I played a valiant PvP against another protoss. But this caught me offguard.
Stargate. I pushed into his base with a pretty strong chargelot/collossus army. I saw that he didnt have that much so I went for it. He held it off with the help of his void rays. I then proceeded to macro up and make some void rays myself. I went to go engage one of his expansions when his army came. At first I thought I would have the fight, but then...
Then mothership came.
It vortex'd my entire army. How can anyone stop this? Any tips on my macro or scouting? Not sure what I can do better here when the other guy can simply make a mothership and win no matter what.
Sorry, I'm not sure about this, but can't you Feedback a Mothership? Plus they're ridiculously slow. If it's a long macro game you should be able to just avoid attacking directly into it until you get one of your own, or can keep doing hit n' runs on his expos. Sorry I'm not home and can't watch the replay, but I have rarely had a game where a Mothership was the determining factor, they're just too slow and easily sniped IMO.
for a start motherships take forever to build and you should be able to scout it, particularly now that you're not gonna be caught off guard by it.. i'd have thought stalkers and voids work well, and you can always follow voids with a mothership of your own!
If it is very, very late game PvP, you need a Mothership too, you can spread your units but it makes engaging him very difficult, especially if he starts sniping your observers (suiciding blink stalkers for them). When he has a Mothership and you don't, it becomes like attacking into a siege line, the onus is on you to control your army correctly, if you screw up then you will lose. It becomes pretty interesting though when you both have a mothership
On February 24 2011 10:47 lolitsme wrote: tl;dr learn to scout and spread your units.
gold league scrub.
Stop being an asshole and explain it properly you fucktard.
Back to topic: If you see mothership, ONE high templar is enough to render it useless by simply feedback that huge airship. Get couple observers and research observer speed. And about spreading, 50% of Masters never spread, don't see it necessary if he is in below Masters... except against ghosts
300/200 for fleet beacon + 400/400 for moship is a ridiculous investment. You should punish him for using his resources like that, and abuse the relatively large timing window you have.
Generally chargelots and colossi have trouble hitting air units, and just like viking wars in tvt if you start voids after the other player you're going to be behind. Make stalkers for AA along with your VRays.
As for scouting, use observers (like 3 or 4, not just 1) and when you see the mothership check its energy.
if it has enough for vortex try to avoid said vortex or blink under it to his army so if he vortexes you, he gets vortexed as well. Another idea would be to throw your whole army in there instead of letting half of it fight and half sit in nowhere :s
Thanks for the advice guys. It's my first time seeing a mothership in a game so I was extremely caught off guard. I'll try my units around, but I don't really see how it's possible.
His army engaged first with the mothership coming in afterwards. So our armies were fighting and then in a split-second the mothership appeared from behind and vortex'd as soon as it got in range. How can I spread my units out here? If some get vortexed and a fraction of my army is left out, wouldn't his army just obliterate mine?
yeah I know it's a rare situation, but seems like if he has a mothership and even if i have a mothership. just who ever gets the vortex first wins. this seems pretty crazy to me.
Prepare for every scenario, no matter how unlikely. Momma ships are rare, but you need to be prepared mentally not to panic.
With Z, I immediatly spam corruptors, and bank larva like a boss. there is a high probability there's an Archon Toilet on teh way, and my army is about to get roflstomped. I, as Zerg, need to be ready A.S.A.P to remax and engage him at HIS BASE, not mine, not in the middle of the map, but HIS base.
This gives me BARELY enough time to remax and strike back at a zero energy momma ship.
If some get vortexed and a fraction of my army is left out, wouldn't his army just obliterate mine?
yes true, which is why you should move your whole army into the vortex so he cant fight half your army at a time. UNLESS he has archons OR 3+colossi. When a vortex pops effectively all of the units that were in the vortex are in the same location and slowly spread out, if there are units that do splash damage (archons/colossi) you are screwed because ALL the units in the vortex will take the damage. So be very careful when judging whether its worth jumping in the vortex.
