EPT[G] PVP: Robo twilight - Page 3
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monk
United States8476 Posts
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ZaloMonkada
United States86 Posts
I've been using this build against one of my toss friends and he's been able to consistantly 3 gate expand against this build at around 5:15. The problem is, he opens with only 1 gas and saves chrono so it looks like a 4 gate and then pushes out with 3-4 stalkers to deny probe scoutes and proxies. Your build tells me that I can scout his 3 gate expo before I commit to this build. What I usually do for my opening is the 3 gate geiko build you suggested, but by the time I scout the expo, my robo/wg is finished and he has an expo nearing completion or finished. He follows up his 3 gate with 2 more gateways and quite a few zealots. Any blink timing I have has quite a bit with this opening. You suggest canceling the robo and adding a 4th gate for an all in, but bc my scouting is denied, I cannot be sure he's expanding and my robo usually finishes. I feel like beating an early expo with my current opening relies on having probes scout without being denied. I dont have a replay atm (the last time we played was about a week ago so the replay has been lost), sorry about that. If you want one, I'll try to get one up ASAP. Why do you think I've been losing? Is my opener weak, am I doing something wrong or is robo twilight soft countered by this build? Should I expand in reaction to his expo? | ||
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monk
United States8476 Posts
On August 09 2011 01:16 ZaloMonkada wrote: Hey 4kmonk, long time lurker but first post on tl ^_^ I've been using this build against one of my toss friends and he's been able to consistantly 3 gate expand against this build at around 5:15. The problem is, he opens with only 1 gas and saves chrono so it looks like a 4 gate and then pushes out with 3-4 stalkers to deny probe scoutes and proxies. Your build tells me that I can scout his 3 gate expo before I commit to this build. What I usually do for my opening is the 3 gate geiko build you suggested, but by the time I scout the expo, my robo/wg is finished and he has an expo nearing completion or finished. He follows up his 3 gate with 2 more gateways and quite a few zealots. Any blink timing I have has quite a bit with this opening. You suggest canceling the robo and adding a 4th gate for an all in, but bc my scouting is denied, I cannot be sure he's expanding and my robo usually finishes. I feel like beating an early expo with my current opening relies on having probes scout without being denied. I dont have a replay atm (the last time we played was about a week ago so the replay has been lost), sorry about that. If you want one, I'll try to get one up ASAP. Why do you think I've been losing? Is my opener weak, am I doing something wrong or is robo twilight soft countered by this build? Should I expand in reaction to his expo? Yea, I agree with you that a 3 gate expo with probe scout denial is a soft counter to the robo twilight opening. If your robo finishes before you scout his nexus, you're in a bit of trouble. What I would do at this point would probably be to go for a dt drop, because most players play the 3 gate expo build with a cannon near their ramp in their natural and don't opt for another cannon in their main or a robo. Or you could blink stalker allin them. But again, both of these moves are desperation moves and rely on your opponent messing up. Generally, I do not recommend expanding against this build, because you will not be able to hold off something like a 6 gate blink stalker attack. However, if your expansion will only be slightly later than his, it is somewhat viable. If you do opt to expand, make sure you deny any of his scouting probes so he plays more passively and doesn't attack you. However, ideally we want to make sure this situation never happens and here's a few ways to do that. I'd have to watch a replay, but I'm not sure how your scouting probe is getting sniped. This shouldn't be possible if your opponent is aggressively pressuring you. On the other hand, if your opponent isn't pressuring you or you see an early 2nd stalker, you can rule out 4 gate and be more aggressive with your inital stalkers, even using them for scouting. I'd like to see a replay though of both your and your opponent's army movements. Another option is to open blink instead of robo blink. I'll have more on this later, but a blink opening is a good counter to any expo opening, as your blink attack hits before his expo kicks in. Blink is a lot safer versus a 1 gate build, because of the smaller threat of a dt build, while at the same time much better versus an expansion build. Depending on the map, both your build orders, and how much intel you can get before blink finishes, blink can actually sometimes come out even or ahead of a robo build. Also, on maps like shakruas plateau where you can easily defend your natural with forcefields, most of this advice goes out the window. A blink opening can be held with a 3 gate expo and counter expos becomes a more viable choice. Also, it's very hard to scout for expos on that map. But again I'd like to see a replay, so I can give more specific advice. | ||
