High master eu. It actually works pretty well. No roaches
Also nestea streams?
rarely.
I stopped doing the build because single stargate into phoenixes seems to counter it, as well as blink all-ins. As far as I've tested it so far. It doesn't quite feel so stable. I've also run into trouble with 4 gate +1 timings. Yes, you can hold them off with that reactive 6:30 roach warren, or a spine to buy time while you mass speedlings and a 7:00 roach warren, but then you are just even with Toss when usually toss would be really far behind when doing a 4 gate +1 and not doing significant damage.
Single stargate doesn't seem like a good counter, double stargate I can see but single stargate unless he is blindly making 6 phoenix by the time your spire finishes you should be fine as you should be able to make 10+ mutalisks instantly.
But in general you need to be scouting and I do think you need a roach warren if you think he's doing some sort of gateway pressure or you need to make lings at certain parts.
This build isn't something you would want to do vs the same guy every game as, like every other build there are weaknesses that they can exploit if you do the same build and that's it.
The thing is, if you also scout with your phoenixes - which you absolutely should - then you can proceed chronoboosting them out and be fine. I've seen players occasionally even add a 2nd stargate right away and take a quick third with only 1-2 cannons and zealots against the lings. Zerg will have zero roaches to pressure you, which makes it viable.
Therefore yes, zerg has to be sure that it's no stargate opener.
Well sure, but as zerg you should be scouting for that and if you see phoenix you shouldn't make mutalisks. Make some corruptors (4-5 corruptors great at dealing with phoenix :D). If they throw down a stargate, will they just wasted money on it as I wouldn't be getting mutalisks once I see phoenix, especially once they scout my spire and keep making phoenixes.
On June 06 2012 04:42 Belial88 wrote: ^ what gets crushed exactly? why does it not work for you?
If you mass lings from 8:30, you should have a large enough army to delay his push, and even if you don't, wreck enough damage with just your lings in a base trade scenario, that it's fine your 15 mutas are popping when he's killed your third.
i mean that's how it's played out for me so far, and seems to be how nestea handled it. it has hard to tell if toss is all-inning with it or not.
id love to see reps where it worked and didn't work though.
I think he's trying to say it is risky if you aren't able to confirm some all-in, but by simply checking the gasses at the natural you can tell if they are going for an 8 minute attack or a 10 minute attack and adjust accordingly. Against an 8 minute attack you definitely need spines or more likely roaches, but otherwise you can just mass spines, sac the third and go heavy on a counter attack as the nestea game shows. Thanks for posting the Symbol game, by the way, it shows great transitions.
On June 06 2012 04:42 Belial88 wrote: ^ what gets crushed exactly? why does it not work for you?
If you mass lings from 8:30, you should have a large enough army to delay his push, and even if you don't, wreck enough damage with just your lings in a base trade scenario, that it's fine your 15 mutas are popping when he's killed your third.
i mean that's how it's played out for me so far, and seems to be how nestea handled it. it has hard to tell if toss is all-inning with it or not.
id love to see reps where it worked and didn't work though.
oh no... I just deleted my reps I will try and see if I can get recent games that work. I just lost the last one where the toss just goes for a base trade, couldn't take him out with my army and a base trade scenario works in his favor as my muta ball was not enough and he spammed cannons everywhere. it doesn't work on maps like ohana, korhoal where your lings just can't get a surround. Toss don't have to use multiple ff to lock down your lings and just 1a your mutas. Pretty map dependent build
I will be grinding ladder tomorrow, will provide replays
here's a replay where I did this against someone doing a solid immortal/sentry all-in. At 10:00 my spire finished, i was 70+ supply at 8:00, I did the build perfectly, better then nestea did in his games. Just like nestea, my spire finished at 10:00 and I would have 15 mutas at 10:33.
The guy did a solid immortal/sentry push and hit me. he even went straight for my natural, instead of my third (clearly read this thread lol). I was forced to make a ton of lings to try to delay his push, so I had no larva for my mutas, even though I had the money and was injecting fine.
