I'd just like to give a quick comparison of the protoss player's income vs a zergs during a contain like this. The maximum rate that 8 minerals can be mined at is ~13 minerals/second. Assuming the zerg went for pool before hatch, his pool should finish at around the 3 minute mark depending on whether he went gas or pool first. The zerg then has to wait 55 seconds before he can get out his queen and make a creep tumor. Assuming you need all of the creep tumors range to get the spine crawler in position (this will vary by map) it takes a creep tumor 86 seconds to get in range. During that time, the zerg has made an in base hatch, spine crawler, and 2nd queen. He then unborrows the spine crawler and moves it to attacking position, burrows it, and kills the pylon. It takes 12 seconds to burrow, and 35 seconds to kill the pylon.
In total the zerg is contained for just over 3 minutes from the time the pylons finish to the time the first pylon dies. During that time, he made only drones from his larva, so he essentially was fully saturated the entire time. A fully saturated base mines minerals at 13.6 minerals/second and gas at 3.8 gas/second.
Now lets look at the protoss view. Assuming he set up the pylons and cannon as soon as he had the money for it, and makes his nexus immediately after that, his nexus goes up roughly 45 seconds after the first pylon. With a 100 second build time, the nexus finishes at roughly the 5:45 mark, a good 20-30 seconds before the zerg can even start his natural hatch. During that time, the protoss has constant probe production. In 3 minutes, not counting chrono boosts, which are saved for warpgate and an upgrade, a protoss can make 11 probes+1 more when the natural finishes, and 18 from before he started the initial pylons, for a total of 30 probes.
For most of the time the zerg is contained, they both have the same income from 1 fully saturate base. Once the protoss's natural is finished, he has 20 seconds before the long range mining starts for the zerg, where he is gather minerals at 20 minerals/second, compared to the zerg's 13.5. Before the zerg can break out, the protoss makes 130 minerals more than the zerg from his natural before the wall breaks. Obviously, the rate of long range mining is going to be different on every map. However, I think it is reasonable that the zerg that has been pumping drones non-stop from 2 hatches can gather more than 6 mineral/second from long range mining.
This means that as soon as the zerg has broken through the wall, even though he doesn't have his hatch up, he is mining more than the protoss, and the protoss is in fact behind from the minerals spent on the wall in, and as soon as the zerg's natural hatch finishes, he will be DRASTICALLY behind, because the zerg has over 60 drones, while the protoss has around 36-40 depending on chrono boosts, got a really late gas compared to the zerg's double gas, and hasn't had to make any units for the first 6 minutes of the game other than drones and queens.
If the map requires 2 creep tumors to reach the wall in then it is better for the zerg to make his macro hatch close to the ramp as soon as the wall goes up. This is slightly slower than making a queen+creep tumor, but not especially significantly.
On September 17 2011 04:27 brainpower wrote: I'd just like to give a quick comparison of the protoss player's income vs a zergs during a contain like this. The maximum rate that 8 minerals can be mined at is ~13 minerals/second. Assuming the zerg went for pool before hatch, his pool should finish at around the 3 minute mark depending on whether he went gas or pool first. The zerg then has to wait 55 seconds before he can get out his queen and make a creep tumor. Assuming you need all of the creep tumors range to get the spine crawler in position (this will vary by map) it takes a creep tumor 86 seconds to get in range. During that time, the zerg has made an in base hatch, spine crawler, and 2nd queen. He then unborrows the spine crawler and moves it to attacking position, burrows it, and kills the pylon. It takes 12 seconds to burrow, and 35 seconds to kill the pylon.
In total the zerg is contained for just over 3 minutes from the time the pylons finish to the time the first pylon dies. During that time, he made only drones from his larva, so he essentially was fully saturated the entire time. A fully saturated base mines minerals at 13.6 minerals/second and gas at 3.8 gas/second.
