Catz's 7 pool on Shakuras Plateau (ZvP)

On October 03 2011 22:33 wikipal wrote:
The Fail Pool, is actually different. Its 2 Lings, O/L 2 more lings. The difference in the build is the double extractor, which allows you to get the zerglings just that bit quicker. And while I did search for this on liquidipedia, I thought it deserved its own thread due to it being slightly different and more structured than the Fail Pool.

On October 04 2011 01:05 Alpina wrote:
Just tried this build and at the exact time my 6 lings came his cannon warped in, so it appeared totally useless push. Even if I would made those 6 lings like few seconds sooner still I don't see this working vs. toss who does not go nexus first.

On October 04 2011 01:19 FairForever wrote:


That's why you 6pool, 6pool will get you there in time before cannon warps in (unless it's something like a 10 forge which is bad vs standard play)

On October 04 2011 01:37 Ben... wrote:
Yes, I 6pool. It hits just enough earlier that you can cause damage without cannons being up yet. My goal with this on both Shakuras and Tal'Darim Altar (It works on that map too, especially if they don't scout you first, though its window of effectiveness is smaller.) is never to kill them but to a) throw them off, and b) force them to build cannons in their main or a bunch of extra buildings. If they throw down a pylon and 2-3 cannons in their main, then the damage is done because I only built the 6 zerglings, and went straight into drone production. I've watched worker count on replays of these games and the Zerg usually ends up even with the Protoss, but they don't have 300-450 minerals of useless cannons sitting in their main or a bunch of extra buildings at their natural (If they panic and start building the great wall of Hongun. If that happens then you are in great shape).

On October 04 2011 02:03 Zelniq wrote:
On Shakuras Plateau, if the protoss player scouts on 9 after pylon, and places his buildings correctly, he should take zero damage from a 6 or 7 pool. What I mean by 0 damage is he should have to pull no extra probes, lose no buildings, lose no units. Just 9 pylon, 13 forge, 14 gate, 14 cannon, 14 gate. the Forge + 2 gates completely walls off the natural's ramp in time before any lings can reach it, and the cannon will finish at around the same time the lings arrive. The protoss can even cancel the 2nd gateway before it finishes and rebuild with a cybernetics core if he wants.

Protoss is then ahead in every way, only having to cut probes for a short time, and this is at 14 rather than 6 or 7 which obviously hurts the zerg's econ more than it hurt the protoss's.

The only reason it has a chance to be somewhat effective on shakuras is if they 1: Don't know how to properly place their first pylon to make a proper wall (probably most common among many ladder protosses), or don't scout after 9 pylon.

On October 04 2011 01:55 raaaiiiii wrote:
I was watching SlayerS_YugiOh stream last night and he was 7 pooling every Protoss he came across... He managed to get in the base every time, forcing a cannon in the main mineral line instead of at the ramp. He got his expo at 18, always before the Protoss.

On October 04 2011 02:03 Zelniq wrote:
On Shakuras Plateau, if the protoss player scouts on 9 after pylon, and places his buildings correctly, he should take zero damage from a 6 or 7 pool. What I mean by 0 damage is he should have to pull no extra probes, lose no buildings, lose no units. Just 9 pylon, 13 forge, 14 gate, 14 cannon, 14 gate. the Forge + 2 gates completely walls off the natural's ramp in time before any lings can reach it, and the cannon will finish at around the same time the lings arrive. The protoss can even cancel the 2nd gateway before it finishes and rebuild with a cybernetics core if he wants.

Protoss is then ahead in every way, only having to cut probes for a short time, and this is at 14 rather than 6 or 7 which obviously hurts the zerg's econ more than it hurt the protoss's.

The only reason it has a chance to be somewhat effective on shakuras is if they 1: Don't know how to properly place their first pylon to make a proper wall (probably most common among many ladder protosses), or don't scout after 9 pylon.

On October 04 2011 02:19 Sbrubbles wrote:




I love how these threads that discuss early pools always have credible sources saying opposite things.

On October 04 2011 02:19 Sbrubbles wrote:
I love how these threads that discuss early pools always have credible sources saying opposite things.

