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On February 16 2011 02:21 Skyro wrote:
I've never tried going for such an early immortal to defend 4-gates, but assuming it works, I do not see the benefit of this over 3-gate. With 3-gate you can get your 2nd gas earlier, have a heavier stalker army, can hold your ramp better (so it is less risky), can delay their proxy pylons (again, less risky) and it leaves your tech path more open.
I see little advantages of getting the early robo comparatively as your army composition of mostly zealot/immortal will not be as strong pushing back or breaking a contain. For example if you hold w/ 3-gates w/ a stalker heavy army, you can smoothly transition into blink stalkers and end the game much quicker since you'll have both an army, tech, and eco advantage compared to your opponent.
It can be tricky to defend with 3 gates, but that aside, this gets your robo faster and gives you immortals and zealots instead of stalkers and sentries. I won't say that one is necessarily better than the other, but it at least offers you different options. You have the option of getting to collosi a little more efficiently. You're significantly stronger against blink stalker plays. In a recent test, I was actually able to FE into a blink stalker opening. Compare that to a 3-gate stalker/sentry opening where the 400 mineral investment would leave you without sufficient defense against a blink timing. My favorite aspect of this opening, however, is that it lets you immortal drop. It's really easy to pick off pylons and small groups of stalkers with 2 immortals + a warp prism, and best of all, the combination is great for defending collosus timing pushes. You just drop 2 immortals at the feet of the collosi and focus them down.
I need to run more tests, but I suspect there may be a way to expo after your 2nd immortal such that there are adaptations afterwards that will allow you to defend against almost anything.
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On February 16 2011 02:42 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On February 16 2011 02:21 Skyro wrote:
I've never tried going for such an early immortal to defend 4-gates, but assuming it works, I do not see the benefit of this over 3-gate. With 3-gate you can get your 2nd gas earlier, have a heavier stalker army, can hold your ramp better (so it is less risky), can delay their proxy pylons (again, less risky) and it leaves your tech path more open.
I see little advantages of getting the early robo comparatively as your army composition of mostly zealot/immortal will not be as strong pushing back or breaking a contain. For example if you hold w/ 3-gates w/ a stalker heavy army, you can smoothly transition into blink stalkers and end the game much quicker since you'll have both an army, tech, and eco advantage compared to your opponent. It can be tricky to defend with 3 gates, but that aside, this gets your robo faster and gives you immortals and zealots instead of stalkers and sentries. I won't say that one is necessarily better than the other, but it at least offers you different options. You have the option of getting to collosi a little more efficiently. You're significantly stronger against blink stalker plays. In a recent test, I was actually able to FE into a blink stalker opening. Compare that to a 3-gate stalker/sentry opening where the 400 mineral investment would leave you without sufficient defense against a blink timing. My favorite aspect of this opening, however, is that it lets you immortal drop. It's really easy to pick off pylons and small groups of stalkers with 2 immortals + a warp prism, and best of all, the combination is great for defending collosus timing pushes. You just drop 2 immortals at the feet of the collosi and focus them down. I need to run more tests, but I suspect there may be a way to expo after your 2nd immortal such that there are adaptations afterwards that will allow you to defend against almost anything.
Well usually blink stalker builds get their 2nd gas early so if you scout that and other signs indicate no 4-gate you can just play standard. I was speaking strictly from the perspective of your relative position right after a successful defense of a 4-gate, where I believe w/ a 3-gate you are left in a better position since you can almost always finish the game right off with blink stalkers.
The main advantage seems to be if you suspect the 4-gate but then it never comes and they are 1-basing, in which case I probably would toss down a robo so a 2-gate robo would be ahead in that scenario.
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On February 16 2011 03:14 Skyro wrote:Show nested quote +On February 16 2011 02:42 kcdc wrote:On February 16 2011 02:21 Skyro wrote:
I've never tried going for such an early immortal to defend 4-gates, but assuming it works, I do not see the benefit of this over 3-gate. With 3-gate you can get your 2nd gas earlier, have a heavier stalker army, can hold your ramp better (so it is less risky), can delay their proxy pylons (again, less risky) and it leaves your tech path more open.
