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On January 11 2012 09:16 Mattchew wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On January 11 2012 09:12 gdalam wrote:
Am I the only person who walks up the ramp immediately with my first Zealot and Stalker when I 4 Gate? This build doesn't seem to have anything to address that.
Being as aggressive as possible with your first Zealot and Stalker (ie. rallied to his base) will force a fight before your opponent's second Stalker is out (on most map distances). If your micro is even half decent and your opponent wasn't watching his ramp at that exact moment, you should be able to win the fight or at least trade evenly. This will allow you to easily get your Probe into his main and build your Pylons, nullifying the fast Sentry. If the other players gamesense is halfway decent they can pull probes + have the next unit popping out in their own base
You'll still be able to get your Pylons up with a faster WG timing than your opponent.
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sg builds operational
1 Gate before Stargate
+ Show Spoiler +This build is absolutely brilliant if you are not aggressively 4gated. If you are aggressively 4gated, it's kind of meh. You can't start your first penix until you get your 1st 4 sentries which is a total drag. Oh well; it's the price we pay for being too cool for ground unitz
If you're being aggressively 4gated
With efficient play, you can actually start your 1st phoenix before your 3rd sentry and still be safe!
9 Pylon
12 Gate
14 Gas
15 Pylon
17 Core (earliest scout; feel free to scout later)
17 zealot (18 if you scouted on core, 17 if you haven't scouted yet)
20 (2nd) Gas
22 Stalker; no chronoboost
22 WG; Chronoboost x3
24 Pylon (25 if you scouted before core)
26 Stalker; 1 chrono boost
29 Stargate
30 Sentry
32 (2nd) Gateway (Cut probes at 32 food)
32 Pylon; resume probe production upon completion
32 (3rd) Gateway
º¿º
(32) 4th CB on WG reasearch
34 (2nd) Sentry
36 Start 1st phoenix; cancel if you need the 100 gas.
@100% 2nd Gateway, CB as you transform it to warpgate, and make (3rd) Sentry (39 food)
39 Zealot (Sentry if you will absolutely need an FF)
Once you have 3 sentries, a phoenix, 2 stalkers, 2 zealots and 3 warpgates, your opponent should have had 6 stalkers and 5 zealots for ~10 seconds. 4 gaters tend to back off once their pylons go down and they've humped the shit out of 3 chained forcefields, but not always. While your 1st phoenix is training, you need to make an important executive decision. Will you need that 4th force field before you can get enough gas with the 100 gas sunk into the phoenix? If you think so, cancel the phoenix and get the 4th sentry. If not, let the phoenix finish and get the sentry with your next 100 gas if you need to do so.
Yes. I know 4 sentries is a lot before you start your first phoenix. TBH, you're not going to run into many 100% perfect 4gates that establish themselves at your ramp ready for a warp-in at the target time of 5:34, so you probably will almost never have to make 4. I just have the numbers "4" and "5:34" here because I'm crash testing it against a near theoretically perfect 12gate 4gate. Wait why are you complaining? You can't get fast tech units while skimping almost entirely on defense against a brutish all-in. What do you think you are, terran?
If you're not being aggressively 4gated
This shit is so sick if you can get away with it.
9 Pylon
12 Gate
14 Gas
15 Pylon
17 Core (earliest scout; feel free to scout later)
17 zealot (18 if you scouted on core, 17 if you haven't scouted yet)
20 (2nd) Gas
22 Stalker; no chronoboost
22 WG; Chronoboost x3
24 Pylon (25 if you scouted before core)
26 Stalker; 1 chrono boost
29 Stargate
30 Sentry
32 (2nd) Gateway (Cut probes at 32 food)
32 Pylon (resume probes production upon completion
33 (3rd gateway optional)
Follow up
If you get to your phoenixes off of 1 sentry, you are in great shape. You don't necessarily need the 3rd gate, but it can help in a pinch against a WP 4gate. I like to send my first phoenixes to the edges of my base and bee line them to my opponents base to check if a WP is en route. If he gets to your base and begins to warp in, engage with your GW units while lifting up the zealots 1 at a time with your phoenixes. Might as well pull probes, as if his attack fails he cannot retreat with anything whatsoever.
To be safe from dt builds, go ahead and start your robo after your 3rd phoenix.
Assuming no wp/dt rush came, you have a few options now.
