EPTThe Protoss Help Me Thread - Page 371
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Make sure you read the OP before asking a question. Asking a question already addressed in the OP will result in moderation action. | ||
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khhan
2 Posts
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EsportsJohn
United States4883 Posts
On November 18 2012 10:09 Whitewing wrote: What has changed since beta is zerg's ability to control his late game army. For a long time zergs would just attack move their whole army (which was roach/hydra for a long time). Now you see even low masters zergs splitting their broodlords and infestors and being more careful when they push. Lategame is genuinely tough vs. zerg. It definitely isn't unbeatable, especially below GM, but it's a lot harder than it used to be. I think looking at chargelots is a really good place to look to find potential strategies to play a longer game vs. zerg. Agreed. The more and more I've studied zerg, I've found that the key is just extending the midgame for as long as possible. Many terrans (like Bomber) were already doing this by getting 3 bases and then just pushing and dropping constantly and never allowing the zerg breathing room to get up higher tech. I think the future of PvZ is going to revolve more and more around the templar/chragelot strategy that LiquidHerO has been showing off lately with double/triple warp prisms everywhere on the map. (As a side note, CreatorPrime's stalker/DT-based play also feels like this). | ||
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MysteryHours
United States168 Posts
On Shakuras Plateau while I'm trying to take my third near the watch tower, an MMM ball rolls up and pressures my third. When I move to engage he picks up everything and drops in my main. The border of the main is so long that it's really hard to cover it all with just a handful of Stalkers, and even when Stalkers are in position if there's more than a couple Medivacs they can just start dropping anyway. Once he's in my base my army is horribly out of position and when I finally catch up he can just load up and fly away or even drop back at my third. Anyone have any tips for dealing with this? | ||
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Whitewing
United States7483 Posts
On November 19 2012 13:45 MysteryHours wrote: In PvT I've been having a lot of trouble with drops. I read the OP FAQ and it suggested keeping vision of his army and applying my own pressure to pin Terran at his base. Even when I see his army coming though I'm still having problems, and my build doesn't allow much pressure of my own until my third kicks in. Here's an example situation that wrecked me recently: On Shakuras Plateau while I'm trying to take my third near the watch tower, an MMM ball rolls up and pressures my third. When I move to engage he picks up everything and drops in my main. The border of the main is so long that it's really hard to cover it all with just a handful of Stalkers, and even when Stalkers are in position if there's more than a couple Medivacs they can just start dropping anyway. Once he's in my base my army is horribly out of position and when I finally catch up he can just load up and fly away or even drop back at my third. Anyone have any tips for dealing with this? Best tip is to make sure you have blink by that time, have stalkers in your main. If he goes to engage, you can blink your stalkers down to help, but if he goes for the drop, you can keep your stalkers in your main to defend that (blink the stalkers down when your armies are just about to fight and it's clear he has to attack or retreat). If you don't plan on using a blink based defense against drops at that timing, make use of cannons, high templar if you can get the tech (feedback on medivacs makes it easy to clean up drops with zealot warp ins, no healing :D), or rely more on gateway units and mass up gateways so you can warp in when he goes to drop. The key to defending that kind of terran aggression is mobility, or limiting his mobility with static defense. Also, having observers in key locations outside your base can let you spot dropships incoming before they get there, so you can have stalkers ready to blink directly under the medivacs and take them out as they come into your base. | ||
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blooblooblahblah
Australia4163 Posts
On November 19 2012 13:45 MysteryHours wrote: In PvT I've been having a lot of trouble with drops. I read the OP FAQ and it suggested keeping vision of his army and applying my own pressure to pin Terran at his base. Even when I see his army coming though I'm still having problems, and my build doesn't allow much pressure of my own until my third kicks in. Here's an example situation that wrecked me recently: On Shakuras Plateau while I'm trying to take my third near the watch tower, an MMM ball rolls up and pressures my third. When I move to engage he picks up everything and drops in my main. The border of the main is so long that it's really hard to cover it all with just a handful of Stalkers, and even when Stalkers are in position if there's more than a couple Medivacs they can just start dropping anyway. Once he's in my base my army is horribly out of position and when I finally catch up he can just load up and fly away or even drop back at my third. Anyone have any tips for dealing with this? Shakuras Plateau is a bit of an extreme example and i'd suggest u shouldn't play on that map anymore for ur own sanity (there's a reason it is very uncommon in tournament map pools nowadays). Doom drops like that are always going to be scary if u don't have blink, and on some maps like Antiga or Shakuras it's almost inevitable that you will lose something to the drop. You should have stalkers in your main to deal with regular drops though, and u can use those stalkers to focus fire medivacs, weakening the eventual drop. They're much eaiser to deal with once u can stabilise with blink, cannons and HTs but there is definitely a timing window where large medivac drops are very dangerous. | ||