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Geiko
France1951 Posts
On August 09 2011 01:16 ZaloMonkada wrote: Hey 4kmonk, long time lurker but first post on tl ^_^ I've been using this build against one of my toss friends and he's been able to consistantly 3 gate expand against this build at around 5:15. The problem is, he opens with only 1 gas and saves chrono so it looks like a 4 gate and then pushes out with 3-4 stalkers to deny probe scoutes and proxies. Your build tells me that I can scout his 3 gate expo before I commit to this build. What I usually do for my opening is the 3 gate geiko build you suggested, but by the time I scout the expo, my robo/wg is finished and he has an expo nearing completion or finished. He follows up his 3 gate with 2 more gateways and quite a few zealots. Any blink timing I have has quite a bit with this opening. You suggest canceling the robo and adding a 4th gate for an all in, but bc my scouting is denied, I cannot be sure he's expanding and my robo usually finishes. I feel like beating an early expo with my current opening relies on having probes scout without being denied. I dont have a replay atm (the last time we played was about a week ago so the replay has been lost), sorry about that. If you want one, I'll try to get one up ASAP. Why do you think I've been losing? Is my opener weak, am I doing something wrong or is robo twilight soft countered by this build? Should I expand in reaction to his expo? You should have 3-4 stalkers of your own to keep his busy while you probe scout ? Do you have a replay or two we could analyze ? | ||
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L3g3nd_
New Zealand10461 Posts
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monk
United States8476 Posts
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ZaloMonkada
United States86 Posts
On August 09 2011 02:08 Geiko wrote: You should have 3-4 stalkers of your own to keep his busy while you probe scout ? Do you have a replay or two we could analyze ? Sorry about the lack of a replay. I'm finishing my last week of work before going back to college and I'm swamped, so I havent had too much time to play. I'll wait to upload a replay before asking too many more questions because theorycrafting only gets you so far  The map I've tested this on is xelnaga. On maps like metalopolis and shattered temple its much easier to sneak probes to scout (metalopolis has two corridors, shattered has a shitty xelnaga, esp for cp), but on xelnaga, my opponent can control the xelnagas quite well because I invest in an early sentry and zealot. I know I should have 3-4 stalkers, but the way he controls space on thin maps like xc is quite difficult to deal with, especially when scouting his expo even 30 seconds late can be game breaking and my 3rd and 4th stalker finish as wg finishes (15 seconds after his expo goes down). The equal stalker count from his side may not be able to engage my army directly, but can usually delay my scounting because he tries to snipe escaping probes. Quick question about this build when used as an opener. The robo should be dropped down instead of the 3 stalker warp in if you dont suspect a 4 gate, right? On August 09 2011 01:57 4kmonk wrote: Another option is to open blink instead of robo blink. I'll have more on this later, but a blink opening is a good counter to any expo opening, as your blink attack hits before his expo kicks in. Blink is a lot safer versus a 1 gate build, because of the smaller threat of a dt build, while at the same time much better versus an expansion build. Depending on the map, both your build orders, and how much intel you can get before blink finishes, blink can actually sometimes come out even or ahead of a robo build. I'm really digging this opening, like the one MC used against Huk in GSL, but I definitely want to work this build out some more and i dont know how well blink works against fast dts and early immortal pushes. I'm considering using a 3 stalker opening (like younghwa's 3 gate robo) on thin maps like xelnaga to make my scouting more reliable. I'll try to get a replay up ASAP because following Forum Guidelines is cool and not posting replays is lame. | ||
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monk
United States8476 Posts
On August 09 2011 04:07 ZaloMonkada wrote: Quick question about this build when used as an opener. The robo should be dropped down instead of the 3 stalker warp in if you dont suspect a 4 gate, right? I personally don't use geiko's opening, but if you're using geiko's opening, then yes. Drop the robo before a 3 stalker warpin. | ||
