EDIT: Fingo and I would first like to say that we're glad this helped some of you guys out there. That's all we wanted to do.
Secondly, I've uploaded new replays that reflects an improved build order that involves chronoboosting out 2 probes before putting down the forge. As you can see in the replay, it works quite well.
I've also uploaded a replay where I decide to play the game out after I don't bust the wall, and instead choose to drone up. The result is astounding. There's a 30 food advantage for the protoss player at the 8 minute mark. He then kills me shortly thereafter. If you watch the replay, I don't catch up in econ until halfway through the game, and Fingo is able to maintain the 30 food lead while teching up to templar. Granted, I played poorly that game, but the point is that a 30 food advantage after your opponent 6 pools is better than anything any toss going 10 or 12 gate could achieve.
If you watched the GSL from last night (Fruit Dealer vs. Inca) you'll see how devastating a 6 pool is if you only try to use probes/zealots and a "normal build (12 gate, etc) to hold it off. It's hard, and you could lose outright. Why would you choose a response that has even remotely a chance to lose when you can instead respond in a way that guarantees you a 30 food advantage going into the mid game, with a push that can often kill the Zerg outright? I just don't understand it.
Disclaimer: This is a guide for Steppes of War. On this map it's almost impossible to stop a 6 pool with even a 10 gate without taking Probe losses, due to the Zealot nerf. This would work on other maps as well (except Scrap Station), since you'd have a little more time to respond.
Introduction
My friend Fingo and I were talking about how powerful 6 pool had become in ZvP since the zealot nerf made it pretty hard to stop a 6 pool with even a 10 gate. So, we started working on build orders that would survive a 6 pool while still being ahead in econ (i.e., not losing any probes). In the end, we discovered a build order that stops a 6 pool cold with you being 15 probes to his 6-7 drones (depending on how many drones the zerg decided to build, and whether you decide to squeeze out 2 extra probes), without having to scout ridiculously early. All credit goes to Fingo for finetuning this build order.
P.S. Fingo is 1600 diamond, and I am 1400.
The Build Order
Probe until 9/10 9/10 Pylon 9/10 Probe Scout immediately after pylon See 6 pool, return with scouting probe 10/18 Chrono Probe 11/18 Chrono Probe 12/18 Forge at ramp 12/18 Begin cannon and Gateway, using the cannon to block the space between the Gateway and Forge 12/18 Resume Probe production
At this point, the lings should be arriving at your ramp. If the Zerg is smart about it, he'll choose to focus the Forge, but it doesn't matter if he focuses the Gateway either. Your Gateway/Forge will probably fall (or come close to dying), and it is essential that you pull probes at this point to block the remaining lings he has, especially if you went with Version 2. You shouldn't lose any probes because the cannon will have come up by then. After you finish off the lings with 0-1 Probe losses, you should be 14-15 probes to his 6-7 drones. Now, rebuild your wall. You've won!
We did a couple variations of this build order. In one variation, Fingo cut the 2 chronoboosted Probes in favor of a pylon block and a faster Gateway. This method still leaves you ahead quite a bit economically, and is also a little safer.
In our replays, I also tried a few variations of the 6 pool, including one replay in which I pulled all my drones to completely all-in the Protoss. The drones don't do much except inflict more Probe casualties.
Or you could micro your probes, try dropping a 13 gate at the ramp and when you see the zerlings coming pull workers to block the choke and click the minerals to bring them back if they get to low. Keep reinforcing till your zealot finishes.
On September 24 2010 10:19 tru_power22 wrote: Or you could micro your probes, try dropping a 13 gate at the ramp and when you see the zerlings coming pull workers to block the choke and click the minerals to bring them back if they get to low. Keep reinforcing till your zealot finishes.
That results in far too many probe losses =\ This way is the cleanest way we found to do it.
I should mention for those bound to reply without watching the replays, this is specifically designed to deal with 6 pool on Steps of War. On other maps, the build is less worrisome.
On September 24 2010 10:31 Fingo wrote: I should mention for those bound to reply without watching the replays, this is specifically designed to deal with 6 pool on Steps of War. On other maps, the build is less worrisome.
We still haven't tried it on Scrap Station yet...But honestly, on Scrap Station you'd have time to put down 2 gateways to block off the ramp completely.
On September 24 2010 10:36 Twistacles wrote: Or you could block the ramp with probes until the zealot comes out.
Did you even watch the replays? We stopped the 6 pool on Steppes of War taking 0 probe casualties. None.
Of course we tried the probe block method. It's not optimal. The protoss ends up equal or just slightly ahead of the Zerg in harvesters. Our aim in this guide was to take NO probe losses and survive the 6 pool while completely crushing the Zerg in worker count.
On September 24 2010 10:40 ionlyplayPROtoss wrote: then you realized he didn't 6 pool...
If you watch the replays, Fingo waits til he sees the 6 pool until he puts down any buildings. He goes about his build normally until then. Please watch the replays before you comment.
Not only will you lose probes, you may lose ALL of them. That is the risk factor. The timing just doesn't work safely, even with 10 gate chrono-boosted zealot. There is a reason we posted this. Before posting further suggestions I urge you to try them in a game first. Cheers
On September 24 2010 10:12 Goobus wrote: 9/10 Probe Scout immediately after pylon See 6 pool, return with scouting probe 10/18 Forge at ramp
The replays you provided confirm that if you were 10 gating, you would have started a Gateway by the time you scout the 6 pool, even with the short walk paths of Stepps of War. You'd have to cancel it to start the Forge. If you were 12 gating, you might have to cancel a probe, and since the probe wouldn't be at the ramp, you'd have to run one up there to begin the wall-in.
I would remake the replays showing the reactionary steps as well (for both 10 and 12 gate, where you succeed), rather than just having the building probe wait for the scouting probe to see the 6 pool before plonking down a Forge... at 215 minerals. At the least, you should mention this in your guide.
On September 24 2010 10:12 Goobus wrote: 9/10 Probe Scout immediately after pylon See 6 pool, return with scouting probe 10/18 Forge at ramp
The replays you provided confirm that if you were 10 gating, you would have started a Gateway by the time you scout the 6 pool, even with the short walk paths of Stepps of War. You'd have to cancel it to start the Forge. If you were 12 gating, you might have to cancel a probe, and since the probe wouldn't be at the ramp, you'd have to run one up there to begin the wall-in.
I would remake the replays showing the reactionary steps as well (for both 10 and 12 gate, where you succeed), rather than just having the building probe wait for the scouting probe to see the 6 pool before plonking down a Forge... at 215 minerals. At the least, you should mention this in your guide.
Good concern. Actually, the build is reactionary as it is. Part of this build (as you may note in the replays) is to wait until your probe scout reaches the zerg base before putting down the forge/gateway. Of course, if you don't scout a 6 or 7 pool, you simply put down a slightly late gateway. When scouting with your pylon probe, this typically results in the forge/gateway being 50 minerals late.
On September 24 2010 10:12 Goobus wrote: 9/10 Probe Scout immediately after pylon See 6 pool, return with scouting probe 10/18 Forge at ramp
The replays you provided confirm that if you were 10 gating, you would have started a Gateway by the time you scout the 6 pool, even with the short walk paths of Stepps of War. You'd have to cancel it to start the Forge. If you were 12 gating, you might have to cancel a probe, and since the probe wouldn't be at the ramp, you'd have to run one up there to begin the wall-in.
I would remake the replays showing the reactionary steps as well (for both 10 and 12 gate, where you succeed), rather than just having the building probe wait for the scouting probe to see the 6 pool before plonking down a Forge... at 215 minerals. At the least, you should mention this in your guide.
I admit, our "scouting" was a bit contrived, but that's a good point. Fingo was at 215 minerals when he put down his Forge, which means that he could have squeezed out some probes there too. Good catch. Post whatever replays you can make and I'll update the OP with them.
So I just checked the replay for the ling timing on Steppes, and I have definitely held off a 6pool that arrived just 4 seconds later without diverting from a 12gate. I suppose if he'd tried to run through with his first lings that I would have taken probe losses, and perhaps I didn't have the money for the walling pylon 4 seconds earlier (pretty sure I did), but I'd be interested to know why you think its impossible to hold it with a 12gate on steppes (and, really, you should 10gate by default on steppes anyway vZ).
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[edit] Granted, its the same basic idea as your build in terms of what it does, but its not delayed if you dont see a 6pool.
What happens if zerg sends his first built drone to block the gateway build?... As I see it, this will effectively fuck up your wall build unless you somehow manage to kill the drone really fast, or get the gateway up before the drone arrives, which can only be done if you don't build probes after 10 i pressume.
On September 24 2010 11:27 Yilar wrote: What happens if zerg sends drone #6 to block the gateway build?... As I see it, this will effectively fuck up your wall build unless you somehow manage to kill the drone really fast, or get the gateway up before the drone arrives, which can only be done if you don't build probes after 10 i pressume.
I'd assume you'd just send 2 probes to chase it off and plop the gateway down right away.
On September 24 2010 11:22 kzn wrote: So I just checked the replay for the ling timing on Steppes, and I have definitely held off a 6pool that arrived just 4 seconds later without diverting from a 12gate. I suppose if he'd tried to run through with his first lings that I would have taken probe losses, and perhaps I didn't have the money for the walling pylon 4 seconds earlier (pretty sure I did), but I'd be interested to know why you think its impossible to hold it with a 12gate on steppes (and, really, you should 10gate by default on steppes anyway vZ).
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[edit] Granted, its the same basic idea as your build in terms of what it does, but its not delayed if you dont see a 6pool.
The timing is really important. The 4 seconds matters quite a lot. Even if you had walled off with a pylon, the pylon would have gone down, and as soon as your first Zealot pops, it would've been surrounded and killed by the 10 lings running in (I double extractor trick to get out my 9th and 10th lings). And even if you do use probes to block, you end up losing a significant number of probes.
As someone mentioned above, I think it's completely possible to chrono out 2 more probes and adapt this build so that it becomes more in line with what a toss does normally.
Couldn't you just micro over the gateway location, or send the following drone right after? There is no need for these drones in terms of getting the first 6 lings anyway.
Actually if you pull a drone after the new drone is done and move in with 2 drones you can completely shut down his wall build. It takes almost 10 seconds to get probes from the mineral line upto the wall and even more time to kill the actual drones, which should ruin the timing on wall build vs ling arrival.
On September 24 2010 11:30 Goobus wrote: The timing is really important. The 4 seconds matters quite a lot. Even if you had walled off with a pylon, the pylon would have gone down, and as soon as your first Zealot pops, it would've been surrounded and killed by the 10 lings running in (I double extractor trick to get out my 9th and 10th lings). And even if you do use probes to block, you end up losing a significant number of probes.
As someone mentioned above, I think it's completely possible to chrono out 2 more probes and adapt this build so that it becomes more in line with what a toss does normally.
So you just build the pylon without waiting, and drop a cannon down without waiting for like 5 seconds like I did - mostly because I wasn't sure if my zealot would get out in time or not. Certainly it will be a lot closer than it is even in the +2 probes replay, but you dont have to delay anything for scouting.
[edit] And the point of that zealot is more to delay the building deaths than anything else, so that the cannon gets up in time.
For the life of my I can't understand why anyone needs help or advice defeating a 6 pool.
by the time he gets his first 6 lings to you you'll probably have 14 probes
14 probes > 6 lings....and the 11 or 12 you have left after the fight is still more than the 7 or 9 drones he has.
Simple. Pull drones...get the surround, keep working to get that blocking zealot out...when the initial lings die go back to mining and building more probes...if he sends more..pull more probes and whatever zealots you have
cannons are not necessary
the exception being if its an all in 6 pool with full drone pull as well. This can be very problematic and largely will come down to drone/probe/ling micro
If you watch the replays, Fingo cuts probes to throw down the forge AFTER he scouts a 6 pool. This is even worse than just randomly going forge first, since he could've squeezed out at least one probe and gotten the forge at the exact same timing.
Scouting a deadwall is a perfect chance to drone up and expo fast. With early lings, you can stop a one-gate zealot counter and easily catch up and surpass the one-base toss. Especially since he wasted 350 on cannon/forge, and took an extremely late gate(two and a half minutes into the game, are you serious?). Even macroing back up from six-pool, six-eight lings is easy, since you have queens, and the toss just cut a ton of stuff.
Basically, this build is terrible against a zerg that decides to go directly into a macro game. You have cannons, but no ability to get out of your own base. Zerg is free to get three base, defend with just lings, and you have no way to push out to get an expo yourself.
On September 24 2010 10:19 tru_power22 wrote: Or you could micro your probes, try dropping a 13 gate at the ramp and when you see the zerlings coming pull workers to block the choke and click the minerals to bring them back if they get to low. Keep reinforcing till your zealot finishes.
That results in far too many probe losses =\ This way is the cleanest way we found to do it.
Actually his way results in no losses. Since drones can walk through each other while they are gathering minerals, the first probe can eat 3 or 4 shots then you should click the minerals and your next probe is now the blocker. Keep the micro up and you wont lose any
Darth- A 6 pooling zerg is not going into a macro game. If he chooses not to attack when he sees the walloff he will be down significant workers, while the protoss is down 100 minerals (pylon to destroy to leave base).
Cyrus- It isn't this simple. You won't just "get the surround" versus a zerg who has a mouse. Keep in mind the lings can micro as well. There is a reason this strategy is gaining popularity in top level play. This being said, if you were up for it, I'd love to see this flawless probe micro defense.
On September 24 2010 12:11 FreeZEternal wrote: Fingo!!! It's me rasengan, anyways, @cyrusdm, you will lose way too many probes if you do that -.-;;
Exactly. This is the point I keep making. What's the point of surviving a 6 pool if you're even with the zerg by the end of it? He can just play as usual then. Unless he's dumb and gg's.
On September 24 2010 12:04 Fingo wrote: Darth- A 6 pooling zerg is not going into a macro game. If he chooses not to attack when he sees the walloff he will be down significant workers, while the protoss is down 100 minerals (pylon to destroy to leave base).
In your specific replay, you walled with forge, cannon, and gateway. You can't expand quickly for one plain reason - you can't get out of your base. If you kill the cannon, you risk a runby. Killing the gateway is an obvious no-no. Killing the forge means no cannons at your expo. You can't expect to hold with just one gate worth of slow-zealots
You forget that an early pool doesn't just mean early lings. It also means early queen. Two rounds(a minute and twenty seconds) of larvae injected droning off one hatch is enough to catch up to the toss, and a toss that went forge/cannon is committed to sitting on his godawful infrastructure. If you take a second gate, you delay core even harder. If you core, forget about pushing out in the next six/seven minutes, you won't have an army.
If you deadwall, even as a sixpool, I will absolutely go into a macro game. Plain and simple. There is no reason for me to not abuse the 350 minerals you basically threw down the toilet, and the horrible field position. You're giving up map control and an expo's worth of minerals. I'm surprised you don't just GG right there.
On September 24 2010 12:04 Fingo wrote: Darth- A 6 pooling zerg is not going into a macro game. If he chooses not to attack when he sees the walloff he will be down significant workers, while the protoss is down 100 minerals (pylon to destroy to leave base).
Cyrus- It isn't this simple. You won't just "get the surround" versus a zerg who has a mouse. Keep in mind the lings can micro as well. There is a reason this strategy is gaining popularity in top level play. This being said, if you were up for it, I'd love to see this flawless probe micro defense.
Good players might, he's doing damage to you just by making you do that build. He can drone like crazy when he sees your build.
Also, you are putting yourself behind by cutting probes any time he doesn't 6 pool.
Do a normal build, take a few probe losses, win the game, and don't cripple yourself against anything that's not a 6 pool.
On September 24 2010 12:25 Darthturtle wrote: You forget that an early pool doesn't just mean early lings. It also means early queen. Two rounds(a minute and twenty seconds) of larvae injected droning off one hatch is enough to catch up to the toss, and a toss that went forge/cannon is committed to sitting on his godawful infrastructure. If you take a second gate, you delay core even harder. If you core, forget about pushing out in the next six/seven minutes, you won't have an army.
Early queen 6pools are significantly easier to defend against than no-queen all-ins. 2 rounds of larva injection is 57 seconds for 14 drones max (I think probably less), which is 11 more than the Protoss can make non-chronoboosted in the same time. If you do this, you are not making any offensive units for an entire minute, while the Protoss is. You are not managing an expo AND permanent drone production from constant injections for quite a while, and with a less ridiculous wall than the one proposed in the OP the protoss can move out at a cost of 100 minerals, drop a cannon or two with the nexus, and basically be safe until you commit to making units again.
Deadwalls are the most consistent way to handle a 6pool, and the only way to handle a completely all-in 6pool. If that ends up making you only "even" with the zerg, I'll take that any day over a strategy that will fail sometimes and cost you the game instantly, and sometimes will put you significantly ahead.
10 gate + probe block isn't a 100% strategy. This forge build is. For those of you who are complaining that it's "not normal" or whatever, this build order can be adapted so that it's as normal as possible, until you manage to get a scout in (i.e. Chrono 10th/11th probe, or 10 gate/cancel into forge+gate block). This is a 100% strategy. You will win against a 6 pool 100% of the time, all-in with drones or not. That's the point. There's no uncertainty.
After you fend it off this way, you're at 15 probes to his 7 drones. Even if you're slightly behind from doing this build, you can simply go about your business, and push out with 2 gate zealots and kill him shortly after, or go 4 gate or whatever you want, if he hasn't gg'd by then. There is no way he is recovering from a 8 worker deficit. Hell, a 2 gate followup would wreck him.
Those of you who are 10-gating and using probes to block can continue to lose SOME percentage of the time. If I played toss, I'd rather take my 100% win-rate vs 6 pool, tyvm.
On September 24 2010 11:47 Darthturtle wrote: If you watch the replays, Fingo cuts probes to throw down the forge AFTER he scouts a 6 pool. This is even worse than just randomly going forge first, since he could've squeezed out at least one probe and gotten the forge at the exact same timing.
Scouting a deadwall is a perfect chance to drone up and expo fast. With early lings, you can stop a one-gate zealot counter and easily catch up and surpass the one-base toss. Especially since he wasted 350 on cannon/forge, and took an extremely late gate(two and a half minutes into the game, are you serious?). Even macroing back up from six-pool, six-eight lings is easy, since you have queens, and the toss just cut a ton of stuff.
Basically, this build is terrible against a zerg that decides to go directly into a macro game. You have cannons, but no ability to get out of your own base. Zerg is free to get three base, defend with just lings, and you have no way to push out to get an expo yourself.
whats stopping him from scouting he is droning and break down his wall?? and there is no way he can stop a four-gate with 7 drones to 14 probes. taking down a pylong takes but all of 1 second with 4 gate units
On September 24 2010 11:36 Yilar wrote: Couldn't you just micro over the gateway location, or send the following drone right after? There is no need for these drones in terms of getting the first 6 lings anyway.
Actually if you pull a drone after the new drone is done and move in with 2 drones you can completely shut down his wall build. It takes almost 10 seconds to get probes from the mineral line upto the wall and even more time to kill the actual drones, which should ruin the timing on wall build vs ling arrival.
If you think about how this would actually go down. Your doing a six pool and he scouts it, so you decide instead of leaving your drones to mine to send to random drones up to stop a wall that may or may not be there depending on if he's doing this build or not. If he doesn't do this build it just puts you even further behind in worker count, if you don't kill him and just take down some probes.
I'm just pointing out that sending the 2 drones is not something you think of if your doing a 6 pool.
Why don't you block the middle position with the canon? That way only 1 ling can be hitting it at any point, and you can always just bust it when you've got your warpgates running and push out for the win.
I watched a game recently where Dimaga 6pooled White-Ra, and what Ra did was just throw down another pylon to fully block off the ramp with buildings until the chronoboosted zealot finished. He also had time to put down a forge and a cannon before the lings could do anything. It seemed to work pretty well.
Cutting probe 11 + 12 is unacceptable for a "just in case he 6 pools" scenario. Since the 10 gate build is 10 pylon, you also don't scout in time for the right 10 gate timing.