You can expand off of your phoenixes, perhaps denying an observer scout with phoenix observer combination while keeping them pinned with the phoenixes, threatening to pick off gas probes on a flyby. Be careful here; you don't want to waste all of your phoenix energy on probes only to get all inned, unable to lift a significant amount of units. Pheonix are a wonderful part of a protoss composition; what are all ground units bad against in a scuffle? colossus (ok speed prism immortal hipsters let's not get all riled up). And nothing deters or even shuts down colossus play like an early phoenix build. This means he will either favor stalkers or immortals with his gas in the early-mid game, both of which can be dealt with a a phoenix composition with immortals and zealots sprinkled in. Phoenix play tend to instigate zealot/archon pushes, but these are not very strong with proper simcity even if you take an expansion.
On the other hand, you can turn this into the sickest pvp all-in of all time. You can either hit relatively quickly, adding on a 4th gate and sniping sentries up a ramp with your phoenix as your zealots stroll right on up. Or, against a late expansion which you sometimes see in a pvp where both are reluctant to drop the nexus, you can can get up to 3 or 4 immortals, a mess of zealots, hell even an archon or two to prevent ff's from blocking your zealots. Your immortals will deal with the simcity and any cannons they might have erected. This all-in comes pretty late, as you can probably tell.
Alternative 2 Gate before Stargate
+ Show Spoiler +This build has more room for error against aggressive 4gate, but obviously does not exploit non 4gate play as hard as the 1 gate build
If you're being aggressively 4gated
9 Pylon
12 Gate
14 Gas
15 Pylon
17 Core (earliest scout; feel free to scout later)
17 zealot (18 if you scouted on core, 17 if you haven't scouted yet)
20 (2nd) Gas
22 Stalker; no chronoboost
22 WG; Chronoboost x3
24 Pylon (25 if you scouted before core)
26 Stalker; 1 chrono boost
29 (2nd) Gateway
30 Sentry
º¿º
(32) 4th CB on WG research
32 Pylon (earlier than usual; resume probe production more quickly, and you are not sure if you can alot so much gas to phoenixes right away so why not get the pylon first? Works either way.. not much of a difference, really)
32 Stargate
33 (3rd) Gateway
35 (2nd) Sentry
**You have an extra WG cool down here. You can choose to get another sentry immediately to be 100% safe, or try to risk it by going sentry/zealot to start your phoenix production earlier. This will come down to the timing of your opponent's 4gate and the efficiency of his approach. Do you need that 3rd sentry right away? If so, get it. If you are completely sure you do not, warp in 1 sentry and 1 other unit (preferably a zealot to conserve gas) at this point and get your 4th sentry on the next round of cool downs if need be.
Phoenix builds don't have the punishing power that blink builds do against failed 4gates, but you still should have no trouble winning the game from here.
If you're not being aggressively 4gated
You have a lot more flexibility with this opener. It's pretty goddam safe if I do say so myself
9 Pylon
12 Gate
14 Gas
15 Pylon
17 Core (earliest scout; feel free to scout later)
17 zealot (18 if you scouted on core, 17 if you haven't scouted yet)
20 (2nd) Gas
22 Stalker; no chronoboost
22 WG; Chronoboost x3
24 Pylon (25 if you scouted before core)
26 Stalker; 1 chrono boost
29 (2nd) Gateway
30 Sentry
32 Stargate
32 Pylon
32 (Optional 3rd Gate)
35 Phoenix
-See 1 gate sg opener for the follow up section-
4k w00t tl sc2 strat forum!
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Wow great builds! Thanks a lot!
I like the "º¿º" face lol
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O.O sick, sick guide. Thanks alot! Looks like it has a build for pretty much everyone, whether they prefer TC, robo or stargate. Alej ftw!
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On January 11 2012 09:12 gdalam wrote:
Am I the only person who walks up the ramp immediately with my first Zealot and Stalker when I 4 Gate? This build doesn't seem to have anything to address that.
