There are many great guides on scouting in TvP but repetition never hurts so I will explain my thoughts on scouting a protoss.
I always scout with my barracks SCV which leaves plenty of time on most maps. On the very biggest maps such as Tal Darim and Antiga you may want to sent it out on 13 to ensure you can scout even if you get unlucky and find the enemy on the last possible location.
When entering the protoss base this is my 4-point checklist :
#1: Is the gateway building a zealot or not #2: How much chronoboost does the nexus have #3: 1 or 2 gas gysers #4: Find all 3 pylons and note their positions.
(I try to find them in this order every game, helps you to engrain it in your brainhole as a habit)
#Extra good stuff: Nexus block: Block the natural with an ebay if you scout 1 gas and chrono spent on probes AND you spot a probe leaving mineral line to build it. Build the ebay until 95% and then leave with your scv, try to delay canceling it as long as possible without letting it die.
The scouting probe: Try to keep an eye out if his scouting probe has returned to his base or not. Stop your scv by the watchtowers on your way back to base to try to find it. I always send my first marine out to hunt for this probe. If you run into a zealot just turn around and return to your base, the zealot cant catch the marine. Always return with the marine after checking 1 or 2 watchtowers so the stalker doesnt kill it.
There is not much you can do to stop the probe scouting your base, however there are a few things that may make a difference.
- If you take a gas build it in the furthest away scout position from the ramp. If he scouts you last and the marine is out with good stutter step you can often kill it before it spots your gas.
- If he arrives early chase that probe with an SCV. It takes away attention from his base management and if he really wants to get great information he has to keep the probe alive for a bit after the first marine is out because that is when either a factory or second rax is planted, which means he has spent an aweful lot of attention microing that probe around while it takes very little attention to just a-chase it, exactly like zealots work . If you are doing a 1-rax FE there is no point in chasing the probe, because on no gas the protoss already knows exactly what you are doing.
- If you open with reactor or 2 rax, keep your marines at the natural or main ramp to prevent stalker, zealot, or a probe poke. You will have enough marines to hold it off. Stutter-step the marines down if its only 1 stalker poking and you can sometimes kill it.
#1 - Scout - 1 gas, high nexus energy, all 3 pylons Tell: The protoss is probably going either fast expand or a 4 gate. Keep your initial scout alive close to his base to scout the natrual for a nexus. If he kills that with a stalker immidiately send out a new one across the map, if you see a probe moving towards your base assume its a 4-gate and bunker up and win.
#2 - Scout - 2 gas - low chrono, 3 pylons. Tell: When the protoss opens double gas, he could really be throwing anything in his early game arsenal your way and even mind game and FE a little bit slower. If you are far apart by air you can rule out any stargate play. That leaves the possible openings the protoss has to these: Immortal all-in, 3-gate blink stalker, 1 base collosus or Dark Templars.
#3 - Scout - 2 gas - low chrono - 2 pylons Send your scv around the map, there WILL be a hidden pylon somewhere on the map, kill it and you are in great shape. Expect your opponent to accuse you of map hacking here. Respond with BM.
In my opinion there are currently only 3 good builds that terrans open with versus protoss:
1/1/1: If you are opening with the 1/1/1 you really dont have to care what the hell the protoss is doing since you will have a bunker, a strong army and hit a timing attack which Protoss must react to.
Fast expand: Your only decision when FE is how many bunkers to build, to prepare reparing SCVs or not, saving oribtal energy and timing of your ebay. In scout case #2 you need to keep sending out scvs towards the protoss to get a tell of what he is doing.
If you spot 1 zealot and the rest all stalkers he wants to blink you. Build 2 bunkers at your front and 1 bunker in your main, keep some scvs by each bunker, try to scan and snipe the observer. Mass up on marauders and just try to take as few losses as possible. I push out when I have a decent number or marauders and my first 2 medivacs out. You will usually just win at this point.
If you spot an immortal: Bunker up hard with 4-5 bunkers and scvs on autorepair. You need to survive the first then second push and you will be in a huge lead. Dont salvage your bunkers unless you have map control and you are sure he isnt right outside your base. Protosses often push a second time if the first one fails, so dont be greedy, do rebuild bunkers that died in the first push. If you sense his push is too strong dont be afraid to pull all of your scvs to defend and tank damage.
If you dont see much at all its probably DTs. Get your ebay up right away and DO NOT drop any mules. Once ebay is done plant one turret at the front and one in your main. Try to bait the DTs into the turrets since good players will not keep sending DTs once the first is done and morph the rest into archons leaving him in a fine position. Basically dont let the protoss know you know he is going DT
I seldom see stargates anymore but I´ve also never had problem dealing with void rays. Just keep repairing the bunkers and get one on the high ground in case he tries to warp in units to your main under the cover of stalkers and void rays. Rebuild any depots that he manages to pick off and wait for him to commit or until you have enough of a force to just roll him, remember to pick off the void ray first with marines. Basically there is no rush for you to do anything other than defend.
