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This seems great, I have gotten bored with SC2 and have abandoned all traditional ways of playing matchups!
Lately I have been using between 3-4 warp prisms and doing heavy harras, and this seems like a fantastic strategy!
One idea though OP, instead of going DT tech, would you have a stronger push if you went HT and storm, and just harassed with warp prisms and zealots, or do the 4 sentry drop into the mineral line?
Just another idea to help with tons of lings and what not, and this way you can feedback the infestors instead of suiciding a group of stalkers, others thoughts?
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On October 14 2011 03:06 CecilSunkure wrote:Show nested quote +On October 14 2011 01:34 Skyro wrote:On October 13 2011 18:53 Anihc wrote:On October 13 2011 11:12 CecilSunkure wrote:On October 13 2011 07:27 NrGmonk wrote:These are my thoughts. I'm going to nitpick, so don't take any offense to this criticism. I'm going to consider this as 2 guides, one as an opening build, and one as a final unit composition. First, I'm going to comment on the opening build. Basically, your opening consists of the following: 1 gate fe into 3 gates into fast robo. I feel as if this build has too many flaws for it to truly be considered a solid build. Its weaknesses include: - Roach ling allin: You definitely don't have enough units or tech to defend a standard roach ling allin.
- Fast 2 base muta: Your warp prism gets to his base right around when mutas come out and you neither have the tech or pressure required to combat units.
- Extremely greedy play: I've had players go 4 base on pure ling tech. Yes, this dies to gateway pressure and it's extremely rare, but you can't punish it with the robo build that you suggest.
As for the ending unit composition: - It's been said before that archons aren't really that important in your unit composition. Personally, I never attempt to get archons until extremely late game. I feel like the money you spend on dts could be funneled somewhere else.
- I find your claim that "Voidray/HT/Immortal is basically unbeatable!" is very untrue. Correct ratios of Infestor/Broodlord/Corruptor/Ground will demolish that."
Well, I might have too few units early on to survive roach/ling allin, but until I die to it I'll just keep playing like I am. Against fast Muta, aren't you in the perfect situation to defend..? Blink Stalkers + Archon tech shortly after? Against really greedy play, yes you cannot kill them outright, but if you catch wind they're doing this earlier on, then you haven't commit to anything. You can also research Hallu earlier for Phoenix scout, you can use the fast obs I talk about as well. I don't see why this build is any worse than any other, unless you're talking about blind Gateway pressure. Same thing with late game - I'll keep doing what I'm doing until it doesn't work anymore. One thing I really like about opening with an early robo and twilight is that it's so versatile and reactive and you can easily adapt to what your opponent is doing. Standard roach play? You already have immortal/blink/sentry. Scout mutas? You're already getting blink. Hydras? You can easily add on a robo bay. Infestors? Add on a templar archives. This is in contrast with say opening stargate, where you'll end up with more or less useless voids if your opponent is prepared and did something other than standard macro play... like 2 base hydra, infestor, or muta... and then you have a late robo and twilight for late colossus or HT tech. Fighting 2 base muta is no problem at all with this build, and I disagree that a greedy low-tech 4 base ling only build cannot be punished with robo - stalker/sentry/immortal is a mid game composition that is ridiculously cost effective against non-lair tech zerg. You don't need some kind of early warpgate push to punish that, just take your time and don't fret, get a nice sentry count, and once you have infinity force fields you can literally beat 200 supply roach/ling armies. As far as late game goes, no protoss army is really unbeatable, but I feel like part of this style of play is constant aggression, via threatening with your stalker/sentry/immortal ball, and the warp prism harass. The zerg really should never get to hive tech unless you mess up and have to play defensively. Although I didn't follow this build exactly, I started playing around with earlier warp prism harass (usually I don't get WP until later, and then it's only to simultaneously warp zealots into an expo or main while I a-move with a deathball), as well as getting blink earlier if I open robo. And I had a lot of success :p After watching your tal darim game I really like the stalker in WP harass, it's essentially like a void ray harass that's much stronger... and faster. You can go around sniping overlords, taking watch towers, harassing drones, even killing queens if the zerg isn't careful. One advantage people always say opening stargate has and why opening robo sucks is the lack of scouting/harassment - well the stalker in WP play pretty much completely negates that argument. I also have been utilizing robo twilight in PvZ a lot and I agree on your points. In particular though I like going twilight -> robo. I feel it is more versatile and if you're like me and prefer getting early upgrades it allows for a faster +2 weapons. Opening robo blindly has weaknesses that can be exploited such as spire play. You should watch the Shakuras replay, in regards to your spire point.
