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Note: I'm at ~700 diamond at the moment.
So I've been trying to find a way to expand in PvP and losing....pretty much every PvP I play for a while now. (Really dragging down my rating....) The problem I've had is that if you expand, you need to spend more on defense early, so your opponent beats you to ranged collosi and you lose. Yesterday, however, I tried out an expansion immediately after my gateway, and before assimilator, cybercore or forge. The idea was that I'd defend rushes with zealots and a couple cannons, and then I'd pump out as many stalkers as possible off of my two bases and try to squeeze in blink when I could. In theory, the expo would be up so early that my income advantage would allow me to fight more efficient robo compositions with pure stalkers. Anyway, I tried it out expecting it to fail miserably as all my other FE ideas have. My opponent (favored in the MU, no less) scouted my FE and predictably rushed for ranged collosi. To my surprise, I won easily. Here's the replay.
![[image loading]](http://www.gamereplays.org/community/uploads/repimgs/repimg-33-139075.jpg)
I definitely haven't seen anyone else use this expansion timing, but I think it just might have a shot with some tweaking to be stable. Would a decent Protoss player like to play around with the build sometime to work out if it can be defended?
From that one game, I'm not too worried about collosus rushes, but I am concerned about how it would hold up against 4-gate stalker, blink stalkers, immortal timing pushes, and void ray rushes.
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umm... most pvp are cheeese oriented, 4 gate, or void rush, and all of these i think would be able to destroy this fe because when you are droning and getting down your cybe core, they can be massing or getting voids. if you get some stalkers out then you will be ok from void, but not a four gate. I think that, if done correctly, this will work against most late game protoss, but if they are aggressive, you will loose.
note: i am at 750ish diamond
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Maybe so, but when I watched the replay, I believe I was able to finish my 2 cannons and get several zealots to defend before he finished warpgate research. I think if done correctly, it would at least be close against a 4-gate. If you could identify a 4-gate and rule out a void ray or counter-expand, you could always throw down some extra cannons as well.
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hey, im interested in that replay. Im mid level P and i love to play around with BO.
the idea of FE is mostly not viable since the amounts of minerals you need for probes + gates + pylons + assimilators + cannon just gona delay your army production like forever. cosidering what if he had gone 1 gate star, you should have die right from the beginning 
1 cannon is 150, extra cannon is almost half a nexus when u come to think of it. i normally go immortal counter cannon back when i got cannon rush in placement but i need the replay to say more.
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Also, this FE would obviously be scouting-dependent. You'd pylon scout, and you wouldn't go for the FE against a 10-gate timing or a 2-gateway opening.
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btw courious, you say, you get the Nexus before the Forge, assimilator or cyber. do you still constantly pump probes and pylons when needed, or do you cut workerproduction for some short time at a certain point?, also how many zealots do you get before putting down the nexus, and/or how many zeals, before getting the forge/cannons?
Ok, the last question is probably highly dependent on what your opp is doing...but I'm still courious about when and how you get that nexus down exactly.
Also do you go 12/13 gate, when you do this?
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I hate to be a naysayer but I don't think this is gonna work -.-
cannons just aren't good enough in pvp i think
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FE in PvP is super non-viable.
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The main issue I have with this is you won't have any way to kill their initial probe for a very long time, so they can run their probe around in your base all day and do the 4 warpgate build pylons in your base build, cannons protecting your ramp/nat will not help you there, and I suspect the rush will come before any advantage kicks in from your expo and you will die.
But keep at it and do post reps, the entire reason I'm not playing protoss is because pvp is so stupid atm, a viable FE build would shake things up a lot.
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Yea, cannon just won't do against PvP due to warp prism. I played against Toss yesterday who thought cannon in the front would hold and try to defend with zealots but I made fast robo and got warp prism and loaded my 3 stalkers and 1 zealot and dropped in his base. And then just warped in stalkers with 4 warpgates done. That's when he got his warp gate done too but too much for him to handle and he wasted minerals on those cannons in the front of his natural. If you have enough forces to break him before his natural kicks in then you'll lose
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Ok, so unsurprisingly, if you post on TL about an idea that runs contrary to popular opinion, you get a bunch of people telling you it can't work. I've thought about the pylon-in-base problem, but it's really only a threat if our opponent 10-gates, and even then, I find it very easy to beat. I've crushed the Korean 4-gate with as little as 2 gates, and I even forgot warpgate research. You just constantly produce zealots. He tries to warp in 4 when you already have 5.... I don't think a warp prism would hit before you have stalkers, so again, I see that as something that could be handled.
NB, if you want to try to work out a stable BO sometime, PM me with your name.id and I'll add you.
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Aotearoa39261 Posts
On August 15 2010 06:34 kcdc wrote:
Ok, so unsurprisingly, if you post on TL about an idea that runs contrary to popular opinion, you get a bunch of people telling you it can't work. Yup. That's because the burden of proof is on YOU, not us. You haven't provided a single replay to validate your claims and so is mere conjecture. Given how stupid PvP is atm, I would be very surprised to see a FE being viable.
I've thought about the pylon-in-base problem, but it's really only a threat if our opponent 10-gates, and even then, I find it very easy to beat. I've crushed the Korean 4-gate with as little as 2 gates, and I even forgot warpgate research. You just constantly produce zealots. He tries to warp in 4 when you already have 5.... I don't think a warp prism would hit before you have stalkers, so again, I see that as something that could be handled.
NB, if you want to try to work out a stable BO sometime, PM me with your name.id and I'll add you. Sounds like BS to me. If someone Korean warpgating you there is no possible way to defend using 2gates after a FE. Your opponent must have been terrible for that to work.
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I'd like to see some replays, like Plexa said. I'm open to anything at this point, but you can't get mad without being able to show anything.
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@Plexa
I haven't said it works against everything. I'll post the one replay I have showing it probably works against a collosus rush. Just saying, "it won't work," doesn't help much in terms of figuring out how to make it work. I just had a long argument about FE in PvT where basically everyone said, "It won't work" over and over and over. When people tried their supposed counters against my FE, however, it held perfectly fine and granted me a big advantage. I think this PvP FE is a long way from being worked out at this point--I've tried it exactly once--but I have a good bit of experience trying relatively early expansions in PvP and this is by far the most promising one I've come up with, so I thought I'd ask if anyone would like to help me test it out and try to optimize it against various responses. If nothing else, the build basically begs people to collosus rush it thinking they'll outrange the cannons, which will turn into easy wins on ladder until people figure out the proper response.