If you scout early collosus. Most protoss will not push until their second collosus is done and the third one is on the way. Keep map control and 1 loaded medivac outside of range of his main. If his main army takes the watchtowers drop his main and force him to go back and defend or attack into your bunker line at your natural and die.
This is the standard response to collosus as a terran. You can not engage their army, but if you keep a few medivacs outside his main and push the natural with the rest of your army while constantly scanning you will find that you can drop the main and kill the natural or third when he goes to defend. Or kill a bunch of units in the main when he goes to save his natural or third. Never drop a protoss without threatening a second position, the drop will fail and you will be behind.
2- rax The third opener that terrans use versus protoss 2-3 rax aggression. *added the Polt 2 rax build to the end of this guide, it is the best early agression build at the moment in my opinion.
This is my favorite opener versus protoss because it is safe versus everything and gives you the army to punish bad decision making by the P. However dont do it on maps with huge rush distances.
If you scout 4 gate, just keep building army in your base and wait for the protoss to attack into you, get an inbase expansion and throw down a single bunker if you feel your macro has been sloppy.
If you scout 1 gate FE or FE first. Attack once you get your second marauder, try to catch zealots and stalkers out on the map. Once you reach his main you want him to engage you as soon as possible, if he waits for the second round of warp gate production you will lose. So engage right away picking of stalkers and you can do a lot of damage, if he pulls probes keep your reinforcements coming and just lightly kite them for as long as they stay alive. I often bring 1-2 scvs with this first push to plant down a bunker, hoping that he makes the mistake of attacking before his second wave of units, or waits too long and lets the bunker complete. Having the second scv infront of your army to tank one or two zealot stabs can also make the difference between winning and losing the fight, since that will let each marauder shot 2 concussive shells at them and they will be half dead by the time they reach you and you just need to do 1 or 2 stutters back to wipe them out, then finish off the stalkers or probes. Expect to lose a lot of games by over-extending this push but once you get the feel for when you can keep pushing in for a win and when you need to back off you will be on the road to becoming a TvP monster
If you scout double gas you will still push with your first 2 marauders but this time let the scv poke up into the main and your main army stand just below it or to the side. This takes some practice to get the timing in right. The important part is not to let your army get forcefielded in half at the ramp. The defending army up the ramp will give you loads of information.
- If the protoss just has 2 sentries to forcefield the ramp and a small army expect DTs or a Stargate. Build an ebay at home, inbase expansion, raise your depots, rally your barracks to the ramp, and keep 5 scvs on autoreapair. Keep pushing the front with your main army and try to kill his defending army before going back home.
- If you spot an immortal just turn around, get an expansion at your natural and a bunker or two, or 5 so scout again every few minutes, and always keep an scv 7-8 range infront of your bunkers to give you time to react.
- If you spot a larger gateway army, build an ebay to block his natural then go back home.
- If the protoss has more than 3 forcefields keep rallying units forward and push up once he runs out, you will usually win at this point.
I still find the mid-late and late game difficult versus Protoss since it is heavily centered around 1 or 2 big engagements.
There are 4 key points that will help you win these large engagments:
#1 Map control: Keep watch towers, patrolling scvs, scan and kill observers relentlessly. - Getting attacked while you are building supply depots in your base is very bad, you need to be ready for the engagement.
#2 Scan his army to check composition and upgrades - Respond with the standard good stuff. More vikings if he has a lot of collosus, more ghosts if archon, and more marines if zealot heavy.
#3 Be sneaky and take your time - This is in my opinion the most important aspect of late game TvP. Don´t just close your eyes throw some EMPs and stim into his prepared and spread army. Even doing something like threatening a base before engaging just to get his army to clump up is well worth it, or moving in then retreating to get them clumped, or forcing the engagement at the other end of the map and leaving a marauder hit squad to flank the trailing High Templars. Do the same trickery with vikings and catch any collosus without heavy stalker or archon cover. Be surgical with your EMPs land them where you want them to land! Once you have done the micro and control dont get too mesmerized by the battle, tap your barracks key and get those marines, marauders, vikings, and medivacs building. There is no worse feeling than crushing a protoss army and then realizing you havent been macroing behind it and pushing into him will result in a loss, so you are forced to go back home rebuild and do another huge engagement that you must win.
#4 Attack to win! - Yeah its an obvious point, but if you cant see yourself winning the battle, stall, delay move back until you know you can beat him.
