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[D] PvZ 2g-forge Expand, Hallu first - Page 4

Forum Index > StarCraft 2 Strategy
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Arachne
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
South Africa426 Posts
May 15 2011 15:46 GMT
#61
Been battling with PvZ myself, good call on the hallu. Cheaper then a robo fac and obs (which i was doing... :/). Was getting the early forge. +1 sooo much fun for keeping xelnaga's when he sends 4 lings against 1 zeo ^^
If I were a rich man, I wouldn't be here
Huckleuro
Profile Joined November 2010
United Kingdom294 Posts
May 15 2011 15:53 GMT
#62
I actually really like the idea/ build. (masters)

People are claiming that the build doesnt allow you to punish a greedy zerg. I actually disagree. The early halluc/ scout means that you can actually more accurately punish a greedy zerg. There is nothing to stop you doing a delayed 5 gate if he takes an early 3rd... or 6gating if hes being real greedy.

Good build, good idea. Probably can be abused if used all the time but as it stands this has been added to my array of PvZ builds.
W2
Profile Blog Joined January 2011
United States1177 Posts
May 15 2011 16:34 GMT
#63
On May 16 2011 00:37 CrAzEdMiKe wrote:
Show nested quote +
On May 15 2011 18:12 W2 wrote:
Are you sure this can hold well executed roach ling all ins? Because using halluc means you are down 2 FF's, plus 2gate without warpgate seems kind of low on units. And, that early phoenix tells the zerg you have no warpgate tech, and he does not have to worry about voids/pheonix/dts/blink/4gate.

I guess that means you are relying on good cannons since you have little units. What if a zerg is good at isolating them with roaches? What if a zerg makes 20 lings (doesn't put him that much behind) and keeps denying cannons from going up? You might have to force leapfrog many cannons, and delay your expo by a lot.

Actually, you know what I am really frightened of if I use this build.. is the warp gate timing. It is so late, it might actually be enough time for a zerg to saturate 2 base and start massing roaches on you (he can do it without worrying about holding voids/dts/blink stalkers.)


First off, I find that there are a lot of "What ifs" in this post. I'm not trying to sound rude or condescending or anything, but with this game you can play the "What if" game all day long. But in response to your post, I'll bring up a couple of points that I feel make your argument a little flawed.

First off, the Protoss is relying on good early scouting to know what's heading his way. That's how in the replay he was able to fend off the roach/ling aggression. Don't underestimate the power of scouting... Because a roach/ling bust is far more dangerous when it goes unscouted than when it is scouted as it gives the Protoss time to react and properly prepare his defenses.

Being able to deny cannons is a possibility however unlikely. 20 lings is not much of a mineral cost for Zerg but 10 larvae is. That could be 10 drones which over the long haul does make quite an impact. But the Protoss is basically slowly "creeping" his way out of his base with Sentries and Cannons, making it quite difficult for a Zerg to shut down the cannons effectively.

As for Warp Gate not being finished early, since this is a purely defensive opening that doesn't actually matter a whole lot. Warp gate tech really helps offensive pushes as you can reenforce immediately, but if you're only looking to turtle for a bit in your base it doesn't matter AS much that you don't get to spawn them wherever you want.

Although you shave off 10 seconds of build time with a Warpgate, the first round of units is a wash since it takes 10 seconds to morph the gateways into warpgates in the first place.

Finally, you are still able to go all sorts of tech avenues just like any other build. Just because you don't have a fast warp gate doesn't mean you can't throw down a Stargate. All that's needed is a Cyber core... So the whole "not worrying about voids/dts" is completely false, as you only need the cyber core to unlock that tech.


It's not a game. You always gotta consider the "what ifs" when making a build! Especially a build that shows its hand right at the start with the phoenix.

Also you cannot rush voids/dts properly with this build because you wg is delayed and you are spending gas on sentries/hallucinate. So the zerg will breathe a sigh of relief when he sees your early hallucinated phoenix, knowing 1) void/dt/blink rush out of the question 2) safe from 4gate.

