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Yeah, the marine all-ins also got me thinking of 13scout, since the mineral difference is midway between 9scout and scout after core, yet I can see whether the opponent has gas. Unfortunatelly, he can still get no gas, 2 marines, and then there's an option to either start a CC, or throw down 3 barracks. I'll have to ask someone to all-in me with marines and see if I can poke in with stalker to check for CC before I make a decision to nexus.
Well, the marine all-in has numbers going to them: GS and stalker kiting are fine, but fighting 16marines with 3stalkers 2zealots isn't easy; and it'll be 24 by the time warpgates finish...specially hard if they're throwing down bunkers at my nat. I'd rather not expand/cancel the nexus, hold my ramp, and move out with superior tech. Good luck getting vikings in time for collosus with a 4rax marine build, indeed 
The sentry-anyway-for a faster nexus can get you killed on a steps-of-war-like map by an all-maradeur build (with or without one marine first; without you see it coming because maradeurs are slower than probe). For example, you can somewhat fight 4 marauders with 2stalker 2zealot, but if it's 2stalker 1zealot 1sentry, you'll be defeated. GS makes them kill the zealot longer, but there's one zealot less; moreover, in such battles good terrans usually fire at zealot once in a while, but mostly run around it and focus the stalkers down.
However, you can a sentry in the time marine-heavy army is moving to your base; problem is it won't have GS.
I FE on all maps, it's just that on large maps I get a robo after nexus, and on small maps I get 2 more gates before robo.
When I get home, I'll check the timings. This adaptation is 100% viable if these two factors are possible:
1)You can get a 13scout probe on a 4player map on last try in the terran main and see whether there is gas or not.
2)Your stalker can reach his base and take a peek on a cross spots on 4player map or a 2player map with large distance before you decide on nexus.
This, however, is perfectionism. Not only no-gas builds are extremely rare, the last try scout is also only 33%; and, finally, you can delay the nexus placement until you know for sure with the stalker (20 seconds on nexus won't decide anything), and just wing it from there. You can play on with a delayed nexus, it's still faster than usual, non-FE protoss expansion; He can't really do much off a defended 4-6 rax marine push.
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On August 31 2010 21:14 Markwerf wrote:+ Show Spoiler +
@ soulforged
Against the marine no gas all in he can't be having stim so the key is to use stalker kiting to the fullest before you engage. Guardian shield also helps tons in keeping your stalkers/zealots survive longer.
I see your preference is to scout quite lot so you can afford a faster 2nd gas etc but for scouting something like a marine all-in it may be a bit late.
I do this FE build with a 13 gate scout, which is generally enough to sneak your probe in so you can see the amount of gas he is taking etc. which i still find important to know if im facing banshee's or something else. The method of running a stalker up the ramp to see the army makeup isn't foolproof as the risk of losing the stalker to a marauder with shells or just not seeing enough (ie. only seeing a bunch of marines) is too high imo.
Starting with 1 zealot then 2 stalkers then 1 sentry you got some early stalkers to deal some damage to a marine all-in on their way over and a reasonably fast sentry helps enormously with guardian shield which is just critical against marines imo. I think it's important anyway to make 1 early sentry in this build as it is a mineral low unit allowing you to expand even faster and guardian shield is good on all occasions. Against kiting marauders you can exactly keep your guardian shield over your zealots while chasing him letting you kite a fair bit longer.
Against a mass marine with scv pull push it's impossible to keep the nexus I think but if you scout this in time you should be able to cancel the nexus (again, the importance of forward stalkers against a no gas build). If you cancel the nexus and keep your ramp with your sentry (which should be able to cast 2 force fields and you can warp in another), I think you can followup with quick colossi to punish his marine build. Afterall if he went very late gas he cant ever get vikings & marauders in time to deal with that, despite you losing the nexus (him pulling scv's costs him about the same as your nexus even if you didn't get to cancel in time).
About fast mara push, before laying expo I throw 2nd gate and I chrono warp gate research all the time and I'm fine vs any early mara.
About poking his front to see units, probe is just fine, since it's light it req 4 shots from mara to kill it, so u should get all intel u need, unless he rallies units further from entrance so you cant T.T but it just happens 5% of the time in my exp.
But with all in marines I just die  although it's extremely rare to see, when t have seen me trying to kite, he just a-moved my main.
Edit:
nice replays, thanks
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I really prefer the sentry anyway approach using my gateway in this order: zealot - stalker - stalker - sentry - zealot - zealot. With 3 chrono's on it and 1 chrono on my cybercore.