- 12 rax - 1 marine then reactor right away (I like placing it at the ramp because it makes it look like a 1/1/1 - 13 gas - 15 orbital - 16/17 second barracks - try to hide it from the scouting probe, get tech lab once its done, start marauder and concussive right away, then get stim right after. - 17 get second supply depot
- constant marine and marauder prodcution out of the raxes, DO NOT get supply blocked a single time it will make the entire push pointless. Supply goes up quickly so you can have an SCV constantly building depots around your base.
Place expo once you can afford it with constant unit production, follow that up with your second refinery, a factory, and then a third refinery at natural followed by an engineering bay. Get startport once factory is done, reactor on factory. (lift factory and send it to land at protoss third or scout main).
Push out again with your first 2 medivacs. If he has low sentry count try to kite the zealots for free kills. If he has a lot of sentrys be very careful and try to bait forcefields. This is quite tricky what you want to do is run close enough to forcefields then stim back and catch a bunch of zealots and waste sentry energy (use this same technique to bait and avoid storms late game). If you get trapped pick the trapped units with a medivac and drop them behind the forcefield.
If he has a collosus you know what to do, drop bait him.
**Extra good stuff** After you start stim you can take 1-2 scvs off gas to get your expansion up faster.
**Mental notes** Get the second supply depot after the reactor is placed. Hide your first marauder from the ramp. Concussive will be done around the time of the second marauder, dont forget STIM! The 2 scvs joining the fight can be sent out a little bit after the main army pushes out. Push with marines up front and marauders out of vision up to the watch tower. If the protoss sees the marauders he will know exactly whats coming and start chronoboosting his gateways. Try to get the stalker at the watch tower to chase your marines back towards your marauders, catch them with concussive! DO NOT forget to start your expansion while you are pushing the protoss, even a short delay on this will put you far behind. Leave an idle scv at natural or in main to quickly build it during fighting.
Thanks for reading this guide, I know some of the explantions are way drawn out but the content should be good. Would love if some P´s could betray their own race and let us know exactly how many units and at what time they could have those when DT rushing.
My TvZ is aweful so you had problems with P but smash Zergs into the ground please share your insights with me
Haha TvZ used to be my best matchup, but my TvP was pretty mediocre and my TvT was awful and switched races ): But seriously, mech is a nightmare to deal with in ZvT. In Tal Darim and maps where you feel you can abuse reapers, open 11 rax 12 gas into a reaper bunker rush, skipping all marines: if the bunker goes up, the hatch will go down. No need to proxy it; place it in the choke of the natural. Expand when you can, and place a factory next to the Tech Labed rax and prepare to go mech. Usually you'll go for 1 fac with reactor + 2 with tech labs, and then add 1~2 more when money allows. be active with the hellions, denying creep tumours and getting map control.
If you scout roaches, 2-port banshees will deal tons of damage; delay the extra factorys till you stop making banshees. Same goes for infestors. Now, if you expect muta ling, get blue flame and an armory ASAP and prepare for a 2-base thor hellion timing; that shit is strong. Get +1 attack (hellions will roast everything so quickly) or +1 armor, so thors are hard as fuck to kill. Push when you have like 4~6 thors and tons of hellions, and expand behind it.
Only get siege before blue flame if you expect a heavy roach all in; you have a rax from the opening, you can use it to produce marines for defense or scout with it. Be careful with roach drops, those can do a lot of damage. If he's going roach heavy make more tanks, if he's going muta heavy more thors etc. Don't be afraid to pull a ton of scvs for repair, they're so worth it.
As you approach the end of mid game, start getting ghosts. Maybe post-nerf they won't be as good, but right now they absolutely wreck ultras and broods, so mech + ghosts late game is pretty awesome.
If you are going for 2-port banshees as in response to roaches and/or infestors, 1~3 factorys is ok before you get your third. If you are going full mech, 3~4 factorys is mandatory. Get a starport for blue flame drops if your timing doesn't outright kill him, and get turrets and tanks to secure your third. You can actually turtle in 3 bases till you reach a mass of thors, hellions and tanks around 160 pop with good upgrading and just go kill him.
In bigger maps you can also go reactored hellions into a third macro CC very quickly (Thorzain style) and rush upgrades while securing that fast third, just watch out for roach drops, that thing is nasty against this style. Btw, you must always scout the spire, if he's rushing for broods you'll need lots of vikings, and that is one of the main responses to mech nowadays. Just get a lot of vikings and push him, you'll probably be able to do a lot of damage.
