and higher up the tech tree.
HTs in a storm drop or reavers in a reaver drop could do similar amounts of damage, but require two sets of units, not just one (and arguably the speed upgrade for shuttles too) to be really effective.
Maybe speedzealots? But they're melee, not ranged.
Reaver drops early game, and storm drops late game. Storm drops take a lot of practice but are super effective. When dropping terran you will often want to unload a zealot first (to take the initial siege tank hit) and then drop your templar. There's lots of videos of pros using storm drops - most late game vs Zerg will have them. Bisu does them a lot
Vultures: I suggest making pylon walls at your natural with only 1 hex opening to keep vultures from running by. Use a dragoon or zealot as a door in that one hex opening. Also use your buildings in your main to make walls so vulture movement is hard in your base. Simcity is probably the best counter from my experience.
Mutas: Scouting your opponent's build is crucial with your first corsair (or zealot/scouting probe). If your opponent FE'd with a 2nd gas he probably is going mutalisk. In this case, make some corsairs in your main defended with one canon - OR - tech to dark archon quick and get hidden maelstrom and catch the group of mutas and become very ahead.
On August 25 2020 03:41 chozen86 wrote: As a protoss, I have nightmares about the damage that mutas and speed vultures can do to a worker line despite defenses (cannons, simcity, defending units). They're fast and comparatively durable (although maybe mutas aren't as cost-effective at vultures, due to their high gas requirement). As a low-level P, any T that makes good use of vulture harass is almost impossible for me to beat.
What is the equivalent unit for the protoss? Is there one?
DTs don't seem to fit the bill. If undetected, they can wreak havoc, but with detection (turrets, cannons, spores) they can't do nearly as much damage as a pack of vultures or flock of muta. And they're fragile and slow, compared to mutas and vultures, and higher up the tech tree.
HTs in a storm drop or reavers in a reaver drop could do similar amounts of damage, but require two sets of units, not just one (and arguably the speed upgrade for shuttles too) to be really effective.
Maybe speedzealots? But they're melee, not ranged.
On August 25 2020 03:41 chozen86 wrote: What is the equivalent unit for the protoss? Is there one?
DTs don't seem to fit the bill. If undetected, they can wreak havoc, but with detection (turrets, cannons, spores) they can't do nearly as much damage as a pack of vultures or flock of muta. And they're fragile and slow, compared to mutas and vultures, and higher up the tech tree.
HTs in a storm drop or reavers in a reaver drop could do similar amounts of damage, but require two sets of units, not just one (and arguably the speed upgrade for shuttles too) to be really effective.
Short answer: No, Protoss has no equivalent to vultures or mutas...
Luckily BW does not have a homogeneous race design, it's a good thing that the races do not have equivalent unit types with identical functions. Thus it's not very fruitful to compare certain units/harrass out of the context of the whole dynamic of the matchup. The different races can very well have different strengths and weaknesses, and a player has to learn to play by those, to create or to avoid the timings and specific situations that are good or bad for him/her.
Protoss' options to kill workers are different, but probably not less effective in their own way. Anyhow, they have other strengths that make up for the lack of abundant high-speed harrass like e.g. Terran vultures.
DTs can't do as much damage to workers as vultures - if (!) they are detected... (They can kill the whole base or army that those workers built btw if they're not detected.) (proxy) DT-rush and DT-drops (multiple DTs) can win you tons of games in an instant in a way that vultures hardly ever do.
Reaver is "no equivalent" or "not as effective" because you have to invest in a shuttle? For the minuscule advantage to be airborne (!) with huge splash-damage? And because you need one other upgrade to make that baby almost as fast as a pack of speed-vultures?
On the point of Templar/Reavers being higher up in the tech tree, remember that Terran has to skip their Tier1-tech in every single TvP to have anything that can move out on the map... They have to invest 200/100 per factory, + some addons and upgrades before producing anything that will be of use.
Also consider that Protoss generally has 1-2 more bases, so losing probes is less crucial than losing an equivalent amount of SCVs. AND in the lategame you get carriers, Arbiters, HTs.... so you don't need another option of high-speed worker-harrass...
Need to practice my speed shuttle storm drop then I know it's effective (really love watching Bonyth use them too), but lack the skill atm to pull it off without something else (macro, army positioning, etc.) suffering.