Now lets look at the protoss view. Assuming he set up the pylons and cannon as soon as he had the money for it, and makes his nexus immediately after that, his nexus goes up roughly 45 seconds after the first pylon. With a 100 second build time, the nexus finishes at roughly the 5:45 mark, a good 20-30 seconds before the zerg can even start his natural hatch. During that time, the protoss has constant probe production. In 3 minutes, not counting chrono boosts, which are saved for warpgate and an upgrade, a protoss can make 11 probes+1 more when the natural finishes, and 18 from before he started the initial pylons, for a total of 30 probes.
For most of the time the zerg is contained, they both have the same income from 1 fully saturate base. Once the protoss's natural is finished, he has 20 seconds before the long range mining starts for the zerg, where he is gather minerals at 20 minerals/second, compared to the zerg's 13.5. Before the zerg can break out, the protoss makes 130 minerals more than the zerg from his natural before the wall breaks. Obviously, the rate of long range mining is going to be different on every map. However, I think it is reasonable that the zerg that has been pumping drones non-stop from 2 hatches can gather more than 6 mineral/second from long range mining.
This means that as soon as the zerg has broken through the wall, even though he doesn't have his hatch up, he is mining more than the protoss, and the protoss is in fact behind from the minerals spent on the wall in, and as soon as the zerg's natural hatch finishes, he will be DRASTICALLY behind, because the zerg has over 60 drones, while the protoss has around 36-40 depending on chrono boosts, got a really late gas compared to the zerg's double gas, and hasn't had to make any units for the first 6 minutes of the game other than drones and queens.
If the map requires 2 creep tumors to reach the wall in then it is better for the zerg to make his macro hatch close to the ramp as soon as the wall goes up. This is slightly slower than making a queen+creep tumor, but not especially significantly.
Looks like I'll be trying this, thanks for the explanation
On September 17 2011 04:27 brainpower wrote: I'd just like to give a quick comparison of the protoss player's income vs a zergs during a contain like this. The maximum rate that 8 minerals can be mined at is ~13 minerals/second. Assuming the zerg went for pool before hatch, his pool should finish at around the 3 minute mark depending on whether he went gas or pool first. The zerg then has to wait 55 seconds before he can get out his queen and make a creep tumor. Assuming you need all of the creep tumors range to get the spine crawler in position (this will vary by map) it takes a creep tumor 86 seconds to get in range. During that time, the zerg has made an in base hatch, spine crawler, and 2nd queen. He then unborrows the spine crawler and moves it to attacking position, burrows it, and kills the pylon. It takes 12 seconds to burrow, and 35 seconds to kill the pylon.
In total the zerg is contained for just over 3 minutes from the time the pylons finish to the time the first pylon dies. During that time, he made only drones from his larva, so he essentially was fully saturated the entire time. A fully saturated base mines minerals at 13.6 minerals/second and gas at 3.8 gas/second.
Now lets look at the protoss view. Assuming he set up the pylons and cannon as soon as he had the money for it, and makes his nexus immediately after that, his nexus goes up roughly 45 seconds after the first pylon. With a 100 second build time, the nexus finishes at roughly the 5:45 mark, a good 20-30 seconds before the zerg can even start his natural hatch. During that time, the protoss has constant probe production. In 3 minutes, not counting chrono boosts, which are saved for warpgate and an upgrade, a protoss can make 11 probes+1 more when the natural finishes, and 18 from before he started the initial pylons, for a total of 30 probes.
For most of the time the zerg is contained, they both have the same income from 1 fully saturate base. Once the protoss's natural is finished, he has 20 seconds before the long range mining starts for the zerg, where he is gather minerals at 20 minerals/second, compared to the zerg's 13.5. Before the zerg can break out, the protoss makes 130 minerals more than the zerg from his natural before the wall breaks. Obviously, the rate of long range mining is going to be different on every map. However, I think it is reasonable that the zerg that has been pumping drones non-stop from 2 hatches can gather more than 6 mineral/second from long range mining.
This means that as soon as the zerg has broken through the wall, even though he doesn't have his hatch up, he is mining more than the protoss, and the protoss is in fact behind from the minerals spent on the wall in, and as soon as the zerg's natural hatch finishes, he will be DRASTICALLY behind, because the zerg has over 60 drones, while the protoss has around 36-40 depending on chrono boosts, got a really late gas compared to the zerg's double gas, and hasn't had to make any units for the first 6 minutes of the game other than drones and queens.
