Please do not reply to this topic with criticism if you are below master league. Yes, it is very elitist, but you probably don't know what you are talking about.
Introduction The 'easy wins' part of the title may rustle some jimmies and 'easy' is a relative term (what one may find easy another may find difficult), but this is a build that requires very little thought, micromanagement and innovation compared to other builds. According to sc2gears I have exactly 92% winrate against Zerg, and the majority of my 8% losses (as far as I remember) is because I failed to scout a spire and suddenly 12 muta pop up in my main's mineral line while my army is at the front. Go figure.
The Build Open up with your favorite FFE. I used to dislike FFE, but the maps have changed quite a lot since I formed that opinion. So I re-thought it, did some tests and I now believe that FFE is superior to gateway openings.
I recommend chronoboosting a zealot or keeping your scouting probe alive to check for the zerg's 3rd base. Remember that some 2base all-ins can be quite difficult to hold if you don't scout them in time, and you don't wanna get caught with just one cannon and a sentry now do you? If you see him 2-basing you may wanna spend an extra chrono on your gateway, create an extra cannon, create an extra sentry... you know the drill, seeing as the FFE is a very dominant PvZ opening I assume you know these basics so I won't really get into them.
After your cybernetics core, you immediately want to throw down a stargate and chrono a void ray, followed by a phoenix that is also chrono'd. It is important to constantly chrono the stargate so you can get the scouting information as soon as possible. Even though this is important I don't do it so much because I'm a greedy bastard and chrono all my probes, but chrono'ing is the optimal play.
The void ray is for some very basic map control. Kill an overlord floating around your base, harass the zerglings in front of your ramp so he isn't entirely sure when you will move out, clear the xel naga towers and perhaps stop a creep tumor or two. Basic stuff. Now with your phoenix you are going to fly over his 3 bases to see what he is doing. Conventional zerg timings involve at least 2 gases at 6:00ish and a roach warren somewhere between 6:45 and 7:30, usually at 7:10ish. At 8:30ish you will reach his base. His lair should still be morphing and speed should be almost done or just finished (you can check this with your void ray, he should have his lings out on the map). You should see a roach warren too, and the evolution chamber will most likely be dancing ('dancing' is the term used for seeing the animation a building has when it is upgrading or building).
So, things to look for at 8:30: - lair morphing - speed not done but being researched, pool dancing - roach warren finished - evo chamber dancing
What if the lair has already been completed? It's possible that he swapped the order of research with zergling speed. Although I personally think it is retarded to get lair before metabolic boost, some zergs do it anyway. This makes for a slightly faster lair. If his lair is already finished you should see if his roach warren is dancing. If it is not dancing that means he is doing something fishy or mutalishky and is up to no good. Either that or he literally is no good. You could also see if his lair is dancing, he may be researching drop tech or burrow. Ideally you just want to look for a spire, that's a pretty sure-sign he is going muta. Make 3 to 5 phoenixes and a few cannons in your mineral lines and continue as normal (read below).
Meanwhile, back at home, you should immediately throw down a fleet beacon in an obscure location (try to hide it to the best of your ability, a lot of zergs fly overlords into your base). The fleet beacon should be placed down after your void ray or your phoenix has been queued up, depending on how you managed your gas. While the fleet beacon is building you should have the minerals to throw down some additional gateways, I usually get about 3 or 4. Make sure you have enough minerals to queue up the mothership as soon as your fleet beacon finishes! Make a mothership and chrono it constantly. After you have queued up your mothership, throw down a twilight council. Now you can either try to take your 3rd and then throw down some additional gateways, (it should be 9ish minutes by now) or you can throw down some additional gateways and then try to take your third. 8ish gateways is enough. If you did a good job with your void ray and your opponent doesn't have lings at your entrance/third/xel nagas/etc. you can try to take your third, make some cannons while it is building. It's also pretty map dependent, it will be harder on daybreak than on condemned ridge for example. After the twilight council is done research charge and throw down templar archives. Now comes the fun part: sit on 3 bases and go to 200/200 on only archons and zealots. If you feel like it you can take a 4th too. Don't bother with harassing or any fancy stuff just sit there and go 200/200 off 6 gas archons. Make a warp prism so you can reinforce easily.
Summarized build flow - FFE - stargate right after c-core - queue up 1 void ray and 1 phoenix, chrono stargate constantly - throw down a fleet beacon after you queued up your void ray or phoenix - while fleet beacon is building, add a few additional gateways (3 to 4) - queue up mothership and constantly chrono, throw down twilight council after - somewhere around here you will want to start +1 weapons, then +2, then +3 - add gateways until you have about 8 and take your 3rd or reverse these two - when twilight council finishes, research charge and throw down templar archives - make some archons and zealots, then throw down a robo facility for obs/warp prism - now you're on 3 bases you want more gateways, I usually have 16 to 20 gateways when on a full 3 bases - sit on your ass until 200/200 - a-move across the map like a boss. Creep, spines, broodlords, infestors etc. shouldn't matter
Q: How do I deal with 'stephano-style' 3-base mass roach/ling timing at my 3rd? A: Vortex his army and send in your 2-3 archons (about as much as you'll have) and zealots, he should be around 160 supply and you should be around 90-100. Don't forget to warp in zealots and new archons after you have vortexed his army, it can be quite tempting to just stare at the wonderful vortex with idle gateways but this may result in defeat.
Q: How do I deal with mutalisks? A: Mutalisks is the only thing that is remotely viable against this build. Add cannons to your mineral lines and spread a bit. You just go for 200/200 but the difficulty in doing so is slightly increased because he's gonna be annoying with mutas.
Q: What about banelings? A: In theory it seems great because you can counter vortex with banelings but it doesn't actually do that much. If you are really scared you can research storm and win for sure but from my experience it's not necessary, a-move is sufficient.
Q: Ultralisks? A: Doesn't do anything.
Q: Mass infestor/broodlord? A: Broodlords are actually pretty bad units in direct combat, but they rely very heavily on their range and on messing up the pathing of your units. If you can circumvent the 35968 broodlings blocking your way you will win easily, and the way to circumvent this is to double vortex the brood lords. As long as your mothership doesn't get neural parasited (followed by him wasting your 2 vortexes) the infestors can be pretty much ignored.
Q: Mass mass mass 3/3 roach kiting on creep? A: A-move with vortex, I know that this sounds like a good counter to zealot/archon in theory but the brutal truth is that it is the worst thing the zerg can do and it is the easiest thing to deal with.
Q: Mass cracklings? A: gooby pls
Replays vs. roach/hydra/ling timing at my 3rd I actually lose my mothership here (which was 100% unnecessary, just wasn't paying attention and playing at 70 apm). Opponent was 'favored'.
vs. close air burrowed roach drops I think this guy was trying to win a prize for being as annoying as possible. Not only roach drops, but also with burrow. Also apparently he doesn't like my mother. Opponent was playing random so I couldn't open forge, it's basically the same thing though.
IMPORTANT
The #1 reason people fail with this build is because they do not preserve their archons. Zergs will try to trade roaches while building up their economy. They can trade as much as they want, as long as they are trading roaches for zealots. If you run out of zealots, do not engage anymore as the next fight will allow him to trade roaches for archons. The trick is to slowly build up your archon count while trading zealots if the zerg is being aggressive. If you have a large fight which you decisively win, you actually cannot push for the win if you lost the majority of your zealots, as the zerg remax will trade for your archons. Just sit back and build up your zealot count again (usually 1, sometimes 2 warp-ins are enough if you have sufficient gateways).
Additionally, before you a-move at 200/200 you may want to type 'IT'S RUSTLIN' TIME' in all-caps in [all]-chat.
DISCLAIMER: if your opponent masses spine crawlers in the middle of the map you have to play it out slow and not just herpderp into 50 spines, get stargates, +3/+3 air, +3 shields, psionic storm and aaaallllllllll of the bases on your side of the map
On July 14 2012 02:03 9-BiT wrote: Interesting....... I guess? The build looks fun, and yes, it will probably get a lot of cheap wins, but I don't think this is a legitimate build....
I have 92% winrate and most of the games used to calculate that winrate are from back when I was at grandmaster MMR, and I am currently playing at mid-master. I have replays where I beat people such as glsnute/infsJRecco who are currently top 20 grandmaster (snute is #8). I can include them if you want to but they are from a while ago and I do not think they are that relevant. I also have repeat wins in ladder against grandmaster and high master zergs who already know what I am going to do, but still fail to win against it.
