Hello my name is Rob I'm a mid level masters toss player. This thread is to discuss the current trend in PvZ, the infamous roach ling build, and if possible try to find a new way to safely expand against zerg. I'm sure Most of you know it from watching GSL and other tourneys but here are the basics. I'm sorry if this explanation seems vague but there is no one build order.
step one: get an expansion
step two: get your desired number of drones, this can be high or low eco depending on how all in you want your attack to be(note you must stay on hatch tech)
step three: attack the toss shortly after he expands before the eco kicks in and his gateway ball is still primarily sentry (you can stream units or drone depends on the game)
The real strength of this build is just the threat of it at any moment, you just don't know if zerg is massing for a massive attack or a minor attack and expanding. Hell zerg can even feign aggression then rush burrow roach
Effects of this build on toss: As most of you also know the favored way for a toss to take his natural has been 3 gate sentry expand. Well tough luck that build cannot hold this if it is executed properly unless you blind hard counter by making a few hundred cannons. Another problem i have with this build is my inability to scout it before it's on top of me. Hallucinate finishes just in time to tell you that you are in fact going to die in 15 seconds.
So how does toss expand now with out playing a guessing game? Hey i know lets do a void ray expand roaches and lings sure can't shoot up. Well we all know how that turns out, the roaches and lings destroy your entire natural while your void rays sit above tickling them.
The one obvious hard counter is DT rushing, but ill come back to my original point that you cannot scout roach ling thus you must blind dt expand. While that may work out ok on the ladder i feel that the pvz match up is starting to force both sides to just play guessing games. If this will requiring patching or just further understanding of the game is not for us to say
http://www.gomtv.net/2011gslsponsors3/vod/65293 Nestea knows that inca cannot stop Roach ling and assumes he will go DT. Nestea assumes correctly and blind counter wins. (no hate towards nestea i would give him both my kidneys)
I would love to see some high level players figure out some kind of PvZ robo expand build that actually works but i have yet to dabble. Post some reps ploz gogo immortal use!
I go voidray expo, or get a stargate right after i expo and cut sentries a little (and still only on maps you cannot forge fe on). 3gate used to be the safe build with average economy, and now it's just a build with average economy.
you pretty much have to blindly go at least 2 cannons and if he builds dones you will have to play from even more behind than you used to. dt build doesn't hard counter this by the way. just a few minerals for a safety evo chamber won't hurt his attack at all and if he sees dts he will just go back build spores and a milllion drones because you can't attack him with the few units you have and play from there.
defend all game and build colossi ht ball (you will lose to infestor bling without ht) and hope he messes up. or be a million times better and outmicro him with blink. not sure what else works right now.
My problem with stargate expand is that roach ling STILL kills it. On forge FE maps ok that's different but what about the nestea spine crawler rush, not seeing it to much yet but i see it becoming a standard play vs Forge FE
On May 19 2011 04:19 Arcanefrost wrote: I go voidray expo, or get a stargate right after i expo and cut sentries a little (and still only on maps you cannot forge fe on). 3gate used to be the safe build with average economy, and now it's just a build with average economy.
This is a very strong move. I am only mid/high diamond, but I encountered similar shenanigans the other night. It looked like a 3 gate expand and he moved out and killed all my forward lings at the expo timing. When I attacked shortly after I was met with no expo, many zealots, a few sentries and 2 voids (a third joining shortly after). I was pretty surprised and I was unable to hold it off.
spine crawler rush only works on maps you don't usually forge fe on. if the spines can only shoot the wall and aren't close to the nat it's not all that good.
On May 19 2011 04:24 gheyrobot wrote: My problem with stargate expand is that roach ling STILL kills it. On forge FE maps ok that's different but what about the nestea spine crawler rush, not seeing it to much yet but i see it becoming a standard play vs Forge FE
You can forge fe safely on more maps than you may think although there are still some maps you have to open one base.
The spinecrawler rush is just a gimmick, probe scout before ling speed finishes you'll see a lair building and 1 gas with no guys mining gas. Add a second gateway and chronoboost a few stalkers and kill the spinecrawlers before they morph in and kill the overlords, stay near your cannon to defend your stalkers against speedlings.
Clearly you did not watch the replays, The timings on roach ling crush void ray builds with much ease And yes Forge FE is still very strong PvZ spine crawler rushing comes down to the zerg preventing scouting.
On May 19 2011 04:31 evanthebouncy wrote: It's just something you have to deal with and get better at. If you look at zerg when we expand we play the guessing game ALL THE TIME.
Thats why i posted, i want people to think of new types of Toss expands. And that's really not true i played a lot of zerg season 1 and it is very easy to pin the protoss player on either Templar stargate or gateway by scouting the front and noting expo timings.
On May 19 2011 04:39 Gescom wrote: Nothing stops you from getting 3-4 gates and expanding gently with a forge and decent sim-city. ?_?
Except for the other response for a zerg seeing a 3gate expand is to drone up super heavily after ling speed and taking a slow nexus will give you a large disadvantage in the midgame.
We all know zerg has scouting issues vs terran but vs toss you should never be surprised early game to an extent that loses you the game or your expansion ALWAYS build a third queen
EX you see a late nexus and low sentry count Conclusion: DT or Stargate Reaction: Build a fourth queen and a spore crawler+drones
EX High sentry count+fast nexus Conclusion: no dts no stargates
you should be doing very little guessing as zerg vs toss and if you use your speedlings to their potential you should prevent ALL scouting untill obs/hallucinate
Because of this, when I 3 gate expand I drop a forge, and 4th gate down at my natural and always 2 cannons while sending out 2-3 probes periodically to check on the Zerg.
On May 19 2011 04:39 Gescom wrote: Nothing stops you from getting 3-4 gates and expanding gently with a forge and decent sim-city. ?_?
Except for the other response for a zerg seeing a 3gate expand is to drone up super heavily after ling speed and taking a slow nexus will give you a large disadvantage in the midgame.
The whole game revolves around scouting and reacting! If a zerg is building mass drones you can still chrono two nex worth of probes to keep up. If a zerg is cutting drones then throw down many cannons.
On May 19 2011 04:39 Gescom wrote: Nothing stops you from getting 3-4 gates and expanding gently with a forge and decent sim-city. ?_?
Except for the other response for a zerg seeing a 3gate expand is to drone up super heavily after ling speed and taking a slow nexus will give you a large disadvantage in the midgame.
The whole game revolves around scouting and reacting! If a zerg is building mass drones you can still chrono two nex worth of probes to keep up. If a zerg is cutting drones then throw down many cannons.
Except you can't reliably scout after ling speed until hallucination/stargate tech kicks in which is too late.
You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
YES you are correct this game is about scouting and reacting, But you CANNOT do this as protoss once speed is out thus you are blind countering and crossing your fingers
On May 19 2011 04:39 Gescom wrote: Nothing stops you from getting 3-4 gates and expanding gently with a forge and decent sim-city. ?_?
Except for the other response for a zerg seeing a 3gate expand is to drone up super heavily after ling speed and taking a slow nexus will give you a large disadvantage in the midgame.
The whole game revolves around scouting and reacting! If a zerg is building mass drones you can still chrono two nex worth of probes to keep up. If a zerg is cutting drones then throw down many cannons.
Except you can't reliably scout after ling speed until hallucination/stargate tech kicks in which is too late.
Try going 2gate robo and pump an immortal and an obs out, then go from there. You can definitely hold roach/ling early on with an early immortal+zeals, if he's not cutting drones you can expand and add probes.
On May 19 2011 05:03 Mirl wrote: You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
Whenever I try this, protoss is so far behind economically that it is hard to make it back. He will see your void ray and throw down spores and build more queens. Then zerg is free to drone. Sure, he can't push out right away, but zerg knows you can't really pressure with a ground force and so he can drone up and throw down a few spines for your 3 gates. Even if you get an expo off it, it will still be behind zerg's economy.
Problem: Protoss is losing to a specific Zerg build!
Finding a solution: 1. Can we, within reason, just play better to make it work? No. Then the next step. 2. Can we do some small thing to prevent Zerg from countering the build without much alteration to the build? (I don't know the answer) If no, go to the next step. 3. Can we fall back to some contingency plan that easily counters the Zerg build if they attempt to counter your default build?(EX: Scout roach/ling, therefore x protoss all-in and win) If no, go to the next step. 4. What do we have to have, at what time, and where to counter the counter directly?(A really good question I'd love to know) Can we get this without making too drastic a sacrifice elsewhere? 5. Build is busted. Generate a new build. -Why did we use the old build. What was good about it. Highlight what had strong specific purposes, and highlight things that had high redundancy. Cross out things that did not havestrong purpose and re-evaluate things with low redundancy. Use this as the base for your new build. -Build the build to be sure to counter what countered the old build.
To be honest it's been hard to evaluate Protoss strength to Zerg for a while. Most of it really has appealed to me as relying on protoss turtling for an infinite strength colossus/forcefield deathball, the occasional cheeses, and tricking a Zerg into droning too heavily so you can crush him with a hidden timing push as he suspects you to just two base turtle to colossus and naturally plays very greedy in response. That sounds like a weak core metagame, although maybe it just sounds weak and it's actually much stronger in practice.
a skilled zerg really has no issues with early game stargate i feel, some kind of 2 gate robo expand needs to be devolved by a pro COUGH COUGH daynine DO EET
The problem with void ray expands is that 1 void ray takes forever to charge up and kill a few roaches. There's absolutely nothing stopping the zerg from just doing the same roach/ling aggression, except now you have probably 3 less sentries and 1 less stalker.
I don't really see how a 2-gate robo build could work, either. At 200/100 for the robo, and 250/100 for your first immortal, you're going to have 2 less sentries, and you won't have minerals to get a cannon up before roach/ling hits. A fast observer to see if the push is coming is good and all, but it doesn't help if you can't hold it off anyway.
Anything slower than a 3 Gate expand will put you at a severe economic disadvantage. Forge FE and 3 Gate can get easily punished by Roach/Ling timings that outright kill you or put you at a severe economic disadvantage. Zerg has map control until the first major push, so scouting is not possible for several minutes. Yes, Zerg has to play the guessing game too, but guess who wins when one side has all the information while the other doesn't.
So, the question is, what's the Protoss safe economic option in PvZ? Right now I see none, so the metagame is going to shift to 1 base all-ins.
Against 3 gate sentry expand this works very well, vs good sim city and a stargate expand not as to be seen on DF's stream vs MyM.SaSe yesterday. Can't provide any replay but his building placement was very good, he got 2 cannons, 2 phoenix and 1 voidray out but fewer sentries ofc and held it off pretty easily.
I hate to say it man, but this sounds surprisingly a lot like the QQ that IdrA currently has about zerg scouting. This is a really sweet zerg timing where you can't just do a build that's "safe enough" without scouting the opponent.
I just watched NesTea vs Inca G1. Inca sacrificed some efficiency in his build to try and trick NesTea, and it didn't work. As a result, all Inca had was a couple sentries, with which he did not FF hardly at all. At that point Inca was up 10 workers when the attack hit. It's the same thing that happens to zerg; play too risky, eco too much, don't make units, lose.
The nature of zerg is that their unit production is really spiky. If they're making a lot of units, their eco behind it will be abysmal. If you fear a roach/ling all in, you might have to sacrifice a scouting worker or stalker. At that point in the game, the zerg likely won't have much creep spread, and the only way they can deny scouting is by revealing their units to you. Any more than maybe... 10 lings at that point in the game (not sure on the exact number for this build) means aggression. It just comes down to just being more creative with scouting, or just taking the loss of a unit or two in exchange for information. I don't really know what else to say... this build is designed to punish expands without sufficient military force, and it did just that.
Wasn't the 3-gate sentry expand designed specifically to be safe against a roach/ling push? Otherwise, what's the point in it? Zerg can't just 1-A into a wall of 3 cannons and expect to automatically win. If they spend a lot of time building roaches instead of droning, they're going to be just as economically disadvantaged as you are.
If it's proven that forcefields cannot hold a roach/ling push (and I'm not totally convinced that they can't,) perhaps a defensive 4-gate should be tried? Delaying your expansion by 1 minute isn't going to end the game for you if your army value is higher early on. Plus, you're better primed to take a 3rd, since you have the defensive advantage of more Stalkers.
After watching Optikzero's stream I tried doing the regular 3gate sentry expand instantly followed by another gateway rather than the forge. So for it seems to work very well.
On May 19 2011 05:44 PrivateOvalawd wrote: I hate to say it man, but this sounds surprisingly a lot like the QQ that IdrA currently has about zerg scouting. This is a really sweet zerg timing where you can't just do a build that's "safe enough" without scouting the opponent.
I just watched NesTea vs Inca G1. Inca sacrificed some efficiency in his build to try and trick NesTea, and it didn't work. As a result, all Inca had was a couple sentries, with which he did not FF hardly at all. At that point Inca was up 10 workers when the attack hit. It's the same thing that happens to zerg; play too risky, eco too much, don't make units, lose.
The nature of zerg is that their unit production is really spiky. If they're making a lot of units, their eco behind it will be abysmal. If you fear a roach/ling all in, you might have to sacrifice a scouting worker or stalker. At that point in the game, the zerg likely won't have much creep spread, and the only way they can deny scouting is by revealing their units to you. Any more than maybe... 10 lings at that point in the game (not sure on the exact number for this build) means aggression. It just comes down to just being more creative with scouting, or just taking the loss of a unit or two in exchange for information. I don't really know what else to say... this build is designed to punish expands without sufficient military force, and it did just that.
You can't sacrifice a worker if they're doing it right. They can take all the watchtowers and hide their lings. There's no way to scout it coming unless the Zerg messes up. (or unless the Protoss opens with something weird like 1gate SG or something.)
So, i beat this on the ladder yesterday by simply not expanding. It's amazing how far economically I was ahead. I went 2 gate robo, saw the incoming roach ling agression, used forcefields to stay alive and got 2 immortals while constantly making drones. Once I got 2 immortals out and held the initial rush, I made my expansion, made 2 more gateways, made a bunch of sentries and zealots and just killed his expansion. There was nothing he could do. My opponent obviously made a lot of mistakes, but I think it's something worth noting.
On May 19 2011 05:44 PrivateOvalawd wrote: I hate to say it man, but this sounds surprisingly a lot like the QQ that IdrA currently has about zerg scouting. This is a really sweet zerg timing where you can't just do a build that's "safe enough" without scouting the opponent.
I just watched NesTea vs Inca G1. Inca sacrificed some efficiency in his build to try and trick NesTea, and it didn't work. As a result, all Inca had was a couple sentries, with which he did not FF hardly at all. At that point Inca was up 10 workers when the attack hit. It's the same thing that happens to zerg; play too risky, eco too much, don't make units, lose.
The nature of zerg is that their unit production is really spiky. If they're making a lot of units, their eco behind it will be abysmal. If you fear a roach/ling all in, you might have to sacrifice a scouting worker or stalker. At that point in the game, the zerg likely won't have much creep spread, and the only way they can deny scouting is by revealing their units to you. Any more than maybe... 10 lings at that point in the game (not sure on the exact number for this build) means aggression. It just comes down to just being more creative with scouting, or just taking the loss of a unit or two in exchange for information. I don't really know what else to say... this build is designed to punish expands without sufficient military force, and it did just that.
I don't really see how sacrificing a Stalker would be a viable scouting option. For one, production is very limited early game if Protoss is doing an expand, so the smaller number of units is going to grow smaller to defend against this tidal push. Second, Zerg alway say that sac'ing an Overlord is impossible early game because of how far behind you would be, but now we're expected to sac 125 min/50 gas. Third, the most important point, is that 5-6 Speedlings can take out a Stalker before he can get anywhere to see anything. So for 3 larva, you can keep the Protoss guessing. Hardly a real economic sacrifice.
On May 19 2011 05:45 accaris wrote: Wasn't the 3-gate sentry expand designed specifically to be safe against a roach/ling push? Otherwise, what's the point in it? Zerg can't just 1-A into a wall of 3 cannons and expect to automatically win. If they spend a lot of time building roaches instead of droning, they're going to be just as economically disadvantaged as you are.
If it's proven that forcefields cannot hold a roach/ling push (and I'm not totally convinced that they can't,) perhaps a defensive 4-gate should be tried? Delaying your expansion by 1 minute isn't going to end the game for you if your army value is higher early on. Plus, you're better primed to take a 3rd, since you have the defensive advantage of more Stalkers.
It was designed against heavy Zergling and Baneling aggression. Between the Roach range increase and nerfed Gateway timings, Roaches have always been effective at busting cannon walls. Just surprised it hasn't caught on as much. As far as 4 Gate, then expand goes, I've never seen a game where Protoss 4 Gates then expands, and isn't behind, because you're usually obligated to do a whole round of Warp-In. He promptly loses thereafter from having a smaller long-term army. I don't know the exact time on delay is, but it's apparently significant enough. I could be wrong though.
I've been playing around with 1 Gate, 1 Robo, Expand then another Gate. It not only has to deal well with Roach/Ling, but Baneling Busts too.
This thread lacks a lot of "scientific" data. The zerg build hits exactly at 7:30. At what time does hallucination finish ? Does that time allows you to react properly to what you scout ? (ie : will you have time to prepare your defenses ?)
What we know : - one gate expo dies - 3 gates sentries die - forge expo dies - every kind of stargate build dies (because lings will ravage your probes before dying to any amount of void rays)
That let us with a combination of forge and gates. 3 gate forge with like 1 minute of probes cut would certainly work. Does 2 gates forge without probe cut would work ? 2 canons or 3 ? (or 4 ?)
This thread is starting the wrong way, everyone theorycraft without any kind of concrete base. I only play zerg and terran so I won't do the tests for you, but imo you should use a more "scientific" approach to this problem.
On May 19 2011 05:03 Mirl wrote: You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
Whenever I try this, protoss is so far behind economically that it is hard to make it back. He will see your void ray and throw down spores and build more queens. Then zerg is free to drone. Sure, he can't push out right away, but zerg knows you can't really pressure with a ground force and so he can drone up and throw down a few spines for your 3 gates. Even if you get an expo off it, it will still be behind zerg's economy.
120 supply void/colossi protoss deathball more effective than 160/170 zerg army imo.
I met Roach/Ling-Allins quite often on the ladder and I'm 3Gate-Sentry-Expanding every game (~1000 Points ML).
In my opinion its still doable under certain circumstances. Those are: Dropping a Forge and a 4th Gateway while your nexus is building, going up to 8 Sentries ASAP and getting some Stalkers afterwards combined with one cannon close to your nexus (You need that to be safe against Burrowpushes anyway).
Now to the important stuff:
First you aren't as blind as a lot of people try to put it - in fact, most of the time getting mapcontrol is as easy as warping in a second zealot and walk up to the Xel-Naga-Towers. Two possibilites:
1.you clean up his scout ling(s) and can proceed to walk up to his base, checking his saturation or how much units he has (Thats why you need 2 btw, because 1 could die to 4 zerglings)
2. He kills two Zealots which requires more zerglings than a zerg would regularly build - guess what could happen
Second: When you realize that all-in is coming - DONT GET MORE STALKERS. I made that mistake for a long time but in fact Zealots are far better in smaller numbers when their prey cant run from them and roaches are neither quick nor big in numbers for this push.
Third: Stay close to your buildings. You have a lot of FFs at your disposal but its still important to use them wisely. I crushed a lot of those pushes without losing a single unit by trapping the roaches close to my buildings with 3 FFs and killing them from afar.
Basically the defense of the push consists of two things: killing the roaches (unimportant) and killing the speedlings (important). The roaches only exist to bait your units out in the open where the speedlings can do the job - as soon as the speedlings are dead you can easily surround the roaches with FFs and finish them off.
But because of that dynamic you have to wait until he sacrifices his Speedlings in any way - if that means that its neccessary to let him take down a pylon/Gate/your Forge then fine - let him get that building, wait for him to stream his speedlings in and place the nail in the coffin - if hes not doing that you are fine as well for obvious reasons.
tl;dr-Version:
* Get a Forge and a Gateway while expanding * Use a group of two zealots to scout * If the all-in is coming stall your Stalkerproduktion, pump out zealots * Stay close to your buildings * Utilize your buildings/FFs to trap speedlings and be able to kill them * Be patient, don't go out in the open until you are sure that there's no mob of speedlings waiting for you
I totally feel the same - no idea how to open now.
Lately on certain positions I've just started 2gating (but not committing to an attack), while getting only 50gas for warpgate research, expanding, then adding on more gates + resuming gas. Tech is quite delayed, but feels very safe with option to attack a greedy zerg.
This is all of course depends on what I see with probe/zealot poking.. I feel that good players will simply respond to my 2gate correctly by fast roach - most of the people I've been meeting go into turtle mode upon seeing the 2nd gate.
Just a thought though - creating pressure / hitting the zerg before his build is ready (7:30 as someone mentioned).
This is just theorycrafting, but the main problem with the Roach/ling aggression is the Roaches killing defensive buildings then letting the lings stream through.
I have been experimenting with a 1 gas 3 gate FE, using mostly Sentry/Stalker. It is very slightly delayed, but you can have more workers on minerals and don't spend 75 on gas early, so it is barely later.
You also have to put the Forge at the front with at least 1 cannon to defend it. You then have to focus down the Roaches and get down fast Robo while making mostly Zealots to deal with any lings that do get in. Ideally, you end up with a good mix of Zeal/Stalker/Sentry and a reasonable Robo, along with +1 ups if you aren't attacked.
On May 19 2011 06:20 Trusty wrote: I totally feel the same - no idea how to open now.
Lately on certain positions I've just started 2gating (but not committing to an attack), while getting only 50gas for warpgate research, expanding, then adding on more gates + resuming gas. Tech is quite delayed, but feels very safe with option to attack a greedy zerg.
This is all of course depends on what I see with probe/zealot poking.. I feel that good players will simply respond to my 2gate correctly by fast roach - most of the people I've been meeting go into turtle mode upon seeing the 2nd gate.
Just a thought though - creating pressure / hitting the zerg before his build is ready (7:30 as someone mentioned).
This could work on close distance maps, but if you show up with like 1 stalker and 1 zealot and suddenly they have 5 roaches, then not only does your pressure do nothing, but you have a smaller army to defend with.
You build a pylon down your ramp, get a forge to beginn a wall of and 1-2 cannons depending on natural wideness. Make sure to produce nonstop from your 3 gate, or add an other gate. This way you are safe against burrow roach to. because cannons have detection and you can start your +1.
You need good forcefield micro.
I saw at some gm stream a toss holding it off this way. 3 gate expand is able to hold this kind of agression with good micro.
On May 19 2011 06:35 tskarzyn wrote: Have any toss played around with sending out multiple probes? IE one as decoy, and 1-2 probes taking roundabout routes.
You could do that or you send out two zealots which cost 50 minerals more and will kill a couple of zerglings even when going down ^^
Okay, in an effort to put more solid scientific data in this thread. Here's the documentation behind the first Inca vs. Nestea game of the series (http://www.gomtv.net/2011gslsponsors3/vod/65293).
Game starts at 35:18 and the timing hits at 40:36. That's at the 5:18 mark. As you can see from the game, Hallucinated Phoenixes come out exactly when the Roaches are at your doorstep. 9 Lings and 9 Roaches is the initial wave, followed quickly by another 6-9 Zerglings. Constant reinforcement of Lings after that. Lings force the Toss to Forcefield while Roaches peel off the Pylons and buildings. Immediate supply block and Probes start dying. Hole in wall leads to death.
I'll experiment with the double Zealot scout to see if that yields results. My biggest issue with that is the fact that you leave yourself open to a Zergling runby.
On May 19 2011 06:40 Cloak wrote: Okay, in an effort to put more solid scientific data in this thread. Here's the documentation behind the first Inca vs. Nestea game of the series (http://www.gomtv.net/2011gslsponsors3/vod/65293).
Game starts at 35:18 and the timing hits at 40:36. That's at the 5:18 mark.
Important note: Thats 07:50 Ingametime.
I was really shocked when I read about 9 lings and 9 roaches at 05:18 ^^
You shouldn't open yourself up to a runby with letting loose two zealots at ~07:50 (Especially as you are pumping out at least 2-3 sentries which will keep things sorted out in your base).
On May 19 2011 06:40 Cloak wrote: Okay, in an effort to put more solid scientific data in this thread. Here's the documentation behind the first Inca vs. Nestea game of the series (http://www.gomtv.net/2011gslsponsors3/vod/65293).
Game starts at 35:18 and the timing hits at 40:36. That's at the 5:18 mark.
5 minutes and 18 seconds real life time, yes, but not SC time. The attack hit at the 7:50 mark, and NesTea danced his roaches around for a few seconds trying to dodge the hallucinations. So probably more like 7:30-7:40. that's on Xel'Naga, which has a 30 second rush distance.
I think going halucination first could be the solution. Because of the sentry build time buff, they build just as fast as from warpgates.
I'm currently encountering the same issues with 3 gate expand. it just sucks if your first halucinated phoenix flies over the roaches outisde your base and you cant do anything to stop it. I even always get one canon blind, but most of the time its not enough. if it's perfectly executed, you really cannot stop it on maps where the natural is too wide open.
On May 19 2011 06:40 Cloak wrote: Okay, in an effort to put more solid scientific data in this thread. Here's the documentation behind the first Inca vs. Nestea game of the series (http://www.gomtv.net/2011gslsponsors3/vod/65293).
Game starts at 35:18 and the timing hits at 40:36. That's at the 5:18 mark.
Important note: Thats 07:50 Ingametime.
I was really shocked when I read about 9 lings and 9 roaches at 05:18 ^^
You shouldn't open yourself up to a runby with letting loose two zealots at ~07:50 (Especially as you are pumping out at least 2-3 sentries which will keep things sorted out in your base).
I was under the impression that you send out your first 2 Zealots instead of making Zealot/Stalker. So is it something like Zealot/Stalker/Sentry/Zealot? I meant a runby during the interim of both your Zealots walking out and waiting on the third Gateway unit.
How about hallucinate before warp gate? It will give you very early scouting and considering sentry build time has decreased, it will not hamper your production too much. It is true that zerg can freely drone up since Protoss has 0 chance of pressuring, but if the zerg is greedy, protoss can react to it by scouting, meaning greedier Toss. And that is not to say Protoss cannot do a timing attack. Hallucinate first removes any chance of a 4 gate, but a MC nexus cancel or a 6 gate are still fine.
On May 19 2011 05:03 Mirl wrote: You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
On May 19 2011 05:03 Mirl wrote: You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
Whenever I try this, protoss is so far behind economically that it is hard to make it back. He will see your void ray and throw down spores and build more queens. Then zerg is free to drone. Sure, he can't push out right away, but zerg knows you can't really pressure with a ground force and so he can drone up and throw down a few spines for your 3 gates. Even if you get an expo off it, it will still be behind zerg's economy.
120 supply void/colossi protoss deathball more effective than 160/170 zerg army imo.
If you're playing bad zergs. Ling/infestor destroys that build.
On May 19 2011 06:06 MrCon wrote: This thread lacks a lot of "scientific" data. The zerg build hits exactly at 7:30. At what time does hallucination finish ? Does that time allows you to react properly to what you scout ? (ie : will you have time to prepare your defenses ?)
What we know : - one gate expo diess - 3 gates sentries die - forge expo dies - every kind of stargate build dies (because lings will ravage your probes before dying to any amount of void rays)
That let us with a combination of forge and gates. 3 gate forge with like 1 minute of probes cut would certainly work. Does 2 gates forge without probe cut would work ? 2 canons or 3 ? (or 4 ?)
This thread is starting the wrong way, everyone theorycraft without any kind of concrete base. I only play zerg and terran so I won't do the tests for you, but imo you should use a more "scientific" approach to this problem.
Where did you get these two points of data from? I've seen that 3gate expo into 5gate dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that dt expand dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that 3gate expo into forge stargate dies from alicia vs losira.
I haven't seen games that backup the two points you made that I bolded however.
On May 19 2011 06:53 Cloak wrote: I was under the impression that you send out your first 2 Zealots instead of making Zealot/Stalker. So is it something like Zealot/Stalker/Sentry/Zealot? I meant a runby during the interim of both your Zealots walking out and waiting on the third Gateway unit.
I'm getting my first zealot and after that sentries only until my Nexus is building. While my expansion is under construction I'm getting my additional Zealot, Forge and 4th Gateway - theres not too much for your zealots to see if you send them out as your first and third unit but I could see that work as well (Zealot/Sentry/Zealot - you need that sentry to close the gap and to prevent the zerg from nibbling away your wall-off ^^).
I start getting my first stalkers after I'm up to 8 Sentries.
On May 19 2011 04:11 gheyrobot wrote: http://www.gomtv.net/2011gslsponsors3/vod/65293 Nestea knows that inca cannot stop Roach ling and assumes he will go DT. Nestea assumes correctly and blind counter wins. (no hate towards nestea i would give him both my kidneys)
This really isn't a blind counter. If you haven't seen your opponent move out to expand at that point two of the most common possibilities are stargate builds or dt builds. That's why the build didn't do direct damage in any of the games.
On May 19 2011 06:06 MrCon wrote: This thread lacks a lot of "scientific" data. The zerg build hits exactly at 7:30. At what time does hallucination finish ? Does that time allows you to react properly to what you scout ? (ie : will you have time to prepare your defenses ?)
What we know : - one gate expo diess - 3 gates sentries die - forge expo dies - every kind of stargate build dies (because lings will ravage your probes before dying to any amount of void rays)
That let us with a combination of forge and gates. 3 gate forge with like 1 minute of probes cut would certainly work. Does 2 gates forge without probe cut would work ? 2 canons or 3 ? (or 4 ?)
This thread is starting the wrong way, everyone theorycraft without any kind of concrete base. I only play zerg and terran so I won't do the tests for you, but imo you should use a more "scientific" approach to this problem.
Where did you get these two points of data from? I've seen that 3gate expo into 5gate dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that dt expand dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that 3gate expo into forge stargate dies from alicia vs losira.
I haven't seen games that backup the two points you made that I bolded however.
One gate expo (to stargate) died today in GSTL. And on crevasse, which is much more secure than most other maps (inbase natural) Forge expo I got that from IPL, I think it was kiwi vs idra but I'm not sure. But if 3 gates expo dies, 1 gate expo should die too.
With this build being so common I usually try to use a stargate expand, but you have to be careful that they don't just runby and nuke your base if you move out with the void rays.
On May 19 2011 07:36 ODKStevez wrote: With this build being so common I usually try to use a stargate expand, but you have to be careful that they don't just runby and nuke your base if you move out with the void rays.
I would love to see a replay of that. How many gates do you make ? I always thought that any build including a stargate is a 100% lose against this (unless you don't expand)
On May 19 2011 06:06 MrCon wrote: This thread lacks a lot of "scientific" data. The zerg build hits exactly at 7:30. At what time does hallucination finish ? Does that time allows you to react properly to what you scout ? (ie : will you have time to prepare your defenses ?)
What we know : - one gate expo diess - 3 gates sentries die - forge expo dies - every kind of stargate build dies (because lings will ravage your probes before dying to any amount of void rays)
That let us with a combination of forge and gates. 3 gate forge with like 1 minute of probes cut would certainly work. Does 2 gates forge without probe cut would work ? 2 canons or 3 ? (or 4 ?)
This thread is starting the wrong way, everyone theorycraft without any kind of concrete base. I only play zerg and terran so I won't do the tests for you, but imo you should use a more "scientific" approach to this problem.
Where did you get these two points of data from? I've seen that 3gate expo into 5gate dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that dt expand dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that 3gate expo into forge stargate dies from alicia vs losira.
I haven't seen games that backup the two points you made that I bolded however.
One gate expo (to stargate) died today in GSTL. And on crevasse, which is much more secure than most other maps (inbase natural) Forge expo I got that from IPL, I think it was kiwi vs idra but I'm not sure. But if 3 gates expo dies, 1 gate expo should die too.
First 1 game does not mean one build doesn't work vs another build. Second he had his gas stolen which delays the voidray a ton.
On May 19 2011 06:06 MrCon wrote: This thread lacks a lot of "scientific" data. The zerg build hits exactly at 7:30. At what time does hallucination finish ? Does that time allows you to react properly to what you scout ? (ie : will you have time to prepare your defenses ?)
What we know : - one gate expo diess - 3 gates sentries die - forge expo dies - every kind of stargate build dies (because lings will ravage your probes before dying to any amount of void rays)
That let us with a combination of forge and gates. 3 gate forge with like 1 minute of probes cut would certainly work. Does 2 gates forge without probe cut would work ? 2 canons or 3 ? (or 4 ?)
This thread is starting the wrong way, everyone theorycraft without any kind of concrete base. I only play zerg and terran so I won't do the tests for you, but imo you should use a more "scientific" approach to this problem.
Where did you get these two points of data from? I've seen that 3gate expo into 5gate dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that dt expand dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that 3gate expo into forge stargate dies from alicia vs losira.
I haven't seen games that backup the two points you made that I bolded however.
One gate expo (to stargate) died today in GSTL. And on crevasse, which is much more secure than most other maps (inbase natural) Forge expo I got that from IPL, I think it was kiwi vs idra but I'm not sure. But if 3 gates expo dies, 1 gate expo should die too.
IIRC kiwi vs idra forge fe was a hatch cancel roach all-in which is completely different and quite holdable kiwi just misplayed it slightly.
Crevasse has more open area on its ramp after killing the rocks than most naturals. Additionally he went gateway nexus core 3gas stargate which is far from usual. The roach ling build in that game was also a much lower economy version than is typically shown as well. (Losira had 34 drones, Nestea had 30, while DongRaeGu had 18)
Although that game does shine some light on the idea someone mentioned earlier about a sacrificial stalker in order to scout what's going on. It doesn't work at all.
