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On June 16 2011 06:13 BigGWesty wrote:
It's called habit. Most pro's are used to the normal wall off. It's still vunerable to baneling bust though so if someone recognised it, they may go all in with a bane bust. Most times though, people save baneling nest for desperation or muta bling.
Anyone talking about vulnerabilities to baneling busts does not know what they are talking about.
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I kinda like his reasoning (he often explained on his stream he hopes to force the Zerg into making too many Lings, which he will then hold with the wallin created using gate #2 and #3), but I prefer to wall in with Gateway #1 + #2.
I will put the Cybernetics Core somewhere else where it is safer (just close to my Nexus). I feel this is better than the standard Core + Gate walloff because
1) The Cybernetics Core isn't vulnerable to any attacks from below the ramp (e.g. with Roaches + Overlord)
2) Some Zergs waste a Drone super early to block your wall and then rush you, which will be negated by this cause you build Gateway #2 somewhere after your Zealot which can prevent the Drone from blocking AND you will not freak out if you cannot place the Cybernetics where you wanted it to be =)
3) It can still bait the Zerg into making way too many Lings because the wall isn't up yet when he scouts. By the time his Lings arrive your wall will be in place though.
White-Ra's wall in shares most advantages, but as some people pointed out already has one big weakness; it requires at least a 3-gate opening. I like to sometimes do a 2 Gate + Stargate or 2 Gate + Robo expand, so I don't have 3 gates  Besides, I don't want to reveal that I go 3 gate expand like White-Ra sort of does with this (although obviously 4gate is still possible). Showing only 2 gates I can still do a 3 gate, 4 gate or the aforementioned 2 gate + robo/stargate.
~edit
Oh and please do not mention the 550/550 vs 500/500 shield/HP "advantage" of the cybernetics core, because obviously the wall is not there to be destroyed in the first place. If you really need the additional 100HP you are doing something wrong ^_^
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I just watched some more recent VODs of White-Ra and it seems like he's changed his wall off strategy. Instead of walling off with Gateways #2 and #3, he is now doing pylon and gateway #1 near his base and then pylon and core at his ramp. Gateway #3 completes the wall off at 4:10.
whitera vs nerchio
This is less of a tech giveaway, gets the wall up at 4:10 which is much sooner than 5 minutes, which should make it stronger against early pools, but retains some of the advantage against 6/7 pools.
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His refined method makes more sense, imo walling with your 2nd and 3rd gateway is bad because it basically tells the enemy what is possible for the next 5 minutes... With the #2 pylon and core walloff, there is still a demand for the sac ol and he's revealed nothing
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I like it when you are playing on maps that are more than 2 players where there is a chance you will get to their base late. On maps that are 1v1, like Xelnaga, I don't like it as much since it is easier and faster to scout the enemy base.
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I tried something similar inspired by nightend's stream, where I put the first gate and cyber next to the nexus, and then gates 2 and 3 on the low ground to form the makings of a wall for the nexus.
On maps like shattered and metalopolis this is at least worth a mention, although it is sketchy at best. For something like shakuras and taldarim, forge or 1 gate fe would be better for most anyway
You do essentially give the zerg your strategy on a plate and allow him to digest it as he pleases, but on the other hand, you have a strongly walled natural to help defend vs roach ling all-ins along with the standard sentry heavy composition, you get the nexus at the same time so there is no direct econ hit, and your units can freely move up and down the ramp helping vs any kind of muta or drop play later on (I groan at the sight of 15 units filing one by one into my own base)
I do 3 gate sentry heavy expo at least 80% of games vs Z, I have done it for 250+ games and know all the nuances and, most importantly, am comfortable with it. So personally I don't mind telling the zerg exactly what I'm doing, because I know how to respond to whatever he does. I do however realise that this logic does not carry to GM
Any thoughts?
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Actually I don't think whitera's placement requires a 3 gate expand. You can do a 1 gate FE and just sim city at your nat nexus. You could also wall off the front with pylon gateway and or core. You could even do pylon pylon gateway at the top of the ramp.
I honestly think what White-Ra does is better, but harder to pull off. Though that's just my personal opinion.
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On June 16 2011 06:43 Markwerf wrote:
I don't get why he does it though. He is pretty much forced to get his other gates in order to get that wall which already reveals part of his strategy. I don't question being able to defend 6 pool with his type of defense, in fact I even prefer his setup against 9 pool where defending at the wall can be more annoying.
The problem I have with it though is that he is simply giving away free information as lings can freely enter his base, i like the fact that a wall-in leaves my opponent in the dark about my plans. I also like to put my 2nd gate at the lowground often something which doesn't work as well with the whitera setup.
I think it's just one of those habits pro's have that is actually just bad. However the disadvantages are so small that they won't lose many games over it and they don't bother to change it. Pro's do bad things or just plain bad build orders tons of times though so this isn't really surprising, just look at how many zergs still do extractor trick while 9 ov is strictly better.
Most pro's are pro's because they execute builds well not because they come up with good builds, they have teams and coaches for that anyway.