If the map requires 2 creep tumors to reach the wall in then it is better for the zerg to make his macro hatch close to the ramp as soon as the wall goes up. This is slightly slower than making a queen+creep tumor, but not especially significantly.
How do you scout for various timing attacks? Assuming you have spine and only drones you would die easily.
re: spine crawlers. Something that hasn't been mentioned yet* is placing your in-base hatch near the ramp so you don't have to use creep tumors to get spines down. This lets your first queen keep injecting. When the hatch is ~40% done make your spines at the edge of your creep. Move them over and your hatch will be done.
Personally, I've reverted back to Nerchio's 8 pool vs toss on most maps because of pylon walls. 8 pool, 2x drones, ov (+ scout if necessary), 8 zerglings, queen and drones into expo
* Edit: Looks like I missed that in brainpower's post.
I do this build on taldrim alter if Zerg goes for 15 hatch which they tend to do on that map if they dont I just go ffe only difference in my build I scout on 9 and send a second probe out if I don't find hiim on first try. as long as you scout for nydus all in/ hidden hatchery u should win. an expo into 6 gate should kill or do a 1 gate double stargate
and listen ... i honestly think most Protoss who use this cheap build are scum i'm Rank 3 diamond (Almost masters) and i've been going
Blind 6 pooling or 10 pooling most protoss on Ladder because Protoss keep Forge Cheesing.
Give em some of their Own Medicine Zergs i can tell you this.
Now if you go blind 6 /7 pool and/or 10 pool and the protoss does a forge expand/Cheese/Pylon-Wall off
You will win guaranteed. If you have good micro. If they go for a 1 base play use your worker to block the buildings at their ramp and harass rally lings in and profit.
Make sure to attack the pylon asap when your lings get in so his zealot can't get out.
I always nydus my way out of these situations, the three pylon block has never actually worked on me.
But that doesn't mean much because I'm only in platinum.
With all the minerals invested in cannons and pylons at my ramp I usually have an absolutely massive upper hand with a good 40 lings nydus'd in protoss main.
If you don't 11 overpool 18 hatch. (which is a hard counter to this).
Then you should be 14 hatching and 15 pooling against P. The trick to stopping protoss cheese like this is to always send TWO (2) workers two your natural at 15 supply (around 150 minerals). You need them in any of the following reasons: 1. There is a probe blocking expo, then you can chase him away quickly. 2. Pylon goes down where natural expansion should be - 1 chases drone/scouts while the other waits for the pylon to be cancelled and expands (or just attacks until zlins pop). 3. The OP's build is used - when you see the first pylon go up to block your ramp, use the drone following the probe and move to the location where the middle pylon would go and procede to put up your expo, pump lings as soon as you can and the game is over. 4. No probe is at the natural - put up expo and scout with the second.
If you don't react to this properly as a zerg, you deserve to lose anyway. Good zergs used to be able to deal with this sort of pylon block when it only took 2 to block a ramp. Sure, they would generally be playing from behind, but it's not game-ending in any way. Also, the money wasted by doing this is now even more. Zergs, remember when this shit was popular, and you would make a drone patrol the foot of your ramp, once your ovie saw the scouting probe? Nothing has changed. Protoss just tried building the garbage in their natural for a while, so they could expand. Now the garbage is simply at the foot of your ramp. Roaches still own this. You can still overpool, but obviously it's risky to hatch first against this. Also, how does this even work on a 4P map? I'm thinking this 80% win-rate is somehow related to an 80% hatch first rate among the higher ranked greedy zergs.
Any zerg going pool first and losing to this is an embarrassment. They're obviously still trying to make nothing but drones. Spines and creep is too slow at breaking this contain. Get it through your heads zergs.
On September 17 2011 04:55 maragin wrote: re: spine crawlers. Something that hasn't been mentioned yet* is placing your in-base hatch near the ramp so you don't have to use creep tumors to get spines down. This lets your first queen keep injecting. When the hatch is ~40% done make your spines at the edge of your creep. Move them over and your hatch will be done.