On May 19 2011 04:11 gheyrobot wrote: While that may work out ok on the ladder i feel that the pvz match up is starting to force both sides to just play guessing games. If this will requiring patching or just further understanding of the game is not for us to say
You think this need a patch ?! And if we look at the thread, you are not the only one to QQ.
I play both Z and P, and Protoss scouting problem is nothing in comparison with Zerg on.
I can tell you for sure, it doesn't require a patch to solve Protoss problem: at worst you can get hallucination first.
What is the cost of hallucination first ? You get a 50/50 gas/mineral opportunity cost when you start reseraching, you get another 50/50 opportunity cost when you reserach warpgate. Both opportiny cost ends around 6min30 (when the warpgate is usually finished). You also get a delayed warpgate tech, this means less production, i.e. another opportunity cost (you need to make a gateway a bit earlier).
So for less than 200 ressources opportunity cost, the protoss can get guaranted and repeatable scouting info. That's is way less expensve than a scan and it's 100 time better than loosing 1 overlord to MAYBE get some info.
Idra has been praying everyday to get overlord speed before lair. That's 100/100 mineral/gas opportunity cost. Probably more expensive than getting hallucination first.
Protoss has an easy and "cheap" way of scouting. I'm not saying that you should get hallucination first, there is probably a better solution. Just keep in mind, the only reason you are struggling is because you are trying to get a tiny advantage in comparison with the easy solution.
On May 19 2011 07:45 Barrin wrote: Zealot + Immortal > Zergling + Roach.
Yes, it has the potential to backfire if your immortals are fighting his zerglings and your zealots are fighting his roaches. That's why you don't let that happen.
Try it.
I don't know if this is a viable opening. if you could post replays that would be nice but the tech off one base before expo I'm not sure about since zealot immortal is very slow you can't pressure after a maybe attack anyway. and they can just take a free third if they don't push or they can drone for free.
there's a replay from Alej he posted in another thread but I'm using my phones tl app so I can't grab it till later. I emulate his expo timing and haven't lost to this timing for a few days.
On May 19 2011 07:45 Barrin wrote: Zealot + Immortal > Zergling + Roach.
Yes, it has the potential to backfire if your immortals are fighting his zerglings and your zealots are fighting his roaches. That's why you don't let that happen.
Try it.
I don't know if this is a viable opening. if you could post replays that would be nice but the tech off one base before expo I'm not sure about since zealot immortal is very slow you can't pressure after a maybe attack anyway. and they can just take a free third if they don't push or they can drone for free.
there's a replay from Alej he posted in another thread but I'm using my phones tl app so I can't grab it till later. I emulate his expo timing and haven't lost to this timing for a few days.
your going to call that tech? 2 gate robo is fairly standard in P matchups, and people DT/Voidray expand, theres nothing wrong with immortal expanding in terms of that It will keep you well defended, you have to wait for the eco boost to kick in regardless of the expansion method so i don't see the problem with using the slower units to take your natural
quick question, is this related to getting too many sentries early when army units are potentially a better defense?
On May 19 2011 06:16 Felo wrote: I met Roach/Ling-Allins quite often on the ladder and I'm 3Gate-Sentry-Expanding every game (~1000 Points ML).
In my opinion its still doable under certain circumstances. Those are: Dropping a Forge and a 4th Gateway while your nexus is building, going up to 8 Sentries ASAP and getting some Stalkers afterwards combined with one cannon close to your nexus (You need that to be safe against Burrowpushes anyway).
Now to the important stuff:
First you aren't as blind as a lot of people try to put it - in fact, most of the time getting mapcontrol is as easy as warping in a second zealot and walk up to the Xel-Naga-Towers. Two possibilites:
1.you clean up his scout ling(s) and can proceed to walk up to his base, checking his saturation or how much units he has (Thats why you need 2 btw, because 1 could die to 4 zerglings)
2. He kills two Zealots which requires more zerglings than a zerg would regularly build - guess what could happen
Second: When you realize that all-in is coming - DONT GET MORE STALKERS. I made that mistake for a long time but in fact Zealots are far better in smaller numbers when their prey cant run from them and roaches are neither quick nor big in numbers for this push.
Third: Stay close to your buildings. You have a lot of FFs at your disposal but its still important to use them wisely. I crushed a lot of those pushes without losing a single unit by trapping the roaches close to my buildings with 3 FFs and killing them from afar.
Basically the defense of the push consists of two things: killing the roaches (unimportant) and killing the speedlings (important). The roaches only exist to bait your units out in the open where the speedlings can do the job - as soon as the speedlings are dead you can easily surround the roaches with FFs and finish them off.
But because of that dynamic you have to wait until he sacrifices his Speedlings in any way - if that means that its neccessary to let him take down a pylon/Gate/your Forge then fine - let him get that building, wait for him to stream his speedlings in and place the nail in the coffin - if hes not doing that you are fine as well for obvious reasons.
tl;dr-Version:
* Get a Forge and a Gateway while expanding * Use a group of two zealots to scout * If the all-in is coming stall your Stalkerproduktion, pump out zealots * Stay close to your buildings * Utilize your buildings/FFs to trap speedlings and be able to kill them * Be patient, don't go out in the open until you are sure that there's no mob of speedlings waiting for you
Can you and other master league players upload their replays to show us to safely do a 3 gate sentry expand (or any other opening that works at that level of play)? Thanks!
On May 19 2011 07:45 Barrin wrote: Zealot + Immortal > Zergling + Roach.
Yes, it has the potential to backfire if your immortals are fighting his zerglings and your zealots are fighting his roaches. That's why you don't let that happen.
Try it.
Easy for you to say that. At higher levels of play such as masters, the ZERG chooses the fight.
The speedlings are able to choose whichever targets he wants to fight, which are the immortals.
On May 19 2011 07:45 Barrin wrote: Zealot + Immortal > Zergling + Roach.
Yes, it has the potential to backfire if your immortals are fighting his zerglings and your zealots are fighting his roaches. That's why you don't let that happen.
Try it.
Easy for you to say that. At higher levels of play such as masters, the ZERG chooses the fight.
The speedlings are able to choose whichever targets he wants to fight, which are the immortals.
keep the zealots around the immortal, it's more effort into micro than the zerg is putting in, but it should stop the lings destroying the immortal although this opens issues with places your zealots/immortal aren't, careful defensive positioning is required
I Forge FE on every map. Usually nexus first if he does an econ based 14 pool. And I get greedy if he goes hatch first. (Basically don't cut probes and chrono them constantly, then get a gateway before my cannon) I rarely die to early pressure. Yes the timing is tight but I get 1 zealot and 2 cannons always. Then depending on his drone count, (I constantly scout with my probe till ling speed finishes, since he cant stop me) I get stalkers/1-2 more cannons if I anticipate roach/ling pressure or go mass sentry and tech up and expand again off 7+ gates and/or robo. Pretty simple. Basically 3-4 stalkers and cannons will stop his push.
The problem is that a lot of protoss have forgot how to play defense and have cut a lot of corners. 1 cannon at your natural is mandatory and 2 is standard. My cannons easily get 10+ kills a piece after roach/ling aggression. Cannons are needed in PvZ and are extremely useful defensively and inhibit a lot of multi-pronged attacks by Zerg. Cannons and proper wall off are all you need.
As for sentry expand I really like the early sentries but ya that army is weak and flimsy till you warp in your first round of stalkers. But will so may FFs and 1-2 cannons i cant see you dying to roach/ling without poor micro by your sentries. Just FF off the roaches and deal with the lings and protect your cannons and probes. Free hits on buildings is fine and preferable. I have no problem losing a forge and gateway to roaches. As long as you don't lose sentries, cannons, or probes you are fine. Basically stall till you can warp in 4 stalkers, then counter attack and rebuild buildings to re-wall off. By that time his second wave has come in and you now have 4 more stalkers. Rinse, repeat. Eventually you will have too much stuff and counter push to his natural while you probe and tech up. Then fall back and you now have the lead in econ and prob tech as well. 2 of the 3 pillars to Starcraft success.
On May 19 2011 08:13 MrBitter wrote: Answer is way simpler than you guys seem to realize.
1.) Get hallucinate before warpgate
2.) Use reduced sentry build time to still get the normal amount of sentries before expanding
3.) If you scout the roach/ling bust, make your cannons reactively (not blindly)
4.) You're now safely playing a normal macro game.
This, like everything else, comes at a cost. This scout timing is not as relevant as the advice Felo gave, which I personally vouch for as well. The reason is that any good/smart zerg, yourself include i'm sure, will know whats up when the hallucinate scout comes that early on and will know he is completely safe to drone with no threat of an attack. The tradeoff, then, is offensive power which doesn't fit into the standard protoss gameplan of poking and prodding to get a reaction. To effectively poke/prod you have to have at least the ability to launch a poweful attack. Missing 3 warp in cycles worth of units because of 80 seconds hallucinate research substantially limits your offensive threat.
The drawbacks to Felos advice are sort of alread built into the 3 gate sentry expand build... that is, you are making a decision to play from behind all game and trying to get to an efficient army that can almost instantly make up for the fact that youve been behind this whole time. Protoss is conditioned to playing from behind like this, but I dont think the new high level game will allow for that much longer. I think aggression and keeping pace will have to be figured out because zergs are getting so good at utilizing their innate food lead and doing real damage.
The opening also needs to be muta-safe, not just safe against roach/ling. Usually getting an early robo triggers the spire. So if the viable opening involves getting a robo pre-expand, then it probably needs to be able to flow into a timing attack that would defeat a zerg who techs to spire after scouting your early robo with a sacrificial overlord.
On May 19 2011 06:06 MrCon wrote: This thread lacks a lot of "scientific" data. The zerg build hits exactly at 7:30. At what time does hallucination finish ? Does that time allows you to react properly to what you scout ? (ie : will you have time to prepare your defenses ?)
What we know : - one gate expo diess - 3 gates sentries die - forge expo dies - every kind of stargate build dies (because lings will ravage your probes before dying to any amount of void rays)
That let us with a combination of forge and gates. 3 gate forge with like 1 minute of probes cut would certainly work. Does 2 gates forge without probe cut would work ? 2 canons or 3 ? (or 4 ?)
This thread is starting the wrong way, everyone theorycraft without any kind of concrete base. I only play zerg and terran so I won't do the tests for you, but imo you should use a more "scientific" approach to this problem.
Where did you get these two points of data from? I've seen that 3gate expo into 5gate dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that dt expand dies from inca vs nestea. I've seen that 3gate expo into forge stargate dies from alicia vs losira.
I haven't seen games that backup the two points you made that I bolded however.
One gate expo (to stargate) died today in GSTL. And on crevasse, which is much more secure than most other maps (inbase natural) Forge expo I got that from IPL, I think it was kiwi vs idra but I'm not sure. But if 3 gates expo dies, 1 gate expo should die too.
First 1 game does not mean one build doesn't work vs another build. Second he had his gas stolen which delays the voidray a ton.
I don't say one game mean anything. But I still see a lot of theorycraft, and I've still yet to see a televised game where this build fails. And I've seen this build more than 20 times on TV (or stream). I would love to see a replay or a vod of someone holding this.
On May 19 2011 08:13 MrBitter wrote: Answer is way simpler than you guys seem to realize.
1.) Get hallucinate before warpgate
2.) Use reduced sentry build time to still get the normal amount of sentries before expanding
3.) If you scout the roach/ling bust, make your cannons reactively (not blindly)
4.) You're now safely playing a normal macro game.
This, like everything else, comes at a cost. This scout timing is not as relevant as the advice Felo gave, which I personally vouch for as well. The reason is that any good/smart zerg, yourself include i'm sure, will know whats up when the hallucinate scout comes that early on and will know he is completely safe to drone with no threat of an attack. The tradeoff, then, is offensive power which doesn't fit into the standard protoss gameplan of poking and prodding to get a reaction. To effectively poke/prod you have to have at least the ability to launch a poweful attack. Missing 3 warp in cycles worth of units because of 80 seconds hallucinate research substantially limits your offensive threat.
You're not missing 3 warp-in cycles. You're getting the same number of sentries, and losing maybe 1/2 of a warpgate production cycle.
Gateways production is still production.
And this trade-off that you mention is just part of playing the game...
If Zerg is going to react to your scout and cut corners by droning more, then you need to be looking for similar ways to power your own economy, like spending all your chrono on probes rather than hammering out upgrades or more units.
(Or you could just chrono your gateways and push anyway, punishing Z for being greedy)
My point is this:
If you have a problem.
And I offer a solution.
There will always be some other "what if" element.
"WTF, DTs keep killing all my drones."
"Make spores."
"But if I do that I have to sacrifice drones anyway."
"So make overseers."
"But if I do that I'm losing gas and slowing my tech."
And on and on and on....
Trade-offs happen. That's part of the exchange that makes the game exciting. The key is making better trades than the other player so that you can create large enough advantages to win games.
On May 19 2011 08:22 Jayrod wrote:Protoss is conditioned to playing from behind like this, but I dont think the new high level game will allow for that much longer. I think aggression and keeping pace will have to be figured out because zergs are getting so good at utilizing their innate food lead and doing real damage.
1.) Well executed 3 Gate expand is not behind in anything. 2.) Food count doesn't tell that much.. Yes Zerg might be ahead in supply, but that's because Zerg T1 has a higher supply/cost ratio than protoss units, while some of the Zerg's production "buildings" (Queens) cost supply as well. + Show Spoiler +
Actually on a small map like Xel Naga a toss can easily block Hatch first builds and the Zerg will be behind in worker count for at least 6 minutes (and therefore, the Zerg will have mined way less minerals). If the toss pushes out (or the Zerg is building units) the toss will stay ahead in worker count until 2 base saturation. This of course doesnt apply if the Toss is playing poorly, meaning, his build is not refined as well as it could be, his forcefields are bad, his building placement is bad and he is not using chronoboost on probes.
hallucination first works well for scouting IF you choose to go for a very passive sentry heavy opening. however you can still get hallucinate in time to get 2 cannons up for the rush. The focus of chronoboost is on wg and then hallucinate. getting forge then nexus is the best option as well the forge will be done in time to make 2 cannons to finish for the attack. you can use the force fields from 5 or 6 sentries to block cannons from long attacks and to keep roaches further back to delay them so lings die to cannons and stalkers can work on roaches. if a drone cut all in version hits earlier than the 30 drone aggression version then give up the natural cancel expo and defend from the main.
A few options come to mind: -use 1 or 2 chronos on nexus, then throw them all on warpgate -> hallucinate. Pre-patch, this worked in time. +20s on warp, probably not but it should be tested. Also putting so many chronos on the cyber might be a problem for your econ. -2 gate sentry expand? Now that sentries build faster you should be able to pump (about) as many sentries but save 150 on an early gate. That might allow you to lay down your nexus faster, making up for 2 blind cannons. Or, it might allow the zerg to drone to infinity and beyond since obv 2 gates aren't going to do squat for pressure. Needs testing. -Do the 2 zealot scout as suggested in this thread. I'd suggest leaving a probe in the choke to lay down a walloff pylon if you see a ling runby. It needs to be tested - if z makes enough lings to kill those 2 zealots, how much does that hurt the toss/zerg? What about if z kills the zealots and then just builds drones instead of roaches? -What about pressuring with a fast stalker or two? It can kill a few zerglings and/or force enough of a change in the zerg early build order that the roach/ling attack will be late. Needs testing. -Hallucinate before warp? Could be workable, certainly feels awkward though. Off the top of my head, z could get a big lead by memorizing timings - if the gate isn't a warpgate by 6:20 (for example), or if he sees a phoenix before 6:00, warp will be late and z can expand/drone harder than normal. -There could be micro techniques that work. For example, whenever I see this roach/ling attack I see FFs thrown down instantly. Maybe build in a way that forces zerg to knock down your wall with roaches before sending in the lings... and just let him do it. Then you have a lot of FF energy left over to continue stalling for your extra units/cannons. -Do a different build =) I'm liking Pepe's 2gate pressure expand if you aren't into FFE
This roach ling 2 base aggression is new? I used to do a variant where I waited till roach speed finished and spammed roach ling... I would win so many games, but good force fields and cannons until collossi are out should work... am i missing something here? I mean, thats what I usually lost to, especially if they had some cannons up.
On May 19 2011 09:21 HedgehogZerg wrote: This roach ling 2 base aggression is new? I used to do a variant where I waited till roach speed finished and spammed roach ling... I would win so many games, but good force fields and cannons until collossi are out should work... am i missing something here? I mean, thats what I usually lost to, especially if they had some cannons up.
Been around for ~ 4 months or so, zergs just getting better at it because pro koreans are refining it/showing how its done. My first experience with this type of play was WZPs all-in attack from months ago.
I know that forge-based builds would be able to handle roach/ling aggression. But does anyone know how much behind P is if Z actually just does hatch first and only makes a few zerglings?
Okay just making sure... and I do believe the best advice is to get a quicker robo. Collossi are a midgame unit in PvZ anyways, and you should be able to get a collosus out before sentries run out of energy and you lose your expo, and if it is a no speed roach push collossi are easily microed versus them. 3gate + robo + add more gates?
On May 19 2011 09:21 HedgehogZerg wrote: This roach ling 2 base aggression is new? I used to do a variant where I waited till roach speed finished and spammed roach ling... I would win so many games, but good force fields and cannons until collossi are out should work... am i missing something here? I mean, thats what I usually lost to, especially if they had some cannons up.
Having roach speed implies you had a lair, usually if you have a lair, hallucination is done and the protoss can scout it. The current roach/ling all ins that are being used to deny 3 gate expands are hitting before hallucination, but after zergling speed making it hard to scout that the zerg is massing up roaches and ling on hatchery tech.
On May 19 2011 09:31 HedgehogZerg wrote: Okay just making sure... and I do believe the best advice is to get a quicker robo. Collossi are a midgame unit in PvZ anyways, and you should be able to get a collosus out before sentries run out of energy and you lose your expo, and if it is a no speed roach push collossi are easily microed versus them. 3gate + robo + add more gates?
Colossus are just not going to be out in time to defend your expansion when roaches and lings are hitting your base at the 8 minute mark. There are a few more subtle suggestions earlier like getting hallucination first and delaying your warp gates, but using the faster sentry build time from gateways to not have to lose many units or delay your expansion.
On May 19 2011 08:13 MrBitter wrote: Answer is way simpler than you guys seem to realize.
1.) Get hallucinate before warpgate
2.) Use reduced sentry build time to still get the normal amount of sentries before expanding
3.) If you scout the roach/ling bust, make your cannons reactively (not blindly)
4.) You're now safely playing a normal macro game.
This, like everything else, comes at a cost. This scout timing is not as relevant as the advice Felo gave, which I personally vouch for as well. The reason is that any good/smart zerg, yourself include i'm sure, will know whats up when the hallucinate scout comes that early on and will know he is completely safe to drone with no threat of an attack. The tradeoff, then, is offensive power which doesn't fit into the standard protoss gameplan of poking and prodding to get a reaction. To effectively poke/prod you have to have at least the ability to launch a poweful attack. Missing 3 warp in cycles worth of units because of 80 seconds hallucinate research substantially limits your offensive threat.
You're not missing 3 warp-in cycles. You're getting the same number of sentries, and losing maybe 1/2 of a warpgate production cycle.
Gateways production is still production.
And this trade-off that you mention is just part of playing the game...
If Zerg is going to react to your scout and cut corners by droning more, then you need to be looking for similar ways to power your own economy, like spending all your chrono on probes rather than hammering out upgrades or more units.
(Or you could just chrono your gateways and push anyway, punishing Z for being greedy)
My point is this:
If you have a problem.
And I offer a solution.
There will always be some other "what if" element.
"WTF, DTs keep killing all my drones."
"Make spores."
"But if I do that I have to sacrifice drones anyway."
"So make overseers."
"But if I do that I'm losing gas and slowing my tech."
And on and on and on....
Trade-offs happen. That's part of the exchange that makes the game exciting. The key is making better trades than the other player so that you can create large enough advantages to win games.
I'd be interested to see a build using this 3gate hallucination before warpgate.
From my testing the economy doesn't line up at all. You can't produce constant sentries out of your 3 gateways. Your 5th sentry comes out much later than your 6th with a warpgate build and by the time you get your 5th sentry and feel safe enough to plant your nexus you have a large mineral buildup and are already supersaturating your main minerals so addtional probes are pure negatives for quite a while.
Here's the post Alejandrisha made on the other Topic covering the same thing
If he's really doing the losira timing you can absolutely get hallucinated phoenix in time to see it. You just need to start hallucination right after you finish warpgate, which I think is going to become standard in order to see this timing as you can't see it with probe scout unless the zerg is extremely careless.
If you don't see the timing, I still think one cannon is pretty safe, but if you see it coming there's no reason not to start 2 cannons; you don't want to be losing sentries. My forcefields were pretty bad when the attack came but it didn't set me too far behind.
Simply putting more structures to help your simcity in your natural will really help; since I can't see the replay I will just say this: put your forge in the natural as well as your 4th gateway
oh heyo time
On May 10 2011 23:12 Alejandrisha wrote: It doesn't help you to start your nexus a minute later. You can go expand-forge-cannon in time for the timing so expanding later is only shooting yourself in the foot. You can scout it with hallucination. You can't scout it any other way. WG finishes at about ~6 minutes with 3gate expand and hallucination takes 60 seconds to research. With a CB or 2 on it (I find blindly chronoboosting probes to be extremely greedy when you are in the dark, which you are at this point in the game) you can scout it as the roaches are hatching, which is really the only tell for this build (besides roach warren before lair starts)
Except you can't reliably scout after ling speed until hallucination/stargate tech kicks in which is too late.
This gentleman is right..
Honestly sentries should just start with hallucination, or it should be a researched off of the nexus or something because the need to get warpgate tech before hallucination makes for zergs to be completely unscoutable for the first part of the game.
I've had a problem with this since I first started playing and I still think it's bad for PvZ. The protoss literally CAN NOT scout once lings are on the board if he's 3 gate expanding and it's kinda BS.
On May 19 2011 06:35 tskarzyn wrote: Have any toss played around with sending out multiple probes? IE one as decoy, and 1-2 probes taking roundabout routes.
What I do upon having my scouting probe die is escort a second scouting probe out by taking my first zealot and few sentries out and clearing the closest watchtower. By this stage they will probably still only have 4 lings so you won't lose your sentries. Then I sneak the probe out and check his saturation at the appropriate time and if he has no drones at his nat, or better yet I see a roach heading to my base, I slap down 3-4 cannons and prepare my sentries to meet the incoming forces at the nearest choke leading to my natural.
So for instance on Xel naga caverns I will stall the roaches with forcefields at the bit where the entrance splits into two, to wait for my cannons to get up. This allows you to minimise the amount of forcefields needed and because the roaches are still slow, it's quite easy not to let anything in. Even if a few lings get in and start hitting your sentries, you can easily negate any damage by forcefielding around your army
Honestly I think the solution to this is just to play the same way we have always played - good forcefields to stall for cannons. You should have enough on most maps
I've managed to stay alive with day9's 1 gas imo zealot with delayed WG. I'm not very good so I don't think this is the best strategy I can't wait for the next 3 gate sentry that made it a good 3 months before this dammed allin came around :/
If he's really doing the losira timing you can absolutely get hallucinated phoenix in time to see it. You just need to start hallucination right after you finish warpgate, which I think is going to become standard in order to see this timing as you can't see it with probe scout unless the zerg is extremely careless.
If you don't see the timing, I still think one cannon is pretty safe, but if you see it coming there's no reason not to start 2 cannons; you don't want to be losing sentries. My forcefields were pretty bad when the attack came but it didn't set me too far behind.
Simply putting more structures to help your simcity in your natural will really help; since I can't see the replay I will just say this: put your forge in the natural as well as your 4th gateway
On May 10 2011 23:12 Alejandrisha wrote: It doesn't help you to start your nexus a minute later. You can go expand-forge-cannon in time for the timing so expanding later is only shooting yourself in the foot. You can scout it with hallucination. You can't scout it any other way. WG finishes at about ~6 minutes with 3gate expand and hallucination takes 60 seconds to research. With a CB or 2 on it (I find blindly chronoboosting probes to be extremely greedy when you are in the dark, which you are at this point in the game) you can scout it as the roaches are hatching, which is really the only tell for this build (besides roach warren before lair starts)
I think we have to differentiate the 30 drone roach ling vs the 18 drone roach ling. That replay showed the former. 3 gate expo with hallu researched 2nd would die against the latter.
sermokala, I searched for this immortal/zealot build but didn't find anything. I'm developing something along those lines and would love to see what Day 9 did. Can you post a link?
On May 19 2011 12:11 ZeromuS wrote: Here's the post Alejandrisha made on the other Topic covering the same thing
If he's really doing the losira timing you can absolutely get hallucinated phoenix in time to see it. You just need to start hallucination right after you finish warpgate, which I think is going to become standard in order to see this timing as you can't see it with probe scout unless the zerg is extremely careless.
If you don't see the timing, I still think one cannon is pretty safe, but if you see it coming there's no reason not to start 2 cannons; you don't want to be losing sentries. My forcefields were pretty bad when the attack came but it didn't set me too far behind.
Simply putting more structures to help your simcity in your natural will really help; since I can't see the replay I will just say this: put your forge in the natural as well as your 4th gateway
oh heyo time
On May 10 2011 23:12 Alejandrisha wrote: It doesn't help you to start your nexus a minute later. You can go expand-forge-cannon in time for the timing so expanding later is only shooting yourself in the foot. You can scout it with hallucination. You can't scout it any other way. WG finishes at about ~6 minutes with 3gate expand and hallucination takes 60 seconds to research. With a CB or 2 on it (I find blindly chronoboosting probes to be extremely greedy when you are in the dark, which you are at this point in the game) you can scout it as the roaches are hatching, which is really the only tell for this build (besides roach warren before lair starts)
I think we have to differentiate the 30 drone roach ling vs the 18 drone roach ling. That replay showed the former. 3 gate expo with hallu researched 2nd would die against the latter.
It was also played on the old version with 140 seconds warpgate making both warpgate and hallucination come out considerably quicker than it would now.
It was also a completely different opening. Losira went 16gas 15pool 16hatch Nestea went 14gas 13pool 19hatch
Bio attempted an idra opening, 15 pool, 2 drones pulled to fight for expansion directly after pool into getting out micro'd into 17 extractor and 24 hatchery. Transfers drones late to a late expansion, puts guys on gas too early and builds a roach warren too late.
@7:50
nestea begins his roach ling assault on the natural
@8 minutes
nestea has 30 drones ~32 lings (lost some already) 9 roaches and 2 queens
bio has 32 drones 20 lings 7 roaches and 2 queens
inca has 5 functioning warpgates, 37 probes 6 stalkers 7 sentries and is mining from his second base and is already under attack
alej has 3 functioning warpgates, 31 probes 2 zealots 1 stalker 7 sentries and his nexus is finishing 2 cannons starting and the attack is 35 seconds away
@8:35
nestea has essentially won the game, unpowered 2 warpgates & supply blocked inca reduced his forces to 31 probes 6 stalkers and 3 sentries and exhausted all forcefields
Hallucinate comes up a tiiiiiiiiiiny bit too late right? Just in time to tell you you're dead in 15s? And if you preemptively build cannons and he DOESN'T attack, you're way behind in econ, right? BUT! If you build the cannons JUST before you hallucinate a phoenix, the phoenix will spot the roaches on the march to your base - and if there aren't any, he'll arrive at the Z base to confirm the drone count in time to cancel the cannons!
Master Zergie here. I think DT expo, even blindly is very viable. Allows toss transition into blink/ht, forces zerg to get at least 2 overseer and forces zerg to stay on 2 base quite a while longer. Even if the zerg knows DT is coming and they do virtually no damage it still puts protoss in decent shape. In starcraft 1 there's the bisu build which uses DT/corsair opening as a standard, so why can't DT be standard in sc 2? If someone polishes it enough it will be a solid toss opening.
When i off race toss, I rush attack upgrades so I get +3 insanely fast with no armor. Tends to work vs diamond zergs, if master toss can polish it out that could work too I think.
And, yeah it rapes the shit of pre lair tech all-ins.
I believe Travis has made a post with a 3gsentry FE Hallu before WG build. Perhaps that is a decent alternative to 3gate/FE expand. Also DT expand are a bitch to deal with as Zerg, I'm forced to wait inside my base until Lair finishes.
Im glad its not just me who has a problem with zergs. With all the nose people make about zerg being underpowered i was starting to feel pretty crappy about my 37% win ratio vs zerg. I have 72% vT and 60% vP. If i can sort my zerg problems im sure ill get masters soon.
I just feel i either one base all in, which against good zerg gets stopped alot of time or i try a expand build that i feel like im either going to die any second or am so defensive the zerg just take more bases.
i agree that DT expo is good but if zerg prepares for it (and any high level masters zerg will) it puts you well behind and sets the zerg up for some sick roach timings knowing that your fastest tech is HT
I'd guess that once the attack comes in, the only option is to run right back up the ramp and FF it off, then rush for DTs/Voids to buy you some space to expand. I'm personally just going to be cleaning up my play on the Multitasking trainer while waiting for a new build or a patch.
On May 19 2011 08:13 MrBitter wrote: Answer is way simpler than you guys seem to realize.
1.) Get hallucinate before warpgate
2.) Use reduced sentry build time to still get the normal amount of sentries before expanding
3.) If you scout the roach/ling bust, make your cannons reactively (not blindly)
4.) You're now safely playing a normal macro game.
Low Master 'toss here. I'm going to have to agree with this. In addition to this good cannon placement/building placement at your natural expansion is essential. As well as taking both watchtowers with a couple of zealots and flawless forcefield placement, and knowing the timing of the push. (usually around the 7 minute mark). Knowing when he's pushing out is key.
On May 19 2011 08:13 MrBitter wrote: Answer is way simpler than you guys seem to realize.
1.) Get hallucinate before warpgate
2.) Use reduced sentry build time to still get the normal amount of sentries before expanding
3.) If you scout the roach/ling bust, make your cannons reactively (not blindly)
4.) You're now safely playing a normal macro game.
This, like everything else, comes at a cost. This scout timing is not as relevant as the advice Felo gave, which I personally vouch for as well. The reason is that any good/smart zerg, yourself include i'm sure, will know whats up when the hallucinate scout comes that early on and will know he is completely safe to drone with no threat of an attack. The tradeoff, then, is offensive power which doesn't fit into the standard protoss gameplan of poking and prodding to get a reaction. To effectively poke/prod you have to have at least the ability to launch a poweful attack. Missing 3 warp in cycles worth of units because of 80 seconds hallucinate research substantially limits your offensive threat.
You're not missing 3 warp-in cycles. You're getting the same number of sentries, and losing maybe 1/2 of a warpgate production cycle.
Gateways production is still production.
And this trade-off that you mention is just part of playing the game...
If Zerg is going to react to your scout and cut corners by droning more, then you need to be looking for similar ways to power your own economy, like spending all your chrono on probes rather than hammering out upgrades or more units.
(Or you could just chrono your gateways and push anyway, punishing Z for being greedy)
My point is this:
If you have a problem.
And I offer a solution.
There will always be some other "what if" element.
"WTF, DTs keep killing all my drones."
"Make spores."
"But if I do that I have to sacrifice drones anyway."
"So make overseers."
"But if I do that I'm losing gas and slowing my tech."
And on and on and on....
Trade-offs happen. That's part of the exchange that makes the game exciting. The key is making better trades than the other player so that you can create large enough advantages to win games.
Mr Bitter, you have a way of stating things extremely well.
It does seem to make sense as the sentry normal build time has been reduced... if you're going sentry heavy in the beginning you don't need warpgates as fast and you gain the ability to scout... I like.
Not grand master level, just as a warning. (get to nervouse to play lots of games a day)
immortal zealot *-* and put the overgas into phoenix for map control and queen sniping, always keep energy on the phoenix so they can support your army while fighting ^^ (one voidray is always fun to force more queens and delay the push while being save against really early roaches). have to scout for the hydra den though, the only scary thing, though armor upgrades and zealot speed and sentry guardian shield for the win (or atleast until lovely storm is out). Only thing that gets me is if i miss the mass hydra switch.
Toss has the hardest time getting up their natural early, because unlike terran they aren't able to build it anywhere. And well zerg, once the a hatch is up you have a cliff like defense building itself up, called creep and an army production structure as well hehe.
But if you wanna stick with sentrys you have to have a good canon and building placement and need any sort of fast scout, which is the halluzination probably. you can also place the canon out of roach range, so 1 grid more behind the buildings so to say. They can attack the buildings that way, but you can force field them into the canon range. and they have no chance to fire back. (takes up alot of energy though, so better be sure you do lots of roach kills, one canon as a bait is always a good idea)
I also like the warp prism if my opponent likes to siege me early game (though it means i have to open with sentrys, which are not my fav). Because 3 zealots in the natural 1 zealot in the main + 2 zealot warp in = terrible eco damage. And well from there alot of stuff can happen. I prefer the scenario of giving up my expansion walling of my ramp and if the zerg pulls back their own ramp will be force fielded as well and they'll lose all their tech+one mining base.
a fast +1 attack upgade is also really good against the ling roach combination.
But i guess if you can't hold your fast expansion play a harass or tech style. and do a double expansion once you are able to fight of a neverending zerg stream.
and its really common to have a high winrate vs 2 races and lose terrible to one race. (atleast platin/master). As the system isn't really using a different rating for each matchup. To get zergs at your level to have a better training effect, you could use different builds against the other races that way you will learn more in all matchups (means you lose a lil more though).
I think the only safe way now to expand is using a 2 Gate Forge build (I remember seeing this way back in GSL S1 lol)
This build will have cannons are your natural a lot quicker then a 3 gate sentry expo, because you'll have the forge already. Add 2 more gates to make a nice wall behind 2 cannons.