Can you please address my biggest worry: a zerg who realizes this, saturates his two bases, and streams roaches/lings at you? Note: I am a very stubborn and evidence-based person.
Hi
Kiarip
Profile Joined August 2008
United States1835 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-15 17:22:06
May 15 2011 17:20 GMT
#64
On May 15 2011 21:46 dementrio wrote:
Show nested quote +
On May 15 2011 18:27 Drowsy wrote:
Just speculating, but what advantages do you think this has over 2-3 gate +1 stargate expand builds? Those seem to solve the roach/ling allin problem pretty convincingly, and set you up for cruncher style play. Even if you don't get any overlord/queen/drone kills, just forcing spores, insulating from mutas, controlling towers, and shutting down roach/ling early allins seems worth the cost of 1-2 voidrays and a phoenix.


I don't get where people got this idea that stargate or dt expand are safe against roach ling "allins". They're not.
The whole concept of a stargate or dt expand is flawed, since it's impossible to hold your expansion if you don't actually win with the dts or voidray.


whaaat?

it's very safe.


You rush to dts/voidrays you harass with them forcing him to spend money on tech, but then you go back and use them to defend, and they can defend roach/ling just fine, and the opponent doesn't have overseers/hydras yet, so you're SO safe.

Then in the case of stargate you'll have 1 phoenix to see whether he's going hydra or spire, and before he has either of those voidrays help delay expo.

In the case of DTs you can't really scout but you just go blink stalkers because they're pretty damn good against anything, or Archon/zealot like this thread suggests. Make sure you have a forge to detect burrowed roaches or similar garbage, and you're in good shape.

edit: sorry, it's not this thread that suggets Archon/Zealot, it's the archon/zealot thread, but still they're pretty decent.
Sir Snoopy
Profile Joined March 2011
United States57 Posts
May 15 2011 18:14 GMT
#65
What would you do assuming this goes into the late game?
That's SIR Sir Snoopy to you!
Deleted User 3420
Profile Blog Joined May 2003
24492 Posts
May 15 2011 18:28 GMT
#66
On May 16 2011 00:36 Markwerf wrote:
Hallucination before warpgate makes absolutely no sense and is just not neccesary.
Hallucination that quickly is just too early, your scouting probe can tell what's up in the early game and you hardly have energy to waste from your sentries then.
Just go warpgate -> hallucination but chrono your cybercore alot, hallucination will come out quick enough for 2 base roach/ling pushes but you will have early warpgate which is just neccesary to make stalkers quickly enough. Not chronoing your gates is fine as you are building pure sentries early anyways..

Simply put, hallucination before warpgate is NEVER worth it.


Did you even read the OP? You don't argue the points I make, you just say "no". and you're totally wrong, lol. You can't scout what the zerg is doing with a probe once he has speedlings, that's nonsense.
Deleted User 3420
Profile Blog Joined May 2003
24492 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-15 18:32:53
May 15 2011 18:30 GMT
#67
On May 16 2011 03:14 Sir Snoopy wrote:
What would you do assuming this goes into the late game?


Same as protoss always does in the late game vs zerg. Use hallucination and react to what you see. Most likely collossus/stalker/sentry/immortal first, and if the zerg makes tons of corruptors I will switch to immortal/templar/whatever. Keep up on bases.

It's the same as late game play from 3gate sentry expand except you have a better economy.
caradoc
Profile Blog Joined January 2011
Canada3022 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-15 18:33:31
May 15 2011 18:31 GMT
#68
This is extremely interesting, and I will definitely be trying this. This is the kind of idea that makes me just smack my forehead and think, "why didn't I think of that earlier?!", insta warpgate research as soon as cybercore is just so set in stone, but this build makes so much sense--

its a really elegant strategy-- if zerg all-ins, you scout it, have cannons, and are ahead in econ.

if zerg goes for an econ heavy build, you won't need warpgate for a bit longer anyways.
Salvation a la mode and a cup of tea...
Deleted User 3420
Profile Blog Joined May 2003
24492 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-15 18:33:26
May 15 2011 18:32 GMT
#69
On May 15 2011 22:41 Ifrit wrote:
Show nested quote +
On May 15 2011 07:32 travis wrote:
because in 3gate sentry expand you haven't been constantly chronoboosting probes.

Actually I always thought this is the right way to play with the 3 Gate expand? oO
I've been using it for several months now and I always dedicate every single one of my CBs on Probes unless I smell cheese/all-ins (no hatch at expansion/massive amounts of Lings, very early Pool or 7RR) up until the Forge is done which is when I will start CBing upgrades+Probes.

