This might sound like a troll title, but I am absolutely serious. My exploration into the TvP matchup has turned up some ugly truths for me that I am not sure how to deal with. I am beginning to think that there are no safe, go to builds vs protoss. My attempt to play the matchup and learn from players better than myself have all been rather fruitless; I never win macro games against toss... I never seen pro players win macro games against protoss either, and well over half the time a terran will cheese a protoss or go for a two base timing rather then play standard. I have heard the term "coinflip" used to describe the matchup before, but never understood it. I think I am beginning to understand now.
I have started numerous threads on Team liquid asking for help. Lately, I have been playing TvP exclusively with practice partners; in the last 3 days I think I have played 20 tvps and for the last two or three months I have been really focused on the matchup. I have been re watching vods from the gsl, trying to learn from pro terran players. I have sat with six streams, two on each of my three monitors, watching for a tvp matchup to come on so I can pause the rest and try and learn. And what i have learned is there is absolutely zero stability to the matchup for terran, and late game tvp seems literally impossible so long as the protoss doesn't royally fuck up. I am not trying to troll here. This is not meant to be flame bait. This is exactly what I have seen and exactly how I feel about the matchup right now.
To add some context, i am a newly promoted diamond league player on the NA server. And I think I need to clarify the above; terran does win sometimes late game vs protoss in pro matchups and on player streams.However, this seems to be an exceptionally rare thing lately. I have watched everyone from Kas, ganzi, gretorp, forGG, demuslim, and every noname high level masters player with all of 6 stream veiwers, trying to figure out exactly what it is I am doing wrong. Trying to understand the decisions I need to make to turn this matchup around for me. So far I have come up empty handed; I just have no idea how at terran should play tvp.
I know I don't like to cheese. I know any gas opening for terran can be beat if by a protoss handily even if they fast expand ( in fact, I would argue that many terran 1 base pressure builds and all ins are easier to hold if protoss fast expands). I have played around some with super greedy 3cc openings and determined that they are simply not safe. This leads me to believe the only stable way to play the matchup is to fast expand and go double gas.
However, if you 1 rax expand as terran in tvp the matchup goes down a very predictable road, a road that seems to have terran at a disadvantage at every turn. There simply are no good two base timing attacks for terran in TvP; there is some marine tank stuff but nothing that you can transition out very easily. There are a plethora of pressure builds, timing attacks, and all-ins for protoss off two base that are really good. I have heard some pros say that some two base immortal timings are simply impossible to stop. I don't know about that, but they certainly feel that way.
Most of the protoss I play tend to favor macro games, however. In macro games, I feel like protoss has some distinct advantages against bio that I just don't know how to overcome.I do the most standard possible, 1 rax fe into three rax, I go for fast stem and combat sheilds with two tech labs. I then get an e-bay, get +1 attack, get a factory, take a third gas, make three medivacs, and push consistently just after 10 minutes with three medivacs and mostly marines. If the protoss isn't playing greedy as hell, I won't attack the front. I will drop the main and the third base and try and keep protoss busy while I take my third base. Often times I am able to get my third up faster then protoss, sometimes significantly faster then protoss.
If I am macroing well, I will move up to 5 barracks, get a ghost academy, and then take my fourth base about two minutes after my third. I will continue to drop, get upgrades, move around the map, and try and macro like a champ. Many, many times I find myself with a supply lead, a base lead, sometimes even an upgrades lead. Sounds great right?
But its not. The protoss eventually becomes too big to contain to two base, so they take at third. Then eventually they max out, and take a fourth. And then from there its all down hill. I know ideally if you are ahead as terran, you want to force protoss to stay on two bases indefinitely. But with third bases on most maps being so easy to defend, and with the protoss army being generally more cost efficient anyway, how the hell do you do that? I have a practice partner that goes two base HT, and just turtles the entire game. If I try and attack the front, I get murdered by storms and forcefields. if I try and drop, I get maybe a pylon, sometimes more; when the protoss has so few bases to defend and can warp in units on top of a drop... I don't understand how its possible to do more then that. So inevitably, despite my best efforts, a protoss given time can take as many bases as they need and I have no idea how to stop it.
Que TvP late game. With all my extra economy and production, its seems like there should be a way to cash that in for the late game. Either in overwhelming production, superior tech, or some kind of advantage. I don't really know how to do that. A terran can build a million turrets and planetary fortress and whatever else and force it to be half map vs half map, but I don't feel like that at all favors terran; a protoss with half the map can make 27 gateways, mass up resources, and win any fight because of the warp in mechanic.