On October 04 2011 03:31 roymarthyup wrote:


nah, every time someone wins with a 6-7pool against FFE, the toss is just bad

many zergs here are saying they are winning with this build. that just means there are MANY bad tosses out there who dont know how to defend this.

even top korean grandmaster tosses are dying to this. it just means they dont know how to counter it

but this is very easy to counter. you can fully wall off before the lings arrive, and take no damage

but 99.99% of tosses on the ladder dont know how to counter this so freely use it until that fact changes

On October 04 2011 05:45 FairForever wrote:


What are you talking about? It's not easy to counter it at all if you don't scout it. On TDA LE it's impossible to wall off before lings get there... well, that's not true. You can wall off, but you won't have a cannon up. I think you can do it if you go something like 10pylon 10forge but that's not standard, and that is a hit to your econ if you aren't facing an early pool.

PS: Also on MLG Metal/Shattered/Xel'Naga, you have that depot down so it's even more risky.

On October 04 2011 05:57 roymarthyup wrote:



1) on TDA LE, it is possible to wall off before lings get there

2) if point 1 is true, im right

3) if you think point 1 is not true, feel free to pm me your info and we can play a game sometime

4) im talking about with 14forge. again, yes its possible. if you want to see how, feel free to pm me

5) this is extremely easy to stop. if point1 is true, then that means 6pool pretty much should never do any damage to a toss who is doing a safe FFE with a 14forge. and because point1 is true, it means everything i have said in this post is true

6) FFE is bad on xelnaga / metal. but for other maps feel free to pm me if you want to see how 6pool is a instant loss to a toss doing a safe FFE




regardless, 99.999% of tosses on the ladder do not know how to do a safe FFE, which involes scouting at 9 and at 12 with a 14forge. so feel free to keep beating tosses on the ladder with 6pool until they learn how to do the safe FFE

On October 03 2011 22:49 -Dustin- wrote:
Wait I'm confused as hell about all these early pool subjects now. When Toss talk about 6Pool they say its OP on a FFE, but 7Pool is "easily held off" could someone explain the difference? I understand the Lings will be slightly delayed.

Seems solid may try it out on ladder as I like to do an early Pool vs Toss as it can give me an advantage/straight up win the game, but at a risk, if I fail to do any damage its pretty much game. I like the risk vs reward of a early pool. I see everyone saying its old, I understand that but I've never seen the exact BO for it as I don't look at Liquipedia much.

I also second what Jermstuddog is saying I love to send a scouting Drone just to block buildings harass the Toss and eventually do a little tanking for my Lings.

On October 04 2011 09:25 Flestiraef wrote:
Guess I should add I went full droning after the initial 6 lings.

On October 04 2011 09:40 Qxz wrote:
I do this often on Shakuras because FFE is very common and by sending the overlord horizontally across, it'll be there in time for your lings to go directly to the good base.

If the protoss reacts correctly, they are slightly ahead. They are not far ahead because the 7 pool always causes at least indirect damage:
- They are forced to cut probes to complete the wall asap
- They must considerably delay the nexus
- They are not proceeding with their build as planned

A lot of protosses including in Master league, even with proper initial defense, will follow it up with a lot of silly decisions, like trying to cannon you (stupid, you have lings out already), rush dts or something else retarded because they've been thrown off their game. Basically you get a lot of free wins vs bad players. But against a player who stays calm and just resumes his normal build after holding the rush, the 7 pool just sets you behind.

A lot of people don't understand that the Catz 7-pool is not an all-in. It's an extremely agressive opener that aims to cause at least indirect damage and throw the opponent off his game.

On October 04 2011 09:45 FabledIntegral wrote:
I would say it's an all-in because you must cause some damage, if they don't lose any probes, lose minimal mining time, etc. I'd say you're considerably far behind. Only thing is, it's really easy to cause "damage," as you've said.

On October 04 2011 10:18 Zelniq wrote:

i'm confused..players at your level don't wall off their natural in time for your lings? is there something i dont understand cus when I tested it once, it just put zerg behind as their lings could do zero damage. no pulling probes, no lost units or buildings, just cutting probes at 14 for like 20 seconds to make the gate/cannon/gate

mb you can try it on me in a custom game?

On October 04 2011 10:18 Zelniq wrote:

i'm confused..players at your level don't wall off their natural in time for your lings? is there something i dont understand cus when I tested it once, it just put zerg behind as their lings could do zero damage. no pulling probes, no lost units or buildings, just cutting probes at 14 for like 20 seconds to make the gate/cannon/gate

mb you can try it on me in a custom game?