Simcity + just a few cannons to defend against vultures, yea?
Yea, thought of putting this in Strategy, but wasn't sure it fit: I was mostly just wondering about the underlying design / balance of the races. Definitely makes sense for there to be strengths / weaknesses! Never considered that, yea, TVP basically T skips their entire Tier 1 tech.
There is no absolute safety against any harrass. Sometimes vultures will find their way in even if you're well prepared, especially if it's a multi-pronged attack, if some are split off do different mineral-lines etc., or if it's a drop. It's all about which player plays better, surprises or out-smarts or out-multitasks the opponent.
But I find that, if I face strong Protoss players (relative to my level of skill of course), they always anticipate my vultures, they are experienced enough to know when and where I'll try to harrass, and they have multiple layers of defense: Firstly, they have goons outside my base or on the way to their bases to drive away or to soften up my vultures, to immediatelly clear my mines etc. Sometimes this makes it impossible to even reach the mineral-lines without losing too many vultures. Then they have every ramp/choke sealed off in time with pylons/buildings and 1-2 cannons behind. Those cannons will kill small groups of vultures or, if there are many vultures, buy time for goons to arrive. Last resort are just a few cannons in/around the mineral line. Those will eventuall kill of small amounts of vultures and they'll force the Terran to actively focus the probes because if they just a-move then the vults will attack the cannons. Also these players react quickly and evacuate probes through additonaly pylon walls if possible.
And don't underestimate reaver-harrass with unupgraded shuttles. The key is to do this with a good (early) timing when Terran has still few units to defend, and to not over-commit, to not try to do damage at all costs but to be annoying, be a threat. Meanwhile you can generally take an expansion undisturbedly. Speed is nice, obviously, and makes shuttle-harrass much more viable in the mid-/lategame when Terran has lots of turrets/units. But speed-upgrade is not a necessity to use shuttles.
While it might come much later than your opponent's vultures or mutalisks, as Protoss you have an advantage that you can also make those units by mind controlling one of their workers
More seriously, I do like the point that sure, reavers and high templar come later than vultures, but Terran is also skipping their first tier of units generally speaking. It isn't as easy for Protoss to skip their tier one units, but I think the impact of reavers and high templar can be considerable even if later.
On August 26 2020 05:55 Highgamer wrote: There is no absolute safety against any harrass. Sometimes vultures will find their way in even if you're well prepared, especially if it's a multi-pronged attack, if some are split off do different mineral-lines etc., or if it's a drop. It's all about which player plays better, surprises or out-smarts or out-multitasks the opponent.
But I find that, if I face strong Protoss players (relative to my level of skill of course), they always anticipate my vultures, they are experienced enough to know when and where I'll try to harrass, and they have multiple layers of defense: Firstly, they have goons outside my base or on the way to their bases to drive away or to soften up my vultures, to immediatelly clear my mines etc. Sometimes this makes it impossible to even reach the mineral-lines without losing too many vultures. Then they have every ramp/choke sealed off in time with pylons/buildings and 1-2 cannons behind. Those cannons will kill small groups of vultures or, if there are many vultures, buy time for goons to arrive. Last resort are just a few cannons in/around the mineral line. Those will eventuall kill of small amounts of vultures and they'll force the Terran to actively focus the probes because if they just a-move then the vults will attack the cannons. Also these players react quickly and evacuate probes through additonaly pylon walls if possible.
And don't underestimate reaver-harrass with unupgraded shuttles. The key is to do this with a good (early) timing when Terran has still few units to defend, and to not over-commit, to not try to do damage at all costs but to be annoying, be a threat. Meanwhile you can generally take an expansion undisturbedly. Speed is nice, obviously, and makes shuttle-harrass much more viable in the mid-/lategame when Terran has lots of turrets/units. But speed-upgrade is not a necessity to use shuttles.
This is super helpful, thanks! The idea of multiple layers is really helpful for me. Each little bit helps, rather than a single magic bullet: practicing F2/F3 evac of workers, ingrained sim city, map control and vision, all help to reduce the effectiveness of harass, to the point where it might become a net negative, or at least not a major blow to any advantage I have.
EPT
I know it's effective (really love watching Bonyth use them too), but lack the skill atm to pull it off without something else (macro, army positioning, etc.) suffering. 