This will make you safe, but unable to pressure for a timing before your 2 warpgates at your natural kick in
On May 20 2011 00:24 Anomyme wrote: terran = extremly op since beta till now zerg = extremly broken and can totally be op or bad toss = strong but weak
I can get behind that. Pretty much feel the same way, I think a lot of people do.
On May 20 2011 00:24 Anomyme wrote: terran = extremly op since beta till now zerg = extremly broken and can totally be op or bad toss = strong but weak
Everyone who is citing the Inca v Nestea series is wasting their time. Inca was off his game (by his own admission), had awful micro, and forgot to build any cannons at his front in all four of those sets. Additionally he kept trying the same DT build that wasted a ton of resources that could have been spent defensively. Those games are worth almost nothing academically.
With the zerg push hitting at just past 7:00, try for a 2 gate expand into 3 gate forge robo or 5 gate forge build on 2 bases. Your expo goes down near 5:00 (~35 food), giving you enough time to secure your natural and get a reasonable army by the time the push hits.
Digging through my replay pool now, I'll get back when I find one of these. I haven't laddered since the patch, but testing the build order actually shows the 2 gate expand timing is a little more crisp after the WG nerf.
I think the solution will be 2 gate hallucination builds. You no longer need a fast warpgate as you can get sentrys from a gateway not as fast as with a warpgate. (Plus it's more spread out instead of relying on getting all your units at one time)
Alternatively, what about 2 gate zealot pressure into forge FE and then taking all your gasses at a much later time? (throwing down 2-3 cannons pre emptively)
Here's a tentative build for hallucination before warpgate.
9 - Pylon 11 - Chrono Nexus 12 - Gateway 13 - Chrono Nexus 14 - Gas 16 - Pylon 16/17 - Core 18 - Zealot 20 - Gas 20 - Chrono Nexus 24 - Sentry (Chrono'd, After zealot finishes) 24 - Pylon 26 - Hallucination (unfortunately the cyber core is idle for a while due to lack of gas) 26 - Chrono Nexus 30 - Sentry (Chrono'd) 30 - Pylon 32 - Sentry 32 - Two Gateways 32 - Warpgate research (right after hallucination finishes)
With this build you have 1 zealot, 3 sentries with hallucination (the first sentry gets 100 energy as hallucination research finishes) and enough money to build at nexus at around 6 minutes. Of course warpgate is delayed significantly but this exchanged for the ability to scout the entire zerg base at approximately 6:30. I didn't chronoboost hallucination as it comes out too early to make use of it then, however it could be better to do so as warpgate research would finish sooner as well.
This is really, REALLY hard to deal with sans cannons. Some things I do that help me personally:
1. Build a wall from the ramp to your nat Nexus immediately every game, with whatever you can put up there (Pylons, anything). Begin immediately walling from the other side of the Nexus to as close as you can get to the back of the natural area; be sure to use the Geyser as a peice of the wall to save time. Don't put buildings anywhere other than the wall, and you will get far enough before Roach / Ling pressure comes.
This helps because as you give your sentry based army a more protected position, it becomes harder for Zerg to maintain effiency with Roaches and Zerglings. You would be really suprised how long you can hold with just great positioning and a couple sentries.
2. When you see the units coming, don't warp in anything else other than Stalkers for a while. It might help to run off of less gas and more minerals. People seem to have this idea that when you start getting hit with R/L you can just keep building the same shit, but it just doesnt work well against sustained foreward pressure. In other words, if you don't get Stalkers fast, all of your shit up front will inevitably die.
3. Remember to Chronoboost Gateways, and immediately throw down a fourth. The chronoboost is key to survival, and the fourth gate will help you to break out and get a bit of map control around your natural after you assure survival. Don't throw down a fifth gate though, because you really can never be 100% sure you won't lose your Nexus to this pressure. If you have four working Gateways, you can generally put up an OK fight against a saturated 2 Base Zerg, and hopefully reestablish your natural at a disadvantage rather than just losing.
4. Probe scout the front at 6:30, and try to see some gases. If there is shit up front that kills your probe, than you better start preparing. It's not "unscoutable" like you say; for the pressure to really be worth anything it requires two or three cycles of injects, so you have a solid 1:30 window to see units popping.
I hope some of this helps those who are experiencing problems with 3GFE when pressured like this. Feel free to PM me on TL if anyone needs anything else
On May 20 2011 01:41 donnerpartyallnight wrote: Everyone who is citing the Inca v Nestea series is wasting their time. Inca was off his game (by his own admission), had awful micro, and forgot to build any cannons at his front in all four of those sets. Additionally he kept trying the same DT build that wasted a ton of resources that could have been spent defensively. Those games are worth almost nothing academically.
With the zerg push hitting at just past 7:00, try for a 2 gate expand into 3 gate forge robo or 5 gate forge build on 2 bases. Your expo goes down near 5:00 (~35 food), giving you enough time to secure your natural and get a reasonable army by the time the push hits.
Digging through my replay pool now, I'll get back when I find one of these. I haven't laddered since the patch, but testing the build order actually shows the 2 gate expand timing is a little more crisp after the WG nerf.
Umm, the game one build from inca was actually freaking awesome. He did a 3gate sentry expand but skipped a zealot and went stalker first. This gave him the ability to bully early lings and overlords and didn't slow down his 3gates like most builds that get a stalker because he skipped the zealot. He got his expansion up 30 seconds earlier than normal and quite safely. Got a ton of probes, 5 quick gateways the normal amount of sentries, but a lot of stalkers early. He was actually quite close to holding that off. If he perhaps placed his pylons slightly differently at his natural or had 2 more forcefields by only making one hallucinated phoenix or had cancelled and cut probes when he scouted the rush he could've held and been in a strong position for the midgame.
I met Roach/Ling-Allins quite often on the ladder and I'm 3Gate-Sentry-Expanding every game (~1000 Points ML).
In my opinion its still doable under certain circumstances. Those are: Dropping a Forge and a 4th Gateway while your nexus is building, going up to 8 Sentries ASAP and getting some Stalkers afterwards combined with one cannon close to your nexus (You need that to be safe against Burrowpushes anyway).
Now to the important stuff:
First you aren't as blind as a lot of people try to put it - in fact, most of the time getting mapcontrol is as easy as warping in a second zealot and walk up to the Xel-Naga-Towers. Two possibilites:
1.you clean up his scout ling(s) and can proceed to walk up to his base, checking his saturation or how much units he has (Thats why you need 2 btw, because 1 could die to 4 zerglings)
2. He kills two Zealots which requires more zerglings than a zerg would regularly build - guess what could happen
Second: When you realize that all-in is coming - DONT GET MORE STALKERS. I made that mistake for a long time but in fact Zealots are far better in smaller numbers when their prey cant run from them and roaches are neither quick nor big in numbers for this push.
Third: Stay close to your buildings. You have a lot of FFs at your disposal but its still important to use them wisely. I crushed a lot of those pushes without losing a single unit by trapping the roaches close to my buildings with 3 FFs and killing them from afar.
Basically the defense of the push consists of two things: killing the roaches (unimportant) and killing the speedlings (important). The roaches only exist to bait your units out in the open where the speedlings can do the job - as soon as the speedlings are dead you can easily surround the roaches with FFs and finish them off.
But because of that dynamic you have to wait until he sacrifices his Speedlings in any way - if that means that its neccessary to let him take down a pylon/Gate/your Forge then fine - let him get that building, wait for him to stream his speedlings in and place the nail in the coffin - if hes not doing that you are fine as well for obvious reasons.
tl;dr-Version:
* Get a Forge and a Gateway while expanding * Use a group of two zealots to scout * If the all-in is coming stall your Stalkerproduktion, pump out zealots * Stay close to your buildings * Utilize your buildings/FFs to trap speedlings and be able to kill them * Be patient, don't go out in the open until you are sure that there's no mob of speedlings waiting for you
I really really like the 2 Zealot approach. Not just does an initial Zealot-and-2-Sentry-Warpin fit in much better than 3 Sentries if you intend to get Hallucination ASAP. It also gives that first Zealot an early purpose beyond securing your ramp-gap. In addition, if you hug cliffs with these 2 Zealots, while moving accross the map, Zerg needs more than 3 sets of Zerglings to kill them, which may be a too costly cut in Drones that early on (because the 30 Drones Roach/Ling Attack apperantly has a pretty tight Buildorder and timing window), and therefore seems to be unlikely to happen. At last this approach is just a minor adjustment to the otherwise solid 3Gate-Expand compared to the advice "DT/Star-Expand instead" and "Hallucination before WG" (which is rather bumpy and completely kills the option to switch to agression instead of expanding). In combination with the other advice given by Felo, his Post appears (at least to me) as the best approach to this problem so far.
Well tough luck that build cannot hold this if it is executed properly
Yes, it can, you just have to have very good forcefields. Also, people are making too big of a deal about Nestea's spinecrawler rush. You can ONLY do that when the Nexus is part of the wall...which is extremely rare, as it's both map and player dependent.
Also, a couple scouting tips as toss vs zerg with speed. If you shark around with your zealot and sentries, and kill the nearest scouting lings, you can often sneak a probe out and get a good look at your opponent's base, after which, the game should be yours. the roach ling all-in is very dependent on denying scouting.
So I tested all day and came to the conclusion, that it is impossible to hold roach/ling all in with 3 gate forge, no matter if you go hallucination first or not. You only scout it a few seconds earlier, because the sentries need to pool energy for a long time to use hallucinate. It's not enough time to get canons up on a map with medium rush distance.
Tomorrow I will try if you can hold it with 4 gates instead of 3 gate forge. The forge in this build was originally only for being safe against a roach burrow attack (which hits before your first observer after 3 gate epand). I can imagine, that you can scout the lair with hallucination and cut unit production to get the forge and a canon to be safe vs the burrow attack.
On May 20 2011 05:50 WrathOfAiur wrote: So I tested all day and came to the conclusion, that it is impossible to hold roach/ling all in with 3 gate forge, no matter if you go hallucination first or not. You only scout it a few seconds earlier, because the sentries need to pool energy for a long time to use hallucinate. It's not enough time to get canons up on a map with medium rush distance.
Tomorrow I will try if you can hold it with 4 gates instead of 3 gate forge. The forge in this build was originally only for being safe against a roach burrow attack (which hits before your first observer after 3 gate epand). I can imagine, that you can scout the lair with hallucination and cut unit production to get the forge and a canon to be safe vs the burrow attack.
What's the point of 4th Gate instead of Forge? It costs the same, needs more time to warp in and from the point you build it until Zergs attack hits you can at best warp in 2 Units, while you can plant virtually infinity cannons at once with forge. In addition cannons are by far the strongest defence you can get for your money. If you cant hold the attack with Cannons you certainly wount without. Imho you should get your Forge AND a 4th Gate immediatly after your Nexus starts. By that time your Main is nearly oversaturated, so you can "comfortably" cut some probes to afford 3 full rounds of production out of all your gates aswell as these Buildings and 2-3 cannons until Hallucination finishes and you know for sure if he is going for the timing or not. If he does, your defense should now be strong enough to deflect his attack. If he does not you can immediatly switch to agression yourself to make up for the potential deficit in workers and your "wasted" cannons now protect you from potential ling backstabs while you are pressuring his front. In addition Forge _and_ 4th Gate already forms a strong wall and on some maps (like Metal 12, 3, 6) enables a solid wall with your Nexus.
As mentioned before I think the real issue with 3 Gate Expand was P's cuting to much corners. Yes, you have to play safer now, but its not the end of the World. This Opening is still viable.
I have been playing around with a strat, not too sure if it's considered cheese. I'll proxy build a forge near thier base but out of sight. I then put down 2 pylons 3 cannons blocking thier ramp. Expand and tech to vrays hold off roaches and lings that escape. Use obs to see what they are going which is usually hydras I'll then get colossi if I see a spire I make pheonixs. This is very vague hopefully I am not reprimanded for this post.
Hey I don't really post much in the strategy forums so feel free to warm me if i say something which is not apropiated or pointless.
I've been watching a lot LiquidTyler's stream lately and i noticed that he always opens the same way in PvZ in almost every game of PvZ. He high eco 2 gate rushes into fast expo and forge before gas.
That build, which may seem weird at first look, is actually really strong for a reson: it puts a lot of pressure to the zerg. With 4 gate not being a real issue anymore, air builds and DTs having a similar and very figured out timing and responce and blink builds being only good on certain maps, the zerg player can pretty much assume that you are going 3 gate expand, that meaning that he is free to act at will, either preparing their 2 base timing or droning like crazy. With 3 gate expand you can put pressure into your oponent and that worked pretty well for a while but now that players have improved it doesn't work anymore, zergs know what they can get away with and what they can't not.
That's why two gate expand is so awesome in my opinion, it can defend most all ins, it puts a ton of pressure into your oponent and it gives you the economy to really commit to a tech path without making too many shortcuts (see rushing to DTs, VR or colossi).
I would love to hear the opinion of those of you who have messed around with this build a little bit and the possible flaws and timings that it might open.
Definitely not impossible to hold. You just have to have very very good micro, and very very good force fields, which people in the lower leagues obviously lack. Timings in this game are so important. If u expand at 35food, your forge should go up as soon as u can afford it as part of your wall. You then put a cannon, not too far out, but then again not too far in, it needs to be put where you can cover it easy, but it is also in range of their units. Once you see they are all ining, you immediately throw down a 2nd cannon, and make units priority over probes until safe.
The most important thing is to NOT PANIC, your nexus has 2000 hp, it's fine, slowly gain a unit advantage and pick of units with ff's when you can.
On May 20 2011 05:50 WrathOfAiur wrote: So I tested all day and came to the conclusion, that it is impossible to hold roach/ling all in with 3 gate forge, no matter if you go hallucination first or not. You only scout it a few seconds earlier, because the sentries need to pool energy for a long time to use hallucinate. It's not enough time to get canons up on a map with medium rush distance.
Tomorrow I will try if you can hold it with 4 gates instead of 3 gate forge. The forge in this build was originally only for being safe against a roach burrow attack (which hits before your first observer after 3 gate epand). I can imagine, that you can scout the lair with hallucination and cut unit production to get the forge and a canon to be safe vs the burrow attack.
What's the point of 4th Gate instead of Forge? It costs the same, needs more time to warp in and from the point you build it until Zergs attack hits you can at best warp in 2 Units, while you can plant virtually infinity cannons at once with forge. In addition cannons are by far the strongest defence you can get for your money. If you cant hold the attack with Cannons you certainly wount without. Imho you should get your Forge AND a 4th Gate immediatly after your Nexus starts. By that time your Main is nearly oversaturated, so you can "comfortably" cut some probes to afford 3 full rounds of production out of all your gates aswell as these Buildings and 2-3 cannons until Hallucination finishes and you know for sure if he is going for the timing or not. If he does, your defense should now be strong enough to deflect his attack. If he does not you can immediatly switch to agression yourself to make up for the potential deficit in workers and your "wasted" cannons now protect you from potential ling backstabs while you are pressuring his front. In addition Forge _and_ 4th Gate already forms a strong wall and on some maps (like Metal 12, 3, 6) enables a solid wall with your Nexus.
As mentioned before I think the real issue with 3 Gate Expand was P's cuting to much corners. Yes, you have to play safer now, but its not the end of the World. This Opening is still viable.
you can only hold it with canons if you build more than one blindly. And that's just not an option, because if the attack never comes and the zerg droned, you are soooooo behind. that's not what playing safer means. this way you outright loose against a droning zerg, because you cant use canons to put pressure on and force units.
making a complete wall-off like you suggest is also REALLY bad. if you encouter a smart zerg, he will just kill pylons and buildings with his roaches and wait with the lings and continue to mass units. as soon as the wall is picked of, the lings come in to play. you can use buildings to narrow the attack surface, but never in a fashion that your units cant reach the zerg's roaches properly.
putting down 4 gates and a forge won't do anything. you just can't get the canons up in time and you have to cut gateway production for it. so if you plan on getting canons anyway, 3 gates is enough.
On May 20 2011 06:50 Minigun wrote: Definitely not impossible to hold. You just have to have very very good micro, and very very good force fields, which people in the lower leagues obviously lack. Timings in this game are so important. If u expand at 35food, your forge should go up as soon as u can afford it as part of your wall. You then put a cannon, not too far out, but then again not too far in, it needs to be put where you can cover it easy, but it is also in range of their units. Once you see they are all ining, you immediately throw down a 2nd cannon, and make units priority over probes until safe.
The most important thing is to NOT PANIC, your nexus has 2000 hp, it's fine, slowly gain a unit advantage and pick of units with ff's when you can.
and that's exactly what does not work anymore. It used to work a month or two ago. But the builds got so refined, that it just wont do it. It took the zergs a while to realize, that the roach range buff is actually huge for this timing. Please show me replays of holding a good executed all-in on a map with a wider natural, like xel-naga caverns. I would love to see how you can do it.
When the zerg attacks off of 25 drones, it's not even close in my experience. The hallucinated phoenix sees the roaches just outside of your base and one canon just finished. and then you just die.
I would LOVE to see a replay how you defend the attack off of 25 drones.
what i've been doing lately, is going 3gate robo, and sneak a warp prism out to the corner of their base.. When you move out to expand, if you see them forcing units at you in an all-in fashion, warp in 3 zealot at their main and send to the drone line. Best case scenario they aren't prepared and you kill all their drones, worse case scenario they get nervous and turn around.
It sucks that protoss is always playing from behind in this matchup but lets be real; thats how PvZ was on BW too, with zerg being free to take 5 expos right off the bat and you have to outplay them with DT/corsair.. so SC2 is the same thing really, except storm is significantly weaker in SC2
Has anyone tried a 4-gate sentry/zealot expand? I saw it done once in the GSL and Artosis commented something to the effect of, "I was wondering when Protosses would figure out that you still have enough money for an expansion if you're only going sentry/zealot off those four gateways."
I'm not a Protoss player, and I don't know how the econ management would break down. But if it works it could be interesting. All you'd need to worry about is banelings.
I'm surprised and sad my idea apparently hasn't even been noticed =[
-Build cannons 0-25s before hallucinating a phoenix (depends on map & timings) -Send phoenix out over the road roaches would take to reach your base -See roaches: good, your cannons will arrive just in time. No roaches, prepare to cancel cannons but fly around their base a bit to make sure. Confirm no roaches, cancel cannons and make gates or something.
This way, you're safe if he attacks and only lose a few minerals from cancel cannons if he doesn't (plus your additional gates will be a bit later). You want the forge anyways for upgrades, no loss there. With a little effort someone could probably work out a way to have 1-2 chronoboosts available when hallucinate completes. Safe = chrono probes, Danger = chrono gates.
Is this flawed in some way? It seems really solid to me.
On May 20 2011 06:50 Minigun wrote: Definitely not impossible to hold. You just have to have very very good micro, and very very good force fields, which people in the lower leagues obviously lack. Timings in this game are so important. If u expand at 35food, your forge should go up as soon as u can afford it as part of your wall. You then put a cannon, not too far out, but then again not too far in, it needs to be put where you can cover it easy, but it is also in range of their units. Once you see they are all ining, you immediately throw down a 2nd cannon, and make units priority over probes until safe.
The most important thing is to NOT PANIC, your nexus has 2000 hp, it's fine, slowly gain a unit advantage and pick of units with ff's when you can.
I thought the idea was that it's not supposed to be impossible to hold, it's just supposed to force you to blow your FF energy on defending and maybe kill some sentries, leaving z safe to drone up his third since toss can't move out with no-energy sentries. Winning outright is more like a bonus when the protoss screws up
I think too often people want strategies or builds that will always produce wins for them, pretty much trying to hard counter what their opponent is doing. However, the fact is at high levels, you're never going to have perfect information so you have to just make assumptions. Each build is obviously going to have pros and cons, to say that you cant do a build because if the zerg does this than i'm so far behind seems kind of silly. That being said, Tyler's 2 gateway forget expand will almost guarantee you get your expo up, but the zerg can than comfortably take a quick third due to your delayed warp gate and tech. Also something i've been theorizing but i havent actually tried yet, is to go 3 gate 1 gas expand, and just show zerg a handful of stalkers and zealots, so now he cant comfortably drone, or go for roach ling aggression, your expo might be slightly later, although maybe not as late as you might think since you're only mining one gas. The downside of this of course is that you have a lower sentry count and lower energy on your sentries. The natural and 3rd set up is definitely something to consider as well. On a map like xel naga 3 gate sentry expand is much more risky than a map like shakuras or shattered temple.
On May 20 2011 08:10 cmizzles wrote: I think too often people want strategies or builds that will always produce wins for them, pretty much trying to hard counter what their opponent is doing. However, the fact is at high levels, you're never going to have perfect information so you have to just make assumptions. Each build is obviously going to have pros and cons, to say that you cant do a build because if the zerg does this than i'm so far behind seems kind of silly. That being said, Tyler's 2 gateway forget expand will almost guarantee you get your expo up, but the zerg can than comfortably take a quick third due to your delayed warp gate and tech. Also something i've been theorizing but i havent actually tried yet, is to go 3 gate 1 gas expand, and just show zerg a handful of stalkers and zealots, so now he cant comfortably drone, or go for roach ling aggression, your expo might be slightly later, although maybe not as late as you might think since you're only mining one gas. The downside of this of course is that you have a lower sentry count and lower energy on your sentries. The natural and 3rd set up is definitely something to consider as well. On a map like xel naga 3 gate sentry expand is much more risky than a map like shakuras or shattered temple.
You don't have to get hallucination. If he gets a quick 3rd, instead of getting the 2nd cannon you can easily get 3 gates and do a 6 gate push + 1 timing attack.
Actually the 2 gate build can deny a 3rd if you transition into a quick stargate. (They won't have creep to the base)
Regardless, forge FE lets the zerg take a very quick 3rd, this wouldn't be that different, and considering your early zealots will force more lings, he won't be high on economy
There are a couple things you can look out for especially spawning positions. A Zerg is much more likely to use this aggressive style in close positions Meta then far or air, for two reasons; faster reinforcement route but more importantly they don’t want to extend this to a major macro game where standard play can benefit the Protoss.
Knowing this, when you spawn CP you need to be sure sure your gateways/warpgates are always flashing, even if the Zerg decides to drone you can use these units offensively to punish him later. In preparing for this, you need a good simcity, the Zerg even with an overwhelming force cannot engage from within an artificial choke. I can’t explain how to do it, but as a zerg user the difference is light and day. The second thing you can do is effective forcefields and keepings those sentry alive, you must use these wisely, the Zerg player will use his roaches to pick at your buildings (my priority is cannons [constructing or established] + critical pylons + nexus) with a hitsquad of lings in the back to surround if you venture out to far. If you venture out to far, you will lose to the Zerg’s forces. Therefore whenever the Zerg starts hitting your nexus, move your stalkers out and put down some dps, the Zerg will return fire and probably try and focus stalkers, drop the forcefields at which point the Zerg will retreat and you can pick off some stragglers. Rinse repeat until you have got enough cannons that roaches picking buildings becomes ineffective and the game will then move into the midgame.
Remember this type of aggression forces the game into a battle of attrition, the Zerg needs to do a substantial amount of damage (probes or a nexus kill) or outright win. This kinda feels like what happens when a Zerg gets 4gated, its not fun, whilst the battle may seem short it seems like an eternity, having a couple units out of position will cost you the game.
I don’t believe rushing VR or DT are effective ways to stop this, as this form of aggression will hit substantially before DT’s become an issue, and even if you are able to chrono out a voidray, that investment may have already cost you your army + your nexus. In close positions meta, 2 base Protoss play is much effective then one base builds, which are equally effective from all positions (far and air).
You said that your hallucinate finishes 15 seconds before you die. Then how about skipping warp gate tech for the time being, since sentries finish at the same time now, and start research on hallucinate before warpgates?
On May 20 2011 06:50 Minigun wrote: Definitely not impossible to hold. You just have to have very very good micro, and very very good force fields, which people in the lower leagues obviously lack. Timings in this game are so important. If u expand at 35food, your forge should go up as soon as u can afford it as part of your wall. You then put a cannon, not too far out, but then again not too far in, it needs to be put where you can cover it easy, but it is also in range of their units. Once you see they are all ining, you immediately throw down a 2nd cannon, and make units priority over probes until safe.
The most important thing is to NOT PANIC, your nexus has 2000 hp, it's fine, slowly gain a unit advantage and pick of units with ff's when you can.
Got a lot of respect for your gaming skill/knowledge minigun, but can you explain how exactly do you see they are all ining before its way too late? A good zerg will always have control of the watch towers and have speedlings near the entrance of your base to prevent probes from leaving right? And sacking units to scout doesn't seem to be a good idea especially when you need everything to defend this.
Also, so what do you suggest for your normal diamond ladder joes who precisely don't have the 'very very good micro and very very good force fields'? I know "just get better" is a legit reply, but is there anything else? I'm sure protoss players don't exactly want to throw away like every single one of their PvZ games while improving haha.
On May 20 2011 09:27 Zealot Lord wrote: Got a lot of respect for your gaming skill/knowledge minigun, but can you explain how exactly do you see they are all ining before its way too late? A good zerg will always have control of the watch towers and have speedlings near the entrance of your base to prevent probes from leaving right? And sacking units to scout doesn't seem to be a good idea especially when you need everything to defend this.
Also, so what do you suggest for your normal diamond ladder joes who precisely don't have the 'very very good micro and very very good force fields'? I know "just get better" is a legit reply, but is there anything else? I'm sure protoss players don't exactly want to throw away like every single one of their PvZ games while improving haha.
If you get the typical unit composition you do not even need to scout it. The most common mistake toss players are making is connecting the wall to the nexus. This blocks your units on the wrong side of the Nexus ( as seen in Nastea vs InCa). The Toss can't protect the pylon at the ramp and cant get any good forcefields there. Place the second gate (the one close to the Nexus) so there is still space to move, you can have your army sit there (pm for demo on the sim city). Any attacking lings and roaches can be trapped there with forcefields and you can defend. (i know the micro isn't that easy, but its possible without 500 apm) You might need to pull probes back to the main for a few seconds, but that's it, you should be ahead after anyways, so losing a few probes isn't too bad.
On May 20 2011 09:27 Zealot Lord wrote: Got a lot of respect for your gaming skill/knowledge minigun, but can you explain how exactly do you see they are all ining before its way too late? A good zerg will always have control of the watch towers and have speedlings near the entrance of your base to prevent probes from leaving right? And sacking units to scout doesn't seem to be a good idea especially when you need everything to defend this.
Also, so what do you suggest for your normal diamond ladder joes who precisely don't have the 'very very good micro and very very good force fields'? I know "just get better" is a legit reply, but is there anything else? I'm sure protoss players don't exactly want to throw away like every single one of their PvZ games while improving haha.
If you get the typical unit composition you do not even need to scout it. The most common mistake toss players are making is connecting the wall to the nexus. This blocks your units on the wrong side of the Nexus ( as seen in Nastea vs InCa). The Toss can't protect the pylon at the ramp and cant get any good forcefields there. Place the second gate (the one close to the Nexus) so there is still space to move, you can have your army sit there (pm for demo on the sim city). Any attacking lings and roaches can be trapped there with forcefields and you can defend. (i know the micro isn't that easy, but its possible without 500 apm) You might need to pull probes back to the main for a few seconds, but that's it, you should be ahead after anyways, so losing a few probes isn't too bad.
But thats for 3gate expand yea? This doesn't apply to FE's (especially on maps with wide naturals) though does it?
God it's driving me insane that nobody confirms or denies that my idea will work. Build cannons just before hallucinating, and cancel them if the attack isn't coming!
On May 20 2011 11:22 Keilah wrote: God it's driving me insane that nobody confirms or denies that my idea will work. Build cannons just before hallucinating, and cancel them if the attack isn't coming!
That double zealot scout that Felo recommended actually sounds pretty cool. A zerg that doesn't plan on being aggressive isn't going to make many lings at all, and so seeing 10+ ling quickly rush your zealots down is obviously an indication of something.
Now it could be mindgames, but at least you know that the zerg is more likely to be aggressive, you killed a couple lings, and you can be a bit more cautious.
3 gate expand is totally defendable against roach ling allin/aggression. You just need good forcefields and prevent him from sniping your cannon. A good simcity helps alot too. Maybe at a lower level where your forcefields arent that good you can open up with 2 cannons. You will not be that much behind with 1 additional cannon since you are playing at a lower level. Whenever i fight roach ling aggression, i grab an early third after fending it off while pumping out immortal/warpgate army. Hopes it helps.
you can still hold this if you were just steadily making sentries and got a forge when expanding. a lot of people that lose to this get surrounded by lings because they did not put down good forcefields or wall well enough
Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
Thanks for the post minigun - definitely helpful. Just curious, what about for maps which you FFE? Say Tal Darim altar, what would be an ideal defensive setup to take against the roach/ling aggression where you don't have as many sentries?
I hope this doesn't bother you minigun, but where would you put the second cannon? over to the left to help defend probes, i feel he could just put roaches over there and take out the nexsus if u dont move out. Thanks
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
That's kinda silly, i mean 1 gateway basically = 1 stalker and nobody goes 'OMG I LOST A STALKER, NO WAY TO WIN NOW' so make another gateway ASAP when you see him coming, since you know one of your gates is going to die. Or something along those lines.
In other news, my idea (make 2 more cannons, scout with hallucinate, cancel cannons if no rush) more or less seems to work, with a few caveats. -gotta scout to see if he's doing a super-early rush off of one base or cancel hat or something, those will hit before hallucinate completes. -3 chronos on probes, the rest on warp and hallucinate, or it's too late. -build the first cannon quickly and just leave it, make 2 more cannons around 7:00-7:10 so they'd complete in time for slightly early versions of the bust. One guy did a 2 base 22 drone version that hit around 7:25, it wasn't too hard to stall for 25s vs that but I doubt I could have stalled for 40. Your hallucinate should be able to scout the path and be over his base for the roach/drone round in time to cancel cannons if he just drones. -Find a way to make those 7:00-7:10 cannons not totally ugh, in my games they always forced me to pylon block or something. I'm sure it won't be too tough to solve. -remember to edit timings for long/short rush distances.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
On May 20 2011 13:02 Basileus wrote: I hope this doesn't bother you minigun, but where would you put the second cannon? over to the left to help defend probes, i feel he could just put roaches over there and take out the nexsus if u dont move out. Thanks
pretty close to the other cannon (in range of lings hitting cannon at least), you can move out, just stay behind nexus/wall
On May 20 2011 12:34 Zealot Lord wrote: Thanks for the post minigun - definitely helpful. Just curious, what about for maps which you FFE? Say Tal Darim altar, what would be an ideal defensive setup to take against the roach/ling aggression where you don't have as many sentries?
just add cannons to the wall off what you scout with a probe
On May 19 2011 04:31 evanthebouncy wrote: It's just something you have to deal with and get better at. If you look at zerg when we expand we play the guessing game ALL THE TIME.
Thats why i posted, i want people to think of new types of Toss expands. And that's really not true i played a lot of zerg season 1 and it is very easy to pin the protoss player on either Templar stargate or gateway by scouting the front and noting expo timings.
This is fairly new build, but i looked at it and i find it very interesting. Both for scouting, holding of ling/roachs all in, and economicly viable.
I haven't personnaly rafine the build i barely tryed it a couple of time in custom games, but i think the idea has a lot of potential. I wish some higher level player could take a better look into this build(mini i am not talking too you in particular but it would be awsome if you checked it out ^^) to see if it is rly viable or not. Because even if the ling/Roaches aggression is stoppable with good FF and cannon placement, i still feel the zerg can simply drones up like a mad man and be way ahead if you go for a 3 gate expo + the nexus,forge,gate wall.
On May 19 2011 08:13 MrBitter wrote: Answer is way simpler than you guys seem to realize.
1.) Get hallucinate before warpgate
2.) Use reduced sentry build time to still get the normal amount of sentries before expanding
3.) If you scout the roach/ling bust, make your cannons reactively (not blindly)
4.) You're now safely playing a normal macro game.
When hallucinate is done researching, how many sentries have enough energy for an hallucinated phoenix ?
And if you send an hallucination, do you think you'll have enough energy left for force-fields against speedlings trying to prevent you from expanding ?
What if with your first hallu you scout a 7RR all-in ? No FF to temporize, no warp ready for the push.. hmm. I don't think the answer is as simple as you make it sound like..
