EPTedit:
specifically, queen/broodlord/infestor, sometimes with corruptor/ling/roach mixed in
[G] Stalkerless PvZ - Page 6
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panzzzzz
United States109 Posts
edit: specifically, queen/broodlord/infestor, sometimes with corruptor/ling/roach mixed in | ||
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rsvp
United States2266 Posts
 Here are my comments on some of the things discussed, I only briefly read through everything so let me know if I missed something that's still under debate.Defending the 3rd: Yes this is the weakest point of this build, but it's far from impossible and if you play around a bit and get used to the timings it becomes easier. Pretty much it just revolves around having storm ready, otherwise you can't kill the hydras. Actually a lot of my games involve the the zerg killing my 3rd before I have enough to defend (i.e. storm 30 seconds from being done), then when storm finally finishes I can clean up his push, so effectively I'm trading my 3rd for his army. But this army composition is so strong that I can still win with that temporary eco disadvantage as long as I still have my core of tech units alive (voids/immortals/HTs/archons etc.). 2 stargate vs 1 stargate: Like kcdc mentioned, one thing I do differently from this guide is that I add a 2nd stargate instead of an earlier robo/immortals. It's personal preference really, and both should work, since the main goal of both is to counter roaches (I make extra voids to counter roaches, this guide goes for faster/more immortals to counter roaches). I like voids better because they are more mobile so I can also use them to deny the zerg's 4th and harass the main/expos. Chrono'ed gateway vs chrono'ed warpgate tech: Both styles will get you a nice force of +1 zeals at the 8:00 mark. The difference is that if you chrono your gateway (or even go dual gateway after FFE), you get those zealots earlier which help with 2 things: breaking down your rocks to get ready to expand to your 3rd, and also perhaps to have even better early game scouting/pressure. If you chrono your warpgate tech, reinforcements to keep the pressure on the zerg's 3rd become much easier especially if he's not really ready to defend against the zealots. I recommend chronoing gateway for maps like tal darim and shattered where you need to break down rocks for your 3rd, and chronoing warpgate tech for all other maps. HT vs colossus: Colossus is the more popular route and I've seen a lot of players go 2 stargate > 2 robo colo. Both styles are viable, I would just play around with both to see what you like better. Strategically, the main difference is that mass corruptor is a great counter to stargate > colo play, whereas mass corruptor will fail hard against stargate > HT play. That's another reason why I like to open 2 stargate - some zergs will see my mass air and respond with corruptors to both help counter my air and also to counter the colo that they are expecting to see me transition into. Then I win with HT. However, if you transition into colo it does become a bit easier to hold off those mid game roach/hydra attacks on your 3rd. Best zerg response? Hydras are the worst answer possible, and it falls into exactly what the Protoss wants the zerg to do. While a roach/hydra mid-game attack on the protoss's 3rd is really strong, if you fail to win the game at that timing you've lost the game. The ratio of roach:hydra is also very difficult, since you basically just want just enough hydra to defend against voids, because too many = you lose to mass zeal because not enough roaches, and not enough = lose to voids/storm. Infestors are ok, but the protoss already has a lot of HT so it's not the best response. Corruptors are bad too because since not only do they don't exactly counter voids, they're expensive and you just lose the ground battle if you overmake corruptors. Roach > muta is really good in my experience. Plain mass roach/ling while expanding is good too (think mondragon style roaches > voids) if you keep counter attacking and not letting the protoss get their 3rd, and then eventually you can switch to whatever and win because it's 4 or 5 base to 2. Queens are also great, if you get good creep spread then roach/queen/infestor is extremely powerful against this. Some replays for you (may be 1-2 month old, haven't played too much recently/holidays) http://drop.sc/63059 http://drop.sc/63060 http://drop.sc/58587 http://drop.sc/58588 | ||
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kcdc
United States2311 Posts
In response to: 2 stargate vs 1 stargate: Like kcdc mentioned, one thing I do differently from this guide is that I add a 2nd stargate instead of an earlier robo/immortals. It's personal preference really, and both should work, since the main goal of both is to counter roaches (I make extra voids to counter roaches, this guide goes for faster/more immortals to counter roaches). I like voids better because they are more mobile so I can also use them to deny the zerg's 4th and harass the main/expos. and Plain mass roach/ling while expanding is good too (think mondragon style roaches > voids) if you keep counter attacking and not letting the protoss get their 3rd, and then eventually you can switch to whatever and win because it's 4 or 5 base to 2. Mondragon style roaches are the primary reason that I favor a 9 minute robo with chronoboosted immortal production. I found that while voids are critical to the build since they punish roach kiting and encourage Z to bring hydras off creep, voids don't always DPS roaches down fast enough to preserve your economy. Delaying the 2nd stargate and cutting a void or 2 for more immortals, in my experience, can help save your third. But you're 100% right that voids are much more mobile, and they're more helpful if Z does anything besides trying to bust your front. I've seen you defend the front-busting style of roach-hydra pushes with basically just storms and voids tho, and it's pretty sick. | ||
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sofakng
100 Posts