The only way this build can be considered good is if it works if you 12 forge, because that's when your scout arrives at the zerg, when you are at 12 food (if you were 10 gating, your gate would already be started, so adjusting into an unoptimal 10 gate is also pretty bad).
It also only works on Steppes, Metal close and LT close, because otherwise your scout doesn't arrive in time.
So replays of 12 forge working (or a 10 forge with a canceled gateway since you need to cancel your gateway if you were going 10 gate), or it's not a viable strategy. Also you should adjust your title to How to stop 6 pool on Steppes, Metal close or LT close.
Cyrus- It isn't this simple. You won't just "get the surround" versus a zerg who has a mouse. Keep in mind the lings can micro as well. There is a reason this strategy is gaining popularity in top level play. This being said, if you were up for it, I'd love to see this flawless probe micro defense.
As a zerg I've gotten very used to dealing with 6 pools...granted its different as a toss, but in both situations you're going to want to involve your harvestors. probes > drones, and drones can do it... so the key is going to getting the surround on the lings (easy - lings wont have speed and you'll have 2x the #'s) while keeping your gateways pylon safe. Let the pylon take some hits then engage with your probes..as he engages your probes pull back a bit...if he chases your probes you a)go for the surround b) have a safe pylon and a zealot still on the way.
Bottom line is if he 6 pools and manages to kill 4 probes..which would be great ling micro and terrible probe micro...but if the toss lost 4 probes..he'd still be at 10 or 11 while the zerg is on 7 or 8 drones.
Don't screw your build by preparing for something like the 6 ling. Just build your initial gate one or max two supply early on steppes and you can come out ahead regardless of losing a couple probes.
On September 24 2010 12:11 FreeZEternal wrote: Fingo!!! It's me rasengan, anyways, @cyrusdm, you will lose way too many probes if you do that -.-;;
14 probes will win vs 6 lings with probably 12 probes. more if you're good at seleting the probes that are losing hull and selecting them to go back to harvesting - thus escaping the ball of probes behind them.
Im mid-high Dia player and never had big troubles with 6pool. Just scout it, go Forge and/or Wall in and gg ... Funny someone invested so much time on that :D
like the idea of this, but I'd make a few changes: • scout earlier (like 7 scout), so you can lay down the forge ASAP if you know you have to • there's 3 scenarios: 1) no 6/7 pool: because you scouted earlier you can just play normal, but your build will be slightly off, because you lost mining time 2) they 6/7 pool and commit: because you scouted earlier, your forge is up sooner and you should be fine 3) they 6/7 pooled but didn't commit once they saw your wall, and droned up instead: as you have the forge already, seems like you could transition well into a 5 warpgate +1 attack push. It'll be weaker than the optimised build of course, but it makes use of the structures you allready have and will be difficult to deal with for the zerg
Also, people keep saying probes beat 6/7 pools hands down. Well, I think those zergs are bad. If I have 6 lings in your base I don't have to kill that many probes. If I can surround a stray one and kill it, I will. But if I can't I'll just run around your base in circles, keeping you from mining minerals and picking off probes/pylons whenever I can.
stopping 6pool is very easy, even on steppes. just use the normal build: send a scout just after building a 9 pylon, then gateway 12. if you see low drone count and spawning build: stop making probes. make 2nd gateway (on 12 aswell), which leaves u 1square choke. and 3rd gateway to completely wall off. cb 1st zealot, make a pylon. keep making zealots, cancel 3rd gateway and simply win it :<
On September 24 2010 11:36 Yilar wrote: Couldn't you just micro over the gateway location, or send the following drone right after? There is no need for these drones in terms of getting the first 6 lings anyway.
Actually if you pull a drone after the new drone is done and move in with 2 drones you can completely shut down his wall build. It takes almost 10 seconds to get probes from the mineral line upto the wall and even more time to kill the actual drones, which should ruin the timing on wall build vs ling arrival.
If you think about how this would actually go down. Your doing a six pool and he scouts it, so you decide instead of leaving your drones to mine to send to random drones up to stop a wall that may or may not be there depending on if he's doing this build or not. If he doesn't do this build it just puts you even further behind in worker count, if you don't kill him and just take down some probes.
I'm just pointing out that sending the 2 drones is not something you think of if your doing a 6 pool.
6 pool is pretty much an all in move, if your initial rush is defeated you've pretty much lost. Why wouldn't you pull 2 drones to stop a wall in, if it can make all the difference? While I'm to lazy to test it, I'm sure you could break the wall with just 2 drones with micro and good timing, and it should make it a lot more interesting.
On September 24 2010 18:19 crun wrote: stopping 6pool is very easy, even on steppes. just use the normal build: send a scout just after building a 9 pylon, then gateway 12. if you see low drone count and spawning build: stop making probes. make 2nd gateway (on 12 aswell), which leaves u 1square choke. and 3rd gateway to completely wall off. cb 1st zealot, make a pylon. keep making zealots, cancel 3rd gateway and simply win it :<
On September 24 2010 11:47 Darthturtle wrote: If you watch the replays, Fingo cuts probes to throw down the forge AFTER he scouts a 6 pool. This is even worse than just randomly going forge first, since he could've squeezed out at least one probe and gotten the forge at the exact same timing.
Scouting a deadwall is a perfect chance to drone up and expo fast. With early lings, you can stop a one-gate zealot counter and easily catch up and surpass the one-base toss. Especially since he wasted 350 on cannon/forge, and took an extremely late gate(two and a half minutes into the game, are you serious?). Even macroing back up from six-pool, six-eight lings is easy, since you have queens, and the toss just cut a ton of stuff.
Basically, this build is terrible against a zerg that decides to go directly into a macro game. You have cannons, but no ability to get out of your own base. Zerg is free to get three base, defend with just lings, and you have no way to push out to get an expo yourself.
whats stopping him from scouting he is droning and break down his wall?? and there is no way he can stop a four-gate with 7 drones to 14 probes. taking down a pylong takes but all of 1 second with 4 gate units
Go actually watch the replays.
He can't scout because he locked himself into his base. He has no probe outside. He has no pylon outside. He's built his zealot INSIDE his wall. He has effectively contained himself.
He doesn't have four gate. He doesn't even have two gate. He has one tremendously late gate, no core, no gas, and no infrastructure.
He NEEDS to one base tech, then, and Zerg does exactly what zerg always does. Expand all over the map and them win with mass units.
If the Protoss tries a 2 gate counterattack - You have the pool already. You can see him push out. Build a single spine crawler and you're defended.
If the protoss tries 4 gate - This will be mildly threatening maybe 7 minutes down the line, due to the fact that he has no tech whatsoever. Build a second spine crawler and you're defended.
As zerg, the two most important things to do are to drone and expand, whenever he gives you a chance. Throwing away 350 minerals, forcing himself into a defensive position, cutting two probes, these all scream please go macro and kill me.
It doesn't matter that zerg is down seven drones. Protoss has NO way to exploit that early window, due to the fact that he's stuck with no tech. He cannot afford to break any building in his wall due to the threat of a runby that he can't scout because he's contained himself. One hatch, one queen is enough to catch up on drone production. Two hatches massdroning is enough to surpass and put yourself into a game-winning lead.
This build is 100% against idiots who see a dead wall and a cannon and decide somehow, that they should break it. It's 0% against two-three base zerg, unless zerg makes a huge blunder like not scouting for a push.
Kill cannon/pylon plug hole with a single zealot and your entire post is undermined darthturtle.. The toss should be light years ahead in terms of production even with a bunch of minerals tied upto into forge/cannon.
After scouted a 6 pool i usually do nothing different and stick to my plan. The probes ive got at the point are enough to do a nice sorround and be conomically ahead of the z. Specially if the Zerg goes for my mineral line i consider it an auto win as u can simply clumb ur drones on one mineral patch, give them the oder to go to another and right away a- move them. Out comes a perfect sorround in which i never loose more than 2-3 probes. When his reinforcement is there my Zealot is, too.
On September 24 2010 20:46 Yilar wrote: Kill cannon/pylon plug hole with a single zealot and your entire post is undermined darthturtle.. The toss should be light years ahead in terms of production even with a bunch of minerals tied upto into forge/cannon.
Not at all. You still seem to believe that just a probe count advantage equals complete win. It's not. It's one advantage in a very deep game.
In this specific case, the Protoss economy advantage translates to extra minerals, because he has no gas. He can build one of three main things.
1. Gateway - going into a two-gate push. I've already extrapolated on why that's not particularly playable.
2. Core. - Very late, basically about as effective as a normal one-gate core build would be against standard zerg, with the additional hindrance of your wall denying you scouting. You can kill the cannon with one gate zealots, but as also stated before, you fear the runby, so you CAN'T.
3. Extra cannons - lulz.
The probe advantage in this case simply does not translate well enough to guarantee a real advantage. Every starcraft player knows the importance of map control. Every starcraft player knows the importance of expanding. Every starcraft player knows that turtling on one base is met with mass expansion and outmacroing the opponent, because with two or more bases, you will outmacro the opponent.
Go actually read my post. You're still making blind assumptions that don't hold any water. So he breaks down his cannon and plugs with a zealot. Does that change anything? No. He still can't get out of his base, not because he's blocked, but because he has no map control.
In the event that he tries to push, zerg already has pool. Zerg has had pool for a very long time. Spine crawlers will solve any 2-gate push, as long as your initial lings weren't wasted trying to break down a wall. Waiting for core and 4 gate pushing will take enough time that the zerg will outmacro you.
^After that build he has 10 probes against 7 drones, if the Z scouts this he makes pure drones and an early queen and he's not that far behind to be honest.
Cyrus- It isn't this simple. You won't just "get the surround" versus a zerg who has a mouse. Keep in mind the lings can micro as well. There is a reason this strategy is gaining popularity in top level play. This being said, if you were up for it, I'd love to see this flawless probe micro defense.
As a zerg I've gotten very used to dealing with 6 pools...granted its different as a toss, but in both situations you're going to want to involve your harvestors. probes > drones, and drones can do it... so the key is going to getting the surround on the lings (easy - lings wont have speed and you'll have 2x the #'s) while keeping your gateways pylon safe. Let the pylon take some hits then engage with your probes..as he engages your probes pull back a bit...if he chases your probes you a)go for the surround b) have a safe pylon and a zealot still on the way.
Bottom line is if he 6 pools and manages to kill 4 probes..which would be great ling micro and terrible probe micro...but if the toss lost 4 probes..he'd still be at 10 or 11 while the zerg is on 7 or 8 drones.
Don't screw your build by preparing for something like the 6 ling. Just build your initial gate one or max two supply early on steppes and you can come out ahead regardless of losing a couple probes.
Are you on Europe? we could get a game to test it because honestly I don't believe you can do it with just 4 probes lost. And the debates about protoss being behind after not suffering any losses (regardless of the costs) to 6 pool is just ridiculous. The protoss is miles ahead, you probably didn't play zerg to understand that. Anyway I would like to plau a test game with anyone who thinks otherwise on Europe (cheerio.762)
haven't seen the replay, but when I scout 6-pool I NEVER leave the zerg-base but leave my probe there to see if he actually gets mass-lings; if he is stupid enough to attack my probe I even buy myself a couple more extra seconds; so you'll know when the lings are on the way; I wouldn't advise going forge first either; 12 gate, later forge and pylon to completely wall-off; put cannons down and start chrono-boosting zealots if he commits; if the attack doesn't come you can cancel the cannons; then you can hack down the pylon that completes the wall-off and throw down a core or an expo; though I prefer a core because once a zerg really outplayed me on the meta-game, didn't attack instantly, waited until I destroyed my wall-in and put down an expo and THEN attacked; I won, but I had to cancel the nexus and had a seriously delayed core
basicly Darthturtle is right with everything he has said; if your opponent 6-pools and DOES NOT ATTACK you need to capitalize on that or you won't gain anything; if your build just leads to both of you being equal later on, you haven't punished him for 6-pooling....put in other words, then every zerg could 6-pool without getting punished for trying; you really want to have an early core, go 3 or 4 gate and crush him with your superior gateway force; you don't want him to recover from the early economic loss
For gods' sake, would somebody make a replay showing once and for all that all you need to hold off a 6 pool are workers already?
Yes, you'll take worker losses, with the number of losses depending on your micro. WIth really good micro, you might be able to lose as few as 2 or 3.
But you will still be ahead, and he is absolutely crippled. You don't have to deviate from your build (you can if you scout it early enough, but you don't even have to scout it to be able to defend), you don't have to cut workers, you don't have to completely wall off your ramp. Not even on Steppes of War.
All you have to do is kill the first 6 lings without losing so many workers that you have fewer left than the zerg does. After that, it's an easy win.
I haven't been 6-pooled in ages, presumably because the 6 poolers simply can't hit 900-1000 diamond, or I'd post one of my own replays.
On September 24 2010 12:25 Darthturtle wrote: You forget that an early pool doesn't just mean early lings. It also means early queen. Two rounds(a minute and twenty seconds) of larvae injected droning off one hatch is enough to catch up to the toss, and a toss that went forge/cannon is committed to sitting on his godawful infrastructure.
Have you ever actually done a 6 pool? I mean, played zerg and 6pooled somebody?
If you use all the available larvae for lings and overlords when 6 pooling, it takes about 15 and a half years of gametime to build up 150 minerals for the queen.
You simply don't have enough workers bringing in minerals to do jack shit for a really long time. There is no way in hell the zerg is going to be able to afford to actually use those two rounds of injected larvae.
On September 24 2010 12:25 Darthturtle wrote: You forget that an early pool doesn't just mean early lings. It also means early queen. Two rounds(a minute and twenty seconds) of larvae injected droning off one hatch is enough to catch up to the toss, and a toss that went forge/cannon is committed to sitting on his godawful infrastructure.
Have you ever actually done a 6 pool? I mean, played zerg and 6pooled somebody?
If you use all the available larvae for lings and overlords when 6 pooling, it takes about 15 and a half years of gametime to build up 150 minerals for the queen.
You simply don't have enough workers bringing in minerals to do jack shit for a really long time. There is no way in hell the zerg is going to be able to afford to actually use those two rounds of injected larvae.
Not to mention that you'd need to get more overlords. There's no way a deadwall loses to a failed 6-pool. You don't even need an expansion since you can just kill them off with 1-base stargate play.
On September 24 2010 11:47 Darthturtle wrote: If you watch the replays, Fingo cuts probes to throw down the forge AFTER he scouts a 6 pool. This is even worse than just randomly going forge first, since he could've squeezed out at least one probe and gotten the forge at the exact same timing.
Scouting a deadwall is a perfect chance to drone up and expo fast. With early lings, you can stop a one-gate zealot counter and easily catch up and surpass the one-base toss. Especially since he wasted 350 on cannon/forge, and took an extremely late gate(two and a half minutes into the game, are you serious?). Even macroing back up from six-pool, six-eight lings is easy, since you have queens, and the toss just cut a ton of stuff.
Basically, this build is terrible against a zerg that decides to go directly into a macro game. You have cannons, but no ability to get out of your own base. Zerg is free to get three base, defend with just lings, and you have no way to push out to get an expo yourself.
whats stopping him from scouting he is droning and break down his wall?? and there is no way he can stop a four-gate with 7 drones to 14 probes. taking down a pylong takes but all of 1 second with 4 gate units
Go actually watch the replays.
He can't scout because he locked himself into his base. He has no probe outside. He has no pylon outside. He's built his zealot INSIDE his wall. He has effectively contained himself.
He doesn't have four gate. He doesn't even have two gate. He has one tremendously late gate, no core, no gas, and no infrastructure.
He NEEDS to one base tech, then, and Zerg does exactly what zerg always does. Expand all over the map and them win with mass units.
If the Protoss tries a 2 gate counterattack - You have the pool already. You can see him push out. Build a single spine crawler and you're defended.
If the protoss tries 4 gate - This will be mildly threatening maybe 7 minutes down the line, due to the fact that he has no tech whatsoever. Build a second spine crawler and you're defended.
As zerg, the two most important things to do are to drone and expand, whenever he gives you a chance. Throwing away 350 minerals, forcing himself into a defensive position, cutting two probes, these all scream please go macro and kill me.
It doesn't matter that zerg is down seven drones. Protoss has NO way to exploit that early window, due to the fact that he's stuck with no tech. He cannot afford to break any building in his wall due to the threat of a runby that he can't scout because he's contained himself. One hatch, one queen is enough to catch up on drone production. Two hatches massdroning is enough to surpass and put yourself into a game-winning lead.
This build is 100% against idiots who see a dead wall and a cannon and decide somehow, that they should break it. It's 0% against two-three base zerg, unless zerg makes a huge blunder like not scouting for a push.
lol. Why do I get the feeling you are theorycrafting?
So what your suggesting is. after being down ~14 probes vs 6-7. You want to somehow, drone up, get a queen as well as throw down an expansion?
If anything, you'll have to first build an overlord before you can make that queen.
Queens take another 50s.
Your not even getting gas yet, because your drone saturation is so shit. Thus the threat of 'runby' is non-existent. Zerglings are only SLIGHTLY faster than probes pre-speed. You don't realise that 6-pool sacrifices ECON as well as TECH, due to much later gas.
All the while a toss can do a +1attack 3gate push down the road. That would be the obvious thing to do. You want to throw up spines on your already crippled economy. If the Toss throws down another gateway asap, and produce zealots from both gates chrono'd or not. He WILL be able to run you over unless you've been making non-stop lings....
No, a 6-pool is very much an all-in. There is no way you can catch up in tech or econ unless they make some major mistakes.
Why don't you try playing vs OP? You 6-pool, he'll do a full wall-off. Then you try win from there.
Also, there's no reason OP can't have a probe scouting outside. Chances are, OP's scouting probes would still be alive until the 4th pair of lings pop out or when the initial 3 pairs come back to hunt it down. But once again, lings are only SLIGHTLY faster than probes pre-speed.
I'm not the toss player, Fingo is. But yeah, we did play a ton of games where he did this build against 6-pool, and I was able to win every time he went 12 gate simply because I was able to inflict enough damage to his probes that we were even.
When he did this forge build, however, he either 2 gated me or 3 warpgate pushed me a few minutes later and rolled me while I was still trying to saturate my main...
Having done the 6-pool so many times in a practice game against P, this is the only reliable way to stop a 6-pool and still be miles ahead in econ. I don't believe your probe micro is so good that you will only lose 2 probes. You will most like lose a lot more -- you seem to forget that the zerg player can micro too.
The Zerg player simply doesn't have the resources to capitalize on the "god awful infrastructure" of this build. He gets his overlord at 12, and only has 7 drones until 12-15 food, depending on when he decided to stop ling production. 7 drones is how many drones you have 20 seconds into the game, and this is at ~2 minutes. He won't be able to get any gas until much later, much less an expansion (queen + drones will take up all resources). If he wants to survive the impending push, he'll also have to get spines, more queens, and more lings. How the hell is he supposed get that money in time?
By then the toss has blown way past him. I don't think even a spine can hold down a 2 gate push ~1-2 minutes after that. If the Zerg doesn't produce constant drones until he's caught up, he's pretty much dead. Producing more lings to stop the push or do a "runby," as you say, is out of the question.
EDIT: I just read one of the posts above about 1 base stargate play. That is actually an excellent point. You don't even need to destroy your own wall to beat the Zerg.
There's a reason pros gg as soon as their 6 pool fails. It's impossible to recover from. That is the reason I posted this build -- it is the only way to reliably hold against a 6 pool without taking a ton of damage. RELIABLY. This build works 100% of the time, and you only do it after you scout.
Yea, I practiced some PvZ vs. 6 pool with a friend a couple of days ago. He was able to stop the 6 pool with some micro and positioning his gateways close to his mineral line.
Unfortunately my micro isn't that great but I came up with the exact same build and building positioning from the OP and was able to fend off the rush every time and win lateron. (i.e. 9 pylon -> scout -> upon seeing the 6 pool I cancel probe 12 and throw down forge + gateway at the choke immediately, then continue with probes and throw down the cannon as soon as the forge is finished).