What i try to do in TvZ is do timings based on my upgrades and zerg expands. I like more frontal attacks style and big battles so i don't harass much only if we trade armies and i have some leftovers. For openings there are alot : I use CC first sometimes,1rax reactor expand then hellions or normal reactor expand. For scouting i think there are 2~3 styles you should look for which require diffrent setup ups :
1 - The normal muta/ling/bane. It seems alot of zergs nowdays drift away from it ( or atleast EU). When i see this style I plan a 2 base timing attack to brake his 3rd or atleast deal some dmg and expand myself. Also with this style try to be active with your army scan, keep him busy and push on his main don't try to get other bases because you might get flank because of his mobile army. This way you will also keep his mutas with his army insted of harassing your bases. 2 - the mass ling 2 evo's/infestor build. I h8 this build the most because sometimes i play too greedy and zerg rolls me with 120lings from 3bases 2-1 upgrades. With this style try to play defensive i usually drop 2 factories and focus on upgrades for my marines and tanks. I kinda skip the ghosts for the infestors because i think with the right sieges you can beat his comp ( but thats only my opinion) Also you can be rly harass heavy vs this style because infestors are slow and he has only lings if you did some 2engi build you are in awesome shape to drop and fight 1 on 1 with lings. GET A VIKING its amazing how it works with no mutas it opens paths for drops and he has no vision of the map. 3 - Any other comps like roaches/banes just mech on them and turtule like Flash and you will be fine.
Basicly in TvZ is who can trade his army more efficient so think in that way : How I'm suppose to trade efficient in this situation ? Are you gonna do drops and harass or do frontal attacks with big timings ? It's all up to you. Also you need to know when the Zerg expands keep some marines scvs on possible 3rd bases. Always scan after 3rd base for Hive and drop a 2nd starport so you don't die to silly BL switches.
Great guide. I like the set up, and there's no such thing as too much information about scouting, BO, etc, as long as the information is useful. Under the scouting section, what about the number of gates? I feel like that is also a tell, because 2 gates usually means some sort of pressure coming, instead of an FE. Thanks!
On February 17 2012 02:22 cydial wrote: Good pointers, but it bothers me that you didn't actually add in any timings....
An SCV for example should leave the protoss base and hide before 4:00 because that's when a stalker will pop out unless he went nexus 15.
Knowing the stalker timing at around 4 minutes is good.
Besides that there are no timings that are worth noting in my opinion. Even knowing when DTs could come doesnt aid your decision making, since getting an early ebay is decided on the information gathered from the P, not the timing of when it could come.
I dont like associating the game to the timer, because knowing the fastest possible collosus, dt, void ray, high templar with storm is really useless. Basically you should be reading your opponent not the in-game timer.
Great guide. I like the set up, and there's no such thing as too much information about scouting, BO, etc, as long as the information is useful. Under the scouting section, what about the number of gates? I feel like that is also a tell, because 2 gates usually means some sort of pressure coming, instead of an FE. Thanks!
Thanks.
You usually dont get to scout more than the pylons, nexus energy and gases until you are forced out of the base.
However a trick I forgot to mention is leaving an scv out on the map and running it into the protoss base when/if they do the zealot/stalker poke can sometimes let you get a free scout of the entire P main. Most Protoss are getting good at finding hidden scvs in and around there natural these days so keep it a bit futher out of range.
As far as responding to 2 or 3 gate pressure expand. FE: you already have a bunker up and will rarely die, worst case you build a few too many bunkers because it can be hard to tell if its an all in or pressure. However you still have your expansion up before his so its better to stay safe than to dismiss it as pressure and then die to the all-in.
2-rax: If he comes to you he will get crushed. If you push his base you need to retreat if you see that large gateway army. Put down your expansion and the game is still even and moves into mid game.
On February 17 2012 02:35 Severus_ wrote: What i try to do in TvZ is do timings based on my upgrades and zerg expands. I like more frontal attacks style and big battles so i don't harass much only if we trade armies and i have some leftovers. For openings there are alot : I use CC first sometimes,1rax reactor expand then hellions or normal reactor expand. For scouting i think there are 2~3 styles you should look for which require diffrent setup ups :
1 - The normal muta/ling/bane. It seems alot of zergs nowdays drift away from it ( or atleast EU). When i see this style I plan a 2 base timing attack to brake his 3rd or atleast deal some dmg and expand myself. Also with this style try to be active with your army scan, keep him busy and push on his main don't try to get other bases because you might get flank because of his mobile army. This way you will also keep his mutas with his army insted of harassing your bases. 2 - the mass ling 2 evo's/infestor build. I h8 this build the most because sometimes i play too greedy and zerg rolls me with 120lings from 3bases 2-1 upgrades. With this style try to play defensive i usually drop 2 factories and focus on upgrades for my marines and tanks. I kinda skip the ghosts for the infestors because i think with the right sieges you can beat his comp ( but thats only my opinion) Also you can be rly harass heavy vs this style because infestors are slow and he has only lings if you did some 2engi build you are in awesome shape to drop and fight 1 on 1 with lings. GET A VIKING its amazing how it works with no mutas it opens paths for drops and he has no vision of the map. 3 - Any other comps like roaches/banes just mech on them and turtule like Flash and you will be fine.