Mothership on 2 bases doesn't work. If the zerg makes fast corruptors he can snipe it before you have the energy to vortex, and your archon count isn't high enough yet to stop them. With your mothership dead it becomes near impossible to take a third, and it only goes downhill from there.
On July 14 2012 02:13 Arcanefrost wrote: Mothership on 2 bases doesn't work. If the zerg makes fast corruptors he can snipe it before you have the energy to vortex, and your archon count isn't high enough yet to stop them. With your mothership dead it becomes near impossible to take a third, and it only goes downhill from there.
This is incorrect. He cannot have enough corruptors and ground forces. Keep in mind that the mothership has 700 combined hitpoints with 2 base armor and that archons deal heavy splash damage, and you have a void ray in there too. Nothing prevents you from moving your mothership a bit back, corruptors only have 6 range and will be shot at by archons/cannons. His window is extremely limited as well as you will get 50 energy extremely quickly, which is enough for 1 vortex combined with your starting energy.
Neat build, i'll definitely give it a shot. Do you think it's possible to forego the void ray in favor of more phoenix, and use those for map control + harassment?
On July 14 2012 02:30 Lolsoup wrote: Neat build, i'll definitely give it a shot. Do you think it's possible to forego the void ray in favor of more phoenix, and use those for map control + harassment?
No that is not possible. The void ray is essential seeing as it fends off the earliest of earliest roach attacks that do not have any anti air with them. You also need a way to clear key parts of the map, such as xel naga towers, the lings just outside your base, at your 3rd, overlords around your base etc.
On July 14 2012 02:23 SergioCQH wrote: This build will roll over and die to drop play.
User was warned for this post
Nope. People don't realize how good zealots are. This build doesn't rely on FF's and ranged units as much as standard play and it makes it stronger vs drop play which basicly forces direct combat (for which zealots are better suited)
what about roach hydra infestor? or roach hydra timing or ling/roahc and bling drops i dunno it doesnt seem awfully strong if you scout it, tho i'd probably lose to it 1st time.
edit: also what about upgrades, with that gas usage, you shouldnt be ahed should you?
I mean what you are doing is playing for a lategame composition as far as I can tell. You are getting an optimal composition off of 3 base. Still I would imagine by the time you attack the zerg would also be rolling broodlord infestor and it just comes down to a micro war. It seems like your strategy is very much to coax the zerg into a bad attack with such a weird build. If they just stay as passive as you, Id guess it would come down to BL spread, fungals, vortexes, spines ect. same as always.
On July 14 2012 03:11 Insomni7 wrote: I mean what you are doing is playing for a lategame composition as far as I can tell. You are getting an optimal composition off of 3 base. Still I would imagine by the time you attack the zerg would also be rolling broodlord infestor and it just comes down to a micro war. It seems like your strategy is very much to coax the zerg into a bad attack with such a weird build. If they just stay as passive as you, Id guess it would come down to BL spread, fungals, vortexes, spines ect. same as always.
If they stay as passive as me then I can probably get a 4th base, and 8gas archon 200/200 will win no matter what. At this point it becomes irrelevant on how many bases the zerg is on or on what units he can remax simply because he cannot even chip away at your 200/200 divinegoddeathball. Additionally, if you are of the tryhard kind, you can have 2 warp-prisms on the map and warp in 20 zealots at a spot where he won't have army and destroy a base. A gun is enough to kill a man, this simple a-move build is the gun. If for whatever reason you need a large rifle or a cannon or a bazooka you can do that too (warp prism drops become nigh uncounterable lategame, so do mass carriers with psionic storm). It's just not really necessary.
On July 14 2012 03:11 Insomni7 wrote: I mean what you are doing is playing for a lategame composition as far as I can tell. You are getting an optimal composition off of 3 base. Still I would imagine by the time you attack the zerg would also be rolling broodlord infestor and it just comes down to a micro war. It seems like your strategy is very much to coax the zerg into a bad attack with such a weird build. If they just stay as passive as you, Id guess it would come down to BL spread, fungals, vortexes, spines ect. same as always.
If they stay as passive as me then I can probably get a 4th base, and 8gas archon 200/200 will win no matter what. At this point it becomes irrelevant on how many bases the zerg is on or on what units he can remax simply because he cannot even chip away at your 200/200 divinegoddeathball. Additionally, if you are of the tryhard kind, you can have 2 warp-prisms on the map and warp in 20 zealots at a spot where he won't have army and destroy a base. A gun is enough to kill a man, this simple a-move build is the gun. If for whatever reason you need a large rifle or a cannon or a bazooka you can do that too (warp prism drops become nigh uncounterable lategame, so do mass carriers with psionic storm). It's just not really necessary.
This gives you a strong composition, but it all still comes down to the pvz lategame. If you are comfortable with that stage of the matchup it is a fine build, but there are many zergs who are equally comfortable there. Ofc there are many things strong in the lategame like warpprisms but that is all standard stuff. Your army is strong, but it isnt significantly stronger than the zerg if he has gone right up to BL infestor. If you fight it still comes down to micro.
6 months ago I was doing a variant of it, the idea was similar but without the stargate/mothership. I found out that roaches/infestors were actually decent at countering it provided that upgrades were equal. Of course, at that time, one difference is that taking the third without a mothership was pretty hard, which forced sentries and immortals before I could fully transition into chargelots/archons. I guess that with that build you can directly go into chargelots/archons with the mothership, so the idea is kindda neat.
On July 14 2012 03:11 Insomni7 wrote: I mean what you are doing is playing for a lategame composition as far as I can tell. You are getting an optimal composition off of 3 base. Still I would imagine by the time you attack the zerg would also be rolling broodlord infestor and it just comes down to a micro war. It seems like your strategy is very much to coax the zerg into a bad attack with such a weird build. If they just stay as passive as you, Id guess it would come down to BL spread, fungals, vortexes, spines ect. same as always.
If they stay as passive as me then I can probably get a 4th base, and 8gas archon 200/200 will win no matter what. At this point it becomes irrelevant on how many bases the zerg is on or on what units he can remax simply because he cannot even chip away at your 200/200 divinegoddeathball. Additionally, if you are of the tryhard kind, you can have 2 warp-prisms on the map and warp in 20 zealots at a spot where he won't have army and destroy a base. A gun is enough to kill a man, this simple a-move build is the gun. If for whatever reason you need a large rifle or a cannon or a bazooka you can do that too (warp prism drops become nigh uncounterable lategame, so do mass carriers with psionic storm). It's just not really necessary.
This gives you a strong composition, but it all still comes down to the pvz lategame. If you are comfortable with that stage of the matchup it is a fine build, but there are many zergs who are equally comfortable there. Ofc there are many things strong in the lategame like warpprisms but that is all standard stuff. Your army is strong, but it isnt significantly stronger than the zerg if he has gone right up to BL infestor. If you fight it still comes down to micro.
It seems that you are under the impression that the game is perfectly balanced with no clear advantage (slight at best) at the lategame. This is not true. Lategame Z cannot beat the lategame of the other races provided they have all their economy and infrastructure up.
An example would be ZvT. I often win lategame T as Z, but I am usually facing MMM or 3/3 thor/tank/hellion with vikings. If I was facing 3/3 battlecruiser/viking with mass raven, I would certainly lose the game. It is however extremely hard for a terran to suddenly pull 15-20 full energy BCs out of his ass with 3/3 and a lot of full energy ravens accompanied with that, there's no real effective way to transition into that (at least not that I know of).
The same is true for ZvP. If the P has a lot of high templars with storms and a bunch of 3/3 carriers and a mothership, there is actually nothing you can do. The same is true for a 200/200 energy mothership with 200/200 3/0 archon behind it, and that is actually attainable - it's not only attainable, it's quite easy in fact if you follow this build. Normal ZvP endgame, although already protoss favored (please don't argue this), is not unwinnable for a zerg. Walls of spines/spores, infestors, broodlords would all do well. That is not true for this composition.
On July 14 2012 03:32 Nyast wrote: Btw, do you continue to add voidrays afterwards ? It sounds like voidrays would nicely complement this compo.
I don't continue to add void rays as it is not necessary for me to win. If you are creating a nice painting you do not have to use every brush in your atelier/repertoire either, even though they may be really good brushes and can have positive effects on your painting. If you want to add void rays, then you can totally do that.
On July 14 2012 02:13 Arcanefrost wrote: Mothership on 2 bases doesn't work. If the zerg makes fast corruptors he can snipe it before you have the energy to vortex, and your archon count isn't high enough yet to stop them. With your mothership dead it becomes near impossible to take a third, and it only goes downhill from there.