On January 06 2012 05:48 kcdc wrote: I'd have to see it, but without immortals or voids, I'm not sure how you handle mass roach. Zealot-archon is fun, but it's bad vs roaches. You have faster carriers and mothership. You basically are delaying your late game while i rush to it and use excess zealots and storms to defend while building up carrier supply. I have a guide in this forum as well. Not as good as yours but includes some of my recent replays. | ||
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Markwerf
Netherlands3728 Posts
On January 06 2012 07:31 kcdc wrote: Yeah, I'm not looking forward to swapping the carrier for the tempest. I doubt tempests will have enough range to hit broodlords while being covered by archons, so they're going to need to be able to engage corruptors head-on in order to fight BL+infestor. And if they can engage corruptors head-on, the MU is broken. Carriers are OP even losing badly to corruptors. Imagine a carrier that was actually good against corruptors..... I still think carriers suck though. All the games I seen I think you would have won more easily if you went with colossi instead of carriers. Carriers just have an abysmal damage output for their cost compared to colossi and die to the same units basically. The big plus for colossi is that they share your zealot/archon attack upgrades while carriers need their own, and carriers without attack upgrades are even more crap. A carrier with 8 interceptors does 21 dps vs roaches, and only 16 vs corruptors given no upgrades on either side. That's just terrible for it's cost. It's practically the same as 2 stalkers vs armored units.. The lategame part of this strategy is very good because of the power of storm/archon + mothership imo, carriers serve no important role imo and might as well be replaced with stalkers and colossi in my opinion. The only thing the carrier has going for it I think is that it forces AA, comes from an otherwise idle building and is better against muta then colossi but all those points are pretty moot when it's lategame. Zerg will be making corruptors anyway, buidling efficiency is of minimal importance and the window for muta has generally passed already. When i see these carrier strats I wonder why you don't go earlier for them? If you have the stargate anyways relatively quick carriers actually becomes quite feasible, the fleet beacon isn't much more expensive then a robo for example and you could get them early where there might be a window for them to be used when zerg isn't making much AA yet. If you're plan is to use them anyway because you think it's a good combat unit I don't see a reason not to get them a little earlier, I could see for example getting carrier before ht or something like that (as carriers are actually quite decent against hydra's). | ||
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Feos
Germany71 Posts
the one unit zerg can muster endgame to destroy a protoss army are the broodlords. carriers with these support units are untouchable and they have an incredible range. once you get to the critical mass of carrier no one can stop them. and if you intent to go mass air, you should ofc upgrade air as well. interceptors have 2 attacks so they will scale better with upgrades than corruptors (armor at least). just read the op again and i really dont understand why you cant see the purpose of the carriers. they just wont die and to terrible terrible damage ^^ | ||
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Sakray
France2198 Posts
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Sea_Food
Finland1612 Posts
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Feos
Germany71 Posts
when the units are in the vortex, there is no need for them anyway. as long as the archons get in... | ||
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Markwerf
Netherlands3728 Posts
On January 06 2012 16:03 Feos wrote: youre missing one critical point: colossi cant attack air. the one unit zerg can muster endgame to destroy a protoss army are the broodlords. carriers with these support units are untouchable and they have an incredible range. once you get to the critical mass of carrier no one can stop them. and if you intent to go mass air, you should ofc upgrade air as well. interceptors have 2 attacks so they will scale better with upgrades than corruptors (armor at least). just read the op again and i really dont understand why you cant see the purpose of the carriers. they just wont die and to terrible terrible damage ^^ Yes colossi not being able to attack air is a major weakness but their low gast cost also makes them easy to pair with some stalkers. Carriers or colossi both die to corruptors so the flying aspect of the carrier is surprisingly often not really relevant. It is true the traditional colossus army has a big problem approaching the broodlord/infestor army but the mothership solves this. There is no 'critical mass' for carriers, they die super hard to corruptors unless you're using the archon toilet... Also why do people keep saying this nonsense that units with two attacks scale better with upgrades. It's the most retarded statement there is. First of all it does not matter AT ALL if it's two attacks or 1 attack, it matters what the base damage is. Yes carriers have low base damage hence a high increase per attack upgrade, however the reverse is also true: armor upgrades are super effective against carriers. It is often unlikely that you'll be ahead in air upgrades to zergs armor upgrades as you start off with a mostly ground based army. I don't know as I'm still testing different styles a lot but I think it's clear in PvZ nowadays that you just want to end up with a 200/200 army with mothership and archons. I don't even think the rest matters a lot as long as you force corruptors and have some good AA to abuse the archontoilet. I just think that using some colossi and stalkers for the midgame is a safer route to get there then rushing templar. As mentioned before in other threads, colossi are usually just a smoother transition as you gradually pay for them and 1 colossus already helps tremendously. With templar you pay so much up front just to get 1 storm at the critical moment, when they push your third. I'll gladly trade a slightly weaker endgame for more easy defending the third. I also find the quick HT strat to be actually a bit weaker against muta. Perhaps you'll be quicker with getting HT + blink stalkers eventually but in the window where you have no stalkers and teching to HT you're tremendously vulnerable. With colossus play you at least have a good amount of stalkers so not too hard to get blink soon. | ||