Yeah I did watch the replays. You basically caught him in a tech switch to infestors. I'm not exactly sure what the zerg's reasoning was there to tech to infestors (I guess in response to seeing blink stalkers?), but for me at least as a protoss player seeing mutas on the field always makes me want to push the zerg since mutas aren't great in a straight up battle. I guess he thought he could distract you with his handful of mutas long enough. IMO he would've won by simply continuing to mass mutas and making a ton of crawlers and either engaging with a pure mutaling army at his crawlers or via a base race.
Also in those replays the DTs just did not seem to have been very effective and most of the time you just ended up morphing them into archons. DT use is still good at denying expos and map control but nowadays zerg players get spores up in their bases blindly so their harassment potential seems limited in this matchup in the current metagame. HTs would have been a much more effective transition. You can still storm drop with HTs as well so it's not like HTs cannot harass.
Also in regards to the prism you should consider doing the 4 sentry drop where you FF b/w their main and natural. You already are so stalker and sentry at that point in the game it is a natural transition. If you went robo first you can hit them early around 9 mins before their muta or infestor tech gets going, or if you went TC into robo you can hit them later with a stronger version with blink.
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Hey with the 1gate FE, isn't it better to put your gates in your base so if Zerg goes for heavy roach aggression they can't snipe your infrastructure/un-power your gates?
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On October 15 2011 02:25 CrazyF1r3f0x wrote: Hey with the 1gate FE, isn't it better to put your gates in your base so if Zerg goes for heavy roach aggression they can't snipe your infrastructure/un-power your gates?
Yea, I have mixed feelings about where to put those gates. I shift back and forth between placing them in the main vs in the natural.
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I also changed PvZ a couple months ago. I go Immortal/blink stalker with attack upgrades and take a fast third while adding my templar archives.
Immortal/blink/HT is so good vs Zerg, it's anti roach, ling, infestor and muta, so if your opponent didn't go very heavy T3 (broodlords) by the you have like 8 HTs and 8ish Immortals are up, he's kind of boned.
I'll have to try this build as well, it looks really good!
You know I'm always surprised to see how good Immortals vs Zerg. Like after 2 or 3 big battles I've lost 2-3 Immortals and all the rest of them have 10+ kills.
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On October 15 2011 02:54 skatbone wrote:Show nested quote +On October 15 2011 02:25 CrazyF1r3f0x wrote: Hey with the 1gate FE, isn't it better to put your gates in your base so if Zerg goes for heavy roach aggression they can't snipe your infrastructure/un-power your gates? Yea, I have mixed feelings about where to put those gates. I shift back and forth between placing them in the main vs in the natural. On the low ground, otherwise you cannot take your Natural. If you have mixed feelings, then research into recent PvZ replays (including mine in the OP) and figure out how the Gateways on low ground help you take a faster Nexus.
On October 15 2011 02:19 Skyro wrote:Show nested quote +On October 14 2011 03:06 CecilSunkure wrote:On October 14 2011 01:34 Skyro wrote:On October 13 2011 18:53 Anihc wrote:On October 13 2011 11:12 CecilSunkure wrote:On October 13 2011 07:27 NrGmonk wrote:These are my thoughts. I'm going to nitpick, so don't take any offense to this criticism. I'm going to consider this as 2 guides, one as an opening build, and one as a final unit composition. First, I'm going to comment on the opening build. Basically, your opening consists of the following: 1 gate fe into 3 gates into fast robo. I feel as if this build has too many flaws for it to truly be considered a solid build. Its weaknesses include: - Roach ling allin: You definitely don't have enough units or tech to defend a standard roach ling allin.
- Fast 2 base muta: Your warp prism gets to his base right around when mutas come out and you neither have the tech or pressure required to combat units.
- Extremely greedy play: I've had players go 4 base on pure ling tech. Yes, this dies to gateway pressure and it's extremely rare, but you can't punish it with the robo build that you suggest.
As for the ending unit composition: - It's been said before that archons aren't really that important in your unit composition. Personally, I never attempt to get archons until extremely late game. I feel like the money you spend on dts could be funneled somewhere else.
- I find your claim that "Voidray/HT/Immortal is basically unbeatable!" is very untrue. Correct ratios of Infestor/Broodlord/Corruptor/Ground will demolish that."