Basicly in TvZ is who can trade his army more efficient so think in that way : How I'm suppose to trade efficient in this situation ? Are you gonna do drops and harass or do frontal attacks with big timings ? It's all up to you. Also you need to know when the Zerg expands keep some marines scvs on possible 3rd bases. Always scan after 3rd base for Hive and drop a 2nd starport so you don't die to silly BL switches.
Thanks. Solid pointers. Reading your post and Vicarous before it makes me feel my TvZ style is probably dated, going marine tank every game regardless of Zerg composition. Looking back its probabaly started going downhill for me once the stephano mass upgraded ling style started getting popular and zergs got super efficient at defending marine drops. Going to work on my mech in TvZ. Also like that you mention how many buildings to get on each base, which is essential for solid macro. Whats the standard amount of factories per base?
So I might as well add that to the TvP pointers. The standard rule of 4 production buildings per base is spot on in my opinion.
With the 2 rax: After getting your starport up, add 3 more barracks as you can afford them. Get another reactor if he is zealot heavy otherwise give them techlabs. You can afford constant production out of these on 2 base while getting upgrades and then a third. So in total you will have 1 reactor barracks, 4 tech lab barracks, and 1 reactor starport. ( I count each reactor building as 2 since it has double production, so on 2 base you have 8 in total). Once your third has started to build, add another 4 barracks.
FE: You usually get 3 barracks, followed by startport and then 2 more baracks. But if you were to open with say 4 rax the rule is still the same and you only add 1 more barracks after the reactor starport. Once your third has started to build, add another 4 barracks.
Following this makes macro decision making very simple.
You aim for 3bases : 5 raxes ( 1 tech lab 4reactors) 2ebays 1 armory 2 factories 1 reactor starport ( 2 ports if you didn't kill 3rd and saw Hive + BL's) When you get your 4th get 3 more raxes and get tech labs + 2 ghost academy for nukes,upgrades Here are also some reps: Bomber vs Idra
#3 - Scout - 2 gas - low chrono - 2 pylons Send your scv around the map, there WILL be a hidden pylon somewhere on the map, kill it and you are in great shape. Expect your opponent to accuse you of map hacking here. Respond with BM.
Would you do this even when doing a 1 rax FE ? I'm afraid to lose my few marines to their stalker and zealot if I go chasing after the inevitable close by warp-in pylon right away.
"#3 Be sneaky and take your time - This is in my opinion the most important aspect of late game TvP. Don´t just close your eyes throw some EMPs and stim into his prepared and spread army. Even doing something like threatening a base before engaging just to get his army to clump up is well worth it, or moving in then retreating to get them clumped, or forcing the engagement at the other end of the map and leaving a marauder hit squad to flank the trailing High Templars. Do the same trickery with vikings and catch any collosus without heavy stalker or archon cover. Be surgical with your EMPs land them where you want them to land! Once you have done the micro and control dont get too mesmerized by the battle, tap your barracks key and get those marines, marauders, vikings, and medivacs building. There is no worse feeling than crushing a protoss army and then realizing you havent been macroing behind it and pushing into him will result in a loss, so you are forced to go back home rebuild and do another huge engagement that you must win."
As a toss player, I think this is the best advice I've read on TvP in awhile. I find that the winner of the big engagements in TvP is usually the one who has initiative in the fight. Faking an attack to cause us to clump up to make you EMPs more effective or move us out of position often works against me...if nothing else, it forces me to make a decision about army movement that I wasn't planning on making.
These are precious advice to me as TvP is by far my worst matchup (must have like 85% loss ratio). I wish I could repay you with some equally good stuff about TvZ, as I am a Zerg demolisher. In my league. Which is gold, so I doubt it would matter.
In any cases, thanks for the good stuff.
One thing though : I found this thread while looking for a PvT help thread, in order to possibly find what does bother the Protoss in that matchup. I haven't find one yet. I can't help but notice there are actually very few "help" thread concerning protoss. Anyway, maybe you should look for a ZvT help thread and just read what bother the GM level zergs in that matchup.
High masters Terran player here, TvZ is my best matchup by far.
I don't think I saw what specifically you have problems with TvZ, but in my opinion, the safest way to play is always get at least one banshee. You won't lose to all ins. Banshees 2 shot banelings, and can just follow roaches from zergs base all the way back to yours, picking off a few on the way.
I don't know if you've played much mech, but here's a build fOrGG used a bunch a couple weeks back on his stream:
10 - depot (wall) 12 - rax (no wall) 13 - gas 15 - orbital 16 - depot (wall) factory @ 100 gas (use scv that build depot reactor @ rax gas depot (wall) starport @ fac complete switch fac and rax tech lab @ rax 2 hellions cloak @ starport banshee 36 - CC @ 6:20 tech lab @ rax lift starport after 2 banshees lift rax @ tech lab complete 2 factories on 2 empty tech labs armory @facs complete, 2 thors, follow with 2 more asap continue making hellions, but prioritize thors @ 4 thors, push towards zerg base, pull 10 scvs to autorepair, bring hellions and banshees with
Transition into mech. Get bf, +1 attack, go for 3rd base. You always want to have a couple thors, but most zergs will do a mass roach counter, so you 100% need tanks.