Against pure marauder the sentry isn't the greatest perhaps but you can always chose to fight from up the ramp then. 2 zeals 2 stalker 1 sentry seems about as good agianst pure marauder as 3 zeals 2 stalker imo. It's difficult to say for sure though as I'm not facing pure marauder a lot and not facing the greatest micro when I do (ie. them hitting my stalkers instead of my zeals all the time).
Problem with the build is you can't know their unit mix for sure so I prefer to get one that will do fine against all. You simply don't know if they go only 1 or 2 marauders with fast stim or pure marauder early on before you start production. The advantage of getting a sentry is that your gas is used to the fullest so you can get your nexus and extra warpgates up earlier, next patch zeals will also be slower to build so a sentry will be faster for spending the same amount of resources (ie. using your gate more efficient).
My PvZ and PvP keep me around the 800 pt level atm so I don't face the real good terrans too often unfortunately and can't say for sure if the sentry is a deadly mistake against top T with marauder pushes. Don't think it is though.
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I'd just like to point something out.
The effectiveness (practical effectiveness) has been confirmed by over a dozen players now in mid-high diamond range. The discussion on whether or not it is beatable is really not the issue, here. Every single strategy can be beaten (and if not, we have a problem). The important thing to learn from this thread is not "if i FE I will always win" but that it simply works, most of the time, against the imperfect players that you are likely to play against. That is all you can hope for with any strategy. I'm sure someone will eventually develop a counter, but then you can develop a counter-counter, and off into infinity. For now, just enjoy a good, solid build.
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On September 01 2010 00:47 ToxNub wrote:
I'd just like to point something out.
The effectiveness (practical effectiveness) has been confirmed by over a dozen players now in mid-high diamond range. The discussion on whether or not it is beatable is really not the issue, here. Every single strategy can be beaten (and if not, we have a problem).
1.) i disagree
2.) how would that be a problem? there definitely should be openers that are unbeatable as long as you play better than your opponent and adapt properly. there certainly was in bw, what would be wrong with that?
anyways the other day i did this build on metalopolis vs deathrow(1250 terran) and he actually did something hilarious. he was fast expo too and he saw my expo and he floated his CC to the gold, and then went straight marauder and outmassed me hard. i really scouted his gold too late to do anything about it but i thought it was a quite hilarious counter.
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On September 01 2010 01:17 travis wrote:2.) how would that be a problem? there definitely should be openers that are unbeatable as long as you play better than your opponent and adapt properly. there certainly was in bw, what would be wrong with that?
generally, playing better is a the best strategy.
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On September 01 2010 01:17 travis wrote:Show nested quote +On September 01 2010 00:47 ToxNub wrote:
I'd just like to point something out.
The effectiveness (practical effectiveness) has been confirmed by over a dozen players now in mid-high diamond range. The discussion on whether or not it is beatable is really not the issue, here. Every single strategy can be beaten (and if not, we have a problem). 1.) i disagree 2.) how would that be a problem? there definitely should be openers that are unbeatable as long as you play better than your opponent and adapt properly. there certainly was in bw, what would be wrong with that? anyways the other day i did this build on metalopolis vs deathrow(1250 terran) and he actually did something hilarious. he was fast expo too and he saw my expo and he floated his CC to the gold, and then went straight marauder and outmassed me hard. i really scouted his gold too late to do anything about it but i thought it was a quite hilarious counter.
You're not entirely disagreeing with me. Your qualifier, "as long as you play better than your opponent" is pretty critical here. If he plays better than you, then you should lose. So then, the strategy is not unbeatable. And shouldn't be, given that he IS better than you.
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On September 01 2010 01:17 travis wrote:Show nested quote +On September 01 2010 00:47 ToxNub wrote:
I'd just like to point something out.
The effectiveness (practical effectiveness) has been confirmed by over a dozen players now in mid-high diamond range. The discussion on whether or not it is beatable is really not the issue, here. Every single strategy can be beaten (and if not, we have a problem). 1.) i disagree 2.) how would that be a problem? there definitely should be openers that are unbeatable as long as you play better than your opponent and adapt properly. there certainly was in bw, what would be wrong with that? anyways the other day i did this build on metalopolis vs deathrow(1250 terran) and he actually did something hilarious. he was fast expo too and he saw my expo and he floated his CC to the gold, and then went straight marauder and outmassed me hard. i really scouted his gold too late to do anything about it but i thought it was a quite hilarious counter.