Personally, I've reverted back to Nerchio's 8 pool vs toss on most maps because of pylon walls. 8 pool, 2x drones, ov (+ scout if necessary), 8 zerglings, queen and drones into expo
Actually if you look at the last paragraph of my post, I did mention that. However, the tumor gets your hatch up slightly faster, and if you are going to make both the inbase hatch, the spine, and 2 queens, and 2 gas you aren't actually able to afford to make drones the entire time if you constantly inject, so you want to get the tumor anyway.
On September 17 2011 04:49 Ryndika wrote: How do you scout for various timing attacks? Assuming you have spine and only drones you would die easily.
To scout for timing attacks, you need to remember that he has no cyber core until ~5 minute mark. You can just park an ovie on his base outside of cannon range, and he can't do anything about it until his first sentry is out around 5:30. If he is going for some aggressive air play, you'll see the starport go down unless he purposely delays it until he chases you out. Even then, you won't actually see a void ray until 8 minutes at the absolutely EARLIEST. It turns out that you can't support 2 hatch worth of drones off 1 base if you constantly inject, especially if you tech at all. Use an inject or two to make extra creep tumors and as soon as the cannon goes down, get creep going towards your 3rd ASAP, and your 3rd will have creep well before any void+phoenix shenanigans.
Once the wall is down, you need to make a few units anyway to go kill the cannon, although I don't think it is best to attack his natural until after your natural is up. Its much better to ride you're drone lead and set up for a 3rd. By then, you'll have finished whatever upgrades you chose to spend all that gas you stock piled earlier. Personally, I like infestor tech. Getting 2 gas geysers up before the protoss even gets 1 and going strait to lair is just really nasty because of the amount of energy you can gather. There is basically no risk of templar with storm, and only max 1-2 colossi, if that. Let your natural kick in, pressure while taking your 3rd, and thank the protoss for putting himself over a minute behind to let you drone for 3 minutes straight.
On September 17 2011 04:27 brainpower wrote: I'd just like to give a quick comparison of the protoss player's income vs a zergs during a contain like this. The maximum rate that 8 minerals can be mined at is ~13 minerals/second. Assuming the zerg went for pool before hatch, his pool should finish at around the 3 minute mark depending on whether he went gas or pool first. The zerg then has to wait 55 seconds before he can get out his queen and make a creep tumor. Assuming you need all of the creep tumors range to get the spine crawler in position (this will vary by map) it takes a creep tumor 86 seconds to get in range. During that time, the zerg has made an in base hatch, spine crawler, and 2nd queen. He then unborrows the spine crawler and moves it to attacking position, burrows it, and kills the pylon. It takes 12 seconds to burrow, and 35 seconds to kill the pylon.
In total the zerg is contained for just over 3 minutes from the time the pylons finish to the time the first pylon dies. During that time, he made only drones from his larva, so he essentially was fully saturated the entire time. A fully saturated base mines minerals at 13.6 minerals/second and gas at 3.8 gas/second.
Now lets look at the protoss view. Assuming he set up the pylons and cannon as soon as he had the money for it, and makes his nexus immediately after that, his nexus goes up roughly 45 seconds after the first pylon. With a 100 second build time, the nexus finishes at roughly the 5:45 mark, a good 20-30 seconds before the zerg can even start his natural hatch. During that time, the protoss has constant probe production. In 3 minutes, not counting chrono boosts, which are saved for warpgate and an upgrade, a protoss can make 11 probes+1 more when the natural finishes, and 18 from before he started the initial pylons, for a total of 30 probes.
For most of the time the zerg is contained, they both have the same income from 1 fully saturate base. Once the protoss's natural is finished, he has 20 seconds before the long range mining starts for the zerg, where he is gather minerals at 20 minerals/second, compared to the zerg's 13.5. Before the zerg can break out, the protoss makes 130 minerals more than the zerg from his natural before the wall breaks. Obviously, the rate of long range mining is going to be different on every map. However, I think it is reasonable that the zerg that has been pumping drones non-stop from 2 hatches can gather more than 6 mineral/second from long range mining.