It's really hard to outline the whole game for you here... Shoot me a PM if you're interested in any replays
On February 17 2012 18:50 Leargle wrote: I don't think I saw what specifically you have problems with TvZ, but in my opinion, the safest way to play is always get at least one banshee.
I don't agree 100% with that. While this is great when going for mech, it's detrimental when you're playing marine-tank, as it slows your other tech down by quite a lot.
Try doing the Bomber style of TvZ. Day9 has a daily on it and it's pretty sick actually. A very simple way to play, and it helps learn a lot about the matchup since you don't care what type of strategy he goes for.
On February 17 2012 18:50 Leargle wrote: I don't think I saw what specifically you have problems with TvZ, but in my opinion, the safest way to play is always get at least one banshee.
I don't agree 100% with that. While this is great when going for mech, it's detrimental when you're playing marine-tank, as it slows your other tech down by quite a lot.
Don't underestimate the power of banshees ^^
A pretty good example game is jjakji vs Sen from this season of Code S on Dual Sight. He opens banshee and hits a very nice 2 base marine tank timing. There was more at work here than just the banshee, but Sen did go for a roach pressure and it got completely wrecked.
On February 17 2012 18:50 Leargle wrote: I don't think I saw what specifically you have problems with TvZ, but in my opinion, the safest way to play is always get at least one banshee.
I don't agree 100% with that. While this is great when going for mech, it's detrimental when you're playing marine-tank, as it slows your other tech down by quite a lot.
Don't underestimate the power of banshees ^^
A pretty good example game is jjakji vs Sen from this season of Code S on Dual Sight. He opens banshee and hits a very nice 2 base marine tank timing. There was more at work here than just the banshee, but Sen did go for a roach pressure and it got completely wrecked.
Well, the problem is when they don't try to apply pressure. It's like bunkers, they're great when they attack you, but if they don't attack you've only lost money. Do you have an example of this?
If they don't attack you get to harass them with said banshees :D
Sometimes you get the free win if they don't have detection, but that's a bit of a coin flip scenario. Often times you'll get a queen and a few drones while they make the spores.
On February 17 2012 20:12 Leargle wrote: If they don't attack you get to harass them with said banshees :D
Sometimes you get the free win if they don't have detection, but that's a bit of a coin flip scenario. Often times you'll get a queen and a few drones while they make the spores.
Yeah, but it's far from always that pays of more than investing in your bio-upgrades. As I said, it's great for mech, but when going for a marine-tank composition it's not that great.
I'm not nearly at your level but the way I have success with Zerg is just always be in their face and never let them get comfortable. Once you have proper upgrades, you can trade so effectively with micro. I personally like to do a really fast 3rd orbital from a hellion opening, with 1-2 marauders in a bunker in case of roaches.
I like to corner the zerg with 3 bases, then take a slower 4th, but a faster 5th if that makes sense. Everytime I see a Zerg take a base, I like to take one too. Also I like to drop in 2-3 places at once and move out with my main army for map position. Once I get the middle, all I really need to do is check every so often for Hive tech and adjust accordingly. Always drop to keep the zerg from being too comfortable. At the later game stages, I always snipe expos too.
edit: also I'm not a big fan of mech. I think there are really strong timings, but I always find really fast (15-16 minute BL's) are hard to deal with, and if you don't do good enough of a job denying a 3rd expo, zerg can easily roll you.
Dealing with Zerg as Terran is interesting, because there's generally 1 of 2 ways the game will play out in standard scenarios:
1. Both sides get 2-3 bases and Zerg goes for early ling/bling/Muta OR Infestor/Ling, and then Infestor/Broodlord.
- deal with this by not letting him get Hive. Properly executed Tank/Marine/Medivac pushes should come just before the Mutas hit if he's going Muta or soft contain the edge of creep when he's going Infestor/Ling. Keeping ahead on upgrades will be a big help here. Zerg is curious in this style because there is almost no way they can attack a properly defended Terran ball with enough siege tanks in the right position, but you must keep yourself aware of positioning so that you don't get caught with your pants down. Add Thors for Muta zone control if desired.
2. Zerg goes 1-2 base baneling bust/roach-hydra.
- easy to deal with in general. Getting your siege tanks up in time completely negates baneling bust, and roaches should be responded to with as many tanks/thors as possible. Simply push, don't get caught unsieged, and watch the roaches melt.