One time I went for fast void rays afterwards, another time for a 3- or 4-gate push, and a third time I teched to fast colossus, and I won every game - even though he is a much better player than me but his economy was really hurt too much.
On September 25 2010 05:13 Goobus wrote: I'm not the toss player, Fingo is. But yeah, we did play a ton of games where he did this build against 6-pool, and I was able to win every time he went 12 gate simply because I was able to inflict enough damage to his probes that we were even.
Then either his initial timings or off, or he doesn't know how to fight zerglings with probes.
Yes, the zerg player can micro too, but the number of probes you have when lings get to your base are definitely enough to end up ahead. And if he's bringing workers in addition to the lings, then rather than fighting, you can delay while waiting for your zealot, it should be all that long, and since he doesn't have mining workers, the fact that your workers aren't mining is much less of an issue.
Post some of the replays where you kill him with a 6pool.
I agree with everything else you said though. There's no way in hell the zerg is ever going to catch up, so if you do wall-off, you're going to win, period.
I just vehemently disagree that cutting probes and walling off is the only way to reliably stop it. Using your workers to kill the lings, or stalling for a zealot, are just as reliable *as long as you know what to do and don't screw it up*, and has the advantage of not actually requiring you to see the six pool.
Yes, people do six pool on maps with 4 starting spots. I don't know why, but they do. And if they get lucky and find you on their first try, you're going to have all the same problems all over again, if you haven't figured out how to stop it without walling off.
On September 24 2010 12:25 Darthturtle wrote: You forget that an early pool doesn't just mean early lings. It also means early queen. Two rounds(a minute and twenty seconds) of larvae injected droning off one hatch is enough to catch up to the toss, and a toss that went forge/cannon is committed to sitting on his godawful infrastructure.
Have you ever actually done a 6 pool? I mean, played zerg and 6pooled somebody?
If you use all the available larvae for lings and overlords when 6 pooling, it takes about 15 and a half years of gametime to build up 150 minerals for the queen.
You simply don't have enough workers bringing in minerals to do jack shit for a really long time. There is no way in hell the zerg is going to be able to afford to actually use those two rounds of injected larvae.
Absolutely wrong. You don't have minerals for drones and OLs if you're spamming lings.
You start droning the moment you see the deadwall. By the time the 6 lings reaches his base, you're at 10/18, 250 minerals. Drone thrice, queen as soon as possible, then drone.
By ~4:20, your queen is out and you're already looking to take the expo. This is about 20/26. After the initial 6 lings, you're not making more lings. You have plenty of money.
On September 25 2010 10:32 Dauntless wrote: As asked earlier; 6-pool on 4-player map where you scout the wrong direction. What do? I find it nearly unstoppable.
Chrono zealot, defend with probes, get an open wall at your ramp.
Just an idea: with a deadwall couldn't you just fast tech to stargate? With good macro on both sides I still don't see how zerg could really catch up quickly enough AND throw down ample defenses, or be able to scout what your doing in time, be it stargate or fast collosi or dt's or whatever you feel like throwing at them
edit: i play zerg but don't like the odds that 6pool gives
On September 25 2010 11:17 kef wrote: Just an idea: with a deadwall couldn't you just fast tech to stargate? With good macro on both sides I still don't see how zerg could really catch up quickly enough AND throw down ample defenses, or be able to scout what your doing in time, be it stargate or fast collosi or dt's or whatever you feel like throwing at them
edit: i play zerg but don't like the odds that 6pool gives
With the forge/cannon/gateway wall, core comes tremendously late. Which means stargate comes late. Hell, I didn't even see a gas go down in the uploaded replay.
Essentially, tech timings are roughly equivalent to standard play if the P tries to tech and the Z tries to drone up.
I'm curious, have anyone of you figured out a way to stop a 4 pool from the BOTTOM of the ramp? I would love to go 12 gate into expand with a wall-off at the nat, but from the games (3) I've had, you can't get cannons up fast enough at the bottom. Unless some one can find a baller sim city for the bottom of the ramp, I can't see it happening.
Scouting a deadwall is a perfect chance to drone up and expo fast. With early lings, you can stop a one-gate zealot counter and easily catch up and surpass the one-base toss. Especially since he wasted 350 on cannon/forge, and took an extremely late gate(two and a half minutes into the game, are you serious?). Even macroing back up from six-pool, six-eight lings is easy, since you have queens, and the toss just cut a ton of stuff.
The forge isn't really wasted though. He can start +1 attack once gas is up, and ALREADY has a bunch more workers than you. As a zerg player, this seems pretty strong. I haven't watched the reps yet, but it seems like, if he scouts your 6-pool and you can't do eco damage, you're waaaaay behind, even against a protoss who's gone early cannon-forge.
Scouting a deadwall is a perfect chance to drone up and expo fast. With early lings, you can stop a one-gate zealot counter and easily catch up and surpass the one-base toss. Especially since he wasted 350 on cannon/forge, and took an extremely late gate(two and a half minutes into the game, are you serious?). Even macroing back up from six-pool, six-eight lings is easy, since you have queens, and the toss just cut a ton of stuff.
The forge isn't really wasted though. He can start +1 attack once gas is up, and ALREADY has a bunch more workers than you. As a zerg player, this seems pretty strong. I haven't watched the reps yet, but it seems like, if he scouts your 6-pool and you can't do eco damage, you're waaaaay behind, even against a protoss who's gone early cannon-forge.
Until he actually has the gas, it's still wasted. It's like having an extra base but nobody mining there.
In this case, Protoss, who currently has no core, no gas, and one gateway, has to get the assimilator, get the 100 gas, begin +1, chrono +1, get another gateway, mass zealots, push for a +1 timing attack, and hope to god that somewhere along the way, zerg didn't get some roaches because if he did, the push is boned.
To misaTO's question, you need to send the drones real early to block the wall. Then you need to keep blocking for a really long time. Then you have to deal with the fact that your lings will be somewhat late, due to less workers mining.
You have to take into account the losses we would suffer when defending with workers. That's why the forge play doesn't hurt our economy all that much. We throw down forge and gateway immediately, so the gateway isn't even delayed. And we can take a regular fast gas because we know we won't need many zealots to fend off the rush, once the wall is intact. We have to cut 1-2 workers maybe and then we can go on with our chosen tech.
Think about the alternative. We defend with our workers which costs lots of mining time and loses us 3-4 workers maybe. And if we misclick, it might lose us the game. Keeping those workers, and having them mine continuously has lots of value, too. The forge is not completely wasted as we can get +1 attack at some point.
On September 25 2010 21:51 Merlinius wrote: You have to take into account the losses we would suffer when defending with workers. That's why the forge play doesn't hurt our economy all that much. We throw down forge and gateway immediately, so the gateway isn't even delayed. And we can take a regular fast gas because we know we won't need many zealots to fend off the rush, once the wall is intact. We have to cut 1-2 workers maybe and then we can go on with our chosen tech.
Think about the alternative. We defend with our workers which costs lots of mining time and loses us 3-4 workers maybe. And if we misclick, it might lose us the game. Keeping those workers, and having them mine continuously has lots of value, too. The forge is not completely wasted as we can get +1 attack at some point.
Wrong and wrong. Think just for one second, about how much money forge and cannon costs. 350 minerals. Now, in a standard game, at what point would we have 350 spare minerals to throw into unnecessary tech? Certainly not in the opening. You're busy getting your second gateway, or your gas and core. Essential tech for solid play.
Then the question becomes: How is it that in this particular build, you do happen to have 350 extra minerals to waste? Does that make it a sub-optimal opening? Is cutting and not losing probes any different from not cutting probes but maybe losing a few if you have bad control?
And always keep in mind that the zerg has options, whereas you have dedicated yourself to one specific semi-allin gamble. In this forge-first opener, you're relying on the 6pooler to lose zerglings, continue to make more zerglings, and keep losing them until you can mass zealots and counter.
Remember that your gate starts late at ~2:30. It completes at ~3:30. The zerg that starts power droning is expanding at ~4:20. You have, at most, two zealots(one barely out of your gateway) to try to sneak past six zerglings and his queen and try to do some damage. Can you do it?
You are basically completely incapable of punishing him for his early bad economy, and he's catching up on workers fast, with his queen.
As I said before, getting the early forge is useless until you have the gas to get +1. Nobody makes an early nexus at their fourth because they 'expect' to use it some time in the lategame. Nobody builds eight gates and two robos on one base because they'll be able to run it all when they expand later. Same for the forge. If you build it, and don't even have an assimilator, then you can't argue that you're getting +1 eventually, so it's okay.
On September 25 2010 22:19 Darthturtle wrote: Is cutting and not losing probes any different from not cutting probes but maybe losing a few if you have bad control?
EXACTLY! Yes. So like I've been saying, and I'm glad there are other people out there with common sense, the best response to a 6 pool is to NOT cut probes. Do your normal build, working toward a partial block and that first blocking zealot....until then use your probes where needed to deal with the zerglings. How you use those probes depends on what the 6 pooler is doing with his lings. * If he's invading your mineral line escape to open space and work for the surround...these are not speedlings - you can surround. 2 control groups of rougly equal probe #'s are optimal. * If he's trying to knock down your pylon supporting your gate(s) u can either attack with all probes and try to finish him here (he wont get the pylon down in time if he sticks with it..and he wont win a straight up fight with your probes (12-14 on 6). Another option is to pull half of your probes and attack his lings...if he stops attacking the pylon and goes for you bait him away from the pylon and make him chase you. Dont engage...when he gives up the chase and goes back to the pylon be right on his tail attacking again. He wont get the pylon down if you are good enough and he might not even kill a probe. Plus this buys time for that first zealot.
When its all said and done, either option has you're normal (flexible!) infastructure up AND you'll have more probes than he does drones. GG .
personally I like to wall off 1 side of my Nexus with a gateway and a pylon, block the back side of the min with another pylon and force the zerg to come in 1 way.
The beauty of T v P is the zergling do so little dmg to the buildings that you wont loose very much of the shield at all. Plus you can still pick off a zerg or 2 and forge them out.
I'm a 1300 Zerg and I've started using 7 pool to get a very safe FE up.
It sounds counter-intuitive, but it does the job.
7 pool 8 OV The pool, OV, and larva all pop at the perfect time to make 6 lings 2 more drones, queen, expo at 300 minerals while the lings are off fighting the good fight.
Whatever the protoss player does ends up in either a super defensive position, or an economy far enough behind that his 4-gate will be very late.
On September 25 2010 21:51 Merlinius wrote: You have to take into account the losses we would suffer when defending with workers. That's why the forge play doesn't hurt our economy all that much. We throw down forge and gateway immediately, so the gateway isn't even delayed. And we can take a regular fast gas because we know we won't need many zealots to fend off the rush, once the wall is intact. We have to cut 1-2 workers maybe and then we can go on with our chosen tech.
Think about the alternative. We defend with our workers which costs lots of mining time and loses us 3-4 workers maybe. And if we misclick, it might lose us the game. Keeping those workers, and having them mine continuously has lots of value, too. The forge is not completely wasted as we can get +1 attack at some point.
Wrong and wrong. Think just for one second, about how much money forge and cannon costs. 350 minerals. Now, in a standard game, at what point would we have 350 spare minerals to throw into unnecessary tech? Certainly not in the opening. You're busy getting your second gateway, or your gas and core. Essential tech for solid play.
Then the question becomes: How is it that in this particular build, you do happen to have 350 extra minerals to waste? Does that make it a sub-optimal opening? Is cutting and not losing probes any different from not cutting probes but maybe losing a few if you have bad control?
And always keep in mind that the zerg has options, whereas you have dedicated yourself to one specific semi-allin gamble. In this forge-first opener, you're relying on the 6pooler to lose zerglings, continue to make more zerglings, and keep losing them until you can mass zealots and counter.
Remember that your gate starts late at ~2:30. It completes at ~3:30. The zerg that starts power droning is expanding at ~4:20. You have, at most, two zealots(one barely out of your gateway) to try to sneak past six zerglings and his queen and try to do some damage. Can you do it?
You are basically completely incapable of punishing him for his early bad economy, and he's catching up on workers fast, with his queen.
As I said before, getting the early forge is useless until you have the gas to get +1. Nobody makes an early nexus at their fourth because they 'expect' to use it some time in the lategame. Nobody builds eight gates and two robos on one base because they'll be able to run it all when they expand later. Same for the forge. If you build it, and don't even have an assimilator, then you can't argue that you're getting +1 eventually, so it's okay.
Forge + cannon is 300 minerals, not 350.Of course our tech is delayed. I never doubted that. But that goes for the zerg player as well. He has 6-8 idle lings at this point and needs to make an overlord before building any more drones. You're right, we can't just move out with our first two zealots.
But as I said above, we can take gas immediately after placing the cannon, because we are safe for the moment. That's why I don't really understand your last paragraph.
Of course you are right in saying this build might not be perfect and a well-executed probe defense might be better. But at least it's easy to execute, and you can't mess up the probe micro.
In the my post I was just saying that losing 3-4 probes + mining time costs us economy and time as well, and we need to see that in relation to the 300 minerals for the cannon+forge.
But I'd love to see some replays of successful 6 pool defenses on steppes of war (without placing a 10 gate).
My mistake, although it doesn't make a substantial difference, as wasted minerals is wasted minerals.
But that goes for the zerg player as well. He has 6-8 idle lings at this point and needs to make an overlord before building any more drones.
Zerg tech isn't delayed at all. It's the worker count that's low. Zergs have 7 drones, six lings, and one overlord building by the time the lings reach the front. As soon as overlord completes, zerg is at ten drones and the queen is following immediately. You can't really call the lings idle when they're containing the Protoss from pushing out until he gets a bunch of zealots off his one gate.
But as I said above, we can take gas immediately after placing the cannon, because we are safe for the moment. That's why I don't really understand your last paragraph.
You don't have gas yet. It's like having a cybernetics core but no gas. Can you make stalkers? No. Can you get warp gates? No. Is it any good then? No.
But at least it's easy to execute, and you can't mess up the probe micro.
The tradeoff is that it costs you your initiative. Zerg basically did damage to you without even attacking yet. He did 300 mineral damage, and delayed your gateway, and forced you to cut, which is the same as losing, two probes.
In the my post I was just saying that losing 3-4 probes + mining time costs us economy and time as well, and we need to see that in relation to the 300 minerals for the cannon+forge.
First, a solid defense against 6pool loses no workers. Ever. Losing workers happens if your micro is bad. Which also means if your micro is good, you are in an even better position than our theoretical standard defense.
Now, in addition to having more probes to begin with, standard play gets a gateway at normal timings, which means tech isn't delayed at all. Compare that to the zerg, who needs to drone up first before continuing to tech. You are ahead on both workers and tech, which is an easy win.
Simply put, standard play is designed to cost you no time. You might lose a bit of mining, but who cares? You're not delaying core, you're not delaying gas.
And last, but not least, we go to the root of the problem. This build itself. This build has one requirement, one teeny tiny kicker that it relies upon in order to work.
It needs the opponent to do something. It needs the opponent to make a decision that is not only bad, but game-losingly bad. It needs the opponent to commit to breaking the front while under heavy cannon fire. The opponent needs to continue to flood lings, even though it damn well can't afford to do so. Because if the opponent doesn't, if he drones up immediately, then as I've explained multiple times, the protoss simply is not able to stop zerg from expanding and powerdroning.
This build, this delay tech, cut probes build that is designed to stop an all-in, just looks completely awful compared to a standard defense, if the opponent decided not to attack. Put the two side by side, and you'll see the standard build pull so far ahead if the opponent decides to not go for it.
The standard build is capable of defending and losing very little time in case of an all-in. It is optimal in the case of no all-in. The forge-first, cut probes build is questionable, even in the one situation we're trying to design it for, and winds up horribly lacking if that situation does not occur.
That is the big problem with this build. How do you guarantee that your opponent will intentionally make an awful mistake that loses the game?
On September 25 2010 10:32 Dauntless wrote: As asked earlier; 6-pool on 4-player map where you scout the wrong direction. What do? I find it nearly unstoppable.
Chrono zealot, defend with probes, get an open wall at your ramp.
This.
Exactly the same way you stop it on a two-player map. Seriously, there is no need to change your build, there is no need to completely wall off, there is no need to put up a forge and get cannons.
If you can't beat 6 lings with 13-14 workers with minimal losses, then PRACTICE, because that's an easily winnable fight. You have the advantage of numbers, and you have the advantage of time, because you should have a zealot on the way. If the zerg can't kill enough probes before that zealot pops, then your probes + zealot will absolutely wipe the floor with little squished zergling bodies.
On September 25 2010 11:49 ibreakurface wrote: Awesome guide, I don't see why people are trying to slander it. Perhaps they don't understand how devastating a 6 pool on steppes is.
Or perhaps all the people claiming 6pool on steppes is borderline imbalanced, and that you absolutely have to wall off + forge to defeat it, just need some practice.
I'm not slandering the guide. I think walling off with a forge is not the most optimal way to beat a 6 pool, because you give the zerg a chance to get back into the game, but unless the zerg is a way better player than you, you're not going to lose with this build.
You're just going to have 20-25 minute games where you should have been easily able to win in 8-10 minutes, as well as give yourself a chance to screw up in the later game, or get surprised by something you weren't expecting.
I fucking hate 6 / 7 pool with a passion and a good portion of them are from them cheese. I feel like if I survive the early game I can win anyone at my skill level cuz I'm a macro type player. I'm considering thumbing down steppes of war instead of scrap station. Do you think that's a smart choice?
On September 26 2010 11:57 CanucksJC wrote: So I have a question for you guys:
I fucking hate 6 / 7 pool with a passion and a good portion of them are from them cheese. I feel like if I survive the early game I can win anyone at my skill level cuz I'm a macro type player. I'm considering thumbing down steppes of war instead of scrap station. Do you think that's a smart choice?
I think if you play against a zerg, you should just tell them to 6pool you right away because that's the only way they'll win the game.
Then watch them all try to 14 hatch and play long macro games.
Personally, I wouldn't thumb down either map, because at most non-pro levels, it honestly won't matter all that much.
On September 26 2010 11:57 CanucksJC wrote: So I have a question for you guys:
I fucking hate 6 / 7 pool with a passion and a good portion of them are from them cheese. I feel like if I survive the early game I can win anyone at my skill level cuz I'm a macro type player. I'm considering thumbing down steppes of war instead of scrap station. Do you think that's a smart choice?
I love getting 6pooled, because unless I fuck up, I get fast easy wins.
I like winning.
I really like winning in <10 minutes.
And I *LOOOOOOVE* beating people who cheese. I don't hate people who cheese, and occasionally even cheese myself, but for some reason it still gives me great, unbridled joy to beat them.
Personally, I think it's silly to hate a strategy that leads to a large win percentage, so I wouldn't ever consider thumbing down steppes or scrap station for that reason.
BTW, I would still really like the original poster to add some replays of the protoss losing to the 6pool in all the testing they did. I strongly suspect there will be a number of very simple things to point out where the protoss messed up.
i wall off with my Gateway my pylon in the back as soon as i c the pool after my 9 scout throw 2 pylons down finish my wall and CB the zealot behind my wall. One pylon will go down briing 4 probes over with the one zealot tanking and owning lings. You lost maybe ur 4 probes or 1-2 and your ahead for an easy win i dislike throwing down cannons because the they are stationary and 300 minerals down
Ok, fair enough. Could some of you maybe share a replay or two where you fend of the 6 pool with probes only (incl. the transition afterwards)? That would be great.
1) A replay where, instead of breaking down the wall, the zerg player uses his lings to contain and then tries to macro up. I have a strong suspicion that Darthturtle is underestimating the time it will take to macro up, but I don't actually know, and neither me nor my friends are diamond (mid-plat random here) so I can't test it myself. Goobus and Fingo have already shown a willingness to explore this situation. Perhaps they could explore this modification as well?
2) Could someone post a replay where their workers defeat a six pool with minimal casualties? Again, Goobus and Fingo maybe? I am imagining that, with good ling micro, focusing on taking down the Gateway pylon first, the lings will do more damage than simply killing two probes. Of course, I don't actually know.