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wajd
240 Posts
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Cornix
United States220 Posts
On November 20 2012 00:11 wajd wrote: I've been getting 6 pooled alot in PvZ. How do you hold this off when you plan on going FFE? No forge up or gateway...so what do you do? If you have a map (see shakuras or ohana) with a small choke at the natural you can potentially wall yourself in before the zerglings get there as long as you scout, then you just wait for your forge to finish and keep walling if they try to break through buildings until your cannon finishes, then you win. On maps with bigger ramp chokes (wider than 9 spaces, see Antiga, Tal'darim Altar, Entombed) in general you want to immediately put down a forge at your first pylon then put a pylon in/near your main mineral line and put down a cannon there immediately when forge finishes and keep that alive with probes and then go gateway and expand/allin from there. Edit: This is all assuming you scout well/scout first on the maps that aren't 2 spawns. (you could get in a lot of trouble on tal'darim or entombed etc.) In general it's safer to go 13 forge, you can almost always live with a 13 forge against a 6 pool. | ||
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rd
United States2586 Posts
On November 20 2012 00:11 wajd wrote: I've been getting 6 pooled alot in PvZ. How do you hold this off when you plan on going FFE? No forge up or gateway...so what do you do? Let forge finish, build a pylon behind your mineral line, a cannon in the mineral line, a gateway in range of the cannon, cboost two zealots to push out the lings then expand and rebuild the forge at the choke with a core and take your gasses. Are you trying to nexus first on a 4 player map or something? | ||
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Whitewing
United States7483 Posts
On November 20 2012 00:11 wajd wrote: I've been getting 6 pooled alot in PvZ. How do you hold this off when you plan on going FFE? No forge up or gateway...so what do you do? If you're going nexus before forge, you're in trouble against a very early pool. If you are going 13 forge against it, you're actually fine. What you do is build the forge at your normal timing, and immediately put a pylon behind your mineral line in your main. Build a cannon in your mineral line as soon as you can, make sure it doesn't block probe mining, and make sure you can micro your probes by mineral walking to surround and attack the lings if they go for the cannon. You want the cannon to be off to the side a little bit so it can cover an assimilator and a gateway. Just micro your probes in your mineral line until your cannon is done. If you build your first pylon and forge down by your natural, you will lose them, but that's okay. From here you play from one base, but you should have a big probe lead and are actually ahead, you just have to do a late expand (usually 3 gate sentry or 2 gate stargate). | ||
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wajd
240 Posts
On November 20 2012 00:43 rd wrote: Let forge finish, build a pylon behind your mineral line, a cannon in the mineral line, a gateway in range of the cannon, cboost two zealots to push out the lings then expand and rebuild the forge at the choke with a core and take your gasses. Are you trying to nexus first on a 4 player map or something? I usually always put down a forge before nexus, unless i get lucky with an early scout and see there is no pressure coming. Lately I am seeing its a 6-pool just as I put down the forge. | ||
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rd
United States2586 Posts
On November 20 2012 02:53 wajd wrote: I usually always put down a forge before nexus, unless i get lucky with an early scout and see there is no pressure coming. Lately I am seeing its a 6-pool just as I put down the forge. You should be okay then. The moment you see the early pool your instinct should be to slam down the pylon near your nexus immediately followed by a cannon then gateway, allowing the lings to kill the forge as it finishes. If the cannon doesn't finish before the lings arrive, surround the cannon with your probes on hold position. If he attacks your probes, mineral walk them away and run. If he attacks the cannon, attack the lings with the probes, etc. Afterwards if you see with your scouting probe that he's droning up/taking his natural, 2 zealots or a zealot with some probes will suffice to retake your natural and expand. Thats the economic way out, there are many other ways to play it from there. | ||
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ant885
United States52 Posts
From watching the blizzard WCS tourney this weekend (among other things) it seems protoss aren't even bothering with going for air transitions in late game PvZ anymore. Obviously they are trying to hit prehive timings, but when they fail it seems most the toss stay on col/stalker/archon, and even rarely getting the mothership. In my lategame PvZs (mid-high masters) I always try to mothership/carrier/void/templar/archon transition (if I feel I can't end it earlier), with like 6 stargates. It would seem this is becoming an "improper" way to play? Any thoughts on that? Perhaps just the styles of the toss that were at wcs? | ||
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striderxxx
Canada443 Posts
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rd
United States2586 Posts