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Dirichlet
21 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.gamereplays.org/community/uploads/repimgs/repimg-33-225733.jpg) | ||
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monk
United States8476 Posts
On August 10 2011 07:03 Dirichlet wrote: + Show Spoiler + Hi. Could you help me understand where I went wrong in this replay? I usually open geikos 3gate, but I scouted early second gas so I dropped robo and twilight earlier than I usually do. I had a much high stalker count than him, and stayed at his front while my expo was going down. We were even on supplies going into the midgame and then I lost an engagement real bad and I'm not sure why. We had similar zealot numbers. He had 2 more archons than me I believe, and he had immortals. . . should I be trying to match his immortal count? Any help would be great If I had to name one key mistake that ended up losing you the game, it would be that you overmade stalkers. You didn't scout his templar archives and his researching twilight council and didn't switch to zealots fast enough. Thus, in the final fight, you were left with inferior fighting units(stalkers) versus the superior zealot/archon count. Also, with your huge amount of stalkers you're still not as aggressive as you could have been. Until he gets charge, You can very freely poke up to his army and pick off a few sentries. Rewatch the replay and imagine doing that against his army when he's parked outside his natural. Even after his charge finishes, you can still afford to be more aggressive with a higher stalker count, but instead you retreat back to your main and camp your own base. Some other minor things: You forgot to bring 2 zealots and an archon in the final fight, which means you were actually down 3 archons.Archons are way more important than immortals for a fight like that. You tried to take a 3rd with an inferior army. You could have made more probes and faster probes when you scouted his expansion. Other than that I have to say it was a pretty well played game by both. | ||
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Complete
United States1864 Posts
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Fiendish
United States210 Posts
I think it's time for me to stop playing this game seriously shits getting real | ||
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GomJabbar
United States161 Posts
On August 10 2011 07:03 Dirichlet wrote: Hi. Could you help me understand where I went wrong in this replay? I usually open geikos 3gate, but I scouted early second gas so I dropped robo and twilight earlier than I usually do. I had a much high stalker count than him, and stayed at his front while my expo was going down. We were even on supplies going into the midgame and then I lost an engagement real bad and I'm not sure why. We had similar zealot numbers. He had 2 more archons than me I believe, and he had immortals. . . should I be trying to match his immortal count? Any help would be great I'll take notes as I go through the replay: You scout an early second gas from the opponent and what looks like a 3-stalker build (2nd gate after core before any units), but still wait until 24 to take your own 2nd gas. You don't want to get behind in the gas. As soon as he does that, you have to match his gas and immediately deviate from Geiko's build. Looks like it's not even a big deal because he delayed his tech so much - he must have been afraid of 4-gate. Your observer gets into his base and you scout a robo. Now you start chronoboosting blink. Personally I think this is a mistake. When I scout a robo from the opponent I go charge and archons asap. But going blink seems viable so I doubt this decision lost you the game. Blink finishes, and you've essentially got a bunch of blink stalkers, with an observer, against his gateway+immortal army. He's following up with blink now. This is an advantage to your opponent. You have a robo that you used purely for observers, meaning you are basically on pure blink against immortal blink at this point. You have him contained with blink and you're expanding faster - good! But here's the thing: once his blink finishes and he pushes down the ramp with blink + immortals, you NEED a bunch of charge zealots or equal numbers of immortals yourself or you probably can't hold the expo. I'm not seeing you tech up after the contain. You're just sitting on blink stalkers while the opponent has immortals, blink and is getting chargelot archon. Ok, you're going charge, good, well done. You had a much faster expo but you're basically even in income and the opponent has caught up in supply at the 16 minute mark. This shouldn't have happened. And at this point in the game, he has a superior army. He has more