Theorycrafting is all well and good (see my handle, har har har), but the strong, uncompromising tone of some of these posts is just silly when no one has provided proof. Will a zerg who switches to a macro game win against this build? Are the people who say all you need is good probe micro blowing smoke? These are things we can prove. I say someone does it, then we discuss the results.
On September 26 2010 12:47 mlbrandow wrote: Would this stop a double 6pool too? Say on Monolith Ridge?
Double 6 pool is pretty damn hard to stop with just about anything, and I *really* dislike walling completely off in a 2v2 because you've basically just said "hey, go kill my ally instead", and you can't ever send anything to help him.
I'm pretty sure the best way to win against a double 6 pool is to have the person not being attacked go kill one of the zergs, which will be super-easy, and then outmacro the shit ouf of the remaining zerg, because the 6poolers can't both kill an enemy and save an ally. They have to choose one. If they choose to save, then you're still in the game and can rely on your ally to hold while you recover, and if they choose to kill you, your ally should be able to kill one fast, and the other eventually.
On September 26 2010 12:47 mlbrandow wrote: Would this stop a double 6pool too? Say on Monolith Ridge?
Double 6 pool is pretty damn hard to stop with just about anything, and I *really* dislike walling completely off in a 2v2 because you've basically just said "hey, go kill my ally instead", and you can't ever send anything to help him.
I'm pretty sure the best way to win against a double 6 pool is to have the person not being attacked go kill one of the zergs, which will be super-easy, and then outmacro the shit ouf of the remaining zerg, because the 6poolers can't both kill an enemy and save an ally. They have to choose one. If they choose to save, then you're still in the game and can rely on your ally to hold while you recover, and if they choose to kill you, your ally should be able to kill one fast, and the other eventually.
i play TP and i usually wall, giving P the ability to wall in a zz game with 0 losses and barely shield drop on cannon is pretty nice. And if I see ZZ i just go 1/1/1 into banshees.
On September 26 2010 13:18 mlbrandow wrote: i play TP and i usually wall, giving P the ability to wall in a zz game with 0 losses and barely shield drop on cannon is pretty nice. And if I see ZZ i just go 1/1/1 into banshees.
If both players can wall, that's fine, but a double 6 pool is obviously going to put a lot more pressure on the wall than the single. Obviously the terran can just repair and be fine, but if you have a pylon as part of your wall, the lings might be able to take it down before you have enough to hold them off.
And if you have a zerg partner, and wall off with static defense, you're pretty much guaranteed to lose the game. If your partner is going to die, you *have* to kill one of the zergs before they can get an economy up.
On September 24 2010 21:06 Cyuss wrote: After scouted a 6 pool i usually do nothing different and stick to my plan. The probes ive got at the point are enough to do a nice sorround and be conomically ahead of the z. Specially if the Zerg goes for my mineral line i consider it an auto win as u can simply clumb ur drones on one mineral patch, give them the oder to go to another and right away a- move them. Out comes a perfect sorround in which i never loose more than 2-3 probes. When his reinforcement is there my Zealot is, too.
+1 This is gold, thanks! I usually win with probes, but getting the surround determines how much I lose.
Btw. I assume you are all walling off with your gateways at the ramp. Do you pull your probes to the front when the zerglings are approaching? Because otherways they'll be able to kill one and even two pylons before the first zealot pops out of a 12 gateway.
Because I find it very hard, almost impossible to defend with my probes at the ramp without losing most of them. You can't even utilize mineral walking very well from this position.
On September 27 2010 03:53 Merlinius wrote: Btw. I assume you are all walling off with your gateways at the ramp. Do you pull your probes to the front when the zerglings are approaching? Because otherways they'll be able to kill one and even two pylons before the first zealot pops out of a 12 gateway.
Because I find it very hard, almost impossible to defend with my probes at the ramp without losing most of them. You can't even utilize mineral walking very well from this position.
As long as your pylon isn't part of your wall, you should be fine. I keep mine hung back just a little so If the lings run in to focus my pylon down, I can surround the lings(and pylon) with probes.
I practiced a bit with a friend today. I tried to go for a 12 gateway, followed by a 14 gateway, and defended with my probes until the first zealot warped in. He decided to go for the pylons powering my gateways and was successful most of the time. I found it very hard to stop the rush with my probes. Of course, my micro is pretty bad. Anyways, I uploaded two replays. Maybe someone can have a look and tell me which awful mistakes I made and why I deserve to lose
I included a win and a loss. Unfortunately I lost more often than not Was it just that I pulled my probes too late in the first game? Or did I make a serious mistake with my build beforehand?
Loss:
Win:
How many probes am I supposed to be pulling if he attacks my front pylon(s)?
[General Tips] 1) When you are at 9/10 supply, and have 50 minerals, pull one probe out, and walk towards the ramp and build a pylon. Right when it hits 100 minerals, plop it right down. 2) I usually go for a 13 gate, but 12 gate works. Once again, when you have 100 minerals, start walking the probe, and building the gateway.
[Possible Decision Choices] 1) I like how you decided to build the gateway. I realized that since a Gateway > Forge because of its building hitpoints, a Gateway makes a nicer walloff than Forge. You could also plop down another pylon, but that might be too weak.
[What I think You Could Have Done] 1) You pulled off probes too late. What you should have done is this if you're safe: a) That drone you went to scout. Keep it in the base just to make sure when his 6 zerglings come out. When they do (and they'll end up killing your probe), pull off your drones. b) At this point, we know this much: He has around 7 or 8 drones, and you already have at least 14 probes. This means that mathematically, you can pull up to 6 probes FOR SURE. (See how you're guaranteed to be economically equal if you have 8 probes mining and he has 8 drones mining?) c) If you wish, pull off more than 6 probes, and at that point, his zerglings should kill off not all your probes, and when you have a zealot, feel free to send your walling probes back to mine. d) Why did you pull your probes back? They're supposed to be sacraficed so he doesn't get into the base to wreck harvoc. That's why your wall exists. And then the second wave, you chose to pull them back again?!? Not the right decision. Press Hold position, RIGHT THERE, and the worst decision you made is you lose all your probes that you used to wall off ... until your zealot comes out. Which means, you'll still be economically at least as good as the zerg player~
On September 27 2010 06:46 Merlinius wrote: I practiced a bit with a friend today. I tried to go for a 12 gateway, followed by a 14 gateway, and defended with my probes until the first zealot warped in. He decided to go for the pylons powering my gateways and was successful most of the time. I found it very hard to stop the rush with my probes. Of course, my micro is pretty bad. Anyways, I uploaded two replays. Maybe someone can have a look and tell me which awful mistakes I made and why I deserve to lose
I'm only watching the loss, but:
Your first pylon is 45 minerals and about 8 seconds late, and your gateway is another couple seconds late.
I don't like building the second gateway. You really need a second pylon to power the gate in case the lings manage to kill a pylon. If you had built a second pylon before the second gateway, you would have had a zealot out in plenty of time to hold the rush off. That gate serves absolutely no purpose whatsoever other than to act as a mineral sink. It's not blocking the ramp, because you don't have zealots to hold position, and its not building more zealots because you don't have enough money due to the fact that you're having to pull probes. No, because Pulling probes sooner would have helped as well.
Most importantly, the very first thing you should to do when your gateway finishes is build a zealot. In this case, it would have just made you lose faster, because you wouldn't have been able to rebuild a pylon, but that's because you built a second unnecessary gateway instead of the life-saving pylon.
Look at the replay at 3:18, which is where the first zealot would have been produced had you been able to start it as soon as the gateway was finished, even if you only used one chronoboost for the zealot. (It takes a little more than one chronoboost to fully boost a zealot, but one chrono will cut 10 seconds off the build time) At that point, you had killed the first wave, had enough minerals to immediately start another zealot, and were ahead by 5 workers, although only 6 of them were actually mining.
If you insert a zealot into the game at that point, it should be pretty clear that you *easily* win. In fact, if your first zealot hits at 3:18, your second will come at 3:46. If you look at that time, you'd have 2 zealots fighting 4 lings, which means you don't even need probes to help fight anymore, and even fighting zealot-less, you still had a 13 to 7 worker lead.
Take another 10 seconds off that from your early game delays, and have 2 pylons instead of 1, and your zealot is there in time to help kill the first 6 lings, meaning you'll take even fewer probe losses.
First of all, fix your early game. 8-10 seconds is a pretty big delay.
Second, double-power your first gateway. ALWAYS.
*edit*
Decided to look at the replay where you won just too see what you did better.
Your pylon and gateway placement timings were much better this game, but still slightly delayed, and I still think the second gateway before your second pylon is both unnecessary and dangerous.
A quick word about pylon placement. I *really* like your pylon placment, and I think this is one of the best ways to block your ramp, leaving just enough room for a gate + gate or gate + cyber. One thing you might want to play around with though, that I've been liking quite a lot. If you put the pylon right up against the edge, behind where your first gate is going to go, it's slightly better protected, and allows you to very easily warp units onto the low ground.
I also really don't like the scout on 9, but that's more of a personal preference thing. I realize a lot of people want to scout a 6pool ASAP, but realistically, the only thing you have to change is making sure you chrono a zealot first instead, if you were planning on getting a core the instant the gateway is finished. Scouting with your gate probe instead the pylon probe gives you the info you need in plenty of time. Still, scouting with the pylon probe is pretty popular, but I think the only reason to do that is if you're going to harass with it. Which might actually be a *really* good idea vs a 6pool. You have a pretty small window, but if you manage to even get one or two drones to pull off the mineral line to chase you off, that's a HUGE hit to the already crippled zerg economy, and you have about a 40 second window where you should be able to either kill a drone, or force them to deal with your probe. With that in mind, I would say either delay the scout, or if you insist on scouting on 9, harass his workers. Worker harassment will be much more painful for a 6pool than it will for a more standard zerg build.
There were also a number of other mistakes in this game:
You left your scouting probe in the middle of the map.
Your first gate was idle for a full 15 seconds, even though you had minerals to afford a zealot from the time it first finished. That first zealot is HUGE in holding off a 6 pool. Get it out ASAP.
As I already mentioned, but I really think it bears reinforcing, I still think the second gate is unnecessary. If you have the minerals, you can always throw it down later to help block, because you don't actually need it to be finished, you just need it to be in the way.
In the fight agaisnt the first 6 lings while they were near your pylons, you lost a probe or two that you didn't have to lose. Pull probes out of the fight when they've lost their shields if at all possible. I realize this is *really* hard, but that's how you beat a 6 pool without probe losses.
When the 3 remaining lings moved to your mine, you had 7 probes (technically 8, including the scout probe sitting in the middle of the map) doing absolutely nothing. Using those probes to help finish the remaining 3 lings almost certainly prevents the one extra probe loss you took at your mineral line, and either kills those 3 lings or chases them off your mineral line.
You took 2 more probe losses after that, leaving you at an 11 to 7 advantage. At that point, you can safely put all your probes back to work, and from there you win the game pretty easily.
Maybe the fact that you won this game relatively easily, despite the fact that you still made rather a number of small mistakes and one ridiculously large mistake (a 15 second delay on your first zealot is absolutely gigantic here), will quell the "omg6poolonsteppes" whining once and for all.
Interesting post. I typically use 2gw as well to block. I have only been 6 pooled a few times though with mixed results so I don't really have a "here's exactly what i'm going to do" strategy. Cannon Forge seems decent, but if zerg doesn't attack (or more likely just pulls back as soon as he sees a cannon) and just powers drones he'd make up for the 6 pool pretty easily and still have his zerglings.
@Merlinius I watched that first replay, I'd try to pull 3-4 probes and put them on hold at the choke point. That way the zerglings don't just waltz in through the opening, and even if they munch your drones and get through to hit the pylons it's much more delayed. I believe the probes can hold off the lings till the zealot appears?
On September 28 2010 03:34 Nasdrova wrote: Interesting post. I typically use 2gw as well to block.
If you already know a 6pool is coming, what exactly are you trying to block? You won't have a zealot in time, and as Merlinius' first replay shows, getting the gateway double-powered is much more important than blocking the ramp, because if the lings do go for pylons, and you're slow bringing probes, you're gate is going to get unpowered.
And to be perfectly honest, before you have a zealot, having the ramp choked with 2 buildings does you absolutely no good anyway. Against a 6pool, you're not going to have a zealot in time, and against anything else, you have plenty of time to block with a second building at a normal time, as well as get a zealot to hold the choke if necessary.
I do like his pylon/gateway placement much better than the typical block that exposes the pylon at the base of the ramp. You don't have the ramp blocked until the second building (gate or cybercore), but it's a much more solid block.
Honestly, I'd really like to start using merlinius' second replay as a perfect example of how you can screw up pretty significantly, getting the first zealot a full 15 seconds later than it should have come, and *still* manage to hold off a 6 pool on steppes.
On September 28 2010 03:34 Nasdrova wrote: Interesting post. I typically use 2gw as well to block.
If you already know a 6pool is coming, what exactly are you trying to block? You won't have a zealot in time, and as Merlinius' first replay shows, getting the gateway double-powered is much more important than blocking the ramp, because if the lings do go for pylons, and you're slow bringing probes, you're gate is going to get unpowered.
And to be perfectly honest, before you have a zealot, having the ramp choked with 2 buildings does you absolutely no good anyway. Against a 6pool, you're not going to have a zealot in time, and against anything else, you have plenty of time to block with a second building at a normal time, as well as get a zealot to hold the choke if necessary.
I do like his pylon/gateway placement much better than the typical block that exposes the pylon at the base of the ramp. You don't have the ramp blocked until the second building (gate or cybercore), but it's a much more solid block.
I typically put a pylon where Melinius does every time against zerg, then if I see an early pool I drop the second gateway then start blocking the entrance with probes.
Blocking with 2 buildings properly gives the zerglings only a very small opening which can be blocked with one unit ( probe or zealot when it arrives ).
On September 28 2010 04:13 Nasdrova wrote: I typically put a pylon where Melinius does every time against zerg, then if I see an early pool I drop the second gateway then start blocking the entrance with probes.
Blocking with 2 buildings properly gives the zerglings only a very small opening which can be blocked with one unit ( probe or zealot when it arrives ).
Why? What is the block gaining you?
Lings will go through a blocking probe in notime flat, leaving you down one probe that you didn't need to lose, and the lings still get through mere seconds later. If you have a delayed second pylon (which you will if you put the second gate down first), you run the risk of having your gates depowered.
There simply is no need to try to keep the first 6 lings out of your base, as long as you're double-powered. If the lings go for your workers, use all your probes to surround and kill them, while trying to micro hurt probes out and back in, and if the lings go for pylons, do exactly what merlinius did, and leave 5-6 workers mining, and pull the rest to attack the lings while they're hitting the pylons, making sure to pull back if the lings turn around and start attacking probes instead. All you have to do is delay til your first zealot is out, and the game is an easy win.
On September 28 2010 04:13 Nasdrova wrote: I typically put a pylon where Melinius does every time against zerg, then if I see an early pool I drop the second gateway then start blocking the entrance with probes.
Blocking with 2 buildings properly gives the zerglings only a very small opening which can be blocked with one unit ( probe or zealot when it arrives ).
Why? What is the block gaining you?
Time to get the zealot out, and i'm not just pulling one drone I am suggesting pulling 3. Also the drones can attack and possibly take out a zergling or two while trying to get through the choke.
What i'm hearing you say is I should just let the zerglings into my base. If they go for your pylons and you have 2 you can get your zealot out in time to deal with it, and if and if they go for your probes you just lose a few probes?
All i'm suggesting is an alternative to try. Maybe someone can test this and post a couple replays?
One where you use 3 probes + 2 gw to block the entrance ( attacking with probes while they block ), and one where you just let them come into your base and attack your probes. I'd love to see which one is easier to micro and lose less probes?
I'll try to do it myself if one of my practice partners comes on.
My problem with walling at the ramp is that all your production structures are ages away from your mineral line, making it so hard for the zealots to get back to your minerals. Sure you can stop any more lings once you get the zealot wall up but meh. I'd rather do it the awesome way.
I build my shit right next to my nexus, and I wall off one side of my mineral line never ever my ramp. I hate ramp walls. The lings are forced to go down the side I want them to. From there I can do the probe surround AND my zealots are coming out right at my mineral line already. With the half mineral wall off it means that the lings get trapped against that side of the wall and I only have to defend one part of my base.
I just follow a standard build. Except with a heavy focus on Zealots and a few stalkers once I have enough Z to hold the lings. I just basically counter-push the moment am comfortable to.
I stole this idea from HuK in one of his games against Adelscott.
I havent lost to a 6pool in ages but I am only playing at platinum level.
How does a forge first give the Z a chance to come back? He has six workers to your 15 if he seven pooled, and only 5 if he 6 pooled. You will have triple the income of the z after the rush fails. You can chrono probes, get down your gateway+core, and shoot past him techwise. Zerg won't have enough workers to support 2 hatch drones even if he expands and he doesn't have the 300 minerals to expand anyways. You can basically guarantee that if you rush for phoenixes/void rays without cutting probes he won't have anti-air. Or you can get 3 gates up and mass zealots and expand with your cannons covering the ramp. If you wall in with a pylon it's no big deal if you have to kill it to get out, it served its purpose.
Imagine if the game started with Z having 6 lings, 6 drones, a hatch, an OL, and a spawning pool while toss had 15 probes, a forge, 2 pylons, 1 cannon, and 1 gateway. I wouldn't consider that a very fair fight for the Z in any way.
Zerg is not this unstoppable expanding force that if you leave it alone for 3 minutes it will win the game automatically. It actually needs a good number of workers to build a lot of workers and can grow exponentially, but when you only have 6 workers exponential growth isn't that impressive.
On September 28 2010 04:34 Nasdrova wrote: Time to get the zealot out, and i'm not just pulling one drone I am suggesting pulling 3. Also the drones can attack and possibly take out a zergling or two while trying to get through the choke.
Blocking probes won't be able to hold long enough for the zealot. They simply die too fast, and I seriously doubt you even come close to killing one ling. I'd love to see a replay proving me wrong though.
On September 28 2010 04:40 DavidMcF wrote: Why does everyone love walling so much?
My problem with walling at the ramp is that all your production structures are ages away from your mineral line, making it so hard for the zealots to get back to your minerals. Sure you can stop any more lings once you get the zealot wall up but meh. I'd rather do it the awesome way.
I build my shit right next to my nexus, and I wall off one side of my mineral line never ever my ramp. I hate ramp walls. The lings are forced to go down the side I want them to. From there I can do the probe surround AND my zealots are coming out right at my mineral line already. With the half mineral wall off it means that the lings get trapped against that side of the wall and I only have to defend one part of my base.
I just follow a standard build. Except with a heavy focus on Zealots and a few stalkers once I have enough Z to hold the lings. I just basically counter-push the moment am comfortable to.
I stole this idea from HuK in one of his games against Adelscott.
I havent lost to a 6pool in ages but I am only playing at platinum level.
Indeed you can hold at your mineral line against an early pool with your buildings by your nexus, but it is quite a bit harder to hold off a gas before pool speedling all-in (standard opening, reactive all-in against him scouting you not walling off). If you can manage it might be worth it though as dealing with muta harass bouncing between your main and natural while streaming your units single file through a choke is quite difficult.
On September 28 2010 04:41 Kikuichimonji wrote: How does a forge first give the Z a chance to come back? He has six workers to your 15 if he seven pooled,
He has 9 workers if he 7 pooled and has a queen on the way shortly after his initial lings which can pretty readily catch him up. Since you went forge and he has lings out already he has complete map control, can drone up quickly and expand and get back into a reasonable position.
On September 28 2010 04:40 DavidMcF wrote: Why does everyone love walling so much?
My problem with walling at the ramp is that all your production structures are ages away from your mineral line, making it so hard for the zealots to get back to your minerals. Sure you can stop any more lings once you get the zealot wall up but meh. I'd rather do it the awesome way.