I guess it just doesn't work.
however, here's a replay of me playing against the same guy, just before this game. instead of all-inning, he went for a third.: http://drop.sc/197482
Like other games I've played like this, this build just destroys any toss who tries to go for a third off of robo tech.
Really, this build will crush anything but a good immortal/sentry all-in. I'm guessing. It really requires good macro, you can't be below 65 supply at the 8:00 mark or else you'll just have nothing, and do nothing.
I've beaten a TON of toss who did bad immortal/sentry all-ins, and every toss who goes immortal/sentry into third. But against a really, really good toss who gets a perfect immortal/sentry timing, it doesn't work.
However I really don't see an answer to immortal/sentry. I don't like the idea of massing roach/ling, because if Toss is actually not all-inning but grabbing his third, it's GG because you made any number of roaches. There's a line with this - if you go mutas against all-in, you lose. If you go roaches against macro play, you lose. If you try to grab a spire and then mass roach/ling against an all-in, you lose. If you make any roaches against a fast third, you lose.
So I'm going to keep doing this build, because you can't tell if toss is all-inning or not with his robo opener (you can't tell if he has 5 or 7 gates), and with this build, you beat bad immortal/sentry pushes, and macro play, while with standard play i feel it's just near impossible to beat immortal/sentry all-ins and especially impossible to beat fast third immortal play.
I wish you could make a spire, and then just mass roach/ling when you realize toss is all-inning, but i feel that 200 gas is too tight against it. I really think it's stupid to make roaches against toss going immortal/sentry, I don't think you are going to win when he has the perfect counter to your roaches.
Maybe the answer is massing spines instead of lings with the mutas.
On June 01 2012 21:45 DarKcS wrote: Ling muta or roach ling base race only way to win this? Bull***. I fail to see how that makes a balanced game. It's like playing an impossible AI knowing that Colossus with +100 dmg instakill upgrades is going to hit at a scripted 12:00 minute and no amount of units you can make will beat it. therefore you need to hit his main.
I just want to echo this comment. This is quite troubling, IMO. Sure, Z, as a race, is intended to use their speed to run-by, contain, and so forth. And P has very hardy units, and all that. But I think it's problematic when a race is forced to resort to a base trade to respond to a particular build order. I think it's all a result of the fact that the counter to both the immortal and the stalker is the zergling, but the zergling is completely nullified by 1) forcefields and 2) the fact that since P moves in a ball, they do not provide the surface area for melee to be cost efficient. I have no idea what the solution would be in terms of balancing here. Perhaps something ludicrous like making stalkers take bonus damage from Psionic queens or some such nonsense.
Can anyone share experiences against the immortal/sentry+1 build using burrow move roaches?
You know, Hyun held an immortal/sentry all-in in the first time in the history of the GomTV, in the GSTL against NSHS_Sage, by going the 'standard' roach/ling pumped after 8:30, but instead of trying to outplay the opponent by engaging and micro'ing way way better, he just went for a base trade.
Similar principle to what nestea did, but with a more standard build that isn't so susceptible.
I don't think Nestea's 'answer' really works. As a few have pointed out, like nrgMonk, a good immortal/sentry all-in will push at like 9:00+ and hit you at 10:30, and start killing you before your mutas pop, especially if he just goes for your natural-main instead of your third.
I think the concepts are interesting though, if you see gas at Toss' base and no robo, or lack of an all-in, just skip the roach warren and roach upgrades.
blade55555 uploaded some replays in the zerg help me thread where he holds immortal/sentry by base trade, like hyun did. Burrow move comes way too late to stop a roach/ling all-in, the closest I've seen it used was some zerg did it in the GSL, he lost his third, but the Toss was stupidly aggressive, lost his entire army to mass roach when he should have backed off, and just died, but that was Toss being an idiot rather than good play. Personally, I've tried double roach warren a few times to try to hold immortal/sentry, but it just failed miserably.
I don't think it's 'troubling' in terms of balance though that the only way zerg can hold this is by base trading. That implies that there's some coinflip involved, and there isn't. The whole basis of muta play in all 3 match-ups, at certain times, is based on base trading, or at least doing way more damage than you receive if the opponent moves out when they shouldn't. The idea behind nestea's answer and Hyun's roach/ling base trade answers, is that against an immortal/sentry all-in, you will win the base trade 100%, so Toss better not move out.