Being as aggressive as possible with your first Zealot and Stalker (ie. rallied to his base) will force a fight before your opponent's second Stalker is out (on most map distances). If your micro is even half decent and your opponent wasn't watching his ramp at that exact moment, you should be able to win the fight or at least trade evenly. This will allow you to easily get your Probe into his main and build your Pylons, nullifying the fast Sentry.
well that's a hell of a condition
as noted in the op, your first 3 units will be down the ramp spread in such a way to see a probe/approach at every angle. a zealot stalker and a probe.. i will focus down the probe before it gets up the ramp. at best you get 2 pylons down below the ramp. if you try to engage with your zealot stalker, i will kill them both for free, should time allow before i have to dance up my ramp as my sentry pops out
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Although I agree 4 gate isn't the most viable strategy PvP anymore, I am quite skeptical about how you worded the fact that "4 gate is dead". Unless something big changes, I think we will still see 4 gate at the highest levels from time to time. The meta game already has shifted to "DO SOMETHING ELSE CAUSE YOUR OPPONENT IS STOPPING 4 GATE!" and that results in safe builds vs. the 4 gate. Unfortunately, these safe builds against the 4 gate can't pressure, and if your opponent is doing something even MORE greedy than you, he will win the game. This leads you to also cut corners, and eventually it gets to a point where you can't hold a 4 gate anymore either.
What does this mean? I rarely ever 4 gate and agree it can be stopped with a huge advantage using 1 gate robo or whatever, but as people get more greedy, the builds you have outlined will not be able to stop the mid-game advantage the other greedier player has received. Again, this reiterates my point that eventually you will have to be greedier, and when you do that and get 4 gated, you will also lose.
TL;DR I agree 4 gate is one of the weakest strategies in the current metagame at this point in time, but I also strongly believe it won't die out for a very long time. Great post though and glad you're helping everyone with these nice guides on builds! 
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On January 11 2012 03:17 caradoc wrote:
What about losing to an apparent but not-all-in 4gate in the long term via spending too much money on gas for sentries? I'm thinking of cases where your opponent takes the low ground, warps enough stuff in to make it look like he's being all-in aggressive, and techs behind it, forcing you to spend a lot on sentries to keep a constant ff up.
Could you show me such a build? that does sound like it'd be quite cryptic. I suppose counting the units would help somewhat. If this guy warps in 3 stalkers and 3 zealots at a standard 4gate timing (as in not a quick 3 gate), I'm going to know something is up, but I will still probably need to add a sentry or two just to be safe. Great question I hope I can answer it for you eventually
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On January 11 2012 09:55 SaroVati wrote:Although I agree 4 gate isn't the most viable strategy PvP anymore, I am quite skeptical about how you worded the fact that "4 gate is dead". Unless something big changes, I think we will still see 4 gate at the highest levels from time to time. The meta game already has shifted to "DO SOMETHING ELSE CAUSE YOUR OPPONENT IS STOPPING 4 GATE!" and that results in safe builds vs. the 4 gate. Unfortunately, these safe builds against the 4 gate can't pressure, and if your opponent is doing something even MORE greedy than you, he will win the game. This leads you to also cut corners, and eventually it gets to a point where you can't hold a 4 gate anymore either. What does this mean? I rarely ever 4 gate and agree it can be stopped with a huge advantage using 1 gate robo or whatever, but as people get more greedy, the builds you have outlined will not be able to stop the mid-game advantage the other greedier player has received. Again, this reiterates my point that eventually you will have to be greedier, and when you do that and get 4 gated, you will also lose. TL;DR I agree 4 gate is one of the weakest strategies in the current metagame at this point in time, but I also strongly believe it won't die out for a very long time. Great post though and glad you're helping everyone with these nice guides on builds!
I agree that simply the threat of 4gate existing means it can never die, but I feel like this opener is pretty damn greedy considering it's safety against a 4gate. I get my 1st tech structure off of one gate! I can sit pretty with 4 units up until any other build wants to start making units as well, as everyone has to be watching for the 4gate WP play. Unless they're being greedy to the point that they don't account for that. At that point it's just bad play
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I've been trying to emulate the openings, but i just can't seem to get that sentry out by 5:25. It's usually 9-10 seconds later for me, which is far too late against the 4gate to be of use. I guess I need to work on my mineral stacking?
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On January 11 2012 10:02 Minus151 wrote:
I've been trying to emulate the openings, but i just can't seem to get that sentry out by 5:25. It's usually 9-10 seconds later for me, which is far too late against the 4gate to be of use. I guess I need to work on my mineral stacking?
Mineral stacking, putting your buildings down on time and scout time all factor heavily into it.
Before you get to mineral stacking, I recommend just getting 8 probes on 8 different patches, then trying to get the next four of them on the closer patches on xel'naga
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I needed this guide like... like... I can't think of any analogy that doesn't involve cocaine. Thank you.
Two questions;
1) I realise you haven't tested against the 11gate max chrono builds, but I'm really curious what would happen. Are there any reactive adjustments you could think of to be sure you'd survive, before testing it properly? Even if they were massive overkill. I'm seeing 11gate 3/4gates really, really often on ladder on my level/server.