There's a reason I didn't call this a guide thread. I'm asking for (1) ideas for ideas about ways to bust the FE, (2) ideas for how the FE might be tweaked to reduce those threats, and (3) a good player to help test those ideas.
As for beating a Korean 4-gate with 2 gates, it definitely happened. (Tho it was 2 gates before cyber and I didn't FE. The FE was a different game entirely. You certainly can't FE against a Korean 4-gate, but it's easy to scout a 10-gate....You know he's 10-gating before you even reach is base if your scouting probe gets more than halfway across the map before running into his scouting probe) I can't say for certain that my opponent was good, but I was at ~700 diamond and I believe he was favored. He'd said he'd just lost to TTone Korean 4-gating him, so he must have been, you know, good enough to get matched against TTone. Anyway, I haven't watched that replay, so I don't know if it was an optimal BO, but I just don't find the Korean 4-gate scary at all. I cut probes, chronoboost zealots and a single stalker off of my gateways, don't stress warpgate research and kill the zealots as they warp in. Then my opponent GG's....
Also, Plexa, would you mind doing some testing w/ me? I think we've played each other before and I remember you being pretty decent.
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if You're going Zealot --> Stalker + Canon Defense then wouldnt 3/4 immortals completely own your composition? And that can be made way faster than ranged Collsoi without giving you much time to reap the rewards from your expansion.
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4gate warp rush or 2gate proxy seems like the best option sadly
i cant wait to see korean pro pvp micro battles lasting only 6 minutes are gonna be intense
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On August 15 2010 07:21 PureReborn wrote:
if You're going Zealot --> Stalker + Canon Defense then wouldnt 3/4 immortals completely own your composition? And that can be made way faster than ranged Collsoi without giving you much time to reap the rewards from your expansion.
I don't know. I'd be more concerned about a 1/2 immortal timing than a 3/4 immortal timing tho. 3/4 would hit when I'd already have 5-6 warpgates, so I could always just defensively warp in a round of zealots to counter the immortals. I'd like to try both tho.
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I've been working on a PvP stargate expo build with cannon sentry voidray as your defensive army. I haven't played it enough and I'm pretty mediocre with protoss right now, but the big boon to the strategy is being able to charge rays on your own buildings. Charged voidrays are imbalanced, and since you always can be charged if you're defending, beating stalkers shouldn't actually be that hard. The cannons/sentries buy time.
The transition is to *insert drumroll* mass voidray with air ups and void speed. COMPLETELY IMBALANCED if you are on the same economy.
So yes, the question is surviving/handling a korean 4 warpgate more than anything. If he goes colossi to break you cannon line, you win because voidrays will decimate him. It's SO funny when you get 6 charged speedvoids with +2 weapons =P
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On August 15 2010 07:32 Floophead_III wrote:
I've been working on a PvP stargate expo build with cannon sentry voidray as your defensive army. I haven't played it enough and I'm pretty mediocre with protoss right now, but the big boon to the strategy is being able to charge rays on your own buildings. Charged voidrays are imbalanced, and since you always can be charged if you're defending, beating stalkers shouldn't actually be that hard. The cannons/sentries buy time.
The transition is to *insert drumroll* mass voidray with air ups and void speed. COMPLETELY IMBALANCED if you are on the same economy.
So yes, the question is surviving/handling a korean 4 warpgate more than anything. If he goes colossi to break you cannon line, you win because voidrays will decimate him. It's SO funny when you get 6 charged speedvoids with +2 weapons =P
Voids to defend an expo are a pretty decent idea since they handle the collosi and immortals which are the obvious threats to cannons. Blink stalkers are the not-so-obvious threat to static cannons, however, and might pose more of a problem.
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On August 15 2010 02:24 JiSu wrote:
Yea, cannon just won't do against PvP due to warp prism. I played against Toss yesterday who thought cannon in the front would hold and try to defend with zealots but I made fast robo and got warp prism and loaded my 3 stalkers and 1 zealot and dropped in his base. And then just warped in stalkers with 4 warpgates done. That's when he got his warp gate done too but too much for him to handle and he wasted minerals on those cannons in the front of his natural. If you have enough forces to break him before his natural kicks in then you'll lose
I second this. Any protoss that builds cannons at his ramp or at his expo will auto-lose to any robo build because of the warp prism.
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on the topic, would it be viable to wall off your nat's choke instead of your normal choke?
even without the FE down using your first gates and pylons.
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I just tried a forge FE in PvP, didn't work to well  - got 4gated and owned.
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Updated OP with the replay.
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On August 15 2010 09:40 atrain117 wrote:
on the topic, would it be viable to wall off your nat's choke instead of your normal choke?
even without the FE down using your first gates and pylons.
Yes, you can build there. However, there are two major weaknesses with doing so. First, you're going to open your front to stalker harassment (ie stalkers shooting your gateways) and it will be difficult for you to stop without fighting the toss in the open. Second, you'll expose yourself more to drops in your mineral line. Basically, if you're going to wall off your natural, you better make sure that you're playing aggressively.
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On August 15 2010 10:00 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:40 atrain117 wrote:
on the topic, would it be viable to wall off your nat's choke instead of your normal choke?
even without the FE down using your first gates and pylons. Yes, you can build there. However, there are two major weaknesses with doing so. First, you're going to open your front to stalker harassment (ie stalkers shooting your gateways) and it will be difficult for you to stop without fighting the toss in the open. Second, you'll expose yourself more to drops in your mineral line. Basically, if you're going to wall off your natural, you better make sure that you're playing aggressively.
IMO, if you wall off, you're stronger against zealots, but weaker against stalkers. If you're worried about 2-gates, walling off will help, but you'll have to play aggressively as soon as stalkers come into play.
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Ive seen FE builds and I just expand without cannons =/
Cannons are better against other Toss than against marauders, thats for sure. And if they decide to tech for Collosi without getting a few immortals it will be a build order loss to blink stalkers i think, depending on micro.
Edit: looks a lot closer to viable than i expected.
Has the added benefit of perhaps forcing your opponent to be on the offensive, which has its own added risks.
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I think a straight 4 warpgate push, with a pilon somewhere close to your front, would have been really hard to defend. Once those 4 gates start producing you fall behind in army size really, really fast. No colosus needed, just continued warpgate production. Illusion missed the best timing windows, allowing your economic advantage to kick in. Since the 4 warpgate style is so popular, your opening seems very risky to me.