I think the metagame is still evolving though on immortal/sentry all-in, so i wouldn't call it imbalanced yet. I think a lot of people already agree that it's strong as fuck and much easier to execute than defend though, like Naniwa's comment on the build (and khaldor and wolf), but I think it's still a little to early to call balance. There was some zerg in the GSL who was always getting roach drops, it seemed like a pre-emptive way to beat immortal/sentry and if they don't immortal/sentry, just a great way to do damage as an aggressive zerg, and then there's this nestea style, and then Hyun's base trade style, and not every toss is doing yet every single game (i dont know why, but they don't, beats me - although 4 gate robo into fast third or fast third behind cannons, robo is strong as fuck too).
Hey, not really sure where to put this since there isn't exactly a "How to beat imortal/sentry all in?" thread. So I'll put this here.
In light of blade555555's comment that you beat immortal/sentry all-in by doing the standard 8:30+ roach/ling response but base trading instead, and Hyun vs Sage GSTL where he beats the immortal/sentry all-in doing that (the first and only time he beats a good immortal/sentry all-in, the only other time it loses is because the guy forgets 2 immortals at home and proceeds to lose all his sentries when not paying attention at the first engagement), I proceeded to do the same thing:
8:30+ roach/ling on 4 gas, but prepare to base trade, and when Toss pushes out, you stop sending army to prepare to backstab, but instead mass spines at your natural, get ready to abandon third, and the rest of the army you make you leave at home.
On July 03 2012 05:12 EnhancedZ wrote: Looking for ideas/suggestions to halt the 2-base Immortal All-In and how to follow up with it.
Right now I've been taking my 3 bases and following up with a fast bane bust. I don't commit to the bust but I push with it in order to bait out FF's and possibly snipe the forge while the upgrade is in progress. Meanwhile, behind it and after I throw up a ton of spines and get lair. I've been messing around getting fast roach burrow-movement, infestors, hydras.. But each time I ultimately fall.
Right now my big problem is just defending the push and I'm more or less looking for ideas as to what other people are doing.
I wouldn't recommend the bane bust. Whether you do it all in or not that is less drones and the protosses immortal push will be that much stronger and probably not holdable due to you having a lot less drones then you should by the 8 minute mark.
If you know the 2 base immortal all in is incoming what I have been doing is making roach/ling and moving them in a hidden spot so I can go for a base trade.
Once I scout he is going all in (no third, lots of gateways and robo) I make a ton of spines at my natural. Once he pushes out I pull everything from my third to my natural and any units I make from there go to defend with a ton of spines and then protoss loses as he's in a bad spot. There are a ton of roach/ling destroying his natural and his army is at my natural with a ton of spines to where he can't bust.
I haven't lost to that immortal push since I have been doing this and it's really effective. But be warned you will get some flames saying how faggy you are to do this :D.
However the guy was so terrible that his push was just 2 minutes late (just really bad guy i guess), but I knew he was all-inning when he didn't plant an expo before 9:00, especially when none was made by 10:00, as well as my overseer clearly seeing him making more sentries and immortals. I saw only 3 gateways or something with my overlord sac so I thought he was going fast third, but I realized otherwise when he didn't have an expo by 9:00 (or at least prepare to by making pylons out there, moving out a probe, etc).
He tries to come all the way back home when I counterattack, i catch his forward pylon, he was just terrible. By the time he arrived, I had more than enough army to simply straight up crush him, and I didn't even need the mass spines at my natural, nor did I have to abandon my third. He engages in a choke (wtf), attacks the rocks (wtf), doesnt make ff (wtf). Just a really bad guy.
But had he done it right, I think I still would have won - I'd lose my third but keep my drones, he'd lose his natural, and then I'd eventually have enough army to win, and deny his natural forever while retaking my third.