I build my shit right next to my nexus, and I wall off one side of my mineral line never ever my ramp. I hate ramp walls. The lings are forced to go down the side I want them to. From there I can do the probe surround AND my zealots are coming out right at my mineral line already. With the half mineral wall off it means that the lings get trapped against that side of the wall and I only have to defend one part of my base.
I just follow a standard build. Except with a heavy focus on Zealots and a few stalkers once I have enough Z to hold the lings. I just basically counter-push the moment am comfortable to.
I stole this idea from HuK in one of his games against Adelscott.
I havent lost to a 6pool in ages but I am only playing at platinum level.
Indeed you can hold at your mineral line against an early pool with your buildings by your nexus, but it is quite a bit harder to hold off a gas before pool speedling all-in (standard opening, reactive all-in against him scouting you not walling off). If you can manage it might be worth it though as dealing with muta harass bouncing between your main and natural while streaming your units single file through a choke is quite difficult.
Ah yeah I agree, but the idea is if the zerg runs his lings into your mineral line, they can only get out one way - the way they came in. So you do have them trapped. Obviously some maps make this A LOT harder than others, but I do think its a pretty viable tactic. I never wall in any of my match ups and it does me alright I think I personally dont think walls ever decide a winner or loser in a game. I will obviously have to play against the early speedlings a bit more since I dont have much experience with that. I'll get my mate to try it.
Thanks for all your advice. I try to get the pylon, zealot etc. all exactly on time and I try not to leave any probes idle in the middle of my base, and not to forget about the scout, but it doesn't always work out that well
I will test this without building the second gateway. I think this is a good idea. I can't really use both of them at this point anyway.
I also tried blocking the chokepoint with probes but this results in lots of probe losses and the zerglings get inside pretty fast anyway.
This might be pretty obvious, but I found that the probe micro (= pulling damaged probes) gets a lot easier when I make good use of zooming in. Anyone who's not already doing this, should give it a try. Needless to say, health bars should be turned on at all times.
On September 24 2010 12:25 Darthturtle wrote: You forget that an early pool doesn't just mean early lings. It also means early queen. Two rounds(a minute and twenty seconds) of larvae injected droning off one hatch is enough to catch up to the toss, and a toss that went forge/cannon is committed to sitting on his godawful infrastructure.
Have you ever actually done a 6 pool? I mean, played zerg and 6pooled somebody?
If you use all the available larvae for lings and overlords when 6 pooling, it takes about 15 and a half years of gametime to build up 150 minerals for the queen.
You simply don't have enough workers bringing in minerals to do jack shit for a really long time. There is no way in hell the zerg is going to be able to afford to actually use those two rounds of injected larvae.
Absolutely wrong. You don't have minerals for drones and OLs if you're spamming lings.
You start droning the moment you see the deadwall. By the time the 6 lings reaches his base, you're at 10/18, 250 minerals. Drone thrice, queen as soon as possible, then drone.
By ~4:20, your queen is out and you're already looking to take the expo. This is about 20/26. After the initial 6 lings, you're not making more lings. You have plenty of money.
Im confused here, you open up with a 6 pool then your at 10/18 (6 drones 6 lings and a drone building. You spend the next 150 on a queen and then you wait 50 secs for her to spawn while making more drones, (four roughly) and 100 on an OL then you spend the next 300 plus a drone making an expo while you vomit on your hatch. You then build 4 more drones wokring yourself up to 20/26, 2 from queen, 3 from lings, and 15 from drones.
So basically you've spent 150m (queen) 450m (drones) 100m (overlord) 300m (hatch) To catch up to where your opponent was and your military consists of 6 lings.
Meanwhile your protoss opponent. ( who has had a constant income of 2x as many minerals as you. Due to having 14 probes when you had 7 and 18 when you had 10) has made approximately 2000m worth of mineral income.
Lets assume that they spent 150m on 2 assimilators, 150 on cy core, 300 on 2 more gates, 200 on a robo facility and 100 on weapons upgrades. That leaves 1100 minerals minus 300 for the probes for each gas and 700 for zealots.
This is at the point where you are trying to build and saturate an expansion you dont need?
I consistantly win games against FE zergs where their mineral score is around 18,050 and mine is 17,950. So suffice to say that second expansion isn't generating that much more income until it is fully saturated.
Bottom line, the toss player has a bunch of zealots/stalkers sentries, and he builds an observer off of that robo and he sees you on 2 bases with 2 spinal crawlers and 12 lings he is going to pop that cannon and crush you.
The strategy is called 6 pool all in for a reason. It is an all in strategy that makes the game nigh unwinable against anyone who is even close to your skill level if they quash the ling rush.
Ok. We know it's an all in from zerg, but we still have to know what to do when we see it so you can 'quash the ling rush'.
I just tried this with my practice partner on steppes. He is diamond level and pretty much has lings in my mineral line at 3:00 into the game. Zealot is maybe half done if you did a 12 gate.
Your scout does not get to his base to discover the 6pool until you have pretty much queued up probe #11 and chrono your gw as part of a normal toss 12gate opening. So anything besides a 12 gate presumes early pool and you are modifying your standard 'just in case', which I do not like doing.
I was wrong. Blocking with 2 gates + probes does NOT work, they chew through the probes and then it's 1 zealot against 6 lings and you still have some time before your second zealot appears.
Blocking your mineral line using nearby gateways and pylons does NOT work. Maybe if you drop gates on 10 and 12 you can get your zealots out early enough and make it work, but then you are again presumining early pool and modifying your standard every time, which will hurt you if they don't early pool you. You need 4 pylons to plug the holes in the back of the mineral line, hard to do.
Building 2 gates and letting the zerglings into your base does NOT work, they just send in a second wave while you are running your probes around and you die. If someone thinks this works I want to see a replay. I couldn't get it to work. I challenge someone to lose less than 6 probes and post a replay doing this. Also, if he 7 pools he's better off economically and you still can't get your zealot in place to block.
Going for normal 12 gate and trying to to micro your probes and attack the lings does NOT work either. Same challenge, lose less than 6 probes and post a replay, I want to see how it's done.
2 things did work. Forge/cannon, as per the OP 2 GW blocking + an additional pylon for 100% seal, and rally zealots outside your base, possibly re-seal with another pylon if necessary.
Anyway thats what I found with some testing, please do your own and verify or debunk.
@Nasdrova: If you want to, you could always not even bother walling off with probes and micro them. Hotkey half to 1 and the other half to 2. When they're in your mineral lines, attack move, then as soon as the first attack goes, move back, select 2 and attack move. vice versa.
It's an easier version of Huk's microed probes against a 7pool (It was in one of Day[9]'s casts, but holy crap, that guy just uses mouse drag move ... =X), but that works, if you can get skilled enough (and hence, why probably most pros don't even rush zerglings).
That aside, I did mention in my post, use up to 6 or even more probes to block because you are still economically ahead even if you take up to 8 probes off worker. As long as you choked it right, it should be 2 zerglings vs 2 probes fighting at any single time. 8 probes should hold it off with at most 5 dying. (I used to use 4 without micro, and it ends up with 3 to 2 lings dying. I let the rest into my mineral lines, because attack move with all those probes usually ends up with at most 1 probe dying. By then, the zealot should come out, and all you do is have that zealot start walling off.
On September 24 2010 12:25 Darthturtle wrote: You forget that an early pool doesn't just mean early lings. It also means early queen. Two rounds(a minute and twenty seconds) of larvae injected droning off one hatch is enough to catch up to the toss, and a toss that went forge/cannon is committed to sitting on his godawful infrastructure.
Have you ever actually done a 6 pool? I mean, played zerg and 6pooled somebody?
If you use all the available larvae for lings and overlords when 6 pooling, it takes about 15 and a half years of gametime to build up 150 minerals for the queen.
You simply don't have enough workers bringing in minerals to do jack shit for a really long time. There is no way in hell the zerg is going to be able to afford to actually use those two rounds of injected larvae.
Absolutely wrong. You don't have minerals for drones and OLs if you're spamming lings.
You start droning the moment you see the deadwall. By the time the 6 lings reaches his base, you're at 10/18, 250 minerals. Drone thrice, queen as soon as possible, then drone.
By ~4:20, your queen is out and you're already looking to take the expo. This is about 20/26. After the initial 6 lings, you're not making more lings. You have plenty of money.
Im confused here, you open up with a 6 pool then your at 10/18 (6 drones 6 lings and a drone building. You spend the next 150 on a queen and then you wait 50 secs for her to spawn while making more drones, (four roughly) and 100 on an OL then you spend the next 300 plus a drone making an expo while you vomit on your hatch. You then build 4 more drones wokring yourself up to 20/26, 2 from queen, 3 from lings, and 15 from drones.
So basically you've spent 150m (queen) 450m (drones) 100m (overlord) 300m (hatch) To catch up to where your opponent was and your military consists of 6 lings.
Meanwhile your protoss opponent. ( who has had a constant income of 2x as many minerals as you. Due to having 14 probes when you had 7 and 18 when you had 10) has made approximately 2000m worth of mineral income.
Lets assume that they spent 150m on 2 assimilators, 150 on cy core, 300 on 2 more gates, 200 on a robo facility and 100 on weapons upgrades. That leaves 1100 minerals minus 300 for the probes for each gas and 700 for zealots.
This is at the point where you are trying to build and saturate an expansion you dont need?
I consistantly win games against FE zergs where their mineral score is around 18,050 and mine is 17,950. So suffice to say that second expansion isn't generating that much more income until it is fully saturated.
Bottom line, the toss player has a bunch of zealots/stalkers sentries, and he builds an observer off of that robo and he sees you on 2 bases with 2 spinal crawlers and 12 lings he is going to pop that cannon and crush you.
The strategy is called 6 pool all in for a reason. It is an all in strategy that makes the game nigh unwinable against anyone who is even close to your skill level if they quash the ling rush.
Watch the replays here. There's a good reason why the protoss in question can't do half of what you're describing.
Your tech is late as fuck. Your units are all locked on the wrong side of the wall-in. You can't scout.
The zerg's hatch timings are only somewhat different from normal zerg play, due to the fact that he's equalizing with the fast queen. The Protoss is nowhere close to being anywhere as threatening as you're trying to insinuate. One, he's not on two gates, one core. He's on one gate, no gas, no core.
If he throws down a gate immediately after walling, he has to cut two probes to get that out. If he doesn't cut, he's at fourteen(one building) probes to the zerg's ten(three building), and on one just started gate. That one gate doesn't even complete until ~3:30, and somehow, magically, he's supposed to whip out a 2 gate robo army with two gas and core already done and punish an undefended zerg expansion? Are you insane? Do you understand the concept of a build time?
As stated before, the Protoss that goes forge-first is relying on the zerg to waste all his minerals on constant zergling spam until he can push out with zealots. It's all in in this case. If the zerg chooses to not be a tremendous retard, hard as this may be to grasp, then the build is not all in.
A protoss with late tech, wasted minerals, and no map control, has very few ways to take the game back from a zerg that didn't insist on playing out a suicide all-in. After the forge-cannon build, I'd already say the zerg is ahead. The zerg only starts to fall behind when he insists on blasting out constant zerglings with no regard to drone production.
On September 28 2010 08:20 ScythedBlade wrote: @Nasdrova: If you want to, you could always not even bother walling off with probes and micro them. Hotkey half to 1 and the other half to 2. When they're in your mineral lines, attack move, then as soon as the first attack goes, move back, select 2 and attack move. vice versa.
It's an easier version of Huk's microed probes against a 7pool (It was in one of Day[9]'s casts, but holy crap, that guy just uses mouse drag move ... =X), but that works, if you can get skilled enough (and hence, why probably most pros don't even rush zerglings).
That aside, I did mention in my post, use up to 6 or even more probes to block because you are still economically ahead even if you take up to 8 probes off worker. As long as you choked it right, it should be 2 zerglings vs 2 probes fighting at any single time. 8 probes should hold it off with at most 5 dying. (I used to use 4 without micro, and it ends up with 3 to 2 lings dying. I let the rest into my mineral lines, because attack move with all those probes usually ends up with at most 1 probe dying. By then, the zealot should come out, and all you do is have that zealot start walling off.
Yes, but if i just use a pylon to block temporarily it only cost me 100 minerals and I never have to pull a single probe. I can cut down the probe once I have a few zealots to block. Obviously I don't have to do any of this unless I see a super early pool. Even then I could possibly try to hold off on committing to that until I see the 6 lings.
I think I need to see a video/replay of the probe micro, i'll also look through the day9 archives and/or try as you suggest and use 2 groups. I still think you need to somehow block your ramp to prevent a second and third wave of zerglings.
On September 28 2010 08:01 Nasdrova wrote: Building 2 gates and letting the zerglings into your base does NOT work, they just send in a second wave while you are running your probes around and you die.
Rep of this losing *that doesn't involve having the gateway unpowered* please, keeping in mind that even if you lose 6 probes, you're still ahead.
On September 28 2010 09:31 Nasdrova wrote: I think I need to see a video/replay of the probe micro, i'll also look through the day9 archives and/or try as you suggest and use 2 groups. I still think you need to somehow block your ramp to prevent a second and third wave of zerglings.
Why are you worried about the second and third waves? If you beat the first 6 lings without taking too many losses, you've already won the game, because all waves after that one will be either 2 or 4 lings.
What's the best way, once you hold off a 6pool, to mop up? I have fended off rushes before, some after reading this thread, and still lost the game. Often I go Phoenix/Void Rays as I'm walled in. Should I break my wall and start mass producing?
Generally they'll expand and set up some static defense to try to regain the tech/resource deficit.
I realize this should be simple, I'd just like to know for the record what the standard build for 3-5 min after the rush is.
I don't do cheese but generall ZvZ 6 pools micro'd drones can kill the lings just fine until more units come, i'd imagine it would work the same for protoss and you dont even hae to worry about spines
if this is just talking steps of war then against zerg i see no reason why going for a 10 gate instead of a usual 12 gate is that big a deal. You start a wall off with a 9 pylon and 10 gate scout after the pylon if you see the fast pool then you can finish the wall off with either a 2nd gate or a forge if you put that down like as soon as you scout the fast pool you will have the first zealot from the 10 gate coming out maybe 5 secs or so after the lings arrive not a big deal or a canon coming up at about the same speed. put a 2nd pylon behind the first so if that does get taken down you still have power and the wall still holds.
If you scout and already have the 10 gate down and the zerg isnt going for a fast pool then you are still in a good position just pump a zealot or 2 maybe put down a 2nd gate and do some early pressure of your own if they are going fast expand you can really punish them and if he isnt you can still do a healthy bit of dmg for not massive econ deficit.
To InZil on steps especially im favouring if i wall myself in with say a gateway and a forge and a cannon i use my scrouting probe to setup a proxy gate or 2 carry on using the wall in gate to pump units then back them up with more from the proxys. Any sensible zerg that goes 6 pool and gets turned away completely will sunddenly start focusing on building an econ as fast as they can. So a realtivly fast 3-4 gate stalker zealot push will wipe them out. If they havent tried to build econ and just keep relentless producing zerglings then you will still crush them with gateway units since you will just be able to produce way more than they possible can on one hatch bad econ.
I have had a fun experience with a zerg going all in baneling trying to bust the wall but with simple micro banelings dont do much dmg to gateway units and against the wall yeah he took it down but i just rebuilt and he was left with so little afterwards that i could just walk into his main with a couple of stalkers and a few zealots and he couldnt do anything.
it would be easily defendable on 2players map however on 4 players everything depends on luck. if you scout him quick you should be able to wall off and defend it
So you scout at 9, build a 10th probe. Once you pylon is 1/2 way across the map your pylon is done. Based on your build order, I would not build another probe until my scout gets to his base, which I could have chronoboosted 2 probes by then.
12 gate 12-13 forge also works. You still need the gateway and the of cannon is not that bad. You can build a zealot and put it on the other side of the wall to delay the bust.
On September 26 2010 12:37 tGhOeOoDry wrote: What this thread needs:
1) A replay where, instead of breaking down the wall, the zerg player uses his lings to contain and then tries to macro up. I have a strong suspicion that Darthturtle is underestimating the time it will take to macro up, but I don't actually know, and neither me nor my friends are diamond (mid-plat random here) so I can't test it myself. Goobus and Fingo have already shown a willingness to explore this situation. Perhaps they could explore this modification as well?
2) Could someone post a replay where their workers defeat a six pool with minimal casualties? Again, Goobus and Fingo maybe? I am imagining that, with good ling micro, focusing on taking down the Gateway pylon first, the lings will do more damage than simply killing two probes. Of course, I don't actually know.
Theorycrafting is all well and good (see my handle, har har har), but the strong, uncompromising tone of some of these posts is just silly when no one has provided proof. Will a zerg who switches to a macro game win against this build? Are the people who say all you need is good probe micro blowing smoke? These are things we can prove. I say someone does it, then we discuss the results.
I find the idea silly that a good protoss player would somehow naturally loose to a zerg who goes macro. That is what zerg should do anyway, while a protoss player can manage on one base simply because our units are so just so powerful, especially late game. Even if the zerg decides to go macro play, there's nothing that stops the protoss to start harassing after this. Given the time-span, by the time protoss has teched up enough to do harassment, I don't see how much of a difference this would make macro-game wise. If the zerg was opting for muta, the gas is very delayed, so muta is not an initial option until the zerg is done powerdroning.
If you are going to make statements that well, zerg can just pull out and start powerdroning, you also have to consider that a good protoss player can manage a zerg who are on 2 bases or maybe even 3. Reminds me of that game where Cool (Fruitseller) forced a protoss player to go one base with mass queens. Guess what? The protoss won. Despite that Cool had 4 bases. I just find the assumption that a protoss has to loose against a zerg macro'ing rediculous, once you get past the early game point, there's nothing saying that the zerg must win just because they macro.
On September 28 2010 19:03 haflo wrote: who ever been saying you can defend 6 pool with with probs + zelot thats a total utter bulls...
go watch inca vs fruitdealer from ro8 . PERFECT micro from inca and still lost horribly .
thanks for the guid OP .much appreciated.
Inca's micro wasn't perfect. First of all he lost the first probe that could have blocked while the rest of them came to the choke. Secondly he cancelled the cyber core that made his wall-in. Third he engaged the zerglings in a narrow passage which made his superior probe numbers less important (note that this isn't a contradiction with #2, if he still had that wall he could have engaged right inside the choke and engaged maybe 1 ling to 3 probes). Fourth, if he had successfully made his choke he could have pulled back some probes to mine. Fifth, at 12:50-ish he lost a zealot. He should have brought the zealot that just spawned around and to the left of the nexus while running the rest of his units to the left as well. Two zealots + probes would have decimated those lings.
Edit: and this is out of order but the way that he walled was bad. Diagonal chokes are not as good as vertical/horizontal ones. Not that this mattered because he cancelled the cyber.
@Kiku: He needed to cancel the cyber because he wasn't going to be able to mine and it was a priority for him to get out as many zealots as possible ASAP. The lings were getting in anyways. Also, FruitDealer is really good, and lings are just as fast (faster?) than probes. So FruitDealer was able to choose where to engage. If Inca backed away from the choke, then the lings go for the gateway/pylon, then back away again as necessary. Of course, that's all just post-hoc justification from a platinum player. It's kind of silly to think that I understand everything that's going on in a pro-gamer's head.
I would still love it if someone would post a replay of them defeating a high-level 6pool with only probes and maybe a zealot or two. I know it can be done, but it hardly seems like a trivial exercise. What is the success rate?
I'd also still love to see a zerg player transition out of a failed 6pool and then outmacro and defeat the protoss player. I don't think it's possible, but some say it is. If it is, please prove it.
Inca's micro wasn't perfect. First of all he lost the first probe that could have blocked while the rest of them came to the choke. Secondly he cancelled the cyber core that made his wall-in. Third he engaged the zerglings in a narrow passage which made his superior probe numbers less important (note that this isn't a contradiction with #2, if he still had that wall he could have engaged right inside the choke and engaged maybe 1 ling to 3 probes). Fourth, if he had successfully made his choke he could have pulled back some probes to mine. Fifth, at 12:50-ish he lost a zealot. He should have brought the zealot that just spawned around and to the left of the nexus while running the rest of his units to the left as well. Two zealots + probes would have decimated those lings.