Yeah, in my experience, if T also goes FE, you can have some trouble against a bio ball that's the same size as your gateway composition. I haven't played a whole lot of games against a FE T, and I'm not really sure what a good response is. Against a FE T, you will have a significantly stronger army early, so you could apply pressure and try to bust in or delay econ/tech. Alternatively, you could delay gateways in favor of gas knowing T can't pressure well, and rush for HT before he can push you. Another option would be to take advantage of T's early weakness by double-expanding.
I don't know what would work well. I do know that in the mid-game, a 2-base Terran beats a 2-base Protoss without HT or collosi.
****
Also, Day9 did feature an idea similar to this build on last nights D9D. Hopefully this will turn more people on to the idea of expanding early in PvT, and that we'll gradually see a shift in the metagame toward a more macro-oriented style.
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On September 01 2010 02:33 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 01 2010 01:17 travis wrote:On September 01 2010 00:47 ToxNub wrote:
I'd just like to point something out.
The effectiveness (practical effectiveness) has been confirmed by over a dozen players now in mid-high diamond range. The discussion on whether or not it is beatable is really not the issue, here. Every single strategy can be beaten (and if not, we have a problem). 1.) i disagree 2.) how would that be a problem? there definitely should be openers that are unbeatable as long as you play better than your opponent and adapt properly. there certainly was in bw, what would be wrong with that? anyways the other day i did this build on metalopolis vs deathrow(1250 terran) and he actually did something hilarious. he was fast expo too and he saw my expo and he floated his CC to the gold, and then went straight marauder and outmassed me hard. i really scouted his gold too late to do anything about it but i thought it was a quite hilarious counter. Yeah, in my experience, if T also goes FE, you can have some trouble against a bio ball that's the same size as your gateway composition. I haven't played a whole lot of games against a FE T, and I'm not really sure what a good response is. Against a FE T, you will have a significantly stronger army early, so you could apply pressure and try to bust in or delay econ/tech. Alternatively, you could delay gateways in favor of gas knowing T can't pressure well, and rush for HT before he can push you. Another option would be to take advantage of T's early weakness by double-expanding. I don't know what would work well. I do know that in the mid-game, a 2-base Terran beats a 2-base Protoss without HT or collosi. **** Also, Day9 did feature an idea similar to this build on last nights D9D. Hopefully this will turn more people on to the idea of expanding early in PvT, and that we'll gradually see a shift in the metagame toward a more macro-oriented style.
well in my experience normally FE protoss beats FE terran because with chronoboosts your production abilities skyrocket, and also the T tends to float the CC so ur FE is up and running a little sooner. in particular in this game i think it was the income that the gold gives that was the problem. i've played with FE vs T FE before and generally i just outmacro and expand again while working to temp and the game is ez mode.
since in the game im talking about he took the gold, he massively cut scvs to make more rax/marauder so he could pressure me much quicker but still have normal FE income
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On September 01 2010 02:51 travis wrote:Show nested quote +On September 01 2010 02:33 kcdc wrote:On September 01 2010 01:17 travis wrote:On September 01 2010 00:47 ToxNub wrote:
I'd just like to point something out.
The effectiveness (practical effectiveness) has been confirmed by over a dozen players now in mid-high diamond range. The discussion on whether or not it is beatable is really not the issue, here. Every single strategy can be beaten (and if not, we have a problem). 1.) i disagree 2.) how would that be a problem? there definitely should be openers that are unbeatable as long as you play better than your opponent and adapt properly. there certainly was in bw, what would be wrong with that? anyways the other day i did this build on metalopolis vs deathrow(1250 terran) and he actually did something hilarious. he was fast expo too and he saw my expo and he floated his CC to the gold, and then went straight marauder and outmassed me hard. i really scouted his gold too late to do anything about it but i thought it was a quite hilarious counter. Yeah, in my experience, if T also goes FE, you can have some trouble against a bio ball that's the same size as your gateway composition. I haven't played a whole lot of games against a FE T, and I'm not really sure what a good response is. Against a FE T, you will have a significantly stronger army early, so you could apply pressure and try to bust in or delay econ/tech. Alternatively, you could delay gateways in favor of gas knowing T can't pressure well, and rush for HT before he can push you. Another option would be to take advantage of T's early weakness by double-expanding. I don't know what would work well. I do know that in the mid-game, a 2-base Terran beats a 2-base Protoss without HT or collosi. **** Also, Day9 did feature an idea similar to this build on last nights D9D. Hopefully this will turn more people on to the idea of expanding early in PvT, and that we'll gradually see a shift in the metagame toward a more macro-oriented style. well in my experience normally FE protoss beats FE terran because with chronoboosts your production abilities skyrocket, and also the T tends to float the CC so ur FE is up and running a little sooner. in particular in this game i think it was the income that the gold gives that was the problem. i've played with FE vs T FE before and generally i just outmacro and expand again while working to temp and the game is ez mode. since in the game im talking about he took the gold, he massively cut scvs to make more rax/marauder so he could pressure me much quicker but still have normal FE income
Yeah, the problems that I've had against FE T are mostly when I don't scout it till way too late, so I don't have a chance to take advantage of his weakened early army at all. It sounds like you use the fact that T's taken an expansion to take your third a little earlier and then tech to HT at a normal speed. Cutting an early gateway to take your third earlier while keeping tech on track makes a lot of sense. You can also run a weak contain with a chronoed 1-gateway army against a 1-rax expansion to delay his nat from mining a little longer. You have to know he's expanding tho because a low bio count could also mean hellion harass. If it's hellions, the contain will have you way out of position.
