I guess i should open this by saying that i was making some notes for these games when i thought it would be kind of cool to post what i found onto Team Liquid... Please note that these build orders don't need to be followed to the T and obviously if you don't have the execution to do it then do it in a fashion where you keep your money low (i.e instead of like a 13 gate go 14 or whatever you need to do). I chose these two games because i felt they were really educational and so i go into depth on some of the decisions that the players made (mainly applies to Naniwa vs Moon).
MLG replays to steal PvZ MC 1 gate expo into 3 gate stargate ▪ expo on 35, or while 3rd sentry is building ▪ Gateway by your low ground pylon (the 30 food one) 35 food ▪ 37 food or after starting your 4th sentry add another gateway totaling 3 ▪ 37 food stargate (note slight probe cut) ▪ 42 food or when you have 5 sentries make a forge (4 made 1 warped) ▪ 2 chrono boost on voidray ▪ 53 food or at ~34 probes add 2 extra gas at natural ▪ at around 10 minutes make a robo, assuming that you make 5+ units out of sg to snipe the zerg third base. Picture of the sim city
Notice the placement of the Gate/pylon/zealot and also the pylon to the south, MC’s sim is an essential part to this build because as you can see he is not vulnerable to anything right now.
This build is a great build because it allows for not only a quicker nexus but also an easy defense from a roach ling all in. This replay demonstrates how well mc’s build is timed out. As you can see the void ray popped right when the roaches got to his base, which is what I call ehon timing. It is important to note that he saved chrono to get the void ray out fast and then rallied to his natural, which shows he knows this timing quite well.
I chose this replay because as I mentioned earlier it allows for you to get a quicker nexus (5:20) and still be safe against timing attacks meant to break your expansion.
Next up for my builds I stole, I have Naniwa vs. Moon on Shakuras Plateau
I chose this replay because Naniwa not only shows a good opener but he shows the importance of positioning vs. a zerg opponent. While the opener is a standard forge expand Naniwa really shows that he has his building placement and build order down to a T. His forge expand interested me because instead of doing like a 5-7 wg timing or a void ray to kill the third Naniwa opened 4 gate and sold a 6wg all in by moving out on the map. This make Moon react by pumping roaches and lings.
MLG replays to steal PvZ Naniwa’s nexus first into 4wg robo • 15 nexus • 15 forge • 17 gateway • 18 pylon • 18 second gateway (cancels when the first gateway finishes, simply used to prevent a ling run by) replaced by a cyber. • 17-18 gas depending on if your scouting probe dies or not • 23-24 second gas • When core finishes start warp gate research before sentry, start sentry when you have your next 100 gas (between 31-33 supply) • ~35 supply drop gates 2, 3 and 4 • you should be able to make 3 sentries before wg finishes. • Here Naniwa kills his forge and remakes it and starts a robo and +1 when the forge finishes, ultimately this is where I stop doing this by food because it is really dumb… (to go by food because obviously every player has their own style). Just keep in mind that you want to get a relatively fast robo (Naniwa gets it around 8:25 ish in this game).
Basically from here Naniwa plays standard but there are some really keynotes of brilliance in this game.
Yes while this may be standard I think it can serve to be beneficial for people looking to refine their building placement.
Do you see what Moon sees; yes gateways finishing. This should lead Moon to become suspicious because he does not know if there are any more gateways, so what does Naniwa do… He sells it, and he does it so well. Look at how smart Naniwa is, him pulling the probe and the units moving out really sells a 6wg timing, and if you look at the production tab he is really forcing a response. Without the probe it would look as if he was just trying to secure map control, but in most circumstances the probe signifies a warp gate all in. Very well done Naniwa =D.
Naniwa’s perfect observer positioning lets him get set up to fight in an area where he can get the positional advantage.
This is just the positioning Naniwa needed as you can see he cuts off the roaches and takes care of the banelings. This is important because it shows how big of a role positioning plays on major battles. Not only positioning but also how he uses the information in the picture with the observer to choose a location in which to engage without losing. Naniwa never ceases to amaze.