Edit: and this is out of order but the way that he walled was bad. Diagonal chokes are not as good as vertical/horizontal ones. Not that this mattered because he cancelled the cyber.
really man ? i don't want to be rude but i think you are behind-sight Nitpicking.
he constantly manage to avoid getting Surround with impossible odds , move injured probes to the back , go back and forth between fighting ground and mining , really much better then an average diamond can do , not to mention average player , and sure 10000x better then what poor me can do , and he didn't marginly lost , he lost big time , maybe it wasn't perfect but it was very impressive and i not sure you can duplicate it .
yes cool is no slouch as well . but really if you need better micro then inca (one of the best toss in the world) to defend 6 gate without walling in and cannons like some people suggested here , i don't call it a valid strategy ,i call it again theoreticly-crafting bulls... but the web page takes everything , so why not type.
personnally i do not believe you can survive well executed 6 pool without any preperations and just normal build / probes ,waiting for the zelots who never come . i would love a replay but really i gonna stick to wallin + cannon , and i will take my chance with zerg macroing after 6 gate (and lets face it the zerg i meet macroing is not that scary )
#1: That was *NOT* perfect micro. Not even close. Fighting zerglings in a narrow area is exactly how you lose all of your probes to the lings. And if his goal was simply to keep the lings back, he should have put some probes back on minerals and delayed with the remaining probes. You only need to pull all of your probes if you're going to try to surround for the kill.
#2: Double power the gateways for fuck's sake. If zergs are 6pooling in high-level tournaments (and it seems they are, at least occasionally), it is quite frankly inexcusable for the second pylon not to have been built powering the gateway.
If InCa puts a few probes back on minerals while delaying, OR if he double-powers his gateway, OR if he tries to lure the lings out into the open to get a surround, rather than letting probes take damage in the choke while not dealing nearly enough back, he probably wins that game.
And I'm just saying he needs to do any one of those 3 things. If he does all 3, the game probably ends up being a complete blowout.
After seeing vids of both Huk and InCa losing to a 6pool, I'm completely convinced that this whole 6pooling at a very high level thing is very new, and the pros simply haven't prepared appropriately. In particular, Huk and Inca both lost purely because their gateway wasn't double-powered, and the zerglings were able to depower it early, before the probes were able to respond.
On September 29 2010 03:54 tGhOeOoDry wrote: @Kiku: He needed to cancel the cyber because he wasn't going to be able to mine and it was a priority for him to get out as many zealots as possible ASAP. The lings were getting in anyways.
Agreed. Canceling the cyber was absolutely necessary.
On September 29 2010 03:54 tGhOeOoDry wrote: Also, FruitDealer is really good, and lings are just as fast (faster?) than probes. So FruitDealer was able to choose where to engage. If Inca backed away from the choke, then the lings go for the gateway/pylon, then back away again as necessary.
Lings are only slightly faster than probes. The difference is so small that 2 lings can chase a probe pretty much across the entire map before managing to kill it. And if the lings go for the gateway, the protoss doesn't need to do anything at all, because it will take the lings a really long time to take down the gate. But if they go for the pylon, they risk being surrounded by probes and killed before they can take the gate down, in which case the game's over, and protoss wins.
Ok, so I'd like to generate a series of replays to put this to rest once and for all. I'm looking for a high level zerg player with really good micro skills (macro is obviously irrelevant for 6pooling) to 6pool me in a series of games, after which the replays will be posted.
I'm only a mid-level diamond random player who is having trouble breaking the 1k point mark, but I'm confident that with a little practice, I can achieve a 100% winrate against a 6pool, without modifying my normal 9pylon 13gate build before the point that I scout the 6pool, or the lings get to my base, depending on whether it's a 2 player or a 4 player map.
If I end up getting crushed and admitting defeat, I'll eat as much crow as is necessary, and still post the replay series as an example of how the 6 pool really does crush mid-level diamond players even if they think they know what to do, but I've seen a replay of Huk losing to Machine, and Inca losing to Cool, and to be perfectly honest, despite the fact that Huk and Inca are obviously WAAAAAAAAY better than me, I don't believe I would have lost either game in their spot, because I *always* double-power my gate, and it would only have been unpowered for the short amount of time that it takes for the second pylon to finish.
PM me if you're interested, or look me up on battle.net, Skrag.133
Another cute tactic is when you see it save 200 mins and go to the bottom of there ramp and build two pylons to wall them in! I saw orb do this on his stream.
On September 29 2010 08:00 Fitzhunt1 wrote: Another cute tactic is when you see it save 200 mins and go to the bottom of there ramp and build two pylons to wall them in! I saw orb do this on his stream.
While you are at it, might as well make it even cheesier and drop a forge at your ramp choke instead of your second gateway then put a cannon right behind to protect the 2 pylons. :D
If the lings kill a pylon, are you supply capped? how many zealots can you get out with your first pylon gone? I'm not sure double powering will save you...
Also, the zerg (cool) used an extractor trick to get extra lings, just like the OP. All the nay-sayers have been suggesting that once you beat the first 6 lings with your sexy micro, it's GG. What if it's 8 or 10 lings vs. 14 probes?
I play T so this discussion is not that important to me. But the people saying Inca's micro was to blame for his loss... just wow. The only thing Inca could have done 'better' is get luckier with the scouting... either seeing the base or the lings on the way would have saved him.
All this VOD shows, really, is that a 6 pool wins if it completely blindsides the P. Which doesn't exactly relate to the OP unfortunately.
Watching the VOD-- InCa does not see the lings or any other sign of 6 pool until they hit his wall at 10:56 in the VOD. He micros his probe (which just built the core) into the narrow gap to buy time and immediately pulls all his probes. It's hard to see when they start moving on the minimap, but they arrive at the scene (all the way across the main) at 11:06 in the VOD, only ten seconds later. It's already too late...
Only way InCa beats this is to see it coming 5-10 seconds before the lings arrive. You would get 'lucky scouting' on a 2 player map (steppes) if you scout early.
On September 29 2010 10:13 aidnai wrote: If the lings kill a pylon, are you supply capped? how many zealots can you get out with your first pylon gone? I'm not sure double powering will save you...
Double-powering would get you one zealot, which, combined with probes, is more than enough to kill the first 6 lings before the next wave comes, or even delay until you can replace the pylon that was destroyed to get more probes and zealots, if the zerglings won't fight. Inca *almost* held it off despite the fact that his gateway was depowered. He had a second pylon, it was just placed all the way back by his nexus.
Also, the zerg (cool) used an extractor trick to get extra lings, just like the OP. All the nay-sayers have been suggesting that once you beat the first 6 lings with your sexy micro, it's GG. What if it's 8 or 10 lings vs. 14 probes?
If the zerg delays until 8 or 10 lings, then you're almost certain to have a zealot out in time. The zealot *easily* makes up for 4 extra lings, as long as it doesn't get surrounded fighting alone.
I play T so this discussion is not that important to me. But the people saying Inca's micro was to blame for his loss... just wow. The only thing Inca could have done 'better' is get luckier with the scouting... either seeing the base or the lings on the way would have saved him.
I say Inca's micro and building placement was to blame for his lost because I listed 3 things that he clearly could have done better, any one of which probably wins him the game, given how close it was. All 3, and like I said, it's probably a blowout win for protoss.
Watching the VOD-- InCa does not see the lings or any other sign of 6 pool until they hit his wall at 10:56 in the VOD. He micros his probe (which just built the core) into the narrow gap to buy time and immediately pulls all his probes. It's hard to see when they start moving on the minimap, but they arrive at the scene (all the way across the main) at 11:06 in the VOD, only ten seconds later. It's already too late...
He did react almost instantly, but not fast enough to keep the pylon from dying. That's why double-powering is so important.
Also, narrow areas work in favor of the lings, not the probes. Simple test: have somebody 6pool you, and fight with all your workers in the mineral line. You'll lose every single worker. Fighting in the open, the workers will win, and the number of losses taken depends purely on your ability to micro damaged workers in and out of the battle.
Only way InCa beats this is to see it coming 5-10 seconds before the lings arrive. You would get 'lucky scouting' on a 2 player map (steppes) if you scout early.
Like I said, there are 3 things he could have done to beat this, IMO. Double power the gateway, stay away from the choke, or pull 5-6 workers back on minerals while trying to make sure the lings don't get a chance to kill the pylon that was being built to repower the gateway.
Double-powering the gate would have got the first zealot out more than early enough to put a serious hurt on the lings, pulling workers back on minerals would have let him continue to add zealots, and staying away from the choke would have lost fewer worker while he was trying to delay for the zealot.
The only thing I'm not 100% sure of is if the lings get through to attack the pylon, if workers will be able to kill the lings before the lings take down the pylon. If not, then trying to block them at the choke was the right thing to do, but he still could have done it with fewer workers, putting enough back on minerals to have a chance.
2 player maps are easy for stopping a 6 pool because you are garanteed to scout it, especially steppes. A forge first is rediculously easy way to stop it, but gateway into forge with a complete wall-off into cannon does fine as well really.
The difficult thing is fending off 6-pools on 4 player maps. You can't be sure to scout your opponent in time of those maps but the rush distances are small enough to lose to a 6-pool if you don't see it on time (cool vs inca for example). The proper way to stop it imo is to go with a good wall-in that can be completed with a forge all the time and double powering your first gateway.
I just rewatched the Inca VOD, to see when the second pylon finished, and it actually finished before the first one went down, so double-powering the gateway would have given him ZERO delay in the first zealot production, instead of the delay of having to build an entirely new pylon.
Take a look at about 3:25 in that match, because that's when the zealot should have been out. It would have made a HUGE difference, not to mention the fact that he could have been more cautious with his probes if he knew a zealot was incoming, and not lost the 5 probes he did futzing around in the choke.
On September 29 2010 11:48 TheFinalWord wrote: I like this method, why bother microing when you can just wall off.
There are only 3 things I don't like about this thread, and walling off in general:
If I'm going to win the game 100% of the time, I'd prefer to win the game quickly rather than slowly.
If I'm not going to win 100% of the time, I'd prefer not to give myself a chance to fuck up later by turtling and somehow getting surprised by a zerg who managed to pull off a whole hell of a lot more than I would have thought he could. There's an example of that in either this thread or one of the other dozens of threads about 6pools, where a failed 6pool came back pretty significantly, taking two gold expansions while the protoss was turtling and building up, and the zerg probably would have won if he hadn't made a number of bad choices.
Finally, and by far most importantly:
The original poster has claimed multiple times that walling in is the *only* way to reliably beat a 6 pool on steppes, and other people have come into the thread supporting that idea, using examples of pro players losing to a 6 pool they clearly weren't ever in a million years expecting to see, that they didn't have appropriate responses worked out for, and that they lost due to very obvious things that they could have done differently. That's really where all my vehement disagreement comes from. Not only is walling off not the only way to defeat a 6pool, but it's not even the most efficient way. It may be the *easiest* way, as long as you don't fuck up later, but it's definitely not the fastest or the most efficient.
I think it's quite efficient actually. In terms of games taking longer, if you get 6 pooled you want the game to go longer. That means you win, despite what certain crazies in this thread may claim.
Short addendum to those who may catch this post: build the 11th probe directly after the 10th. There is no reason not to. You will still have 150 minerals to react accordingly should you see the the early pool. I'll try to upload a rep of the refined version later tonight for those interested.
A better way should just be to throw up a 12gate followed by another gateway and then completely seal off with a pylon. Make you zealots behind the wall, and depending on the timing you can cancel the pylon, and then beat them with 2gate zealots. Otherwise, keep chronoboosting out zealots and you should have enough to hold and counter once they break in.
On September 29 2010 11:48 TheFinalWord wrote: I like this method, why bother microing when you can just wall off.
Finally, and by far most importantly:
The original poster has claimed multiple times that walling in is the *only* way to reliably beat a 6 pool on steppes, and other people have come into the thread supporting that idea, using examples of pro players losing to a 6 pool they clearly weren't ever in a million years expecting to see, that they didn't have appropriate responses worked out for, and that they lost due to very obvious things that they could have done differently. That's really where all my vehement disagreement comes from. Not only is walling off not the only way to defeat a 6pool, but it's not even the most efficient way. It may be the *easiest* way, as long as you don't fuck up later, but it's definitely not the fastest or the most efficient.
It's not really 100% though. Maybe for diamond players but this best for those not confident with their micro, its quite easy to mess up. I agree this thread has the wrong approach, but It's still rea asonable method that shouldn't be discounted because of this.
On September 29 2010 13:01 Durantula wrote: A better way should just be to throw up a 12gate followed by another gateway and then completely seal off with a pylon. Make you zealots behind the wall, and depending on the timing you can cancel the pylon, and then beat them with 2gate zealots. Otherwise, keep chronoboosting out zealots and you should have enough to hold and counter once they break in.
Very high probability that the zerglings take that pylon down before you have a zealot out.
Maybe not if they can't all 6 attack at once, but did you see how fast the lings took out Inca's pylon? Even if you multiply that by 2, I think you still lose the pylon, at which point you're back to fighting the lings with probes or stalling for the z anyway.
I agree with the forge response, actually. A zerg player can keep pumping lings out after the first few, and it's hard to keep up with probes and zealots alone. Especially on Steppes. You might be able to get away without cannons on maps with longer distances, but Steppes... Ouch.
For those who think you can do a "normal build" vs. a 6 pool, Fingo and I just tested a 6 pool against a 12 gate. The results weren't even close. 6 pool beats 12 gate on steppes unless the zerg screws up.
It's a game of psychology. I always try to not go forge against 6 pool because a smart zerg may take a risk and build 3 drones instead of 3 zerglings to make me waste my cannon wall in. You guys should test out how far behind a protoss player may be if he cannon walls in and a zerg player goes for 3 drones instead of 3 lings.
I'm gonna do some practice games against my friend with him 6poooling me
I'm determined to win against 6pool playing 9pylon 12gate without a wall(apart from the mineral line wall that I spoke about earlier) and get some good replays of it.
Talking about pylons being attacked by lings, I put my first pylon against my nexus and build the gateway also directly next to it. So the area of attack for the lings is actually quite small.
If I'm playing zerg, I only chronoboost once until I know he isnt going 6pool. If he isnt then I continue boosting probes, if he is I just boost Zealots. If possible I throw down a second gateway(which isnt usually possible ), I also try to be continuously making probes.
I just think that having the Zealots come out right at your mineral line is so important for this rush, I think it makes it much easier for me. I've never liked walling and I've never played with a wall, so i'm used to dealing with it
u shouldnt have to do this, mechanically this is a major design flaw on blizzards part and probably the signal most powerful cheese to date. the zealot nerf is beyond stupid for this reason. i currently am determined to be able to build at my natural not on my ramp. however i do build at the bottom of my ramp in the event of such zerg skullduggery (wall at the bottom)
-u cannot two gate this map period. you will lose to a 6pool every time your zealots wont come fast enough and your pylons will die - a 10 gate into forge fe is imo preffered on this map its very versatile and can hold this cheese and also be effective vs macro builds. - when u see a 6 pool make a wall bottom or top of ramp it doesnt really matter but you cant have those zergligs running wild in your main right away. -if at the bottom rally your zealot to the inside of your wall. the goal is to then use your zealot and probe to jam the leak of the dead pylon hole and get some pretty epic zergling grinding
its still not easy to deal with and will be pretty tense but its better than op as if they are not six pooling but instead going hatch first you wont be in very good shape
All right, I specifically started my account to set some things straight in this thread.
I've tested the hell out of this. I'm one of the few people here that dont need to watch the replays.
For anyone talking about how a 6-pool is just 6 lings, you don't know exactly what youre talking about. A real deal 6-pool starts out with 6 lings, then at 12 second intervals (whatever larve is) is 8 to 10. Then if any of the lings die, sets keep coming. The 6 pool were looking to reliably stop isnt the easy to defend one. The whole 6 lings die and its over garbage. This is ignoring that even 6 lings cant do enough damage to justify it.
When me and some friends first got the game we 6-pooled people and we did it mostly at a solid 10 supply for good portion of it. If you think you can reliably stop that (1v1 not team games) with workers and 1 zealot at a time whatever. That info is just for you guys that think theres some rule to 6 pooling where you only make 6 lings, ignoring the extra two sets which arrive in time to fight your workers. then if any of them die, the more that come asap. Not going to get into how even more lings can make it out with the extractor trick.
First things first, anyone talking about how much of a huge set back it is making a forge and a cannon is crazy. If you lose 4 workers, thats already 200 minerals, i dont know the mining you lose, but its pretty obvious thats quite the setback. Coupled with the fact thats 200 minerals lost and isnt able to do anything ever. edit: without chrono boost 4 probes worth of time making will lose you an additional 200 minerals worth of mining. Figure with two chronoboosts ( im not going back to check ) itll be about +100.
Real quick, anyone talking about the zealot choke block--no. Not enough time. Just say if this persons late on the 6 pool (just for the sake of it) and you got the zealot completing the wall and fighting lings one at a time. He will die. More lings will be coming. You dont even have to worry about your workers--you lose the game if your gateway goes down. For anyone trying 6 pool defense, see what happens when instead of 14v6ing your probes they just attack the gateway.
The zealot isnt fighting 10 lings so hot and making a choke for the zealots to fight in ( considering buildings will go down with this method) requires more money and is a kind complicated to build and perfect timing needed, plus you lose zealot. aka the cannon is just effing better. ( i initially started with some elaborate wall that made a choke just in time, it wasnt reliable) Thats a tangent though its late ill try to be a little more coherent here.
The tests I did all revolved around 9 pylon (at ramp) scout. I usually go 12 gateway, which can easily get substituted with a 12 forge (maybe 11) then the gateway to complete the wall off. I got a gateway forge and a pylon doing the wall. The cannon finishes in time to get the hits on the ling, and if they attack the pylon when it goes down thats when the zealots making its way in (along with the other pylon I'm making to power this stuff and not be supply blocked conveniently. The most lost is the pylon, either by the ling taking it down, or me using the cannon to take it down soon after. 100 minerals sacrificed for a 100% scouted, reacted and defended situation. You can get your probes, gas and cybercore just fine. Don't even need chronoboost for the first zealot. Yeah okay you might have to cut one or two workers if you want to throw down the cyber core and gas sooner--or just get them a little later. The canon damages lings well before the zealot can.
In the no wall method, the moment the 6 pool is stopped isnt when the first 6 lings die, its when 2 healthy zealots are out. There are far too many variables to account for when choosing this method. Micro on both sides, and the buildings the zerg decides to attack.
In this "make a forge when you see the pool" build the rush is stopped when you scout it. It is certain.
It really isnt much of a deviation from a regular build besides making a complete wall and losing 100 minerals. Any deviation is not much to sacrifice for a brick wall stop.
Unless youve tested things out enough to figure this out, stop spreading nonsense. The guys starting this are doing a good thing for the forum. If that worker fighting thing is working for you good for you, you arent really getting the full brunt of it. If you think the probes waiting for the one zealot at the choke is going to work in time, allright. Just try not to spread all the misinformation without any definite facts. Which some people are trying to figure out.
On September 28 2010 08:01 Nasdrova wrote: Ok. We know it's an all in from zerg, but we still have to know what to do when we see it so you can 'quash the ling rush'.
I just tried this with my practice partner on steppes. He is diamond level and pretty much has lings in my mineral line at 3:00 into the game. Zealot is maybe half done if you did a 12 gate.
Your scout does not get to his base to discover the 6pool until you have pretty much queued up probe #11 and chrono your gw as part of a normal toss 12gate opening. So anything besides a 12 gate presumes early pool and you are modifying your standard 'just in case', which I do not like doing.
I was wrong. Blocking with 2 gates + probes does NOT work, they chew through the probes and then it's 1 zealot against 6 lings and you still have some time before your second zealot appears.