zealots, he has 3 immortals, and he has more archons. Stalkers become crappier and crappier in straight up fights the longer the game goes, so your stalker advantage won't help you here. The final battle: By the time all the zealots die, you have your stalkers and one archon left - he has 3 immortals, his stalkers, and 4 archons left. His army is just a better composition. So if I can summarize this game, I'd probably say that you essentially opened blink and your opponent opened robo-twilight and won. I say this because you did start with the robo, but didn't make any real use of it beyond observers, which you didn't utilize to harass very much at all. You committed too much to blink stalkers while the opponent went immortal blink, and switched into chargelot archon a bit faster than you. You could have leveraged your expo advantage to probably win with superior zealot+archon numbers, but you let him catch up in economy and supply. In the final engagement, you just had too many stalkers, which his 3 immortals and superior zealot count would tear through. That said, I generally liked your opening although the gas could have been sooner. You got an early advantage in that game with the blink contain. But you didn't properly leverage it. | ||
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monk
United States8476 Posts
On August 10 2011 07:33 Complete wrote: If your opponent goes pure blink stalker and you go robo->tc and got an immortal and a sentry - and they contain you at the bottom of your ramp, what's to stop them from force fielding the ramp when you blink down so your zealot(s),immortal(s),sentry arent in the battle and then just winning the fight because you had to spend your blink to get down whilst they can blink during the battle to micro - plus your non-stalker units aren't in the battle? Players going robo/twilight should not get a high zealot count, usually getting either 0 or 1. In addition, the player going robo twilight should get at most 2 immortals along with his blink stalkers. Also, if the blink/sentry player is trying to contain his robo/twilight opponent, why is he doing so? It doesn't make sense unless he's making an expansion. So imagine this hypothetical situation where the blink stalker player has around 18 stalkers and a sentry. The robo/twilight player has 2 immortals, 1 zealot, 1 sentry, and 15 stalkers. The best case scenario for the blink player is that he forcefields everything but one immortal up the ramp. Then, at best for the blink player, he gets to fight 18 stalker/1 sentry vs 15 stalker/1 immortal. Now for an even more convoluted answer: There are two types of blink builds, allin and macro. The difference is in the number of probes made, either cutting at around 24 or going all the way up to 30. Versus the the allin version, you will have 2 immortals but a 6 probe lead in econ. Versus a very econ heavy version, you can get away with making 1 immortal and thus have more blink stalkers. Therefore, the situation I postulated previously will lean even further towards the robo/blink player. There's a lot of other minor reasons, but that's my main one. And if all else fails, warp prism. | ||
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Dirichlet
21 Posts
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GomJabbar
United States161 Posts
On August 10 2011 08:20 Dirichlet wrote: Thanks for the help guys. I'm still trying to figure out how to play PvP properly. Should I have been building immortals while I had him contained/while my expo was going up? Or should I have been focusing on teching to archon, and adding zealots? Personally I'd have teched as fast as possible to chargelot archon and pretty much cut stalker production once you had the contain. Having a superior zealot and archon count is super important. | ||
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monk
United States8476 Posts
On August 10 2011 08:20 Dirichlet wrote: Thanks for the help guys. I'm still trying to figure out how to play PvP properly. Should I have been building immortals while I had him contained/while my expo was going up? Or should I have been focusing on teching to archon, and adding zealots? It all depends on what you scout from your opponent. If he's focusing more heavily on stalker, then get an immortal or 2. If he's transitioning really quickly to zealot/archon off of 1 base, then transition yourself to that composition while still maintaining a slight stalker lead for map control. | ||
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monk
United States8476 Posts
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sleepingdog
Austria6145 Posts
Early obs accompanied by stalkers gives amazing mapcontrol. | ||
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greggy
United Kingdom1483 Posts
Thank you, OP, this is truly a great guide. | ||
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