Endless waves of units doesn't work either. The toss army is so cost efficient when put in a defensive position. Its impossible to force and advantageous engagements as terran; if you lead with vikings they all get shot down, you try and be aggressive with ghosts and emps and they die to zealots. If a protoss does''t attack you they don't risk superior concaves, good emps and positioning, ect.
And late game tech for terran just doesn't exist for this matchup. Battle cruisers are no good, tanks never seem to work out; there is some cute theory crafting you can do with ravens but I don't have a clue how you make it work. Ghost are obviously good but you reach a certain point where more just simply is not better. having 6 ghosts feels great, having 12 ghosts feels the exact same. Have anymore then that and I feel like your army might actually get weaker.
Maybe the trick is to do insistent dropping late game? after all, a max toss army can't warp in right? But in practice it never seems to work that way. A protoss can harrass with zealot warp ins, dts, and warp prisms as effectively, if not more so effectively, then a terrran can with drops. Zealots become essentially free after a point, so losing 5 or 6 at at time actually helps protoss; if a protoss can stay at about 190 supply and keep terran busy putting out small fires they are in great shape. if a terran trys to drop late game its makes defending zealot warp ins that much more difficult, and because protoss is routinely sacrificing zealots they can still warp in units on top of the drop! Also, when both players are maxed with 2k+ in the bank, killing six probes and a gateway doesn't mean shit late game. Its literally not worth the APM. over commit to dropping by trying to do like six at a time in different places, and a protoss can just counter your main and win the game. Its so fragile late game. And toss armies are so cost effective; even with perfect micro (Which I don't have) storms, collossus, high templary, chargelots, ect are really good. Especially if protoss can warp in ten or more after a fight to clean up or provide fodder to save some of their more expensive units.
I know this is essentially a giant QQ thread, but understand I wouldn't be making it if I had any idea what I was supposed to do. I am at a complete loss. I want to play a macro focused style vs protoss. I understand that a terran army requires tons of micro and necessitates harass to stay even against a protoss or zerg; but with the current metagame and balance it feels impossible to ever meaningfully get ahead, or to position myself to win a game. If I play a zerg, at least with the current patch, I generally feel at a disadvantage in the late game against broodlord infestor, but I have some ideas about what I can do to stop it. In the early game, mid game, and late game there are techniques I can employ to harasser and get ahead, their are compositions that are powerful and potent and if the situation arises it is possible to push directly into a zerg and end the game. I don't feel like that against protoss. It feels like I follow a script that inevitably leads to me either dieing to a two base timing attack, or losing 25 minutes into the game despite all my best efforts.
Below is a DL link for a zip archive which contains all of the practice games I have played. They are my most recent, best executed games. There is some evolution in there, so keep that in mind if you watch one of the earlier ones. I can find mistakes I made in all of them, but what I can't find is a method I can use to turn my losses into victories. I can strive to execute perfectly but I can't figure how to capitalize in my advantages to win the game.
http://www.mediafire.com/?0xnzacf39wcyfmk (its about 20 games. In particular, I would like to know about what to do with antiga shipyard(63) and korhal compoundLE (13). )
I would really appreciate replays, vod links, or whatever else so I can watch them and learn from them. Thanks for any help or insight.
Let me first empathize with you and admit that TvP is my weakest TvX matchup.
That said, as well intentioned and honest as your viewpoints may be, it's the wrong way to ask for help on TL.net. It's like the childhood prank question: "Does your mom know that you are gay?" You are preconditioning responses and just asking for trouble.
Instead say:
I am having trouble with lategame TvP. Here's a specific replay where I did X and Protoss did Y and I'm not sure what the biggest keys were to me losing/winning.
Alternatively, if you have as many replays as you do there, you should group them like:
1rax gasless fe vs storms 1rax gasless fe vs colossi etc etc
I'm going to watch a couple of games real quick to see if I can see anything obvious.
From watching this replay, I'm getting a few ideas here that may coalesce into patterns.
Going through the motions vs Actually doing something You scout with your scv You scan his production line You scan his production line again You scan before you drop
Are you making decisions here or just following some playbook? You scout with your scv, see that he has only one gas, clumps his pylons, and is using all chronos on his nexus. Your reaction is to build a second bunker? You scan and can see that his second gas is very fresh and has a robo and know he has a stalker. But you still build a turret at the designated super fast DT timing? Are you actually thinking as you play or you checking items off a grocery list here?
He must not get a third~!!!!!!!! Or can he? Instead of thinking: I'm screwed if toss gets a third, think: from where he is right now, what will he have to give up to get a third right now? Or a third in 2 production rounds? In 10 production rounds? Oh gosh, he has 4 sentries and a robo bay and an immortal with 4 gas. Where is his other gas going? (Super fast 2/2 that game)
Oh joy. He's getting a very late third! Let's... drop him? Really? What's the point of a drop? What's it good against? If a guy is turtling.. why are you trying to counter by trying to breaking a rock with a scissor?