What else is supposed to be CBed with the 3 Gate expand build, Warptech or Sentries?


No, 3 gate sentry expand you chronoboost your warpgate. If not you will die to an allin, because you don't have a forge to make cannons. So you need faster warpgate to be able to make faster reinforcements.
FuzzyLord
Profile Joined September 2010
253 Posts
May 15 2011 20:33 GMT
#70
Does this work on all maps? Or only the ones with relatively small chokes? I have this feeling that walling off on maps like XNC would take a while and leave you open to early pressure on your nat.
Deleted User 3420
Profile Blog Joined May 2003
24492 Posts
May 15 2011 20:55 GMT
#71
On May 16 2011 05:33 FuzzyLord wrote:
Does this work on all maps? Or only the ones with relatively small chokes? I have this feeling that walling off on maps like XNC would take a while and leave you open to early pressure on your nat.


It works on all maps. just place cannons intelligently, and if they try to maneuver around them block it off with forcefields and get stalkers. You will have so many sentries you will be able to lay down a ton of forcefields.

On XNC if they want to wrap around the back they will have to go allllll the way around the rock'd 3rd and that takes forever with roaches.
CanucksJC
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
Canada1241 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-15 21:34:00
May 15 2011 21:33 GMT
#72
Hmm, so say you did this and scout the zerg going 2 base roach ling all-in, I guess you would just put down mass cannons...? Then aren't you way behind, zerg can pick off whatever outside the range, you don't even have wg research done... Interesting idea though, and it will require more game sense to know when to produce which units too imo.

I still think Inca's dt expand has some potential. I mean, with MC as his mentor / partner, he didn't just try some improvised build 3 games in a row in the most important series of his life
UBC StarCraft Club is official @ UBC Vancouver campus! Your first eSport community on campus. Welcomes players of all levels at UBC. Follow us on facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/group.php?gid=155630424470014 or IRC @ irc.rizon.net #ubcsc
dave333
Profile Joined August 2010
United States915 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-15 21:56:29
May 15 2011 21:56 GMT
#73
Inca'd DT expand has potential, but the difficulty is finding a balance between disguise/getting the DTs out quick enough. Each of the games he made it totally obvious he was going some sort of tech; only 1 stalker, 1 sentry, 1 zealot--> expo. More sentries would delay the DTs but have better disguise, however it seems Nestea always puts his Evo chamber down around the same time every game, which really reduces the effect of this sort of thing.

Inca getting photon cannons would've helped a lot though.
ODKStevez
Profile Joined February 2011
Ireland1225 Posts
May 15 2011 22:05 GMT
#74
On May 15 2011 07:57 BoxedLunch wrote:
I'd like to see replays of this. I'm sure the thread won't get closed considering who the OP is, but this sounds pretty legit, so I'd love to see it in action.


TeamLiquid are extreamely fair on who they ban. Just look at past bans such as IdrA. They are fair to protect these forums.
Luppa <3
CanucksJC
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
Canada1241 Posts
May 15 2011 22:06 GMT
#75
On that idea, I think going gas first DT expand would have a much higher potential... still trying to figure out how it would work, the main problem is overcoming the mid-game once the zerg gets one overseer -_-

Anyway, on topic I'm gonna go try this out :D
UBC StarCraft Club is official @ UBC Vancouver campus! Your first eSport community on campus. Welcomes players of all levels at UBC. Follow us on facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/group.php?gid=155630424470014 or IRC @ irc.rizon.net #ubcsc
Markwerf
Profile Joined March 2010
Netherlands3728 Posts
May 15 2011 22:29 GMT
#76
On May 16 2011 03:28 travis wrote:
Show nested quote +
On May 16 2011 00:36 Markwerf wrote:
Hallucination before warpgate makes absolutely no sense and is just not neccesary.
Hallucination that quickly is just too early, your scouting probe can tell what's up in the early game and you hardly have energy to waste from your sentries then.
Just go warpgate -> hallucination but chrono your cybercore alot, hallucination will come out quick enough for 2 base roach/ling pushes but you will have early warpgate which is just neccesary to make stalkers quickly enough. Not chronoing your gates is fine as you are building pure sentries early anyways..

Simply put, hallucination before warpgate is NEVER worth it.


Did you even read the OP? You don't argue the points I make, you just say "no". and you're totally wrong, lol. You can't scout what the zerg is doing with a probe once he has speedlings, that's nonsense.