On October 04 2011 10:18 Zelniq wrote:

i'm confused..players at your level don't wall off their natural in time for your lings? is there something i dont understand cus when I tested it once, it just put zerg behind as their lings could do zero damage. no pulling probes, no lost units or buildings, just cutting probes at 14 for like 20 seconds to make the gate/cannon/gate

mb you can try it on me in a custom game?

On October 04 2011 10:18 Zelniq wrote:

i'm confused..players at your level don't wall off their natural in time for your lings? is there something i dont understand cus when I tested it once, it just put zerg behind as their lings could do zero damage. no pulling probes, no lost units or buildings, just cutting probes at 14 for like 20 seconds to make the gate/cannon/gate

mb you can try it on me in a custom game?

On October 04 2011 11:59 roymarthyup wrote:



hey zel id be willing to 6pool against you once just so we can provide a replay for this thread. im pretty confident in my ability to do a perfect 6pool, however i still believe it only works against tosses opening a greedy FFE. safe FFE with a 14forge and pylon/gateway/forge/pylon wall should always beat 6pool


i think we should do it on shakuras or TDA or heck maybe 1game on each


ill pm you my charactor ID tomorrow or in 2days or somethin and whenever were not busy we can play a game or something to see

On October 04 2011 15:15 Chemist391 wrote:


/Agree, there's too much talk and not enough replays. So far there is only 1 (the one I posted on the first page).

I'm mid-master, and I managed to hold off this exact build on the exact map in question by CatZ.

On October 04 2011 22:35 redloser wrote:
in Shakuras Plateau, 6~8 pool openers always backfire for Zerg, cuz if Protoss has played correctly, he can fend off 6 pool at his natural with no damage on workers whatsoever.

fast pool should work if Protoss player scouts late... but yeah that's only depending on luck.

On October 04 2011 14:45 FabledIntegral wrote:


They complete the wall but you can always kill the third warped in building. And I mean pretty much always, unless they do something like 13 forge 13 gate 13 cannon 13 gate, completely cutting probes (or sneaking one in during the building build time). It rarely, rarely happens. The third building usually starts warping in about 5 seconds before you get there, maybe a little bit more, but the thing is the cannon isn't done yet so you can target it down and run past, or force him to make other buildings behind it.

If the cannons are late, you can usually just target down the forge which has the least amount of health, in which you're usually ahead, but not always, I've just played enough games using that build to know the ins and outs.

I guess 14-14-14 would probably work too, idk, but if they cut probes THAT long you're probably not that far behind anyways. You'll have probably 12 or 13 drones at that point by the time they put up the third gate (this is only off the top of my head, mind you), and a queen for injects. You also don't need to mine gas because they won't be attacking you anytime soon.

On October 04 2011 01:50 Skyro wrote:


On Tal'Darim you can wall-off a 6-pool in time if the pylon scout guesses correctly and scouts the zerg first, so that's a risk right there. On shakuras you won't be able to wall off even if they scout it first, so it's much more solid on that map.

Also I'm not sure why a Protoss player would build more than 1 cannon. 1 cannon in the mineral line plus probe micro is able to hold until the zealot comes out even if you stream lings and go all-in.

On October 04 2011 10:18 Zelniq wrote:

i'm confused..players at your level don't wall off their natural in time for your lings? is there something i dont understand cus when I tested it once, it just put zerg behind as their lings could do zero damage. no pulling probes, no lost units or buildings, just cutting probes at 14 for like 20 seconds to make the gate/cannon/gate

mb you can try it on me in a custom game?

On October 05 2011 03:47 T.O.P. wrote:

Protoss is fine with 13 probes if you 7 pool. Zerg won't have much drones either and protoss has a advantage in tech at that point as well as full energy on nexus.

On October 04 2011 15:15 Chemist391 wrote:


/Agree, there's too much talk and not enough replays. So far there is only 1 (the one I posted on the first page).

I'm mid-master, and I managed to hold off this exact build on the exact map in question by CatZ.

On October 05 2011 10:30 Shadrak wrote:
Tested this out on Shakuras today and had a pretty good results (mid master). I analyzed the replay and found that delaying the toss's expansion plans was what really put me ahead. He had the lead in harvesters up until my attack, but had to cut probes to block in, which delayed his expo.

My early queen and hatchery enabled me to far outpace his worker production because he was only going off of one nexus for longer than he planned to be. Given that he spent minerals walling and cannoning while I expanded I ended up with 1.5x his harvester count quite quickly and then transitioned into a standard game.