For once I agree with you! hahah
I also think that despite however good white-ra is, doing this IS a liability if the zerg denies your scout and then really wants to go allin vs it with speedlings(maybe roach followup), and has the right level of control.
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whitra is doing this opening mainly to protect his first pylon. ~ 6pool hits before a zealot can be out with a 12-13 gate regardless of cb
it enables you to deal fairly well with early nonspeed lings and still gets your wall up in time for major busts. the biggest pro of this building placement is that even if you lose a probe or 2 you are always able to maintain unit production from your initial gateway
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Walling with two more gates shows the zerg you have two more gates, which you don't necesserily want them to know.
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I'm sure what White-Ra does is better for various reasons. For someone like me though who does not have as good of crisis management ( or micro for that matter ) as him I personally don't like it. Part of the reason I like standard wall in PvZ so much is it does keep them in the dark quite a bit, or forces them to sacrifice an early OV if they really want to see what's going on ( might be scared you are doing DT or Void build ). I also just feel safe with it and know exactly where I'm placing stuff on every map and when I should send my probe.
Maybe when (if) I get to a higher level I will practice various walling strategies but for now I don't think changing my walling strat is going to increase my performance very much, as with a lot of people in this thread there is probably much better things I could focus my energy on.
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In his marathon for charity stream last night, Sheth played White-Ra a bunch of times. When he noticed the lack of early wall, Sheth did his usual "make a bunch of lings and harass while droning up" strategy. I think it worked out really well for him, as he won the first 2-3 games from the advantage he secured doing early ling harassment.
The thing is, many zergs don't make those extra lings when their pool finishes, so in those situations, White-Ra probably gains a small edge.
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I feel fairly confident I can hold early pools whether I wall off with first structures or not.
I'm sure WhiteRa feels the same way, he is probably doing this for the small extra income you save from the lost mining time.
As a side note, SimCity around your nexus is the safest thing you can do in 2vs2 vs early aggression so it's definitely a good skill toi have if you are in to team games.
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I haven't really done this too much in 1s PvZ, but like Geiko said, I do it all the time in team games especially if there's a wide ramp.
I suppose it's probably similar in consequence to T deciding to wall with 3 depots, 2depots/rax, or 2rax/depot.
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Back in BW, you had to pretty much do this since walling off was weird and to my knowledge you couldn't wall off with 2 gates + pylon or pylon+gateway (correct me if I'm wrong?) so you had to just put 3 Zealots at the ramp, but back in BW ling runbys weren't nearly as dangerous since their AI wasn't nearly as good and they moved slower too.
But I never thought you could do this, as in still put up your 2nd and 3rd gateways up in time for a speedling attack. Thanks for sharing, ima start doing this to look pro :D
Edit: I thought he was going to use his first few buildings to limit off access to the probe line, but the first pylon isn't hugging anything. The buildings are closer but if he's not going to wall off at the ramp, why not have them hug something closer so you save time moving probes to build and so that you can defend a smaller area when early lings come?
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I guess this wall is better vs an early pool, and building 2more gates at the front is not sooo telling as it might seem, just thinking of the possible follow ups:
3gate expand
1gate expand
3gate dt expand
4gate allin
3-4gate blink allin
3gate+stargate allin
4gate+dt allin
5gate canceled Nexus allin
so I think the only strategy that is missing, is the 2gate+stargate expand.
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just the same reason why a terran would love to not wall in, boosts your eco if you build close to your cc/nexus and the scouting time you give the zerg is only a tiny bit higher. So its totally worth it. But the reason not everyone does it is because its a risk for 20 minerals~ more in the beginning.
In bw toss didn't wallin, because 1 zealot and 1 probe were enough to block the ramp. And with 2 zealots and 1 probe you could hold a ramp against endless zerglings hehe.
Oh the discussion of building close to your cc/nexus was there even in bw.
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On June 16 2011 07:19 randplaty wrote:I just watched some more recent VODs of White-Ra and it seems like he's changed his wall off strategy. Instead of walling off with Gateways #2 and #3, he is now doing pylon and gateway #1 near his base and then pylon and core at his ramp. Gateway #3 completes the wall off at 4:10. whitera vs nerchioThis is less of a tech giveaway, gets the wall up at 4:10 which is much sooner than 5 minutes, which should make it stronger against early pools, but retains some of the advantage against 6/7 pools.
I think this should be added to the OP, since (at least for me) it gives you more options than something that involves 3 gates.
He has been doing this long time ago, I remember him doing this in the Super World Tournament against July on Scrap, where it has even more sense since you can't wall in time to hold early pool that easily..
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This opening is safer to 6 pool than the normal 1-st-gate-at-ramp build.
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On June 16 2011 08:53 zylog wrote:
In his marathon for charity stream last night, Sheth played White-Ra a bunch of times. When he noticed the lack of early wall, Sheth did his usual "make a bunch of lings and harass while droning up" strategy. I think it worked out really well for him, as he won the first 2-3 games from the advantage he secured doing early ling harassment.
The thing is, many zergs don't make those extra lings when their pool finishes, so in those situations, White-Ra probably gains a small edge.
Was White-Ra's wall not up yet? When did Sheth's speedlings hit?
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EPT