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On September 01 2010 02:33 kcdc wrote:
****
Also, Day9 did feature an idea similar to this build on last nights D9D. Hopefully this will turn more people on to the idea of expanding early in PvT, and that we'll gradually see a shift in the metagame toward a more macro-oriented style.
Tee hee, then again, maybe not. The D9D thread is currently filled with, "WTF!?!? DAY9 HAS LOST IT. EXPANDING WILL NEVER WORK!"
It's like Day #1 in this thread all over again.
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Kcdc: At first i was pretty sceptical. I definitely throught that my bio stim with 1 ghost push would beat this, but I tested timings and you simply have to many units out at that time. Obv. the best counter are some pretty cheesy ones, like a 6min 3 barrack hit and run attack i guess. Its kind of weak vs fast cloacked banshees i could imagine, and to some cheesy mass marine early timing push you most liekly willl lose. However most terran players dont know your doing this builld, and wont have time to prepare for it, and likely wont respond correctly. Defintely a good build but not one I would use in every game if i was playing a bo5 in a tournament.
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On September 01 2010 04:35 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 01 2010 02:33 kcdc wrote:
****
Also, Day9 did feature an idea similar to this build on last nights D9D. Hopefully this will turn more people on to the idea of expanding early in PvT, and that we'll gradually see a shift in the metagame toward a more macro-oriented style. Tee hee, then again, maybe not. The D9D thread is currently filled with, "WTF!?!? DAY9 HAS LOST IT. EXPANDING WILL NEVER WORK!" It's like Day #1 in this thread all over again.
lol. well, at least they'll have a different thread to spam their disbelief in so maybe we'll see less of it here.
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You can have two observers out by the time cloak finishes(~08:20, I guess if they get it faster, one observer, still double chrono is good), though still have to be careful of those banshees. And as far as playing in a bo5, there's a plenty of options for prototss:
1)Small map -> FE->3gate->robo
2)Large map -> FE->robo->3gate
3)Close air distance -> Gnai'ls Void Ray, stalkers still can do good with large ground distance since they are fast.
4)Safe build -> 1gate robo -> 2 or 3gate off 1base, with an obs to decide on immortal/colossi/nexus timings
5)Cute build - phoenix opening
6)Cheese build - 2player maps inbase gateway proxy.
7)Leaving less reliable stuff like chargelots or DT->FE or even cannon rush openings.
There's a lot to do in a bo5.
BTW, as far as terran FE goes, I just don't cut probes, skip a gateway wave for 3rd/4th gas, and then react depending on obs scouting. If I see lots of raxes started, I go 3->5->8 gate HT/chargelot, if I see tanks or banshees being made or opted towards in good numbers, I go 3gate->nexus on gold->8 gate.
If they expanded really quick, literally off 1 rax with gas, I might cancel 2nd or at least 3rd gate and just get the tech even quickier. If I went nexus->robo, I'll get an immortal to force some bunkers.
If they went for no-gas CC, I'll use initial chronoboosted-off-1gate army to force more bunkers and tech robo+twilight->3gate/4gas until obs tells more.
I pretty much always camp the probe at their natural. If the attack comes, I count their stuff and try to guess the barracks count from it. If they're moving out with a small army(~3marauders) and early, I'll try to sneak in once they moved, and if I don't see a CC I could even rally a stalker-in-the-making at main for possible reaper/factory float helion backstab.