From watching purely from your perspective, what I really liked was having the marines at the top right cluster and bottom left cluster of bases. He was highly unlikely to get a third up w/o you knowing and definitely not getting a fourth. I would set them to patrol b/t the bases to be even more sure.
But as soon as you see that he is delaying his third for sooo so long, I would be scanning his army and seeing his chosen tech path + his upgrades. This will get you an idea of where his gas is going. PvT is extremely gas dependant, esp off 2 base.
One thing you can do is load up three medivacs, one by his third outside his nat and 2 by his main. Soon as he moves out, drop his main. Then scan his nat ramp. if he moves up that nat ramp, you can guesstimate when his army wil be in his main and you can drop his nat as they are en route. Then, hot pickup whichever he overcommits to defending. if he wants to base race, lift a cc or two and get ready to pull scvs.
When you drop, esp big drops, you MUST scan the obvious choke point where the opp will show his hand how he plans to defend. Will he send everything? poke his front. Will he send just enough? focus on microing your bio ball. Will he not react? Target forges/twilights/robo bays. Assimilators make poor targets. And there's no reason to throw 50 food away just because you might be able to snipe another gateway/pylon.
Oh, and for god sakes make more production facilities. 3k minerals means you can make another 10 rax.
I stopped this game at 9:58 You scanned his nat entrance around 9:50. Then you stimmed in and attacked.
Let's see. He has two cannons. That's 300 minerals. He has a forge to get those cannons. That's 150 minerals.
Oh look, he paid you to cut unit production for 10 seconds to get a free third. But you attacked? Really? Dude pays you to expand and you attack. His cannons are stationary. They will never be a threat to you. You have medivac tech not even 2 minutes away (medivac travel time) and you want to throw units away because your stim is done? Sometimes the enemy made a move that can counter yours. That's not an invitation to say: To hell with it.
I almost feel like I'm being trolled here. Exact same thing this game but you blew two scans.
I recommend that one scan in main if your opp groups his pylon like an idiot. Then if you see two forge or some other baddie strat, stim a marine in with the rest just a bit behind. If he has two cannons, expand immediately while prepping to drop. If he doesn't group his pylons, scan his nat to see what he might have immediately before you attack. Or save the 270 minerals and throw away a 50 mineral marine. Either way, you will know if dropping, attacking head on, or running like all hells is the best strat.
On February 19 2012 16:17 Emperor_Earth wrote: Let me first empathize with you and admit that TvP is my weakest TvX matchup.
That said, as well intentioned and honest as your viewpoints may be, it's the wrong way to ask for help on TL.net. It's like the childhood prank question: "Does your mom know that you are gay?" You are preconditioning responses and just asking for trouble.
Instead say:
I am having trouble with lategame TvP. Here's a specific replay where I did X and Protoss did Y and I'm not sure what the biggest keys were to me losing/winning.
Alternatively, if you have as many replays as you do there, you should group them like:
1rax gasless fe vs storms 1rax gasless fe vs colossi etc etc
I'm going to watch a couple of games real quick to see if I can see anything obvious.
High, respectively I agree. If you check my post history, you will see several examples of that. I have been given advice about my build, about harrassing more, about ways to execute and whatever else and implemented them the best I know how; the problem is I don't see the connection between the advice I have been given (and I have been given a LOT) and ways to actually win. My hope is that by pouring my frustrations out, I can reveal some weakness in my understanding and mindset that someone else can point out and explain. Thanks for taking the time to try. I really do want to find answers.
In general, yes you can macro on par with protoss. In my opinion the keys to winning are exploiting timings and good army control, with a keen eye for expansion timings. Always remember that bio balls work really well in smaller numbers and don't scale that well against protoss aoe entering the mid-late game, so even if you think a drop will be denied and you won't do damage, it's still a good idea. Pick small fights when you can, and trade armies in the early game if you can. (once tech lab ups are done)
If you're interested in picking up a style and general tvp knowledge(1 rax gas fe) that I've been using you can pm me and we can talk about it, I'd rather not plug it everywhere.
Protoss wants to get to the late game so they are going to try and stay in their base to reach their point of greatest power. If you take four bases vs their two they will have to move out. Once your army gets larger make extra ocs just so you can mule. Mules pull in tons of minerals without costing supply.
I think it comes down to unit composition. If you do not have great multitasking and micro the standard MMM+Ghost/Viking becomes weak in TvP late game. Thus, I do not think it is useful to copy pro players as Terran in TvP is you are a more normal skilled player.