I see little advantages of getting the early robo comparatively as your army composition of mostly zealot/immortal will not be as strong pushing back or breaking a contain. For example if you hold w/ 3-gates w/ a stalker heavy army, you can smoothly transition into blink stalkers and end the game much quicker since you'll have both an army, tech, and eco advantage compared to your opponent. It can be tricky to defend with 3 gates, but that aside, this gets your robo faster and gives you immortals and zealots instead of stalkers and sentries. I won't say that one is necessarily better than the other, but it at least offers you different options. You have the option of getting to collosi a little more efficiently. You're significantly stronger against blink stalker plays. In a recent test, I was actually able to FE into a blink stalker opening. Compare that to a 3-gate stalker/sentry opening where the 400 mineral investment would leave you without sufficient defense against a blink timing. My favorite aspect of this opening, however, is that it lets you immortal drop. It's really easy to pick off pylons and small groups of stalkers with 2 immortals + a warp prism, and best of all, the combination is great for defending collosus timing pushes. You just drop 2 immortals at the feet of the collosi and focus them down. I need to run more tests, but I suspect there may be a way to expo after your 2nd immortal such that there are adaptations afterwards that will allow you to defend against almost anything. Well usually blink stalker builds get their 2nd gas early so if you scout that and other signs indicate no 4-gate you can just play standard. I was speaking strictly from the perspective of your relative position right after a successful defense of a 4-gate, where I believe w/ a 3-gate you are left in a better position since you can almost always finish the game right off with blink stalkers. The main advantage seems to be if you suspect the 4-gate but then it never comes and they are 1-basing, in which case I probably would toss down a robo so a 2-gate robo would be ahead in that scenario.
If you hold an aggressive 4 gate cleanly, you're going to be ahead. I suppose some builds might leave you more ahead than others, but I generally look for builds that give me a chance to win against the greatest number of potential openings rather than a build that lets me win the hardest against the build I'm most concerned about. The goal in this opening isn't to smash the hell out of 4-gate. It's to give you a flexible opening that gives you a good shot against 4 gate, but also leaves you in good shape against a variety of openings. I consider it an alternative to an eco 4-gate in that it's pretty good against a lot of things, but not great against anything.
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nice build, great work!
is there a way to hold a 11 gate 4 gate?
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Theres some 4 gates that actually hit in a perfect window not at the 6:00 mark but at about 5:45 mark with the first attack. That gives them a 10 second window with their 6 units to snipe some of your units before the immortal can come out and then it snowballs from there. I don't think 1 gas 1 gate robo can hold a clean executed 4 gate like this but will hold a slightly delayed or a little sloppily executed 4 gate.
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Hey, i am ~3400 master league @ EU and i tryed it a bit, have not met any 4gatepusher yet, but against a standard players i have some things to notice.
Poke with a probe near his base and try to go in using mineralwalk about 3.40-4.00 so u can scout second gas and gateway count.
Move out with your first stalker. And if his troops are inside - he is not pushing at all. If he is out just try to win some time poking with stalkers carefully, shooting guys and moving your stalker as far from your base as you can in same time. You can even try to catch and kill his probe for denying pylons.
Everybody who talk about stargate dont understand that if u see 2nd gas or guy is not pushing, you can do not make the second immortal and save gas for stalkers, and ofc take your gas yourself.
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Definitely like the theory kcdc (and I'm a fan of your posts), but in the replays you provided, your opponents' 4gates were not executed cleanly. I would love to see a couple of replays vs clean 4gate builds. =)
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On February 16 2011 07:12 Omniscient wrote:
Definitely like the theory kcdc (and I'm a fan of your posts), but in the replays you provided, your opponents' 4gates were not executed cleanly. I would love to see a couple of replays vs clean 4gate builds. =)
kcdc's execution wasn't super-clean either, with timings 10-15 seconds later than what he's claimed is possible (and that I've verified myself playing against the AI on the slowest speed, cause I simply don't have the mechanics to execute cleanly at fastest without practicing it quite a bit more than I wanted to just to verify the timings).
I agree though. I'd really like to see reps of cleanly executed 4gates, as well as clean execution from kcdc. 