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On August 15 2010 07:46 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 07:32 Floophead_III wrote:
I've been working on a PvP stargate expo build with cannon sentry voidray as your defensive army. I haven't played it enough and I'm pretty mediocre with protoss right now, but the big boon to the strategy is being able to charge rays on your own buildings. Charged voidrays are imbalanced, and since you always can be charged if you're defending, beating stalkers shouldn't actually be that hard. The cannons/sentries buy time.
The transition is to *insert drumroll* mass voidray with air ups and void speed. COMPLETELY IMBALANCED if you are on the same economy.
So yes, the question is surviving/handling a korean 4 warpgate more than anything. If he goes colossi to break you cannon line, you win because voidrays will decimate him. It's SO funny when you get 6 charged speedvoids with +2 weapons =P Voids to defend an expo are a pretty decent idea since they handle the collosi and immortals which are the obvious threats to cannons. Blink stalkers are the not-so-obvious threat to static cannons, however, and might pose more of a problem.
Well the quick answer is stalkers need vision to blink so you need an obs and therefore robo to make it work. You could try to zerg past the cannons but I have sentries so you'll just end up getting trapped and kill more likely than anything lol.
I think the korean 4 warpgate is the biggest burden for this build. I think your best bet is kinda cheesing a bit by going for the world's fastest stalker and killing the probe and securing your ramp asap so you can safely dedicate cannons to the nat entrance. I don't know though, korean style 4 warpgate cheese is SO annoying.
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If I see a fast expand I'm just going to put my feet up and take the free win. Don't see how this could ever be viable if the opponent is playing decently. You can't really defend it long enough for the reward to outweigh the risk.
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You acknowledged that the Korean 4gate would be a problem, but you don't necessarily have to 10-gate to make it work. Really the only early game investment is saving up some Chrono so if you fast expand he just plops down 3 gates, chrono's warpgate and collects his win. Also, keep in mind that by fast expanding you won't have out a whole lot of units and certainly won't be able to kill his scout in time so I expect if you do go for this you're gonna end up with a whole lot of pylons and zealots in your main. Don't get me wrong, if you can somehow get it to work, I'll be super interested and do it all the time, but I just don't see how and I'm gonna need some convincing before I go trying it a whole bunch.
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On August 15 2010 15:29 Alou wrote:
If I see a fast expand I'm just going to put my feet up and take the free win. Don't see how this could ever be viable if the opponent is playing decently. You can't really defend it long enough for the reward to outweigh the risk.
The reward is you've been pumping voidrays. Voidrays are the best unit in PvP. If you get enough you can't lose is my conjecture and the point of FEing would be to have a safe way to get many voidrays. Otherwise you could simply cannon you base and make infinite voidrays but he could expo and make enough stalker or enough of his own voidrays to beat you. Expoing might let him expo for free, but it puts you on equal ground economically with you having the better army cause it's voidrays.
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On August 15 2010 15:24 Floophead_III wrote:
Well the quick answer is stalkers need vision to blink so you need an obs and therefore robo to make it work. You could try to zerg past the cannons but I have sentries so you'll just end up getting trapped and kill more likely than anything lol.
Don't know how you are going to trap blink stalkers with FF. If you FF your ramp to your main then i'll just blink behind your nats mineral line., kill me some probes. Then it's 1 base vs 1 base, with you contained, and having wasted minerals on cannons.
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On August 15 2010 15:24 Floophead_III wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 07:46 kcdc wrote:On August 15 2010 07:32 Floophead_III wrote:
I've been working on a PvP stargate expo build with cannon sentry voidray as your defensive army. I haven't played it enough and I'm pretty mediocre with protoss right now, but the big boon to the strategy is being able to charge rays on your own buildings. Charged voidrays are imbalanced, and since you always can be charged if you're defending, beating stalkers shouldn't actually be that hard. The cannons/sentries buy time.
The transition is to *insert drumroll* mass voidray with air ups and void speed. COMPLETELY IMBALANCED if you are on the same economy.
So yes, the question is surviving/handling a korean 4 warpgate more than anything. If he goes colossi to break you cannon line, you win because voidrays will decimate him. It's SO funny when you get 6 charged speedvoids with +2 weapons =P Voids to defend an expo are a pretty decent idea since they handle the collosi and immortals which are the obvious threats to cannons. Blink stalkers are the not-so-obvious threat to static cannons, however, and might pose more of a problem. Well the quick answer is stalkers need vision to blink so you need an obs and therefore robo to make it work. You could try to zerg past the cannons but I have sentries so you'll just end up getting trapped and kill more likely than anything lol. I think the korean 4 warpgate is the biggest burden for this build. I think your best bet is kinda cheesing a bit by going for the world's fastest stalker and killing the probe and securing your ramp asap so you can safely dedicate cannons to the nat entrance. I don't know though, korean style 4 warpgate cheese is SO annoying.
Yeah, we don't know the timings right now as to how you could shut down blink stalkers w/ a FE void play. Observers are one way to get vision to blink up, but other options include hallucinated phoenix and sacking a stalker by running him by the cannons and blinking him onto the ramp so that the others can blink to the high ground. A void ray into blink stalker opening could also be trouble.
Here's why I'm not that worried about the Korean 4-gate. Once you have a stalker and 4 zealots (or less if you control well), units warping into your base just aren't threatening. Even if you don't match your opponent's production capacity, you can kill the first round without losing much, and continue to build your unit count advantage despite your lower warpgate count. (He warps in 4 zealots, you kill 4 and lose 1. He warps in 4 more zealots as you produce 3 zealots. Now it's 6 zealots + a stalker against 4 warping zealots....) So the Korean 4-gate is really only a problem if it hits before you have 4 zealots and 1 stalker. If I'm going to FE, I'm definitely going to be constantly producing chronoboosted zealots off of my 1 gateway, so for the attack to hit me in time, he's going to have to start his gateway early and save chronoboost, both of which I'll scout well before I commit to my FE.
So, IMO, a Korean 4-gate forces you not to FE, but by the time your opponent scouts your FE, it will be too late to do a responsive warp-into-base attack. The other consideration about a delayed warp-into-base attack is that you'd see the pylons going up, and you could just add a couple cannons in your main. You already have the forge, and the cannons build quickly enough that if you started them shortly after your opponent starts warping in pylons, you'd be able to hold pretty easily.
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On August 15 2010 00:03 kcdc wrote:If you could identify a 4-gate and rule out a void ray or counter-expand, you could always throw down some extra cannons as well.
You go do that. And I'll go find God, quit drinking, get in touch with myself emotionally, and we'll meet right back here at half past impossible. Mmmmm'kay?