Well, I might have too few units early on to survive roach/ling allin, but until I die to it I'll just keep playing like I am. Against fast Muta, aren't you in the perfect situation to defend..? Blink Stalkers + Archon tech shortly after? Against really greedy play, yes you cannot kill them outright, but if you catch wind they're doing this earlier on, then you haven't commit to anything. You can also research Hallu earlier for Phoenix scout, you can use the fast obs I talk about as well. I don't see why this build is any worse than any other, unless you're talking about blind Gateway pressure. Same thing with late game - I'll keep doing what I'm doing until it doesn't work anymore. One thing I really like about opening with an early robo and twilight is that it's so versatile and reactive and you can easily adapt to what your opponent is doing. Standard roach play? You already have immortal/blink/sentry. Scout mutas? You're already getting blink. Hydras? You can easily add on a robo bay. Infestors? Add on a templar archives. This is in contrast with say opening stargate, where you'll end up with more or less useless voids if your opponent is prepared and did something other than standard macro play... like 2 base hydra, infestor, or muta... and then you have a late robo and twilight for late colossus or HT tech. Fighting 2 base muta is no problem at all with this build, and I disagree that a greedy low-tech 4 base ling only build cannot be punished with robo - stalker/sentry/immortal is a mid game composition that is ridiculously cost effective against non-lair tech zerg. You don't need some kind of early warpgate push to punish that, just take your time and don't fret, get a nice sentry count, and once you have infinity force fields you can literally beat 200 supply roach/ling armies. As far as late game goes, no protoss army is really unbeatable, but I feel like part of this style of play is constant aggression, via threatening with your stalker/sentry/immortal ball, and the warp prism harass. The zerg really should never get to hive tech unless you mess up and have to play defensively. Although I didn't follow this build exactly, I started playing around with earlier warp prism harass (usually I don't get WP until later, and then it's only to simultaneously warp zealots into an expo or main while I a-move with a deathball), as well as getting blink earlier if I open robo. And I had a lot of success :p After watching your tal darim game I really like the stalker in WP harass, it's essentially like a void ray harass that's much stronger... and faster. You can go around sniping overlords, taking watch towers, harassing drones, even killing queens if the zerg isn't careful. One advantage people always say opening stargate has and why opening robo sucks is the lack of scouting/harassment - well the stalker in WP play pretty much completely negates that argument. I also have been utilizing robo twilight in PvZ a lot and I agree on your points. In particular though I like going twilight -> robo. I feel it is more versatile and if you're like me and prefer getting early upgrades it allows for a faster +2 weapons. Opening robo blindly has weaknesses that can be exploited such as spire play. You should watch the Shakuras replay, in regards to your spire point. Yeah I did watch the replays. You basically caught him in a tech switch to infestors. I'm not exactly sure what the zerg's reasoning was there to tech to infestors (I guess in response to seeing blink stalkers?), but for me at least as a protoss player seeing mutas on the field always makes me want to push the zerg since mutas aren't great in a straight up battle. I guess he thought he could distract you with his handful of mutas long enough. IMO he would've won by simply continuing to mass mutas and making a ton of crawlers and either engaging with a pure mutaling army at his crawlers or via a base race. Also in those replays the DTs just did not seem to have been very effective and most of the time you just ended up morphing them into archons. DT use is still good at denying expos and map control but nowadays zerg players get spores up in their bases blindly so their harassment potential seems limited in this matchup in the current metagame. HTs would have been a much more effective transition. You can still storm drop with HTs as well so it's not like HTs cannot harass. Also in regards to the prism you should consider doing the 4 sentry drop where you FF b/w their main and natural. You already are so stalker and sentry at that point in the game it is a natural transition. If you went robo first you can hit them early around 9 mins before their muta or infestor tech gets going, or if you went TC into robo you can hit them later with a stronger version with blink. He switched to Infestors so that he wouldn't die to my army. If he just made more Muta/Ling he still wouldn't have been able to engage my army, due to not dealing any initial damage with the Mutas. Also, why would I engage into spines..? His best bet was to definitely try to defend, as it isn't smart to try to base race a player with Blink + Archons with Muta/Ling, when he already is heavily cannoned.
As for Sentry drop, I just prefer having less risk in my Prism (vespene), and like the Sentries in my army. It's personal preference.
As for DT tech not dealing a ton of damage, you don't need to deal a ton of damage. It's just a very good tech to have throughout the game. They are great in your army composition, and grant access to more vespene cheap Archons. They force down perpetual Overseers, and lots of Spores + harass defence. They can also kill buildings, which HT cannot.