This is incorrect. He cannot have enough corruptors and ground forces. Keep in mind that the mothership has 700 combined hitpoints with 2 base armor and that archons deal heavy splash damage, and you have a void ray in there too. Nothing prevents you from moving your mothership a bit back, corruptors only have 6 range and will be shot at by archons/cannons. His window is extremely limited as well as you will get 50 energy extremely quickly, which is enough for 1 vortex combined with your starting energy.
He just makes corruptors first, snipes your ms as it pops and then proceeds to transition into roachmax which denies your third. Hasuobs also said this once during a cast.
On July 14 2012 02:13 Arcanefrost wrote: Mothership on 2 bases doesn't work. If the zerg makes fast corruptors he can snipe it before you have the energy to vortex, and your archon count isn't high enough yet to stop them. With your mothership dead it becomes near impossible to take a third, and it only goes downhill from there.
This is incorrect. He cannot have enough corruptors and ground forces. Keep in mind that the mothership has 700 combined hitpoints with 2 base armor and that archons deal heavy splash damage, and you have a void ray in there too. Nothing prevents you from moving your mothership a bit back, corruptors only have 6 range and will be shot at by archons/cannons. His window is extremely limited as well as you will get 50 energy extremely quickly, which is enough for 1 vortex combined with your starting energy.
He just makes corruptors first, snipes your ms as it pops and then proceeds to transition into roachmax which denies your third. Hasuobs also said this once during a cast.
What you are describing is not possible, no matter how much you want it to be. I do remember the HasuObs cast where he said this, but he was incorrect as well (or not using the proper build).
The mothership will pop between 10 and 11 minutes. You will need a ridiculous amount of corruptors before 12-13 minutes (that is when I get 100 energy and can vortex your corruptors, and then instantly kill them by means of an archon toilet. Remember that the few seconds of invulnerability that was added after exiting the vortex is not as relevant to air units, as air units spread much slower than ground units.) Also, I can just move the mothership back.
On July 14 2012 03:11 Insomni7 wrote: I mean what you are doing is playing for a lategame composition as far as I can tell. You are getting an optimal composition off of 3 base. Still I would imagine by the time you attack the zerg would also be rolling broodlord infestor and it just comes down to a micro war. It seems like your strategy is very much to coax the zerg into a bad attack with such a weird build. If they just stay as passive as you, Id guess it would come down to BL spread, fungals, vortexes, spines ect. same as always.
If they stay as passive as me then I can probably get a 4th base, and 8gas archon 200/200 will win no matter what. At this point it becomes irrelevant on how many bases the zerg is on or on what units he can remax simply because he cannot even chip away at your 200/200 divinegoddeathball. Additionally, if you are of the tryhard kind, you can have 2 warp-prisms on the map and warp in 20 zealots at a spot where he won't have army and destroy a base. A gun is enough to kill a man, this simple a-move build is the gun. If for whatever reason you need a large rifle or a cannon or a bazooka you can do that too (warp prism drops become nigh uncounterable lategame, so do mass carriers with psionic storm). It's just not really necessary.
This gives you a strong composition, but it all still comes down to the pvz lategame. If you are comfortable with that stage of the matchup it is a fine build, but there are many zergs who are equally comfortable there. Ofc there are many things strong in the lategame like warpprisms but that is all standard stuff. Your army is strong, but it isnt significantly stronger than the zerg if he has gone right up to BL infestor. If you fight it still comes down to micro.
It seems that you are under the impression that the game is perfectly balanced with no clear advantage (slight at best) at the lategame. This is not true. Lategame Z cannot beat the lategame of the other races provided they have all their economy and infrastructure up.
An example would be ZvT. I often win lategame T as Z, but I am usually facing MMM or 3/3 thor/tank/hellion with vikings. If I was facing 3/3 battlecruiser/viking with mass raven, I would certainly lose the game. It is however extremely hard for a terran to suddenly pull 15-20 full energy BCs out of his ass with 3/3 and a lot of full energy ravens accompanied with that, there's no real effective way to transition into that (at least not that I know of).
The same is true for ZvP. If the P has a lot of high templars with storms and a bunch of 3/3 carriers and a mothership, there is actually nothing you can do. The same is true for a 200/200 energy mothership with 200/200 3/0 archon behind it, and that is actually attainable - it's not only attainable, it's quite easy in fact if you follow this build. Normal ZvP endgame, although already protoss favored (please don't argue this), is not unwinnable for a zerg. Walls of spines/spores, infestors, broodlords would all do well. That is not true for this composition.
On July 14 2012 03:32 Nyast wrote: Btw, do you continue to add voidrays afterwards ? It sounds like voidrays would nicely complement this compo.
I don't continue to add void rays as it is not necessary for me to win. If you are creating a nice painting you do not have to use every brush in your atelier/repertoire either, even though they may be really good brushes and can have positive effects on your painting. If you want to add void rays, then you can totally do that.
I agree once you start getting 3-3 carriers you will be close to invincible, but you arent getting 3-3 carriers with this build and I do not believe that archon mothership is a composition which is anything but the equal of BL infestor. I actually think zerg will always have a slight edge in this match because so much of it comes down more to the zerg's spread than any micro the protoss can do.
On July 14 2012 02:13 Arcanefrost wrote: Mothership on 2 bases doesn't work. If the zerg makes fast corruptors he can snipe it before you have the energy to vortex, and your archon count isn't high enough yet to stop them. With your mothership dead it becomes near impossible to take a third, and it only goes downhill from there.
This is incorrect. He cannot have enough corruptors and ground forces. Keep in mind that the mothership has 700 combined hitpoints with 2 base armor and that archons deal heavy splash damage, and you have a void ray in there too. Nothing prevents you from moving your mothership a bit back, corruptors only have 6 range and will be shot at by archons/cannons. His window is extremely limited as well as you will get 50 energy extremely quickly, which is enough for 1 vortex combined with your starting energy.
He just makes corruptors first, snipes your ms as it pops and then proceeds to transition into roachmax which denies your third. Hasuobs also said this once during a cast.
What you are describing is not possible, no matter how much you want it to be. I do remember the HasuObs cast where he said this, but he was incorrect as well (or not using the proper build).
The mothership will pop between 10 and 11 minutes. You will need a ridiculous amount of corruptors before 12-13 minutes (that is when I get 100 energy and can vortex your corruptors, and then instantly kill them by means of an archon toilet. Remember that the few seconds of invulnerability that was added after exiting the vortex is not as relevant to air units, as air units spread much slower than ground units.) Also, I can just move the mothership back.
you seem super confidernt you should probably go in gstl as pvz sniper!!
On July 14 2012 02:13 Arcanefrost wrote: Mothership on 2 bases doesn't work. If the zerg makes fast corruptors he can snipe it before you have the energy to vortex, and your archon count isn't high enough yet to stop them. With your mothership dead it becomes near impossible to take a third, and it only goes downhill from there.
This is incorrect. He cannot have enough corruptors and ground forces. Keep in mind that the mothership has 700 combined hitpoints with 2 base armor and that archons deal heavy splash damage, and you have a void ray in there too. Nothing prevents you from moving your mothership a bit back, corruptors only have 6 range and will be shot at by archons/cannons. His window is extremely limited as well as you will get 50 energy extremely quickly, which is enough for 1 vortex combined with your starting energy.
He just makes corruptors first, snipes your ms as it pops and then proceeds to transition into roachmax which denies your third. Hasuobs also said this once during a cast.
What you are describing is not possible, no matter how much you want it to be. I do remember the HasuObs cast where he said this, but he was incorrect as well (or not using the proper build).
The mothership will pop between 10 and 11 minutes. You will need a ridiculous amount of corruptors before 12-13 minutes (that is when I get 100 energy and can vortex your corruptors, and then instantly kill them by means of an archon toilet. Remember that the few seconds of invulnerability that was added after exiting the vortex is not as relevant to air units, as air units spread much slower than ground units.) Also, I can just move the mothership back.
you seem super confidernt you should probably go in gstl as pvz sniper!!
He's playing the build so one could assume he knows it better than people who do not use it frequently.
On July 14 2012 02:13 Arcanefrost wrote: Mothership on 2 bases doesn't work. If the zerg makes fast corruptors he can snipe it before you have the energy to vortex, and your archon count isn't high enough yet to stop them. With your mothership dead it becomes near impossible to take a third, and it only goes downhill from there.