So what I have started to use instead is: 1.Go 1 rax gasless expand every game (I vote down every map where this is not viable, like Meta). 2 . If he FE as well I tech up. If not I go for 4 rax defense plus 3 bunkers. 3. Marauder/Banshee as a midgame army. I use clocked banshees to snipe expansions, tech and probes. If he goes Templar I spam the cloak on/off so that my Banshees are always low on energy thus not vulnerable to feedback. 4. Late game I go Marauder/Banshee/ Battlecruisers. The Mauraders and Banshees are the real damage dealers, the Battlecruisers are there to soke up damage and yamato high prioritity targets. I complement the army with some Ghosts and Medivacs.
(Obviously you will need some marines or vikings if he goes heavy air, and build marines if you are floating minerals but are gas starved).
I have not idea if this is viable on higher levels but on lower levels it works great, banshees and mauraders have a really good synergy and does not require great micro to pull off, just some basic storm dodging. And you can defeat an equal pop lategame Protoss army even if you are low APM player.
I updated that post with the three most recent games I saw. Hopefully that'll give you something to chew on. The biggest issue I see is a lack of fundamentals, which should be the second thing you learn.
Mechanics (efficiently+quickly doing things) -> Fundamentals (understanding why things are done) -> Control/Positioning -> Game decision making -> Build orders-> Mind games
It's a tough MU right now. I appreciate your post, very well laid out and doesn't come off as QQ at all. I think terran needs to mix it up and start implementing some non-standard playstyles as the standard doesn't appear to be very effective.
Protoss players can sit back, defend, tech up, build that late game army at their pace and seemignly have all the advantages in the late game. It's Terrans responsibility to not let this take place. I think we might be reaching a phase where Protoss have crossed the line and are being too greedy early and the normal 1 RAX FE does nothing but allow Toss to stay safe and take advantage of that greed.
The last month or so I've seen a lot of older school banshee plays and deception where terran techs to Cloaked banshee but builds a bunker in front of the NAT giving the look of an expand build, and grabs easy wins. I understand this is risky and maybe a bit cheesy but it's necessary in the current Meta game.
I've also seen some very interesting 2 base tank play (See Gumiho from this weeks GSL vs Puzzel I believe) where Terran gets a few early tanks and siege to again punish early game greedy Toss. Terran can do a lot of damage, make all those centuries a liability, take a solid lead and delay all the Protoss teching and passive play.
Protoss have adapted to drop play and the traditional terran aggro plays so more unconventional means are required. And I do believe terran has the tools to make this happen. Most games I've watched that terran win are from early/early-mid game advantages. Focus on that. Try some non-standard playstyles. Marine/Tank/Banshee 2 base pushes with forward bunkers, some deception, hell throw in some reaper builds -- take the pressure off and have some fun.
You're a better player than I am, and clearly you've put a lot of time into this, but I don't think the answere lies in standard terran play as we've come to know. Every challenge brings with it the seed of a greater opportunity (Great Quote), take some time to relax, try some diffferent tactics and assume your going to lose some games while you figure this out. You'll find something and likely make big strides in your game in the process.
Hi emporer. In the two games were I attacked the front, I thought based on the fast robo and the upgrades I might have a time to do damage. In the third game, I didn't attack the front against the same build because I knew from the previous two it didn't work.
In the antiga game, I found myself significantly ahead but I didn't know what to do with that lead. My thought was that if I forced trades I could eventually wear him down. I don't have a very high win percentage against a protoss that gets to have and keep a third base. I think in the future I would play more passively with my lead, but I still wouldn't know what to do once I maxed out and had all the tech I wanted. How to I break them? Whats to stop the protoss from casually taking gold when they max out and turtling further?
On February 19 2012 17:18 mothergoose729 wrote: Hi emporer. In the two games were I attacked the front, I thought based on the fast robo and the upgrades I might have a time to do damage. In the third game, I didn't attack the front against the same build because I knew from the previous two it didn't work.
In the antiga game, I found myself significantly ahead but I didn't know what to do with that lead. My thought was that if I forced trades I could eventually wear him down. I don't have a very high win percentage against a protoss that gets to have and keep a third base. I think in the future I would play more passively with my lead, but I still wouldn't know what to do once I maxed out and had all the tech I wanted. How to I break them? Whats to stop the protoss from casually taking gold when they max out and turtling further?
As they spread, defending drops becomes much harder.
If you have a base or two up, the onus is on them to come out to you. Just stay outside his base pre spread out and ready to outconcave him with a drop or two daring him to meet you. He can't reliably tech switch with you having extra scans and more resources to race them that way so they have to come out for an allin.
