EPT[Q]PvT ogsMc/voidray opening - Page 2
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Mada_Jiang
Australia236 Posts
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W2
United States1177 Posts
replay of me doing MC's build with good execution. Enjoy | ||
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drcatellino
Canada346 Posts
Then I began experimenting with void rays build and my life changed for the best. Basically I use a 3gate stargate build. Here is the build order and global strategy I use: + Show Spoiler + 9 Pylon 13 Gateway 14 Assimilator 15 Pylon 16 Cyb core 17 Assimilator 17 Zealot (not counting anymore) Research Warp Gate, then when you have enough gas build the stargate Then 2 more Gateway When Stargate finishes, build void ray then place proxy pylon. At 6:05, the first void ray finishes. Warp in 1 sentry and 2 stalker. Between 6:40 and 7:00 you should be ready to launch your attack. If wall in, poke it and use low ground stalker to kill stuff. If no wall in, just walk in and use force field to mess with your opponent infantry. Void rays should focus on marauders. Void rays reinforcement should be on the way if the attack does not succeed immediatly. Keep sending waves of Gateway units too. You should focus on killing the add-ons first, then the production buildings (if there is a starport kill it). This attack don't have to be focused on mineral line since void rays kill buildings so fast. I used this build about 20 times against Terran. I lost 2 times to people with no wall-in and awesome marines control. ( I am 2500 Diamond) Here is a replay of this build, against a player using tanks. It's mostly to show the timing you should focus on. ![[image loading]](http://img33.imageshack.us/img33/5404/voidrayreplay.jpg) DrCatellino vs KYU | ||
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Azzur
Australia6255 Posts
The 3-gate 1-star build is a powerful, flexible protoss opening that can outright kill or contain the terran which allows the protoss to seize an economic lead. As some people have pointed out, there are several variations to it, but if you're not at the pro-level, any basic 3-gate 1-star will do. In fact, my build is tailored to fight against this specific protoss build. I open 1-1-1 cloaked banshees with reactored marines. If the terran goes infantry (especially marauder) heavy (like 3-rax), they can also hold it off provided the play defensively and expand. If they go for a timing push, this can lead to a loss. | ||
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Yoshi Kirishima
United States10318 Posts
Vs a wall off: 2 gate stargate with 1 zealot 5 stalkers, robo at 6:30, hit at 7:00-7:10. I've seen MC do this build every time he scouts a wall off and he's won about 10/10 games with this build. I do a similar version that hits faster, cuts less probes, and hits with 4 stalkers instead. Vs 2 rax expand on close air distance Ex: vs IMMVP in gisado KOTH on metal 2 gate stargate expand. Gateway units should be more focused on zealot and sentry initially. MC put down a stargate once his probe luckily got up the ramp of the terran and scouted 2 rax. The concept of this build is to get 1 voidray and use it to pin you opponent in his base. This voidray also serves the purposes of forcing more marine heavy than he would like and being a scout. If you're really lucky, you can even force some turrets with just 1 voidray. A very marine heavy army can lose to pure gateway units with good forcefields if he chooses to attack you.. Then, when you finally get collosi, you'll rape his marine heavy army. Vs 1 rax expand: Ex: vs jinro on Shakrus in GSL 3 gate stargate with zealot/sentry heavy early on. At 7:55, all-in with 2 voidray, 3 zealot, 4 stalker, 2 sentry Vs low ground rax/depot: Ex: vs MKP on LT in GSL 3 gate stargate. Puts up a pylon on low ground and uses voidray for vision to warp onto high ground. I wouldn't recommend this build. It's very hard to execute and MC kinda got lucky in this game. I think MC was originally planning to depot bust and this was his backup plan. Wow thanks man  | ||
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Tekst
United States14 Posts
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Mada_Jiang
Australia236 Posts
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Quochobao
United States350 Posts
On February 11 2011 12:55 Mada_Jiang wrote: I am not questioning the masters here or anything saying that its in response to wall... but the fact of the matter is, my friend's 14 yo cousin who is a silver can exicute a 3 gate void, and run up when there is no wall and obliterate the T that happens to be low masters. . I really really do wish that you can post a replay to back this claim up. No walling means he's not teching too hard-- thus I'm having difficulty imagining how the Terran lost the fight. Any other replays of you is welcome too. | ||
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Azzur
Australia6255 Posts