This means that as soon as the zerg has broken through the wall, even though he doesn't have his hatch up, he is mining more than the protoss, and the protoss is in fact behind from the minerals spent on the wall in, and as soon as the zerg's natural hatch finishes, he will be DRASTICALLY behind, because the zerg has over 60 drones, while the protoss has around 36-40 depending on chrono boosts, got a really late gas compared to the zerg's double gas, and hasn't had to make any units for the first 6 minutes of the game other than drones and queens.
If the map requires 2 creep tumors to reach the wall in then it is better for the zerg to make his macro hatch close to the ramp as soon as the wall goes up. This is slightly slower than making a queen+creep tumor, but not especially significantly.
Those are some really interesting points, I would want to experiment with that and see how it works. It might actually make more sense to oversaturate in that case then go for a bust.
On September 17 2011 04:55 maragin wrote: re: spine crawlers. Something that hasn't been mentioned yet* is placing your in-base hatch near the ramp so you don't have to use creep tumors to get spines down. This lets your first queen keep injecting. When the hatch is ~40% done make your spines at the edge of your creep. Move them over and your hatch will be done.
Personally, I've reverted back to Nerchio's 8 pool vs toss on most maps because of pylon walls. 8 pool, 2x drones, ov (+ scout if necessary), 8 zerglings, queen and drones into expo
Actually if you look at the last paragraph of my post, I did mention that. However, the tumor gets your hatch up slightly faster, and if you are going to make both the inbase hatch, the spine, and 2 queens, and 2 gas you aren't actually able to afford to make drones the entire time if you constantly inject, so you want to get the tumor anyway.
Actually, the post you quoted contains an asterisk. That asterisk leads to an immediate edit where I referenced that you mentioned it above, including your name. This happened as your post wasn't there when I started posting (within a half hour of each other).
I'd have to test the timings (can't, at work). When I was testing against this, I was on Nezarim Crypt where the ramp is in a different zip code. The hatch near the front seemed great, and didn't interfere with any injects at all. Will have to test again sometime this weekend.
On September 17 2011 04:27 brainpower wrote: I'd just like to give a quick comparison of the protoss player's income vs a zergs during a contain like this. The maximum rate that 8 minerals can be mined at is ~13 minerals/second. Assuming the zerg went for pool before hatch, his pool should finish at around the 3 minute mark depending on whether he went gas or pool first. The zerg then has to wait 55 seconds before he can get out his queen and make a creep tumor. Assuming you need all of the creep tumors range to get the spine crawler in position (this will vary by map) it takes a creep tumor 86 seconds to get in range. During that time, the zerg has made an in base hatch, spine crawler, and 2nd queen. He then unborrows the spine crawler and moves it to attacking position, burrows it, and kills the pylon. It takes 12 seconds to burrow, and 35 seconds to kill the pylon.
In total the zerg is contained for just over 3 minutes from the time the pylons finish to the time the first pylon dies. During that time, he made only drones from his larva, so he essentially was fully saturated the entire time. A fully saturated base mines minerals at 13.6 minerals/second and gas at 3.8 gas/second.
Now lets look at the protoss view. Assuming he set up the pylons and cannon as soon as he had the money for it, and makes his nexus immediately after that, his nexus goes up roughly 45 seconds after the first pylon. With a 100 second build time, the nexus finishes at roughly the 5:45 mark, a good 20-30 seconds before the zerg can even start his natural hatch. During that time, the protoss has constant probe production. In 3 minutes, not counting chrono boosts, which are saved for warpgate and an upgrade, a protoss can make 11 probes+1 more when the natural finishes, and 18 from before he started the initial pylons, for a total of 30 probes.
For most of the time the zerg is contained, they both have the same income from 1 fully saturate base. Once the protoss's natural is finished, he has 20 seconds before the long range mining starts for the zerg, where he is gather minerals at 20 minerals/second, compared to the zerg's 13.5. Before the zerg can break out, the protoss makes 130 minerals more than the zerg from his natural before the wall breaks. Obviously, the rate of long range mining is going to be different on every map. However, I think it is reasonable that the zerg that has been pumping drones non-stop from 2 hatches can gather more than 6 mineral/second from long range mining.
