EPT[G] PvZ Tyler's 2 Gate Sentry Expand. - Page 2
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recklessfire
United States373 Posts
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Surili
United Kingdom1141 Posts
On May 04 2012 05:45 Pylons wrote: I personally don't really like this style because of the meta including zergs taking a really fast 3 hatch. 2gates isn't alot of production, and so they will definitely have their second hatch finished in time to produce a few lings / spine crawlers to deal with this and then be miles ahead when their 3rd is nearly done or finished because you will be just transferring probes at this time. However, it's a smart idea and good because the meta is pretty much zerg playing greedy, macroing up to 70-80 drones on 3base and then maxing out on roaches/infestors, or pure roach. Nicely done writing the guide  Any zerg doing this is flipping coins, because they have no real way of know that a 4/5 gate with nexus cancel isn't coming, as you have chrono boosted core lots of times. Despite this, i still don't think what you said is actually true anyway, any zerg that skips gas completely gives up complete map control to this build which means they HAVE to play extra safe and build extra spines, or they could die to another variation with would be warping in extra stalkers instead of quite so many sentries, and turning the poke into a push. | ||
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Pylons
Canada54 Posts
On May 04 2012 05:49 Oreo7 wrote: If they go 5 min 3rd and you scout it you can pressure with your 3 zealot 6 sentry and do LOTS of damage, esp if you forced them to take their 3rd before their nat w/your scouting probe. Did you read the OP? Yeah , I read it and I try this stuff quite often, but if they scout it , it's really not that hard to defend, and then drone up to be ahead... I just don't have much luck with these styles, not even because of wrongly executing the build :D However, I do also agree with the style at the same time, I just don't like how late the nexus is, so they can be so ahead. I think it's really important to pressure or harass the zerg player so they can't get away with playing super greedy | ||
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Oreo7
United States1647 Posts
On May 04 2012 05:52 Pylons wrote: Yeah , I read it and I try this stuff quite often, but if they scout it , it's really not that hard to defend, and then drone up to be ahead... I just don't have much luck with these styles, not even because of wrongly executing the build :D They shouldn't be able to defend w/o taking lots of damage/forcing 20+ lings if they've gone 3 hatch no gas. :o. Not sure what you're doing wrong - make sure NOT to push if you don't scout 3 hatch, you can be caught in the open and lose all your sentries which is huge. | ||
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Pylons
Canada54 Posts
On May 04 2012 05:54 Oreo7 wrote: They shouldn't be able to defend w/o taking lots of damage/forcing 20+ lings if they've gone 3 hatch no gas. :o. Not sure what you're doing wrong - make sure NOT to push if you don't scout 3 hatch, you can be caught in the open and lose all your sentries which is huge. Oh that's probably it, thanks for the tip - I'm still learning  I'm only rank 750-900 masters  | ||
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thrawn2112
United States6918 Posts
On May 04 2012 05:36 Surili wrote: 1: As for your questions about scouting, what about hallucination? It gives you absolute vision of his base without using up robo time at all, i usually get it at the same time as the first immortal, so that the first phoenix can check lair timing while the second immortal is in production to take a third quickly, but still cancelable if necessary so that i can replace it with a slightly earlier twilight/blink. yeah i liek the idea of being able to scout while also being able to go immortal first... but i think an important part of going for stalkers as a main part of your army during midgame is having super fast upgrades and blink. getting hallucinate would slow this down which makes me go ehhhhhhhhh. however it could be that my gas timings for my natural could be tweaked in order to get more gas early on, i will mess around with different gas timings and see. on that topic when do you usually get gas on your natural? i always just sorta wing it lol which is really bad. i know it would probably depend on if you are preparing for roaches or mutas but in general what's a good time to get the first and 2nd gas? i've always gotten first gas right as expo is completing and another one shortly after. i dislike carriers in general, and i tend to favour templar styles as i find them more fun, and more effective in case of a muta switch. I don't start getting carriers until after i've already maxed out and started trading supply so at that point in the game i'm not really worried about mutas. also i dont think going carrier means you cant go templar as long as you have a lot of gas and are basically done getting upgrades. i've tried to steer away from resorting to mothership+archons because i think it's a gimmicky strategy that zerg's shouldn't lose to. Generally to be honest, i tend to have quite a lot of problems very late game against zerg, and usually try to hit a timing against broods, or have done enough damage that they can't get up to a massive number of them. I really need to practice that more. imagine the standard protoss deathball... but with carriers. as the game goes longer and longer you want to be trading your non carrier units in exchange for carriers and over time you will have an unstoppable army. if i'm worried about my carriers being to slow to defend counters i rely on cannons/defensive mothersip. imo this is a much better composition if you can force the game to last long enough to reach carrier tech. (i use least 3 stargates with double air upgrades going) if i'm playing a game where i am have a big enough bank and not pressed to spend money on units i will go ahead and get plus 1 air and then ground, so that when i go carrier i can throw down an extra cyber core and the first carriers will pop out and be pretty close to already having 2/2/3 | ||