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On August 15 2010 22:12 Ftrunkz wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 00:03 kcdc wrote:If you could identify a 4-gate and rule out a void ray or counter-expand, you could always throw down some extra cannons as well. You go do that. And I'll go find God, quit drinking, get in touch with myself emotionally, and we'll meet right back here at half past impossible. Mmmmm'kay?
Know what you can hold at any given time, and scout his unit count and his nat for an expansion. It won't be perfect, but with experience, I bet you could get a sense of how many cannons you need/can afford to build at various points through the game.
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On August 15 2010 22:18 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 22:12 Ftrunkz wrote:On August 15 2010 00:03 kcdc wrote:If you could identify a 4-gate and rule out a void ray or counter-expand, you could always throw down some extra cannons as well. You go do that. And I'll go find God, quit drinking, get in touch with myself emotionally, and we'll meet right back here at half past impossible. Mmmmm'kay? Know what you can hold at any given time, and scout his unit count and his nat for an expansion. It won't be perfect, but with experience, I bet you could get a sense of how many cannons you need/can afford to build at various points through the game.
yeah but that was kind of my point, you have no way of scouting other than probes that are insanely easily hunted down by stalkers... and at a high level when he realizes your giving up every bit of map control, he's going to sit a stalker at your watchtower or out-side your choke and not let you get eyes on the map, his army composition, his natural, anything.
At that point it becomes incredibly risky because it almost becomes like pvz in broodwar if you lost your initial scout-probe to the first lings spawned and couldn't get another one out... You're forced to guess at one of the options he has, if your right you win or go into an even game, if your wrong he wins or the game continues with a huge deficit to yourself.
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I was thinking about PvP FE this morning, and here's what I was thinking:
Nexus cost is 400 minerals. So in theory you are 400 minerals behind your opponent if you build a fast expansion. Therefore the biggest threat to you is that he will bring in a proxy pylon and kill you after his warp gates finish researching because his army is 400 minerals bigger than yours.
But what about chronoboost? You could throw down the nexus after your cyber core (forget the forge entirely, cannons are completely useless on a lot of maps, i.e. metalopolis), then play exactly a four-gate build as if the 400 minerals had never been spent. Don't chronoboost warp gates, instead use that chronoboost to get out four zealots. Your army will then be exactly equal to your opponents (assuming he went four gate) so that even if he comes in with a proxy pylon, your army size should be the same.
Then after your second nexus finishes you can stop spending chronoboost on probes altogether, since you will have 2x probe build speed by having two nexus/nexi/nexuses/nexusasaurases. This allows you to spend the extra income from your expansion immediately until you can get up some extra production facilities to make full use of your expansion.
I haven't tried this but I'd be interested to find out how it works for higher level players.
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if i see a forge and cannons at the choke of the natural, i just put down a nexus immediatly.
He spent 3*150 = 450 (at least) , i spend 400 for the nexus and have a faster and safer expansion (because he is not able to attack)
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@Sugar
I think you're right. After playing around with the cannon expand, it could maaaaaybe work if you really scout your base for pylons and perfectly time out when to add more cannons, but it just feels too hard. When something is going to work, it usually feels strong pretty quickly, but this one isn't.
I'll go back to working on an expansion after core. If you constantly chronoboost units out of your gateways as they finish, it actually takes quite a while to save up enough minerals to start your 3rd and 4th gateways. I believe constant unit production with chronoboost off of 3 gateways will actually result in a larger army well into the game than the way people usually do a 4-gate where they mostly let their gateways sit while they chronoboost warpgate research. So at least for now, you should be able to save 150 minerals relative to a typical 4-gate, and then by delaying your second assimilator and keeping those 3 extra probes on minerals, you could probably squeeze out an additional 150-200 minerals relative to your opponent by the time they'd attack. So with some good scouting and some well-timed probe cutting, I think you could more or less match your opponent's unit count and make up any slight difference by pulling probes. The expand after core can probably be done. But if it can, it will be super-close.
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Normally, I'd say you were crazy, but after converting all those naysayers, including me, about 1 gate core nexus PvT, I'm gonna give you the benefit of the doubt.
If you watch Day9s White-Ra PvP video, he plays a PvP on LT against a blue toss, and Day9 mentions that this toss very often favors a gas-less zealot army into a really fast expand, Nadir, was it? Same thing with Melon the orange, late-but-double-gas-toss later in the video.
So i defo think you MIGHT be on to something (not saying you are yet tho, since a number of strats could wreck this, you say you could defend from a warp-in, yes, but not warping in WHILE dropping?
You fight 3 zealots and 1 stalker (dropped) while 4 more units are warping in, figure out WHEN he can do this at the earliest, and how much YOU can possibly have at that time, if you figure both of those out, and prove that you can still beat it, people will believe you and end the travesty that is current PvP.
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On August 16 2010 23:36 kcdc wrote:
@Sugar
I think you're right. After playing around with the cannon expand, it could maaaaaybe work if you really scout your base for pylons and perfectly time out when to add more cannons, but it just feels too hard. When something is going to work, it usually feels strong pretty quickly, but this one isn't.
I'll go back to working on an expansion after core. If you constantly chronoboost units out of your gateways as they finish, it actually takes quite a while to save up enough minerals to start your 3rd and 4th gateways. I believe constant unit production with chronoboost off of 3 gateways will actually result in a larger army well into the game than the way people usually do a 4-gate where they mostly let their gateways sit while they chronoboost warpgate research. So at least for now, you should be able to save 150 minerals relative to a typical 4-gate, and then by delaying your second assimilator and keeping those 3 extra probes on minerals, you could probably squeeze out an additional 150-200 minerals relative to your opponent by the time they'd attack. So with some good scouting and some well-timed probe cutting, I think you could more or less match your opponent's unit count and make up any slight difference by pulling probes. The expand after core can probably be done. But if it can, it will be super-close.
I would actually recommend pulling all probes out of gas while saving for the nexus.
Edit: Unless you can think of a reason not to.
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@Catch and Sugar
About favoring minerals entirely over gas and using almost entirely zealots, I've definitely considered it, but I'm worried about 3 stalkers showing up and just kiting your zealots down while rallying more stalkers across the map before you can get something to stop it. I don't know how big of a blob of zealots you could get, so maybe they'd just take long enough to kill with kiting that you could get a stalker or 2 on the high ground in time to discourage the kiting. I don't know. It's another idea on my 'to try' list, and I'll definitely watch that D9D. I've been keeping an eye out for PvP D9D's cause I really hate the current style of play.