This is incorrect. He cannot have enough corruptors and ground forces. Keep in mind that the mothership has 700 combined hitpoints with 2 base armor and that archons deal heavy splash damage, and you have a void ray in there too. Nothing prevents you from moving your mothership a bit back, corruptors only have 6 range and will be shot at by archons/cannons. His window is extremely limited as well as you will get 50 energy extremely quickly, which is enough for 1 vortex combined with your starting energy.
He just makes corruptors first, snipes your ms as it pops and then proceeds to transition into roachmax which denies your third. Hasuobs also said this once during a cast.
What you are describing is not possible, no matter how much you want it to be. I do remember the HasuObs cast where he said this, but he was incorrect as well (or not using the proper build).
The mothership will pop between 10 and 11 minutes. You will need a ridiculous amount of corruptors before 12-13 minutes (that is when I get 100 energy and can vortex your corruptors, and then instantly kill them by means of an archon toilet. Remember that the few seconds of invulnerability that was added after exiting the vortex is not as relevant to air units, as air units spread much slower than ground units.) Also, I can just move the mothership back.
you seem super confidernt you should probably go in gstl as pvz sniper!!
He's playing the build so one could assume he knows it better than people who do not use it frequently.
Then again I am also the one who has most interest in the build seeming strong as I am the one who published a guide on it, so it is important to keep an open mind and question what you read (goes for every part of life actually). But debating things that are actually not possible (the corruptor sniping crap that has come up) is pretty annoying.
Build reads very well, seems like a good one. Thou I don't see how you prevent the zerg from scouting with an overseer - seeing your play for exactly what is, Then taking an early 4th and eariler 5th and simply flooding you with roach/corruptor/infestor at about the 14 minute mark.
Beyond that this all seems a bit pointless to me. In HotS the vortex will only effect ground units and I think 1.5 will also make that change for WoL. You're basing you're entire build on a broken mehcanic, sure you'll win and for most people that is all that matters but whats the point?
I don't see how you could hold your third against a stephano max roach ling push with burrow. Ur army when it hits would consist of zealots, 1 void ray, 1 mothership and some pheonixes with cannons. 2 pronged attack at nat and third, say on day break, sniping cannons and burrowing when mothership arrives. Impossible to hold both sides as roach owns zealots and your air units will deal negligible damage.
On July 14 2012 04:35 NoNonsense wrote: I don't see how you could hold your third against a stephano max roach ling push with burrow. Ur army when it hits would consist of zealots, 1 void ray, 1 mothership and some pheonixes with cannons. 2 pronged attack at nat and third, say on day break, sniping cannons and burrowing when mothership arrives. Impossible to hold both sides as roach owns zealots and your air units will deal negligible damage.
Echoing NoNonsense's skepticism, after reading the guide and watching your replays, I feel that this is a build that's more map specific than compositionally specific. I see it running into issues on maps where multi-pronged aggression excel, but excelling on maps where the 2nd and 3rd bases can be defended with small well positioned groups of units and good wall offs.
That being said, perhaps an adjustment on maps such as cloud kingdom or daybreak that have several available attack paths could be building an extra sentry or 2 and using gateways to sim-city bases?
Can you post more replays of you winning against a zerg that maxes broodlords/infestor? I think it's quite hard to hit good vortexes if the zerg has a good spread...
I also would like to see you defend your third against the max roach/ling build from stephano.
On July 14 2012 04:34 IcemanAsi wrote: Build reads very well, seems like a good one. Thou I don't see how you prevent the zerg from scouting with an overseer - seeing your play for exactly what is, Then taking an early 4th and eariler 5th and simply flooding you with roach/corruptor/infestor at about the 14 minute mark.
Beyond that this all seems a bit pointless to me. In HotS the vortex will only effect ground units and I think 1.5 will also make that change for WoL. You're basing you're entire build on a broken mehcanic, sure you'll win and for most people that is all that matters but whats the point?
You don't get that much of an economic boost from grabbing an earlier 4th and 5th and the drones cut into your supply count. For example, 2 bases is twice as good as 1 base, but 3 bases is only 1.5x as good as 2 bases. Eventually you get negative returns because the additional drones required to make use of the base eat into your food count, which eats into your army strength (but feeds your remax strength). 100 bases is the same as 50 bases.
The only thing the zerg could make use of is gas (using the additional bases only for production and gas mining). Gas is invested in high tech units and zerg high tech units don't work against mass archon with the vortex mechanic. Your best bet is bl/inf, and that's what everyone is doing to me (and failing).
The second part of your post is completely irrelevant to everything so I shall ignore it.
On July 14 2012 04:35 NoNonsense wrote: I don't see how you could hold your third against a stephano max roach ling push with burrow. Ur army when it hits would consist of zealots, 1 void ray, 1 mothership and some pheonixes with cannons. 2 pronged attack at nat and third, say on day break, sniping cannons and burrowing when mothership arrives. Impossible to hold both sides as roach owns zealots and your air units will deal negligible damage.
Echoing NoNonsense's skepticism, after reading the guide and watching your replays, I feel that this is a build that's more map specific than compositionally specific. I see it running into issues on maps where multi-pronged aggression excel, but excelling on maps where the 2nd and 3rd bases can be defended with small well positioned groups of units and good wall offs.
That being said, perhaps an adjustment on maps such as cloud kingdom or daybreak that have several available attack paths could be building an extra sentry or 2 and using gateways to sim-city bases?
Just a suggestion. Thanks for the write-up.
It seems impossible, but I can verify from own experience that it actually is holdable with this build. There's not much else to say. What you think is not holdable with this build due to the low amount of units, actually is holdable.
Echoing NoNonsense's skepticism, after reading the guide and watching your replays, I feel that this is a build that's more map specific than compositionally specific. I see it running into issues on maps where multi-pronged aggression excel, but excelling on maps where the 2nd and 3rd bases can be defended with small well positioned groups of units and good wall offs.
That being said, perhaps an adjustment on maps such as cloud kingdom or daybreak that have several available attack paths could be building an extra sentry or 2 and using gateways to sim-city bases?
Just a suggestion. Thanks for the write-up.
It seems impossible, but I can verify from own experience that it actually is holdable with this build. There's not much else to say. What you think is not holdable with this build due to the low amount of units, actually is holdable.
Can you include a replay? The only replay we have of you holding anything remotely similar to the max roach style that's come up several times is the game where you faced mutalisk play. By the time you were hit with a sizable roach force, your army had grown considerably larger than it was when a Stephano esq. max would hit you.
We're not trying to punch holes in your strategy or ridicule you, we're trying to understand your reasoning and see an example of what you are trying to teach us.
WTF is with these responses? 2-base Mothership into expand is one of the most solid PvZ builds in the game.
If you add cannons under your Mothership, Corrupter diving is never cost effective because of the HP of the Mothership and the good DPS that cannons do. Zealot, Archon + Vortex is literally the most cost-effective combination in the game assuming equal supply, unless the Zerg tosses banelings or something in the vortex. Even if they make enough Corrupters to kill your Mothership, you just power your 3 base economy to a huge Zealot Archon counter attack, and there's no way Zerg can reinforce over that after he's invested enough gas and supply into killing a Mothership with Corrupters, despite Archons and Cannon fire.
This guy has a decent MMR, and like he said, plays vs high GM players. What more do people want? If you have a higher MMR, you should be out solving your own problems or making your own builds, but I'm a firm believer that any reasonably well thought-out strategy can beat any caliber of player in the right hands.
Most responses in this thread are forum-nerdery, where they just state a counter as if the opponent always has infinity information. One of the benefits of 2-base Mothership is that they know you have a Mothership, but have virtually no idea what is under the Mothership until they commit to an attack, or sacrifice an overseer and hopefully see everything that's there. That's a lot of time for the Protoss player to stabilize into a super solid unit count. People should actually consider the actual game, instead of saying stuff like "well, they could easily just drop banelings on every mineral line, have max mutas, fungal your army to death, Corrupter snipe the Mothership and then EASILY win! Duh!"
Regarding Sentries in PvZ - I'm just waiting for the day that Zergs automatically take an additional geyser on top of their Roach plays, research drops and just drop a max Roach army on top of a pathetic sentry count and easily win games. Sentries in PvZ are so overrated.. why do people think that no sentries = no safety? I'm shocked that Zergs already don't automatically research drops when seeing more than 3 sentries on the field. It's such an easy win if their sentries have basically 0 cost effectiveness. More than anything, all of these pushes designed to rely on forcefields will become obsolete as Zergs figure out that drops + Roaches completely counter a sentry-based army. In the future, more Zealots and building walls will be used to expand and control space, rather than sentry energy, as drops get more popular. Hopefully this will cause Protoss players to spend gas on units that have a long life-span and wide range of use... at least some people are already figuring these steps out and planning for the future.