If he's really a baddie, after you get like 30 rax/15 starpoints 3-5 with reactors rest tech labs + fusion core, then make extra OCs and start sacing scvs ten at a time.
Alternatively, get siege and start sieging up outside his nat/third.
On February 19 2012 17:18 mothergoose729 wrote: Hi emporer. In the two games were I attacked the front, I thought based on the fast robo and the upgrades I might have a time to do damage. In the third game, I didn't attack the front against the same build because I knew from the previous two it didn't work.
In the antiga game, I found myself significantly ahead but I didn't know what to do with that lead. My thought was that if I forced trades I could eventually wear him down. I don't have a very high win percentage against a protoss that gets to have and keep a third base. I think in the future I would play more passively with my lead, but I still wouldn't know what to do once I maxed out and had all the tech I wanted. How to I break them? Whats to stop the protoss from casually taking gold when they max out and turtling further?
As they spread, defending drops becomes much harder.
If you have a base or two up, the onus is on them to come out to you. Just stay outside his base pre spread out and ready to outconcave him with a drop or two daring him to meet you. He can't reliably tech switch with you having extra scans and more resources to race them that way so they have to come out for an allin.
If he's really a baddie, after you get like 30 rax/15 starpoints 3-5 with reactors rest tech labs + fusion core, then make extra OCs and start sacing scvs ten at a time.
So essentially try and contain him to three bases? This is my goal if I get ahead? I feel like even with a pre spread a max toss army, especially a max toss army that cut probes at like 50, is so strong. How do I make sure I win that fight or force a favorable trade?
On February 19 2012 17:18 mothergoose729 wrote: Hi emporer. In the two games were I attacked the front, I thought based on the fast robo and the upgrades I might have a time to do damage. In the third game, I didn't attack the front against the same build because I knew from the previous two it didn't work.
In the antiga game, I found myself significantly ahead but I didn't know what to do with that lead. My thought was that if I forced trades I could eventually wear him down. I don't have a very high win percentage against a protoss that gets to have and keep a third base. I think in the future I would play more passively with my lead, but I still wouldn't know what to do once I maxed out and had all the tech I wanted. How to I break them? Whats to stop the protoss from casually taking gold when they max out and turtling further?
As they spread, defending drops becomes much harder.
If you have a base or two up, the onus is on them to come out to you. Just stay outside his base pre spread out and ready to outconcave him with a drop or two daring him to meet you. He can't reliably tech switch with you having extra scans and more resources to race them that way so they have to come out for an allin.
If he's really a baddie, after you get like 30 rax/15 starpoints 3-5 with reactors rest tech labs + fusion core, then make extra OCs and start sacing scvs ten at a time.
So essentially try and contain him to three bases? This is my goal if I get ahead? I feel like even with a pre spread a max toss army, especially a max toss army that cut probes at like 50, is so strong. How do I make sure I win that fight or force a favorable trade?
Don't always do one thing. Understand what each strat requires and risks.
If a toss maxes out at 150 in army, he obv is allining and will not have any ability to sustain that attack. 1941 him.
E.g., make it a multifront war where the push into the heartland will meet multiple walls of your troops. The farther away he goes from his base, the more vulnerable his own base is and the longer his reinforcement line is. And his reproduction capability is very limited.
i think the way to go in tvp lategame if you're not gsl level is to use nukes; they require much lower apm than drops and you don't have to judge how much of your army to commit to a drop. i think it's the easiest way to put the burden of multitasking onto protoss; you can sit and wait for his army to attack into bio ghost viking and you can emp him much more easily since you are waiting and mostly focused on your army instead of trying to micro multiple drops at once. also it's important to realize that when you kill protoss army unless you are massively ahead in bases and came out massively ahead in the fight it's often the wrong decision to try and attack his expoes because it's very easy to get overrun by his reinforcements.
also when he's running around to try and save his expoes from a single unit it's easy for you to pick off colossi or HT if he isn't watching his army.
basically lategame tvp is very turtley and you need to be patient and wait for toss to screw up and lose his whole army for free unless you are really good at dropping.
-You don't necessarily need to wall of with your barracks, dealing with harrass is easier with your barracks near your CC
-Building the CC on the lower ground is good but be careful of 1 gate aggression of 2 stalkers (w/ Zealot) as at that point you will only have 5 marines. Maybe take the tower when scout escapes?
-@9:00 - You are up on supply and also ahead on harvesters with medivacs coming at a good time. The Toss isn't macroing as well.
-Your drop @10:30 was spotted immediately which meant you could pressure the Toss properly even though he is teching hard into double upgrades. Instead of doing a single drop. Either double drop OR Expand while poking the front. If you just stim, run in and kite the Zealots back, Sentries Tickling you isnt going to do much, while you might not be able to kill him, you now have an earlier third. The front is vunrable cos he has stalkers in his main defending drops. Why not go to his tower and then drop? once you kill his obs anyway.