As for 2 base HT + storm, you won't have many HT to spare in the event you get into a battle. You also won't have enough energy for FB + Storm in the event that you come up against Ling/Infestor. It's also very hard to fight Muta/Ling, due to having very limited storm count. It's just not reliable to rely on killing off super mobile units with a couple spells. In the event you are using your already very limited storms in a drop, that's even less in the event of an engagement.
I highly recommend HT on 3+ base, but not earlier than.
On October 14 2011 14:12 Balgrog wrote: Just another idea to help with tons of lings and what not, and this way you can feedback the infestors instead of suiciding a group of stalkers, others thoughts? That's a pretty bad idea. You won't have enough feedback to defeat 2 base vs 2 base if they just get a lot of Infestors. It isn't suiciding Stalkers, most of the time they don't even all die. It's picking off Infestors with a lot of energy.
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On October 14 2011 06:36 CecilSunkure wrote:
Then once you eventually hit BL tech, the Toss is forced to also switch into some other tech route.
Couldn't this style, once broodlords are out, proceed into the HUARGH-style mothership play? It seems like the logical progression for zerg, against this composition, is broodlords, which the mothership-style works quite well against.
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i played against one of you evil protoss before. WHAT DO I DO AGAINST THAT AS ZERG he actually just 2-base timing pushed me and (if i remmeber correctly) used high templar to morph archons. how can i exploit this style as zerg?
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United States8476 Posts
On October 15 2011 04:29 Tal0n wrote:i played against one of you evil protoss before. WHAT DO I DO AGAINST THAT AS ZERG he actually just 2-base timing pushed me and (if i remmeber correctly) used high templar to morph archons. how can i exploit this style as zerg?
If you lost to a 2 base push with this composition as zerg, you probably just didn't have enough units. Roach ling, Roach hydra, roach ling hydra, roach ling infestor should all easily beat this type of push.
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He switched to Infestors so that he wouldn't die to my army. If he just made more Muta/Ling he still wouldn't have been able to engage my army, due to not dealing any initial damage with the Mutas. Also, why would I engage into spines..? His best bet was to definitely try to defend, as it isn't smart to try to base race a player with Blink + Archons with Muta/Ling, when he already is heavily cannoned.
Well if his reasoning to tech switch to infestors was to deal with your army it was pretty pointless since he lost a straight up battle anyway no? That's the point I was trying to make, that mutas bait a Protoss to push and that tech switching during this time period is a huge gamble.
However if he channeled all his resources spent on infestors into more mutas and spines he could've taken out your cannons and probe lines (actually your 2nd base wasn't even cannoned IIRC) when you pushed out, and then depending on the situation he can either attempt a base race or just fly back and try to engage at his front now their your econ is shot. If he does destroy your econ you're pretty much forced to attack into his spines.
Of course I'm not saying this is a guaranteed win for zerg as you could possibly still break his front, or you can turtle to HT and weaken his mutas and grab your 3rd and progress from there etc. etc., but I reckon this isn't a position that most protoss players would consider favorable. This is why personally I prefer to hit at a pre-muta timing with warp prisms if I went robo first, and if TC first then of course I would be in a more defensive stance.
As for DT tech not dealing a ton of damage, you don't need to deal a ton of damage. It's just a very good tech to have throughout the game. They are great in your army composition, and grant access to more vespene cheap Archons. They force down perpetual Overseers, and lots of Spores + harass defence. They can also kill buildings, which HT cannot.
As for 2 base HT + storm, you won't have many HT to spare in the event you get into a battle. You also won't have enough energy for FB + Storm in the event that you come up against Ling/Infestor. It's also very hard to fight Muta/Ling, due to having very limited storm count. It's just not reliable to rely on killing off super mobile units with a couple spells. In the event you are using your already very limited storms in a drop, that's even less in the event of an engagement.
I highly recommend HT on 3+ base, but not earlier than.
You know in retrospect I can see your point here. I tend to favor the heavy zealot opening out of a FFE, which affords me the gas to actually get HT on 2 base, but if you're going for a stalker/sentry heavy composition out of a gateway into expo you won't have the spare gas, and DTs also hedge your risk to mutas as well since you can delay mass expos from zerg while he is harassing with mutas, giving you option and time needed to turtle up and tech to HT and grab a third if you don't think you can push him.
You know what would be cool though is if you get some replays and/or a guide out for the 1-gate expo since that seems to be your expo of choice. It's an opening I have been attempting to learn but I must be missing some of the ins-and-outs because I am getting wrecked by roachling all-ins or mass lings denying/delaying the expo. It seems to be a very nuanced opening that depends a lot on scouting that I think would be very well received.