@OP: I think your usage of words makes people immediately judgmental. I have to admit, when I first clicked on the thread, I wanted to check your replays to see what caliber of players you were playing. I expected it to be like High Diamond or something, just by the title of the thread. If the title actually described the build order, people would probably be more respectful.
In any event, I use a very similar build, and have a very similar winrate at 1000-1200 Masters NA. My build opens double Stargate pressure and gets a little later Mothership. I also rely on cannons quite a bit, basically borrowing the opener from that other thread about the Mothership, VR expand, but I add Immortals on 3 bases so I can power through Roaches and Spine walls. The high Void Ray count really helps out in the late-game especially.. I hate investing gas into units that have an expiration date on their usefulness. In my games, I usually just sit and wait for a favorable engagement (basically if I land a single Vortex), and then counter for the win with warp prism reinforcement. I like the 2x Stargate opener for double Phoenix in the event that they open Spire, by the way.
The ability to harass really heavily and recall is a big bonus, too... something that traditional PvZ does not offer whatsoever.
Overall, any build that opens 2-base Mothership is solid assuming they take the necessary precautions and scout well. Of course, stuff like drops, Nydus, etc are going to cause problems, but not more problems than any other sentry-based build would already have. Regarding this specific build, unless you have a quick Immortal transition planned or a high Void Ray/Phoenix Count along with cannons, I'm also a little worried about a Zerg that blindly eco Roaches really hard. Of course you can trade very efficiently with a Vortex, but if you're ever out of MS energy after reinforcement, I think you're going to have trouble without some beefy, high anti-armored DPS units.
On July 14 2012 04:34 IcemanAsi wrote: Build reads very well, seems like a good one. Thou I don't see how you prevent the zerg from scouting with an overseer - seeing your play for exactly what is, Then taking an early 4th and eariler 5th and simply flooding you with roach/corruptor/infestor at about the 14 minute mark.
Beyond that this all seems a bit pointless to me. In HotS the vortex will only effect ground units and I think 1.5 will also make that change for WoL. You're basing you're entire build on a broken mehcanic, sure you'll win and for most people that is all that matters but whats the point?
You don't get that much of an economic boost from grabbing an earlier 4th and 5th and the drones cut into your supply count. For example, 2 bases is twice as good as 1 base, but 3 bases is only 1.5x as good as 2 bases. Eventually you get negative returns because the additional drones required to make use of the base eat into your food count, which eats into your army strength (but feeds your remax strength). 100 bases is the same as 50 bases.
The only thing the zerg could make use of is gas (using the additional bases only for production and gas mining). Gas is invested in high tech units and zerg high tech units don't work against mass archon with the vortex mechanic. Your best bet is bl/inf, and that's what everyone is doing to me (and failing).
The second part of your post is completely irrelevant to everything so I shall ignore it.
Offcourse 4th and 5th mentioned are for gas only as you would not be mined out at the main at that time. ( 78 drones total ) On three base mineral and 10 geyser I can maintain constant production of mass roach+corruptor+infestor which I don't see how your'e holding as fungals + roach seems to beat everything you have out and even a few corruptor should be able to take out your mothership as you don't have alot of AA ( and what AA you have can be fungaled and has short range ), unless I missed something ( are you keeping up the VR production? ) . the extra gas goes for the infestors and double upgrades while maintaing max supply of production. How would you take your 4th?
As for the second part of my post. I agree that as long as the mechanic is in the game it should be used as you should play to win but it's still broken. They tried to fix it before and failed ( Temporary invulnrability doesn't last long enough to unclump air units ) and they are finnaly removing it in HotS ( No vortex on air units for that reason precisely ). While this might not be immdietaly relevant for this discussion, how the removal of the keystone of your build is completely irrelevant escapes me.
This build seems awfully similar to http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=271279 with the exception that you're going for Zealot Archon instead of Blink Stalker. Have you tried the latter as well as the former? Seems like +2 blink could give you a good period of strength, even without the fast toilets.
By the way, regarding Corrupter vs Mothership - most people won't need a Vortex to fight that other than to buy time. Almost every Zerg player clumps their Corrupters up naturally, and they will if you micro the Mothership back. That's when Archons are valuable vs Corrupters. Corrupters actually spread quite well when coming out of a Vortex unless there are like 25 of them.
On July 14 2012 04:35 NoNonsense wrote: I don't see how you could hold your third against a stephano max roach ling push with burrow. Ur army when it hits would consist of zealots, 1 void ray, 1 mothership and some pheonixes with cannons. 2 pronged attack at nat and third, say on day break, sniping cannons and burrowing when mothership arrives. Impossible to hold both sides as roach owns zealots and your air units will deal negligible damage.
You can't kill units that you can't see. Roaches don't hit air either. With "stephano max roach" you won't have the necessary amount of overseers to see the army long enaugh before mothership, voidray, phenixes and cannons kill them.
Echoing NoNonsense's skepticism, after reading the guide and watching your replays, I feel that this is a build that's more map specific than compositionally specific. I see it running into issues on maps where multi-pronged aggression excel, but excelling on maps where the 2nd and 3rd bases can be defended with small well positioned groups of units and good wall offs.
That being said, perhaps an adjustment on maps such as cloud kingdom or daybreak that have several available attack paths could be building an extra sentry or 2 and using gateways to sim-city bases?
Just a suggestion. Thanks for the write-up.
It seems impossible, but I can verify from own experience that it actually is holdable with this build. There's not much else to say. What you think is not holdable with this build due to the low amount of units, actually is holdable.
Can you include a replay? The only replay we have of you holding anything remotely similar to the max roach style that's come up several times is the game where you faced mutalisk play. By the time you were hit with a sizable roach force, your army had grown considerably larger than it was when a Stephano esq. max would hit you.
We're not trying to punch holes in your strategy or ridicule you, we're trying to understand your reasoning and see an example of what you are trying to teach us.
The replay on condemned ridge that I have attached is a good example of a stephano-esque build, although he used a lot of hydras instead of roaches. It accomplished roughly the same thing, however, and even made me lose my mothership (which I could have saved). Keep in mind that if he has only roaches your void ray and mothership will have free reign. If you are feeling insecure against mass roach timings (which I don't), you can always add one extra void ray.
I'm a bit thin on recent, relevant replays but I can probably find a few more.
On July 14 2012 05:02 SidewinderSC2 wrote: WTF is with these responses? 2-base Mothership into expand is one of the most solid PvZ builds in the game.
If you add cannons under your Mothership, Corrupter diving is never cost effective because of the HP of the Mothership and the good DPS that cannons do. Zealot, Archon + Vortex is literally the most cost-effective combination in the game assuming equal supply, unless the Zerg tosses banelings or something in the vortex. Even if they make enough Corrupters to kill your Mothership, you just power your 3 base economy to a huge Zealot Archon counter attack, and there's no way Zerg can reinforce over that after he's invested enough gas and supply into killing a Mothership with Corrupters, despite Archons and Cannon fire.
This guy has a decent MMR, and like he said, plays vs high GM players. What more do people want? If you have a higher MMR, you should be out solving your own problems or making your own builds, but I'm a firm believer that any reasonably well thought-out strategy can beat any caliber of player in the right hands.
Most responses in this thread are forum-nerdery, where they just state a counter as if the opponent always has infinity information. One of the benefits of 2-base Mothership is that they know you have a Mothership, but have virtually no idea what is under the Mothership until they commit to an attack, or sacrifice an overseer and hopefully see everything that's there. That's a lot of time for the Protoss player to stabilize into a super solid unit count. People should actually consider the actual game, instead of saying stuff like "well, they could easily just drop banelings on every mineral line, have max mutas, fungal your army to death, Corrupter snipe the Mothership and then EASILY win! Duh!"
Regarding Sentries in PvZ - I'm just waiting for the day that Zergs automatically take an additional geyser on top of their Roach plays, research drops and just drop a max Roach army on top of a pathetic sentry count and easily win games. Sentries in PvZ are so overrated.. why do people think that no sentries = no safety? I'm shocked that Zergs already don't automatically research drops when seeing more than 3 sentries on the field. It's such an easy win if their sentries have basically 0 cost effectiveness. More than anything, all of these pushes designed to rely on forcefields will become obsolete as Zergs figure out that drops + Roaches completely counter a sentry-based army. In the future, more Zealots and building walls will be used to expand and control space, rather than sentry energy, as drops get more popular. Hopefully this will cause Protoss players to spend gas on units that have a long life-span and wide range of use... at least some people are already figuring these steps out and planning for the future.