On May 20 2011 23:11 Nyast wrote: When hallucinate is done researching, how many sentries have enough energy for an hallucinated phoenix ?
none. that's the problem. it takes a lot of time, until a sentry pooled 100 energy. The benefit is only a few second compared to researching warpgate first. so not really worth it.
using travis's build, a sentry will have enough energy to use a hallucination at around the 6minute mark, which is when you should be putting your nexus/pylon down at your expansion and it is a perfect time to scout for a 2 base roach ling all-in. assuming this is xelnaga caverns again (a map with difficult simcity) your phoenix should arrive at the zerg's base roughly 30 seconds after you cast the phoenix out. if you see a finished roach warren, not a lot of drones, no lair morphing, no third, you should assume that there will be some pressure soon.
going back to the 3wg sentry expand, if we look to nestea's first game against inca as an example for timings you can expect the roaches to be knocking at your door at 7:40. consider that you have more gateways than a 2gate forge build - but, you will be cutting into gateway production to lay down a nexus, pylon, and gateway+forge at your natural and if you plan on having cannons your gateway production will be cut into even further, so you really won't be benefitting fully from your 3gates anyway.
however, if you use a gate+forge build you will be making use of 2 gateways (fewer minerals overall), and your forge will be long done so you can lay down cannons as soon as you have the minerals. you can prioritize gateways over cannons or vice versa depending on the situation, i personally think getting the cannons first would be better so that they absolutely will be done before roaches arrive and have 0 chance of being focusfired before they're finished - the gateways built afterward would serve as a time buffer for you, assuming the zerg chooses to target one of the gateways making up your wall - this time buffer can be used to spend resources on additional cannons which logically would make up for the opportunity cost of losing that gateway.
also, if your phoenix scouts his base and you see no roach warren, an early third, or a fast lair, you have the option of aiming for +1 right away as your forge was finished before you moved out of your main base; it is a much more robust opener in my opinion. but we will see how long 3wg really lasts, for example if pros adapt to a 2gate forge build or not etc.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
On May 20 2011 13:02 Basileus wrote: I hope this doesn't bother you minigun, but where would you put the second cannon? over to the left to help defend probes, i feel he could just put roaches over there and take out the nexsus if u dont move out. Thanks
pretty close to the other cannon (in range of lings hitting cannon at least), you can move out, just stay behind nexus/wall
On May 20 2011 12:34 Zealot Lord wrote: Thanks for the post minigun - definitely helpful. Just curious, what about for maps which you FFE? Say Tal Darim altar, what would be an ideal defensive setup to take against the roach/ling aggression where you don't have as many sentries?
just add cannons to the wall off what you scout with a probe
If I can add one thing to miniguns post I would like to say that if you Forge FE on tal darim send your first zealot out of the gateway towards a xel naga watch tower and use the zealot to help scout the front of your base looking to see if a baneling bust is coming or if roaches are on the way thanks to xel naga watchtower vision if at all possible. Isnt as fast as a probe scout but can hold a watchtower for longer against lings and its saved me a number of times. I know its not optimal at tip top levels of play but for us average joes it is darn good idea
I don't see anyone suggesting 1 gate robo, but I tried it with a friend a bunch last night and had pretty good success. Observer first so you can get constant scouting during the early stages. You can either expand or build more gateways depending on what you scout. A couple immortals plus a mix of gateway units shuts the early timing push down pretty well unless you get severely out-micro'd.
I've also held it with 3 gate sentry expand, warpgate first, then hallucinate with liberal amounts of chrono on each. You should be able to get your scout out in time to see whether he made units or not, and drop any necessary cannons to help defend.
Drop a second forge inbase if you have already sent your probes to your natural and benefiting from the mineral income, might seem stupid and might delay a stalker but it will be worth it when it gets hairy
That zerg build is not an all-in. For example, Nestea vs Inka game 1 of grand finals. Nestea had 30 drones mining minerals which is pretty good saturation for two bases (no gas) and while attacking he was taking a 3rd. If it fails you can safely drone up because you will kill a good portion of his forces and although you will be behind in tech, you have 3 bases.
On May 20 2011 17:00 Keilah wrote: That's kinda silly, i mean 1 gateway basically = 1 stalker and nobody goes 'OMG I LOST A STALKER, NO WAY TO WIN NOW'
you would be surprised how often that actually happens protoss just dies if you make any mistake early game and losing a stalker equals insta gg in most situations
ontopic i try to forge expand everywhere. there are maps where it can be really dangerous but i'd rather lose because i built too few cannons/bad wall than just lose because i 3 gate expand and he's zerg
i'd rather lose because i built too few cannons/bad wall than just lose because i 3 gate expand and he's zerg
And then you build 5 cannons and he double expands. SOLID STRAT mate
Pretty much.
You don't want to build more than one or two cannons pre-emptively, if he sees 3+ Cannons then hes just going to skip the all in and drone.
For 3gate expo, when your expansion comes up you are actually tight on minerals, if you build 3+ Cannons it either delays your tech, cripples your infrastructure or cuts into your Stalker count, you can't just throw up static defense blindly or you set yourself too far behind. Especially if you build more than two cannons as your expanding, if you do then you will miss warpgate cooldowns
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
The IM timing isn't really an all-in. It starts with usually even economy to a 3gate sentry expand and takes a 3rd base right before the attack and right as the protoss natural is getting up. 3 hatch 2 queen gives zerg an insane ability to power drones
He doesn't out right kill him, in fact he doesn't even do too much damage but he's on equal economy before the attack. @ ~7minutes 34 drones to 29 probes roaches on the way @ ~10minutes the attack stops he's killed a few probes but really not done too much damage. alicia's battle control was very good. 32 drones to 30 probes @~12minutes this is the next time we get to know the worker count its 65 drones to 44 probes and what really could alicia have done by now? there's a group of speedlings ready for a backstab as soon as the attack stops if alicia trys to counter attack
I've seen mc do a 4 gate expand. I think he does 4 gates now to get enough units to defend off the roachling allin then he can put pressure back on the zerg.. I'm not a protoss user this is just theorycraft
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
The IM timing isn't really an all-in. It starts with usually even economy to a 3gate sentry expand and takes a 3rd base right before the attack and right as the protoss natural is getting up. 3 hatch 2 queen gives zerg an insane ability to power drones
He doesn't out right kill him, in fact he doesn't even do too much damage but he's on equal economy before the attack. @ ~7minutes 34 drones to 29 probes roaches on the way @ ~10minutes the attack stops he's killed a few probes but really not done too much damage. alicia's battle control was very good. 32 drones to 30 probes @~12minutes this is the next time we get to know the worker count its 65 drones to 44 probes and what really could alicia have done by now? there's a group of speedlings ready for a backstab as soon as the attack stops if alicia trys to counter attack
Yes I remember that game, he lost a ton of probes, not a few, he handled the attack poorly. He cut corners for a stargate. I've held this attack off and at the end i'd have not 2 less workers, but 10+ more. This attack keeps protoss honest, nothing more.
Here are my basic thoughts on the matter (and a comparison to 4 gate).
There is a timing where scouting is very difficult, for Zerg that is between the wall in + an AA unit (stalker/sentry) and the lair tech kicking in, for protoss it is between ling speed finishing and when they get observer/hallucination/[hoenix.
The main issue is that if you know you have a blind spot you must play safer. For me that means I always throw down 2 spine crawlers and/or make 5-6 roaches and have a few larvae stockpiled in anticipation of 4 gates. For toss it may mean a couple of cannons or an extra gateway (you don't need to constantly pump out of it but an extra 2 units in a pinch may help).
The other thing I have noted is that most toss builds have 2 gas. Is it possible to use those probes and 75 minerals from the second gas better in cannons/zealots? Do you need 8-10 sentries rather than a few more beefy units? At the end of the day force fields can be baited and also matter less if you have a ton of zealots (because the zealots cut up the lings quite well).
Expand builds from Terran and Zerg are low gas whereas toss always seems to rush VRs or DTs.
In a lot of cases Zerg players can't scout properly (especially versus Terran) and the reaction is simply to always have enough units you can survive while going for econ, tech is just not the right answer.
Tech means you can't compete if they go full macro on you and you aren't any safer from rushes. Maybe taking a slower tech approach (using hallucinate for scouting instead of fast robo, using cannons for defense) and a gateway heavy composition would be safer.
As a Zerg I really don't see how I can take a tech leap that destroys a gateway comp that is in a defensive position. Zerg learned to rely more on Queens/spores and less on overseers and hydras, maybe toss has to adapt by making an equivalent transition.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
I had a game similar to this, what do you do if he starts attacking your nexus? I couldn't muster out the forces to stop it and the cannon is outranged.
TO OP: Typically in PvZ I do a 10gate DT tech rush into expo, and often times I catch the Zerg player massing at their natural. Although I have 1 stalker and about 3 zealots for most of the early game, I am very active with them, ritually clearing out the xnwt and my natural, looking for spare lings.
At 6:45 I can warp in 3 dts, and a few seconds later I am able to place my nexus. The DTs are really strong at that point in time, and more often than not I can snipe their natural and a few drones. If they all-in me, which the Zergs have several times, (queen, drones, remainder of army) I cancel my nexus, go back up my ramp, warp in sentries and bring 1 DT back to base to clear out the trash. The other 2 take care of cleaning up his base. The difficulty I have is usually when the Zerg player, as stated in the OP, is able to correctly predict DT and gets detection. The counter to this is simple, and was made even stronger in the 1.3.3 patch: Archon.
If I am forced out of the Zerg natural early, without doing much damage (very rare; due to a sac ol scouting DT shrine or blind spore crawler building), the worst thing I could do is lose even 1 DT since I spent so much early game resources getting them... Hence the solution is to pull 1 and place at the Zerg 3rd, and bring 2 back for archon defense. Since I am on double geysers, I will have a lot of sentries, and a lot of minerals, so I (if I haven't already) place a forge and then cannon my natural. The sentries coupled with the archon (most important unit here) really make a staunch defense even by themselves, but against this roach ling allin I find that I need the extra support of cannons both as damage dealers and detection units. I don't mind spamming 4-6 cannons either, even though that is typically an overreaction, but the idea behind that is this: If I make 2-4 cannons and together with my army I just barely hold, the zerg has the macro mechanic to overwhelm me especially since I am relying on cannon build times as part of my defense. Even if I hold, I will have received a lot of damage and spent a lot of resources replenishing units/structures that I have lost. Alternatively, if I build 4-6 cannons, they could completely shut down the aggression and give the Zerg player absolutely no returns for the combat unit investment they've made, both in having done no damage and in wasting so much larva for an army that can't do much due to force field and the archon... The strength of the roaches, even with burrow, is based on the presence of the zerglings able to be in the combat, but the archon/sentry combination (especially after the range buff to archon attack) that fact is easily deniable (though it is of course contingent on how well force fields are placed). All of this is doable because of the DT though... they both act as scouts and threats that demand attention from the Zerg player, forcing a delay in their push to acquire the necessary detection.
As a Protoss player, I operate under the belief that the forge should be placed soon after your nexus is placed. I tend to overproduce combat units and place my forge late, but it shouldn't really affect the timing of this push since the Dark Templar are what dictate when this push goes into effect. Also, if you are good at finding holes in your opponent's defenses, Dark Templar are a unit you want to have as early as is possible.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
So basicly, the reason people are losing to the agression is because they are being greedy with their probes and not investing in enough units to stop the agression.
What if you do this and see that they decided to take a quick third instead? I am more inclinded to try for my third myself, but how quickly.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
The IM timing isn't really an all-in. It starts with usually even economy to a 3gate sentry expand and takes a 3rd base right before the attack and right as the protoss natural is getting up. 3 hatch 2 queen gives zerg an insane ability to power drones
He doesn't out right kill him, in fact he doesn't even do too much damage but he's on equal economy before the attack. @ ~7minutes 34 drones to 29 probes roaches on the way @ ~10minutes the attack stops he's killed a few probes but really not done too much damage. alicia's battle control was very good. 32 drones to 30 probes @~12minutes this is the next time we get to know the worker count its 65 drones to 44 probes and what really could alicia have done by now? there's a group of speedlings ready for a backstab as soon as the attack stops if alicia trys to counter attack
Yes I remember that game, he lost a ton of probes, not a few, he handled the attack poorly. He cut corners for a stargate. I've held this attack off and at the end i'd have not 2 less workers, but 10+ more. This attack keeps protoss honest, nothing more.
Mini can you find a zerg to do this to you and post the replay? It'd be super helpful to see how to hold it in action.
yeah the voidray tactic would prolly work, but honestly... who goes voidray expand :S? that must be if u can scout the build, which in it self is a hard thing.
I've been doing what Mini posted and what I saw in another thread from Alejandrisha and I have found that this works quite well Here is a replay of me doing this Granted I am only diamond but I think this an help others around my level specifically in seeing it can be done.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
The IM timing isn't really an all-in. It starts with usually even economy to a 3gate sentry expand and takes a 3rd base right before the attack and right as the protoss natural is getting up. 3 hatch 2 queen gives zerg an insane ability to power drones
He doesn't out right kill him, in fact he doesn't even do too much damage but he's on equal economy before the attack. @ ~7minutes 34 drones to 29 probes roaches on the way @ ~10minutes the attack stops he's killed a few probes but really not done too much damage. alicia's battle control was very good. 32 drones to 30 probes @~12minutes this is the next time we get to know the worker count its 65 drones to 44 probes and what really could alicia have done by now? there's a group of speedlings ready for a backstab as soon as the attack stops if alicia trys to counter attack
Yes I remember that game, he lost a ton of probes, not a few, he handled the attack poorly. He cut corners for a stargate. I've held this attack off and at the end i'd have not 2 less workers, but 10+ more. This attack keeps protoss honest, nothing more.
I think you misremember, he didn't get a stargate that game he got hallucination and eventually robo and twilight council tech.
During the attack at his natural he lost from my count: 3 zealot 6 probe 3 stalker 2 sentry 1 cannon 1 pylon
If he had kept those 6 probes alive he would've had an income lead for about 20-25s before the drone count surpassed him.
I think you misremember, he didn't get a stargate that game he got hallucination and eventually robo and twilight council tech.
During the attack at his natural he lost from my count: 3 zealot 6 probe 3 stalker 2 sentry 1 cannon 1 pylon
If he had kept those 6 probes alive he would've had an income lead for about 20-25s before the drone count surpassed him.
This is the game where he didn't wall off at his nat right? He moved out and wasted 5 FF. He also didn't build the cannon immediately after the forge finished. He built the cannon at 8:15 when his forge finished at 7:25.
Stargate expand is not the answer. Sure roaches and lings can't kill void rays but the void ray can't kill the roaches fast enough to really do anything.. by the time you've killed the roaches your expansion is gone. Also it doesn't address the zerglings at all. 3gate dt expand is very good because it more effectively deals with the push and in the meantime, these zerg openings sacrifice early detection for more aggression. I myself have had success with getting hallucination right after warpgate, adding 1 cannon preemptively and adding 1 or 2 more if I scout the all in and using good simcity + forcefields + cannons to deal with it.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
In the nestea vs inca GSL finals game 1, Nestea's attack hit around 7:40. In your screenshot, the timer is at 8:30. Is the screenshot you posted an accurate description of what you would generally have at the 7:45 mark?
On May 21 2011 04:10 ZeromuS wrote: I've been doing what Mini posted and what I saw in another thread from Alejandrisha and I have found that this works quite well Here is a replay of me doing this Granted I am only diamond but I think this an help others around my level specifically in seeing it can be done.
It was on backwater Gulch for those who care. the Zerg really didnt expect me to hold it at the end lol
This was some kind of delayed push. At 7:30 mark when this usually hits, you just hallucinated your phoenix and your army was a zealot and 8 sentries, no cannons either. You were lucky that he attacked at around 8 minute mark, which gave you time to make stalkers and allow your cannon to finish. What I am saying here is if the zerg did it as he should have, it would have been an easy win for him.
I really think that stopping at 5-6 sentries with a slightly later second gas is the answer to this. Having a few stalkers up instead if pure sentries when their attack first gets to you is HUGE, and allows you to actually hold things off while you make cannons. Also has the added benefit of making a stalker second instead of a sentry which helps to deny scouting overlords and make the zerg wary of a 4 gate. Basically the way I've been playing it is zealot->stalker->sentry->sentry off the first gate, then expand and warp in 3 sentries followed up with more stalkers on subsequent warpins.
I think you misremember, he didn't get a stargate that game he got hallucination and eventually robo and twilight council tech.
During the attack at his natural he lost from my count: 3 zealot 6 probe 3 stalker 2 sentry 1 cannon 1 pylon
If he had kept those 6 probes alive he would've had an income lead for about 20-25s before the drone count surpassed him.
This is the game where he didn't wall off at his nat right? He moved out and wasted 5 FF. He also didn't build the cannon immediately after the forge finished. He built the cannon at 8:15 when his forge finished at 7:25.
Yep and so pretend if he had those extra forcefields and could've saved all the units he lost at the end of the battle when he was out of energy. He would've then lost only:
Regardless my point stands that it was not an all-in but rather an attack the forces protoss to burn off all their sentry energy and delays any scary push for a few minutes while zerg is free to drone up (it takes about 3 minutes for a sentry to gain 100 energy which is coincidentally about the same time it takes to get a lair and burrow). If protoss moves out anyways zerg backstabs with lings.
If protoss doesn't turn around to clean it up then zerg doesn't have to drone up because protoss is on 1 base economy and zerg can stay on his 2 base economy and spend larva from his 3 hatcheries on units to stay alive.
IMO it's just a good way to get your third base running as zerg vs a 3gate sentry expand. If protoss makes mistakes it can win the game, if he doesn't you're still fine for the midgame. Just like a 2gate expand with a 4stalker zealot sentry attack is a good way to get your natural up against a Terran and can potentially win the game if he makes mistakes.
Yep and so pretend if he had those extra forcefields and could've saved all the units he lost at the end of the battle when he was out of energy. He would've then lost only:
Regardless my point stands that it was not an all-in but rather an attack the forces protoss to burn off all their sentry energy and delays any scary push for a few minutes while zerg is free to drone up (it takes about 3 minutes for a sentry to gain 100 energy which is coincidentally about the same time it takes to get a lair and burrow). If protoss moves out anyways zerg backstabs with lings.
If protoss doesn't turn around to clean it up then zerg doesn't have to drone up because protoss is on 1 base economy and zerg can stay on his 2 base economy and spend larva from his 3 hatcheries on units to stay alive.
IMO it's just a good way to get your third base running as zerg vs a 3gate sentry expand. If protoss makes mistakes it can win the game, if he doesn't you're still fine for the midgame. Just like a 2gate expand with a 4stalker zealot sentry attack is a good way to get your natural up against a Terran and can potentially win the game if he makes mistakes.
But don't you think that if he had a proper wall off and his cannon was placed down at 7:30 that he would have escaped with very few losses? The cannon would have been up, dealing damage the entire time. His wall off would have allowed him to use even less FF than he did, so he would have had even more FF at the end of the battle. He used 5 unnecessary FF while pushing out. He had to FF one side of his natural two times using 3 FF each. That's 6 additional FF that could have been saved. So that's 11 FF total that he didn't really need to use.
I think it would have been possible for him to fend off the attack without losing any probes and retain probably 75% of his army... which means that the zerg couldn't just drone up for fear of a 5 or 6 gate.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
The IM timing isn't really an all-in. It starts with usually even economy to a 3gate sentry expand and takes a 3rd base right before the attack and right as the protoss natural is getting up. 3 hatch 2 queen gives zerg an insane ability to power drones
He doesn't out right kill him, in fact he doesn't even do too much damage but he's on equal economy before the attack. @ ~7minutes 34 drones to 29 probes roaches on the way @ ~10minutes the attack stops he's killed a few probes but really not done too much damage. alicia's battle control was very good. 32 drones to 30 probes @~12minutes this is the next time we get to know the worker count its 65 drones to 44 probes and what really could alicia have done by now? there's a group of speedlings ready for a backstab as soon as the attack stops if alicia trys to counter attack
Yes I remember that game, he lost a ton of probes, not a few, he handled the attack poorly. He cut corners for a stargate. I've held this attack off and at the end i'd have not 2 less workers, but 10+ more. This attack keeps protoss honest, nothing more.
Hey Mini, thanks for taking the time to post in this thread and helping the protosses out :D
What do you think is the main difference between a greedy build which would straight up die to this, and a safe one which can defend it?
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
The IM timing isn't really an all-in. It starts with usually even economy to a 3gate sentry expand and takes a 3rd base right before the attack and right as the protoss natural is getting up. 3 hatch 2 queen gives zerg an insane ability to power drones
He doesn't out right kill him, in fact he doesn't even do too much damage but he's on equal economy before the attack. @ ~7minutes 34 drones to 29 probes roaches on the way @ ~10minutes the attack stops he's killed a few probes but really not done too much damage. alicia's battle control was very good. 32 drones to 30 probes @~12minutes this is the next time we get to know the worker count its 65 drones to 44 probes and what really could alicia have done by now? there's a group of speedlings ready for a backstab as soon as the attack stops if alicia trys to counter attack
Yes I remember that game, he lost a ton of probes, not a few, he handled the attack poorly. He cut corners for a stargate. I've held this attack off and at the end i'd have not 2 less workers, but 10+ more. This attack keeps protoss honest, nothing more.
I think you misremember, he didn't get a stargate that game he got hallucination and eventually robo and twilight council tech.
During the attack at his natural he lost from my count: 3 zealot 6 probe 3 stalker 2 sentry 1 cannon 1 pylon
If he had kept those 6 probes alive he would've had an income lead for about 20-25s before the drone count surpassed him.
No I didn't, I was talking about the 2nd set.
The first set is I guess what you are talking about.
HE CUT CORNERS, just like I was saying, it's to keep protoss honest.
he had NO WALL, one pylon, and his cannon wasn't even up cross positions on that huge map
he
cut
corners
This build is to keep protoss honest. He had no wall on game 2 either, having a wall saves A TON of forcefields.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
In the nestea vs inca GSL finals game 1, Nestea's attack hit around 7:40. In your screenshot, the timer is at 8:30. Is the screenshot you posted an accurate description of what you would generally have at the 7:45 mark?
i misplaced a pylon and it took me a minute to decide if i should kill it or just leave it up, I decided to kill it, so therefore the "time" mark is off but what u see I have is what you should have when it hits....
As a zerg, if I see FFE, or even nexus first, a roach/ling all-in is what you're getting from me.
If there wasn't rocks at the third on Tal'darim i would expand, but blizz doesn't like people who expand in response to expansions. So, roach/ling all in.
The times I am thwarted it's just forcefields, a lot of them. If they had enough sentries they can hold me off, simple as that. If they were spending their gas on tech of some kind, then no amount of sim city will save them from my aggression. One time, I ran into DT's but I was slow with my attack, I'm sure the "typical" roach/ling blob shows up earlier than I mustered that game.
I like the term "keeping the protoss honest", I think it's a cheeky response for them to throw down a nexus in response to my hatchery - When a hatchery could just be for production, like more warp gates or barracks. It's a greedy response and if you decide to take it, you need to have a plan for defense, rather than just hoping your opponent lets you expand.
For the 3 gate expand, first, a wall is critical. It takes advantage of the melee range of lings to funnel them. One set up includes pylon(s), Forge, and the 4th gateway in the wall. At least 2 cannons are necessary as they provide excellent DPS in support of your army forces.
Get 6+ Stalkers for FFs, but remember to save gas for Stalkers. In this situation with the lings funnelled/trapped, and combating the ranged Roaches, Stalkers do quite well.
Maps like X Caverns can be a bit tricky because the natural is so large, but with good building and FF placement, you can turn the tide of battle for your forces.
On May 20 2011 12:28 Minigun wrote: Nah it's pretty much meant to lower your sentry count and outright kill you. If you live you should be ahead. Here is what you will have when it hits on XEL NAGA and what your buildings should look like.
Now, when u see it come, you add pure stalker after having 8-10 sentries, and units come before probes, and have a 2nd cannon warping in. Notice the positioning of the first cannon, and how there is a pylon behind it powering it.
do not go out, stay behind mineral line/wall
Yes i realize the forge/gateway will get picked off if you don't go outside the wall
no one cares , you just have to SURVIVE if you survive ESPECIALLY without losing probes, you are AHEAD.
that's exactly how my building placement looks. roaches pick it apart; as you say. But if you loose your 4th gateway and forge, the zerg will just outproduce you. I know you are probably more skilled than me (I'm high master), so I think it's just that you never faced a zerg who is REALLY committing to this and is pumping pure units for the entire time. As soon as the buildings are down, a zerg can run in with 40 speedlings. your sentry energie won't last forever and you don't have the dps to kill the masses fast enough. when he is committing, he WILL kill you.
I'm not talking out my ass, it's not like I haven't been roach/ling all in'd by zergs at my level, it happens from time to time, and it is definitely feasible, hard, but as long as you don't mess up, it should be fine.
that's true they can, but u are forgetting you have forcefields, lings and unupgraded roaches, are helpless against sentries+cannons, completely helpless. You should be warping in more sentries as needed, if the attack continues, warp in more, I've held off these attacks and had like 14-15 sentries at the end because I needed them.
The IM timing isn't really an all-in. It starts with usually even economy to a 3gate sentry expand and takes a 3rd base right before the attack and right as the protoss natural is getting up. 3 hatch 2 queen gives zerg an insane ability to power drones
He doesn't out right kill him, in fact he doesn't even do too much damage but he's on equal economy before the attack. @ ~7minutes 34 drones to 29 probes roaches on the way @ ~10minutes the attack stops he's killed a few probes but really not done too much damage. alicia's battle control was very good. 32 drones to 30 probes @~12minutes this is the next time we get to know the worker count its 65 drones to 44 probes and what really could alicia have done by now? there's a group of speedlings ready for a backstab as soon as the attack stops if alicia trys to counter attack
Yes I remember that game, he lost a ton of probes, not a few, he handled the attack poorly. He cut corners for a stargate. I've held this attack off and at the end i'd have not 2 less workers, but 10+ more. This attack keeps protoss honest, nothing more.
I think you misremember, he didn't get a stargate that game he got hallucination and eventually robo and twilight council tech.
During the attack at his natural he lost from my count: 3 zealot 6 probe 3 stalker 2 sentry 1 cannon 1 pylon
If he had kept those 6 probes alive he would've had an income lead for about 20-25s before the drone count surpassed him.
No I didn't, I was talking about the 2nd set.
The first set is I guess what you are talking about.
HE CUT CORNERS, just like I was saying, it's to keep protoss honest.
he had NO WALL, one pylon, and his cannon wasn't even up cross positions on that huge map
he
cut
corners
This build is to keep protoss honest. He had no wall on game 2 either, having a wall saves A TON of forcefields.
Yes the first set, the game on terminus, like I said.
I'm not sure what you are trying to get at. He had enough forcefields to control the battle as he pleased until that last little bit where he lost an extra zealot 2 stalkers and 2 probes. I could believe he would've lost even less had he built a blind cannon. If he lost nothing but all his sentry energy I still believe the game would've gone on much as it did.
Unless you're suggesting that the forge in his natural would've saved enough forcefields that he'd have enough left to pressure zerg into continuing to produce units or risk dying to a counter attack.
Alicia wasn't in terrible shape after that attack he just couldn't put any pressure on zerg for a while. He moved out around 13 minutes as I would expect based on sentry energy regeneration. He scouted the hydra switch with hallucination and went for an attack with primarily immortal sentry anyways and the game really ended at the 15 minute mark when he lost his whole army due to a horrible composition mismatch. But that's beside the point of this thread.
He already blind forged and he built a cannon pretty much as soon as he saw roaches. If you have to blind forge and cannon at your natural you're giving zerg a world of information. You'll start the forge around the time he starts roaches and can easily scout to front and decide if he wants to turn all those larva into lings or drones. Either way you're pretty much assuring him that no 9minute 5-6gate timing is coming.
I guess that's fine if it's true but it seems like a pretty big opportunity cost. That forge and cannon could be a 4th and 5th gateway for instance. If zerg heavily drones up after speed instead of doing the timing or goes for a 10-11 minute muta timing is your attack still strong enough after buying safety from this potential hatch tech roach ling attack? Then again maybe you already needed that to buy safety in case of the 9 minute roach burrow/tunneling claws timing.
To summarize I think the timing is a good way for zerg to force out all of the forcefields out of a 3gate expanding protoss far from the zerg's base and get into his 3 base lair tech mid game safe from core tech pure gateway timings on equal or better terms economically and maintain map control until protoss tech kicks in.
And if it's not I'd like to know and see how a good defense of a solid execution leads directly to an easy quick win.
You can have all of the things that Minigun said by the time the roach ling all-in comes, but i suggest using a specific simcity format that i've been messing with:
This way is not currently standard as far as i can tell, but it allows you to use significantly fewer forcefields and the set-up works the same way in both positions. also the odds of a pylon bust followed by an avalanche of lings is almost next to none. It's very easy to set-up too, I just don't see anyone using this format because everyone has continued the former tradition of a pseudo-choke beneath their ramp with a pylon + zealot, which actually hasn't worked since patch 1.2 was released last year. I do realize that this wall-in requires a fifth gateway, but you would only place the fifth gateway if you knew that roach-ling pressure was coming and the benefit you get from having gateway walls vastly outweighs the consequences of having a different arrangement that simply calls for additional pylons in my opinion. Furthermore if you're using travis's build, you would need to replace the forge with another gateway since your forge is in your main already.
What is the purpose of making that wall-behind-the-wall with pylon #2? Doesn't that just restrict YOUR movements? Is there another way to place it that powers both cannons? Cannon #3 is very vulnerable, isn't it? What if you moved it 1 square to the right and didn't send any probes to the left side mineral patches until the attack was cleared off?
cannon 3 is not as important as the first two and should only be placed if the attention is focused behind your mineral line, as you forcefield him away from it as it warps in, there is a reason i have them numbered and that is because they are in order of importance.
as for the 2nd pylon, there are other places to put the pylon so that it still supports both cannons but i think the benefit you get from having fewer holes for lings to run through is worth walking around the gas. your entire army will always be near the gas anyway, either on the left or the right of it, and shouldn't prevent you from defending efficiently. though if it's that concerning to you, there are a lot of other ways to make this wall.
edit: by far the most important part of why i put this picture up is to point out the use of a gateway wall extending from the ramp as opposed to a pylon wall.
edit 2: the reason i elect to use the pylon placement that i am using in this picture is that it obeys a simple rule for construction placement that applies to a lot of different maps that i play on, and makes it easier for me to remember.
I've seen some Grand Master players going 4 gate ---> expand.
If the Z plays greedy / drones hard, then gg Protoss wins instantly. If Z is being aggressive you will be able to cope with it pretty easily. If Z is being mildly aggressive / droning behind it then you will probably out-macro him and be able to pressure him back while you expand. If Z plays super defensive with like 4 spines or whatever then oh well take ur expansion and the money you spent on 4 gating he wasted on spines.
to be safe you need to get a forge right after you plot down your expo and put down a cannon or two. good simcity along with sentries and stalkers can hold this. i've held the push several times this way and i am also mid masters. about the socuting yes i know it can feel like u are playing blind, but u have to try and hide a probe or two around the map so u can scout in intervals to see whether or not he is teching to lair or getting a fast roach den. this and getting hallucination / 4 gates before getting robo is my choice of PvZ.
i like to go 3 gate sentry expand > forge > upgrades + cannon > researching hallucination > get a fourth gateway > pressure if i see zerg being greedy and shark him with my 4 gates along with hallucination support Or i get a robo (if i see roach/hydra) and get a few immortals if its roach, immediately tech up to colossus if its hydra. and play standard from that point on. if its two base roach ling its very dependent on sim city and good proper forcefields (having 1-2 cannons is crutch).
Maybe with godly force fields you can hold against losira build with only one cannon on Xel'Naga, but I doubt even that. On maps with such wide open naturals you're basically guaranteed to take a ton of damage if you 3 gate expand. With the setup minigun took a picture of, you're going to lose that pylon on the outside right off the bat, and then maybe with perfect force fields you'll only lose a few probes.
Either way, you're taking damage, you're going to use up almost all of your force fields while they take a third, and you'll probably lose a few sentries and probes as well.
Just go 3 gate DT expand like HuK and take your free win against roach aggression while still being fine against anything else.
I've been playing the roach/ling build a lot, and it seems pretty random; sometimes 3 gate exp with good sim city (and good micro/reaction time) can actually defend it without getting behind, most stargate builds can defend, but p ends up losing his nexus (so he gets waaay behind), dt builds obviously defend really well, but if z scouts/maphacks he will just add 2 spores, drone and be way ahead in eco.
Personally I think agains losira's build (losira gets ling speed quite late, nestea gets it a bit sooner from what I recall) early stalkers can be a massive pain in the ass - otherwise just cut probes and get an early 4th/5th gate (or cannons), I think both are quite viable if you know it's coming.
Yea, I been reading comments and tried the DT build. imo it is very coinflip against player skill. It is very obvious if you are going dt or not, fast 2 gas+low sentry+slow expo means dt or void ray opening which evo+spore counters both. Then they can just safely drone get a few roaches and take a 3rd and you become so far behind.
The main problem I'm having with going hallucination first is you have less units when they attack comes because you missed the warpgate transition unit boost(at least it feels like I always have less units). It is just hard yea Stargate opening is pretty fail. I lose nexus every time and my void ray has to stay at my natural to kill off units since I don't have enough sentries to infinite ff my ramp. Then they always get spore+queen in the mean time and I do little to no damage(my micro isn't the greatest but picking off extractors and maybe an ovie or 2 just doesnt seem like it will get me even).
I know my micro needs more work as my ff isn't a pro level but yea it just seem really hard to hold off.
On May 21 2011 04:10 ZeromuS wrote: I've been doing what Mini posted and what I saw in another thread from Alejandrisha and I have found that this works quite well Here is a replay of me doing this Granted I am only diamond but I think this an help others around my level specifically in seeing it can be done.
It was on backwater Gulch for those who care. the Zerg really didnt expect me to hold it at the end lol
you placed the ff quite well. I'm diamonad too but cant place it well as you you only used one cannon to hold it and just lost 1 gateway and few units(only zealot). it is pretty nice hold.
Well, here is my contribution. I know nobody will be satisfied until a build is made that has enough cannons and units to stop the roach/ling attack by Nestea.
I tried out a new idea of just taking probes off one gas in order to get some extra money to build cannons and the infrastructure a little faster. -I have about 5 stalkers, 5 sentries, and 2 cannons at around 7:45. Hallucination finishes at around 7:35, which barely gives time to scout. I guess if you don't scout the roach ling pressure, you can cancel the second cannon and build a gateway.
-I am aware that I cut probes and even one gateway.
-I also have only 5 sentries instead of 8 or 9
-The building placement isn't the best, but this is only the beginning of the refinement of this build.
Hopefully, a stronger player can add onto this idea to make a more refined build (I am only diamond).
I would like to know the weaknesses and downsides of what I am doing. Is this idea viable? If it isn't just tell me, so I can move onto the next idea.
mmm the allin abuses the larger space at the expansions, and the fact that sentrys need alot of energy and can't fight on their own. Sound for me like a don't use sentrys ^^. I am not a grandmaster toss though, mostly switch races around to test stuffies and have fun. So the zergs i play aren't top level and might react poorly to different situations. (well from my experience almost everyone reacts poorly to strange strats, never played someone above low grandmaster though). Well that is probably the reason why they play this allin even if they don't see the mass sentrys.