If the Zerg does get hive in either of these scenarios, you need to be prepared. Preparations must include at least 1 or 2 additional Starports, 1 with a Tech Lab, and a whole bunch of Tech Lab barracks (if you've been going marine/tank this is nice because you already have Infantry ups going). Aggressively scan and scout him to see what's coming. If there are 0 Corruptors on the field, assume Ultras. You will need lots of Marauders and Tanks, aggressively sieged to prevent the Ling/Ultra ball from rolling you. Nukes would not be a bad idea either. If you see a blob of Corruptors, assume Broodlords. Keep building Marine/Ghost, but make sure to slam out 3-4 Vikings at once, and get at least 1 or 2 Ravens. The Ravens will drop PDD to keep your Vikings from getting mauled by 20 Corruptors while they obliterate the Broodlords. Use Ghost EMPs to get rid of Infestors, and try to spread preemptively so that Fungals don't kill you instantly.
This one isn't the same build order, but it's another viable mech opener. Got gas capped so I went for double reactor hellion into thor/hellion timing attack http://drop.sc/113663
Annnnnd then 14cc into double armory mech because I fucking can. http://drop.sc/113665
Surprisingly , the build/style that actually works best for me at the moment , is the bomber style of play which was also covered by day9 (Daily#395). If yo don't know it , short summary:
You get a fast third, +2/+1 upgrades, and the first time you push out is when the upgrades finish, which is at the time youre nearly maxed out. When you move out you also take your 4th. Allthough it sounds really passive , its actually pretty great. The push will hit really hard and eventually kill the zerg all right if he went expansion crazy, because your army will just be too big. If he is able to defend, you can start to drop , and go into usual late game.
I wonder, what do you think of 1 rax marauder opener?. I do it all the time and it's hilarious when Protoss just sends their first stalker in to scout and loses it so quickly. It allows for a pretty quick CC, safely on the low ground, start stim (or combat shield) early and I've found it's virtually a build order win against blink builds.
On February 18 2012 01:14 Huggerz wrote: Love the thread, thanks for posting.
I wonder, what do you think of 1 rax marauder opener?. I do it all the time and it's hilarious when Protoss just sends their first stalker in to scout and loses it so quickly. It allows for a pretty quick CC, safely on the low ground, start stim (or combat shield) early and I've found it's virtually a build order win against blink builds.
It's pretty easy to scout, and any stargate/immortal based all in will completely wreck it.
I did this build for quite a long time. Around mid diamond players figure out how to beat it completely. Better off doing the reactor first 2 rax or the rainbow rush (conc marauder + hellions).
Nice guide. Playing random means that I know what protoss buildings =, but ur ways of dealing with certain more unique protoss all in builds are very useful . I especially like the way you counter collussus (drop baiting or whatever you called it). I would offer some advice in tvz but seeing as your a full league higher than me; I'm assuming that you know everything I could possibly tell you ^_^;: Thanks anyways though.
What do you think of the proxy center of the map marauder rush? I saw it a couple of times (gsl/ksl etc) and this build looks stellar; I mean you're almost guaranteed to force him to pull probes, and as soon as that happens he will be automatically taking economical damage- where as you are left completely untouched which gives you the choice of continuing to pressure him or simply grabbing an expansion and waiting for your 2 base timing (with proper scouting I don't see how the protoss can grab the advantage back short of some kind of unscouted 1 base all in, defending (but with less production...) your 2 base timing) - and that's only if you chose to play it that way;
I don't think that we really need 0:00 timers since most of these builds have been allocated whole threads where the timings are gone into in length and detail...
On February 18 2012 01:46 MyTHicaL wrote: Nice guide. Playing random means that I know what protoss buildings =, but ur ways of dealing with certain more unique protoss all in builds are very useful . I especially like the way you counter collussus (drop baiting or whatever you called it). I would offer some advice in tvz but seeing as your a full league higher than me; I'm assuming that you know everything I could possibly tell you ^_^;: Thanks anyways though.
What do you think of the proxy center of the map marauder rush? I saw it a couple of times (gsl/ksl etc) and this build looks stellar; I mean you're almost guaranteed to force him to pull probes, and as soon as that happens he will be automatically taking economical damage- where as you are left completely untouched which gives you the choice of continuing to pressure him or simply grabbing an expansion and waiting for your 2 base timing (with proper scouting I don't see how the protoss can grab the advantage back short of some kind of unscouted 1 base all in, defending (but with less production...) your 2 base timing) - and that's only if you chose to play it that way;
I don't think that we really need 0:00 timers since most of these builds have been allocated whole threads where the timings are gone into in length and detail...
Thanks.
The proxy marauder rush is not something I have ever tried. Off the top of my head the advantage is that it hits sooner and will do a lot of damage to stalker first builds.