On February 11 2011 15:04 Mada_Jiang wrote: Thanks Azzur, i have always felt that by the time 1 void comes out, the 3rd gate isn't really ready it, if i replace that gate with a robo, wouldn't that be better equiped for handeling banshees, while having the same attack force? Or maybe I am just doing it totally wrong. Dude if you have any reps I would love to see them please, and thanks to all who posted reps. Spectacular. Azzur I am sure I have seen your nickname somewherebefore, at a Lan or at a netcafe. You are Sydney sider? I don't think I have any replays where I fend off the 3-gate 1-star. I don't play protoss so I'm not sure about the specific timings of the 2-gate 1-star 1-robo. However, my feeling is that it's a safer build but will have less chance of killing the terran outright. You may have run into me on the ladder perhaps, I live in Perth. | ||
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Mada_Jiang
Australia236 Posts
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LeoLeo
Sweden456 Posts
ALL THE TIME It's really hard to hold and you gotta know if it's coming, I have a thumb rule: If u see 2 gas and no robo (because who proxies a robo?), it's a 3 gate stargate or a DT rush. What I do most games is open banshee and if I see no robo i throw down another rax make a reactoer on my factory and after my banshee and raven I make double viking and laugh at them. | ||
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sleepingdog
Austria6145 Posts
On February 11 2011 11:32 iamke55 wrote: Wow, this is the perfect example of a player copying a pro's build without understanding the reasoning behind it. Getting a fast void ray is not something you go into the game planning to do. It's a response to scouting the terran's wall off, which is sometimes seen on maps that are good for proxy gates. The idea is to pick off the two supply depots in the wall and force a response in the form of either turrets which are expensive, or a high marine count which allows you to kite with stalkers. It spots a banshee opening in time to get observers for cloak, and the presence of the stargate means your opponent will think twice about going for a 2 port timing. If you are looking for a standard blind opening, stick with 2 gate robo. Please people listen to this man. I've played around with this opening A LOT and I found it to be just too weak against standard MM play unless you go all-in. Against the typical wall-off there exists a really strong timing where you attack with 5 stalkers (3 built from the gate, 2 warped in) and a single voidray while getting your robotics and your expansion. You pick off depots, warp in 2 stalkers at home while getting an observer against the cloak-threat and are in a great position against outright mech-play. The reason why the voidray-opening works so good against a wall is, because a voidray has higher-range than a marine. Therefore there are always spots where you can shoot at stuff without marines being able to hit you back. And even if 2-3 can, then there are your stalkers picking them off. The problem against MM expo is, that many terrans learned that they need 2-3 bunkers to not die to a 4 gate. Unless you really are MC and can place 6-8 forcefields perfectly in split-seconds, then this will prevent any all-in. Just to put this into perspective, the 3 gate stargate loses even against a no gas mass-marine FE with mass-bunkers. Obviously you can't do any voidray-harassment against such an opening at all. Basicly if you go stargate against a 1 rax FE you already are in a position where you have to do damage because you are behind economicly. This is also why MC went all-in. Then this opening gets reduced to a meager all-in timing attack, like marine/tank, marine/banshee etc. Not stable. Against a more conservative 2 rax expansion with more marauders you can do some harassment and expo yourself. Nevertheles the problem here is the transition. I played some time with a build HuK used, to harass with voidrays, expand and tech hard to storm. Since he needs some marines at home he won't be attacking you (unless all-in). Nevertheless this has a very weak timing, especially if he gets turrets up. Due to the fact that you force marines, you have to get colossi better sooner than later. And here comes another problem into play....namely that terrans will want to slowly tech to vikings to have an additional force against your voidrays. They hardly ever will stay with pure mass marines. Now these vikings just happen to hard-counter your colossi. This means, while primarily forcing marines, you ALSO already force the perfect counter to the colossus which you are teching to after all. If you slow-tech to colossus after a robotics, the terran relies on scouting and intuition. Because blind vikings will lose him the game against a double forge play with early third and against an early storm-tech. If you open with void-rays the terran has his tech-path perfectly layed out - first get more marines than marauders, then add vikings. There is hardly anything you can surprise him with, unless you hard-tech to storm which again can mean you just die right before storm tech is ready. | ||
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Lurk
Germany359 Posts
However, sometimes i just die to the push, especially if i don't see it coming and it's a map with a long mineral line - ramp distance (like SoW). I'd say i have about 75 % success rate though. Phoenix openers on the other hand ... just drive me crazy. | ||