Also, Catch, glad I was able to get you to come around on PvT expo after core. Hopefully not too many more P players start using it tho, or T players might start adjusting.
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The only expansion you can get away with in PvP is either a hidden one (surprisingly good, considering Protoss have a lot of trouble scouting the whole map without Phoenixes or Hallucination, which nobody gets), or post-Collossus. At that point you're spending 200 gas every time it comes available, with lots of minerals piling up, so an expansion is worthwhile. Not like the other guy is outnumbering you with Stalkers and Immortals when your both spending 200 gas seconds after you've gathered it.
You kept that expansion because he went for Collossi, which was a hair-brained move. I imagine most would just go for a 3, 4-Gate or Immortal push and kick your ass.
And slowing down Warp Gate tech like that is just suicide.
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On August 17 2010 00:28 kcdc wrote:
@Catch and Sugar
About favoring minerals entirely over gas and using almost entirely zealots, I've definitely considered it, but I'm worried about 3 stalkers showing up and just kiting your zealots down while rallying more stalkers across the map before you can get something to stop it. I don't know how big of a blob of zealots you could get, so maybe they'd just take long enough to kill with kiting that you could get a stalker or 2 on the high ground in time to discourage the kiting. I don't know. It's another idea on my 'to try' list, and I'll definitely watch that D9D. I've been keeping an eye out for PvP D9D's cause I really hate the current style of play.
Also, Catch, glad I was able to get you to come around on PvT expo after core. Hopefully not too many more P players start using it tho, or T players might start adjusting.
I'm not suggesting using pure zealots, because you're right that would die to 3 stalkers easy. I'm saying to play standard and chronoboost your army out instead of warp gates so that your army size is high enough to kill your opponent. Zealots was an easy example because 4 zealots is exactly equal to the cost of the nexus, plus one full chronoboost will exactly half the production time of zealots. I see no reason why you could not play the exact same as you normally do, with the single exception being to chronoboost units instead of warp gates/probes after your nexus finishes.
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On August 17 2010 00:46 SugarBear wrote:Show nested quote +On August 17 2010 00:28 kcdc wrote:
@Catch and Sugar
About favoring minerals entirely over gas and using almost entirely zealots, I've definitely considered it, but I'm worried about 3 stalkers showing up and just kiting your zealots down while rallying more stalkers across the map before you can get something to stop it. I don't know how big of a blob of zealots you could get, so maybe they'd just take long enough to kill with kiting that you could get a stalker or 2 on the high ground in time to discourage the kiting. I don't know. It's another idea on my 'to try' list, and I'll definitely watch that D9D. I've been keeping an eye out for PvP D9D's cause I really hate the current style of play.
Also, Catch, glad I was able to get you to come around on PvT expo after core. Hopefully not too many more P players start using it tho, or T players might start adjusting. I'm not suggesting using pure zealots, because you're right that would die to 3 stalkers easy. I'm saying to play standard and chronoboost your army out instead of warp gates so that your army size is high enough to kill your opponent. Zealots was an easy example because 4 zealots is exactly equal to the cost of the nexus, plus one full chronoboost will exactly half the production time of zealots. I see no reason why you could not play the exact same as you normally do, with the single exception being to chronoboost units instead of warp gates/probes after your nexus finishes.
Yep, agreed. My comment above was just a response to whether I'd favor bringing probes off gas while saving for nexus. I'm not sure whether that would be best because you need gas (or cannons) to fight stalkers.
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sorry, if i scout you doing a FE, I'll just do the any 4 gate and get my free win.
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On August 17 2010 00:53 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On August 17 2010 00:46 SugarBear wrote:On August 17 2010 00:28 kcdc wrote:
@Catch and Sugar
About favoring minerals entirely over gas and using almost entirely zealots, I've definitely considered it, but I'm worried about 3 stalkers showing up and just kiting your zealots down while rallying more stalkers across the map before you can get something to stop it. I don't know how big of a blob of zealots you could get, so maybe they'd just take long enough to kill with kiting that you could get a stalker or 2 on the high ground in time to discourage the kiting. I don't know. It's another idea on my 'to try' list, and I'll definitely watch that D9D. I've been keeping an eye out for PvP D9D's cause I really hate the current style of play.
Also, Catch, glad I was able to get you to come around on PvT expo after core. Hopefully not too many more P players start using it tho, or T players might start adjusting. I'm not suggesting using pure zealots, because you're right that would die to 3 stalkers easy. I'm saying to play standard and chronoboost your army out instead of warp gates so that your army size is high enough to kill your opponent. Zealots was an easy example because 4 zealots is exactly equal to the cost of the nexus, plus one full chronoboost will exactly half the production time of zealots. I see no reason why you could not play the exact same as you normally do, with the single exception being to chronoboost units instead of warp gates/probes after your nexus finishes. Yep, agreed. My comment above was just a response to whether I'd favor bringing probes off gas while saving for nexus. I'm not sure whether that would be best because you need gas (or cannons) to fight stalkers.
It's probably just a matter of preference, but if you take probes off gas for just the 400 minerals you need for the nexus and then put them right back in, you would have the exact amount of gas you typically have if you just skipped the nexus and did x build.
Anyway, if you try it out and have success I'd love to watch some replays ^^
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My initial thoughts about the gas timings are this, you know how most good zerg players pull drones from gas after they get to 100 for the Metabolic Boost? What is we as protoss players applied this logic for Warp Gate research during a FE. Get the 50 gas you need for WG, and get the gas for either 1-2 stalkers depending on how comfortable you are. Then proceed with the FE and Zealot production as normal until the cyber drops. Once cyber is down, spend all your gas and then make the decision about what to do next depending on what you have gathered from scouting.
Also, I would say this style could lend itself to a double probe scout. If you have one safely in your opponents base, why not try to sneak a second one in, so that you can get a good idea of what else is going on, even after your opponent thinks you aren't scouting any more. This may prove to be more difficult than it is worth, but it could be possible.
I'd also like to point out that everyone in this thread understands that without really good micro and timings a Korean 4-Gate destroys this build. So please stop stating the obvious. The whole point of this thread is to consider whether this type of build is viable. And while one BO does directly counter it, that is the case with many other BOs as well. [D] Means discussion not flame.
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My answer to PvP FE = Blink stalkers, instant win
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I'm currently Gold League player, near the top of my division, and have lost to a Protoss player who basically went the similar tactic to this one.