On November 20 2012 05:44 ant885 wrote: Question about PvZ From watching the blizzard WCS tourney this weekend (among other things) it seems protoss aren't even bothering with going for air transitions in late game PvZ anymore. Obviously they are trying to hit prehive timings, but when they fail it seems most the toss stay on col/stalker/archon, and even rarely getting the mothership. In my lategame PvZs (mid-high masters) I always try to mothership/carrier/void/templar/archon transition (if I feel I can't end it earlier), with like 6 stargates. It would seem this is becoming an "improper" way to play? Any thoughts on that? Perhaps just the styles of the toss that were at wcs? It's not improper, just difficult. It really depends on the state of the game and how large the zerg economy is. If you've dealt sufficient damage while keeping up with your own base count, air transitions are more than viable. But if the zerg is sitting snugly on 20 infestors with enough bank to shove 30 corruptors and remake them, air transitions generally get swatted down. I'd assume they had the foresight to realize the Zerg's economy would be way too big and opted for a timing to end the game -- but, that's usually how all PvZ's go anyways. Air transitions fall into the weird medium where they hold but are crippled to the point the Protoss can hold their fourth and secure a fifth, catching up in economy -- which is, pretty rare considering it extends well beyond the point where infestor/brood hits it's max timing. The nature of the those engagements are very polarized. One side generally loses everything and proceeds to lose. It's just not that often Protoss can secure the economy required for skytoss but not roll over to Infestor/brood. Even before WCS, it didn't occur often in high level PvZ. That, and why bother when you have control like Parting's to consistently cripple a zerg or win outright with an immortal timing. | ||
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rd
United States2586 Posts
On November 20 2012 05:53 striderxxx wrote: Hey how do I get my probe to attack a SCV building something? The probe loses it's attack contact if the SCV swings over to the other side while building, but I've seen others have the probe automatically follow and continue it's assault. Is there a trick to do this? Thx! Spam shift+right-click on the SCV, so that multiple attack orders are queued on the SCV -- though be careful not to accidentally set a move command. Everytime the SCV moves the probe will act on a queued up attack command and follow the SCV and continue to attack. | ||
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striderxxx
Canada443 Posts
On November 20 2012 06:00 rd wrote: Spam shift+right-click on the SCV, so that multiple attack orders are queued on the SCV -- though be careful not to accidentally set a move command. Everytime the SCV moves the probe will act on a queued up attack command and follow the SCV and continue to attack. Awesome, thanks!!! Let the annoying probe harass begin! I'm in a low level so I should be able to get a kill once in a while  | ||
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probeater
124 Posts
do i need to cut probes or alter the build at all against a properly executed 10min medivac push from terran? also if i don't need to change anything, in what cases would i lose to this (example not having colossus out in time) | ||
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wajd
240 Posts
On November 20 2012 05:10 rd wrote: You should be okay then. The moment you see the early pool your instinct should be to slam down the pylon near your nexus immediately followed by a cannon then gateway, allowing the lings to kill the forge as it finishes. If the cannon doesn't finish before the lings arrive, surround the cannon with your probes on hold position. If he attacks your probes, mineral walk them away and run. If he attacks the cannon, attack the lings with the probes, etc. Afterwards if you see with your scouting probe that he's droning up/taking his natural, 2 zealots or a zealot with some probes will suffice to retake your natural and expand. Thats the economic way out, there are many other ways to play it from there. What if he keeps making lings and rallying them to my base? | ||
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rd
United States2586 Posts
On November 20 2012 07:39 wajd wrote: What if he keeps making lings and rallying them to my base? Well, they shouldn't unless they think they can actually kill you. If they erroneously continue to make lings thinking they can kill you despite the cannon/zealots, then you have a couple of options -- which you should also note aside from the fact that you see no hatch/more lings being produced is whether or not he got a gas. You can continue to cboost zealots and try to get the nexus down, regardless of whether the lings are cleaned up -- if the z is gasless. You can throw down a second gate and stay gasless, chrono out 8-10 zealots then send them off to his natural/third for pressure once the lings are cleaned up in your base. Or you can take your gasses and sentry expand more slowly, hitting a small pressure timing a little later. It's basically the same as opening 1 base PvZ. edit: It's pretty important you continue to produce workers through all of this, as it's the biggest lead you have against an "economic" 6 pool. | ||
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To3-Knee
Canada100 Posts
On November 20 2012 07:39 wajd wrote: What if he keeps making lings and rallying them to my base? It should be okay with a cannon in your mineral line and zealot on the way. Just continue to run your probes away and attack when the lings go after the cannon. They are pretty much dedicating to the all-in and once you've got 1-2 zealots out, the lings will not be a threat. As long as you continue on with your probe and tech lead, you'll win the game since they've used all their larvae for lings and not drones. | ||
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