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I have been experimenting with a similar build with great success against 4gates on the ladder.
However, I opt for an early 2nd gas by skipping the zealot and make a stalker or sentry (depending on scout info). The extra gas allows for faster immortal timing (gate, core, robo, gate, gate) so you end up with a 3gate robo and still more probes than any serious 4gate. The immortal pops in plenty of time to hold stalkers and you have sentries with extra energy for FFs.
Have you considered a second gas for the faster immortal timing since it allows for more stalker/sentry production to hold the ramp, split his forces, or snipe the proxy pylon? I like this build because it offers options like a fast colossus, an immortal drop, observers, etc. He can't exactly contain you if you warp units down your ledge away from the ramp, not to mention the econ advantage allows easy expo after breaking the contain (or warping in at your scouts proxy on the map to pressure him at home)
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This build is awesome. The only time I lost so far is because my mouse screwed up, which prevented me from getting a zealot and immortal fast enough.
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kcdc, have any reps showing cleaner execution on both sides? A clean 4gate should have either 6 stalkers or 5 stalkers + a zealot attacking up your ramp at 5:45-5:50, and if your execution isn't clean you will probably just lose to an attack that fast. Specifically, if you don't have zealots #4+#5 already out at that time, and the immo within 5 seconds of finished or so, I don't see how you'll be able to stay even, much less get ahead.
Although if you have any reps of you beating the 5:45-5:50 with the same level of execution you showed in the posted reps, I'd love to see those too.
Definitely not saying you played bad or sloppy, but you were delayed a decent amount from an optimal execution, and the 4gates you've shown were all fairly late as well.
By "optimal" execution, I mean the times I was able to achieve playing the opening at the slowest game speed, as I'm only a low to mid diamond player, and simply don't have the speed to execute anywhere near optimally at fastest. However, by playing at slowest, I was able to come in quite a bit faster than what you've shown here by doing that (15-20ish seconds on the immo if I recall correctly), but was only able to cut about 2 seconds off a 5:45-ish attack in 4gate rep I found in another thread.
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why dont people just pay more attention to the thread before posting , ive upload 3 replays on the first page of me defending with this build ( improved version-20 seconds faster immortal) vs a perfectly executed 4 gate rush that comes at 5.35-.40 at my ramp.
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On February 21 2011 06:19 Skrag wrote:
kcdc, have any reps showing cleaner execution on both sides? A clean 4gate should have either 6 stalkers or 5 stalkers + a zealot attacking up your ramp at 5:45-5:50, and if your execution isn't clean you will probably just lose to an attack that fast. Specifically, if you don't have zealots #4+#5 already out at that time, and the immo within 5 seconds of finished or so, I don't see how you'll be able to stay even, much less get ahead.
Although if you have any reps of you beating the 5:45-5:50 with the same level of execution you showed in the posted reps, I'd love to see those too.
Definitely not saying you played bad or sloppy, but you were delayed a decent amount from an optimal execution, and the 4gates you've shown were all fairly late as well.
By "optimal" execution, I mean the times I was able to achieve playing the opening at the slowest game speed, as I'm only a low to mid diamond player, and simply don't have the speed to execute anywhere near optimally at fastest. However, by playing at slowest, I was able to come in quite a bit faster than what you've shown here by doing that (15-20ish seconds on the immo if I recall correctly), but was only able to cut about 2 seconds off a 5:45-ish attack in 4gate rep I found in another thread.
Doesn't warp gate FINISH at 5:45, and thus, the perfect attack is at around 6?
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kcdc, have you tried this build vs the 3 chrono stalkers? I lost with this build in ladder vs korean 3 chrono'ed stalker (see: Cecil thread)..my 1 zealot 1 stalker died along with 7 probes and couldn't catch back up.
I think this build is now very vulnerable on Steppes and smaller travel distance spawns..what do u think?
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On February 21 2011 07:14 Strivers wrote:
kcdc, have you tried this build vs the 3 chrono stalkers? I lost with this build in ladder vs korean 3 chrono'ed stalker (see: Cecil thread)..my 1 zealot 1 stalker died along with 7 probes and couldn't catch back up.