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Mada_Jiang
Australia236 Posts
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sleepingdog
Austria6145 Posts
On February 11 2011 20:48 Mada_Jiang wrote: Thanks sleepingdog and lurk. I am assuming you are like.... high masters or something am I right? Was wondering if you had some reps to share, and if you can maybe comment on what you think would be an ideal opening. It's hard when we have 2 master P and Ts telling me how amazing voidray opening is and how it can outright win or "FORCE" a contain.... while you are saying that it is only for wall in, and even then not so good because there is no adequate follow up, is that right? Please don't get me wrong, I don't doubt what you say, I would just love to see it happen... iamke55, sleeping dog and lurk, if you have reps please share and much thanks for wisdom. Nope I'm not in masters, currently my MMR is high diamond/low masters (ppl I get matched up against). The only "prove" that I have concerning the unviability of voidray harassment is that it's rarely done in pro-games. If you have read my post closely, I have NEVER stated that it can't outright win or force a contain. My whole post was centered about the point that it's not that viable against a 1 rax or 2 rax FE where you want to go into a macro-game. If this wasn't clear enough, then I want to state it here again explicitly. The voidray opening done by MC vs Jinro on shakuras and against MKP on LT was therefore very all-in-ish. I doubt that MC had that much of a back-up-plan in case it failed. Also I saw MC open voidray-harass on xeph's stream vs NexByun...the harass didn't go too well and MC lost the game because his expo was ages behind. Conclusion: voidray opening a) vs wall-in: really good opening, you can always do damage if you don't screw it up. Follow it up with a robotics and an expansion, you will be ahead. You delay/prevent timing-attacks, are safe vs banshees and delay the expansion of terran. b) vs 1 rax/2rax expo: not a very good opening if you want to go into macro-mode. You have to delay your nexus because you won't be able to defend it against aggressive marine-heavy MM play. Also the harass forces vikings after the marines, which is bad because of the colossus-transition. Nevertheless it's a good and viable strategy when played as an all-in. However - as every all-in - it can be defended with proper preparation. I have a folder with about 5-10 successful non all-in stargate-opening-replays by pros and by myself...if you want I can post the ones against the wall-off to see why it's so effective. | ||
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Lurk
Germany359 Posts
If he relies heavily on marines and bunkers to fend you off, you can still try to pick off stray marines with stalkers and harass the mineral lines and try to force stims (he won't have medivacs for a long time to it's gonna hurt). As long as you don't loose your rays you'll be fine. He can't attack you because his marines will get slaughtered by your stalkers without the cover of bunkers. So you'll be free to expand yourself and switch to whatever tech you like. If he techs (1/1/1) he will likely have a viking on the way by the time you get to his base and have a bunker full of marines at the ramp. In this case, you can still do some damage - pick off a depot, harass the mineral line with the ray (if he pulls the marines out of the bunker to battle the ray, charge the front with the stalkers). Sometimes, he the terran is not scouting properly, you can put a pylon near his base and warp in stalkers inside his base with the vision from the ray. His 6-7 marines he will have by that time won't stand a chance without their bunker. In any case, you'll want to get a robo ASAP and chrono out an observer to fight the cloaked banshee(s) that are most likely on the way. Always remember that your only goal is to kill all his marines, even if you loose all your stalkers by doing that - it won't matter if he has marauders left. Once he has no marines left, your voidray(s) WILL kill him. He can only reproduce marines 2-3 at a time and that's not enough to handle a VR (which will recharge shields in between waves). I will try to look over my replays and see if find some but i'm not facing this build very often so keep you fingers crosses (phoenix openings seem to be way more popular nowadays). | ||
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Thorxes
United States119 Posts