2) What do you do on maps where you have to scout earlier for proxies? My current go-to builds are the 11 probe puncher and (now) this, and both of those scout on core. I really don't know what to do on maps like Shakuras.
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What's the point of scouting so late? Couldn't you cut more corners if you scouted earlier to confirm they aren't 4gating? Does a core scout even give you any information except their location? Even at HSC the latest JYP and MC scouted was after the 16 pylon.
Even though you get 1 zealot 2 stalkers, you can't even fake a 4 gate so what is the point in getting the zealot. The build seems only useful if you 100% sure know your opponent is 4 gating. Even then I think I'd rather 3 stalker rush.
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How badly would you mess up these builds if you just did gate scouts?
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On January 11 2012 09:53 Alejandrisha wrote:Show nested quote ++ Show Spoiler +On January 11 2012 09:12 gdalam wrote:
Am I the only person who walks up the ramp immediately with my first Zealot and Stalker when I 4 Gate? This build doesn't seem to have anything to address that.
Being as aggressive as possible with your first Zealot and Stalker (ie. rallied to his base) will force a fight before your opponent's second Stalker is out (on most map distances). If your micro is even half decent and your opponent wasn't watching his ramp at that exact moment, you should be able to win the fight or at least trade evenly. This will allow you to easily get your Probe into his main and build your Pylons, nullifying the fast Sentry. well that's a hell of a condition as noted in the op, your first 3 units will be down the ramp spread in such a way to see a probe/approach at every angle. a zealot stalker and a probe.. i will focus down the probe before it gets up the ramp. at best you get 2 pylons down below the ramp. if you try to engage with your zealot stalker, i will kill them both for free, should time allow before i have to dance up my ramp as my sentry pops out
To clarify, what I meant was that if they aren't watching, you should be able to get in there and kill their initial Stalker and Zealot, putting yourself at a huge advantage. Even if they do catch you at the ramp, you should be able to trade and muck up their very tight anti 4Gate build.
And apparently you didn't understand what I said. If you rally your first Stalker over, you will get there before your opponent has their second Stalker (except certain cross spawns obviously). With half decent micro you'll be able to trade and get your Probe in there.
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On January 11 2012 10:05 Belisarius wrote:
I needed this guide like... like... I can't think of any analogy that doesn't involve cocaine. Thank you.
Two questions;
1) I realise you haven't tested against the 11gate max chrono builds, but I'm really curious what would happen. Are there any reactive adjustments you could think of to be sure you'd survive, before testing it properly? Even if they were massive overkill. I'm seeing 11gate 3/4gates really, really often on ladder on my level/server.
2) What do you do on maps where you have to scout earlier for proxies? My current go-to builds are the 11 probe puncher and (now) this, and both of those scout on core. I really don't know what to do on maps like Shakuras.
Glad I could help you out!
1. a good tinman will make the approach around 4:45. Your 2nd stalker will be just finishing at this point. I'm considering always placing my pylon+gate closer to the ramp just to account for this. You won't have the luxury of a second stalker to take down the probe, but you should still be able to deny an above ramp pylon. However, most 11 gates you see on the ladder will not be finely tuned enough to get the nearly ideal warp in of 5:22, finishing 5 seconds thereafter. Even if they do pull it off, you should be able to deny high ground vision for the first warp in with your 1z2s against his 1z1s, allowing your 1st sentry to get out with plenty of time to place the forcefield when he tries to get up the ramp and eventually warp in zealots. Your 2nd sentry timing is going to be very important here. You need to start warping it in 5 seconds before your 1st ff falls, put another way, 10 seconds after you place it. A pretty good 2nd sentry timing falls a bit before 5:50, which is troubling against a good tinman. If they push with 4s1z after the first warp-in, they'll hit the ramp at about 5:30 if they have REEEEALLY good timing. You still have a 1 stalker lead before his warp in, so you can at least stall him and then hold a strong presence above the ramp with 1z2s1s.