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Surili
United Kingdom1141 Posts
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ShatterZer0
United States1843 Posts
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Surili
United Kingdom1141 Posts
On May 04 2012 06:30 ShatterZer0 wrote: This build. This fucking build makes me crazy. You have to be so CRISP on your forcefields when the Zerg goes on for midgame pressure with rocahes... I mean if you pull it off you come out with a tech advantage and a decent econ... but the utter knife edge number of forcefields you have to use T.T Well, this is true, but building placements help too. I was watching some lower level matches yesterday and one thing that i noticed was that after they forcefield they don't back their army up a little. Ever. I mean, you don't ALWAYS have to do it, it is situational of course, but generally toss units have greater range than zerg ones, so after you forcefield backing up half and inch on the screen makes a HUGE difference to the dps of the two armies, and suddenly they become one sided. This is only a little tip, but i hope it helps. PS i am not saying that you are necessarily a low level player, just that it is a tip that is underused. | ||
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Sated
England4983 Posts
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Treehead
999 Posts
3-gate sentry expand used to be the go-to build for protosses all over, and then it suddenly wasn't because of a few early 2-base allins coupled with the warpgate nerf (the primary allin IIRC - I could be wrong here - was the Losira 2-base roach build). These allins crushed 3-gate sentry expand convincingly enough that people started to believe FFE was the only really viable build. This was a long time ago and a couple notable buffs have come to protosses since: 1. Sentries build faster from gateways. 2. Immortals have a bigger range. The first buff (I'm guessing) is the reason why Nony is doing 2-gate sentry expand instead of 3. This might be enough to hold the allins that gave the 3-gate sentry expand trouble, but it's hard to say for sure. Has anyone since done any testing against early two-base allins? Now the interesting part: given the Stephano style 12 (or 11) minute roach max - is Losira style with this build easier to hold than Stephano style with FFE? Certainly, this build can keep the ~5 minute third from ever getting off the ground, so Stephano style shouldn't be an option, which is attractive to me. | ||
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Sated
England4983 Posts
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Heh_
Singapore2712 Posts
On May 05 2012 01:15 Treehead wrote: I don't think anyone here has really hit upon the relevant question yet. 3-gate sentry expand used to be the go-to build for protosses all over, and then it suddenly wasn't because of a few early 2-base allins coupled with the warpgate nerf (the primary allin IIRC - I could be wrong here - was the Losira 2-base roach build). These allins crushed 3-gate sentry expand convincingly enough that people started to believe FFE was the only really viable build. This was a long time ago and a couple notable buffs have come to protosses since: 1. Sentries build faster from gateways. 2. Immortals have a bigger range. The first buff (I'm guessing) is the reason why Nony is doing 2-gate sentry expand instead of 3. This might be enough to hold the allins that gave the 3-gate sentry expand trouble, but it's hard to say for sure. Has anyone since done any testing against early two-base allins? Now the interesting part: given the Stephano style 12 (or 11) minute roach max - is Losira style with this build easier to hold than Stephano style with FFE? Certainly, this build can keep the ~5 minute third from ever getting off the ground, so Stephano style shouldn't be an option, which is attractive to me. In the NASL, Nony used his 2 gate sentry expand against Crazymoving. In game 1 on dual sight, it was a good choice. However, Crazymoving cut drones at 18 and swamped Nony with lings just as the nexus started to build. He had only 2 sentries and a zealot when the ling flood started, and subsequent waves eventually broke the natural and even did good damage in the main, eventually putting Nony so far back that a subsequent roach-ling attack killed him off. In game 2 on antiga shipyard, Crazymoving went for 3 bases, and Nony did a zealot/sentry attack on the third. Nony's forcefields were amazing, allowing him to kill the third while keeping the roaches and lings away. However, his army was stuck and eventually sentry energy ran out and all the forces died. A subsequent timing attack by Nony was premature, and he got surrounded and threw away what advantage he had. In summary, gateway expands appear to be good only if the zerg player gets to 3 bases. On 2 bases, any timing attack would be a lot less effective. The most problem with this 2 gate expand is the expanding part itself; it's extremely vulnerable to speedling allins. This is the exact reason why most people dismiss gateway expands; it seems that this 2 gate expand build isn't sufficiently robust either... Any other thoughts on the game? | ||
TangSC
Canada1866 Posts
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Sated
England4983 Posts
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Treehead
999 Posts