-I liked the poke you made at the 12 minute mark but was a little late. You were also missing 8 marines and a medivac in the engagement. The Battle was very even and you are still ahead in supply with a 3rd going down. Also you didnt take his tower so he knew exactly where your army was.
-Macro did fail abit at this point as you took your third but so did his so not to worry. Maybe put a reactor on your 4th rax?
-Why did you go for cloaking instead of mobius? You know he is ony 2 bases atm so you need ghosts out earlier. Ghosts without energy are useless when you want to cloak them.
-Take your watch tower man, you need to know when he moves out and his composition!
-Have a marine or scv scout for a third at this time cos the Toss should have. Had you found it, you could have killed it and run away i think.
-17:00 he kills your third. You could have given chase seeing as you are about 60 supply up! He has no storms and such a tiny army compared to yours.
-The Toss only has 60 workers. His income is going to be so low. Why not drop his natural? While poking the front/killing his army. Never be afraid to scan for his army. You need more map presence. Take the towers. Scout for a third. I have no idea why he took that base instead of his natural 3rd.
-Nice battle at 19:00. had you know he had a 3rd. you could have killed his base and remaining army. Also. pause of a sec to heal up. All your units were in the red when you engaged the zealots at the natural. You must think. Where did his army just run to?
-lovely EMPs and push at 22:40. You kill his third and army very cost efficiently. You are maxed verses his 150 suppy. I cant see how you lost this.
-Also check your medivac count. Yours was downt o 1 at one point. You need around 5.
-You also needed to scout his composition or his main, cos he is know pumping out double collosi.
-You need to stop building SCVs, you were up to 90 and still building. 70 is fine.
-In the engagement at 24:00, you lost alot of ghosts. When you scout his collosus, you will need a 2nd starport. I like the air upgrades, good thinking if you can spare the gas.
-ONce he ghost collosus, the army size starts to go his way and you still don't have a proper answer to 4 collosus.
-@26:00 - because you dont have the tower, his army can just march up and kill your 4th and 3rd as you go to kill him?
-27:30 - the game is over, his has 6 collosi to your tiny hurt bio ball with no ghosts left. You should have 20 vikings by this point.
- you have so much money, you needed 10 more rax, plus you werent using them for 20 seconds at a time. Constant production would help alot.
Conclusion:
This games are only becoming long macro games because you made them do it. Terran is a race when you can do this pokes here and there ton see what his has. There were maybe 5 points in the game that with better scouting you could have killed his bases or his whole army. you were ahead till his had collosus. And because he stayed on so few workers, his economy was shit. So next time: Better scouting, more production late game, scan his base every 3 mins after 15 min mark so see tech change. You were the "better" player by far in that game.
You're not playing against Puzzle, Genius, Parting, or Brown.
Let me repeat that. You are not playing against good players with excellent macro, tactics, and defense who only make some mistakes. You are playing against relatively atrocious players who fail at every single aspect of the game - and this also applies to the top NA GMs, let alone the diamonds you're matched with. Even if the matchup is broken, you can still win.
Just get calm and comfortable and improve your own play; try to fix some of the innumerable mistakes you find in it (if you can't find them, that's your first big problem).
Some thoughts based on watching game #20:
Your bunker feels late. I'm surprised you aren't losing lots of games to stalker pressure. High level players who go with a late bunker like that probably rely on micro to survive.
Hide your scv further away. Just because it doesn't get scouted most games by bad players doesn't mean you have found a good spot. You can't rely on just hoping throwing down 3 bunkers will stop whatever the P does when you have no idea what he's doing! With no info on him, you should have scanned.
At 8:20, you've let him bully you into staying on 3 raxes with 1 addon and your factory just barely started and no engineering bay. Your early economic lead is rendered impotent as he tears you apart; you were up workers, then a little later he has another 10 workers, is at 56 and and you haven't built any.
OH GOD. 7 vikings is not enough against 4 colossus. Try 12 or more. You need enough your vikings can kill colo without your bio getting butchered, and as you can clearly see that is not happening.
Watch the first game of IPL Fight Club ThorZaiN vs HerO on TDA.
Anyone saying Terran can't play macro games versus Protoss are just in denial or something. The fact is that with the combination of lots of OC, PF at bases you actually mine, lots of Vikings and Ghosts, there's no safe way for Protoss to engage a Terran army head on. So as long as you defend the guerrilla tactics, it's very possible to win.
