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Blink stalkers + observer(s) can typically force a base race against robo compositions on most maps. You keep an obs near his ledge and a spotter at his front door and blink in to his main any time he tries to move out. If the robo player takes his natural, he opens himself up to harass. The blink player can constantly poke back and forth at both fronts picking off pylons, probes and robo facilities and then blink back to safetly. If the robo player tries to split his force to defend the dual-pronged harass, the blink player abuses his superior mobility to combine his stalkers and isolate the robo player's split forces. Ultimately, the robo player is inevitably frustrated by the constant pestering and moves his whole army as one to attack the blink players base. Initiate base race.
Meanwhile, a smart blink player can design his entire strategy around forcing and winning a base race. Instead of taking his natural, he spreads out his bases on opposite corners of the map and takes islands if they're available. Because he never plans to fight head on, he can skimp somewhat on army spending in the mid-game and take extra bases. These tactics give the blink player a huge advantage in the base race. The blink player will be in the robo player's main as soon as the robo player leave his base, allowing the blink player to take out the robo player's production and economy before the robo player makes it across the map. This allows the blink player 2-3 extra rounds of production. The robo player will also have taken his natural allowing the blink player to trade his main for the robo player's main and natural. This will leave the blink player with 2 spread out mining bases while the robo player will be on 0 bases. The blink player also has a huge advantage in mobility which can pin a robo player's army to his last remaining structures while the blink player is free to split his forces.
If the robo player attacks too early, the extra rounds of production may give the blink player the superior army which is an auto-win for the blink player. If the robo player waits too long, the blink player will greatly out-macro the robo player with double the bases which is nearly an auto-win for the blink player.
I've played 10+ games at high diamond, and this works really really well. I'm not sure what a robo player's best response is. Going collosus+blink stalker and accepting a macro disadvantage?
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Would depend a lot on the map wouldn't it? I don't see this working on SoW for instance.
But assuming I was already going robo either I'd split my forces up if I had enough of any army or turtle on 1-base for a bit until you can get enough. I also would get charge instead of rushing to colossi since colossi in few numbers w/o a heavy immortal support gets picked off by blink stalkers quite easily. Then I would keep a group of chargelots in my main which will rip apart any stalkers blinking up there since blink will be on cooldown.
Other things I might do are proxy pylons in/near your base (which is good to do vs any sort of contain) as well as attempting to snipe your observer.
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KcDc, If you harass me with blink stalkers, I save up 400 minerals, pull all my probes and stomp you with 3+ colossus( this has happened to me in games, and this is what I have learned from myself and from professional players which I have asked )
EDIT:: I take your main instead of my natural.
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The first thing I'd try is just building lots of obs. If you can remove their ability to blink around your ramp you are in a lot less danger.
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On January 07 2011 03:42 Skyro wrote:
Would depend a lot on the map wouldn't it? I don't see this working on SoW for instance.
But assuming I was already going robo either I'd split my forces up if I had enough of any army or turtle on 1-base for a bit until you can get enough. I also would get charge instead of rushing to colossi since colossi in few numbers w/o a heavy immortal support gets picked off by blink stalkers quite easily. Then I would keep a group of chargelots in my main which will rip apart any stalkers blinking up there since blink will be on cooldown.
Other things I might do are proxy pylons in/near your base (which is good to do vs any sort of contain) as well as attempting to snipe your observer.
Yeah, SoW doesn't work. I've had a lot of success with it on LT and XNC. I've also lost to it multiple times on Metal. It works best on maps where there's a big cliff to blink over that's relatively far away from the ramp and natural.
As for leaving a force to defend your main, it's harder than you'd think to split your army effectively. Blink stalker is only a little weaker than robo, and with its mobility advantage, the blink player chooses when and where to engage. If robo splits his forces, blink can bring all of his stalkers together and attack the smaller force, so in order for the split to work as intended, the robo player needs to double the blink player's army strength so that each force can handle the full blink force. Otherwise, you're just giving the blink player free units.
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On January 07 2011 04:18 Kefka.dancingmad wrote:
KcDc, If you harass me with blink stalkers, I save up 400 minerals, pull all my probes and stomp you with 3+ colossus( this has happened to me in games, and this is what I have learned from myself and from professional players which I have asked )
EDIT:: I take your main instead of my natural.
Taking the opponent's main is a good idea, but it doesn't solve the problem. The blink player is still more mobile and spread out than you are.
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Also, if people haven't tried this on ladder, you really should if only to see how it works. It's a little strange to make your gameplan around the idea that you'll be losing your main, but it's surprisingly effective. If nothing else, people on ladder don't respond to it well, and you'll get a lot of comeback wins picking off free units.
I don't know if a strategy involving losing your main should be your go-to build, but it's a great way to fight back into a game after a 3-gate blink rush fails. You just get a robo facility and take spread out expansions putting a few gateways in each base and suddenly, your paper army is incredibly hard to beat.
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Can you upload the replays? It sounds interesting, but I think that it is pretty hard to actually contain the opponent at one base if he snipes your observer. And once the observer is gone, the robo player can just chase the blink stalker player away.