I would be thankful if someone could take a look at this replay, and comment on it. I usually know what I did wrong and how to fix it next time I encounter a particular strategy, but here although I know what I did wrong, I'm not sure how to best approach this kind of strategy.
To describe the match a bit, the map was BS, and I placed a bit earlier gate at 10, proceeded to scout and saw an early forge. I then scouted my base but found no signs of cannon rush. My scout then died to a cannon in his main, and at this point I probably underestimated my opponent, thinking he doesn't know what he's doing.
I proceeded with my 3gate into robo build, transitioning into colossi. Sent an observer in his base, which died to his mass cannons around his nexus. I was feeling pretty confident after starting my natural exp, and trying to push out with my 2 colossi and the rest of the units. But then I hit 5 voidrays, with upgraded speed. I had to cancel my nexus, and tried getting more stalkers, but the mobility of the void rays was just killing me. At this point I was thinking well I'll just take out his expansions, only to find mass of cannons next to each of these. I tried sniping cannons with my colossi, but the void rays just kept on coming and pretty soon demolished my army. I was stuck in a position where I couldn't approach his expansions because of the cannons, and had to chase his speedy voids to defend my base.
Now obviously I had poor scouting, I held 2 towers, and after my first obs died to cannons I completely forgot to scout in some other way, so I had no idea about his expansions and the cannons around them. When I saw the void rays I though about going for phoenix army but I had no stargates at that time, so decided to go with mass stalkers, but they just melted against voidrays.
I've been thinking about this loss for a while now, and can't find the best solution to this. Would it be viable to just mass expand once I see him placing so many cannons in his main? Also, would it be better to use phoenixes to counter VR, or try blinking stalkers?
The replay is here, hopefully it's the correct one, I'll check it just in case.
![[image loading]](http://www.gamereplays.org/community/uploads/repimgs/repimg-33-139562.jpg)
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On August 14 2010 23:57 Awesomestarcraft2 wrote:
umm... most pvp are cheeese oriented, 4 gate, or void rush, and all of these i think would be able to destroy this fe because when you are droning and getting down your cybe core, they can be massing or getting voids. if you get some stalkers out then you will be ok from void, but not a four gate. I think that, if done correctly, this will work against most late game protoss, but if they are aggressive, you will loose.
note: i am at 750ish diamond
4 gate isn't cheese. stop it. It's easy to transition out of it, and it allows you to get an expo, therefore it isn't cheese.
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Ok, so I tried out a FE w/ hella chronoboost on my single gateway and cut probes to immediately get 3 more gateways to put me at 4. My opponent 4-gated me, and I actually held. I had to cut probes and I lost a bunch more probes defending, so it didn't put me way ahead, but the FE held against a 4-gate, which I think is a good sign.
![[image loading]](http://www.gamereplays.org/community/uploads/repimgs/repimg-33-139568.jpg)
I wouldn't watch anything past the 4-gate defense. We both massed blink stalkers from that point forward and I eeked out a sloppy win by slightly outmacroing him w/ my extra base.
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On August 17 2010 01:38 Nitron wrote:
My answer to PvP FE = Blink stalkers, instant win
I would think blink stalkers would fail miserably against the timings I'm talking about. Standard four gate presents the biggest threat, but by the time you chronoboost warp gates, convert your gateways, warp in a round of units, travel across the map, warp in a pylon, and warp in another round of units, I think your opponent's nexus will have collected 25 energy. At that point he can fight you to a draw and win because the longer it drags out the greater his advantage will be, whereas you have to win decisively right then to end the game in your favor. Adding the warp in time for a twilight council plus research time for blink, you would probably get roflstomped by an army that's about 10 food larger than yours, despite how well you can blink micro.
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On August 17 2010 02:40 Odoakar wrote:I'm currently Gold League player, near the top of my division, and have lost to a Protoss player who basically went the similar tactic to this one. I would be thankful if someone could take a look at this replay, and comment on it. I usually know what I did wrong and how to fix it next time I encounter a particular strategy, but here although I know what I did wrong, I'm not sure how to best approach this kind of strategy. To describe the match a bit, the map was BS, and I placed a bit earlier gate at 10, proceeded to scout and saw an early forge. I then scouted my base but found no signs of cannon rush. My scout then died to a cannon in his main, and at this point I probably underestimated my opponent, thinking he doesn't know what he's doing. I proceeded with my 3gate into robo build, transitioning into colossi. Sent an observer in his base, which died to his mass cannons around his nexus. I was feeling pretty confident after starting my natural exp, and trying to push out with my 2 colossi and the rest of the units. But then I hit 5 voidrays, with upgraded speed. I had to cancel my nexus, and tried getting more stalkers, but the mobility of the void rays was just killing me. At this point I was thinking well I'll just take out his expansions, only to find mass of cannons next to each of these. I tried sniping cannons with my colossi, but the void rays just kept on coming and pretty soon demolished my army. I was stuck in a position where I couldn't approach his expansions because of the cannons, and had to chase his speedy voids to defend my base. Now obviously I had poor scouting, I held 2 towers, and after my first obs died to cannons I completely forgot to scout in some other way, so I had no idea about his expansions and the cannons around them. When I saw the void rays I though about going for phoenix army but I had no stargates at that time, so decided to go with mass stalkers, but they just melted against voidrays. I've been thinking about this loss for a while now, and can't find the best solution to this. Would it be viable to just mass expand once I see him placing so many cannons in his main? Also, would it be better to use phoenixes to counter VR, or try blinking stalkers? The replay is here, hopefully it's the correct one, I'll check it just in case.
First thing is to throw down a nexus the second you see a forge before a gateway for your opponent. Second is to get blink stalkers to take out pylons inside his cannons. Third is get a ton of gateways. Fourth is push out and win.
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On August 17 2010 02:56 kcdc wrote:Ok, so I tried out a FE w/ hella chronoboost on my single gateway and cut probes to immediately get 3 more gateways to put me at 4. My opponent 4-gated me, and I actually held. I had to cut probes and I lost a bunch more probes defending, so it didn't put me way ahead, but the FE held against a 4-gate, which I think is a good sign. I wouldn't watch anything past the 4-gate defense. We both massed blink stalkers from that point forward and I eeked out a sloppy win by slightly outmacroing him w/ my extra base.
Nice! Gonna watch this the second I get home tonight :D
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What's the hub-bub with FE? It's certainly not a ticket to score a guaranteed win, nor is it a certain "strategy" to be employed in PvP especially. Beyond the early cheese it really is about one-base aggression, micro intensity, and choosing WHERE to fight.
