EPTOn December 02 2011 23:20 TangSC wrote:
Well he's either expanding or doing a 1base all-in (typically a 4gate zealot/stalker). If you scout early with a drone and steal the gas like I recommend, you'll see his nexus energy - if he's not using any chronoboosts except the first 2 on probes, he's probably going to 4gate you. In that case, make sure you get a 3rd queen and start 3-4 spines at your expansion right away (The first warp-in of most 4gates hit at about 5:45-6:15minute, but you can delay this if your speedlings find his proxy pylon). You won't be able to get roaches out for the first wave or 2, you have to rely solely on spines and speedlings but when you can, move into roach/ling to defend.
Once you've held the pressure, scout his expansion (You should have an overlord around there to fly in and see) and if he's going for an expansion, go for a big roach/ling push as he'll have too few sentries to hold it. If he's not expanding, get a spore at the front, +1, a few drones, and continue to build more roaches with evolution chambers in front of spines.
The most important thing is that early drone scout - seeing his nexus energy and whether he took a 2nd gas. Another hint is if he builds a stalker instead of a sentry after his first zealot, but that's not ALWAYS a 4gate.
Well he's either expanding or doing a 1base all-in (typically a 4gate zealot/stalker). If you scout early with a drone and steal the gas like I recommend, you'll see his nexus energy - if he's not using any chronoboosts except the first 2 on probes, he's probably going to 4gate you. In that case, make sure you get a 3rd queen and start 3-4 spines at your expansion right away (The first warp-in of most 4gates hit at about 5:45-6:15minute, but you can delay this if your speedlings find his proxy pylon). You won't be able to get roaches out for the first wave or 2, you have to rely solely on spines and speedlings but when you can, move into roach/ling to defend.
Once you've held the pressure, scout his expansion (You should have an overlord around there to fly in and see) and if he's going for an expansion, go for a big roach/ling push as he'll have too few sentries to hold it. If he's not expanding, get a spore at the front, +1, a few drones, and continue to build more roaches with evolution chambers in front of spines.
The most important thing is that early drone scout - seeing his nexus energy and whether he took a 2nd gas. Another hint is if he builds a stalker instead of a sentry after his first zealot, but that's not ALWAYS a 4gate.
Well, I was speaking mainly of 2-3 warpgates, build 2-3 stalkers and push, forcing you to make lings very early.
Anyway, I've gotten better at defending early pushes and I've now noticed my main issue: air. I played a bo7 with my diamond friend, he lost to the ling roach push the first game, then owned me every game afterwards. It just seems that even if you steal gas and try to get the roaches out really quickly, the toss can easily have his stargates running already, and once they are out, you can't really do much. You can put down an evo chamber and spit out spores, but that ruins your economy and the toss has no reason to attack you, they just need to keep you on two bases and win. You lose 100% of your map control since lings/roaches are kinda bad vs air.
How do you transition out of the roaches? Do you go hydras defensively and give the toss map control, or do you go into two base muta? I feel it's very hard to take a third since the toss can attack you before it's up, so you really can't get the drones to use it.