Really cool stuff, I'm going to keep doing this method. I also reached 78 supply at the 8:00 mark, a personal best for me, so that was really impressive in my opinion, so I think that had a lot to do with why i won. I notice that all-ins are much easier or harder based on what you hit at 8:00, and if you are ~65 it's a struggle, but if you are 70+, its really really easy.
However I really don't see an answer to immortal/sentry. I don't like the idea of massing roach/ling, because if Toss is actually not all-inning but grabbing his third, it's GG because you made any number of roaches. There's a line with this - if you go mutas against all-in, you lose. If you go roaches against macro play, you lose. If you try to grab a spire and then mass roach/ling against an all-in, you lose. If you make any roaches against a fast third, you lose.
If you make roach/ling in preparation for counter-attacking against immortal/sentry all-in and they just take a third, you can drop them. I've been using this after seeing symbol do it and I think it's the best way to play against immortal/stalker/sentry.
The biggest problem was JYP losing so many units without doing the critical damage to make it worthwhile, the first zealot didnt get the creep tumor, then the stalker + zealot got cleaned up by speedlings, the void ray phoenix pressure did nothing but he lost units there too. He then overcommited too many zealots to taking out the 4th once he knew mutas were on the field and they got cleaned up almost for free as well. I dont think it was the build by Nestea which was revolutionary and allowed for the romping you saw but more a collection of clutch defensive moves by Nestea and lacklustre attacks by JYP. Nestea is the sort of player who knows exactly how to maintain and take advantage of such a situation and he pressured JYP when he knew he couldnt hold it dealing real economic damage with the muta's and taking none in the earlier attacks himself.
Theres no substitute for solid play. Nestea had it in spades.
On July 04 2012 10:51 tsango wrote: The biggest problem was JYP losing so many units without doing the critical damage to make it worthwhile, the first zealot didnt get the creep tumor, then the stalker + zealot got cleaned up by speedlings, the void ray phoenix pressure did nothing but he lost units there too. He then overcommited too many zealots to taking out the 4th once he knew mutas were on the field and they got cleaned up almost for free as well. I dont think it was the build by Nestea which was revolutionary and allowed for the romping you saw but more a collection of clutch defensive moves by Nestea and lacklustre attacks by JYP. Nestea is the sort of player who knows exactly how to maintain and take advantage of such a situation and he pressured JYP when he knew he couldnt hold it dealing real economic damage with the muta's and taking none in the earlier attacks himself.
Theres no substitute for solid play. Nestea had it in spades.
Saw coca doing this in the EG masters cup thing; also added a deceitful infestation pit, a good bluff vs high level players as with the proxied spire they are going to be wondering where the gas is going. I am sorry not to be able to list who it was; i can't remember but it was on entombed valley.
On July 05 2012 02:12 WorldEater wrote: Saw coca doing this in the EG masters cup thing; also added a deceitful infestation pit, a good bluff vs high level players as with the proxied spire they are going to be wondering where the gas is going. I am sorry not to be able to list who it was; i can't remember but it was on entombed valley.
That's a great idea, especially as pure muta play is often not really viable even if you can surprise someone with it, so you need to transition to infestor/hive tech quickly anyway. It's not a huge investment and if your opponent is good enough to scout and react to seeing that (often colossus is popular vs infestor), it could make your mutalisk attack and harass very effective early on.
On May 21 2012 20:29 KrakInDub wrote: Something doesn't make sense to me ~~
"I wonder what it's weakness is - you see toss get gas, you don't get a roach warren. If there's no gas, you get a roach warren. Fast mutas, ezpz, even against stargate."
Toss get ALWAYS Gas, like every race, doesn't matter if he goes for Gate or Stargate play, but isn't gas a must anyways? So could you explain me please what do you mean exactly by this?
If he goes 2 gas its a timing if he goes 1 gas its heavy zealot stalker aggression, if he goes 4 gas it's tech. Its pretty simple..
ive been going spire whenever i see stargate vs protoss. phenox are no match for mutas. Just keep them in your base around spores or queens untill you get more then 10. if you see them keep massing phoenix, expand like a mofo and make 1 or 2 corruptors. ez pz
You know, in light of what blade55555 has said about base trading immortal/sentry, and re-watching that game, i think you can actually do nestea's anti-immortal sentry build.