Again, there doesn't seem to be a solid strategy on guaranteeing FE. If there was, then everyone would be doing it yes?  The player has to keep a mental count of units lost during skirmishes to know when you have a slight advantage to expand - this is the best time (unless you're lucky enough to be playing with someone who's been building photon cannons, then, in which case, you can expand all-day, errday).
Sure, there may be a timing where your FE econ advantage can mass blink stalker and overpower colossus tech, but what if he shifts to mainly immortals? or what about VR harassment while your opponent expands? or even a DT rush/drop? It's just not feasible to FE without knowing for certain that your opponent will be rushing colossus... which is never. =(
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You will die to 2gate rushes and 4Gate warpin, just as every single other PvP build does.
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Incidentally, do Hallucinated Collossi break force fields? Did they revert that along with a bunch of other stealth reverts they did a while back? I got 6-Sentry Force Fielded at my ramp yesterday on Steppes after the guy pushed me back on the first little bout and I was sitting pretty at the top of my ramp waiting for him. He took the opportunity to pull that little maneuver, expand and just crush me. Haven't seen that play in forever, so it was a refreshing, albeit frustrating change of pace.
I didn't think to try Hallucinate until after the match. I went Void Rays, got spotted by an Observer and stupidly sending the things right through the watchtower sight radius and that was the end of it. Should have just rampaged for Collossi, if anything. Lesson learned. That much gas spent on Sentries means seriously delayed Collossi. But at any rate, Hallucinate would be a good counter to that strat, too.
If not, its definitely a good way to secure an expansion without risking a gambit like an FE. Just gotta watch out for them, thar Collossi.
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On August 17 2010 03:37 AncienTs wrote:What's the hub-bub with FE? It's certainly not a ticket to score a guaranteed win, nor is it a certain "strategy" to be employed in PvP especially. Beyond the early cheese it really is about one-base aggression, micro intensity, and choosing WHERE to fight. Again, there doesn't seem to be a solid strategy on guaranteeing FE. If there was, then everyone would be doing it yes? The player has to keep a mental count of units lost during skirmishes to know when you have a slight advantage to expand - this is the best time (unless you're lucky enough to be playing with someone who's been building photon cannons, then, in which case, you can expand all-day, errday). Sure, there may be a timing where your FE econ advantage can mass blink stalker and overpower colossus tech, but what if he shifts to mainly immortals? or what about VR harassment while your opponent expands? or even a DT rush/drop? It's just not feasible to FE without knowing for certain that your opponent will be rushing colossus... which is never. =(
If you can pull of a fast expansion you gain a significant advantage over your opponent, so it's worth trying to figure out ways of making it work.
Certainly your opponent could do things like colossus/robo tech/void rays, but there's nothing stopping you from doing the same with a FE.
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While at first I tought this idea was bad, I am reconsidering it now.
We all now the 4 gate korean style: 10gate 13 gas 15 cyber gatgategate bunch of pylons in opponents main warpin collect win.
What now if we spared the minerals wich we normally use on pylons in the opponents main to expand? We would get a FE and 4 gates to defend it. I have not tried it out, but I shall on the build order tester and in custom games tommorow.
What do you gurs think?
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On August 17 2010 04:28 Anomandaris wrote:
While at first I tought this idea was bad, I am reconsidering it now.
We all now the 4 gate korean style: 10gate 13 gas 15 cyber gatgategate bunch of pylons in opponents main warpin collect win.
What now if we spared the minerals wich we normally use on pylons in the opponents main to expand? We would get a FE and 4 gates to defend it. I have not tried it out, but I shall on the build order tester and in custom games tommorow.
What do you gurs think?
You're not really saving the money by foregoing the pylons and expanding. The pylons used in the Korean 4gate warp in attack are used also to increase the foodcap for constant zealot warp ins. Basically, the net result is that you're dedicating 400 minerals to your expansion when the attacker is dedicating those 400 minerals to attacking you. In other words, you still end up behind.
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4 Gate Korean dies to early aggression (like 2 Gate or Proxy), also would this variation.
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On August 17 2010 04:28 Anomandaris wrote:
While at first I tought this idea was bad, I am reconsidering it now.
We all now the 4 gate korean style: 10gate 13 gas 15 cyber gatgategate bunch of pylons in opponents main warpin collect win.
What now if we spared the minerals wich we normally use on pylons in the opponents main to expand? We would get a FE and 4 gates to defend it. I have not tried it out, but I shall on the build order tester and in custom games tommorow.
What do you gurs think?
FE means fast expansion; expandng after 4 gates and a core is not fast. Pulling off that build is like going 6pool to defend, it doesn't make sense. Also it dies to 2gate.
Actually everything but 2gate dies to twogate. Bring back shield battery for defenders advantage.
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On August 17 2010 04:35 Xanatoss wrote:
4 Gate Korean dies to early aggression (like 2 Gate or Proxy), also would this variation.
Well obviously scout! I often do the korean 4 gate but if I see my opponent 2 gating I do the same.
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If I saw a toss player trying to FE early game I wouldn't try to tech to colossuses and allow him time to yield the resource advantage. I would 2 gate zealots straight to his base and kill him. Sure you'll get to block off one of your bases with a cannon by the time my first 4 zeals get there, but then you other base is unprotected.
This strategy is not viable. You will get a fair number of wins with it because it is rogue and a lot of players fail when it comes to beating something they haven't seen before.
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After practicing the PvP expo after core some more, I think you can do it safely. It's a similar BO to my PvT FE, except I basically save more chronoboost for the 1 gateway and cut probes more as well. If you save up more chronoboost, you can actually squeeze in nearly 2 zealots while your cybercore warps in and still constantly chrono your first 3 stalkers. You get a big early-game army fast that way, and then you can cut probes after you start your nexus to get 3 more gateways. It's been holding against 4-gates today anyway. After that, I'm having some trouble tho. The T1 units w/ blink/charge aren't cutting it. I'm thinking you'll either need to try to catch up on robo tech, or transition to mass void after you research blink. The blink stalkers will force immortals and collosi, and then the voids could clean up. At least that's what I'm hoping. Haven't gotten a good transition timing down yet.
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On August 17 2010 04:28 Anomandaris wrote:
While at first I tought this idea was bad, I am reconsidering it now.
We all now the 4 gate korean style: 10gate 13 gas 15 cyber gatgategate bunch of pylons in opponents main warpin collect win.