@OP: I think your usage of words makes people immediately judgmental. I have to admit, when I first clicked on the thread, I wanted to check your replays to see what caliber of players you were playing. I expected it to be like High Diamond or something, just by the title of the thread. If the title actually described the build order, people would probably be more respectful.
In any event, I use a very similar build, and have a very similar winrate at 1000-1200 Masters NA. My build opens double Stargate pressure and gets a little later Mothership. I also rely on cannons quite a bit, basically borrowing the opener from that other thread about the Mothership, VR expand, but I add Immortals on 3 bases so I can power through Roaches and Spine walls. The high Void Ray count really helps out in the late-game especially.. I hate investing gas into units that have an expiration date on their usefulness. In my games, I usually just sit and wait for a favorable engagement (basically if I land a single Vortex), and then counter for the win with warp prism reinforcement. I like the 2x Stargate opener for double Phoenix in the event that they open Spire, by the way.
The ability to harass really heavily and recall is a big bonus, too... something that traditional PvZ does not offer whatsoever.
Overall, any build that opens 2-base Mothership is solid assuming they take the necessary precautions and scout well. Of course, stuff like drops, Nydus, etc are going to cause problems, but not more problems than any other sentry-based build would already have. Regarding this specific build, unless you have a quick Immortal transition planned or a high Void Ray/Phoenix Count along with cannons, I'm also a little worried about a Zerg that blindly eco Roaches really hard. Of course you can trade very efficiently with a Vortex, but if you're ever out of MS energy after reinforcement, I think you're going to have trouble without some beefy, high anti-armored DPS units.
While I would never consider myself special enough to automatically fall outside the categories of forum readers you've described (forum-nerdery etc.), I've written a few guides and a discussion page, and I find it pretty funny how many people don't even read the whole post, don't watch the replays, and comment with the first criticism they can think of, and than NEVER come back to see if the OP responded. I wonder to myself if these people have any idea how stupidly obvious it is that they didn't even put in the effort to read the OP and consider his sources before shit talking. Frequency wise, its about 2-3 useless posts to every 1 well thought-out worthwhile post. What sucks the most is that legitimate questions get less attention/discussion or are discarded.
The more I've posted here, the more I've accepted it, and responding to the forum-nerdery has become a routine part of posting for me. It sucks, but hey, welcome to the forum haha.
Echoing NoNonsense's skepticism, after reading the guide and watching your replays, I feel that this is a build that's more map specific than compositionally specific. I see it running into issues on maps where multi-pronged aggression excel, but excelling on maps where the 2nd and 3rd bases can be defended with small well positioned groups of units and good wall offs.
That being said, perhaps an adjustment on maps such as cloud kingdom or daybreak that have several available attack paths could be building an extra sentry or 2 and using gateways to sim-city bases?
Just a suggestion. Thanks for the write-up.
It seems impossible, but I can verify from own experience that it actually is holdable with this build. There's not much else to say. What you think is not holdable with this build due to the low amount of units, actually is holdable.
Can you include a replay? The only replay we have of you holding anything remotely similar to the max roach style that's come up several times is the game where you faced mutalisk play. By the time you were hit with a sizable roach force, your army had grown considerably larger than it was when a Stephano esq. max would hit you.
We're not trying to punch holes in your strategy or ridicule you, we're trying to understand your reasoning and see an example of what you are trying to teach us.
The replay on condemned ridge that I have attached is a good example of a stephano-esque build, although he used a lot of hydras instead of roaches. It accomplished roughly the same thing, however, and even made me lose my mothership (which I could have saved). Keep in mind that if he has only roaches your void ray and mothership will have free reign. If you are feeling insecure against mass roach timings (which I don't), you can always add one extra void ray.
I'm a bit thin on recent, relevant replays but I can probably find a few more.
I'll give the condemned ridge replay another look. Thanks! I know some zergs I can get to try the Max roach deal against me and I'll use your build the best I can and comeback with any good replays [i.e. both me and my opponent play solidly] I can generate.
- 9 Pylon, chrono only probes - 13 Forge - 17 3x Pylons at ramp = gg
Only way for Zerg to beat it, besides patrolling the ramp (which you can still glitch out if they are using patrol command, or if you bring 2 probes), is to 6-10 pool, in which case you either cannon your main or block the ramp, win.
win win scenario. I dont know why Toss isn't 100% on ladder.
On a side note, good guide. Seems like most of the Toss I play on ladder. They beat me too.
On July 14 2012 05:09 Jergen wrote: This build seems awfully similar to http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=271279 with the exception that you're going for Zealot Archon instead of Blink Stalker. Have you tried the latter as well as the former? Seems like +2 blink could give you a good period of strength, even without the fast toilets.
If you read the first paragraph you can see that Plexa links to my earlier version of this build that I had posted. He identified the similarities as well. That being said, I have tried that build as well and it seemed grossly inferior to me - more like a build I would use in a bo3 or bo5 to throw an opponent off, not like my standard go-to macro build.
On July 14 2012 05:14 Tombomb wrote:While I would never consider myself special enough to automatically fall outside the categories of forum readers you've described (forum-nerdery etc.), I've written a few guides and a discussion page, and I find it pretty funny how many people don't even read the whole post, don't watch the replays, and comment with the first criticism they can think of, and than NEVER come back to see if the OP responded. I wonder to myself if these people have any idea how stupidly obvious it is that they didn't even put in the effort to read the OP and consider his sources before shit talking. Frequency wise, its about 2-3 useless posts to every 1 well thought-out worthwhile post. What sucks the most is that legitimate questions get less attention/discussion or are discarded.
The more I've posted here, the more I've accepted it, and responding to the forum-nerdery has become a routine part of posting for me. It sucks, but hey, welcome to the forum haha.
Indeed. I just think it's reasonable to give the OP a fair chance. They didn't play all these games, figure out specific timings and make a detailed forum post for some know-nothing to chime in with their uneducated opinion. Like this OP, I also like to make cool stuff that wins at reasonably high levels and share it with people that also want to do cool stuff. But half the time, people chime in with "well this will never work.. lawl", when it's obvious that I either have a better MMR and a better winrate, or they don't even understand what is going on in the build.
I can't believe how incredibly disrespectful people are on the internet, especially in a community like this. People should watch the replays, try it, or at least bring some semblance of intelligence regarding how the game actually works before they start adding lame comments like "lawl, no sentries = gg". If people don't like it, include a way to improve it rather than blatantly dumping ass on somebody's hard work. If people actually don't understand the game, they shouldn't be posting on a strategy forum.
On July 14 2012 05:18 Belial88 wrote: I got another easy win for you:
- 9 Pylon, chrono only probes - 13 Forge - 17 3x Pylons at ramp = gg
Only way for Zerg to beat it, besides patrolling the ramp (which you can still glitch out if they are using patrol command, or if you bring 2 probes), is to 6-10 pool, in which case you either cannon your main or block the ramp, win.
win win scenario. I dont know why Toss isn't 100% on ladder.
On a side note, good guide. Seems like most of the Toss I play on ladder. They beat me too.
I can vouch for this as well, btw. Belial isn't crying, trolling or exaggerating, this is actually pretty broken and always has been as far as I can remember.
Echoing NoNonsense's skepticism, after reading the guide and watching your replays, I feel that this is a build that's more map specific than compositionally specific. I see it running into issues on maps where multi-pronged aggression excel, but excelling on maps where the 2nd and 3rd bases can be defended with small well positioned groups of units and good wall offs.
That being said, perhaps an adjustment on maps such as cloud kingdom or daybreak that have several available attack paths could be building an extra sentry or 2 and using gateways to sim-city bases?
Just a suggestion. Thanks for the write-up.
It seems impossible, but I can verify from own experience that it actually is holdable with this build. There's not much else to say. What you think is not holdable with this build due to the low amount of units, actually is holdable.
Can you include a replay? The only replay we have of you holding anything remotely similar to the max roach style that's come up several times is the game where you faced mutalisk play. By the time you were hit with a sizable roach force, your army had grown considerably larger than it was when a Stephano esq. max would hit you.
We're not trying to punch holes in your strategy or ridicule you, we're trying to understand your reasoning and see an example of what you are trying to teach us.
The replay on condemned ridge that I have attached is a good example of a stephano-esque build, although he used a lot of hydras instead of roaches. It accomplished roughly the same thing, however, and even made me lose my mothership (which I could have saved). Keep in mind that if he has only roaches your void ray and mothership will have free reign. If you are feeling insecure against mass roach timings (which I don't), you can always add one extra void ray.