I generally go for fast immortals and +1 ground attack (I chrono that over the warp gate). A zerg can run by easily against this army composition, but attack it directly with ling roach, not a chance (its heavy micro for the toss) (i use a few sentrys too, they are a perfect extra buff if you have a bit overgas). Just need to scout the zerg pretty well so you won't be suprised by mutas. (luckily an almost forgotten tech in tvz). Its something for people that don't fear a basetrade ^^. (you are better off in this situation as toss).
it works well with my defensiv playstyle with thrown in harass. though it allows the opponent to eco alot and i don't know how bad this can end against really good zergs. (well they love to rally befor your base and if you fought them off nicely in the first round you can afford that evil warp prism)
But since i know when i play zerg that i love to pump lings after roaches saved up alot of larva and that roaches often end up killing the ling counters.
And if you love your sentrys and hate immortals because they allways shoot the lings. Maybe its a good idea to just throw in this +1 and cut 2 sentrys (gas a tiny bit later). Zerg will either need +1 armor or lots of roaches. And mass roach is a pretty old thing ^.^.
PS: the best thing is if the +1 finishes just in battle xD and the zerg didn't saw the upgrade and is like what just happened xD. 80% chance of getting imba flames !
On May 21 2011 11:51 Pro]ChoSen- wrote: I've seen some Grand Master players going 4 gate ---> expand.
If the Z plays greedy / drones hard, then gg Protoss wins instantly. If Z is being aggressive you will be able to cope with it pretty easily. If Z is being mildly aggressive / droning behind it then you will probably out-macro him and be able to pressure him back while you expand. If Z plays super defensive with like 4 spines or whatever then oh well take ur expansion and the money you spent on 4 gating he wasted on spines.
How is 4 gate expand a bad choice ^^
Do you mean defensive 4gate? If I am not mistaken you are talking about a 4gate attack. And if you don't kill him right away, you are WAY behind, cuz you cut probes and don't have money for expo. Can you give some more info on this?
I tested some different builds. One of them was to add 2 Gates instead of forge / gate and cut probes for units after nexus is finished. It worked really well because you can defend and win against an all in by having unit advantage or you can push early to do dmg and force units (pretty strong timing). It's kind of the same play compared to ling/roach all in.
On May 21 2011 20:19 FeyFey wrote: mmm the allin abuses the larger space at the expansions, and the fact that sentrys need alot of energy and can't fight on their own. Sound for me like a don't use sentrys ^^. I am not a grandmaster toss though, mostly switch races around to test stuffies and have fun. So the zergs i play aren't top level and might react poorly to different situations. (well from my experience almost everyone reacts poorly to strange strats, never played someone above low grandmaster though). Well that is probably the reason why they play this allin even if they don't see the mass sentrys.
I generally go for fast immortals and +1 ground attack (I chrono that over the warp gate). A zerg can run by easily against this army composition, but attack it directly with ling roach, not a chance (its heavy micro for the toss) (i use a few sentrys too, they are a perfect extra buff if you have a bit overgas). Just need to scout the zerg pretty well so you won't be suprised by mutas. (luckily an almost forgotten tech in tvz).
That is terrible advice my friend. Fast immos against this build is a free win for Zerg. How many immos are you going to have at 8 mins? Your composition will simply be overrun.
Can we have some of the pro's comments editted into the OP please?
I am seriously struggling against this type of play by Z and would be much appreciative if we could filter the thread and update the OP.
I'm at my wits end here.....TT
Thanks
Edit:
If it helps, I'm finding the trouble to be that even if I hold the first two waves or so, there seems to be no viable way to hold the waves that follow, the units that can be replaced quickly from warp gates seem to be too weak to hold once sentry energy runs lows and sentries feel to expensive to replace, not to mention they can't win the fight solo, uggggh this is driving me bananas.
2 gate FE with cannons is my play against this, using a relatively quick hallucination to scout how many cannons I need. Builing more gates is only counterproductive imo as you don't really have gas to support much more gas units anyway, early on you cant make more then 2 gates worth of sentries and when he pushes I just switch to stalkers, chronoing the gates non stop and making cannons.
Except a DT build there is no magical way to autobeat this build imo. It does quite good against any other aggresive build because it gets quite an amount of lings.
Trick to beating it is just to FF him out while your cannons finish imo, if you have 2 up your are quite safe.
I didnt even need cannon help, only good forcefields
This replay is an example of some of the various roach timing attacks that are possible. However, I and probably along with many others are looking for a safe build that stops a perfect copy of the nestea/losira timing attacks.
Particularly, i am trying to figure out a build that stops 9 roaches and 30 lings that hit around the 7:50 mark.
I hate to be rude, but some of the replays that are being shown are just not that same build. I see roach builds that are hitting at the 8:30 mark with like 5 lings, then the protoss says that "I stopped it easily with perfect forcefields." Just take a look at your build and see if it is even near capable of stopping 9 roaches and 30 lings at that 7:50 mark. That is what we are looking for. I posted a possible solution with a 3 gate expand while taking probes off of one gas, making it possible to add 2 cannons and a forge along with a quick expand. There are downsides, but I was hoping for some discussion and help to improve on the build.
Here is a somewhat close example of what we are trying to stop. Sheth in this replay does a roach ling timing, but still it doesn't quite match that of nestea caliber. http://drop.sc/11053
I didnt even need cannon help, only good forcefields
This replay is an example of some of the various roach timing attacks that are possible. However, I and probably along with many others are looking for a safe build that stops a perfect copy of the nestea/losira timing attacks.
Particularly, i am trying to figure out a build that stops 9 roaches and 30 lings that hit around the 7:50 mark.
I hate to be rude, but some of the replays that are being shown are just not that same build. I see roach builds that are hitting at the 8:30 mark with like 5 lings, then the protoss says that "I stopped it easily with perfect forcefields." Just take a look at your build and see if it is even near capable of stopping 9 roaches and 30 lings at that 7:50 mark. That is what we are looking for. I posted a possible solution with a 3 gate expand while taking probes off of one gas, making it possible to add 2 cannons and a forge along with a quick expand. There are downsides, but I was hoping for some discussion and help to improve on the build.
Here is a somewhat close example of what we are trying to stop. Sheth in this replay does a roach ling timing, but still it doesn't quite match that of nestea caliber. http://drop.sc/11053
A lot of the VT guys, and some of the other pros I've been practicing with regularly are opting for hallucinate before warpgate.
This lets you see if Z cuts drones and starts saving larva so that you can opt for well-informed cannons, or whatever other changes you might like to make to your unit composition.
I didnt even need cannon help, only good forcefields
This replay is an example of some of the various roach timing attacks that are possible. However, I and probably along with many others are looking for a safe build that stops a perfect copy of the nestea/losira timing attacks.
Particularly, i am trying to figure out a build that stops 9 roaches and 30 lings that hit around the 7:50 mark.
I hate to be rude, but some of the replays that are being shown are just not that same build. I see roach builds that are hitting at the 8:30 mark with like 5 lings, then the protoss says that "I stopped it easily with perfect forcefields." Just take a look at your build and see if it is even near capable of stopping 9 roaches and 30 lings at that 7:50 mark. That is what we are looking for. I posted a possible solution with a 3 gate expand while taking probes off of one gas, making it possible to add 2 cannons and a forge along with a quick expand. There are downsides, but I was hoping for some discussion and help to improve on the build.
Here is a somewhat close example of what we are trying to stop. Sheth in this replay does a roach ling timing, but still it doesn't quite match that of nestea caliber. http://drop.sc/11053
A lot of the VT guys, and some of the other pros I've been practicing with regularly are opting for hallucinate before warpgate.
This lets you see if Z cuts drones and starts saving larva so that you can opt for well-informed cannons, or whatever other changes you might like to make to your unit composition.
Honestly, I think its the best option you have...
I just can't imagine this being safe... Can you really afford to use 2 force fields that early in the game? I just don't see how you can possibly get your nexus down against some standard ling pressure when you are delaying warp gate for so long and using up so much energy.
Also, this is far less of an issue, but if you play against some CatZ style proxy hatch roach/ling shenanigans I think you're completely dead if you wasted 100 gas on hallucinate and your warp gate research is that delayed.
I didnt even need cannon help, only good forcefields
This replay is an example of some of the various roach timing attacks that are possible. However, I and probably along with many others are looking for a safe build that stops a perfect copy of the nestea/losira timing attacks.
Particularly, i am trying to figure out a build that stops 9 roaches and 30 lings that hit around the 7:50 mark.
I hate to be rude, but some of the replays that are being shown are just not that same build. I see roach builds that are hitting at the 8:30 mark with like 5 lings, then the protoss says that "I stopped it easily with perfect forcefields." Just take a look at your build and see if it is even near capable of stopping 9 roaches and 30 lings at that 7:50 mark. That is what we are looking for. I posted a possible solution with a 3 gate expand while taking probes off of one gas, making it possible to add 2 cannons and a forge along with a quick expand. There are downsides, but I was hoping for some discussion and help to improve on the build.
Here is a somewhat close example of what we are trying to stop. Sheth in this replay does a roach ling timing, but still it doesn't quite match that of nestea caliber. http://drop.sc/11053
A lot of the VT guys, and some of the other pros I've been practicing with regularly are opting for hallucinate before warpgate.
This lets you see if Z cuts drones and starts saving larva so that you can opt for well-informed cannons, or whatever other changes you might like to make to your unit composition.
Honestly, I think its the best option you have...
I just can't imagine this being safe... Can you really afford to use 2 force fields that early in the game? I just don't see how you can possibly get your nexus down against some standard ling pressure when you are delaying warp gate for so long and using up so much energy.
Also, this is far less of an issue, but if you play against some CatZ style proxy hatch roach/ling shenanigans I think you're completely dead if you wasted 100 gas on hallucinate and your warp gate research is that delayed.
I think that's looking at it a little unfairly...
There is obviously a trade-off when you go hallucinate first, but sentries did get a gateway build time reduction...
And when the trade-off is
"If he sacrifices eco by making some extra lings, I take my natural 1 production cycle later."
I think it makes a lot of sense.
Also, look at your alternatives:
Blindly expand at the normal time and risk losing outright, or slow down your first warp-in, while still producing off of gateways so that you can know what's happening.
I can understand it being "not ideal", but I don't think it's a bad option at all.
edit: And with proper timing, you should really only need a single hallucinate. I couldn't say exactly when, but I would think that at around 6:30 you'd be able to see whether Z is saving larva or not.
I didnt even need cannon help, only good forcefields
This replay is an example of some of the various roach timing attacks that are possible. However, I and probably along with many others are looking for a safe build that stops a perfect copy of the nestea/losira timing attacks.
Particularly, i am trying to figure out a build that stops 9 roaches and 30 lings that hit around the 7:50 mark.
I hate to be rude, but some of the replays that are being shown are just not that same build. I see roach builds that are hitting at the 8:30 mark with like 5 lings, then the protoss says that "I stopped it easily with perfect forcefields." Just take a look at your build and see if it is even near capable of stopping 9 roaches and 30 lings at that 7:50 mark. That is what we are looking for. I posted a possible solution with a 3 gate expand while taking probes off of one gas, making it possible to add 2 cannons and a forge along with a quick expand. There are downsides, but I was hoping for some discussion and help to improve on the build.
Here is a somewhat close example of what we are trying to stop. Sheth in this replay does a roach ling timing, but still it doesn't quite match that of nestea caliber. http://drop.sc/11053
A lot of the VT guys, and some of the other pros I've been practicing with regularly are opting for hallucinate before warpgate.
This lets you see if Z cuts drones and starts saving larva so that you can opt for well-informed cannons, or whatever other changes you might like to make to your unit composition.
Honestly, I think its the best option you have...
I just can't imagine this being safe... Can you really afford to use 2 force fields that early in the game? I just don't see how you can possibly get your nexus down against some standard ling pressure when you are delaying warp gate for so long and using up so much energy.
Also, this is far less of an issue, but if you play against some CatZ style proxy hatch roach/ling shenanigans I think you're completely dead if you wasted 100 gas on hallucinate and your warp gate research is that delayed.
I think that's looking at it a little unfairly...
There is obviously a trade-off when you go hallucinate first, but sentries did get a gateway build time reduction...
And when the trade-off is
"If he sacrifices eco by making some extra lings, I take my natural 1 production cycle later."
I think it makes a lot of sense.
Well, I have not tested it myself, so in that sense I am being a bit unfair.
But my experience leads me to believe that spending 100/100 so early is not cheap, and also that you will barely have 100 energy at that point. So basically if they do any really early aggression after you've hallucinated a phoenix, I would think that you'll have a pretty hard time. I also think delaying warp gate by 60 seconds is going to delay your expansion by a lot more than any hit the zerg is taking by producing a few lings early.
I have also played against a number of non-standard strategies from CatZ, Destiny and Slush where I think delaying warp gate is nearly an auto-loss. For example, if CatZ does a proxy hatch in your main into roaches on close spawns, you're dead if you spent 100/100 on hallucinate that early. Also, if he does early lings into taking the gold base, you won't have warpgate research done early enough to punish before the econ advantage kicks in.
Also, look at your alternatives:
Blindly expand at the normal time and risk losing outright, or slow down your first warp-in, while still producing off of gateways so that you can know what's happening.
I can understand it being "not ideal", but I don't think it's a bad option at all.
edit: And with proper timing, you should really only need a single hallucinate. I couldn't say exactly when, but I would think that at around 6:30 you'd be able to see whether Z is saving larva or not.
Those aren't your alternatives, though. You can expand at the normal time, get a cannon, get hallucinate at the more standard time, and then add 2 cannons if they are going losira build. I think this is how aLeJ is currently playing PvZ, and is having success with it.
You can also do any build other than 3 gate expand and be safe against losira. 2 Gate forge expand into fast void ray holds very well, as does 3 gate DT expand.
Also to supplement what mrbitter has just said, I could be wrong about this because I'm not a top level player but if a zerg is making a significant enough amount of lings to make you need to cancel your nexus and wait for a few more sentries, this has caused his drone count to be far too low to do a roach ling all-in anywhere near nestea's timing, as he will have to produce up to the necessary drone count before he could pump the 7 or 8 roaches.
On top of that, the limiting factor in nestea's roach ling timing is how long it takes the roaches to walk to your base, as the build involves a very quick roach warren that finishes just about at 6:30 like mrbitter said. following the roach warren completion is a huge roach ling pump, with the initial lings to bait FF's while trying to not lose any, followed by copious amounts of lings as the lings quickly catch up with the slow unupgraded roaches. So to cut into his drone count so heavily and so early for the initial 8 or 10 lings that you refer to as being a threat to expanding, plus to have to wait again to pool larva and then for the roaches to make their way across the map, I think a massive roach ling follow-up would be the least of your problems.
On May 22 2011 00:21 kyarisan wrote: Also to supplement what mrbitter has just said, I could be wrong about this because I'm not a top level player but if a zerg is making a significant enough amount of lings to make you need to cancel your nexus and wait for a few more sentries, this has caused his drone count to be far too low to do a roach ling all-in anywhere near nestea's timing, as he will have to produce up to the necessary drone count before he could pump the 7 or 8 roaches.
On top of that, the limiting factor in nestea's roach ling timing is how long it takes the roaches to walk to your base, as the build involves a very quick roach warren that finishes just about at 6:30 like mrbitter said. following the roach warren completion is a huge roach ling pump, with the initial lings to bait FF's while trying to not lose any, followed by copious amounts of lings as the lings quickly catch up with the slow unupgraded roaches. So to cut into his drone count so heavily and so early for the initial 8 or 10 lings that you refer to as being a threat to expanding, plus to have to wait again to pool larva and then for the roaches to make their way across the map, I think a massive roach ling follow-up would be the least of your problems.
Yes, if they pressure with 8 to 10 lings or something they won't be going a massive roach/ling follow-up.
But that's not the point. If you are getting hallucinate quickly to scout for a roach/ling all-in, then sure, you'll be fine if they do losira build. But what if they do some other standard build, and delay your expansion by an extra 30 seconds to a minute because you researched hallucinate first. Then you are behind.
It's like if you played some opening move in chess and said, "Well, if my opponent continues to play the king's indian after this move they will be behind a tempo," while completely ignoring the fact that they can transpose into some other variation where you are strictly worse than the main line.
Why don't protoss for defense, hallucinate zealots more? IMO they are one of the BEST units to hallucinate because the AI loves to target them. If you make hallucinated stalkers/voids/phoenix/whatever for tanking damage...you really probably won't lower enemy DPS like 2 fake zealots would...no other unit gives you a better chance of absorbing more shots from your real stalkers/sentries/cannons. Plus you get two of them unlike say the immortal or archon.
In fact when doing a gateway push, hallucinated zealots could be so key to tanking damage from spines/lings/drones.
If you can pick the terrain and have better quality units, forcefields have way more stamina. I'll agree that hallucinated tanking units can often be good when things get messy or when you're attacking.
Perhaps...I just think forcefields are kind of overrated. Spines ignore them...roaches/hydras can actually fire over them for the most part. If you have zealots, you pretty much can't use forcefields without helping your opponent. Vs lings it can be tough to make waterproof walls vs them. Plus they can fake attack, let you expend your energy, then attack for real. That or they are so fast they get inside your forcefields which obviously is never a good thing. Even if you have that perfect army split, if their backline hugs the forcefields chances are good you won't have the energy for a 2nd wall and all they have to do it to be relentless and press for victory. I see too many time zerg players give up after they army had been split by just a few sentries and gateway units, when if they had kept on pressing they would have easily won.
I've seen some of the Chinese players like XiaoT going for 1 gas 3 gate expand. Pumping out only Zealots and Stalkers. I feel that this is a very good mix to hold the losira push. Zealots for Lings and Stalkers for Roaches. Tos players are getting to used to the 3 Gate Sentries openings.
Pre Losira push, Protoss players are warping 6-7 Sentries in to save up mana and holding Zergling pressure. However with Roaches currently in the mix, Sentries needs too much proper positioning. Zealots and Stalkers will probably hold the push fine.
With a standard 3 Gate expo, often times you will be lacking in minerals to get probes, cannons, Stalkers/Zealots. I think getting 1 gas is a good choice in the current meta.
The upside is the build looks exactly like a 4 gate. The downside is very low Sentry mana for Force Fields, which may affect the mid game. Who cares about the mid game if you cant even pass the 7:30 mark.
Yeah...to cove, I'm not a pro, but have noticed in watching a lot of pro games an inverse correlation in PvZ games between the number of sentries produced and the chances protoss has in winning the game. I see mass sentry and think...protoss is probably going to lose...and it almost always happens! Sentries are just SO expensive. So with 6 sentries that cost you 300m/600g. Even with this number you will probably only get one good army split on say that roach army but this won't make the sentries pay for themselves. By using 600gas that many sentries really delays your tech (they're aren't many ways of winning vs zerg without fast and early colossi with attack upgrades). Plus it takes up valuable warpgate capacity that could have been used on attacking units to dissuade the zerg from expanding.
Only ways to beat zerg are to 4 gate them, do a phoenix/void rush, do a DT rush, do a 2 base timing rush, do a early blink stalker push or macro up a colossi ball with supporting units. Late/late game you are probably dead unless you get stalker/colossi + storm to cut through the defensive upgrades and bulking caused by max zerg armies. Very tricky to do...
I didnt even need cannon help, only good forcefields
This replay is an example of some of the various roach timing attacks that are possible. However, I and probably along with many others are looking for a safe build that stops a perfect copy of the nestea/losira timing attacks.
Particularly, i am trying to figure out a build that stops 9 roaches and 30 lings that hit around the 7:50 mark.
I hate to be rude, but some of the replays that are being shown are just not that same build. I see roach builds that are hitting at the 8:30 mark with like 5 lings, then the protoss says that "I stopped it easily with perfect forcefields." Just take a look at your build and see if it is even near capable of stopping 9 roaches and 30 lings at that 7:50 mark. That is what we are looking for. I posted a possible solution with a 3 gate expand while taking probes off of one gas, making it possible to add 2 cannons and a forge along with a quick expand. There are downsides, but I was hoping for some discussion and help to improve on the build.
Here is a somewhat close example of what we are trying to stop. Sheth in this replay does a roach ling timing, but still it doesn't quite match that of nestea caliber. http://drop.sc/11053
A lot of the VT guys, and some of the other pros I've been practicing with regularly are opting for hallucinate before warpgate.
This lets you see if Z cuts drones and starts saving larva so that you can opt for well-informed cannons, or whatever other changes you might like to make to your unit composition.
Honestly, I think its the best option you have...
Why bother to go hallucination first though, you can easily go WG and then hallucination and you can just scout in time. You only need the scout to see how many cannons you need so there really is no need to scout THAT fast. The reduction in sentry build time just means you can chrono warpgate more instead of sentries and then afterwards chrono hallucination it still gets out quite fast, ie about 6:30. As long as hallucination finishes before the nexus finishes you are fine really, any attack that comes before that can simply be dealt with by canceling the nexus and going back up the ramp, there isn't anything that can break you then..
Hallu before warpgate throws away ANY offensive options (thus if zerg see's the super fast fake phoenix they can just take a third...). Super fast hallu also has an awkward early cost, ie you need to have the cybercore or gateway idle for some time and finally super fast hallu sucks in case they are doing some other form of pressure, like super fast 3 roach allin or just some speedling harass.
so i've been looking into this alot and i've found a couple things that work. The main thing that makes them work is that you can't base your attacks on your expo at all (standard play is that you only want to attack as you start your nexus, or after u benefit from it to be more optimally, but this restrains you A LOT in the early game). so here are some ideals: 1) 3gate expand, while getting +1 attack before you expand. still get sentries n zealots with some stalkers, and then push out after +1 finishes. if roaches are present, just fall back, make stalkers, get blink, get +2, and push when that all finishes (grab a 3rd here if you can). 2) 1 base pheonix voidray. this build isn't all in. you can do a lot of damage with it, and expand with around 4 cannons once you (if you) scout a lack of roaches/lings. keep you cannon count up with the zergs potential army while making sentries. but you do have to get a lot out of your pheonixs.
There really is not a great way to 100% scout this but this is what I've been doing: Your scouting probe pops back up into their base just before their lings get out and you go and check their gas. I have found that zergs that are doing at least the super early versions of this build will not take all or any of the drones off of gas as they normally would. Of course I'm afraid soon zergs will realize this tell and take them off for at least a second to thwart the probe
After seeing the gas I always put 2 cannons and then send out hallucination to try to find their army. I have found that seeing exactly when the push is coming (which seems to be anywhere between 7:30 and 10:00) is very important in getting the perfect forcefields that are required. The next thing that I do is have a probe sitting not far out of normal vision range of my nat so again I can have the advance warning of where the roaches are coming from. Remember, most of the time the lings will come from the other angle.
My problem now is figuring out what the best way to force field. Do I keep the roaches out and try to kill the lings first (this has NOT been working, my sentries get surrounded and then i have to use too many forcefields all at once to survive). So do I cut the army in half trying to kill small portions of both? The synergy of how these 2 units works would make me think this still might not be cost effective (probably losing too many sentries) The other option which I'm starting o really lean towards is trying to keep the lings out and the roaches in, thus your zealots cant be kited by the roaches and the lings are nullified for now. This seems pretty logical, but man its hard to keep zerglings out on many maps... (so skill comes into play bigtime here, which is fine). Another option would be to use forcefields to keep all of his units out trying to get some free hits while waiting on an extra warp-in or cannon to finish, again this might be hard on many maps.
My final concern or question is how I should keep my army. I have this nice semi-wall-off going on at my natural with a cannon etc... so do I use it to protect my army and lowering my own dps and ability to micro, or do I step a bit out so that I can get better forcefields and dps but endangering my sentries.
Why not just put 3 cannons instead of 2 with really good sim city and forcefields? You may lose an advantage if he goes for a macro game but you will be safer, and if he DOES do this ling roach aggression he will be behind cuz your extra cannon did more damage.
Seems to me like hallucinate first is worth a lot of testing to see if z can force an advantage reactively, after the z knows it's hallucinate and not warpgate. If yes, hallu first = bad If no, see if z can force an advantage by doing something blind, like inbase hat + roach or 3rr or double expanding If no, sweet! hallucinate first is fine If yes, decide whether you want to complain because ZvP imba or because SC2 is rock paper scissors
On May 22 2011 03:55 TheGreenMachine wrote: Why not just put 3 cannons instead of 2 with really good sim city and forcefields? You may lose an advantage if he goes for a macro game but you will be safer, and if he DOES do this ling roach aggression he will be behind cuz your extra cannon did more damage.
Im ~600 master Zerg and Protoss.
because drones > cannons > roaches > no cannons > drones, and neither side can scout the other before committing so we're back to rock paper scissors.
Except toss can scout in time if he builds cannons just in time to defend, hallucination scouts before they complete, and cancels them if they aren't needed. Roaches can't be cancelled without losing larva =p
I don't think the key is to go hallucination first. If he isn't all ining, you can't put on ANY pressure, for a LONG time. I have held this attack off many times, without scouting it. You have to position your first cannon correctly and have near perfect forcefields. I don't think there is any other answer. Making two blind cannons isn't worth it,
On May 22 2011 07:46 Minigun wrote: You have to position your first cannon correctly and have near perfect forcefields. I don't think there is any other answer. Making two blind cannons isn't worth it,
On May 22 2011 07:42 Keilah wrote: builds cannons just in time to defend, hallucination scouts before they complete, and cancels them if they aren't needed.
On May 22 2011 07:46 Minigun wrote: You have to position your first cannon correctly and have near perfect forcefields. I don't think there is any other answer. Making two blind cannons isn't worth it,
On May 22 2011 07:42 Keilah wrote: builds cannons just in time to defend, hallucination scouts before they complete, and cancels them if they aren't needed.
Seriously? Really?
Can I just take an aside here and say the following: why did you post only 2 quotes, adding no extra substance to the discussion here and add a response to minigun who plays on ROOT and has blue post because of his consistently solid and well thought out advice on the forums?
If you dont agree thats fine discuss thats the point of a discussion thread. The point isnt to blindly post a quote of something you said and in response to a high level player without offering insight into why this might work and how it might work. Are the timings good enough that you can cancel? What if the roaches arent scouted? these are things that you need to address when saying "make 2 cannons, hallucinate and cancel them" - they are what happens in a discussion
I quoted because I didn't feel like typing the exact same things again. I think he's wrong when he says 1 blind cannon + good FFs is the only way. I think 2-3 cannons at the last second, with a hallucinate to see if they can be cancelled, is better. If not, I'd like to hear why he disagrees.
And yeah, the timings work out really well and the roaches will always be scouted if they're coming. Even if he takes some roundabout path with the roaches to avoid being spotted, the phoenix should arrive in his base just in time to do a drone/larva/building count and spot the followup lings.
On May 22 2011 08:09 Keilah wrote: I quoted because I didn't feel like typing the exact same things again. I think he's wrong when he says 1 blind cannon + good FFs is the only way. I think 2-3 cannons at the last second, with a hallucinate to see if they can be cancelled, is better. If not, I'd like to hear why he disagrees.
And yeah, the timings work out really well and the roaches will always be scouted if they're coming. Even if he takes some roundabout path with the roaches to avoid being spotted, the phoenix should arrive in his base just in time to do a drone/larva/building count and spot the followup lings.
When I do the standard 3 gate expand, hallucinate doesn't finish, until after the attack already hits. I usually start it after 5 sentries+ my forge and pylon at my natural.
If u get hallucination before forge, your cannon won't be up in time for the attack, which is why I don't see it being viable.
you must be using your chronoboost differently than me because my hallucinate usually finishes around 7:20 or so (from memory, + - 10s)
Since the patch I've also been 2gate sentry expanding instead of 3gate, my gas is always spent so I see no reason why a 3gate would be better unless the third early gate is needed for variants where you go attack really fast or need an extra unit to defend. Since I save 150 on an early gate, the forge and cannon(s) are down in time.
On May 22 2011 08:21 Keilah wrote: see, now that's an answer
you must be using your chronoboost differently than me because my hallucinate usually finishes around 7:20 or so (from memory, + - 10s)
Since the patch I've also been 2gate sentry expanding instead of 3gate, my gas is always spent so I see no reason why a 3gate would be better unless the third early gate is needed for variants where you go attack really fast or need an extra unit to defend. Since I save 150 on an early gate, the forge and cannon(s) are down in time.
I've been trying to do 2gate expo and currently am expanding with 2WG, 5 sentries and a zealot at ~6:10 mark, with 2 more sentries on the way. It does allow for a significantly earlier forge+cannon so you are slightly safer, however I have had trouble expanding against roach rushes which hit around that timing. Without the 3rd gateway it's hard to get enough units to push out and break the contain. With the money you save from not getting the 3rd gateway, you need to throw down a forge+gate immediately to start simcity-ing in addition to blindly getting a cannon because you don't have the production to spend the additional income though, and it could be somewhat risky.
On May 22 2011 08:21 Keilah wrote: see, now that's an answer
you must be using your chronoboost differently than me because my hallucinate usually finishes around 7:20 or so (from memory, + - 10s)
Since the patch I've also been 2gate sentry expanding instead of 3gate, my gas is always spent so I see no reason why a 3gate would be better unless the third early gate is needed for variants where you go attack really fast or need an extra unit to defend. Since I save 150 on an early gate, the forge and cannon(s) are down in time.
I don't get why people 3 gate either if you intent to get hallucination. 2 gates provide enough capacity to dump all your gas into sentries already. Saving minerals on the third gate only saves minerals for the forge, if you want you can always drop that third gate relatively quickly afterwards on the lowground. As long as you have a forge you can always put excess money into cannons instead of units so there really is no need for that 3rd gate early. I only 3 gate when i'm not getting hallucination which is usually in really close spawns where I just get a blind cannon and pressure more, big maps I dont feel safe moving out without hallucination thus I get it early.
On May 21 2011 14:32 PJA wrote: Maybe with godly force fields you can hold against losira build with only one cannon on Xel'Naga, but I doubt even that. On maps with such wide open naturals you're basically guaranteed to take a ton of damage if you 3 gate expand. With the setup minigun took a picture of, you're going to lose that pylon on the outside right off the bat, and then maybe with perfect force fields you'll only lose a few probes.
Either way, you're taking damage, you're going to use up almost all of your force fields while they take a third, and you'll probably lose a few sentries and probes as well.
Just go 3 gate DT expand like HuK and take your free win against roach aggression while still being fine against anything else.
PJA, is this (http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=213108) the 3gate DT expand you're referring to? If not, would you mind linking to a replay of DT play against this sort of Zerg pressure? It feels that Zerg can simply throw up some spines/spores at home and proceed to do significant damage on the Protoss base anyways, as the gas that normally would've gone to sentries is instead sunk in tech.
I have been experiencing this as a high diamond. I pretty much go dt expand every game. It is quite easy to transition out of if he doesn't go rl all-in. if he does, it's auto gg for you. No way can the zerg survive the dt's
roach-ling hits around 7:45 ( xel naga caverns ) i think, hallucination is done with chrono boost around 7:20. you should have time to see him coming across the map and use your forcefields to hold him off for the last 20 seconds while 2 more cannons get up.
Just some ideas I have been working with, I'm not nearly skilled enough to be able to argue with Minigun
On May 22 2011 09:27 _Fiction_ wrote: roach-ling hits around 7:45 ( xel naga caverns ) i think, hallucination is done with chrono boost around 7:20. you should have time to see him coming across the map and use your forcefields to hold him off for the last 20 seconds while 2 more cannons get up.
Just some ideas I have been working with, I'm not nearly skilled enough to be able to argue with Minigun
yes this is exactly what I've been saying, except that you need to put the cannons up before hallucinate completes because sometimes they do a less-drone hit-earlier version.
I died to this today. Exact as the OP described it. The second I built my hallu pheonix there was roaches at my door. I haven't really theorycrafted on it yet but from what I gather, cannons are the way to stop it if your going for a three gate expand. You have two choices, you can either do like a 2-3 stalker harass just to scout the fringe of the zergs base to check army size which is a good indicator or just go blind 2-3 cannon. If you think about it it breaks even in the end. The zerg sacrifices drone count for the extra units while u give a few extra minerals for defence. Even then its gonna be difficult to defend. I gues on maps with a ramp at your natural forcefields alone along with the usual 1 cannon is possible, but on maps like xel naga and metalopolis zerg will have the advantage especially close position.
Hallu after WG, lots of chronos on wg/hallu (you shouldn't have to spend many CB's on sentries since the patch; you don't really have the gas anyway). 2 cannons if you scout it. On xel Naga or LT, maps where the zerg has to break rocks down to establish the 3rd, their push will be slightly delayed but in this replay, the rocks are down by the time the roaches get there.
My control during the hold was not even that great and I was never at risk of dying; if your ff micro is not very good just play very conservatively (and cancel your gateway when its about to die.. tt)
You can follow up by taking a 3rd but I think you have a very strong timing with an immortal or 2 and a whole bunch of gateways to end the game with a 2base push afterwards. Zerg really only has 2 ways of transitioning out of this build because they are low on gas (only have 1 gas til the timing is over) so they can't really get infestors in time unless they don't make any other units. They should be on 3 bases and have about as many workers as you do at this point. So here are their 2 real option
1. Continue making roaches
2. Transition to hydra
If they stay on roach tech, you should be able to outright kill them with the immortal + 6-8gate (+ blink if you like) timing. This was the case in the replay above. Going to post the second replay in a minute; this is where the zerg transitioned to hydras. You can't really kill them with the timing (though you might be able to if you get blink) But you should be able to do significant damage and possibly even kill an expansion. In this case, back off and take your 3rd and you are way ahead.