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On September 01 2010 05:29 Soulforged wrote:
You can have two observers out by the time cloak finishes(~08:20, I guess if they get it faster, one observer, still double chrono is good), though still have to be careful of those banshees. And as far as playing in a bo5, there's a plenty of options for prototss:
1)Small map -> FE->3gate->robo
2)Large map -> FE->robo->3gate
3)Close air distance -> Gnai'ls Void Ray, stalkers still can do good with large ground distance since they are fast.
4)Safe build -> 1gate robo -> 2 or 3gate off 1base, with an obs to decide on immortal/colossi/nexus timings
5)Cute build - phoenix opening
6)Cheese build - 2player maps inbase gateway proxy.
7)Leaving less reliable stuff like chargelots or DT->FE or even cannon rush openings.
There's a lot to do in a bo5.
BTW, as far as terran FE goes, I just don't cut probes, skip a gateway wave for 3rd/4th gas, and then react depending on obs scouting. If I see lots of raxes started, I go 3->5->8 gate HT/chargelot, if I see tanks or banshees being made or opted towards in good numbers, I go 3gate->nexus on gold->8 gate.
If they expanded really quick, literally off 1 rax with gas, I might cancel 2nd or at least 3rd gate and just get the tech even quickier. If I went nexus->robo, I'll get an immortal to force some bunkers.
If they went for no-gas CC, I'll use initial chronoboosted-off-1gate army to force more bunkers and tech robo+twilight->3gate/4gas until obs tells more.
I pretty much always camp the probe at their natural. If the attack comes, I count their stuff and try to guess the barracks count from it. If they're moving out with a small army(~3marauders) and early, I'll try to sneak in once they moved, and if I don't see a CC I could even rally a stalker-in-the-making at main for possible reaper/factory float helion backstab.
It sounds like your response against a FE T is more or less:
-if bio, skimp a bit on early defense to get HT up faster
-if mech/banshees, skimp a bit on early defense to get a third base faster
This sounds about right, although I think I'd favor getting HT before taking a third against banshees. I never feel completely safe against banshee/marine until I have storm.
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If mech/banshees, I'm still getting HTs. It's more like:
-if CC, skimp on 2nd/3rd gate(if scouted early enough) for faster robo+twilight. Still get those gateways, but after those 350 minerals. No probe cuts. Fast double gas at nat, right after gate #3.
-obs looks at terran base. If bio, add lots of gates. I'm getting minerals for gates while sinking gas in existing warpgates on HTs
-if mech, add 3rd nexus(still get HTs), and then lots of gates.
Now, those are against a gas-before-CC-builds.
So far I haven't had enough run-ins with a no gas FE from T to judge correctly there.
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On September 01 2010 05:49 Soulforged wrote:
If mech/banshees, I'm still getting HTs. It's more like:
-if CC, skimp on 2nd/3rd gate(if scouted early enough) for faster robo+twilight. Still get those gateways, but after those 350 minerals. No probe cuts. Fast double gas at nat, right after gate #3.
-obs looks at terran base. If bio, add lots of gates. I'm getting minerals for gates while sinking gas in existing warpgates on HTs
-if mech, add 3rd nexus(still get HTs), and then lots of gates.
Now, those are against a gas-before-CC-builds.
So far I haven't had enough run-ins with a no gas FE from T to judge correctly there.
How are you using the faster twilight? Are you starting charge as soon as you have 3 gates or are you rushing for storm? As I understand it, against a FE T, you'd go gate, core, nexus, robo, twilight, gate, gate. I don't know if I'd favor investing in charge quite THAT early, but I could see the twilight timing allowing you to get storm ridiculously fast.
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I'm having a loooooot of trouble with stim MM timing push. I'm not doubting the build, I'm just having trouble defending against it, when do you put down the extra gates and what units do you end up making?
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On September 01 2010 06:00 kcdc wrote:
How are you using the faster twilight? Are you starting charge as soon as you have 3 gates or are you rushing for storm? As I understand it, against a FE T, you'd go gate, core, nexus, robo, twilight, gate, gate. I don't know if I'd favor investing in charge quite THAT early, but I could see the twilight timing allowing you to get storm ridiculously fast.
You are correct .
Twilight->archives->charge->storm. I'm not sure on what time is the earliest I can safely take 4gas, though. I mostly start charge before storm because it's 30seconds longer to research, but now you got me thinking I could start in later and just chrono it.
Optimal solution would be finding a way to take extra gases early enough to afford this:
Twilight->start archives -> start charge -> archives finish -> start storm asap, all while affording an observer(if you saw front CC with a probe, can get away with just one, you'll know of banshees long beforehand).
I'll go and test it.
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EPT