I'm a bit thin on recent, relevant replays but I can probably find a few more.
I'll give the condemned ridge replay another look. Thanks! I know some zergs I can get to try the Max roach deal against me and I'll use your build the best I can and comeback with any good replays [i.e. both me and my opponent play solidly] I can generate.
If you can get me replays where you execute this build and the necessary defense properly and lose against a properly executed stephano-esque timing I shall reconsider my opinion, obviously.
Maybe we should have some non-biased and high-level people try this out. OP seems to have a response to every criticism, so all that really needs to be done is have some unbiased people try it out and see if it works in practice.
Echoing NoNonsense's skepticism, after reading the guide and watching your replays, I feel that this is a build that's more map specific than compositionally specific. I see it running into issues on maps where multi-pronged aggression excel, but excelling on maps where the 2nd and 3rd bases can be defended with small well positioned groups of units and good wall offs.
That being said, perhaps an adjustment on maps such as cloud kingdom or daybreak that have several available attack paths could be building an extra sentry or 2 and using gateways to sim-city bases?
Just a suggestion. Thanks for the write-up.
It seems impossible, but I can verify from own experience that it actually is holdable with this build. There's not much else to say. What you think is not holdable with this build due to the low amount of units, actually is holdable.
Can you include a replay? The only replay we have of you holding anything remotely similar to the max roach style that's come up several times is the game where you faced mutalisk play. By the time you were hit with a sizable roach force, your army had grown considerably larger than it was when a Stephano esq. max would hit you.
We're not trying to punch holes in your strategy or ridicule you, we're trying to understand your reasoning and see an example of what you are trying to teach us.
The replay on condemned ridge that I have attached is a good example of a stephano-esque build, although he used a lot of hydras instead of roaches. It accomplished roughly the same thing, however, and even made me lose my mothership (which I could have saved). Keep in mind that if he has only roaches your void ray and mothership will have free reign. If you are feeling insecure against mass roach timings (which I don't), you can always add one extra void ray.
I'm a bit thin on recent, relevant replays but I can probably find a few more.
I'll give the condemned ridge replay another look. Thanks! I know some zergs I can get to try the Max roach deal against me and I'll use your build the best I can and comeback with any good replays [i.e. both me and my opponent play solidly] I can generate.
If you can get me replays where you execute this build and the necessary defense properly and lose against a properly executed stephano-esque timing I shall reconsider my opinion, obviously.
Haha I'm glad you're open to constructive criticism, but I'm mostly going to try and help you out and get you some replays that show how to respond with this build to heavy roach play. We'll see what comes of it.
Am I totally wrong in thinking that roach/hydra/ling timing would beat this?
Whenever I see a toss go stargate, I quickly take a 4th, then proceed to go hydra ling while continuously scouting for the colossus production. If I don't see it, I just mass a crap ton of hydras and lings...and a-move and reinforced with roach/ling.
As a zerg, if I see you're 2 basing, I will mount an attack on you somehow or some way off 3 or 4 bases because I figure you're up to no good and I can't sit around and let you get some op army off 2 bases...
On July 14 2012 06:06 Amaterasu1234 wrote: Am I totally wrong in thinking that roach/hydra/ling timing would beat this?
Whenever I see a toss go stargate, I quickly take a 4th, then proceed to go hydra ling while continuously scouting for the colossus production. If I don't see it, I just mass a crap ton of hydras and lings...and a-move and reinforced with roach/ling.
As a zerg, if I see you're 2 basing, I will mount an attack on you somehow or some way off 3 or 4 bases because I figure you're up to no good and I can't sit around and let you get some op army off 2 bases...
I could see an infested terran timing on the third doing fairly well against this. When/if you scout it how do you deal with it? Your obs (i think) wont be out in time for you to deal with their burrowing away and I could see follow up roach/infestor drops catz style doing pretty well to bug your econ out before you can really get rolling.
Of course this is all theorycraft, I'm mostly interested in if you've met infested terran timings on the third/natural walls on ladder and how you dealt with them.
On July 14 2012 06:23 MagicalGirl wrote: Hi poon, quick question:
I could see an infested terran timing on the third doing fairly well against this. When/if you scout it how do you deal with it? Your obs (i think) wont be out in time for you to deal with their burrowing away and I could see follow up roach/infestor drops catz style doing pretty well to bug your econ out before you can really get rolling.
Of course this is all theorycraft, I'm mostly interested in if you've met infested terran timings on the third/natural walls on ladder and how you dealt with them.
Hey, I think we played a PvP yesterday. Sorry for the BM, but I have a 10% winrate in PvP and that was my 5th one in a row (comes with having a 90+% winrate in PvZ, another match-up has to suffer).
Infested terran timings from 2base (the old 'destiny style') are not counterable by following the conventional build. Your way of getting by with virtually no units is by 1. abusing the zerg's lack of anti air early-game and 2. forcefields/sim-city. Mass infested terrans obviously deal very well with both these things.
If you scout 2-base zerg, you should simply stay on 2 bases as well and add extra cannons. You know when he grabs a 3rd base, because you have a phoenix on the map. The conventional destiny style is to double expand after doing the infested terran timing (or getting out the initial infestors). At this point you can expand as well, and the zealots + archons will deal with any kind of infested terran/ling attack due to the high splash and damage (and zealots being naturally good against zerglings). If you are really worried about infestors, you can leave one ht at the start and have it build up energy, so it can pop 4 infestors without really cutting into your archon count.
If he is doing the same thing but off 3 bases you can actually just follow the exact same build as outlined in the OP.
You are right about the obs not being out in time, but this is usually no problem due to cannons at your natural and third.
What's the plan against someone who goes 3 base into Hydra/Ling or Muta, without making useless units or wasting anything beforehand?
I say this, because in the replays it looked like you had no reliable scouting information and took a third off a mothership and a void ray. Your opponent took lair very late, which is why the hydra attack hit later than it normally would and you managed to defend it at that point.
I suppose that's some evidence that at the least this build would require a zerg to hit good timings (which is true of all greedy mothership turtle builds like this) to kill you in the short window where you have absolutely no defense. They either have that option, or go into the late game with Roach/Infestor, which is also strong against this particular composition.
i don't see how zealot archon is going to fight a late game zerg army with brood infestor and a decent spread. you are relying on getting god vortexes and if that doesn't happen you lose i feel. Archon zealot has its place though .
Really need to try this out cause from my experiences Archon zealot get owned by Roach infestor like really hard. What do you do about upgrades do you double forge? single?
I only have one question? Which GSL season did you win? I mean, since this build is sooooo good, and you are being very defensive to anybody who tries to question it, then it must be unstoppable. I don't see why you aren't the best player in the world. Are you smurfing down in Masters? Because it seems to me you should be #1 GM.
OR
This build is only good for a cheap win here and there and it's not the second coming of Jesus you make it out to be.
On July 14 2012 07:11 SigmaoctanusIV wrote: Really need to try this out cause from my experiences Archon zealot get owned by Roach infestor like really hard. What do you do about upgrades do you double forge? single?
Just one forge, you only really need the attack upgrades. I research shield after +3 attack but that's usually when the game ends.
On July 14 2012 07:18 sfdrew wrote: I only have one question? Which GSL season did you win? I mean, since this build is sooooo good, and you are being very defensive to anybody who tries to question it, then it must be unstoppable. I don't see why you aren't the best player in the world. Are you smurfing down in Masters? Because it seems to me you should be #1 GM.
OR
This build is only good for a cheap win here and there and it's not the second coming of Jesus you make it out to be.
It only works in PvZ and there are 2 other match-ups as well. My PvP is atrocious.
On July 14 2012 07:18 sfdrew wrote: I only have one question? Which GSL season did you win? I mean, since this build is sooooo good, and you are being very defensive to anybody who tries to question it, then it must be unstoppable. I don't see why you aren't the best player in the world. Are you smurfing down in Masters? Because it seems to me you should be #1 GM.
OR
This build is only good for a cheap win here and there and it's not the second coming of Jesus you make it out to be.
Did you see his winrates in other MU... did you look at the replay... Pointless to you are they ?
OP: I kinda doubted the build at first like everybody. I've looked at the replay and it does seems really good.
I will try it and maybe share some replay for you. I kinda dont like stephano style against this build... I mean if he spread you out like on... Daybreak. You can put a lot of cannon and mothership but and voidray on the other side but if he remax non stop... you'll run out of cannon wouldnt you ?