Now I'm sure some one is going to quote this and post the timings from the GSL. Sorry, I can't play 12 hrs a day, I play 1-2 if I am lucky :p
Hallu after WG, lots of chronos on wg/hallu (you shouldn't have to spend many CB's on sentries since the patch; you don't really have the gas anyway). 2 cannons if you scout it. On xel Naga or LT, maps where the zerg has to break rocks down to establish the 3rd, their push will be slightly delayed but in this replay, the rocks are down by the time the roaches get there.
My control during the hold was not even that great and I was never at risk of dying; if your ff micro is not very good just play very conservatively (and cancel your gateway when its about to die.. tt)
You can follow up by taking a 3rd but I think you have a very strong timing with an immortal or 2 and a whole bunch of gateways to end the game with a 2base push afterwards. Zerg really only has 2 ways of transitioning out of this build because they are low on gas (only have 1 gas til the timing is over) so they can't really get infestors in time unless they don't make any other units. They should be on 3 bases and have about as many workers as you do at this point. So here are their 2 real option
1. Continue making roaches
2. Transition to hydra
If they stay on roach tech, you should be able to outright kill them with the immortal + 6-8gate (+ blink if you like) timing. This was the case in the replay above. Going to post the second replay in a minute; this is where the zerg transitioned to hydras. You can't really kill them with the timing (though you might be able to if you get blink) But you should be able to do significant damage and possibly even kill an expansion. In this case, back off and take your 3rd and you are way ahead.
Now I'm sure some one is going to quote this and post the timings from the GSL. Sorry, I can't play 12 hrs a day, I play 1-2 if I am lucky :p
I'm still working on figuring out the best way to transition out of holding this, so bear with me if it's a bit sloppy ^^
The only problem with doing the build like you did, is you have 31 probes at the 8 minute mark, which is really really bad. When i'm doing a normal 3 gate expand I have 31 probes at around the 6:30 mark.
If the zerg is not all ining, and just plays straight up, I'm pretty sure you will lose if you both play perfect.
Hallu after WG, lots of chronos on wg/hallu (you shouldn't have to spend many CB's on sentries since the patch; you don't really have the gas anyway). 2 cannons if you scout it. On xel Naga or LT, maps where the zerg has to break rocks down to establish the 3rd, their push will be slightly delayed but in this replay, the rocks are down by the time the roaches get there.
My control during the hold was not even that great and I was never at risk of dying; if your ff micro is not very good just play very conservatively (and cancel your gateway when its about to die.. tt)
You can follow up by taking a 3rd but I think you have a very strong timing with an immortal or 2 and a whole bunch of gateways to end the game with a 2base push afterwards. Zerg really only has 2 ways of transitioning out of this build because they are low on gas (only have 1 gas til the timing is over) so they can't really get infestors in time unless they don't make any other units. They should be on 3 bases and have about as many workers as you do at this point. So here are their 2 real option
1. Continue making roaches
2. Transition to hydra
If they stay on roach tech, you should be able to outright kill them with the immortal + 6-8gate (+ blink if you like) timing. This was the case in the replay above. Going to post the second replay in a minute; this is where the zerg transitioned to hydras. You can't really kill them with the timing (though you might be able to if you get blink) But you should be able to do significant damage and possibly even kill an expansion. In this case, back off and take your 3rd and you are way ahead.
Now I'm sure some one is going to quote this and post the timings from the GSL. Sorry, I can't play 12 hrs a day, I play 1-2 if I am lucky :p
I'm still working on figuring out the best way to transition out of holding this, so bear with me if it's a bit sloppy ^^
The only problem with doing the build like you did, is you have 31 probes at the 8 minute mark, which is really really bad. When i'm doing a normal 3 gate expand I have 31 probes at around the 6:30 mark.
If the zerg is not all ining, and just plays straight up, I'm pretty sure you will lose if you both play perfect.
just my opinion.
41 vs 28 once the push is all over though :D I don't really like cb'ing probes after the 1st 2 against zerg and I didn't notice any but 2-3 extremely small probe cuts so I'm not too displeased with having that few blind. Obviously if I scouted and there was no timing I'd throw a few rounds of CB on both nexi. And we all know my opponent sure likes his timings -.-
One expo i've had a lot of success with in masters as toss is to do a 2 gate stargate expo. Around 7 minutes i can push out with 4 phoenix and a handfull of gate units if the zerg is going for roach ling agression i can usually kill so many ovs and queens it makes the push very weak. I can then use the phoenixes to lift up the roaches and kill kill his army in parts. While phoenix harrassing throw down a forge and transition into whatever you feel like based on the dmg u did.
I'm a Zerg player myself, but I feel like this whole thread is kind of odd. 3 Gate Expo is a build which shuts down Roach/Ling attacks really, really well. It takes great micro and decent scouting to pull off, though.
Specific example: I was watching White-Ra earlier with Mr. Bitter and he was talking about what he was scouting and how he was reacting as he played. He scouted a roach/ling all-in (arguably not the best executed, but pretty much what you see in mid/high masters) and defended it with a Cannons and a single Stalker (more units came, but that was what he had when 8 roaches marched up to his base). The key was scouting the attack en-route (On Tal'Darim Altar) by effectively using a probe scout.
Losing to unscouted Roach/Ling seems to be like losing to an MC style unscouted 4 gate. You're praying he won't all-in you and not getting enough scouting information to shut it down. Force Field combined with Cannons is super, super good against this style of play in the early game. Is it truly a hard counter? I don't think so, but 3 Gate Expo is a safe way to play against every standard early Zerg style, this included.
I did just successfully stop the build on ladder. The thing is the guy who did it wasn't thinking when he did. He had done some early ling aggression and lost the lings without inflicting any damage. So I made cannons cause my gut was talking to me heh. So the guy attacks into the cannons and sentries. Which isn't smart, he did the really all in ish version where you cut drones at like 20 something. If he had done the more economic version and expanded instead of attacking that would've won the game for him. He saw the cannons and the units and attacked anyway, which makes no sense to me. The problem people are having is not stopping the build, it's stopping the build without being super far behind. Because a smart player won't attack into those cannons they'll just expand or make 90 drones. It's true that economically they may be behind the toss for a moment. But what they've done is effectively shut down ALL pressure potential for the Protoss, they know this because if the Toss was being cute they would've died. Or won if they did something that hard counters it etc.
tl;dr The problem is that smart zergs see cannons/VRs/DTs and just expand and defend and get really far ahead in the mid/late game.
The problem Protoss's had vsing this was they were teching to fast, meaning they were constantly missing warp ins from their 3 gates, if you get a quick robo right after you expand, it's essentially useless when the rush comes because you can't get an immortal out in time, nor is it really useful against mass lings. So for example at the 8 minute mark you might have 6 sentries, 2 zealots and a stalker if you were teching, while if you didn't you would have, 8 sentries, 2 zealots and 4 stalkers.
I recommend to Protoss players to just get hallucination as soon as they put down their nexus, while constantly warping in sentries and zealots, then eventually start getting a few stalkers. I also put down the forge when nexus is around half HP, then you can start putting down pylons as a wall to, I haven't lost to any sort of ling/roach aggression ever doing this, the quick hallucination scout will also allow you to scout the roach/ling aggression.
The problems I have with the way alej is doing it are: -sometimes the zerg hits earlier, with slight deviations that leave him less econ but hit faster. You are dead to those versions, because Mini is right that the build as you played it gets the forge and cannon too late. Even with 32 drones, I read that it can hit around 7:50 and neither of these guys hit before 8:00. -pretty significant amount of unused time on the gateways and some small probe cuts. EDIT: -loads of chronoboost left over, but your minerals were mostly spent. If you'd cut one gate you could have boosted probes a couple more times early on.
For those reasons, I really think the build would be improved by delaying the third gate in favor of nonstop probes and a faster cannon plant.
OK, so I've been playing around. Before I spend all day on this, I wanted to toss the framework out there for criticism and helpful hints.
The goals:
-warpgate research complete at 6:00 - requires 3 chronoboosts, assuming you 14gate which gets the cybernetics core done around 3:50
-forge complete with 300 minerals available at 7:10 for completed cannons at 7:50
-hallucinate complete at 7:20 - it takes about 25s for a phoenix to cross most maps, so it will be over your opponent's hatchery in time to cancel your cannons if there are no roaches. This will happen with zero chronoboosts on hallucinate, assuming warp finished at 6:00 and you start hallucinate ASAP. Hallucinate could be completed at 7:10 with one more chrono boost if you want a little freedom with your APM, but It's better not to waste chronoboost and just do things smoothly. EDIT: On maps and positions where the path to the main is not a straight line (cross map metal for example), you definitely want to use at least 1 chronoboost on hallucinate, possibly 2, to make up for the phoenix taking longer to cover the approach path on the way to the enemy main. Same for bigger maps where it takes longer. You will need to hallucinate extra phoenixes if there is more than 1 attack path. EDIT #2: I'm going to go ahead and recommend at least 1 chronoboost at all times, just because most/all of us aren't robots and you really do want a few seconds to look around your opponents main and make sure, in time to cancel the cannons. On spawns like metal cross, use 2 boosts and send the phoenix out at 7:00. If you think you can do without the extra 10s, be my guest =]
-spend 100% of gas at all times, until you finish sentry production. Avoid idle gateway time. EDIT: 1 base of gas can't quite keep up with sentry production on 2 warpgates. Unless most people build a second zealot, I'm seriously confused as to why anyone would 3gate instead of 2gate.
-Build probes nonstop, with as many chronoboosts as possible, as early as possible. Assuming 3 chronoboosts on warp, that leaves you 4 to spend on probes before it completes. You also get a 5th and 6th available while hallucinate is researching. You might want to use your first chronoboost on the zealot, and you might want to save the 5th and 6th to use as a reaction based on what the phoenix sees. In my BO making, I'm going to assume that you do NOT get to use a 3rd boost on probes before making a zealot, as it delays your first zealot and sentry by a few seconds, which usually matters.
-put the forge AND 3rd gate into the expo wall? I'm not certain the forge is necessary, since you'll have 2 cannons, but it could be helpful - could also be a liability in case they do some goofy allin and force you to abandon the low ground. Anyways, to get the forge into the wall on time you need a low ground pylon started by 6:00. My tests give me 1 zealot and 2 sentries around 5:15, the 3rd around 5:50, and the 4th/5th around 6:10. Can the pylon be planted and defended with 1z/3s for ten seconds until the 2 extra sentries arrive? Someone better than me can answer that. If you have 2 cannons, 1-2 pylons, and just the 3rd gateway in the wall, is that enough?
-nexus planted ASAP, as long as it's after 5:50. I say this because, if you get hit with some sort of faster roach attack with less drones before the 7:30 mark, you might need to cancel your stuff on the low ground and retreat up your ramp. 20s + of FF stalling with no backup DPS is probably unrealistic. Also, 5:50 is when you get your third sentry, and before that I'm 99% certain you can't leave your ramp to fight off speedlings.
-3rd gate planted in time to keep up with your income - this one I'm including as a formality really, since between chronoboosts, nonstop probes, 2 gates, and building geysers at the expo, I find there's no trouble at all keeping the money spent. I also think a 3rd gate might not even be necessary - 2gates will spend your income up to the point of the attack, and you get a phoenix into his main by 7:50, so you can still decide to build a faster robo or something instead of more gates. Cancelling the cannons when you determine there's no roach rush coming does leave you with a bunch of minerals, but there's no harm in being flexible in the way you spend them.
-Have ways to branch off the main build into some variant(s), based on scouting at certain times - this is frosting on the cake for some determined individual, I won't touch this but it's worth mentioning.
-Is there anything else that needs mentioning? I don't think so. Feel free to add something if it's important.
So, now that the goals have been laid out, I ask for confirmation that they are in fact what we're looking for. If the cannons just NEED to be 10s sooner, or if you gotta build a 3rd cannon, or anything else, speak up.
Regardless of whether or not the goals are useful - preliminary testing tells me they are 100% attainable. Now it's a matter of optimizing and making sure it works in real games.
I recently been experimenting with 2 Gate -> Stargate -> 3 Gate expand. It's really not that far behind 3 Gate expand (I have not timed it, might just be the same), and IMO its a lot more safe versus early aggression. People are saying Roach/Ling still overruns it but I do not agree. Voidrays own Roaches and can charge up on them. You still have enough Sentries to keep Lings away, so pure ling wouldn't really work either (though I agree 3 Gate pure sentry/zealot is better than the Voidray vs mass Ling aggression).
Something that should not be forgotten is the fact the Voidray will net you at the very least 1 Overlord kill, force the Zerg into responding in one way or another (he doesn't know if you will add Phoenix or stay on 1 VR), and you can deny his 3rd or at least damage it heavily. I think I will start using this more and more.
Here is a replay of the opening vs 21 worker Ling/Roach aggression on Xel'Naga Caverns. It's in Master league, he has ~1100 points, I had about 600 I think (~350 bonus pool).
the hallucination before warpgate sounds like the best idea yet and i will most certainly try it out the thing is there is no real sacrifice other than building blind cannons or sending out decoys which might get killed before seeing anything special and well if you think a very early hallucinated phoenix shows z he can drone up like crazy well you can do the same plus you can send out the hallucinated phoenix not directly when its finished but more like when z already had invested in his roach/ling build and you still have enough time to react with cannons
On May 22 2011 19:43 Papillon wrote: the hallucination before warpgate sounds like the best idea yet
2 things: 1) If you don't get WG first, how can you pressure zerg early if he is not going for rl allin? 2) If you go hallu first, even if you scout the incoming allin, how can you make units fast without WG?
WG is the best toss upgrade in the game. Not getting it is like playing marine/marauder without stim.
P.S. And please don't say you go for stargate. 100 gas for hallu, 100 for each sentry, 150 for stargate, 100/150 for phoenix/vray... This cannot be done off of 2 gas no matter what.
Delaying WG for such a long time is actually a horrible idea, you should never do it. As just_godlike already pointed out, it does not give you any more defense it only gives you information. That's great and all, but you cannot instantly reinforce your army without WG so your defense will be even more delayed than normal. A normal 3 Gate expo should hold aggression if you position correctly and place buildings in the right places.
The Stargate opening I talked about a few posts ago also helps IMO, but I am not sure yet if it holds it easier, have to test it a bit more.
Only one cannon + good force fields on 3 gate expands holds this. White-ra does hold it oftently then the zerg is just so far behind. I'm top master and ive a couple of replays too holding this with 3 gate expand and 1 canon, or simply 3 gate expand without canon with clutch forcefields
On May 23 2011 04:24 aZoX wrote: Only one cannon + good force fields on 3 gate expands holds this. White-ra does hold it oftently then the zerg is just so far behind. I'm top master and ive a couple of replays too holding this with 3 gate expand and 1 canon, or simply 3 gate expand without canon with clutch forcefields
Just a reminder that the build not only needs to handle Roach/Ling aggression, it needs to be flexible enough to handle a macro Zerg too. Anyone can herp derp 10 cannons in the nat and survive the push.
On May 22 2011 19:43 Papillon wrote: the hallucination before warpgate sounds like the best idea yet
2 things: 1) If you don't get WG first, how can you pressure zerg early if he is not going for rl allin? 2) If you go hallu first, even if you scout the incoming allin, how can you make units fast without WG?
WG is the best toss upgrade in the game. Not getting it is like playing marine/marauder without stim.
P.S. And please don't say you go for stargate. 100 gas for hallu, 100 for each sentry, 150 for stargate, 100/150 for phoenix/vray... This cannot be done off of 2 gas no matter what.
1) you dont need to put pressure, you can play greedy yourselves if zerg decides to do the same also i want to note this hallu first strat is best played when going for an fe (not possible on every map i know) 2) lets say the allin arrives at around 7:30; you send the hallucinated phoenix when the upgrade is finished at around the 6min mark to be able to react with enough cannons (when zerg plays roach ling allin theres nothing wrong in this investion as you might know)
besides its not like you cant built units without wg; the very important sentry has the same building time with or without. you can still built units from your gates, have around the same amount of sentrys and you can react properly to the allin. you can drone up if zerg does the same. when did p ever move out with a small gateway army when he did fe to pressure zerg? and you can still go heavy wg pressure with 6-7 gates, its not like wg upgrade takes years another nice effect of hallu first when fe'ing is that you can see zerg going contain with sunkens earlier and have more time to react (or at least you can see him preparing for this strategy which gives it kinda away; still its a scary strategy)
Basically Toss has been to passive as of late in PvZ especially early game. Terran has been expanding while pressuring Zerg for a long time. I recently have been fooling around with high aggression expand builds and I will tell you what, it works very well.
Especially 3gate blink stalker pressure. Everything is the same as a typical 3gate sentry expand, except you make the TC after the second gate and after the first 1-2 sentries. Then expand to your natural while researching Blink and 1 zealot 3-4 sentries. Make proxy plyon at some point and begin your push warping in all stalkers. Its best to have your stalkers lag behind your sentry zealot push so that he doesn't know its coming.
Make sure you pylon block your ramp and don't get supply blocked. The best part is that its easy to retreat and can easily kill him if he over drones since FFing the ramp can isolate his natural. Plus having early blink gives you map control and the ability to deny expos. Just be able to macro at home while pressuring and you are all good.
Remember you don't need to kill him, this is just to keep him honest. Which is exactly what Zerg was doing with the early roach/ling push.
I recommend keeping a contain if you killed his natural but cant push up into the main OR just harass with your stalkers to let your sentries retreat then blink back home. This army should be strong enough to hold a roach/ling all-in if he decides to to counter push.
It's not true that you auto win with this build. Protoss can hold it off with good forcefields. You can actually get hallucination out in time to scout for this roach ling attack and you can set up reactionary cannons. They won't be up in time, but they will be very close to being so, and if he rushes in to attack, you can punish him for it. Other options are DT expand and void ray expand.
Professional players aren't complaining about it so I don't see why lesser players should be. You still have a lot of room to improve, so it's better to spend your time doing so.
Papillon, I don't want to argue with you about something THAT obvious. If you so desire, you can go for 17 stargates off of 2 base. Just don't post it here and confuse everyone by saying it works. I have tried hallu first and it is HORRIBLE! All I am going to ask is what do you do if you go hallu first and zerg immediately takes his 3rd? You can't attack him, can't play macro game against him, you basically just die.
P.S. I don't want to be rude, but saying you can drone up if zerg does it is just hilarious. You can make 2 probes at a time even with CB, while zerg can make like 12 at a time (2base vs 2base). You sound like you have never played vs zerg...
ehm when did i ever talk about stargates? you cant really put pressure when z takes third when you did fast expand and the kind of pressure you normally do can still be done with a slightly delayed wg it seems like you think everything would change when you go hallu first im just saying that wg is a bit delayed and you can hold off heavy aggression more easy because of the scouting information
i dont know how good you are im high masters and around the top 500 including gm so please dont insult me; plus i never said i play this strategy i said it sounds interesting and like the best idea i heard in this thread
On May 23 2011 19:52 Papillon wrote: please dont insult me
I never did and I don't intend to. I am just stating facts. I am sorry if my posts sounded like insults. It is not intentional.
On May 23 2011 19:52 Papillon wrote: i never said i play this strategy i said it sounds interesting and like the best idea i heard in this thread
Well if you don't play like that how can you say it is a good strategy? As I said before, I tried it a couple of times against a practice buddy of mine and I got decimated every single time. Zerg went rl allin, fast third, fast lair, doom drop - basically every strategy in the book. I don't recall being ahead a single time if I went hallu first. Infortunately, I didn't save the replays so I can't show you the results.
Here's an idea for your next forge fast expand against any hatch that comes earlier than a pool. Forge -> Cannon rush. I'm not saying outright kill the bugger with cannons, just force him to respond to that and probably lose his natural. Then while he's reacting to what you're doing you can safely fast expand yourself. Maybe I'm wrong, i'm only a gold level player. But if the idea is to be economically greedy and get ahead with a fast expand then why not.
On May 23 2011 19:40 Sweetness.751 wrote: Mid-masters.
Basically Toss has been to passive as of late in PvZ especially early game. Terran has been expanding while pressuring Zerg for a long time. I recently have been fooling around with high aggression expand builds and I will tell you what, it works very well.
Especially 3gate blink stalker pressure. Everything is the same as a typical 3gate sentry expand, except you make the TC after the second gate and after the first 1-2 sentries. Then expand to your natural while researching Blink and 1 zealot 3-4 sentries. Make proxy plyon at some point and begin your push warping in all stalkers. Its best to have your stalkers lag behind your sentry zealot push so that he doesn't know its coming.
3gate blink stalker pressure absolutely has its own massive weaknesses though (ie fast hydra ling); a committed 1 base blink stalker build CAN be very threatening even against a hydra ling response, but by trying to expand at the same time i feel that you miss the timing window of the 1base blink stalker all-in and you don't get another one before burrowed roaches or hydra ling comes into play.
plus it's so much more expensive and slow than a terran 2 rax FE! how can you examine both of these builds with a clear head and determine that they're equivalent in terms of mineral/gas cost, unit commitment, and the risk of potential build order losses?
im having the same problem, ive recently tried to get hallu before wg since 3g expand doesnt really need wg all that early. havent bumped into the all in yet but im guessing u can forsee it easier if u can scout more units than usual. dono but worth trying.
I've found getting fast DTs after you expand deters or at least delays these kind of pushes, but your opponent can just ignore the 3 or so you warp in and ravage your economy whilst taking the damage.
I really thing the only way to safely play against possible Roach Ling all ins IS ENTERILY MAP SPECIFIC.
For example on Xel naga Caverns, a Roach ling bust is super threatening because you can't make a 1 zealot wall at your expansion.
But on Tal Darim 3 buildings can cover your expansions main ground entrance. On Shakuras it's the same deal.
Every build has to be adjusted to your opponent and to the map. In Starcraft 2 positioning is a very heavy factor.
Certain maps Fast expanding is Risky because you have not yet re-scouted the zerg since your original probe.
Personally, What I do. on Maps where Sim-city is easy to build, I tend to throw down my first gateway at my expansion. And transition into 3 gate forge expand.
Basically this build is super risky, but you have to Play the early game guessing. There is no "Safe" way to play.
Because let's be honest, a Protoss can equally Fake a 3 gate expand, and morph 4 warpgates and win the game right there. Since Zergs have been not seeing the 4 gate as much since its easy to defend if you gear up for it.
On Maps like Zel Naga, Typhon Peaks.
I do either 2 things, 3 gate robo. With constant crono Boost on probes. That way, when your observer gets around to seeing the zerg base. You can throw down the nexus, and transfer full saturation without delay. At that point I throw down a robotics bay, 2 forges, 3 gateways. And with pylons you should have a solid Wall of buildings at your Natural to provide additional defenses.
The most important factor in ZvP is the "Plan" and how to adjust accordingly.
Some games you may have to throw your plan out the window because you don't attack now you will lose an easy expansion kill.
For example, If i see a 3rd base shortly after my second base. I tend to give up on any colosus tech and go right into 7 gate aggression.
The other Option, Is you Gear up for your third base while grabbing fast upgrades and colossus tech.
Back to the original Question. There are many economic Builds you can use. The problem is if you're doing the generic 3 gate sentry expand. There is a timing window for zerg to punish the protoss. And the reason for that is very simple. Predictability.
To be very specific you're asking for a Foolproof way to defend against something you are not sure is coming while not giving up ground to early all in aggression.
I'm actually glad protoss view this build as probematic. I play protoss on ladder and Have lost to this build, it taught me to not always be extra greedy vs zerg as they can punish my greedy build.
How did I respond? Well, I learned to cut probes slightly and try to get an early sight on this potential aggression. You have to be aware of what can happen in this matchup. There is no 1 way to play as protoss and always have a good chance at winning.
Build order wins are definelty a potential for zerg equally for protoss.
im not too familiar with this all in push with ling/roach in terms of experience(i never 3 gate expand) but i feel like many of the possible builds to counter this ling/roach all in wont work if zerg does drops...a lot of these cannons + sentries and then fast expanding or like cannons fast expand 1 stargate build gets completely destroyed by 2 things i have experienced
1. mass ling drop in base
2. zerg taking a 3rd and having better econ
to all the players who are mentioning some sorta double probe scout or stalker/zealot sacrifice...none of these will work vs a smart zerg...and scouting cant rly be done until observer or hallucans...in which case everyone is mentioning robo quick builds dont rly work and hallucans cost too much
I think the best way is to do some sort of pressure build into expanding which will cause the the zergs to make at least some sorta error in their decision making to use limited eggs on either fighting units or drones which people havent seemed to be focusing on in this thread...maybe look more closely at pete's build or other pressure builds that can allow for an expand...but the idea of 2-3 cannons quick or forge expanding rly fast will always lead to some sorta problem now or in the future to zergs who does either of the 2 options i mentioned
In general though like 50% of the zergs have been complaining to me about how op protoss is in PvZ despite my contrary beliefs...so i guess there is a way to defend against this ling/roach build mentioned(or its harder to pull off by the zerg than it seems)
This thread has had discussions of how stargates can't kill the roaches+lings quickly enough, how DTs are risky and should be dealt with easily if the zerg doesn't make a major mistake, and how sentry+cannon builds are just not safe.
Where does blink play fit into this discussion? Before roach speed, the only units zerg has that can touch blink stalkers are speedlings, which is very much a micro battle to determine who comes out ahead.
Opening stalker as your 1st gas unit lets you poke before speed is done and get a bit of scouting information, and makes the zerg make more lings than they would like. Obviously, the zealot stalker, or 2-3 stalker pokes aren't anything new, but they went out of style, and with the warpgate timing change widening the already large timing when zerg can drone up, some early pressure is worth looking into.
One of the reasons the roach/ling push is so strong is because it has complete map control against any sentry heavy protoss play. With a blink stalker play, the zerg has to make you move back while you pick away at his lings (being very careful not to get surrounded). That should be more than enough time to lay down 2 cannons.
Obviously the timings would have to be worked out, but I would be interested if anyone already has tried this so I either have a point to start from, or can not waste my time.
The early roach build is very powerful vs protoss, even more so due to the warp gate research nerf. The nerf means that it is difficult to get out enough units to defend in time. Zelots dont work because people can kite with the roaches Sentries, although the forcefields are good the sentries do not do enough damage to have any sort of impact Stalkers, they are hard to get out in the propper numbers needed to defend against the roaches, also if the zerg player gets a few lings mixed in it makes the stalkers vertually useless. There is also not enough time to get out immortals, and even if the protoss player does get 1-2 immortals out they can just be focued down by the roaches. This is imba
On May 24 2011 03:23 Gracksaurusrex wrote: The early roach build is very powerful vs protoss, even more so due to the warp gate research nerf. The nerf means that it is difficult to get out enough units to defend in time. Zelots dont work because people can kite with the roaches Sentries, although the forcefields are good the sentries do not do enough damage to have any sort of impact Stalkers, they are hard to get out in the propper numbers needed to defend against the roaches, also if the zerg player gets a few lings mixed in it makes the stalkers vertually useless. There is also not enough time to get out immortals, and even if the protoss player does get 1-2 immortals out they can just be focued down by the roaches. This is imba
forcefields + cannons seems like a good combination. the forcefields keep the zerg at bay while the cannons dish out the damage. there are plenty of suggestions for dealing with this in this thread, you should especially check out miniguns posts.
On May 19 2011 05:03 Mirl wrote: You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
350 min 300 gas added to the cost of fe + 1 crono lost on VR 1 ovy 100 extra queen 150 or 300 depends on how scared is he evo 150 AA 150 more ( again depends of how "scared" he is of the VR ) So its a max of 700 minerals loss for zerg while you losse 350 mineral and 300 gas, considering that at that point the zerg economy is miles ahead its not quite a fair trade i would say, it may work sometime but i don't think its good enough to be "standard ".
This really seems to be perfect against it. I do this at around 1k master and sometimes Zergs just leave when they see the immortal(s) and know they cant push.
The build relies on getting 2 gates to be sure you dont die by ling all ins after that add a robo + 3rd gateway. Then when the robo finishes get an obs out (chrono) with an immortal after (chrono). Around the time the robo finishes get an expansion. Once the observer reaches the expansion you can see exactly how many drones he has and what he's building. Then you can decide to get more probes tech up or build defence.
This really seems to be perfect against it. I do this at around 1k master and sometimes Zergs just leave when they see the immortal(s) and know they cant push.
The build relies on getting 2 gates to be sure you dont die by ling all ins after that add a robo + 3rd gateway. Then when the robo finishes get an obs out (chrono) with an immortal after (chrono). Around the time the robo finishes get an expansion. Once the observer reaches the expansion you can see exactly how many drones he has and what he's building. Then you can decide to get more probes tech up or build defence.
This actually provides Protoss with a push that was common about 6months back. It was a 2 immortal 5 gate timing if the Zerg went for roaches and a fast third.
With good forcefields and proper unit composition you should be able to stop it, you need less zealots(2-3 max) and more stalkers. The point is you need to cut roaches from lings and because you usually have like 6-7 sentries you should be able to do that easily even if you waste some FFs it's still ok for you.
On May 25 2011 04:20 Keilah wrote: wasn't zlot + fast immortal popular in beta? Man roaches were OP back then =[
With range 3 roaches, you could place cannons behind gateway-sized buildings such that the roaches couldn't reach the cannon and couldn't hit the gateway without being in range of the cannon. It's a big difference.
I've had more luck with faking a 3gate expo as best I can and going for dt's to defend my front. Sometimes I go stalker first and let him see it to see if I can get him to think I'm doing something more aggressive, also serves to deny overlord scouting.
I still win half my games vZ with this, but it's volatile as hell and if you get scouted he can just build spores and drone like a psycho, which is lights out.
Makes me wonder about trying to reincarnate the bisu build from bw in sc2, though. If zerg can't break a protoss that gets dt's out, and P can get his nat then go stargate for phoenix and use the combination of phoenix and dt's to maintain map control, I bet he could get a pretty fast third and close the gap. It's backwards from the broodwar style, but made even more amusing in theory craft since overlords aren't detectors.
I'll be playing around, but if anyone knows of a reason why this is bullshit and would never work (i.e. someone really good tried it and it was terrible), please say so.
The early roach build is very powerful vs protoss, even more so due to the warp gate research nerf. The nerf means that it is difficult to get out enough units to defend in time. Zelots dont work because people can kite with the roaches Sentries, although the forcefields are good the sentries do not do enough damage to have any sort of impact Stalkers, they are hard to get out in the propper numbers needed to defend against the roaches, also if the zerg player gets a few lings mixed in it makes the stalkers vertually useless. There is also not enough time to get out immortals, and even if the protoss player does get 1-2 immortals out they can just be focued down by the roaches. This is imba
Here's an idea for your next forge fast expand against any hatch that comes earlier than a pool. Forge -> Cannon rush. I'm not saying outright kill the bugger with cannons, just force him to respond to that and probably lose his natural. Then while he's reacting to what you're doing you can safely fast expand yourself. Maybe I'm wrong, i'm only a gold level player. But if the idea is to be economically greedy and get ahead with a fast expand then why not.
How about instead of making more bad posts and responding to/quoting bad posts you read the good posts that are already in the thread
On May 23 2011 19:42 PopoChampion wrote: It's not true that you auto win with this build. Protoss can hold it off with good forcefields. You can actually get hallucination out in time to scout for this roach ling attack and you can set up reactionary cannons. They won't be up in time, but they will be very close to being so, and if he rushes in to attack, you can punish him for it. Other options are DT expand and void ray expand.
Professional players aren't complaining about it so I don't see why lesser players should be. You still have a lot of room to improve, so it's better to spend your time doing so.
Perfect forcefields + Great sim-city + Fast reflexes.
I enjoyed reading through this thread. I loved the higher ranked posts as that was what I needed for today. :D
On May 23 2011 19:42 PopoChampion wrote: It's not true that you auto win with this build. Protoss can hold it off with good forcefields. You can actually get hallucination out in time to scout for this roach ling attack and you can set up reactionary cannons. They won't be up in time, but they will be very close to being so, and if he rushes in to attack, you can punish him for it. Other options are DT expand and void ray expand.
Professional players aren't complaining about it so I don't see why lesser players should be. You still have a lot of room to improve, so it's better to spend your time doing so.
Perfect forcefields + Great sim-city + Fast reflexes.
I enjoyed reading through this thread. I loved the higher ranked posts as that was what I needed for today. :D
Agreed, this thread has been the only reason I win against 3/4 roach ling engagements just after my nat goes up :D
This works really well. Playing against the roach ling style presents 2 huge problems for the 1-3 gate expoing protoss: 1.) You could die. (or get too far behind over-investing in cannons) 2.) You won't be able to tech to colossi very quickly because the investment may mean you die.
Getting the robo pre-expansion seems to help solve both problems. Being able to expo relatively safely and have 3 colossi out at 13 minutes in seems really strong. Obv sentry count will be low and zealot count will be high, but that's ok.
Voidray and DT rushing both suffer from a diminishing effect on your sentrycount, something that's easily scoutable by the speedling pokes. You'll notice Nestea and Losira both dropping spores as soon as they see the sentry count not being where they expect it to be to counter potential stargate or DT expands. They still go through with their regular timing attack, as at worst, the vr/dt will save the expo at the cost of every single sentry the protoss has, and that will cripple the protoss' ability to be offensive with the exception of his vr/dt which is already defended against with spores.
Myself, I've been going gate-robo-gate-forge instead of the standard 3gate opening, getting a fast observer out, then immortals. All chronos on probes. Add gate 3, 4 and 5 to simcity the natural, and add cannons as needed (use that observer to see if he's making an army). If he doesn't roach/ling rush me, I wait for him to take his third or drop significant tech (spire/infestation pit), then I push with 2-3 immortals, 8-9 sentries, rest zealots/stalkers. If I don't end the game right then and there I typically end up in a situation where I'm ahead economically and can just push again in a little bit.