Something he can also use for instance is a warp prism drop while reinforcing it. Once the blink stalker army is forced to go home to defend it is basically game over as he will be overrun by colossi.
Edit: It would be interesting to try at ladder, but every game is either cannonrush or 4gate.
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On January 07 2011 07:19 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On January 07 2011 03:42 Skyro wrote:
Would depend a lot on the map wouldn't it? I don't see this working on SoW for instance.
But assuming I was already going robo either I'd split my forces up if I had enough of any army or turtle on 1-base for a bit until you can get enough. I also would get charge instead of rushing to colossi since colossi in few numbers w/o a heavy immortal support gets picked off by blink stalkers quite easily. Then I would keep a group of chargelots in my main which will rip apart any stalkers blinking up there since blink will be on cooldown.
Other things I might do are proxy pylons in/near your base (which is good to do vs any sort of contain) as well as attempting to snipe your observer. Yeah, SoW doesn't work. I've had a lot of success with it on LT and XNC. I've also lost to it multiple times on Metal. It works best on maps where there's a big cliff to blink over that's relatively far away from the ramp and natural. As for leaving a force to defend your main, it's harder than you'd think to split your army effectively. Blink stalker is only a little weaker than robo, and with its mobility advantage, the blink player chooses when and where to engage. If robo splits his forces, blink can bring all of his stalkers together and attack the smaller force, so in order for the split to work as intended, the robo player needs to double the blink player's army strength so that each force can handle the full blink force. Otherwise, you're just giving the blink player free units.
I agree I've both tried it and played against it and it will cause a lot of mistakes from players who are not used to dealing with it. But at the same time if your strategy is to base trade don't you kind of have to expand yourself too? There's no sense of urgency to expand or push out unless you make them think you are going to win via superior economy.
But I'm surprised you didn't list Jungle Basin as one of the maps you have success on. It's like tailormade for early blink abuse since you don't need an obs to blink into their natural.
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Aotearoa39261 Posts
Would be interested in seeing some reps actually.
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On January 07 2011 08:02 Plexa wrote:
Would be interested in seeing some reps actually.
As am I, would be nice to see some examples of this in action.
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did a similar strat once in PvT. In LT i would expand to another main, keep like 2 sentrys in each ramp to continually ff and with like 3/4 phoenix i would force some turrets, counter drops and always keep track of Ts army. problem was that terran would only need 1/3 of his army to kill all my stalkers (marauders imba ^^).
I also used blink in PvP on shakuras (IMO the perfect map for this), kill the backdoors rocks and attack his front and back randomly and then try to out macro him with 3 bases.
this builds really excels against less skill oponnents, against top players they are kinda gimmick...
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played against some guy at my mid diamondish level who did this against my robo build on LT. While 3gate robo crushes this on one base, an expo makes it amazingly annoying to defend, with the only advantage being that stalkers take absolute ages to kill a nexus, so an expo is relatively safe. The key to defend this on 2 bases I think is to leave zealots in the main, while immortals and stalkers defend the expo. The reasoning behind this is that any stalkers that blink into the main can be held off by zealots for quite some time while the rest of the army gets up, and stalkers don't really ever want to go up against a multiple immortals. The key is just to let econ and tech advantage kick in with multiple robo's until immortals hit high enough numbers to just waste stalkers.
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I've experimented with using blink some in PvP but never used it much like this. I would love to see a replay demonstrating this.
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United States8477 Posts
oGsMC and NsPGenius's response to blink stalker from a robo build is to go twilight council. In MC's case, when his observer scouts the enemy base, he notes whether there's robo or not. If there's a robo he goes blink himself. With blink, he breaks his contain. If his opponent put up an expo already, push the expo. If not, put up your own expo and gain an economy lead. The thing is, if your opponent invests enough minerals to go 3 gate blink stalker plus a robo, his expand will be somewhat late.
Btw these are the games I'm referring to:
oGsMC vs Pooh on xelnaga, gisado KOTH day 2, game 3-this is probably the best demonstration of this counter strategy.
oGsMC vs some other protoss on xelnaga, gisado KOTH
NexGenius vs AnyproPrime on LT, GSL code S
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Thanks I really wanted to try this last night and it was the first time in the history of Starcraft that I didn't get ANY pvp's. Ill try again later.
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Any decent player will have an observer before you, possibly even 2, and will snipe yours. You can't contain the player without the observer as only 2 immortals + gateways units will totally wreck you...
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When i start a game, i aim for a solid win. Not a base race.
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On January 07 2011 23:15 PatouPower wrote:
Any decent player will have an observer before you, possibly even 2, and will snipe yours. You can't contain the player without the observer as only 2 immortals + gateways units will totally wreck you...
I'm pretty sure blink stalkers have the advantage when it comes to observer sniping.
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Certain openings end up in base races depending on your opponents moves; I am not quite convinced that in this situation the blink player wins, based on the trading mains thing (this has happened to me). I don't think the blink player can fight head on and win, which eventually must happen at some point.
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EPT