I think this build is now very vulnerable on Steppes and smaller travel distance spawns..what do u think?
You should be able to have 1 zealot 1 stalker 1 sentry out against 3 chrono stalkers, which is pretty much insta-win if they try to go up your ramp. You can easily scout the 3 chrono stalker build in time to adjust by chronoing out the sentry rather than getting such an early robo.
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On February 21 2011 06:19 Skrag wrote:
kcdc, have any reps showing cleaner execution on both sides? A clean 4gate should have either 6 stalkers or 5 stalkers + a zealot attacking up your ramp at 5:45-5:50, and if your execution isn't clean you will probably just lose to an attack that fast. Specifically, if you don't have zealots #4+#5 already out at that time, and the immo within 5 seconds of finished or so, I don't see how you'll be able to stay even, much less get ahead.
Although if you have any reps of you beating the 5:45-5:50 with the same level of execution you showed in the posted reps, I'd love to see those too.
Definitely not saying you played bad or sloppy, but you were delayed a decent amount from an optimal execution, and the 4gates you've shown were all fairly late as well.
By "optimal" execution, I mean the times I was able to achieve playing the opening at the slowest game speed, as I'm only a low to mid diamond player, and simply don't have the speed to execute anywhere near optimally at fastest. However, by playing at slowest, I was able to come in quite a bit faster than what you've shown here by doing that (15-20ish seconds on the immo if I recall correctly), but was only able to cut about 2 seconds off a 5:45-ish attack in 4gate rep I found in another thread.
I'll start saving them again. I ran a bunch of tests with Floophead and VanGool when I first posted this thread, but none of them were 100% perfect on both sides. I think we ran about 10 tests and this build held in all but 1. If I run into a particularly well executed 4 gate while I'm using this build in ladder tho, I'll post it. It's really hard to run a perfect 4 gate while scouting, microing and defending your forward pylon.
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If anyone's interested, I've been working on transitions for this build, and in my limited testing, I think you can expand fairly safely after 2 immortals. This expansion timing happens after a 4 gate would hit, so you don't have to worry about that. The next attack timing is 3 gate blink, and with the 2 immortals, I've been able to hold that pretty comfortably for the most part. After the blink timing passes, if they haven't expanded, the next standard attack timing is 1 base collosus. I've been able to hold this by getting 2 more gateways (total of 4) and pumping zealots, stalkers and immortals with 1 warp prism. 1 base collosus is very zealot heavy, so you're free to load 2 immortals into the warp prism and drop them on his collosi. Even if you're not able to kill them, you can keep the collosi running around which neutralizes a lot of the DPS in the attack.
Of course, ~6 min 4 gate, 3 gate blink and 1 base collosus are only the most standard attack timings you'll have to worry about. It's possible that this expansion timing will simply die to something funky like a delayed 4 gate or quick chargelots. Given the current metagame, however, it seems like a strong play.
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How do you deal with a phoenix opener using this build? I know they are pretty rare, but for the most part and 3 gate stargate build is indistinguishable from a robo build until after your scouting probe is chased off. If you are lucky, your obs will be out about the same time he pushes out with 3 phoenix and you will have time to warp in one round of stalkers. If not, you are left with one stalker to protect your immortals while his zealots and a few stalkers combat your smaller gateway army.
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On February 24 2011 04:11 brainpower wrote:
How do you deal with a phoenix opener using this build? I know they are pretty rare, but for the most part and 3 gate stargate build is indistinguishable from a robo build until after your scouting probe is chased off. If you are lucky, your obs will be out about the same time he pushes out with 3 phoenix and you will have time to warp in one round of stalkers. If not, you are left with one stalker to protect your immortals while his zealots and a few stalkers combat your smaller gateway army.
Stargate openings require 2 gas early enough to scout it with a probe. If you see 2 gas, you don't need to prepare for the 6 min 4 gate by going zealot/immortal, and you can take 2 gas.
If you do find yourself using this build against a stargate opening, however, you're not in that bad of shape. Just make sure you have more zealots than he does, and you'll be ok.
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More replays added showing my expansion transition.
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EPT