This means that as soon as the zerg has broken through the wall, even though he doesn't have his hatch up, he is mining more than the protoss, and the protoss is in fact behind from the minerals spent on the wall in, and as soon as the zerg's natural hatch finishes, he will be DRASTICALLY behind, because the zerg has over 60 drones, while the protoss has around 36-40 depending on chrono boosts, got a really late gas compared to the zerg's double gas, and hasn't had to make any units for the first 6 minutes of the game other than drones and queens.
If the map requires 2 creep tumors to reach the wall in then it is better for the zerg to make his macro hatch close to the ramp as soon as the wall goes up. This is slightly slower than making a queen+creep tumor, but not especially significantly.
I like this post. It opens up a whole lot of new things to discuss.
But I have a few questions. Wouldn't the toss player be using chrono boosts for probes? I'm sure I do. I mean I know I am completely safe from any Zerg strategy for a while so I know I can afford to get my warpgate a few seconds later and just spend CB on my nexus (this includes nydus worm). But perhaps at most, I would use one for the first air unit I build, but that's not a whole lot and comes a bit later. So I think the toss player will be able to get more probes out then you mentioned. Furthermore, while you did mentioned that the zerg will be ahead in workers, you did not take into account the time value of money, which is that money earned sooner is worth more than money earned later.
To add, I would also like to mention that you either have to (a) kill all 3 pylons before your drones can start distance mining or (b) use larva on lings to kill the cannon. Which either (a) wastes more time before you can start mining long distance or (b) lessens the drones you can get depending on how many you make.
Furthermore, 3 minutes in game time takes quite a while to break out, despite you adding the word "just". What I am trying to get at is being behind on your expo for 3 minutes as opposed to the usual SOP in game of having your expo up earlier than the toss. Would you get gas, btw?
On September 16 2011 12:22 PenguinWithNuke wrote: Dear OP,
I would appreciate it if you capitalized your words at the beginnings of sentences and didn't use shorthand notations. It's difficult to read your posts and to understand what you want to say.
What does OP think is the best counter to this? You mention an 80% winrate.
Also, feel free to read the Forum guidelines. It's stickied, so you can find it.
I saw some good zergs here posting on how to counter this, so u could look that up, as for capitalizing each word at the begining of the sentence...is it really such a big deal to u? wow
Yes, it is a big deal to me. This isn't 4chan.
I did read what they had to say (the blue posters). I also read what you had to say about your strategy. However, you chalked it up to you making mistakes and misreading the zerg. I would like to know what you are genuinely afraid of when you do this build. This would help me as a player to know what goes through the head of a Protoss when he does this build.
Arir you are aware that ~24 probes spread on 2 bases is almost twice the income of 30 workers on 1 base right? Why would you think you are ahead economically of a protoss who can double chrono boost 2 nexii?
If what you're saying is so true, why wouldn't you just play 1 base 2 hatch every game? That way if Protoss doesn't wall you in, you're ahead, and if he does wall you in, well, GG right?
What you're saying is ridiculous. It makes no sense how you claim that 1 base Zerg is 'ahead economically' of 2 base FFE protoss, even though it's common knowledge that 2 base Zerg is behind a FFE protoss despite larva inject and 2 queens.
Well, I guess for the OP, he said he doesn't like to do it every game because things like his game sense will degrade because you don't play a normal game anymore. Also, I don't think this can be done for pools before 14. And pools before 14, I'd rather just get an economic advantage by getting my nexus up earlier and defending their 1 base push. 6 cannons with a few ground units will be able to hold off a lot. No need to hold back on cannons when you scout early roaches incoming or that he doesn't have a hatch at the natural. You're ahead so just prevent him from catching up by getting your natural destroyed. By the time he puts down his natural, you've already mined a significant amount of time at your own and he spent a lot on army units instead of focusing on econ.
So it has nothing to do with if zerg hatches first or not - the OP made it sound like he is actually making some brilliant tactical decision and strategy rather than just being abusive. Sure paints a different picture of this awesome strat!