The only thing I've been losing to is basetrading where the natural is too open to block off completely. I had a hard time against a ling/bane composition, but I screwed up the forcefields, and I think I still won against it in the end.
Best way to counter that ..i think is 2 gate robo...you expand only after you get your first immortal..you should also have about 4-5 zealots 1 sentry 1 -2 stalkers ~6:00 usually if a zerg sees immortal he will go afterwards only lings..so try getting zealots and a 3rd gate if he persists..otherwise establish your expo..and think about a a 3rd at about 10-11:00..as the zerg will most probably try to get his 2nd expo asap as well
Best way to counter that ..i think is 2 gate robo...you expand only after you get your first immortal..you should also have about 4-5 zealots 1 sentry 1 -2 stalkers ~6:00 usually if a zerg sees immortal he will go afterwards only lings..so try getting zealots and a 3rd gate if he persists..otherwise establish your expo..and think about a a 3rd at about 10-11:00..as the zerg will most probably try to get his 2nd expo asap as well
So long as you're getting an early Robo, has anyone ever played around with getting an Obs + Warp Prism with 1 Stalker in it as a "Zerg Honesty Squad"? You could go around sniping Creep Tumors + Overlords like a Voidray, and if you see your opponent is building nothing but drones or took a super early third, you could warp in more units at the Prism, do some damage, and still escape with all of them. It seems like the core problem in PvZ (I know it's mine) is having any kind of map presence between the time when Speedlings finish and the natural is established -- that's why people started doing Voidray expands. An early Obs + Prism might have a similar effect.
On May 19 2011 05:45 accaris wrote: Wasn't the 3-gate sentry expand designed specifically to be safe against a roach/ling push? Otherwise, what's the point in it? Zerg can't just 1-A into a wall of 3 cannons and expect to automatically win. If they spend a lot of time building roaches instead of droning, they're going to be just as economically disadvantaged as you are.
If it's proven that forcefields cannot hold a roach/ling push (and I'm not totally convinced that they can't,) perhaps a defensive 4-gate should be tried? Delaying your expansion by 1 minute isn't going to end the game for you if your army value is higher early on. Plus, you're better primed to take a 3rd, since you have the defensive advantage of more Stalkers.
You don't understand the problem. First, you make 3 cannons blindly, you are WAY behind. Like faaaar behind.
Second, if you make a 4th gate you have to cut probes to produce off it, so you are WAY behind if he doesn't all in.
This actually really excited me, despite the fact i'm a ptoss ^_^. I love trying to find new builds for a match up because of a problem, best part of the game. Can't wait for the pvz revolution.
I have been working on 3 gate robo pressure into expand against all races and it has worked out pretty darn well I might say, as for the not knowing when it is going to hit you my suggestion would be scouting, obviously you do it but it isnt required to only scout at certain times, I for instance scout until I know what is going on, I will sacrifice 3-4 probes just to know whats going on and make sure I hold the xel naga towers if they are relevant.
So from here if your probes see a decent amount of roaches and lings then obviously something is about to happen so chrono out those immortals asap and if you dont see a bunch of roaches and lings then get your obs over there asap to find out whats going on. Its really just about scouting till you know what is going on, I have noticed alot of players tend to scout at pre determined times, they send their initial scout, then I wont see one for another few minutes and so on throughout the matchup, but really if you know what is going on you should almost always win. Also dont be afraid to pull probes, after all if you hold, he just lost a bunch of units, is still on hatch tech, hasnt been producing drones, and probably doesnt have much in the way of units to hold a counter attack. So after a hold I will usually scout with my obs see what he has, put pressure on if I can if not I just tech an expand, after all you are on the same base number as the Zerg and ahead tech wise and econ wise so you really can do whatever you want.
O and I dont get many sentries usually, just stalkers with a few zealots and then immortals (this solves the issue of getting the immortal out fast enough because you will have the get your robo up fast and begin immortals production right away) My first immortal is almost always done when they hit with my second typically half way done (I usually just get them in a row then my obs to be safe)
tester 2-0ed a zerg (slayers.yugioh) using a stargate expand game 1 and a dt expand game 2. anyone looking for information about either of those builds might want to watch those vods, both of them looked pretty clean. frankly i think tester just outplayed yugioh regardless of build so it might be a little difficult to judge the effectiveness of either based on those games but it is interesting to watch regardless.
the roach ling attack discussed in this thread wasn't employed by yugioh, but to me that was actually more helpful because i know i can hold it with dts; i was interested to see how dt/vr would fare against other builds.
There are so many threads on early Zerg all-ins (you guys call it aggression, sure) the past weeks. My style is to just get good sim city at my natural with a Forge, Gateway, Pylon, and Nexus, and I never cut my first cannon, doing so is just too greedy, especially with Zergs abusing Roaches in early game too as well.
Personally, on ladder, most Zergs get too aggressive with their Roaches, I feel that they should just try to dance around, and passively try to snipe down the Nexus, as any Stalker count under two should be relatively easy to deal with, especially against players like me that make sim-cities that backfire when trying get in range from a small choke.
Essentially you can't just 3 gate expand anymore-if zerg sees this he can just do this all in and kill you. You can make it look like your doing something else by getting a stalker after your first zealot. Also Huk goes for a 3gate dark templar expand. This lets him keep his opponent pinned back in his base until he gets his lair up at which point you can hold off such attacks.
So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
I think if you want to go dt, voidray, or even robo expand, you need to take 2nd gas earlier. You don't necessarily need to mine out of it right away, but I've noticed out of the last 5 times I've faced roach/ling early aggression, 4 times the player gased me.
I never have trouble vs roach ling all in. And im even or ahead on worker count at a 1200+ master level play some gmaster zergs as well. Stndard 3 gate expo with gates at arounfd 29 and constant chorno on probes gives you a high probe count. Once you throw down expo you make termplar or sg and get either vray phoenix or dark shrine. This makes zerg either make units cancel his third or kill drones. I always 3 gate expo with a 4th gate a forge and 1-2 cannons. If you see like 8 lings poking it means hes droning and you can go kill him with 3 gate pressure. If you see less or more lings he is either going roach or mass ling either way you are ahead. with a wall made of what i told you you get to make probes constantly and take fast third once you hold off aggresion you also can harass or outright kill zerg if they are all ining you. If you are ever having trouble vs zerg watch my stream and what i do. Youll never lose to zerg again. At least in the opening when i dont get caught out of position.
On May 26 2011 14:37 jackalope1234 wrote: I never have trouble vs roach ling all in. And im even or ahead on worker count at a 1200+ master level play some gmaster zergs as well. Stndard 3 gate expo with gates at arounfd 29 and constant chorno on probes gives you a high probe count. Once you throw down expo you make termplar or sg and get either vray phoenix or dark shrine. This makes zerg either make units cancel his third or kill drones. I always 3 gate expo with a 4th gate a forge and 1-2 cannons. If you see like 8 lings poking it means hes droning and you can go kill him with 3 gate pressure. If you see less or more lings he is either going roach or mass ling either way you are ahead. with a wall made of what i told you you get to make probes constantly and take fast third once you hold off aggresion you also can harass or outright kill zerg if they are all ining you. If you are ever having trouble vs zerg watch my stream and what i do. Youll never lose to zerg again. At least in the opening when i dont get caught out of position.
Any chance of replays? Or is just stream advertising?
On May 19 2011 05:03 Mirl wrote: You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
Sorry for not reading all 15 pages of this thread, but reading this, i looked into Antimage's void ray expo build. Is that not a more appropriate build given the "metagame" (hope im using the word right) is that Z expects 3 gate sentry builds that they can adjust comfortably and know what to expect (e.g. roach/zergling all ins, corruptors in advance)??
On May 26 2011 11:06 JoonX wrote: So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
[url blocked]
When I roach ling all in my last roach finishes around 5:45 - 5:50. If you are getting halluc at 6:45 its way way too late. The roaches will be knocking at your forge-step already
Edit: Build order for your reference... 13 Extractor 15 Pool 15 Overlord 15 Queen 17 Zergling 18 Zergling (Prevent any more probe scouting) 22 Metabolic Boost 22 Overlord 22 Hatchery (Can be cancelled if necessary) 21 Roach Warren 20 Roach 22 Roach 24 Roach 26 Roach 28 Roach 30 Roach 32 Roach 34 Queen (Only if hatchery completed) 36 Overlord Speedlings / Drones
On May 26 2011 11:06 JoonX wrote: So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
[url blocked]
When I roach ling all in my last roach finishes around 5:45 - 5:50. If you are getting halluc at 6:45 its way way too late. The roaches will be knocking at your forge-step already
Edit: Build order for your reference... 13 Extractor 15 Pool 15 Overlord 15 Queen 17 Zergling 18 Zergling (Prevent any more probe scouting) 22 Metabolic Boost 22 Overlord 22 Hatchery (Can be cancelled if necessary) 21 Roach Warren 20 Roach 22 Roach 24 Roach 26 Roach 28 Roach 30 Roach 32 Roach 34 Queen (Only if hatchery completed) 36 Overlord Speedlings / Drones
Could i ask anyone with a replay with good execution for this build on xelnaga caverns. I keep on getting conflicting info on this build. The losira timing from what ive seen hits on 8:00. Other lesser econ version hits at 7:30. I would really want to see a rep for this timing of yours. thanks
Edit: I think this is another style of an all in zerg build called a 7RR, although with slight deviations. This isnt the zergling- roach all were talking about and this hits before expo is even planted. this is easily scout-able due to the quick warren and late zergling speed (scouting probes can outmaneuver 4 zerglings with no speed if handled correctly)
On May 26 2011 11:06 JoonX wrote: So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
[url blocked]
When I roach ling all in my last roach finishes around 5:45 - 5:50. If you are getting halluc at 6:45 its way way too late. The roaches will be knocking at your forge-step already
Edit: Build order for your reference... 13 Extractor 15 Pool 15 Overlord 15 Queen 17 Zergling 18 Zergling (Prevent any more probe scouting) 22 Metabolic Boost 22 Overlord 22 Hatchery (Can be cancelled if necessary) 21 Roach Warren 20 Roach 22 Roach 24 Roach 26 Roach 28 Roach 30 Roach 32 Roach 34 Queen (Only if hatchery completed) 36 Overlord Speedlings / Drones
Could i ask anyone with a replay with good execution for this build on xelnaga caverns. I keep on getting conflicting info on this build. The losira timing from what ive seen hits on 8:00. Other lesser econ version hits at 7:30. I would really want to see a rep for this timing of yours. thanks
Edit: I think this is another style of an all in zerg build called a 7RR, although with slight deviations. This isnt the zergling- roach all were talking about and this hits before expo is even planted. this is easily scout-able due to the quick warren and late zergling speed (scouting probes can outmaneuver 4 zerglings with no speed if handled correctly)
I dont see any problem killing the probe with 4 lings and queen only. You throw down the warren only after killing the probe. Even with delays caused by troublesome probes, you should still be able to hit this timing WAY before 7:30. This opening resembles 14gas 14 pool more, which is the standard PvZ opener due to probes blocking expos
Youre right about the probes; its quite easy to do that however I found a major weakness in this build. I tried my style against this build and I found a major weakness in the attack timing itself - it is too early. The attack comes BEFORE the nexus finishes giving me enough time to cancel the nexus, stall with some FF on my ramp and warp in a round of stalkers and voila easily defended with no major losses. I could go tech up and punish the zerg with this. The losira timing is strong only because it allows the nexus to finish before the attack, limiting the resources available to the toss player for more defence (money goes to the nexus and the probes for the expo).
On May 19 2011 05:03 Mirl wrote: You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
Sorry for not reading all 15 pages of this thread, but reading this, i looked into Antimage's void ray expo build. Is that not a more appropriate build given the "metagame" (hope im using the word right) is that Z expects 3 gate sentry builds that they can adjust comfortably and know what to expect (e.g. roach/zergling all ins, corruptors in advance)??
On May 19 2011 05:03 Mirl wrote: You should try 3 gate+stargate+forge+expand.Void Rays doing amazing job.
when you get void rays; 1.At least you kill 1 Overlord(100 mineral) 2.Zerg scared roach&ling all in 3.Zerg get extra quenn or evolution chamber(150 gold) 4.You can kill Creep Tumors 5.you can deny zerg 3rd Base
Sorry for not reading all 15 pages of this thread, but reading this, i looked into Antimage's void ray expo build. Is that not a more appropriate build given the "metagame" (hope im using the word right) is that Z expects 3 gate sentry builds that they can adjust comfortably and know what to expect (e.g. roach/zergling all ins, corruptors in advance)??
Thoughts anyone??
Roach / Ling all-in can destroy that build if it can destroy this build.
Stargate, DTs, 2gate robo, forge, less sentries, blink, etc.. there are a million different tech options that protoss has, it's kinda like the 1 rax expand in TvP, protoss would just make 2 gates and kill you, now it's more in the 2 rax vs 3 gate area, which is less imbalanced, the 3 gate vs roach ling is similar, zerg waits a tad longer to attack than if toss was going 2 gate expand, and just smashes down the front door if the toss makes any miss micro
Basically you can hard counter them by DT rushing, bu that's a bit blind, you can scout their roach warren timing, see if they're pooling larvae or producing roaches, etc.. etc... basically you can scout it fairly easily, and then just stay on 1 base for a bit longer and get some immortals out, then expand and u'll be ahead, tech to collosus and a-move like usual
I feel like if toss puts down "enough" cannons to be safe against a roach/ling push toss basically HAS to cut probes. And, even with probe cutting, (assuming the toss and zerg are both playing around a high level) if zerg can manage to wast a couple FFs, since their reinforcements are so much quicker/stronger/larger in number, toss still has to pull probes to stop it. And in the end toss isn't really "ahead" per say. Toss might have a higher probe count by a couple, but toss has 0 aggression possibility, while the zerg still has complete map control, and even after an unsuccessful aggression has the option of either 1. Drone up and go for a 3rd hatch, 2. Mass up again and go for another wave (this wave basically being an all in), 3. drone up and just go for some tech oriented all in (well i guess the only tech oriented all in would be either nydus or mutas)
Toss, in response to those 3 options is basically forced to cannon up again in the front (so many times have i stopped the 1st big roach/ling push, then decided to only remake 2 of my cannons again and got mauled), and try to be somewhat ready for a muta/nydus play (again i've had games where zerg saw me make 5 cannons in the front decided to just make a handful of mutas or nydus and maul my main). While zerg STILL has the option of going for a mid game play by droneing up. A cannon/sentry is SUCH a passive build that it lets zerg do whatever it wants, and if zerg doesn't do a full frontal attack it leaves you way too behind.
A response to a 4 gate push worked because once the 4 gate failed the defender was given multiple options while the 4gateing person isn't. A response to a 3 rax all in works because once the 3 rax fails, the defender is given options. In a roach/ling aggression, even if toss defends it using cannon/sentry it's still the zerg with options and toss still playing a guessing game. (Yes i do realize if toss guesses it right toss is given an easy win, but that's still a blind guess toss has to take)
This is why i don't think static defense + sentry build isn't a legitimate response (even if somehow toss was able to scout it and do it as a "response" and not a preemptive thing).
On May 27 2011 10:34 CatNzHat wrote: Basically you can hard counter them by DT rushing, bu that's a bit blind, you can scout their roach warren timing, see if they're pooling larvae or producing roaches, etc.. etc...
I hid my DT tech quite well the other day (I know it wasn't spotted) and my zerg opponent got an overseer anyhow to accompany his roach/ling push, lost my DT's immediately and couldn't hold it off. I have a feeling that this will be the case quite often from now on. They have found a strat that is very hard for toss to holdl I'll be interested to see if Toss players can come up with anything that really is a good counter.
On May 26 2011 11:06 JoonX wrote: So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
[url blocked]
When I roach ling all in my last roach finishes around 5:45 - 5:50. If you are getting halluc at 6:45 its way way too late. The roaches will be knocking at your forge-step already
Edit: Build order for your reference... 13 Extractor 15 Pool 15 Overlord 15 Queen 17 Zergling 18 Zergling (Prevent any more probe scouting) 22 Metabolic Boost 22 Overlord 22 Hatchery (Can be cancelled if necessary) 21 Roach Warren 20 Roach 22 Roach 24 Roach 26 Roach 28 Roach 30 Roach 32 Roach 34 Queen (Only if hatchery completed) 36 Overlord Speedlings / Drones
This build has nothing to do with the actual topic -- it's not the roach/ling build that is being discussed, it's easy to scout that something funky is up, and any good toss will adapt accordingly.
3 gate expand is simply not a good opening vs zerg anymore in this new patch. Sentries build faster and warpgate take longer. 3 Gate is not optimized for these facts. Either forge fast expand, voidray expand, dt expand or some kind of 1-2 gate expand with a very fast forge is still very viable. People need to drop 3 gate expand allready. Doign a 2 gate expand you basically get the same ammount of sentries as the old 3 gate expand and you do get faster forge or nexus if you're feeling bold. If you do a 2 gate expand you can add the second gate faster and an in base forge slithgly before moving out to take the expo. If he tries to ling all in this or "no drone roach all in" you you just cancel the expo and expand behind a +1 pressure.
The matchup has become more of a scouting and pressure based one where you actually need to inflict some kind of damage or threat to get a good opening. You can't simply make mass sentries and think you'll be fine.
On May 26 2011 11:06 JoonX wrote: So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
[url blocked]
When I roach ling all in my last roach finishes around 5:45 - 5:50. If you are getting halluc at 6:45 its way way too late. The roaches will be knocking at your forge-step already
Edit: Build order for your reference... 13 Extractor 15 Pool 15 Overlord 15 Queen 17 Zergling 18 Zergling (Prevent any more probe scouting) 22 Metabolic Boost 22 Overlord 22 Hatchery (Can be cancelled if necessary) 21 Roach Warren 20 Roach 22 Roach 24 Roach 26 Roach 28 Roach 30 Roach 32 Roach 34 Queen (Only if hatchery completed) 36 Overlord Speedlings / Drones
Could i ask anyone with a replay with good execution for this build on xelnaga caverns. I keep on getting conflicting info on this build. The losira timing from what ive seen hits on 8:00. Other lesser econ version hits at 7:30. I would really want to see a rep for this timing of yours. thanks
Edit: I think this is another style of an all in zerg build called a 7RR, although with slight deviations. This isnt the zergling- roach all were talking about and this hits before expo is even planted. this is easily scout-able due to the quick warren and late zergling speed (scouting probes can outmaneuver 4 zerglings with no speed if handled correctly)
I dont see any problem killing the probe with 4 lings and queen only. You throw down the warren only after killing the probe. Even with delays caused by troublesome probes, you should still be able to hit this timing WAY before 7:30. This opening resembles 14gas 14 pool more, which is the standard PvZ opener due to probes blocking expos
Any competent protoss will hide a probe on the map and scout for an expo in time to defend this all in. Once you see no natural hatchery you pop stargate + gate + eventual forge and stall your ramp with force fields. The new short sentry build time makes it very very easy to counter this build unless he walks up your ramp before you notice. Chrono boosted sentries comes out ridiculously fast now. Not to mention that if you use any kind of zealot/stalker pressure you will scout his roach all in way close to his base and get a head start on defending the all in even if you didn't scout the empty natural.
On May 27 2011 07:06 JoonX wrote: Youre right about the probes; its quite easy to do that however I found a major weakness in this build. I tried my style against this build and I found a major weakness in the attack timing itself - it is too early. The attack comes BEFORE the nexus finishes giving me enough time to cancel the nexus, stall with some FF on my ramp and warp in a round of stalkers and voila easily defended with no major losses. I could go tech up and punish the zerg with this. The losira timing is strong only because it allows the nexus to finish before the attack, limiting the resources available to the toss player for more defence (money goes to the nexus and the probes for the expo).
I don't see how thats a problem actually. Usually if my ling scouts tell me its too early, I will just start droning, the second I notice you are committing to an expand I will make 7 roaches and spam lings. The main strength of this build is not the timing, its that I have a good enough econ to support ling reinforcements from 2 hatches, which will kill even a 4 gateway push. So regardless of you cancelling your nexus, the build will succeed.
On May 26 2011 11:06 JoonX wrote: So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
[url blocked]
When I roach ling all in my last roach finishes around 5:45 - 5:50. If you are getting halluc at 6:45 its way way too late. The roaches will be knocking at your forge-step already
Edit: Build order for your reference... 13 Extractor 15 Pool 15 Overlord 15 Queen 17 Zergling 18 Zergling (Prevent any more probe scouting) 22 Metabolic Boost 22 Overlord 22 Hatchery (Can be cancelled if necessary) 21 Roach Warren 20 Roach 22 Roach 24 Roach 26 Roach 28 Roach 30 Roach 32 Roach 34 Queen (Only if hatchery completed) 36 Overlord Speedlings / Drones
Could i ask anyone with a replay with good execution for this build on xelnaga caverns. I keep on getting conflicting info on this build. The losira timing from what ive seen hits on 8:00. Other lesser econ version hits at 7:30. I would really want to see a rep for this timing of yours. thanks
Edit: I think this is another style of an all in zerg build called a 7RR, although with slight deviations. This isnt the zergling- roach all were talking about and this hits before expo is even planted. this is easily scout-able due to the quick warren and late zergling speed (scouting probes can outmaneuver 4 zerglings with no speed if handled correctly)
I dont see any problem killing the probe with 4 lings and queen only. You throw down the warren only after killing the probe. Even with delays caused by troublesome probes, you should still be able to hit this timing WAY before 7:30. This opening resembles 14gas 14 pool more, which is the standard PvZ opener due to probes blocking expos
Any competent protoss will hide a probe on the map and scout for an expo in time to defend this all in. Once you see no natural hatchery you pop stargate + gate + eventual forge and stall your ramp with force fields. The new short sentry build time makes it very very easy to counter this build unless he walks up your ramp before you notice. Chrono boosted sentries comes out ridiculously fast now. Not to mention that if you use any kind of zealot/stalker pressure you will scout his roach all in way close to his base and get a head start on defending the all in even if you didn't scout the empty natural.
What are you talking about? This is a 2 base build, you throw down the natural hatchery around 21 supply (earlier if there is no probe block). As for scouting, its based on how competent your micro is. If you sit the lings below your ramp / opening and then bring your queen up to the edge of the creep, there is no reason for the probe to get through and see your warren...
On May 27 2011 10:34 CatNzHat wrote: Basically you can hard counter them by DT rushing, bu that's a bit blind, you can scout their roach warren timing, see if they're pooling larvae or producing roaches, etc.. etc...
I hid my DT tech quite well the other day (I know it wasn't spotted) and my zerg opponent got an overseer anyhow to accompany his roach/ling push, lost my DT's immediately and couldn't hold it off. I have a feeling that this will be the case quite often from now on. They have found a strat that is very hard for toss to holdl I'll be interested to see if Toss players can come up with anything that really is a good counter.
Must have been pretty delayed if he got layer and morphed an overseer.
Anyone watch Cruncher in the NASL last night? If not go watch it and learn about how to stop this exact thing. It's all about ff placement. Also why did the guy talking about cannons get warned? You absolutely have to delay your expansion in favor of getting that forge. When you expand you need to be able to put down one to two cannons and have 5 or so sentries. This enables you to expand and hold off the zerg pressure even on maps with large naturals. Once you have held the initial push it's pretty much gg as the zerg has invested way to much into lings and roaches.
On May 26 2011 11:06 JoonX wrote: So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
[url blocked]
When I roach ling all in my last roach finishes around 5:45 - 5:50. If you are getting halluc at 6:45 its way way too late. The roaches will be knocking at your forge-step already
Edit: Build order for your reference... 13 Extractor 15 Pool 15 Overlord 15 Queen 17 Zergling 18 Zergling (Prevent any more probe scouting) 22 Metabolic Boost 22 Overlord 22 Hatchery (Can be cancelled if necessary) 21 Roach Warren 20 Roach 22 Roach 24 Roach 26 Roach 28 Roach 30 Roach 32 Roach 34 Queen (Only if hatchery completed) 36 Overlord Speedlings / Drones
I thought it was just a reactive transition? Like Zerg just opens standard and has something to scout the expansion timing, and once the expansion goes down you start pumping an army and attack them with constant reinforcements until they break. Your build seems pretty heavily set to do a blind rush in the first place. What I've tried (albeit only once but quite effectively) is open the standard 14 pool 16 hatch, with a Roach Warren somewhere in there (this is where I'm praying that he's going 3 gate expo with Sentries). My Zergling at his expansion spots the expansion timing, and I start pumping Zerglings and Roaches as minerals and gas dictates, then push when I have a sizable army, then put in constant reinforcements until I have a clear advantage. He had a significantly less Sentries than I had hoped and far more Stalkers... I was scared because he actually had a big army, but I had to commit and hoped the speedling reinforcements would be enough to tip it in my favor. Surprisingly enough, it was more than enough. I should probably test it out, but if you're 100% sure on when he drops his Nexus, you can probably drop a Roach Warren and a second gas right then and still have enough in time to break him by the time it all finishes.
On May 27 2011 07:06 JoonX wrote: Youre right about the probes; its quite easy to do that however I found a major weakness in this build. I tried my style against this build and I found a major weakness in the attack timing itself - it is too early. The attack comes BEFORE the nexus finishes giving me enough time to cancel the nexus, stall with some FF on my ramp and warp in a round of stalkers and voila easily defended with no major losses. I could go tech up and punish the zerg with this. The losira timing is strong only because it allows the nexus to finish before the attack, limiting the resources available to the toss player for more defence (money goes to the nexus and the probes for the expo).
You do realize what the point of the Roach/Ling all in is right? To absolutely PUNISH Protoss for expanding without having a massive army, and maintaining an economic lead.
You lost an expansion that is nearly complete (400 minerals held up for a long time) and 100 of that isn't refunded. You'll be on 1 base and he's on 2 base. YOU can't break him and he still has an economic lead! He just pulls back, the speedlings will all make it home safely and you'll snipe some Roaches, but he can make a lot more at home, start Lair Tech, hold off your counterattack, then go again when Roach speed or Hydras finish. On a 1 base economy you won't be able to do much about it. Even if you tech like crazy, you just won't have enough stuff. 1 Colossus with range takes a while to make. If you attack when range finishes, you have 2 Colossus and he'll probably have a crapload of Roaches and Hydras. Not only that, on a 1 base economy you're not going to have many gateway units to protect your Colossi (like maybe a dozen Zealots, which are terrible versus Roach/Hydra). If you drop your Nexus again, he can pump out a round of drones, maybe even drop an expansion, then go back to pushing you. The only time I see 2 base Zerg lose to a 1 base Protoss is when the Zerg did a horrible 1 base all in, failed, and decided to drop an expansion or when Protoss does some crazy 1 base all in that the Zerg isn't ready for (the OLD days of 4 Gate vs Zerg when they didn't know how to most effectively deal with it).
On May 27 2011 10:34 CatNzHat wrote: Stargate, DTs, 2gate robo, forge, less sentries, blink, etc.. there are a million different tech options that protoss has, it's kinda like the 1 rax expand in TvP, protoss would just make 2 gates and kill you, now it's more in the 2 rax vs 3 gate area, which is less imbalanced, the 3 gate vs roach ling is similar, zerg waits a tad longer to attack than if toss was going 2 gate expand, and just smashes down the front door if the toss makes any miss micro
Basically you can hard counter them by DT rushing, bu that's a bit blind, you can scout their roach warren timing, see if they're pooling larvae or producing roaches, etc.. etc... basically you can scout it fairly easily, and then just stay on 1 base for a bit longer and get some immortals out, then expand and u'll be ahead, tech to collosus and a-move like usual
I'm real iffy on using a Stargate expansion... Maybe after they see you start your harass (because as I said before my understanding of the all in is that they start it the instant they see you drop your Nexus, though I could be wrong), but if you try and drop that expansion too early, they can still do a lot of damage to you... Void Rays have a hell of a time cleaning up Roaches and Lings. I'm thinking 2 Gate Robo is the best "non-cheesy" bet now. Get an Observer to scout, and chronoboost army units as necessary like how it's played versus Terran (since hatch tech means no mobile detection). People do drop a Forge (unless you mean Forge FE) but you have to make 2, maybe 3 cannons blind.
I currently rely on the DT expand build and feel it's the only real way to safely expand at around the same timing (I was satisfied with the economy of a 3 Gate expand but PvZ isn't my best matchup and you can pretty much turtle on 3 base for the deathball and be fine anyways). The great thing about the DT expand is that if they held out on their Lair timing to try and punish my expansion, I can punish them for lack of detection. Sometimes I just get auto-wins from Zergs that either don't know how to be flexible with the all in and/or simply don't know how to scout a Protoss player's options by their Sentry count (the benefits of having Diamond level MMR is quite depressing). And after everything is done, I have map control until he has an Overseer so he can't all in me anymore because if I just block my ramp and get a few DTs out, the damage he can do is really minimal (considering how powerful the attack is otherwise). The reason I like DTs so much right now though is that they open up Templar tech and Blink, which is something I want to try in PvZ. I just find Colossi boring and too easy to counter nowadays. It's super powerful early game, but people are learning to deal with it more efficiently...
On May 27 2011 23:41 YarNhoj wrote: Anyone watch Cruncher in the NASL last night? If not go watch it and learn about how to stop this exact thing. It's all about ff placement. Also why did the guy talking about cannons get warned? You absolutely have to delay your expansion in favor of getting that forge. When you expand you need to be able to put down one to two cannons and have 5 or so sentries. This enables you to expand and hold off the zerg pressure even on maps with large naturals. Once you have held the initial push it's pretty much gg as the zerg has invested way to much into lings and roaches.
Just watched that game, and Moman's execution of the attack was really poor. He basically ran in with his ~10 Roaches, got Forcefielded, and then had his Speedlings trickle in two at a time, and die without accomplishing anything. The reason the attack is so good is because it's quite difficult to deal with Roaches AND Speedlings at the same time with just FF. Just Roaches (which is basically what Moman did) aren't a problem at all at that point in the game.
In general, Moman's push was quite weak for how late it came (8:00).
Finally, Cruncher's expo went down quite late (7:00). This was fine in that game, partially because Moman chose to do what he did, but also because Cruncher scouted Moman first, and could delay the expo hatch a fair amount. Had that not happened, and Moman did something like a hatch first, Cruncher's build would have ended up way behind against a Zerg powering drones.
You lost an expansion that is nearly complete (400 minerals held up for a long time) and 100 of that isn't refunded. You'll be on 1 base and he's on 2 base. YOU can't break him and he still has an economic lead! He just pulls back, the speedlings will all make it home safely and you'll snipe some Roaches, but he can make a lot more at home, start Lair Tech, hold off your counterattack, then go again when Roach speed or Hydras finish. On a 1 base economy you won't be able to do much about it. Even if you tech like crazy, you just won't have enough stuff.
Again, the problem with that timing is is that its just too early. Hits around 6:00. At that time, I just started my expo. its just barely 10% complete. No big loss in time. Not to mention the zerg has barely a 2nd base running since all the larvae are directed to speedling production. I just go to a 3 gate stargate quickly to deal with his army. I think youre misreading my post. That was directed to the guy stating his 7RR all in, not to the losira timing attack build. As for that timing, I found out I can get a hallucinate scouting at 6:45, just enough time to respond with FF stalling, a cannon or 2 at my natural and a round of reinforcements.
On May 26 2011 11:06 JoonX wrote: So I was tinkering a bit with my previous 3 gate PVT build and I manage to get a finished WG research at ~ 5:30 and finish my hallucination research at 6:45 exactly (Thank goodness for Chronoboost). Maybe this could help a bit with the scouting dillema vs this all in. I posted a replay although I butchered the end part. Maybe you guys can tinker with it too so we can get a solution against this all in style. Do note that this all in attack can start at 7:30
[url blocked]
When I roach ling all in my last roach finishes around 5:45 - 5:50. If you are getting halluc at 6:45 its way way too late. The roaches will be knocking at your forge-step already
Edit: Build order for your reference... 13 Extractor 15 Pool 15 Overlord 15 Queen 17 Zergling 18 Zergling (Prevent any more probe scouting) 22 Metabolic Boost 22 Overlord 22 Hatchery (Can be cancelled if necessary) 21 Roach Warren 20 Roach 22 Roach 24 Roach 26 Roach 28 Roach 30 Roach 32 Roach 34 Queen (Only if hatchery completed) 36 Overlord Speedlings / Drones
Could i ask anyone with a replay with good execution for this build on xelnaga caverns. I keep on getting conflicting info on this build. The losira timing from what ive seen hits on 8:00. Other lesser econ version hits at 7:30. I would really want to see a rep for this timing of yours. thanks
Edit: I think this is another style of an all in zerg build called a 7RR, although with slight deviations. This isnt the zergling- roach all were talking about and this hits before expo is even planted. this is easily scout-able due to the quick warren and late zergling speed (scouting probes can outmaneuver 4 zerglings with no speed if handled correctly)
I dont see any problem killing the probe with 4 lings and queen only. You throw down the warren only after killing the probe. Even with delays caused by troublesome probes, you should still be able to hit this timing WAY before 7:30. This opening resembles 14gas 14 pool more, which is the standard PvZ opener due to probes blocking expos
Any competent protoss will hide a probe on the map and scout for an expo in time to defend this all in. Once you see no natural hatchery you pop stargate + gate + eventual forge and stall your ramp with force fields. The new short sentry build time makes it very very easy to counter this build unless he walks up your ramp before you notice. Chrono boosted sentries comes out ridiculously fast now. Not to mention that if you use any kind of zealot/stalker pressure you will scout his roach all in way close to his base and get a head start on defending the all in even if you didn't scout the empty natural.
What are you talking about? This is a 2 base build, you throw down the natural hatchery around 21 supply (earlier if there is no probe block). As for scouting, its based on how competent your micro is. If you sit the lings below your ramp / opening and then bring your queen up to the edge of the creep, there is no reason for the probe to get through and see your warren...