That is because the OP hardly contained any good arguments in favor of getting hallucination first.

Yes there is a gap between getting denied scouting by lings (though it takes quite some time for speedlings to finish usually) and hallucination finishing. This doesn't mean that scouting earlier is automatically better, after all scouting is only useful if you have the means to adapt to what you see well. This build scouts so early and has no warpgate for a long time that it's quite hard to efficiently use the information you see with scouting. Also note that pressure after your first 1 or 2 sentries finish and before you make your nexus and pylon on the lowground is nonexistant in PvZ.. Once you have a few sentries and WG going you are safe from any early attacks, it is only when you start your expo that you get vulnerable again = > why scout so early when you aren't putting down the nexus that early anyways...
Finally wg before hallucination functions much smoother because:
- wg tech is cheaper and takes longer to research and thus is easier to afford fast. With a hallu first build you need 100/100 when the core finishes and 50/100 for that sentry when the zealot finishes, with a wg first build you effectively save yourself a 50/50 investment for practically two minutes.
- wg tech is safer despite not having fast scouting, hallu won't do any good if they do something wonky like a baneling bust or super fast roach pressure as you won't even have the spare energy to scout then nor will you need to. WG still helps as much as before when making zealots and stalkers...
- Super early hallucination simply conflicts with having a sentry to use hallucination. Suppose you use a FF to kill 4 of his lings on your ramp, you won't even be able to use hallucination when it finishes then..


The entire build is just not efficient, why use so many chrono's on your nexus for example?? Beyond the first four there is almost no use to chrono your nexus as you are saturated by that point anyway, you are better off investing chrono and money into something that can actually allow you to expand faster like WG tech and a forge. An earlier nexus easily makes up the buildtime for probes and allows a quicker maynard. If you chrono wg and then hallucination afterwards it will still finish relatively quickly but you are actually much safer because you have two warpgates going instead of normal gateways much quicker. Warpgates are still 10s faster then normal gates for stalkers which is what you need to make against pushes...
freetgy
Profile Joined November 2010
1720 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-15 22:48:09
May 15 2011 22:44 GMT
#77
i also think watching your replay, that this build gives zerg the option of just double expanding cause your no where in shape of pressuring your opponent if he can force cannons out of you.

you also can't afford to constantly scout with phoenixes cause you need the Energy for forcefield defence, while i don't say it has no advantages. i am not sure if it is worth it.

Keilah
Profile Joined May 2010
731 Posts
May 15 2011 22:47 GMT
#78
-I tried a build very much like this, and comedically my opponent decided to 1-base roach rush me (lol wtf) and I died because I had no stalkers or cannons and warpgate was miles away.

-If you hallu just a FEW zealots for the 'attack', that's better than loads because
a)its more realistic looking
b)you don't blow all the energy on your sentries
c)because of b), he can't just see 'oh no energy on sentries, must be hallus'

-possibly you could time your attack with the completion of warpgates and build a proxy pylon, then fly in a hallu phoenix to see if you should actually attack or GTFO

-hallucinate is decent in combat vs a z with no detection, the hallus tank damage

-someone PLEASE take advantage of the fact that 1 hallucinate = 4 probes, combined with the fact that probes which aren't attacking make a movable wall that must be manually targeted to get through, find a way to make this >> FF and post a replay. PLEASE
iChau
Profile Joined December 2010
United States1210 Posts
May 15 2011 22:56 GMT
#79
On May 16 2011 07:44 freetgy wrote:
i also think watching your replay, that this build gives zerg the option of just double expanding cause your no where in shape of pressuring your opponent if he can force cannons out of you.

you also can't afford to constantly scout with phoenixes cause you need the Energy for forcefield defence, while i don't say it has no advantages. i am not sure if it is worth it.



If he was making a lot of roaches and lings, thinking of breaking a standard 3 gate expo, then he is behind because he used so many larvae.
us.battle.net/sc2/en/profile/1688911/1/SaniShahin/ | http://teamenvy.net/
Nisco
Profile Joined September 2008
Brazil98 Posts
May 15 2011 23:06 GMT
#80
I've been doing this, but I didn't think about going hallucination first. Makes total sense though. Considering primarily sentry production, there really isn't a need for warpgate as early as we used to need it.
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