Any early pool I suppose can deal with this, like 10 pool, but then there's issues with Protoss just lol-cannons at home and GG.
If you don't react to this properly as a zerg, you deserve to lose anyway. Good zergs used to be able to deal with this sort of pylon block when it only took 2 to block a ramp. Sure, they would generally be playing from behind, but it's not game-ending in any way. Also, the money wasted by doing this is now even more. Zergs, remember when this shit was popular, and you would make a drone patrol the foot of your ramp, once your ovie saw the scouting probe? Nothing has changed. Protoss just tried building the garbage in their natural for a while, so they could expand. Now the garbage is simply at the foot of your ramp. Roaches still own this. You can still overpool, but obviously it's risky to hatch first against this. Also, how does this even work on a 4P map? I'm thinking this 80% win-rate is somehow related to an 80% hatch first rate among the higher ranked greedy zergs.
Any zerg going pool first and losing to this is an embarrassment. They're obviously still trying to make nothing but drones. Spines and creep is too slow at breaking this contain. Get it through your heads zergs.
Huh? Unless Zerg goes something like 8 pool for aggressive zerglings (in which case they basically GG lose to FFE, like in this build), the wall-in will be up before zerglings. These kind of posts that know nothing are annoying, if you knew the timings better you'd know 14 pool is too late to deal with this. It's not a strat, it's abusive and Zerg autoloses unless Protoss is dumb and lets a nydus or mass roach streamroll him. Zerg just has to patrol a worker, it's he either he's doing it, or he isn't, he either is okay, or he loses.
Master zerg here, I've had this happen to me, it's the most frustrating thing in the world.
Best option is to take a macro hatch in your base so you can keep up your production. After your first queen pops, get a 2nd queen and drop a creep tumor with your first queens 25 energy. Get two spine crawlers and simply edge yourself near your ramp. This is how I deal with it, but if the protoss keeps reinforcing cannons it gets pretty damn hard.
Also with ramp vision changing, I think more roaches will be able to hit more cannons since they will have less vision up a ramp from the low ground.
Hey guys I just recently uploaded a video of this here Unfortunately the zerg player ragequit before I had the time to transition. I've played many games with this abusive style and I find that the zerg player is almost always behind if the protoss player scouts and reacts accordingly and gets 6 gates up in time to defend an allin. Most zergs that I use this against usually tech to nydus and try to nydus my main. Once I kill the nydus easily with 5 probes they usually nydus out to expand somewhere while pressuring with roaches. I find that 6 gate blink with +2 into collosus and a 3rd rolls this as long as you can hold the early roach aggression with good cannons and forcefields. Additionally since his forces are spread thin dt harrassment is really good.
On September 17 2011 08:59 mage36 wrote: I like this post. It opens up a whole lot of new things to discuss.
But I have a few questions. Wouldn't the toss player be using chrono boosts for probes? I'm sure I do. I mean I know I am completely safe from any Zerg strategy for a while so I know I can afford to get my warpgate a few seconds later and just spend CB on my nexus (this includes nydus worm). But perhaps at most, I would use one for the first air unit I build, but that's not a whole lot and comes a bit later. So I think the toss player will be able to get more probes out then you mentioned. Furthermore, while you did mentioned that the zerg will be ahead in workers, you did not take into account the time value of money, which is that money earned sooner is worth more than money earned later.
To add, I would also like to mention that you either have to (a) kill all 3 pylons before your drones can start distance mining or (b) use larva on lings to kill the cannon. Which either (a) wastes more time before you can start mining long distance or (b) lessens the drones you can get depending on how many you make.
Furthermore, 3 minutes in game time takes quite a while to break out, despite you adding the word "just". What I am trying to get at is being behind on your expo for 3 minutes as opposed to the usual SOP in game of having your expo up earlier than the toss. Would you get gas, btw?