These pictures all happen at around the same time (17:31). Basically it shows Naniwa not only denying an expansion of zerg, and taking map control but expanding as well. Naniwa’s excellent obs positioning allows him to do this poke because he knows that if the zerg is to attack into his excellent positioning he is fine and he also knows that the zerg will not counter attack. But to be honest that expansion kill is simply a bonus, what he was trying to do was gain map control so he can take his 4th with out any real risk.
This scene right here is what made me do this replay in the first place. It starts off with Naniwa poking through by the watch tower and ultimately denying the zergs expansion, but then when he engages he uses the choke and force fields to his advantage. It really is a great move by Naniwa, while even though he really doesn’t have the best arch and the colossi are taking heavy fire he still managed to isolate around 30-40% of the zergs roaches. Without those force fields this fight would have been extremely different.
Through out that whole battle Naniwa was not focusing corrupters, and it is now clear why. By not focusing corrupters Naniwa has left Moon with 20 useless supply in corrupters when Naniwa is deciding to make a tech switch into templar immortal. This is “bad news bears” for Moon who is already behind in supply so surely 20 useless supply won’t help him.
They engage once again but this time Moon decides to attack off creep with hydras and some ovys with banes. He ends up losing most of his corrupters so Naniwa responds by building 2 colossi. Naniwa knows that Moon sees that he has no colossi so it is very unlikely that he will re max with corrupters so Naniwa does an intelligent play by making 2 colossi.
Naniwa kills Moon’s expo uncontested…. That really hurts, essentially Naniwa has taken position at this base and unless Moon wants to get stormed to death he won’t walk down that choke.
Where once a zerg army stood. Naniwa played exceptionally well and ends up winning the game shortly after this play. To find this replay go to http://s3.majorleaguegaming.com/2011-columbus-starcraft2-champ.html# then click on the Naniwa Moon section and it is the game on Shakuras.
I hope you enjoyed this blog, i am considering doing one for pvt matches from MLG. In particular i was thinking about Tyler's 1-1 6 gate and Maybe some of Naniwa's or MC's games. Please note that this was just me taking notes and then thinking hey i could post this on Team Liquid, but either way i hope you enjoyed it. =D
Ive stolen the 1gate expand build and its actually pretty solid and not nearly as dangerous as i thought it would be... im not sure how or why it works but it seems to be working atm.. the only thing im worried about is a mass ling build or something like that and he just completely will not let u get ur nexus down off 1 gate...
but with sooooooo many people doing that roach ling all in/heavy aggression into taking 3rd base this build kinda hardcounters it imo and since thats 90% of my ladder games.. its workin wonders
Haha, you make a post that takes up 9/10ths of my page and has awesome pictures and detailed BOs, and you're not sure it's enough content? You have HIGH standards.
Anyway, thanks a ton for this. Really helps out - I saw a ton of PvT strategy posts, but it seemed that PvZ strat posts were lacking. Very helpful!
On June 10 2011 10:09 HolyArrow wrote: Haha, you make a post that takes up 9/10ths of my page and has awesome pictures and detailed BOs, and you're not sure it's enough content? You have HIGH standards.
Anyway, thanks a ton for this. Really helps out - I saw a ton of PvT strategy posts, but it seemed that PvZ strat posts were lacking. Very helpful!
That is nothing, it was 10 pages on word before i copied it over... But thank you =D
Great post. I copied MC's 1-gate earlier but lost horribly to zergling rushes and 3rr. As a ladder build it's just not safe enough IMO.
The nexus first build seems to be quite map situational. On Shakuras it's just so easy to forge FE, and I believe he put the nexus down first because he didn't scout an early pool. The info on positioning & building placement is key though.
On June 10 2011 10:14 Gradius wrote: Great post. I copied MC's 1-gate earlier but lost horribly to zergling rushes and 3rr. As a ladder build it's just not safe enough IMO.