On February 11 2011 18:20 sleepingdog wrote: Please people listen to this man. I've played around with this opening A LOT and I found it to be just too weak against standard MM play unless you go all-in. Against the typical wall-off there exists a really strong timing where you attack with 5 stalkers (3 built from the gate, 2 warped in) and a single voidray while getting your robotics and your expansion. You pick off depots, warp in 2 stalkers at home while getting an observer against the cloak-threat and are in a great position against outright mech-play. The reason why the voidray-opening works so good against a wall is, because a voidray has higher-range than a marine. Therefore there are always spots where you can shoot at stuff without marines being able to hit you back. And even if 2-3 can, then there are your stalkers picking them off. The problem against MM expo is, that many terrans learned that they need 2-3 bunkers to not die to a 4 gate. Unless you really are MC and can place 6-8 forcefields perfectly in split-seconds, then this will prevent any all-in. Just to put this into perspective, the 3 gate stargate loses even against a no gas mass-marine FE with mass-bunkers. Obviously you can't do any voidray-harassment against such an opening at all. Basicly if you go stargate against a 1 rax FE you already are in a position where you have to do damage because you are behind economicly. This is also why MC went all-in. Then this opening gets reduced to a meager all-in timing attack, like marine/tank, marine/banshee etc. Not stable. Against a more conservative 2 rax expansion with more marauders you can do some harassment and expo yourself. Nevertheles the problem here is the transition. I played some time with a build HuK used, to harass with voidrays, expand and tech hard to storm. Since he needs some marines at home he won't be attacking you (unless all-in). Nevertheless this has a very weak timing, especially if he gets turrets up. Due to the fact that you force marines, you have to get colossi better sooner than later. And here comes another problem into play....namely that terrans will want to slowly tech to vikings to have an additional force against your voidrays. They hardly ever will stay with pure mass marines. Now these vikings just happen to hard-counter your colossi. This means, while primarily forcing marines, you ALSO already force the perfect counter to the colossus which you are teching to after all. If you slow-tech to colossus after a robotics, the terran relies on scouting and intuition. Because blind vikings will lose him the game against a double forge play with early third and against an early storm-tech. If you open with void-rays the terran has his tech-path perfectly layed out - first get more marines than marauders, then add vikings. There is hardly anything you can surprise him with, unless you hard-tech to storm which again can mean you just die right before storm tech is ready. What if the strat is to hold off early MM and MMM pushes by forcing the vikings early? Yes you force vikings that counter the colossus you need to get in order to make it to the late game, but if you have a stargate up, why not cut VR production and pump out a few pheonix to soak up some damage from the vikings and return some fire on them? Essentially you delay Terrans early push while getting the tech needed to make your colossus survive longer. This may not work, but I'm trying to play devil's advocate and find a good way to transition out of the early game from this build. | ||
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Vega62a
946 Posts
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Azzur
Australia6255 Posts
On February 11 2011 18:01 Mada_Jiang wrote: Does that meant you been killed by 3 gate star consistently? Thats ok, how about replays of you getting rolled by 3 gate star lol. Back in the GSL3 days, I saw this opening alot more and that is how I tweaked my build to better handle it. Currently on the NA ladder, I haven't seen this opening that much. I would say I have good results when facing against it and some break-evens. It is useful as a surprise weapon because many people are not expecting it. Sleepingdog does speak the truth in that a defensive terran play can beat the 3-gate 1-star opening. Anyways, if you follow the GSL, many terrans now do some sort of infantry based early expand (which is good against the 3-gate 1-star). Also, the protosses have been doing some sort of gateway sentry based bunker FF-bust so that is also going to reflect on the ladder since many ppl copy pros. | ||
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tehemperorer
United States2183 Posts
http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/137941-1v1-terran-protoss-xelnaga-caverns http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/137939-1v1-terran-protoss-xelnaga-caverns http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/121841-1v1-terran-protoss-xelnaga-caverns http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/121840-1v1-terran-protoss-lost-temple http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/121796-1v1-terran-protoss-lost-temple If you see you can't win you force a sentry contain and macro. I favor High Templar in this matchup mixed with either Immortals or Void Rays or both, depending on bases. HT/Immortal is super hard to stop since storm takes care of marines, and weakens marauders to the point where they are 1-2 shot by Immortals. If you have HT,VR you storm the marines then run your gateway army away, letting the VRs take care of everything else. The problem with Vikings is they are pretty weak to storm/VR too, taking a good deal of total health % from a single storm, so there is no real answer to this comp by T. They can still win, but only if they avoid head on engagements with the deathball. | ||
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