On May 05 2012 01:27 Heh_ wrote: In summary, gateway expands appear to be good only if the zerg player gets to 3 bases. On 2 bases, any timing attack would be a lot less effective. The most problem with this 2 gate expand is the expanding part itself; it's extremely vulnerable to speedling allins. This is the exact reason why most people dismiss gateway expands; it seems that this 2 gate expand build isn't sufficiently robust either... I don't really understand your commentary. "appears to only be good if the zerg player gets to three bases" What does this mean? Doesn't every non-allin end with both players getting to three bases? Are you just saying this is worse against allins in general? Because I certainly don't think that's true, for the same reason that... "On 2 bases, any timing attack would be a lot less effective" This is almost trivially not true. The boon of going Nexus/Forge or Forge/Nexus is that it allows you to spend more on economy than you would be able to by going gateway first. However, when you're gearing up for a timing attack, you're not looking to go max economy, you're looking for army advantage. Think of it simply like this: Go to 7/8 minutes in any game where the P FFEs. You'll see that his warpgate just completed and he's got some light zealot pressure coming to the zerg's third - something like 6-8 zealots. That's as timing-attackish as you can get with FFE. Now go to a 2-gate FE build. By 7-8 minutes you can have a much more substantial army (albeit, probably without +1 atk). "it seems that this 2 gate expand build isn't sufficiently robust either..." Explain please. What about it isn't "robust"? | ||
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Heh_
Singapore2712 Posts
On May 05 2012 04:26 Treehead wrote: I don't really understand your commentary. "appears to only be good if the zerg player gets to three bases" What does this mean? Doesn't every non-allin end with both players getting to three bases? Are you just saying this is worse against allins in general? Because I certainly don't think that's true, for the same reason that... "On 2 bases, any timing attack would be a lot less effective" This is almost trivially not true. The boon of going Nexus/Forge or Forge/Nexus is that it allows you to spend more on economy than you would be able to by going gateway first. However, when you're gearing up for a timing attack, you're not looking to go max economy, you're looking for army advantage. Think of it simply like this: Go to 7/8 minutes in any game where the P FFEs. You'll see that his warpgate just completed and he's got some light zealot pressure coming to the zerg's third - something like 6-8 zealots. That's as timing-attackish as you can get with FFE. Now go to a 2-gate FE build. By 7-8 minutes you can have a much more substantial army (albeit, probably without +1 atk). "it seems that this 2 gate expand build isn't sufficiently robust either..." Explain please. What about it isn't "robust"? Okay, I guess I wasn't very clear. When I talked about three bases, I meant a quick three bases. In my opinion, a quick third base by zerg is a bad choice against any kind of gateway expand. This goes hand in hand with the second point you brought up, that if the zerg is on 2 bases, it is harder for protoss aggression to do significant damage. The zerg player would have less drones, a smaller area to defend, and most likely a bigger army. That larger army that comes with a 2 gate expand would almost definitely snipe a third. However, if the zerg takes a delayed third (~9-10min), he would be in a better position to defend that pressure. The robustness I was talking about is the ability to fend off allins without taking significant damage. In game 1, when the speedlings arrived, Nony was ill-prepared to defend. That basically sealed his loss. He tried to defend, but failed. If he went up the ramp, he would have to give up 2 sentries, 1 zealot, 1 pylon, 1 forge, 1 warping-in gateway and 1 warping-in nexus. The robustness I'm looking for is a way to fend off these kinds of pressure/allins without dying in the process or compromising on economy. A way to make this more robust would be to warp in more sentries before expanding, but this slows down your own economy. | ||
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aZealot
New Zealand5447 Posts
Also, Zergs can take the 3rd a little earlier than ~9-10.00, I think. Anything before ~7.00 may be unsafe, but after that can be safely held if not perhaps in every circumstance at which point Zerg is well ahead. (I think that largely 2 base Zerg Roach/Ling armies can be underestimated.) I wonder if in these cases it is better to tech, take a 3rd a little later and prepare to defend? So much of good gateway based play, I think, is dependant on good scouting, good reads, and good decisions. Edit/ if the Z takes a 3rd at ~9 - 10.00 then that is fine. It's almost what the build wants to achieve. | ||
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Treehead
999 Posts
On May 05 2012 04:58 aZealot wrote: Edit/ if the Z takes a 3rd at ~9 - 10.00 then that is fine. It's almost what the build wants to achieve. Yes. This is why P plays gateway first. Eventually, Z will be able to take 3 bases (and generally with the right setup P probably can too). The trick is too keep their three bases from coming out before you're ready to deal with the economy they'd have from producing from 3 bases. It's not THAT they get a third - it's the timing. I'm not sure on the fix for the speedling allin. Maybe Nexus before 2nd gate so it has more health when the lings come to survive til sentries 3-4 can engage? I didn't see the game - maybe Nony just got caught before he got his simcity in place or with his sentries out of position. I don't think attacking lings should be able to claim sentries, should they? | ||
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BearStorm
United States795 Posts
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