So blade55555 and the only pro zerg to hold immortal/sentry at gom, do it by base trading with roach/ling, and massing spines in the nat at 9:00+
Nestea is doing that - he is massing spines in his nat at 9:00, and all future units stay at home. When the attack hits at 10:30, his mutas are popping from his third but he's just hitting the base, as he should be. Monk says "well the guy just wins by going to the natural instead of the third" but you can't do that, the spines are there and you don't have enough warped in yet, so you have to go to the third.
I think nestea's build may work against immortal/sentry, even if you go straight to the nat. Basically, you just have to base trade against it and mass spines in your nat, the fact nestea did mutas is just an aside.
On July 08 2012 18:12 Belial88 wrote: You know, in light of what blade55555 has said about base trading immortal/sentry, and re-watching that game, i think you can actually do nestea's anti-immortal sentry build.
So blade55555 and the only pro zerg to hold immortal/sentry at gom, do it by base trading with roach/ling, and massing spines in the nat at 9:00+
Nestea is doing that - he is massing spines in his nat at 9:00, and all future units stay at home. When the attack hits at 10:30, his mutas are popping from his third but he's just hitting the base, as he should be. Monk says "well the guy just wins by going to the natural instead of the third" but you can't do that, the spines are there and you don't have enough warped in yet, so you have to go to the third.
I think nestea's build may work against immortal/sentry, even if you go straight to the nat. Basically, you just have to base trade against it and mass spines in your nat, the fact nestea did mutas is just an aside.
Yeah, as long as you have muta + ling you'll easily be able to crush them before they can kill all your buildings. There's a good chance you can just come home after doing enough damage to them, too.
If you see 2x gas mining from natural, where is his gas going really? Stargate/Robo/DTs. If he goes stargate make corr + mutas, 1x corr per 4 phoenix then mutas.
You can fend off any early 1+ zealot with a spine+few lings and the queens w/ good micro.
If you don't see any gasses at the natural around the 7ish min mark, 6-8 Gate all in, but that should've tipped you off cause the forge being worked. = drop roach, standard timing at 7 min even if you go early 1 gas. Forge not being worked? Stargate Evo at 7 mins, also standard.
This works even better vs 6-8 gate all ins due to speed is very early so you can delay proxy plyons for timing of reactionary spines.
I would make a guide for my ZvP, I have MANY styles but I have no time for that right now... instead I thought I'd just chip in by Belial cause he is a very productive Zerg player for TL.
Top 300 NA Masters player's input, this is all off protoss who can play aka high masters/GM. Lower players wouldn't have crisper timings so you'd be thrown off and lose to dumb shit like the toss forgetting 1+ with his 6-8 all in that hits at the 8-9 min mark, which is standard but easily crushed if I didn't make a spore in each base... LOL. Herp derp.
i was only lucky the toss was really bad and went back when my lings counterattacked (i dont know why, I wasn't going to break his wall anytime soon...), but if he had pushed, I would have won anyways because I had massed spines in my nat in time.
I think just in general against immortal/sentry, you need to abandon your third no matter what, even if you go roach/ling and plan to fight head on (see leenock vs mvptails gsl recently, he loses the third and gets FF owned, but eventually cleans up the army with the help of drones, broodlings, and queens, and wins the game because despite losing his third, he cleaned up all of tails army, so the game is sort of reset). Either you base trade with ling/muta or roach/ling and mass spines in your nat, or fight head on and know you'll lose your third but will clean up the opponent's army.
In this game I hit 74 supply at 8:00, so I macro'd really good. I like this style of nestea muta vs robo because if they go 5 gate robo expand, I dont think they can hold it either.
EPT
I will try and see if I can get recent games that work. I just lost the last one where the toss just goes for a base trade, couldn't take him out with my army and a base trade scenario works in his favor as my muta ball was not enough and he spammed cannons everywhere. it doesn't work on maps like ohana, korhoal where your lings just can't get a surround. Toss don't have to use multiple ff to lock down your lings and just 1a your mutas. Pretty map dependent build