If his timing is perfect, I think it's a bit of a BO loss. But you don't usually see perfect timing, as that 5th CB on the WG tech is really hard to nail perfectly. Assuming a perfect 11 gate, you might only have success by pulling some probes as the stalkers are pushing up the ramp to buy some time for the 2nd sentry to warp in to try to deny vision up the ramp for the zealot warp-in which should always start AFTER you have your 2nd sentry and thus 2nd ff; if you can deny vision up for the zealot warp-in, you win if you can chain the 3rd ff in time. The 2 gate openers should shut this down if you can get to this point, but the 1 gate openers might not be able to get out the 3rd sentry in time 100% of the time
2. On shak, I'd scout for proxies in base and between your nat and the close nat and the tower on 12. You can still use this build, but with a slightly later core, zealot on 18 instead of 17, 2nd gas on 21 instead of 20. You have the advantage here later because you can zone an aggressive push through the large ramp, allowing you to snipe the probe 100% of the time, usually before they can even place the 2nd pylon, and usually netting yourself a free stalker if he's too pushy. This build is extremely strong on such maps for this reason; never lose to wg pressure on shak/antigua/entombed or forever live in shame!
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On January 11 2012 10:18 CrazyF1r3f0x wrote:
How badly would you mess up these builds if you just did gate scouts?
Not too badly. core time will suffer ~5 seconds. Not a big deal on maps like antigua/shak/entombed where you have the advantage of the secondary ramp to zone the approach. On metal, proxies are tough because you have to probe scout a long way to check for them (by your 3rd and by your gold), so I usually opt for 11gate here rather than this build.
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On January 11 2012 10:14 paintfive wrote:
What's the point of scouting so late? Couldn't you cut more corners if you scouted earlier to confirm they aren't 4gating? Does a core scout even give you any information except their location? Even at HSC the latest JYP and MC scouted was after the 16 pylon.
Even though you get 1 zealot 2 stalkers, you can't even fake a 4 gate so what is the point in getting the zealot. The build seems only useful if you 100% sure know your opponent is 4 gating. Even then I think I'd rather 3 stalker rush.
The zealot helps tremendously against any gw pressure builds and you might as well get it at the prescribed time because your production is going to be pretty tied up with stalker/sentry production until you have either ruled out WG aggression or after it is over. What else would one do with those minerals anyway? Investing it in an earlier gate is the trendy thing to do, but that's not my style :D
Zealot will also help against wp 4gate later on, and I don't have to blow and WG cool downs on it since I already have it!
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On January 11 2012 10:20 gdalam wrote:Show nested quote +On January 11 2012 09:53 Alejandrisha wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On January 11 2012 09:12 gdalam wrote:
Am I the only person who walks up the ramp immediately with my first Zealot and Stalker when I 4 Gate? This build doesn't seem to have anything to address that.
Being as aggressive as possible with your first Zealot and Stalker (ie. rallied to his base) will force a fight before your opponent's second Stalker is out (on most map distances). If your micro is even half decent and your opponent wasn't watching his ramp at that exact moment, you should be able to win the fight or at least trade evenly. This will allow you to easily get your Probe into his main and build your Pylons, nullifying the fast Sentry. well that's a hell of a condition as noted in the op, your first 3 units will be down the ramp spread in such a way to see a probe/approach at every angle. a zealot stalker and a probe.. i will focus down the probe before it gets up the ramp. at best you get 2 pylons down below the ramp. if you try to engage with your zealot stalker, i will kill them both for free, should time allow before i have to dance up my ramp as my sentry pops out To clarify, what I meant was that if they aren't watching, you should be able to get in there and kill their initial Stalker and Zealot, putting yourself at a huge advantage. Even if they do catch you at the ramp, you should be able to trade and muck up their very tight anti 4Gate build. And apparently you didn't understand what I said. If you rally your first Stalker over, you will get there before your opponent has their second Stalker (except certain cross spawns obviously). With half decent micro you'll be able to trade and get your Probe in there.
how will your 2 unchronoboosted stalkers get to my ramp before my 2nd stalker, chronoboosted, gets to my ramp..?
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Very cool was playing with the idea of scouting really late and using the extra minerals to do get out an additional Stalker and go 1 Gate Twilight most of my games. Survived a 4 Gate without making a single Sentry (blink finished in time) and then the other games my Blink timing was just earlier than prepared for resulting in timing attack wins. Pretty cool idea. Only thing is not sure what to do vs proxy 2 Gate?
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I used to defend 4gates with sentries, then I took a warp in to the knee.
Every season, Pro-Tossers claim that 4gate is dead and every season I change my build to something more econ or techy as a result and die to a 4gate.
I am now convinced that 4-gate is immortal. You can never kill it. and if you think it's dead and lower your guard, it will bludgeon you to death. The only way to defeat the monster is to become the monster.
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EPT