The nexus first build seems to be quite map situational. On Shakuras it's just so easy to forge FE, and I believe he put the nexus down first because he didn't scout an early pool. The info on positioning & building placement is key though.
The important thing with both builds is relying on information you gather, so obviously both builds are situational but as shown in both replays both naniwa and MC had great scouting so it wasn't a problem. Also if you have the tower and you see the stream of lings you can just cut your losses and cancel your nexus and play from about even footing. Naniwa also did a build similar to this vs losira on Test Bug and held with ease vs a large number of zerglings.
On June 10 2011 10:08 edc.initiative wrote: You really should analyze more replays, as this is a great read. I recommend the MC vs. IdrA games in MLG Columbus Day 1.
I will add that, i think game 1 is probably the more interesting of the 2. Also, thank you for your kind words.
this is really helpful, I didn't manage to catch many, if any of the games at all during mlg. Saves abit of time knowing which replays to go through, given that there seems to be hundreds. really nice notes. I hope you keep it up, my PvZ really needs alot of help
On June 10 2011 10:14 Gradius wrote: Great post. I copied MC's 1-gate earlier but lost horribly to zergling rushes and 3rr. As a ladder build it's just not safe enough IMO.
The nexus first build seems to be quite map situational. On Shakuras it's just so easy to forge FE, and I believe he put the nexus down first because he didn't scout an early pool. The info on positioning & building placement is key though.
u have to gather information, if the zergs opens speedlings, u cant do this build but if see the zerg doing 14-15hatch or gasless expo, u can do this build. reason behind this is due to fact that MC, pressure the zerg with his Initial Stalker and buy time to get the expo up and wall off and since there wont be any speed done u can get away with it.
On June 10 2011 10:14 Gradius wrote: Great post. I copied MC's 1-gate earlier but lost horribly to zergling rushes and 3rr. As a ladder build it's just not safe enough IMO.
The nexus first build seems to be quite map situational. On Shakuras it's just so easy to forge FE, and I believe he put the nexus down first because he didn't scout an early pool. The info on positioning & building placement is key though.
u have to gather information, if the zergs opens speedlings, u cant do this build but if see the zerg doing 14-15hatch or gasless expo, u can do this build. reason behind this is due to fact that MC, pressure the zerg with his Initial Stalker and buy time to get the expo up and wall off and since there wont be any speed done u can get away with it.
i would even argue that you could still do it, but you need to have the tower and you need to check his natural drone saturation.
I did an analysis and walkthrough of MC's 1-gate expand into void ray PvZ on my youtube channel. I hope it helps to better illustrate the awesome write-up in the OP!
On June 10 2011 12:25 GomJabbar wrote: I did an analysis and walkthrough of MC's 1-gate expand into void ray PvZ on my youtube channel. I hope it helps to better illustrate the awesome write-up in the OP!
On June 10 2011 13:12 Goofus wrote: This is great! You should definately do analysis of more replays. I would love to see some TvZ.
As much as i would love to do non protoss match ups it would be incredibly hard. This is mainly because i main race protoss but i still do have some insight on other match ups. But thank you none the less. And Yes i plan on doing one of these about once a week. =D
On June 10 2011 10:51 doomblaze wrote: this is really helpful, I didn't manage to catch many, if any of the games at all during mlg. Saves abit of time knowing which replays to go through, given that there seems to be hundreds. really nice notes. I hope you keep it up, my PvZ really needs alot of help
That was basically my whole idea behind this, i am glad you liked it. I figured since i spent all weekend watching and ended up downloading the replays that i could post my notes which i was already doing as a blog, which ended up becoming a strat post.
Watch out on the first build with the simcity: It holds roach ling aggression very easily, but Idra takes advantage of it very easily by dropping in MC's main, requiring the stalkers to go all the way around the Nexus to defend. So when you do simcity on the first build, make sure you're engaging in a position that's beneficial for you (close to your defenses or far away from your main) and make sure you scout because a doom drop or nydus can kill you.