Actually I was adressing the 7RR which is a 1 base build. But that's why I said don't 3 gate expand. The nexus is either too late or too early for what you need. 1gate expand or forge expand allows cannons to be up before the attack comes, you can make a good simcity that prevents roach/ling all ins. If you expand behind voidray or DT you are safe to this kind of all in too if you use your units correctly and wall good. As far as I see we are not in disagreement here. You can't 3 gate expand safely vs this zerg build on a map with an open natural, so don't 3 gate expand.
I don't get this 'hard counter' that DTs are supposed to be. The Zs I face make an Evo before moving out and if they get swiped near my base, they full retreat to Spore city and take it from there.
I think its fucking retarded how zerg can make only two units and win the game. I just lost twice on the ladder against this bullshit. Hell, my 6 gate even had time to kick in, and I had 2 cannon just to be safe from this shit. Still he breaks me. I opened up 3 gate btw. I had halucination and scouted him just to see that i'm about to die.
Something needs to be done about current zerg, feels like Protoss vs Zerg and maps where you can't forge FE is an uphill battle and I have flip a coin many times just to break even. 80% of the games I am forced play from behind. You would think that you'd be ahead economically if zergs does this and you survive, but zergs can just pump out drones at a ridiculous rate, its not even funny.
Also, I dont wanna QQ about balance or anything since I am sure there is a way to counter this, but it's just frustrating as hell when zerg can do a push thats so easy to execute and win games by just doing it.
I don't have a big problem with losing some games to this kind of play, but I can't help but wonder if there would be some more interesting protoss plays to pre-empt it if they had kept to the longer warpgate research with shorter pre-warpgate unit build times. It might have kept the zerg metagame a little more honest - instead of 50 minerals of lings and only drones up until the time your warren gets finished.
On May 31 2011 11:13 FreshVegetables wrote: I think its fucking retarded how zerg can make only two units and win the game. I just lost twice on the ladder against this bullshit. Hell, my 6 gate even had time to kick in, and I had 2 cannon just to be safe from this shit. Still he breaks me. I opened up 3 gate btw. I had halucination and scouted him just to see that i'm about to die.
Something needs to be done about current zerg, feels like Protoss vs Zerg and maps where you can't forge FE is an uphill battle and I have flip a coin many times just to break even. 80% of the games I am forced play from behind. You would think that you'd be ahead economically if zergs does this and you survive, but zergs can just pump out drones at a ridiculous rate, its not even funny.
Also, I dont wanna QQ about balance or anything since I am sure there is a way to counter this, but it's just frustrating as hell when zerg can do a push thats so easy to execute and win games by just doing it.
ps. i am 1300 masters, playing alot of gm's etc.
TT1 foretold this a while back, i believe right after infestor buff at the height of the zerg QQ. I think maybe if someone reputable like whitera started calling everyone that beats him bad and saying its impossible for protoss things might get better for you lol
I don't have a big problem with losing some games to this kind of play, but I can't help but wonder if there would be some more interesting protoss plays to pre-empt it if they had kept to the longer warpgate research with shorter pre-warpgate unit build times. It might have kept the zerg metagame a little more honest - instead of 50 minerals of lings and only drones up until the time your warren gets finished.
This as well. I was really looking forward to what kind of aggression builds would pop up given rush distances are more reasonable now. I really cant think of a good pressure build that doesnt either put you further behind or cause you to lose the game outright.
So Tyler appeared to hold this roach-ling build vs Idra on Xel Naga with just 3 gates and no sim city to speak of. Idra's mistake? Or something Tyler did well? I'm not good enough to work out why Tyler didn't just die like I would with only 3 gates in that situation...
So Tyler appeared to hold this roach-ling build vs Idra on Xel Naga with just 3 gates and no sim city to speak of. Idra's mistake? Or something Tyler did well? I'm not good enough to work out why Tyler didn't just die like I would with only 3 gates in that situation...
Some insight from a player better then me would also be appreciated from my perspective.
On May 31 2011 11:13 FreshVegetables wrote: I think its fucking retarded how zerg can make only two units and win the game. I just lost twice on the ladder against this bullshit. Hell, my 6 gate even had time to kick in, and I had 2 cannon just to be safe from this shit. Still he breaks me. I opened up 3 gate btw. I had halucination and scouted him just to see that i'm about to die.
Something needs to be done about current zerg, feels like Protoss vs Zerg and maps where you can't forge FE is an uphill battle and I have flip a coin many times just to break even. 80% of the games I am forced play from behind. You would think that you'd be ahead economically if zergs does this and you survive, but zergs can just pump out drones at a ridiculous rate, its not even funny.
Also, I dont wanna QQ about balance or anything since I am sure there is a way to counter this, but it's just frustrating as hell when zerg can do a push thats so easy to execute and win games by just doing it.
ps. i am 1300 masters, playing alot of gm's etc.
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Actually, if you hold this off, the Zerg won't have an army while you likely have a pretty decent one, your extra Gateways should be done (or at the very least started), and his economy will be approximately even to yours, if not worse. You can just go over there, drop a proxy Pylon, and win. The problem most people have comes in just holding the all in to begin with. The answer really is to drop a cannon or two and have great Force Fields or just DO A DIFFERENT BUILD. But if you're really good, you don't even need cannons sometimes as having REALLY GOOD Force Fields will save you anyway. The problem is, VERY FEW people are THAT good with Force Fields, even at the pro level (hence the domination in the last GSL finals).
A game between Idra and TT1. Someone please let me know what TT1 could have done?
1) Get a Forge, don't know why he skipped that. When he scouted all the units he could have build a Cannon and it would finish about in time 2) Scout somehow. Either hallucination or a quicker Robo. He was playing 100% in the dark. 3) Better forcefield placement or army positioning. There is no excuse to let so many Lings through. If you are not confident, position yourself at your ramp vs the Lings, then move out again vs the Roaches.
I have been experimenting with 2 Gate Robo and it actually doesn't sacrifice that many Sentries. Basically you sacrifice one early for the Robo since it's 50/100 more expensive than gateway but after that you can chrono some out quite quickly from dual gate. The quick Observer is extremely useful as it will let you know if Roaches are coming, generally just in time. If not, you can see if he has a 3rd or whatever else he's doing. It helps greatly in deciding your tech path. Same holds for Hallucination, but that doesn't help vs a rush at all so it's a lot more risky.
If you see Roaches coming, you can chrono out an Immortal which absolutely destroys Roaches, especially early on. It 3-shots Roaches, while Roaches need to hit the Immortal 10 + 13 = 23 times.
One weak point of robo is it doesn't really help much vs a pure ling all-in, but those are pretty pathetic anyway and can be easily held with some OK Force Fields.
IdrA did the same to Tyler in NASL and Tyler held it off easily; though it seemed IdrA used fewer Lings there. Force Fields by Tyler were much better though, he also had no Forge.
Interesting to see the metagame shift this much due to the recent patch. From 4-gate "allin" being the nuisance to now roach-zergling "allin" being the problem. Poetic justice? Ironic? I do not know what it is but I look forward to ladder again
Does not look unbeatable though, but it will probably be pretty frustrating until the pro`s figure out some good respones.
Has anyone brought up what MC did in pretty much every game he played against zerg? Proper building placement can shut this down almost effortlessly IMO, or at least when MC did he could.
*hint, using building to wall of the side of the nexus closes to the main, put units behind it, and then you only have to forcefield a small area.
I have started to do 3gate expo into 5gate instead of forge+cannons and if he is not attacking I just add a robo for obs + colo. I have only played 3-4 games but I havent lost to roach/ling allin at all. I just drop the gates almost immediately after the expo starts, so they finish a little bit before the nexus does. I can put pressure, expand or whatever. I think this gives a lot of freedom.
hey buds, best way to stop this roach all in, is to do ur 3 gate expo, or 1 gate FE mc-style, then add the 2 gates. From there, add a star gate, u want like 1 or 2 vrays, so they dont cut into sentry count. From there u shud be good, if they end up not doing it, its pretty easy to just keep probing up and transition into robo / 3rd expansion while pressuring with vray (or 2) and a couple phoneixes.
for those who might question my credibility I know because im a high 1300+ masters. Usually i hold this off with this (i've also seen MC hold it off like this i think), or with a high sentry count and FF really good, while warping in stalkers. Try to think about ur sim city in ur natural expansion. It'll help out tons with ur Force fielding. Also, try to cut off the army, while sandwiching/trapping 3 or so roaches to kill.
If he doesn't go roach/ling all in then get robo facility and bay up and get collosi asap. Obviously switch over to blink stalkers / high templars if he goes mutas instead of hydras.
On June 09 2011 11:54 KingofGods wrote: 1 gate expo into 3 gate stargate is the way to go
If he doesn't go roach/ling all in then get robo facility and bay up and get collosi asap. Obviously switch over to blink stalkers / high templars if he goes mutas instead of hydras.
After watching the first 10mins of the replay I have to ask: What division are you in? Both you and your opponent did so many mistakes/stupid decisions, its just unbelievable.
On June 09 2011 11:54 KingofGods wrote: 1 gate expo into 3 gate stargate is the way to go
If he doesn't go roach/ling all in then get robo facility and bay up and get collosi asap. Obviously switch over to blink stalkers / high templars if he goes mutas instead of hydras.
After watching the first 10mins of the replay I have to ask: What division are you in? Both you and your opponent did so many mistakes/stupid decisions, its just unbelievable.
Your argument would be lot more convincing with some examples of 'mistakes' of 'stupid decisions'. Like this is seems like unnecessary bashing
To answer your question, using sc2ranks I think he's 1220 Diamond.
On June 09 2011 11:54 KingofGods wrote: 1 gate expo into 3 gate stargate is the way to go
If he doesn't go roach/ling all in then get robo facility and bay up and get collosi asap. Obviously switch over to blink stalkers / high templars if he goes mutas instead of hydras.
After watching the first 10mins of the replay I have to ask: What division are you in? Both you and your opponent did so many mistakes/stupid decisions, its just unbelievable.
Your argument would be lot more convincing with some examples of 'mistakes' of 'stupid decisions'. Like this is seems like unnecessary bashing
To answer your question, using sc2ranks I think he's 1220 Diamond.
Examples: the zealot was not on hold position so lings got in (zealot walloff) then he FF-ed the ramp for no apparent reason (behind the lings so they couldnt go back lol) then he almost lost his sentry for no apparent reason (tried to kill 4 lings with 1 sentry alone)
his opponent waited like 30sec in front of his base giving him enough time to get a vray out his opponent just ran the lings around in his base without doing anything with them (except almost getting the sentry cuz of lack of focus from the P) when his opponent allined him, he focused a gateway and left it alive, then focused the nexus, left it alive and then when his roaches were almost dead he tried to run up the ramp instead of killing workers
Why is it that whenever the meta game mostly solves a build and a race is forced to adapt people call it imba? Look, the safe build was safe because it was not yet widely understood how to beat it. People solved it and now its no longer a safe build. And for the record, as someone already said Zerg plays in the dark (I'd like to believe because we haven't figured out scouting to the exact level as other races) and we have to guess sometimes. You can open up 3 gate and add a 4th after killing the scout and go apply pressure, cut probes and all in or expand. What right are you asking for when that is a reality?
If you want to complain about people reacting to your 6 sentries and 3 gateways then don't bloody leave 6 sentries at your wall. If Terran did a 3rax all in by building 3 barracks as a wall and 18 marines directly behind it, how would you address him if he complained about how easy it is to scout it?
I actually handle this easily now with a 2 gate FE (and if I even scout just ONE roach), I put 2 cannons behind sim-city. I don't have problems anymore. I go 2 gate fe because I don't go aggressive with sentries, but use Felo's 2 zealot trick to scout (the roach popping out/roach warren/lots of speedlings).
The nexus goes down at around 5:40, then a pylon + warp-ins + a forge. The cannons finish at around 8.
void ray expand anyone? one of the biggest problems with sc2 is that when the metagame shifts people start crying when they use their same old builds that others havee adapted to beat.
yeah sorry protosses but 3 gate expands with pure sentry just isn't as viable as it used to be, and because you NEED cannons to hold this off i would even venture to say that the build is defunct now .
just look at players like kiwikaki, who've started doing 4 gate expands, or alicia that makes a single voidray while expanding and a. scares the zerg into a defensive position b. has a safety net againstroach ling agression (remember alicia was one of the first players to get thoughroly stomped by it).
essentially, if your not greedy you can hold this off pretty easily, and its a good time to mass up units anyways since zerg's third is just around the corner
On June 12 2011 23:50 nick00bot wrote: void ray expand anyone? one of the biggest problems with sc2 is that when the metagame shifts people start crying when they use their same old builds that others havee adapted to beat.
yeah sorry protosses but 3 gate expands with pure sentry just isn't as viable as it used to be, and because you NEED cannons to hold this off i would even venture to say that the build is defunct now .
just look at players like kiwikaki, who've started doing 4 gate expands, or alicia that makes a single voidray while expanding and a. scares the zerg into a defensive position b. has a safety net againstroach ling agression (remember alicia was one of the first players to get thoughroly stomped by it).
essentially, if your not greedy you can hold this off pretty easily, and its a good time to mass up units anyways since zerg's third is just around the corner
Lol I hold roach ling all ins with around 6 sentries (only 2 gates iirc) with 2 cannons. The only thing I'm worried about is that I'm kinda doing it blind, but I use the 2 zealot trick to find out what I need to do.
On June 12 2011 23:50 nick00bot wrote: void ray expand anyone? one of the biggest problems with sc2 is that when the metagame shifts people start crying when they use their same old builds that others havee adapted to beat.
yeah sorry protosses but 3 gate expands with pure sentry just isn't as viable as it used to be, and because you NEED cannons to hold this off i would even venture to say that the build is defunct now .
just look at players like kiwikaki, who've started doing 4 gate expands, or alicia that makes a single voidray while expanding and a. scares the zerg into a defensive position b. has a safety net againstroach ling agression (remember alicia was one of the first players to get thoughroly stomped by it).
essentially, if your not greedy you can hold this off pretty easily, and its a good time to mass up units anyways since zerg's third is just around the corner
Lol I hold roach ling all ins with around 6 sentries (only 2 gates iirc) with 2 cannons. The only thing I'm worried about is that I'm kinda doing it blind, but I use the 2 zealot trick to find out what I need to do.
yeah but you need cannons to hold it off, and i think the hallmark of a safe build is that it relies on units rather static defense to hold stuff off. even then, 2 gate is arguably safer than 3 simply because you have your expansion up faster and puts you in a powerful position a lot faster than a 3 gate, which is really important if zergs mindset shifts from 4" lets kill some sentries" to " i need to kill him ".
as you said, the problem with cannons is that you're never quite sure if your opponent is planning to attack and if you get limited scouting (i.e your see 1 roach) you're responding more to the metagame than actual ingame infromation. i just feel that if i see protoss use up 2 zealots for the sole purpose of scouting, the gig is up and its time to drone and take a third instead of attacking.
The easiest way to hold this off is to go blind 2 cannons, but that sets you back quite a bit if you're going for a timing or the zerg is around your level (ie: you can't just stomp him and every advantage matters) and zerg doesn't do any RL attack. I'm really curious about this 2 zealot trick O_o
On June 12 2011 23:50 nick00bot wrote: void ray expand anyone? one of the biggest problems with sc2 is that when the metagame shifts people start crying when they use their same old builds that others havee adapted to beat.
yeah sorry protosses but 3 gate expands with pure sentry just isn't as viable as it used to be, and because you NEED cannons to hold this off i would even venture to say that the build is defunct now .
just look at players like kiwikaki, who've started doing 4 gate expands, or alicia that makes a single voidray while expanding and a. scares the zerg into a defensive position b. has a safety net againstroach ling agression (remember alicia was one of the first players to get thoughroly stomped by it).
essentially, if your not greedy you can hold this off pretty easily, and its a good time to mass up units anyways since zerg's third is just around the corner
Lol I hold roach ling all ins with around 6 sentries (only 2 gates iirc) with 2 cannons. The only thing I'm worried about is that I'm kinda doing it blind, but I use the 2 zealot trick to find out what I need to do.
what 2zealot trick?
It's nothing really special or complicated. Most of a time, when a zerg is using some all-in he will drone really hard. Getting a 2nd zealot in your first warp-in is a good idea because you can use those 2 zealots to scout at the 6:30 minute mark, which is usually when a zerg starts preparing his all-in. A zerg usually can't beat these 2 zealots unless he uses around 9 lings and during the time these 2 zealots move out, you can count the drones, the gas, the ling numbers, see a roach, ,etc.
If the zerg attacks the 2 zealots with 9 lings really fast, then you know an all-in is coming. If it takes a while, it is a more delayed all-in which you can hold with 2 cannons.
Search up "Felo". Actually here is his wonderful post:
I met Roach/Ling-Allins quite often on the ladder and I'm 3Gate-Sentry-Expanding every game (~1000 Points ML).
In my opinion its still doable under certain circumstances. Those are: Dropping a Forge and a 4th Gateway while your nexus is building, going up to 8 Sentries ASAP and getting some Stalkers afterwards combined with one cannon close to your nexus (You need that to be safe against Burrowpushes anyway).
Now to the important stuff:
First you aren't as blind as a lot of people try to put it - in fact, most of the time getting mapcontrol is as easy as warping in a second zealot and walk up to the Xel-Naga-Towers. Two possibilites:
1.you clean up his scout ling(s) and can proceed to walk up to his base, checking his saturation or how much units he has (Thats why you need 2 btw, because 1 could die to 4 zerglings)
2. He kills two Zealots which requires more zerglings than a zerg would regularly build - guess what could happen
Second: When you realize that all-in is coming - DONT GET MORE STALKERS. I made that mistake for a long time but in fact Zealots are far better in smaller numbers when their prey cant run from them and roaches are neither quick nor big in numbers for this push.
Third: Stay close to your buildings. You have a lot of FFs at your disposal but its still important to use them wisely. I crushed a lot of those pushes without losing a single unit by trapping the roaches close to my buildings with 3 FFs and killing them from afar.
Basically the defense of the push consists of two things: killing the roaches (unimportant) and killing the speedlings (important). The roaches only exist to bait your units out in the open where the speedlings can do the job - as soon as the speedlings are dead you can easily surround the roaches with FFs and finish them off.
But because of that dynamic you have to wait until he sacrifices his Speedlings in any way - if that means that its neccessary to let him take down a pylon/Gate/your Forge then fine - let him get that building, wait for him to stream his speedlings in and place the nail in the coffin - if hes not doing that you are fine as well for obvious reasons.
tl;dr-Version:
* Get a Forge and a Gateway while expanding * Use a group of two zealots to scout * If the all-in is coming stall your Stalkerproduktion, pump out zealots * Stay close to your buildings * Utilize your buildings/FFs to trap speedlings and be able to kill them * Be patient, don't go out in the open until you are sure that there's no mob of speedlings waiting for you
Lately I have been doing 2g expo into forge, then 3rd gate way. With forge in natural as well as the 3rd gate and a cannon shortly thereafter, I haven't lost to a roach all-in in forever. Then again, I haven't really seen much of it in recent times. It seems like it was a fotm build after losira beat alicia with it in gsl and now serves more like a meta game build and one that punishes weaker players. I haven't even been getting hallu to scout for it anymore, just getting out 1 cannon and 7-8 sentries before it hits is plenty.
good sim city good ff 1 cannon. (you can add 1 when it actually hits you as the attack gets stronger over time- the more ffs you use, the scarier this attack is, and a good zerg won't be losing many of his roaches.) that is all
yes, also you might not share this opinion with me, but a LOTTT A LOT of players are still using pylons in their natural wall-ins, which i think is a SEVERE weakness to roach ling all-ins. it might be a tiny pain in the ass, but it's so much better and safer to learn where the pylon actually belongs so that you can make a building wall. keeps you safer vs mass ling too as your natural is getting set-up.
On June 09 2011 00:44 Micket wrote: Roach Ling aggression didn't work at all in MLG. Sim city is all that's needed, heck MC holds it with 1 gate expand into 3 gate Stargate.
he manages to hold it with the absolute best counter protoss has? I am amazed!
that said, I think stargate play is one of the best options protoss has right now vs Z. But the problem with all defensive or gimmicky builds like forge, dt, or stargate, is when zerg goes in macro beast mode from the start and stays in macro beast mode, with just some speedlings for scout denial and expansion delaying.
On June 19 2011 09:26 whereismymind wrote: Alejandrisha can you be so kind and link me 2gate expo strategy, since I have problems to find it via search ^3^. Thank you sir.
I would like to see some good examples of 2 gate expos as well that are safe thanks!
On June 19 2011 09:42 travis wrote: he manages to hold it with the absolute best counter protoss has? I am amazed!
that said, I think stargate play is one of the best options protoss has right now vs Z. But the problem with all defensive or gimmicky builds like forge, dt, or stargate, is when zerg goes in macro beast mode from the start and stays in macro beast mode, with just some speedlings for scout denial and expansion delaying.
I wouldn't say that Stargate play is the best 'counter' to Roach/ling aggression. All the aggression is required to do is kill off some sentries, and the one Void Ray you will have by then won't be enough to save the Sentries on it's own. The best 'counter' is just good FFs, good simcity and good gamesense.
On June 19 2011 09:42 travis wrote: he manages to hold it with the absolute best counter protoss has? I am amazed!
that said, I think stargate play is one of the best options protoss has right now vs Z. But the problem with all defensive or gimmicky builds like forge, dt, or stargate, is when zerg goes in macro beast mode from the start and stays in macro beast mode, with just some speedlings for scout denial and expansion delaying.
I wouldn't say that Stargate play is the best 'counter' to Roach/ling aggression. All the aggression is required to do is kill off some sentries, and the one Void Ray you will have by then won't be enough to save the Sentries on it's own. The best 'counter' is just good FFs, good simcity and good gamesense.
You are thinking to small. The point of Stargate play out of Sentry-Expand is not just about defending a potential Roach/Ling-Aggression; its aswell about putting pressure back on Z asap and denying a third base.
I don't feel like "putting pressure back on the zerg" is that useful, you can get an earlier third instead while allowing his third to get up, poking with you army as usual. Flashy units like voidrays are of course good as you can even deny the third but I feel it's a bit of a gamble since it will defend a roach/ling attack and deny a third, sure, but it can't deny a third if the zerg is macroing like normal. And instead you will then be behind because getting voidrays isn't the best choice for army composition (no deathballs at this point in the game).
You can do both Latedi. My overlords and third base have to be defended or you could cover a third of your own. Zerg's weak early anti air means a headache for zerg. Stargate opening doesn't have to inflict heavy damage, just enough to force zerg into a undesired tech path.
On June 22 2011 10:53 Gattaca.usa wrote: so can anyone post a good example or build order for a 2 gate expo?
I am still having trouble with the roach/ling aggression.
Even with a cannon up I am still losing. Am I being too greedy? should i engage or just FF and stall while warping in more units?
What i started doing is delaying the expo by ~30sec. When WG finishes I warp in 3 sentries, but then before going down the ramp and putting pylons/forges/gateways/whatever i wait for another warp in of stalkers. After the stalkers are done I move down and expand the normal way.
Tbh from watching streams/reps there are two mistakes people make that will end up costing them the game:
a) Move your army out in the open to prevent roaches shooting at your buildings. Do NOT do that! If the zerg all-ins you, wtf who cares if he kills a pylon (unless you produced an Artosis pylon, of course). But if you move your 90% sentry-army out of position, he'll roflpwn you with speedlings, therer are only so many forcefields.
b) Build the cannon at the front. You do NOT need a cannon to kill the couple of roaches - you need the cannon to protect your stuff against the speedlings running into your mineral line! If he keeps his speedlings out of your base, then just let him shoot at your buildings while comfortably warping in stuff in a safe position. Reinforcing with slow roaches is just terrible. In other words, he kinda has to move in with his lings if he wants to take you down. At this point you need to forcefield his roaches OUT and take care of the lings. The cannon will prove to be extremely important now, as it will provide the necessary DPS against the lings streaming in.
TL; DR: a) Don't fight vs roach/ling in the open. Accept the loss of forge/pylons. b) Build a cannon - but NOT at a place where it can be easily taken out by roaches. One "box/field/square" (how do you call it in English?) below/beside buildings is perfect.
On June 22 2011 10:53 Gattaca.usa wrote: so can anyone post a good example or build order for a 2 gate expo?
I am still having trouble with the roach/ling aggression.
Even with a cannon up I am still losing. Am I being too greedy? should i engage or just FF and stall while warping in more units?
Here's a build i just came up with its a 2gate Stargate expand. I like it a lot on maps where the third is relatively hard to connect with creep so he cant defend it till 2 queens drag their slow ass over there or hydras/spire tech finishes.
Here's the replay. Though his profile says platinum, don't be fooled by that. I know him and he is at least of high diamond quality.
Plus his 2v2s and 3v3s is high masters if that means anything lol.
Say you hold the aggression off. I still feel behind as it takes so long for you to kill all the roaches and lings. It is able to buy enough time for the zerg to get a third and begin to saturate it. What is the follow up after they have done their damage with their lings and roaches?
On July 27 2011 11:50 Tossup wrote: Say you hold the aggression off. I still feel behind as it takes so long for you to kill all the roaches and lings. It is able to buy enough time for the zerg to get a third and begin to saturate it. What is the follow up after they have done their damage with their lings and roaches?
If you went a stargate expand and he suicided all his stuff on your defense, just go and take out the third with your 2 voidrays.
If you retained all of your sentries or most of them I would add a few more gates and pressure that third.
If you had already made either a robotics or twilight before the attack hit, I'd add an immortal and pressure or go for DTs and secure a third of my own.
This is all assuming you defended really well against his attack and much of his army is obliterated AND he droned hard behind it so there is not much there to fight for him.
i expand on every map forge/nexus/gate/cannon/stargate right when cyber done....i do this because 3gate expos in terms of long term macro games lead to basically protoss being down 40-50 food where u see its like 130-140 food vs a zerg maxed out 200 if no contact is made(which is just ridiculous btw, if some dont believe me just watch some legit replays of PvZ matches on metapolis/xel other maps from MC and other protoss pros
scouting the roach ling all in is all about being tricky with scouting probe and just enemy messing up, honestly it is VERY VERY hard to scout it if zerg player is on his game..impossible in the near future when players are 100% comfortable with first few minutes of the game
also when u scout it u arent sure rly how many lings are coming out and how many roaches which is a bummer, but whether u defend it or not all depends on how many cannons u make(this is on maps where its harder to expand like xel naga/meta and whether the cannons are at the front of nexus or not(so where u build your cannons/buildings)..if u build enough cannons/keep up with making those voids, and have 1 sentry ready for some zerglin run by, u should be fine if u play PERFECT(anything less than that u could be in deep trouble)
every single game is different due to the timings(what positions u ply at) and zerg's unit composition
this is just a note on my experience but i never do the 3 gate expand because PvZ atm is pretty f***** atm in my opinion so i told u guys what i use, and if done right u can at least get to my level(which isnt that impressive or bad)
On July 28 2011 04:51 Tossup wrote: harry, how can you feel safe to cannon expo on every map? I only feel safe doing it if there is some kind of wall off I can do with 3 or so buildings
I have a similar playstyle to harry I guess.
The answer is that I don't feel safe doing it; its just a less bad option. Toss has no good options in PvZ right now, and if we try to 3 gate expand its basically an auto-loss if the zerg goes for the roach/ling bust.
Getting that nexus up first SOMETIMES gives you the economy to deal with zerg effectively, but it still usually ends up as a loss.
Well... you have to scout. I usually poke with a probe or research halluc.
If you see a lot of roach just throw down 2 more cannons ( 40 game sec) assuming you have your forge down, if you see it on his natural you will be fine in 99% unless it is Slug Pits. You can kite with stalks to slow down his push
On July 28 2011 05:09 Corsica wrote: Well... you have to scout. I usually poke with a probe or research halluc.
If you see a lot of roach just throw down 2 more cannons ( 40 game sec) assuming you have your forge down, if you see it on his natural you will be fine in 99% unless it is Slug Pits. You can kite with stalks to slow down his push
never try to do this.
He will NEVER just attack with roaches... lings will accompany that. And losing 2-3 stalkers to a ling surround early game is an instant loss.
On July 28 2011 04:51 Tossup wrote: harry, how can you feel safe to cannon expo on every map? I only feel safe doing it if there is some kind of wall off I can do with 3 or so buildings
I have a similar playstyle to harry I guess.
The answer is that I don't feel safe doing it; its just a less bad option. Toss has no good options in PvZ right now, and if we try to 3 gate expand its basically an auto-loss if the zerg goes for the roach/ling bust.
Getting that nexus up first SOMETIMES gives you the economy to deal with zerg effectively, but it still usually ends up as a loss.
You dont have to battle economy,zerg has a trade off make drones or make army , as a toss you have to use it, by this i mean force them to make more attaking units and have better economy.
On July 28 2011 05:09 Corsica wrote: Well... you have to scout. I usually poke with a probe or research halluc.
If you see a lot of roach just throw down 2 more cannons ( 40 game sec) assuming you have your forge down, if you see it on his natural you will be fine in 99% unless it is Slug Pits. You can kite with stalks to slow down his push
never try to do this.
He will NEVER just attack with roaches... lings will accompany that. And losing 2-3 stalkers to a ling surround early game is an instant loss.
Scouting>All
If its is close spots metal than you can do it from your ramp.
On July 28 2011 04:51 Tossup wrote: harry, how can you feel safe to cannon expo on every map? I only feel safe doing it if there is some kind of wall off I can do with 3 or so buildings
I have a similar playstyle to harry I guess.
The answer is that I don't feel safe doing it; its just a less bad option. Toss has no good options in PvZ right now, and if we try to 3 gate expand its basically an auto-loss if the zerg goes for the roach/ling bust.
Getting that nexus up first SOMETIMES gives you the economy to deal with zerg effectively, but it still usually ends up as a loss.
You dont have to battle economy,zerg has a trade off make drones or make army , as a toss you have to use it, by this i mean force them to make more attaking units and have better economy.
to force a zerg to make units often means you lose your entire army to those units, and then have nothing to defend.
If you try to pressure off a 3 gate expand, a roach/ling all-in will kill you.
if you try to pressure before a 3 gate expand, it doesn't matter how many units you force him to make, because he can make drones so much faster than you can make probes, and your expo is very late.
the only viable way to play PvZ is to either do a 1-base all-in, or forge first or 1 gate FE. You need your expansion up and defended as soon as possible to have a chance.
On July 28 2011 05:09 Corsica wrote: Well... you have to scout. I usually poke with a probe or research halluc.
If you see a lot of roach just throw down 2 more cannons ( 40 game sec) assuming you have your forge down, if you see it on his natural you will be fine in 99% unless it is Slug Pits. You can kite with stalks to slow down his push
never try to do this.
He will NEVER just attack with roaches... lings will accompany that. And losing 2-3 stalkers to a ling surround early game is an instant loss.
Scouting>All
If its is close spots metal than you can do it from your ramp.
Good luck scouting a competent zerg who went speed first. You can't scout him until you get observers or hallucinations, because he will have the towers with lings, and anything you send out will be spotted and killed. Lings >>> all toss until colossus or templar.
On July 28 2011 04:51 Tossup wrote: harry, how can you feel safe to cannon expo on every map? I only feel safe doing it if there is some kind of wall off I can do with 3 or so buildings
I have a similar playstyle to harry I guess.
The answer is that I don't feel safe doing it; its just a less bad option. Toss has no good options in PvZ right now, and if we try to 3 gate expand its basically an auto-loss if the zerg goes for the roach/ling bust.
Getting that nexus up first SOMETIMES gives you the economy to deal with zerg effectively, but it still usually ends up as a loss.
You dont have to battle economy,zerg has a trade off make drones or make army , as a toss you have to use it, by this i mean force them to make more attaking units and have better economy.
to force a zerg to make units often means you lose your entire army to those units, and then have nothing to defend.
If you try to pressure off a 3 gate expand, a roach/ling all-in will kill you.
if you try to pressure before a 3 gate expand, it doesn't matter how many units you force him to make, because he can make drones so much faster than you can make probes, and your expo is very late.
the only viable way to play PvZ is to either do a 1-base all-in, or forge first or 1 gate FE. You need your expansion up and defended as soon as possible to have a chance.
I dont like forge fe tbh, i prefer to go 3 gate exp where it is viable and then quickly go blink to return map control. Good luck with that using forge fe.
you HAVE to have PERFECT forcefields to hold it. 3 gate expand in PvZ is slowly fading out, you have to forge FE or open DT/stargate expand.
all zerg has to do is save larva, if they think u r expanding and they dont see much, pump mass lings and roaches, if they see cannons and a good wall off, they can just pump 20 drones and be wayyyy ahead.
On August 07 2011 00:24 Gattaca.usa wrote: doing a roach ling all in is so easy....
you HAVE to have PERFECT forcefields to hold it. 3 gate expand in PvZ is slowly fading out, you have to forge FE or open DT/stargate expand.
all zerg has to do is save larva, if they think u r expanding and they dont see much, pump mass lings and roaches, if they see cannons and a good wall off, they can just pump 20 drones and be wayyyy ahead.
PvZ is so frustrating right now.
No I 3 gate expo all the time. I lost to roach ling yesterday for the first time in about 2 months. Just dont let the lings surround the sentries and fight back by the cannons/wall.
Push out with 6 sentries one zealot, if you see roaches and no spines back off make another cannon and warp stalkers while retreating with the sentries and zealot. Off creep the roaches wont catch you and the lings won't be on the way yet since they arent made until after the roache.s
Note that this applies to smaller maps. On big ones zealot sentry poke insta loses to the roach ling thing.
EPT
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