On February 19 2012 17:18 mothergoose729 wrote: Hi emporer. In the two games were I attacked the front, I thought based on the fast robo and the upgrades I might have a time to do damage. In the third game, I didn't attack the front against the same build because I knew from the previous two it didn't work.
In the antiga game, I found myself significantly ahead but I didn't know what to do with that lead. My thought was that if I forced trades I could eventually wear him down. I don't have a very high win percentage against a protoss that gets to have and keep a third base. I think in the future I would play more passively with my lead, but I still wouldn't know what to do once I maxed out and had all the tech I wanted. How to I break them? Whats to stop the protoss from casually taking gold when they max out and turtling further?
As they spread, defending drops becomes much harder.
If you have a base or two up, the onus is on them to come out to you. Just stay outside his base pre spread out and ready to outconcave him with a drop or two daring him to meet you. He can't reliably tech switch with you having extra scans and more resources to race them that way so they have to come out for an allin.
If he's really a baddie, after you get like 30 rax/15 starpoints 3-5 with reactors rest tech labs + fusion core, then make extra OCs and start sacing scvs ten at a time.
So essentially try and contain him to three bases? This is my goal if I get ahead? I feel like even with a pre spread a max toss army, especially a max toss army that cut probes at like 50, is so strong. How do I make sure I win that fight or force a favorable trade?
Don't always do one thing. Understand what each strat requires and risks.
If a toss maxes out at 150 in army, he obv is allining and will not have any ability to sustain that attack. 1941 him.
E.g., make it a multifront war where the push into the heartland will meet multiple walls of your troops. The farther away he goes from his base, the more vulnerable his own base is and the longer his reinforcement line is. And his reproduction capability is very limited.
Not to be rude, but that didn't make any sense to me. I am ahead on bases. My drop harrass worked, they are turtling hardcore. Now what do I do? I don't understand how to make that eco lead count because my experience is that protoss just turtles and maxes out slower. We end up in the same place as if they got to expand whenver they wanted to, it just takes longer.
It's worth mentioning that you should check out lastshadow's TvP videos. Take it with a grain of salt though, while he does have a deep understanding of the game he is somewhat pandering to the crowd.
I think Day[9] described it perfectly in one of his dailies; that TvP is like compressing a spring. You can push the spring back as hard as you can, but unless you completely break the spring it will always have the opportunity to spring back to its full state given that you lift the pressure.
That's just generally how late game TvP is right now. Even if you kill the Protoss army, warp in mechanic allows them to pretty much get up another round of units that's sufficient enough to hold any counter aggression. So you really have to get out of the mindset of thinking you won the game after a major fight. You have to do something else to maintain pressure on the Protoss. Taking another expansion is a must, but if you have enough left over units from the fight you can also attempt to split up his new warp ins and try to snipe a fringe expansion. Also taking this time to set up a PF so you can split up the map also solidifies your lead. When its the late game and your spamming CC/OC you should try to at least have one CC on stand by so you can float it into a advance location and morph it into a PF after every major engagement.
This is assuming you win the end game fights though. Despite how hard it may seem, it is completely possible to win late game engagements. Lastshadow goes into depth in his vlogs but this is pretty much the rough checklist of what you should be doing before the fighting happens.
1. Have a balanced unit composition of Marine/Marauder/Medivac/Vikings/Ghosts. This is probably the hardest to nail down. You generally want 3 vikings per collosi, this also forces stalkers which aren't that good of a unit in late game TvP, the less zealots the better. Also your army needs to consist of mostly marines, you wan't enough marauders to act as a meat shield, keeping them in front of your marines to soak up zealot hits. Generally you wan't 5 medivacs and enough ghosts to keep his HT in check. Again the bulk of your army needs to be marines, not marauders.
2. Positioning is so important as terran. You need to pick where the fighting is going to go down. Again splitting the map with PF is great. Keep a PF near your rally point as a fallback position. This rally should be somewhere safe, as in not to far away from your natural. If we used shakuras as an example, this PF should be around the area between your natural and the other natural of the other spawn location. Once our location is picked, try to keep marauders out in front. Two hotkey groups are preferable but being active with your control clicking should more then suffice. Keep adding more PF in locations where you think you can plant them down, so that your actively splitting the map. These PF buy you time to remax if you botch an engagement.
3. Scan your army, scan his army , scan the area you wan't to fight. You need to snipe every observer that is near or around the battlefield. Use your vikings to accomplish this. This gives your cloaked ghosts free reign to fuck with his HT, and assist vikings taking down collosi.
4. Once the observers are dealt with you got a a window of opportunity to do some damage. Send in 1-2 cloaked ghosts and emp the fuck out of his HT. If those ghosts didn't instantly die then send the rest of your cloaked ghosts and blanket emp everything. Prioritize any left over HT and then to carpet his zealots. Be extremely careful of your ghosts getting spam stormed, splitting your ghosts as they move into engage will help immensely.