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Cecil, I need help with my ZvC. =P
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On October 15 2011 04:54 Skyro wrote: Well if his reasoning to tech switch to infestors was to deal with your army it was pretty pointless since he lost a straight up battle anyway no? That's the point I was trying to make, that mutas bait a Protoss to push and that tech switching during this time period is a huge gamble. Well 2 base muta like that was the real gamble, not so much a tech switch.
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I like this build a lot, but I prefer going for ht instead of dt and getting a faster third(11min ish). With the fast dts you get great harass but I feel like you need better splash than just archons at tha time in the game, and feedback is a nice thing to have aswell.
The warp prism stalker harass is quite an epiphany,so amazing :p
This is so relentless at punishing any mistake the zerg makes, if he misses the prims he loses drones but also exposes himself to a immortal/gateway push with infinite forcefields. Love it
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What do you do with this style if the zerg goes for a 2 base infestor ling timing push?
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On October 17 2011 15:31 DgSensei wrote: What do you do with this style if the zerg goes for a 2 base infestor ling timing push? I don't know of a good "ling Infestor" timing push. You should be able to beat that with any good army and good macro. Archons are exceptionally good against Ling/Infestor.
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United States8476 Posts
On October 17 2011 15:44 CecilSunkure wrote:Show nested quote +On October 17 2011 15:31 DgSensei wrote: What do you do with this style if the zerg goes for a 2 base infestor ling timing push? I don't know of a good "ling Infestor" timing push. You should be able to beat that with any good army and good macro. Archons are exceptionally good against Ling/Infestor.
Ling infestor timings are quite common. They hit around 10:30 with 2 base lings and about 5-6 infestors. Off the top of my head, players like Destiny, DRG, and Monster have been known to do such attacks. I'm certain there's more, because I see it quite a lot in the GSL. They're really quite good too. I can see how your style would have trouble with it. Usually, you can't hold them off without either a collosi, storm done, cannons, or just plain lots of gateway units, especially zealots. Because this style invests so much on tech and has a lot of units placed in warp prisms, I can see how it would be hard to defend such an attack. However, on the flip side of the coin, the zerg has to be able to defend his base from the warp prism harass, so that may delay the timing.
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Once again a fantastic guide Cecil, thanks for the contribution!
Can I ask, how is this playstyle different to the recent guide Noumena posted on warp prism? I can see you have a lot more depth regarding late game composition compared to his but otherwise, the main difference I see is (1) He opts for FFE, you go 1GFE (2) uses early zealot pressure at 6:20-7min to scout (3) he almost avoids sentries altogether, you make lots of sentries and therefore ur mid/late game army is arguably stronger due to infinite FF
Is that correct? It actually seems that you both have similar playstyles, but you are more sentry-focused but Noumena is not, and this is almost a result of choosing different opening builds (cos 1GFE requires you to get sentries, but FFE does not). Im a pretty low level player so my insight could be way off so would be good if someone more experienced can clarify
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looks cool, I'll definitely give it a try when i screw around on ladder as toss.
You try mixing in hallucination? I think your composition has more than enough sentry energy for forcefields; if you decided to forgo the DT harass, zerg usually wont get overseers (aside from those used for scouting) and a few hallucinated archons could really help out.
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On October 18 2011 07:37 TutsiRebel wrote: looks cool, I'll definitely give it a try when i screw around on ladder as toss.
You try mixing in hallucination? I think your composition has more than enough sentry energy for forcefields; if you decided to forgo the DT harass, zerg usually wont get overseers (aside from those used for scouting) and a few hallucinated archons could really help out. No reason not to
On October 18 2011 07:15 bankai wrote:Once again a fantastic guide Cecil, thanks for the contribution! Can I ask, how is this playstyle different to the recent guide Noumena posted on warp prism? I can see you have a lot more depth regarding late game composition compared to his but otherwise, the main difference I see is (1) He opts for FFE, you go 1GFE (2) uses early zealot pressure at 6:20-7min to scout (3) he almost avoids sentries altogether, you make lots of sentries and therefore ur mid/late game army is arguably stronger due to infinite FF Is that correct? It actually seems that you both have similar playstyles, but you are more sentry-focused but Noumena is not, and this is almost a result of choosing different opening builds (cos 1GFE requires you to get sentries, but FFE does not). Im a pretty low level player so my insight could be way off so would be good if someone more experienced can clarify I don't know, I didn't read that thread.
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