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Treehead
999 Posts
On January 06 2012 22:54 Markwerf wrote: Yes colossi not being able to attack air is a major weakness but their low gast cost also makes them easy to pair with some stalkers. Carriers or colossi both die to corruptors so the flying aspect of the carrier is surprisingly often not really relevant. It is true the traditional colossus army has a big problem approaching the broodlord/infestor army but the mothership solves this. There is no 'critical mass' for carriers, they die super hard to corruptors unless you're using the archon toilet... Also why do people keep saying this nonsense that units with two attacks scale better with upgrades. It's the most retarded statement there is. First of all it does not matter AT ALL if it's two attacks or 1 attack, it matters what the base damage is. Yes carriers have low base damage hence a high increase per attack upgrade, however the reverse is also true: armor upgrades are super effective against carriers. It is often unlikely that you'll be ahead in air upgrades to zergs armor upgrades as you start off with a mostly ground based army. The flying aspect is totally relevant as it rules out baneling drops and roach flanks as an ability to take out your power unit, as is the ability to continue attacking while running away, as is the fact that only carriers can attack broodlords while being at a safe distance from the corruptors. An interceptor does 10 damage base, but because it's in two attacks, when you get +1 attack, it increases to 12 damage base. If they did 10 damage in one attack, it would only increase to 11 when you got +1 (assuming they scaled like every other unit in the game). This is why people say that. It doesn't take the enemy's armor upgrades into account, but that's the rationale and it's situationally correct (the situation being "as long as you stay ahead in upgrades"). If your point is that multuiple attacks scale better with your upgrades, but also scale horibly with their upgrades, I don't think anyone will disagree - but if they don't know your endgame goal is carriers, they can't prematurely go for armor upgrades, whereas you can prematurely go for attack upgrades. Sure, that doesn't mean multiple attacks are better the singular ones - but it does mean that the statement is far from "the most retarded statement there is". | ||
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rustypipe
Canada206 Posts
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kcdc
United States2311 Posts
But it seems silly to me to pretend that carriers don't have a role in lategame PvZ. Sure, carriers don't have good damage for cost, but broodlord+infestor poses tactical challenges that any Protoss composition without carriers will have trouble solving. Broodlord+infestor deals massive anti-ground damage at siege range, and fungals lock your army in place and out of range. Stalkers and void rays can't reliably get in range of the BL's, and they die very quickly against BL+infestor. Vortex helps, but good Zergs don't let you hit more than a third of their army, and they're getting better at dealing with vortex every day since it's become much more common. And archon+mothership loses to 2/3 of a BL+infestor army because the archons are essentially melee range and they're immobile against broodlings and fungals. But if a big chunk of your army supply is in carriers, you can respond to the siege range AtG BL's with siege range AtA carriers which is a big win. Against carriers, Zerg's two scariest units, broodlords and infestors, are more or less useless. It forces Z to fight with crappy units like corruptors or hydras. Moreover, it forces Z to bring his units to you where your archons, stalkers, and storms can reliably deal big damage. To summarize, you don't make carriers for their DPS. You make them for their AA range, their tankiness, and their invulnerability against BL's and infestors. | ||
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Treehead
999 Posts
On January 07 2012 01:11 rustypipe wrote: I've played against a build very simular to this, however the guy I played relighed on mass phenoix and zelots till carriers poped out. Once a protoss gets 3-4 carriers out, its OVER for the zerg. The zerg has 0 units that are cost effective vs carriers. And carriers + pheonix = by by corruptors and hydra. I played it 2 or 3 times and never found a good counter to it aside from all-in attempts the second I spotted dual stargates, even then most of the all-in's just failed Neither Phoenix nor Carriers are cost effective against Corruptors without storm. They both have too much damage mitigated by the Corruptor's armor. Next time, just make a big pile of corruptors and +1 armor if you have time and morph some to broods after you kill his army. | ||
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Skyro
United States1823 Posts
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Nuclease
United States1049 Posts
But I like the philosophy...maybe I'll give it a try we'll see. | ||
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sofakng
100 Posts
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ssregitoss
Turkey241 Posts
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treeqt
Germany237 Posts
Trying to get a third made me cry... :S Waiting till tomorrow to try it on another map. It's fun to play though, I like it! | ||
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Skyro
United States1823 Posts
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