In order: Your cyber core finishes at nearly 6 minutes, only shortly before the zerg breaks out and becomes a serious threat. Only zealots and cannons can't defend your natural if the zerg made a roach warren, pulls his drones and goes all in. Many zergs do this out of reflex because they feel they are super far behind without a natural. Once +1 attack finishes on your zealots, its a much more even fight, which is why it requires a chronoboost. Also, remember, that you only have 2-3 sentries, with 1 force field each. You NEED warpgate tech out ASAP to get the 4 extra units from transforming to warp gates. Your 1st voidray also is no help. It doesn't arrive until 7:45 at the earliest, around the time when warp gate tech finishes with chrono boosts. Without chronoing all 3 of those, a zerg all in WILL kill your cyber core, forge, and natural, and you lose.
The time value of money works both ways in this situation. While its true the zerg gets fewer minerals than if the had taken his natural on time, he also has no reason to take drones off gas. In fact, he doesn't have any reason to get zergling speed until the wall is down, so he can get lair tech before speed if he chooses. Also, remember that it isn't as though the zerg NEEDS a massive income to power drones. I need to jump in a practice game and see how soon its possible to start a tech building and still build drones, but I can tell you that a player that likes to go mutas is in great shape to stop a 6 gate because of how late warpgate tech is started, and has an outstanding gas count. 3 hatches worth of mutas all at once is extremely difficult to stop.
As for the kill pylons vs zerglings, the answer is obviously lings. I don't remember off hand how many lings it takes to kill a cannon, (I want to say 6) but remember that the zerg hasn't needed to make a single zergling all game up to this point, and has had 4 inject larvas on his main hatch, and 2 on his macro hatch which is up 80 seconds before the wall breaks. That's a whopping 40 larva he has to work with to make only overlords and drones. Since he is starting around 16 drones when the wall is made, he ends with roughly 50 drones to the protoss' 30 (thanks for bringing that to my attention, I forgot to factor in lost larva from overlords and buildings, so I thought it was closer to 60 drones). While his natural is building is EXACTLY the right time to make units so that he can finally get some map presence, take out any destructable rocks, and prepare to take his 3rd. Losing a few lings to a cannon is not going to hurt him in the slightest.
Furthermore, 3 minutes in game time takes quite a while to break out, despite you adding the word "just". What I am trying to get at is being behind on your expo for 3 minutes as opposed to the usual SOP in game of having your expo up earlier than the toss. Would you get gas, btw?
This part made me sad to read because it means I did a poor job explaining why the zerg isn't behind on economy, which was the true goal of the post. First of all, the zerg's expo isn't behind by 3 minutes. Its behind by 2:15 because the 450 minerals of the wall in delay the protoss' expansion for 45 seconds. Secondly, 30 workers split between two bases only gather 6 more minerals/second than 30 workers all on 1 base. With long range mining, they are essentially even. There is only a very short window where the protoss is able to mine from his natural before the zerg has broken down the wall, and they are at even income. While this is certainly non-ideal, it comes at a time when the protoss is completely unable to apply pressure because of his late tech. As soon as the natural finishes, the zerg, who is far ahead of worker count takes a commanding income lead, and is in a good position to take a 3rd and expand that lead because of his early gas and high production ability from an early macro hatch.
Now I'm not trying to advocate an inbase hatch in a standard game. It has been tried, it was proven to be ineffective. However, it is only moderately inefficient. 450 minerals before even making a production building is massively wasteful, and makes the in base hatch a much more appealing option.
I hope that was helpful. I know I can be a bit long winded, so if i was unclear with anything please let me know.
On September 17 2011 10:43 emc wrote: Master zerg here, I've had this happen to me, it's the most frustrating thing in the world.
Best option is to take a macro hatch in your base so you can keep up your production. After your first queen pops, get a 2nd queen and drop a creep tumor with your first queens 25 energy. Get two spine crawlers and simply edge yourself near your ramp. This is how I deal with it, but if the protoss keeps reinforcing cannons it gets pretty damn hard.
Also with ramp vision changing, I think more roaches will be able to hit more cannons since they will have less vision up a ramp from the low ground.
Roughly how many cannons are we talking about? At some point you just have to say "he just wasted 3 expos worth of minerals to keep me contained, I'm just going to nydus out and go kill him.
EPT
I hope that was helpful. I know I can be a bit long winded, so if i was unclear with anything please let me know.