On June 10 2011 15:48 Havefa1th wrote: Watch out on the first build with the simcity: It holds roach ling aggression very easily, but Idra takes advantage of it very easily by dropping in MC's main, requiring the stalkers to go all the way around the Nexus to defend. So when you do simcity on the first build, make sure you're engaging in a position that's beneficial for you (close to your defenses or far away from your main) and make sure you scout because a doom drop or nydus can kill you.
Well you get your infrastructure up way before drops become a real problem, and if you are not prepared for a drop/nydus then it is really just your fault. Also the Sim won't slow you down too much, especially after you get blink.
This is more of an analysis of a player/game than it is the description of a build, which in my opinion is much more valuable. You did a great job of going in depth on the decision making/positioning of the players in their games, really awesome. You should do more :D
Another great strat was the 3 zealot rush vs fast expanding zerg
ogsmc vs idra game 2. mc kinda messed up, if he had just focused down the hatch he would have killed it. ive used this alot on ladder and it catches people off guard.
also if they go pool first the zealots do not hurt.
I was just wondering how this 1 gate expand could hold roach ping agression? I'm a low masters Zerg player myself and when I see an early expansion from Protoss the roach ling all-in is rarely stopped.
Ive been doing the quick expand off of 2gates instead of 1, since I feel a tad bit safer doing it, and then transition to the 3gate stargate expand and its been working great.
I'm about mid-high masters and I've been able to hold off roach ling all in and agression, and I've actually tried turtling up and amassing the good ol protoss death ball off of only two bases. Surprisingly, It has worked both against a roach hydra infestor player, as well as roach hydra corruptor, that I would say were both easily ahead of me in economy. It seems to me as long as you engage in the correct spots and chokes, void ray collosus and gateway units still seem crazy strong.
This has helped me a ton. As a low level player with a love for the game who is trying to get better any info I can get is great but this has been very helpful. Thank you.
Hey, very nice write-up. I just dont feel good about the wall-off screenshot on shakuras.. it is better to use next pylon upon edge of the cliff. This can be unpowered so easily. Basically just put cannon closer to the edge and put pylon above it This also opens other ways to create your wall
On June 11 2011 01:39 YosHGo wrote: Hey, very nice write-up. I just dont feel good about the wall-off screenshot on shakuras.. it is better to use next pylon upon edge of the cliff. This can be unpowered so easily. Basically just put cannon closer to the edge and put pylon above it This also opens other ways to create your wall
I am willing to assume that if naniwa sniffed pressure he would drop 1 more pylon and 1-2 more cannons. Because if moon did what he did to mc (cancel hatch go roach ling all in) he would defiantly need more defense.
On June 10 2011 11:39 MK4512 wrote: wow! this is great! nice job, i've also stolen MC's 3zeal pressure vs. zerg that he did against idra, its a really strong BO
That build is kind of up to chance though, because i feel if they drone scout you it becomes a lot less effective.
On June 11 2011 05:52 Phanekim wrote: wow what a post. i really commend you on making one helluva post lol. jeez.
thanks, I plan on doing it again some time. Probably next week actually, but like i said in the post I will probably do Tyler's 1-1 6wg, and maybe a naniwa game.
On June 10 2011 22:51 Terrokhan wrote: Awesome blog, great job.
I was just wondering how this 1 gate expand could hold roach ping agression? I'm a low masters Zerg player myself and when I see an early expansion from Protoss the roach ling all-in is rarely stopped.
Are you talking about the typical 2 hatch roach ling all in or the cancel hatch roach ling pressure? I am kind of curious, i think if it is the latter you scout it and cancel your nexus and low ground gateway. Also i really should have added this in the OP but basically the two builds i listed are map situational, i.e that sim only works on metal (that specific sim, perhaps there is others on different maps).
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