What now if we spared the minerals wich we normally use on pylons in the opponents main to expand? We would get a FE and 4 gates to defend it. I have not tried it out, but I shall on the build order tester and in custom games tommorow.
What do you gurs think?
The Pylons also give you food, and you depend on that food to provide the massive Zealot force.
I'd really just recommend early pressure into a hidden expansion. Its not even cheese if the other guy is going for Collossi, because you know full well he's only going to have one Observer, at best, which is spending its time watching you and not what's going on on the islands of say, Lost Temple. Doing a standard Collossus rush, but making a single Warp Prism to drop off a Probe at a nice hidden spot and build a gas-producing expansion is actually a really powerful tool. All you need is gas. We've all been in the situation where we're pushing for Collossi against someone doing the exact same thing and can only produce one at a time because we're so gas starved, so we just build a bunch of kamikaze Zealots with all those surplus minerals. But, with that expansion, and surplus gas coming in, you can field more Stalkers and Sentries to ruin the guy's day, double your Collossus production, upgrades, whatever you want.
A hidden gas factory is pretty awesome.
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Problem you haven't really addressed and quite a few have mentioned: what the hell do you do vs a 2 gate proxy? A lot more people 2 gate proxy now to counter the 4 gate all in.
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On August 17 2010 07:46 holy_war wrote:
Problem you haven't really addressed and quite a few have mentioned: what the hell do you do vs a 2 gate proxy? A lot more people 2 gate proxy now to counter the 4 gate all in.
Well in the OP's case, you either change your game plan to a 2-Gate, or you die.
In general, you just 2-Gate yourself. Its near-impossible to get enough ranged units to hold back the Zealot swarm, so your only hope is to match his Zealot count and fight in a manner that favours you. If he proxies inside your base, then you're on essentially even-footing, although you have a slightly better economy in your favour. If he proxies outside your base, you just need a wall of 5 Zealots on hold position around the top of your ramp and voila. He now has to fight 3v5 and has to suffer a buttload of casualties to get in there.
I pretty much 2-Gate every game, because it forces the other guy to 2-Gate and pretty much renders any attempts at that Korean 4-Warp-Gate mass Zealot stuff null and void. I'd rather deal with Zealot micro and a transition to Collossus rush than base-trading with that crap.
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why wouldn't this be viable? i go 14cc a lot when playing TvP so what is it about PvP that makes this non-viable?
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If you see your opponent 2gate you don't fast expand. Not even zerg can FE vs. 2 gate.
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On August 17 2010 08:06 SilentCrono wrote:
why wouldn't this be viable? i go 14cc a lot when playing TvP so what is it about PvP that makes this non-viable?
The Zealot wall is unstoppable without Force Field, an equal number of Zealots, a hell of a lot of Stalkers, or Collossi. You just have to make a Bunker or two and voila. Complete safety (excepting a 4-Warp-Gate rampage). Playing PvP is really all about circumventing the Zealot wall, whether by using Blink Stalkers, going to air with Void Rays, hiding at the top of your ramp with a Sentry or two or just getting Collossi out as quickly as possible (they tear them up something fierce).
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On August 17 2010 07:16 kcdc wrote:
After practicing the PvP expo after core some more, I think you can do it safely. It's a similar BO to my PvT FE, except I basically save more chronoboost for the 1 gateway and cut probes more as well. If you save up more chronoboost, you can actually squeeze in nearly 2 zealots while your cybercore warps in and still constantly chrono your first 3 stalkers. You get a big early-game army fast that way, and then you can cut probes after you start your nexus to get 3 more gateways. It's been holding against 4-gates today anyway. After that, I'm having some trouble tho. The T1 units w/ blink/charge aren't cutting it. I'm thinking you'll either need to try to catch up on robo tech, or transition to mass void after you research blink. The blink stalkers will force immortals and collosi, and then the voids could clean up. At least that's what I'm hoping. Haven't gotten a good transition timing down yet.
Have you considered going putting down 2 more gates and a robo instead of 3 gates after the nexus goes down?
Most 4 WG pushes involve a hefty amount of stalkers, so if you mix it up with zealot/stalker/sentry immortal then I think it could be possible to hold, with micro of course. It would also help you on your way to Colossus a bit quicker.
I'm following this thread with interest, I have used your PvT FE with good effect, so looking forward to seeing where this goes 
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On August 17 2010 07:16 kcdc wrote:
After practicing the PvP expo after core some more, I think you can do it safely. It's a similar BO to my PvT FE, except I basically save more chronoboost for the 1 gateway and cut probes more as well. If you save up more chronoboost, you can actually squeeze in nearly 2 zealots while your cybercore warps in and still constantly chrono your first 3 stalkers. You get a big early-game army fast that way, and then you can cut probes after you start your nexus to get 3 more gateways. It's been holding against 4-gates today anyway. After that, I'm having some trouble tho. The T1 units w/ blink/charge aren't cutting it. I'm thinking you'll either need to try to catch up on robo tech, or transition to mass void after you research blink. The blink stalkers will force immortals and collosi, and then the voids could clean up. At least that's what I'm hoping. Haven't gotten a good transition timing down yet.
Hey just watched your replay. The build looks really solid, you only really had to cut probes thrice before the nexus (one right after your third pylon, another right before putting up the nexus, and one more to get up three more gateways). Even then your opponent was only half a production cycle worth of probes ahead of you and since you were on two bases your workers were mining more efficiently. I don't think you would have had any problems at all if you'd kept your units out by your expo so he couldn't forcefield you up on your ramp and kill all the probes you transferred. Your army was bigger than his almost the entire game, and was never smaller than his, despite putting up the expo. Great job *thumbs up*.
I'm going to play around in yabot sometime this week and see if cutting everything to get the nexus up right after the cyber core helps at all with efficiency vs. the way you did it. Hell, I'm so excited I'm gonna go do it right now lol. Will post back here with my results.
Edit: Will also try 3gate robo instead of four gate after expo.
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Okay, I did some testing in yabot and here's what I found:
kcdc's build order seems the most stable. If you pull probes out of gas and cut production of everything to get the nexus down ASAP after cyber core, you end up with 4 more probes, but only 3 stalkers instead of 6 by the time the 7 minute push comes.
On the other hand, if you build a robo facility right away it will be up and you can chronoboost an immortal out, but the immortal still won't be there until about 20-25 seconds after the 7:00 mark, which is pretty much the difference between losing your expo or not.
So cutting probes after your third stalker to get four gateways up ASAP is definitely the most stable build for holding off a four-gate push.
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EPT