As a result of the extremely slow speed of the mothership, attacking elsewhere would be the simplest option. Also, as a result of your opponent having to send a large portion of his army to defend, you may be able to snipe the mothership with a small force with a couple of voids. Sniping the mothership is even easier if your opponent sends ALL his force to defend, since the mothership will be significantly trailing behind his army if he just 1A-s to your army.
You don't even need to upgrade storm or kaydarin amulet. Also, archons are very good in PvP, they soak up a ton of colossus fire, and take bonus damage from nothing (being psionic type only, I believe they are the only unit in the game with this attribute).
The thing is, teching to high templar in pvp isn't very practical (ie, storm does nothing) and also gas heavy and if you wanted archons it's more logical to get them from dt's. I guess if you had enough time, feedbacking would be one way to approach, you could also try to abuse the mobility of the mothership or just snipe it.
I would bet the vortex spell will be removed eventually. Blizzard is too lazy to rework archon or baneling splash due one abusive spell. Seems ridiculous that lazily pressing one button can wipe out an entire army. There are plenty of other creative abilities to give the mothership that aren't game breaking
I've seen the Mom being used more and more in the toss late game recently. It can really add a lot to your army. One of my favorite tricks I've seen done with it is using mass recall to bring your army back to your base.
This highlights the importance of scouting I think. It's not hard to scout, the signs are pretty obvious; fleet beacon generally with no carriers building (at least initially), and a nexus lit up like a Christmas tree. If scouted there are a few things you can do to combat it:
- Voidrays kill 'em super fast. This is probably the easiest thing to do.
- Templar to feedback
- Try and keep your army spread - use multiple hot keys this makes it easier to move chunks of your army around. You should do this no matter how you decide to deal with it.
- Get a Mom of your own and throw down your own vortex right after his. Your units will pop back out first then you can get good positioning on his army
- Abuse the his armies immobility. Drops, blink stalkers, phoenix, whatever really. That is a super expensive army. If you can wreck his economy enough you're in a good place.
I don't think Vortex or Archon Toilets are that OP. I have won many times while ppl tried to do an Archon Toilet to me. It is a good strategy just that. If everybody starts to call everything OP (actually they do) then doom drops would be OP as well. Using one unit to change the game is actually what mothership is designed for imo.
Other than that spreading your army or backing a little bit just until vortex finishes are good responses to this. On current ladder maps if protoss throws down a vortex it also blocks his own path so they can't follow you as effectively. So back off, not all the way back to your base but a little bit and attack back when the vortex finishes. Also attacking at their own base is also a really good idea. I don't think running into the vortex is viable anymore. You should just do this if he has no archons or collosi and most of your army already in vortex.
Yeah, running into the Vortex simply cannot be decent advice here. If a Protoss late-game army has a Mothership, it's extremely, extremely likely to have several Colossi too.
One templar for feedback is pretty cost-effective. Assuming by lategame you'll have the Twilight already, then 200/200 for the Archives, and 50/150 for a templar, = 250/350, compared to Fleet Beacon + Mothership, = 700/600. And there's a massive window for this, because you can a) scout a Fleet Beacon (doesn't necessarily mean MS, but a tell), b) scout the MS building out of a Nexus, c) Mothership moves slowly to get anywhere, d) MS doesn't spawn with enough energy to vortex. MS takes 160s to build, Archives take 50...
If you are sure your enemy is building a mothership, don't build one yourself, train archons if he's got air units and colossus if his army is ground focused. Throw AoE units into the vortex, send the others at enemy base/expo.
at 190 supply must have for any protoss army, with a mothership you feel like you have 300 supply on the map. It takes some training but its awesome if you want to attack unpunished with your whole army. But you need hts in pvp to protect your mothership against feedback, if you want to use it offensiv.
Other then that the vortex cast range is pretty low so you can retreat from any chokepoint and spread your units. When you see the mothership.
You should use your observer a bit more activ, not only to see what he has, but also to see weakspots in his defense, turtling up an army is fine but your opponent will do the same, so to get ahead and be able to attack you need to get some advantage, which can be done with harrassing.
PS: i use my mothership defensiv protecting the important expo saving harassment armys etc.
EPT