The disadvantages are that you have an exposed tech lab (getting your stim or combat shields cancelled sucks!, leaves your base undefended so a protoss can hold your pressure then warp in units and walk into your main.
On February 18 2012 01:50 Laurens wrote: question about the polt 2 rax:
When do you add more raxes, when the starport is building or after you put down a 3rd in your base?
You add 3 barracks as you can afford them after you started building the 2 medivacs out of the reactored starport.
If your first push did a lot of damage you COULD get the 3rd command center before the 3 barracks. Personally I never do it because it leaves you unnecessarily vulnerable to counter attacks.
Masters Terran Here First, consider the metagame - what have you been seeing?
I think watching recently TLO @ MLG, Stephano, and fairly recently Nestea and many more opting for zergling focused strategies involving double evo and early macro hatches. I see very few zergs opting for a quick roach warren evem when zerg gets a good scout off on the reactor factory.
I think this is a good enough reason to use a hellion build and work on your hellion control. Hellion control, is about 100x easier than marine control and hellions are far stronger vs lings, so there's 2 more reasons to make some hellions. I think the best build going at the moment is reactor hellion expand into double reactor factory hellions, hitting initially with 4 or 2/4 and kill any lings and poke at his drones. If he is super greedy feel free to go for a runby and fry a bunch of drones.
If you kept the hellions alive, use a watchtower scv to repair them, and return with 10-12 hellions and fry him up, kill the lings first.
Just do everything you can to hide what you're doing, which should be easy because you have hellions which = map control.
P.S. I think rallying your first marine to his base and building a bunker is pretty awesome, you can usually get at least one drone kill and I often get the bunker up. You even get an occasional over-reaction from about a quarter of masters zergs. Especially if he hasn't scouted you, he may not be super sharp on his timings and not know that a proxy 2 rax would have hit earlier (but it's really close even on a map like antigua).
I also think proxy 2 rax on antigua is sick with a far back bunker to protect a closer bunker. Proxy 2 rax never disappears completely in the gsl, sometimes it is just awesome and is an okay alternative to going hellions every game, but you can't really go too wrong going hellions.
On February 18 2012 01:14 Huggerz wrote: Love the thread, thanks for posting.
I wonder, what do you think of 1 rax marauder opener?. I do it all the time and it's hilarious when Protoss just sends their first stalker in to scout and loses it so quickly. It allows for a pretty quick CC, safely on the low ground, start stim (or combat shield) early and I've found it's virtually a build order win against blink builds.
To me that is an advanced build you could use if you truly understand your opponent and how they react.
Let me explain. It does not give the attack and safety of a 2 rax and not as great an economy lead as a FE.
Its basically a mind-game pressure build where you hope to trick the protoss to over-prepare defenses (chronoboosting or cutting probes). Its the equivalent of bunker pressuring a zerg. I am assuming you must get 1 marine before the marauder to hide your intentions from the scouting probe to be able to catch the stalker, a Protoss should never stalker poke if they have seen a tech lab barracks.
On February 18 2012 01:14 Huggerz wrote: Love the thread, thanks for posting.
I wonder, what do you think of 1 rax marauder opener?. I do it all the time and it's hilarious when Protoss just sends their first stalker in to scout and loses it so quickly. It allows for a pretty quick CC, safely on the low ground, start stim (or combat shield) early and I've found it's virtually a build order win against blink builds.
a Protoss should never stalker poke if they have seen a tech lab barracks.
And if the do you kill it and then tab out and turn on
I'd love to see a few replays of yours doing the 2rax vs protoss. The more the better :3
About TvZ: I was a high masters zerg and switched to terran a little more than a month ago and I do MVP's double expand build every game. Here's the replay http://drop.sc/51169 (MVP vs nestea) The build is very hard to execute and from what I can tell it's only good vs standard ling bling muta play, but is kinda weak to ling bling muta all in and ling infestor. I changed the BO a little bit though and get my ebay at about 7mins and push when I got 2-1 at about 15mins with about 180 supply. If you check out the bomber tvz daily by day9 you'll see a very similar build.
A question to ShaneFeit regarding the Polt 2 Rax: 1) What is the target supply to push out or the time to push out on both small or large maps? 2) Do I keep rallying units when I push out or leave them in my base? 3) Should I start stim instantly after Conc? If my army gets cleaned up but I ALOT of damage, do I allin or macro up?
Thanks again for this guide, I haven't won a match vs protoss since last december :') (plat terran here).
EPT
. If you are doing a 1-rax FE there is no point in chasing the probe, because on no gas the protoss already knows exactly what you are doing. 
. I especially like the way you counter collussus (drop baiting or whatever you called it). I would offer some advice in tvz but seeing as your a full league higher than me; I'm assuming that you know everything I could possibly tell you ^_^;: 