Blocking your mineral line using nearby gateways and pylons does NOT work. Maybe if you drop gates on 10 and 12 you can get your zealots out early enough and make it work, but then you are again presumining early pool and modifying your standard every time, which will hurt you if they don't early pool you. You need 4 pylons to plug the holes in the back of the mineral line, hard to do.
Building 2 gates and letting the zerglings into your base does NOT work, they just send in a second wave while you are running your probes around and you die. If someone thinks this works I want to see a replay. I couldn't get it to work. I challenge someone to lose less than 6 probes and post a replay doing this. Also, if he 7 pools he's better off economically and you still can't get your zealot in place to block.
Going for normal 12 gate and trying to to micro your probes and attack the lings does NOT work either. Same challenge, lose less than 6 probes and post a replay, I want to see how it's done.
2 things did work. Forge/cannon, as per the OP 2 GW blocking + an additional pylon for 100% seal, and rally zealots outside your base, possibly re-seal with another pylon if necessary.
Anyway thats what I found with some testing, please do your own and verify or debunk.
Thanks for being one of the few people that are making any sense. This above to anyone confused, is reality.
It's good to throw around ideas but it's been proven microing workers doesn't stop 6-pool (it's not just 6 lings that come, they KEEP coming), proven 6-pool is an all in that you cannot recover from if the protoss player is anything other than a bronze player (you cannot transition into queens and 2nd bases and win, sorry), and it's been proven you cannot not wall off on Steppes and survive a well timed 6-pool. Sorry I've read 7 pages of 'theory' of how you can 'easily' stop 6-pool and it's not nearly as easy in reality as it is in your head. Thanks for the replay and build OP, seems to work very well.
This build is quite obvious, but unfortunately only works on 2 player maps, specially steppes of war. Thats why 6pool has never really been an issue on steppes of war, but a huge threat on other maps. This works on other 2 player maps as well, though you will have to cancel the 12/13 gate and make a forge instead at once when you see the pool, if you 9scout... The problem has always been 4 player maps where you have 0 warning.
On September 29 2010 22:24 asmo.0 wrote: This build is quite obvious, but unfortunately only works on 2 player maps, specially steppes of war. Thats why 6pool has never really been an issue on steppes of war, but a huge threat on other maps. This works on other 2 player maps as well, though you will have to cancel the 12/13 gate and make a forge instead at once when you see the pool, if you 9scout... The problem has always been 4 player maps where you have 0 warning.
Don't forget the random player than rolls Zerg on 4 player as well, that can really be hard to prepare for.
On September 29 2010 22:24 asmo.0 wrote: This build is quite obvious, but unfortunately only works on 2 player maps, specially steppes of war. Thats why 6pool has never really been an issue on steppes of war, but a huge threat on other maps. This works on other 2 player maps as well, though you will have to cancel the 12/13 gate and make a forge instead at once when you see the pool, if you 9scout... The problem has always been 4 player maps where you have 0 warning.
Fingo and I are currently working out the kinks of stopping a 6 pool on a 4 player map. So far, it seems to be a game of chance: counterintuitively, in cross positions, the toss has the least chance of scouting and preparing for a 6 pool, but in close positions, the chances of you scouting it are much higher and a 12 gate seems to stop it a decent amount of the time. However, when it's scouted (either when you reach his base or when you see the lings coming when your probe passes the towers), the surest way to stop it seems to also be the forge+gate+cannon dead wall. When Fingo (the toss partner) used a 12 gate, what killed him usually was losing mining time and running out of money to build zealots while he lost all his probes and I kept rallying lings to his front.
You must remember, micro from both players factor heavily into the outcome of the match any time a zerg chooses to 6 pool.
Currently working on replays and the optimum build order that simulates a "normal" opener from the toss, but that also takes into account the chance of dying from a 6 pool. Will upload these as they come. Thanks for the good discussion; I'll keep updating the thread with good thoughts I see from fellow TLers as well as expanding the OP to include 4 player maps, other 2 player maps, etc.
On September 24 2010 10:12 Goobus wrote: Secondly, I've uploaded new replays that reflects an improved build order that involves chronoboosting out 2 probes before putting down the forge. As you can see in the replay, it works quite well.
The second replay is of the build failing. Might want to fix that.
On September 24 2010 10:12 Goobus wrote: Secondly, I've uploaded new replays that reflects an improved build order that involves chronoboosting out 2 probes before putting down the forge. As you can see in the replay, it works quite well.
The second replay is of the build failing. Might want to fix that.
Ah let me fix that when I get home. I might've uploaded the one where Fingo messes up the build. xD Just goes to show how many people watch the replays. When I first posted this, I accidentally uploaded one of my replays from the beta (which, needless to say, could not be opened) and nobody said a thing =P
On September 24 2010 10:12 Goobus wrote: Secondly, I've uploaded new replays that reflects an improved build order that involves chronoboosting out 2 probes before putting down the forge. As you can see in the replay, it works quite well.
The second replay is of the build failing. Might want to fix that.
Ah let me fix that when I get home. I might've uploaded the one where Fingo messes up the build. xD Just goes to show how many people watch the replays. When I first posted this, I accidentally uploaded one of my replays from the beta (which, needless to say, could not be opened) and nobody said a thing =P
Yep, that's the one. He messed it up, said "go again zzz sry" and the replay ends.
On September 29 2010 05:30 Skrag wrote: Ok, so I'd like to generate a series of replays to put this to rest once and for all. I'm looking for a high level zerg player with really good micro skills (macro is obviously irrelevant for 6pooling) to 6pool me in a series of games, after which the replays will be posted.
I'm only a mid-level diamond random player who is having trouble breaking the 1k point mark, but I'm confident that with a little practice, I can achieve a 100% winrate against a 6pool, without modifying my normal 9pylon 13gate build before the point that I scout the 6pool, or the lings get to my base, depending on whether it's a 2 player or a 4 player map.
If I end up getting crushed and admitting defeat, I'll eat as much crow as is necessary, and still post the replay series as an example of how the 6 pool really does crush mid-level diamond players even if they think they know what to do, but I've seen a replay of Huk losing to Machine, and Inca losing to Cool, and to be perfectly honest, despite the fact that Huk and Inca are obviously WAAAAAAAAY better than me, I don't believe I would have lost either game in their spot, because I *always* double-power my gate, and it would only have been unpowered for the short amount of time that it takes for the second pylon to finish.
PM me if you're interested, or look me up on battle.net, Skrag.133
On September 24 2010 10:19 tru_power22 wrote: Or you could micro your probes, try dropping a 13 gate at the ramp and when you see the zerlings coming pull workers to block the choke and click the minerals to bring them back if they get to low. Keep reinforcing till your zealot finishes.
That results in far too many probe losses =\ This way is the cleanest way we found to do it.
a probe off the mineral line is pretty horrible becuase its minerals invested thats not doing its job. a probe not harvesting is tantamount to a dead probe You would want to minimize time spent fighting lings/being a wall of probe
On September 29 2010 16:31 Goobus wrote: For those who think you can do a "normal build" vs. a 6 pool, Fingo and I just tested a 6 pool against a 12 gate. The results weren't even close. 6 pool beats 12 gate on steppes unless the zerg screws up.
Reps please.
You keep making this claim, without backing it up.
On September 29 2010 05:30 Skrag wrote: Ok, so I'd like to generate a series of replays to put this to rest once and for all. I'm looking for a high level zerg player with really good micro skills (macro is obviously irrelevant for 6pooling) to 6pool me in a series of games, after which the replays will be posted.
I'm only a mid-level diamond random player who is having trouble breaking the 1k point mark, but I'm confident that with a little practice, I can achieve a 100% winrate against a 6pool, without modifying my normal 9pylon 13gate build before the point that I scout the 6pool, or the lings get to my base, depending on whether it's a 2 player or a 4 player map.
If I end up getting crushed and admitting defeat, I'll eat as much crow as is necessary, and still post the replay series as an example of how the 6 pool really does crush mid-level diamond players even if they think they know what to do, but I've seen a replay of Huk losing to Machine, and Inca losing to Cool, and to be perfectly honest, despite the fact that Huk and Inca are obviously WAAAAAAAAY better than me, I don't believe I would have lost either game in their spot, because I *always* double-power my gate, and it would only have been unpowered for the short amount of time that it takes for the second pylon to finish.
PM me if you're interested, or look me up on battle.net, Skrag.133
I'd really love to see those replays
Any any other 6 pool replays as well.
I'd really love to make those replays, but so far nobody has taken me up on it. And despite multiple requests, the OP has failed to post replays of games where they failed to defend, you know, those games that they're using to claim it's impossible to hold off without walling? At this point, I can only assume they're not posting the reps because they know how easy it will be to pick them apart.
So, I'll ask again. If you think you can kill me a significant percentage of the time with a 6pool, lets do it.
On September 29 2010 20:36 TOMNGAI wrote: All right, I specifically started my account to set some things straight in this thread.
I've tested the hell out of this. I'm one of the few people here that dont need to watch the replays.
For anyone talking about how a 6-pool is just 6 lings, you don't know exactly what youre talking about. A real deal 6-pool starts out with 6 lings, then at 12 second intervals (whatever larve is) is 8 to 10. Then if any of the lings die, sets keep coming. The 6 pool were looking to reliably stop isnt the easy to defend one. The whole 6 lings die and its over garbage. This is ignoring that even 6 lings cant do enough damage to justify it.
Nobody's claiming a 6pool is just 6 lings. But if you kill those first 6 with your zealot and enough probes intact, you've won the game. End of story. 1 zealot at a time is better than 2-4 lings at a time, and once the protoss starts to recover, it should be 2 zealots at a time very quickly.
When me and some friends first got the game we 6-pooled people and we did it mostly at a solid 10 supply for good portion of it. If you think you can reliably stop that (1v1 not team games) with workers and 1 zealot at a time whatever. That info is just for you guys that think theres some rule to 6 pooling where you only make 6 lings, ignoring the extra two sets which arrive in time to fight your workers. then if any of them die, the more that come asap. Not going to get into how even more lings can make it out with the extractor trick.
Unless you fail to double-power your gateway, any lings past the first 6 are also going to have to deal with a zealot.
Seriously, if you think you can beat me repeatedly with a 6pool while I'm doing a normal build, then lets do it. One of the two of us will have to eat a little crow at the end of it, but I'm ok with that possibility.
IF you kill the 6 lings with a zealot and enough probes intact.
Yeah IF. Do you know when a zealot comes out in a regular build/ when 6-pool lings arrive at your ramp and then at the nexus? Tell me some times if you want. Even before the patch this was a problem. Zealot at 12 and 13 gate comes pretty damn late, If you do 12 or 13 gate you're going to have problems. When you figure out even with 5 extra sc seconds before the patch it was a problem, youd realize the specific solution isnt the zealot.
Not talking about winning with that first amount everytime, but yeah this "normal build" if attacked by the real lamer cheese way will take enough losses to justify doing something else. Considering the best micro you could have just isnt going to work everytime with the mount of losses hoped for.
This isnt about being stubborn and ignoring a problem. Its about scouting what the opponent is doing and reacting in a specific way that guarantees results. If you think your regular build and fighting the rush your way is going to not be a coin toss, go get a friend and tell him to set his rally point and spam lings. If he has half any idea how to control them, and when to attack a building and or something else, youll get the idea. Got to do it a lot of times to get the facts, get a decent friend.
I've took the time and tested this enough before posting so I dont need to spend anymore time on this. Stop asking for replays if you don't want to believe it. You go test it, and you figure it out.
On September 30 2010 04:04 Skrag wrote: I'd really love to make those replays, but so far nobody has taken me up on it. And despite multiple requests, the OP has failed to post replays of games where they failed to defend, you know, those games that they're using to claim it's impossible to hold off without walling? At this point, I can only assume they're not posting the reps because they know how easy it will be to pick them apart.
So, I'll ask again. If you think you can kill me a significant percentage of the time with a 6pool, lets do it.
We haven't posted those replays because they aren't relevant. Yes, it is possible to hold a 6 pool with a 10 gate and, to a lesser extent, with a 12 gate. You may even be able to hold it the majority of the time after some practice (although 12 gate is dubious, on steps at least). The point at issue is that you're forced into playing a dangerous micro game. Lings will often get into your base, hell will break lose, and you may very well lose. This build forgoes the risk and puts you significantly ahead.
As to your personal challenge, what's the point? I'm satisfied with the pro players who have recently lost to 6 pools using standard builds to know that micro and probes isn't always sufficient. I don't need to beat you.
On September 30 2010 04:04 Skrag wrote: I'd really love to make those replays, but so far nobody has taken me up on it. And despite multiple requests, the OP has failed to post replays of games where they failed to defend, you know, those games that they're using to claim it's impossible to hold off without walling? At this point, I can only assume they're not posting the reps because they know how easy it will be to pick them apart.
So, I'll ask again. If you think you can kill me a significant percentage of the time with a 6pool, lets do it.
We haven't posted those replays because they aren't relevant.
Yes, they are relevant, or I wouldn't be asking for them. I'm quite convinced that if you did post one, there would be very simple things that could be pointed out that were done incorrectly, leading to the zerg winning. Post one. What do you have to lose, if I'm wrong.
As to your personal challenge, what's the point? I'm satisfied with the pro players who have recently lost to 6 pools using standard builds to know that micro and probes isn't always sufficient. I don't need to beat you.
I'm not satisfied with those pro games, because I've seen HuK and Inca both lose because THEY DIDN'T RESPOND CORRECTLY.
In both of those games, they lost because they didn't double-power the gate. There are at least 2 other things Inca could have done differently that would almost certainly have resulted in a win, and Huk put down a useless second gateway instead of a second pylon.
Yes, I said it. Two pro players lost against a 6 pool because they weren't properly prepared for it.
Put me in my place and prove me wrong. Or at the very least, stop making claims while being completely unwilling to show any proof of those claims.
I believe I could have won the game that Inca lost against Cool/FruitDealer. Feel free to track Cool down and have him 6 pool me in a series of games. After a practice game or two, I truly believe that I would beat him every single game, or at the very least demonstrate that it's so close that a better player than me (Huk or Inca for example) would be able to win 100% simply by not letting their gate get depowered.
It's really hard to see timings from that replay, since the commentator focused on the zerg base until after the zerglings were already attacking, but it appears he went forge first, and built a gateway before building any cannons.
When he did place cannons, the placement forced him to fight in the mineral line, with 2 cannons blocking off space as well. Enclosed spaces massively favor the lings. If you fight in your mineral line with all your probes, you will lose them all. Add the extra blockage from the cannons, and the zerglings are, of course, going to rape your probes, which is exactly what happened.
It's entirely possible that better cannon placement, that didn't force the probes to fight in small enclosed spaces, would have made it possible to hold the attack off. In particular, placing the cannons directly against the nexus, spaced a little further out, so that the lings couldn't get a full surround on them, and allowing the probes to protect them better, might have worked.
I'd be more than happy to test that, if anybody is willing.
At best, this replay shows that forge-gateway is not a stable build against zerg because it insta-loses to a 6pool.
Its pretty funny to see how unable alot are to defend a 6 pool. They forget how low eco and allin the build is and think loosing probes vs it is a problem. Its pretty hilarious..
Unfortunately I'm on the EU server (and my micro is bad anyways). Otherwise I would test it with you.
Don't get me wrong, I know that your strategy will fend off a 6 pool if executed correctly. When I tested this with my practice partner, he was able to defend with his probes 100% of the time against my 6 pool. But he always builds his pylon + gateway right at his nexus, so that the probes are a bit better protected and he can defend his pylon more easily. But personally I like walling-off in order to protect myself from other early aggression builds (like speedling rushes etc.).
It's just that I mess up too often when trying to defend this and it would be nice to see the defense executed properly in a replay. I absolutely believe that your strategy is optimal given sufficient micro. But seeing even pros mess it up this frequently makes me wonder if I should just opt for the easy route (like OP's wall-in) instead of trying the theoretically perfect way and losing 80% of the time.
Ok, I just found the replay for that Dimaga vs KiwiKaki game. The forge and wallin at the bottom of the ramp were actually *in response* to seeing the 6pool, and didn't go down til 16 supply, which seems maybe a little excessively greedy.
KiwiKaki tried to get away with a little more than maybe he should have, chronoboosting up to 15 probes before he even considered putting another building down, and even then, he was very late in putting a building down. He spotted the 6pool at He had enough minerals to build a gateway or a forge at 1:59, scouted the 6pool at 2:08, but didn't actually place the forge until 2:19, with a surplus of 120 minerals.
If he had placed a gate at 1:59, (which, at 15 supply, is very late by typical standards, although I won't pretend to know what he was trying to do), it would have finished slightly after the zerglings got there, leaving him in the more familiar situation of either fighting in the open or delaying for a zealot.
And if he was actually planning on forge first for some reason, 20 seconds would have made a *world* of difference.
Guess what? Pros fuckup sometimes too, and greediness can, and does, cause losses against rushes. There is absolutely nothing out of the ordinary here.
On September 29 2010 04:20 haflo wrote: he constantly manage to avoid getting Surround with impossible odds
how exactly does 6 zerglings get a surround on 12 probes?
12 probes beat 6 zerglings in a fight given equal micro. Inca handled it wrong. He's a fantastic player...a lot better than me thats for sure - but that doesn't mean he can't make mistakes, and he made one.
I got some reps. My opponent is not a zerg player, but is a 1450-ish diamond terran player, and has pretty good micro. I, on the other hand, am a random player who is having trouble breaking the 1k mark on the ladder.
A couple notes: I'm not a top notch player by any means. My micro and macro are both lacking, and it shows in these replays. Yet I still win pretty convincingly.
First, a replay of me doing the same ultra-greedy and slow response that Kiwikaki did against Dimaga, but with better cannon placement. Having the cannons against the nexus and closer to the edge allows me to protect them better, without having to fight in the narrow spaces created by the mineral line. It doesn't play out exactly the same way as the kiwikaki game, for example the gateway doesn't actually go down, but I think it shows that you can be ridiculously late, and still manage to hold. This one shows pretty clearly how well probes do against lings when they're out in the open, as opposed to fighting in narrow corridors.
Second, a more standard defense on steppes. I lose more probes than I should, and my gateway even gets unpowered at one point, because I suck, but I don't think I ever drop below 11 probes to his 7 drones.
Finally, just for giggles, a total all-in on steppes, including his drones. I was not expecting him to do this, and he may have been able to win if he'd focused on pylons before gateways, I'm not sure. Obviously, if you win the fight and have even one worker left, you win.
I got all the broad strokes right, but if you notice all the little things I could have done better (which presumably a pro player would be doing much better than me), I don't think it's even close.
BTW, the steppes replays are of me doing a 13gate, which is my standard protoss build. 12 gate would have a slightly easier time, and 10pylon/11gate would absolutely crush it. (see the most recent Dimaga vs Kiwikaki KOTH showmatch, where dimaga tries to 6pool Kiwi again and gets crushed. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=155154 I don't remember which game, sorry)
Btw., in the second replay (Steppes of War, without drone attack) I noticed a bug. When you cancel the assimilator, the replay software counts it as Units Lost - 75 Resources. Not sure but I don't think that's intentional.
Still you lost 10 or 11 probes in this replay. Of course, it's possible to survive with smaller losses, but 11 probes is significantly more than 1-3 like some people were arguing in this thread. I'm not doubting that you can lose less (even < 3) but it shows just how hard it is and it's not a safe win by any means. If the Zerg had macro'd at some point and built a queen and some more drones, you would not have been ahead necessarily. He had enough money for this.
On September 30 2010 10:40 Merlinius wrote: Thank you for the replays!
Btw., in the second replay (Steppes of War, without drone attack) I noticed a bug. When you cancel the assimilator, the replay software counts it as Units Lost - 75 Resources. Not sure but I don't think that's intentional.
Still you lost 10 or 11 probes in this replay. Of course, it's possible to survive with smaller losses, but 11 probes is significantly more than 1-3 like some people were arguing in this thread. I'm not doubting that you can lose less (even < 3) but it shows just how hard it is and it's not a safe win by any means. If the Zerg had macro'd at some point and built a queen and some more drones, you would not have been ahead necessarily. He had enough money for this.