5. If you executed all this perfectly and he has no storms and no shields on his zealots he will generally retreat to a safer location. Take this time and pick off any straggling collosi. If he dosen't retreat you can crush his standing army. But you need to make sure his collosi are dealt with. Make sure your being active with your vikings and picking them off where you can. When the engagement happens try to get your vikings coming in from a nice angle and you will get most of the collosi before the vikings fall.
6. You don't really need to stutterstep when the fighting begins, however try to split your army a bit just in case if he happens to have 1-2 storms left. Marines melt zealots, and with marauders in front with medivac healing the zealots won't have a chance.
If you execute this correctly you should always win fights. It isn't easy and in a 1A scenerio the protoss will always win, but if you do this correctly you will force just as much unit control from the protoss to combat this.
7. So he either retreated or you traded armies fairly cost efficiently. Take this time to set up more forward PF and take expansions. Keep doing this and eventually you will choke the protoss out.
Now lets say the fight didn't go so well and you lost. You still have multiple PF to fall back and gather your reinforcements. You have to really, really , really fuck up an engagement for the protoss to ram through a PF defense fast enough that you can't muster a response. As in you ate a lot of storms and all your marines keeled over. This should never ever ever happen! The protoss needs to respect the fact that you have ghosts, and if your active about killing observers over your own army the protoss should never feel that confident. Adding 1 missle turret where your army is parked saves on a lot of scans that you can use elsewhere.
Remember that you get to choose the engagements, the protoss will never fight you near one of your own PF. Jock for position on the map and force confrontations when your comfortable to do so. Also make sure you focus on upgrades and get adequate sensor tower coverage to help deal with any backstab attempts, turret rings also help.
So yea I don't think I'm forgetting anything. This might seem a little daunting especially if your Diamond, I was diamond last season and I also have issues doing this sort of stuff. It also feels extremely unfair because if you don't do this the protoss will always roll you over. However if you do this even semi correctly its in the protoss players hands to muster a proper response and will almost always force quite a similar amount of unit control then the typical 1A melt your face with storm nonsense =)
Also this is kind of a cool alternative build avilo has been doing, and is worth a shout out. He goes over it in his own vlog. This idea is to work towards a BC/Ghost deathball which uses the same turtle style. It takes a while, but once you achieve it you can pretty much kill everything the protoss can possibly throw at you.
Also this is really general, and how you should approach those late game TvP fights. However like others have said, working on your macro and having more units then your opponent will win you most of your games.
Also im very tired, 5 am and I haven't slept yet, apologies in advance for any grammar mistakes x,x
I´m in the same boat as you and i found out, that going a fast 3rd with just 3 Raxes is really greedy and you can´t attack into Protoss if you do this, because he will have like 5 Gateways with Collossus tech and even more with HT tech. So your option is to stay passive in that point and with this you give the protoss time, time that you should not give to protoss. What i´m doing right know is going 5 Rax before my 3rd Base. With this i can pressure more and i can punish greedy or bad protoss, because my army will be larger. I also found out that killing the observers is really important. With those guys they can see everything and they can decide how greedy they want to be. If you kill a lot of them, theier collosuss army is weaker, because they had to rebuilt those observers all game long. Be active on the map and look for those observers to kill. It´s the same strategy as if you play aggainst Zerg. No vision = no information = safe play or bad decisions that you can punish. Aggainst the HT first style, you should wait until your ghost have cloak and allways try to kill the observers before the battle. Unless you have cloak and kill his observers he will kill your ghosts before you can get off your emps on those HTs.
Summary: - 5 Raxes before 3rd for more pressure - kill observer for less vision = indirect pressure - aggainst ht tech wait for cloak and kill the observers with scans (for this 2-3 vikings are great) - aggainst an collossi player you can hit a timing, when you spot it fast you can make a lot of vikings and produce with your 5 raxes, if he´s taking a third with collossus you can win the game right there - i usually don´t produce more than 60 SCVs, because i have mules and with that my army will be bigger than his
These are some points that helped me out in TvP, but i still have problems in microing big fights. If you paly a long macro game, don´t overcommit to force him to a fight. Pick up a fight, where you can trade a decent amount of his army and when you have an economy advantage and a lot of raxes, you will come out ahead after the fight. The most mistake i see terrans do they engange and loose all their army to kill 20% of the protoss ones so he can remax in a second and kill you even if you have 4k ressources banked. Trade slowly in the lategame and try to get in favourable positions to deny his expandtions and force fights where you want to fight. It´s hard, but you have to be really patiant.
EPT