The total number of probes lost is irrelevant, as long as you stay far enough ahead that if the pressure comes off, you have a significant income advantage. It's also important to note that in the steppes replay without his drones attacking, I was able to leave workers on minerals and still hold.
If they're attacking pylons, you don't need to bring all your workers, and if they try to attack workers instead, fighting them in the open with all of your workers makes for very few losses, as shown in the first replay where I was just trying to delay until cannons got up.
And IMO, it is a totally safe win. We played quite a few more games than this, the steppes replay I ended up posting is just the one where he did the most damage, and if you watch the replay, there are a lot of spots where I'm playing pretty poorly.
The complete all-in with drones could have gone either way, I'm honestly not sure what the best way to handle that is.
The first attempt to reproduce the Kiwikaki vs Dimaga game, I did lose, but it was because I made a *really* bad mistake. I had all my probes selected, and was going to place a pylon, so the build menu was up, but needed to attack to save a cannon, and didn't cancel the build menu first, so rather than actually attacking, my probes were just moving, and I ended up losing both cannons before figuring out why the hell my probes weren't attacking when I told them to.
Other than those two games, I don't think I was ever in danger of losing, including one game where I only got one zealot out before he took down both my pylons.
This guide is so useless as it states a way of stopping a easy 6-pool, ie. one you scouted early with your buildings already set up to form a wall easily.
If you make a guide it's better to make one about more difficult cases, for example when you scout a zerg last on LT and you started off with gateway. Making a guide that says forge first beats 6 pool is beyond obvious really.. The whole point about 6 pools is having a build that can beat it if you went with a normal build and scout it relatively in time.
On September 30 2010 21:12 Markwerf wrote: The whole point about 6 pools is having a build that can beat it if you went with a normal build and scout it relatively in time.
And a 6pool fails at doing this unless the protoss player fucks up. It's seriously quite possibly the easiest cheese in the game to stop.
goobus, try a build that stops the roach rush build i made (not the one with the lings) On steppes its nearly impossible for a toss to stop. forge fast expo doesnt work, teching to stalker normally doesn't work, and if u get out even one zealot you probably lost. the reason this is so successful is because this build is hard to scout. you wont know its coming.
but still i would like to know if there is a clear cut normal build that will stop this on steppes. even if it was a blind counter. so i know what to look for so i can change up the build. if you need the build order i can PM it to you if you'd like
I'm starting to lean towards what the OP is suggesting here for 6 pool and going for early forge/cannon instead of trying to block with 2 GW and 1 Pylon.
Yesterday I scouted a 6 pool, he actually waited another cycle and brought like 10 zerglings into my base (with 2 more trailing after that ) and I was using the method where I block with 2GW + a pylon.
Here is the replay:
Here's some problems I ran into.
The gateways are wide, so plenty of zerglings can attack them, making them go down fairly fast.
If you try to rally your zealots outside the base 2 things can happen: 1. If they don't pop out 2 at a time, they just get eaten alive (maybe not if theres only 6 zerglings but 8-10 certainly) and sometimes don't even kill one zergling, especially if they micro them. 2. The zerglings actually block the 'pathing' of rallying outside the wall so even though you try to rally there, the zealots pop inside your base.
Once a gateway goes down it's down to whether you cranked out enough zealots to chew through the zerglings. In my case I didn't quite have enough by the time the GW went down and the game went downhill from there.
I dunno, I'm sure I could have done better in lots of areas, but i'm starting to just think build a forge/cannon and be done with it.
Meh just now I had a 14pool vs 6pool ZvZ. defended with 14 drones so that I killed 3 lings and got 3 to red HP while losing 6 workers, then got my own Zerglings out.
I really think you can just defend vs this with workers only.
On October 01 2010 03:27 Shikyo wrote: Meh just now I had a 14pool vs 6pool ZvZ. defended with 14 drones so that I killed 3 lings and got 3 to red HP while losing 6 workers, then got my own Zerglings out.
I really think you can just defend vs this with workers only.
Fruitdealer does not agree with you. I guess he is more trustworthy.
On October 01 2010 03:27 Shikyo wrote: Meh just now I had a 14pool vs 6pool ZvZ. defended with 14 drones so that I killed 3 lings and got 3 to red HP while losing 6 workers, then got my own Zerglings out.
I really think you can just defend vs this with workers only.
It's a little different for protoss because any 6 pooler is going to go straight for the pylon to cut zealot production, and then to the probe line. Since our pool is literally a half second from our mineral line, or , whereas the pylon is going to be at the entrance ramp, the lost time in mining defending your pylon (or even worse, letting it fall) vs the 6 pool would ultimately kill the Protoss shortly thereafter.
On October 01 2010 03:23 Nasdrova wrote: I dunno, I'm sure I could have done better in lots of areas, but i'm starting to just think build a forge/cannon and be done with it.
Your first probe wasn't rallied to minerals, your first pylon was late, you had probes sitting around doing nothing, you didn't continue probe production, and you blocked yourself completely in but rallied zealots to the outside, letting them die one at a time, which led to your wall going down without having enough zealots behind the wall when it fell.
If you're going to completely block off, 2 gates and a pylon is the worst possible way to do so.
On October 01 2010 03:27 Shikyo wrote: Meh just now I had a 14pool vs 6pool ZvZ. defended with 14 drones so that I killed 3 lings and got 3 to red HP while losing 6 workers, then got my own Zerglings out.
I really think you can just defend vs this with workers only.
It's a little different for protoss because any 6 pooler is going to go straight for the pylon to cut zealot production, and then to the probe line. Since our pool is literally a half second from our mineral line, or , whereas the pylon is going to be at the entrance ramp, the lost time in mining defending your pylon (or even worse, letting it fall) vs the 6 pool would ultimately kill the Protoss shortly thereafter.
Watch my reps please. 6pool doesn't kill anything unless you screw something up. And yes, the pro players that are losing to this, in every high level 6pool loss I have seen so far (huk to machine, inca to fruitdealer, and kiwikaki to dimaga), lost because they screwed something up.
On October 01 2010 03:27 Shikyo wrote: Meh just now I had a 14pool vs 6pool ZvZ. defended with 14 drones so that I killed 3 lings and got 3 to red HP while losing 6 workers, then got my own Zerglings out.
I really think you can just defend vs this with workers only.
Fruitdealer does not agree with you. I guess he is more trustworthy.
Oh, fruitdealer lost while defending with workers?
On October 01 2010 03:27 Shikyo wrote: Meh just now I had a 14pool vs 6pool ZvZ. defended with 14 drones so that I killed 3 lings and got 3 to red HP while losing 6 workers, then got my own Zerglings out.
I really think you can just defend vs this with workers only.
It's a little different for protoss because any 6 pooler is going to go straight for the pylon to cut zealot production, and then to the probe line. Since our pool is literally a half second from our mineral line, or , whereas the pylon is going to be at the entrance ramp, the lost time in mining defending your pylon (or even worse, letting it fall) vs the 6 pool would ultimately kill the Protoss shortly thereafter.
Well building at ramp is awful vs 6pool in general, I think that the only option you have if you don't scout it is to clog your ramp up with all your probes and try to boost a zealot out.
On October 01 2010 07:20 johngalt90 wrote: Do u guys think blocking the ramp of the Zerg would be an effective solution to buy time to get your zealots up?
On October 01 2010 03:27 Shikyo wrote: Meh just now I had a 14pool vs 6pool ZvZ. defended with 14 drones so that I killed 3 lings and got 3 to red HP while losing 6 workers, then got my own Zerglings out.
I really think you can just defend vs this with workers only.
Fruitdealer does not agree with you. I guess he is more trustworthy.
Fruitdealer played one 6 pool on a map that was highly unfavored to zerg. Regardless of whether he won or not, he 6 pooled because he would've finished faster and gotten to the other maps sooner.
Inca had piss-poor defense. Oh sure, his micro was cute, but his overall defensive plan was terribad. I can have perfect micro, but that doesn't mean a 6 worker all-in is some sort of good aggressive play, for example. There are other factors that contributed to Inca's loss that have nothing to do with the 6pool being hard to defend with standard.
We all know that Spunky already stated that he planned out this elaborate strategy for Inca to PvZ on this map, so someone who's probably busy setting up for all sorts of awesome harass and timing attacks probably isn't ready for six lings to get crammed down his throat. Mentally, Inca might already have been defeated.
Inca was forced to cancel his wall because he got himself broke and needed the minerals. But if he left half his probes mining while the other half took out the immediate zergling threat, he wouldn't have to cancel the core. Inca already made two bad plays at this point: 1 - Pulling probes to defend way too late. 2 - pulling too many probes.
Then his probe defense was what lost him the game. He let zerg get the absolute best position possible there, managing somehow to use his own gateway and choke to forcehimself into a bad concave. Maybe I'm not giving Fruitdealer enough credit for forcing an engagement at the best possible spot for zerg, but to be honest, I don't feel that was forced at all. Just bad positioning by Inca. Two inches forward or two inches back, and Inca would have gotten a huge surround on the zerglings and easily killed them all without heavy losses.
On October 01 2010 07:43 Darthturtle wrote: Inca already made two bad plays at this point: 1 - Pulling probes to defend way too late. 2 - pulling too many probes.
You forgot #3: not double-powering the gate.
I have always double-powered my starting buildings ever since the first time a fast rush managed to take down my pylon leaving me dead in the water. Why pros seem to not do this as a simple matter of habit is completely beyond me.
The third pylon can go wherever you need it to go, but the second should always be in proximity to the first.
On October 01 2010 07:24 Shikyo wrote: Well building at ramp is awful vs 6pool in general, I think that the only option you have if you don't scout it is to clog your ramp up with all your probes and try to boost a zealot out.
Not building at the ramp if they don't 6 pool can be much worse than building on the ramp against a 6 pool.
I always build at the top of the ramp against zerg or protoss, and the reps I've posted in this thread show me defending a 6pool (from a much much better player than me, even though he's not a zerg player) just fine with a 13gate at the ramp, even though I messed up quite a bit on micro and continuing to build zealots and probes.
On October 01 2010 07:43 Darthturtle wrote: Inca already made two bad plays at this point: 1 - Pulling probes to defend way too late. 2 - pulling too many probes.
You forgot #3: not double-powering the gate.
I have always double-powered my starting buildings ever since the first time a fast rush managed to take down my pylon leaving me dead in the water. Why pros seem to not do this as a simple matter of habit is completely beyond me.
The third pylon can go wherever you need it to go, but the second should always be in proximity to the first.
I don't mind not double-powering so much. It's a strategic decision, in fact.
Optimally, Protoss will defend well enough so that the pylon does not go down. If that's the case, then it doesn't matter nearly as much if the front is double-powered.
As a matter of fact, single-powering the front has one unique feature: Zergs are way more likely to see that and try to focus down the pylon, rather than go for the probe line. If Inca's timing was good, he could use his probes to wipe out the entire wave of zerglings(assuming they commit to sniping the building), barely save the pylon, and not lose anything at all. Unfortunately, Inca played like ass and lost the pylon, and now, all of a sudden, not double-powering becomes extraordinarily noticable. And then he had to break his wall to afford a replacement.
Not double-powering isn't a mistake unless part of your plan involves definitely losing your pylon. Otherwise, the mistake is whatever you did or didn't do that let the opponent kill your building.
I have been 6 pooling vs p for a while. I'm only silver, so wanted some higher feedback, because I added an ol to the build. This only delays the first 6 lings by a second or two, and wit the five drones I can still make lings as soon as larva spawn. I very rarely lose doing that, even on 4 player maps when I don't find them at the first spot...the I'll often have 12 lings when I get there. Now, my opponents are bad, but so am I...and I feel like when I lose it's because I messd up and lost lings too early. Was wondering if anyoe actually good had tried it that way?
while waiting for the spawn pool you build up around235 minerals and max out larva...if you hit the ol at 100 you'll have 135 and 3 larva when the pool pops...just a couple seconds to hit 150 for 3 lings...from then on you have just over 50 each time another larva spawns
On October 02 2010 01:03 pbecot01 wrote: while waiting for the spawn pool you build up around235 minerals and max out larva...if you hit the ol at 100 you'll have 135 and 3 larva when the pool pops...just a couple seconds to hit 150 for 3 lings...from then on you have just over 50 each time another larva spawns
In all the replays I've seen of pros 6pooling, they drone up to 7 after building the pool, which obviously you're not doing if you build up to 235 when the pool isn't done.
This doesn't cut into larvae production at all, you still have 3 larvae when the pool pops, and following that up with a double-extractor trick still allows you to get an extra 4 lings very quickly. Obviously there's a delay for any lings after that, since you need to build an overlord, but I don't think any larvae get wasted.
What's the point of a 7th drone? The 5 mining produce exactly enough minerals to pump lings with all your larva, and the delay from building the OL at 12 or so will be longer then the couple seconds earlier.
I dunno, guess it doesn't really matter-I don't much like 6 pooling because my micro is bad enough that I lose a good percentage if my opponent builds around his nexus. But It still seems like I can mass lings better with the OL first.
On October 02 2010 10:19 pbecot01 wrote: What's the point of a 7th drone? The 5 mining produce exactly enough minerals to pump lings with all your larva, and the delay from building the OL at 12 or so will be longer then the couple seconds earlier.
Scouting on 4player maps for one. It also builds up enough resources that you can get a queen eventually, which can be huge if the game is very close and going back and forth. You get exactly the same number of lings total, because that's limited by larvae not minerals, but there's a delay after the 5th set, waiting for an overlord. The first 10 lings come out at the same time, though (or a few seconds faster), and those are by far the most important ones anyway. If you haven't done significant damage with those, then the chances are very good you're going to lose anyway.
I was 6pooled today on Steppes, and this guide helped so much! I tossed up a pylon in the corner, gateway + forge to cover the entrace and then did a cannon at the back. He had to pull out, as I had dual-powered my wall-in, because by the time he might've killed that pylon the cannon would be up, and I had the possibiilty to start chrono'ing zealots. However, I HAD to do a 10 gate, and even when I did, the gate just about finished when the first zergling wave arrived. I immediately tossed up a forge after my gateway, and they finished about the same time. I could have done a cannon instead of that second pylon, but I think that second pylon was a good investment in case the zerg would try to gamble and get down that first pylon in the corner and two pylons + cannon going up was too intimidating, so he pulled out without even trying.
During all this time, I had a far superior economic advantage. I got warpgate, denied a possible FE at his nat by putting up a pylon protected by two cannons (I stayed outside with my scouting probe), which also quite effectively limited his movement out of his base, forcing him to go one base. I kept warping in units at the proxy pylon at his nat, in case he pulled out while I teched up to phoenix and from there it was gg, when I kept killing his overlords which cost his already crippled eco so much.
I don't see how you are supposed to get out a zealot before the zergling wave arrives. Maybe I am just slow, but I doubt my gateway was that delayed.
On October 03 2010 04:37 Lea wrote: I was 6pooled today on Steppes, and this guide helped so much! I tossed up a pylon in the corner, gateway + forge to cover the entrace and then did a cannon at the back. He had to pull out, as I had dual-powered my wall-in, because by the time he might've killed that pylon the cannon would be up, and I had the possibiilty to start chrono'ing zealots. However, I HAD to do a 10 gate, and even when I did, the gate just about finished when the first zergling wave arrived. I immediately tossed up a forge after my gateway, and they finished about the same time. I could have done a cannon instead of that second pylon, but I think that second pylon was a good investment in case the zerg would try to gamble and get down that first pylon in the corner and two pylons + cannon going up was too intimidating, so he pulled out without even trying.
During all this time, I had a far superior economic advantage. I got warpgate, denied a possible FE at his nat by putting up a pylon protected by two cannons (I stayed outside with my scouting probe), which also quite effectively limited his movement out of his base, forcing him to go one base. I kept warping in units at the proxy pylon at his nat, in case he pulled out while I teched up to phoenix and from there it was gg, when I kept killing his overlords which cost his already crippled eco so much.
I don't see how you are supposed to get out a zealot before the zergling wave arrives. Maybe I am just slow, but I doubt my gateway was that delayed.
How can you respond with a 10 gate? If you pylon scout, your 11th probe should be almost finished when you scout his build (on Steppes of War). The earliest response you could possibly do is delaying the 12th probe and throwing down the gateway a second or two earlier.
Btw. on Steppes it is not possible to get the first zealot out before his lings arrive (not even with a 10 gate, i think). You need to defend with probes - unless you're doing some kind of wall-in, of course.
Why did you throw down a cannon at the back of your base? Just use your workers to kill of the lings and save those minerals.
Why did you throw down a cannon at the back of your base? Just use your workers to kill of the lings and save those minerals.
Probably because somebody put funny ideas into people's heads like cutting early probes and using cannons to defend. Then we get some other people that drew all sorts of crazy conclusions.
News Flash: If you cut two probes, but delay your gate while waiting for your scout to get there, that's not a ten gate. That's a 12 gate short two probes.
Thx so much OP, this build has already saved me a number of would-be losses . I agree with some people in this thread that you can also do it with solid probe micro, but this build is much easier to execute imo and it doesn't throw off my regular timings when zerg does play a standard game!
Why did you throw down a cannon at the back of your base? Just use your workers to kill of the lings and save those minerals.
Probably because somebody put funny ideas into people's heads like cutting early probes and using cannons to defend. Then we get some other people that drew all sorts of crazy conclusions.
News Flash: If you cut two probes, but delay your gate while waiting for your scout to get there, that's not a ten gate. That's a 12 gate short two probes.
Watch the fucking replays. We modified the build so that you don't have to cut 2 probes. Stop flaming my thread and gtfo. If you have something constructive to say, say it. Otherwise, save it.
I think any good player should have these prepared backup plans / modified builds in their arsenal for things like scouted 6-pool. It's pointless to desperately cling to your one 12/13 gate build when there are such better options out there, unless you lack the mental capacity to remember / execute more than one opening.
For Zergs reading this, thinking they're screwed now, you're really not. After you build your pool, use the newly made drone to scout and block their ramp. If they send probes, micro while bringing a 2nd drone down. 6 lings coming in afterwards ends it.
On October 07 2010 12:30 forgotten0ne wrote: For Zergs reading this, thinking they're screwed now, you're really not. After you build your pool, use the newly made drone to scout and block their ramp. If they send probes, micro while bringing a 2nd drone down. 6 lings coming in afterwards ends it.
The only time sensitive building is the forge, the gateway can be delayed 10-15 seconds and still be fine. As long as the protoss isn't terrible and brings 2-3 probes to shoo the drone away it should be ez
So what would you do if the zerg goes directly after your pylons and then kites your workers to wait for reinforcements when you pull them from the mineral line or just finishes off the pylon if you're too slow?
The easiest way to defend a 6pool is definitely to scout at 9 and just place a gateway at 12, then a forge at 14, and a pylon at 15 (the pylon finishes your wall off). The pylon should finish about when lings get there and your cannon/s should already be going up. When people 6pool me I do this then when they see it I say "Enjoy" just to rub it in that they're totally screwed ^_^.
What i do is 9 pylon scout see the pool as the 9 pylons building continue worker production at 12 gateway and gas when u can after gate way next when gates finished chrono boost out a zealot while building the cyber core the pylon position is the same as his but the gate way would be where his forge is and the cyber core right next to where the gate way is leaving small gap at the right where u can place the first zealot.. make sure to hold position on the zealot... and make two more just in case and the reason i don't go forge is that its a waste of minerals that early unless u plan to cheese block off entirely and go straight for voids which is very dishonorable..any ways the point of the way i do it is because 1 zealot can tank 4 lings if they don't surround him and because the lings get forced into that one entry point which is too small for them to get a surround on u u save your self minerals and u get an early defense that can cope with a ling rush and 100 minerals if u decide to go two zealot.. also with this u have more of an option to switch your build to something else because timing with your warp tech is game changing the earlier u get that the better u can defend and counter push.. Having said that by the time the zerg realize the push failed u can easily transition into 4 gate and push for the win because the zerg would have invested to many resources into the ling production and have no econ and no way to defend against your on coming 4 gate push