I'll wait for others to provide replay or i'll try it myself to see it... Like a lot of people I doubt the build but since you say you hold it easily... I will try it.
Thx a lot for your time writting the build, we need more people like you in the community. and thx for the language it was kinda funny reading it
i dont think its that big of a deal that hes beating GM players with this build
however i believe the most important point of this thread is not that he wins, but that 2base mothership expand seems to not only be safe but gets your third up at a nice time even against stephano style aggression because 1) he needs hydras to stop the voidray/pheonix from killing overseers and 2) if he gets hydras his push is slower/weaker and 3) if he has no hydras, he cant kill cloaked units
if 2base mothership expand can get your third up at a nice time, and compete with the zerg econimcally, then id say its a hell of a nice strategy. If you lose the game at a later time it doesnt mean the build is bad it just means your enemy was better than you. Ive always thought it could be possible to make a 2base mothership expand that uses the cloaking field to protect the third and this seems to do it.
I think the reason this is so powerful is because of the cloaking field allowing that third to be safe against stephano roaches and if u scout the early roach warren you can just keep making voidrays and 4-5 voidrays+mothership come on zerg needs something higher tech to survive
my only suggestions for this playstyle is i highly highly suggest you keep getting +air upgrades and use your single stargate to keep making 1 voidray a minute after the third goes up.
Think about it. lets say from 13 minutes to 27 minutes, that 1 stargate while have made 14 voidrays. Just sayin the damage output of 14 voidrays with +ups is absolutely insane. just make sure to spread against fungal and they are a damn powerful heavy assault force for your archon/zealot to work with. then if you get a 5th base put on 2 more stargates for some +3 carriers. archon/voidray/storm/carrier/mothership is like the unbeatable god army against zerg
On July 14 2012 07:18 sfdrew wrote: I only have one question? Which GSL season did you win? I mean, since this build is sooooo good, and you are being very defensive to anybody who tries to question it, then it must be unstoppable. I don't see why you aren't the best player in the world. Are you smurfing down in Masters? Because it seems to me you should be #1 GM.
OR
This build is only good for a cheap win here and there and it's not the second coming of Jesus you make it out to be.
Did you see his winrates in other MU... did you look at the replay... Pointless to you are they ?
OP: I kinda doubted the build at first like everybody. I've looked at the replay and it does seems really good.
I will try it and maybe share some replay for you. I kinda dont like stephano style against this build... I mean if he spread you out like on... Daybreak. You can put a lot of cannon and mothership but and voidray on the other side but if he remax non stop... you'll run out of cannon wouldnt you ?
I'll wait for others to provide replay or i'll try it myself to see it... Like a lot of people I doubt the build but since you say you hold it easily... I will try it.
Thx a lot for your time writting the build, we need more people like you in the community. and thx for the language it was kinda funny reading it
Going pure roach isn't good, but maxed roach/hydra attacks with ~5 overseers are very strong against any mothership expand build if you don't opt for splash damage immediately. You'll have one vortex in time and you can often hold off the first wave, though you'll lose a lot of your army and any cannons you build. The problem comes when they just remax and attack you again. The thing is that most foreigners don't make hydras ever. These builds don't work on KR at all even against low masters players.
I faced this exact build on ladder today. Now, my opponent was only diamond and I was perhaps a bit lucky, who knows, but like Grapefruitseemed to want to convey earlier in this thread: A low gate and sentry count leave you very vulnerable to ground forces.
Generally when I scout only one stargate, I make lots of lings and roaches, check for a third to deny, and then attack nat. If the z is not too late in doing this, I believe the 3 base z should be able to break the p.
Sure, the void ray will help out a bit, but it will not be enough, I think. It wasn't in my match anyway. And that guy/gal even got the MS out.
On July 14 2012 10:46 bropedo wrote: the fact that any race can even pull off a build close to this and have success against decent players is appalling
Uhh, why? You can 6 pool GM level people and beat them and that's not appalling? A build is a build for a reason. It works. Whether you like it or not doesn't mean it's "appalling" or cheese or skill-less. If it works, why not use it?
"Going pure roach isn't good, but maxed roach/hydra attacks with ~5 overseers are very strong against any mothership expand build if you don't opt for splash damage immediately"
because so many zergs build 5 overseers and +3 missile roach/hydra against protoss amirite? And the build gets splash decently early, does it not?
On July 14 2012 11:22 Fatam wrote: "Going pure roach isn't good, but maxed roach/hydra attacks with ~5 overseers are very strong against any mothership expand build if you don't opt for splash damage immediately"
because so many zergs build 5 overseers and +3 missile roach/hydra against protoss amirite? And the build gets splash decently early, does it not?
They do when they scout stargate and a fast third, especially if they see fleet beacon. The build gets Archons, which are not good splash against a large army. Chargelot/Archon is very poor when your opponent gets a large size army before you are able to max out. I also never said +3 missile attack, but they can easily have +2 and if they were dedicated early +2/+2 is quite possible.
On July 14 2012 11:35 Larkin wrote: So I did it and the Zerg hit me with a roach-speedling all-in as my stargate was finishing. He unpowered the pylons before my void ray was out.
I scouted him not taking a 3rd and the fast roach warren + speed, so got extra cannons but couldn't afford sentries with the stargate.
What would you suggest? Just going for 4 gas straight up to afford the sentries + stargate, or going mass cannon (I got 4)?
Typically 4 cannons will hold. 1 sentry can help as well and you should have your void ray out before they can break that. I'm puzzled how you did not hold, you should post the replay for help.
I logged in to state that the OP's "BALANCED." comment on Condemned Ridge had me literally burst out in laughter, both for the comment and the silliness that is late game PvZ haha.
Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
There seems to be a lot of skepticism on this build just because it's different from what's currently accepted. However, please keep in mind the point of a guide is to show you how to play a new style. Kudos to the original poster; looks like a fairly solid build that exploits the fact that Zergs in the current metagame don't generally rush for spire, and instead prefer to stay on roach tech and max off that. I like it. :>.
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
What prevents you from making second stargate?
Losing all your probes before that point. There's a reason the OP said 3 hatch muta (or even 2 hatch) is a strong counter that he often loses to.
If you manage to scout the spire in time (not at all a given, but probably what people need to be doing with their phoenix), you can opt for a 3rd base and enough cannons to defend, as well as potentially 2 sg for phoenix or simply go templar. There are other threads on that, though. The important thing is scouting the spire fast enough to take an early enough third, cannons, and the proper tech paths. You can go straight for blink even as you already have the TC.
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
What prevents you from making second stargate?
Losing all your probes before that point. There's a reason the OP said 3 hatch muta (or even 2 hatch) is a strong counter that he often loses to.
If you manage to scout the spire in time (not at all a given, but probably what people need to be doing with their phoenix), you can opt for a 3rd base and enough cannons to defend, as well as potentially 2 sg for phoenix or simply go templar. There are other threads on that, though. The important thing is scouting the spire fast enough to take an early enough third, cannons, and the proper tech paths. You can go straight for blink even as you already have the TC.
If you lost probes to it than you're just bad, it's not the build. If you don't see spire you will see the gas count and lair timing. So even if he hides spire you can defend in time from mutas.
On July 14 2012 18:08 CheesusCrust wrote: I'd love to neural your mothership and archons while having all your zealots fungaled.
You say that you can trade zealots but not archons, implying that gas is the limiting factor here. So why not make your archons from dark templars instead of high templars ?
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
What prevents you from making second stargate?
Losing all your probes before that point. There's a reason the OP said 3 hatch muta (or even 2 hatch) is a strong counter that he often loses to.
If you manage to scout the spire in time (not at all a given, but probably what people need to be doing with their phoenix), you can opt for a 3rd base and enough cannons to defend, as well as potentially 2 sg for phoenix or simply go templar. There are other threads on that, though. The important thing is scouting the spire fast enough to take an early enough third, cannons, and the proper tech paths. You can go straight for blink even as you already have the TC.
If you lost probes to it than you're just bad, it's not the build. If you don't see spire you will see the gas count and lair timing. So even if he hides spire you can defend in time from mutas.
1 phoenix and 1 void ray plus zealots against 14+ mutas. There's a reason the OP said he loses to it. Why don't you try the build and see the weaknesses yourself. Seeing gas count and lair doesn't mean muta, it could easily be infestor as well.
On July 14 2012 18:46 Geiko wrote: You say that you can trade zealots but not archons, implying that gas is the limiting factor here. So why not make your archons from dark templars instead of high templars ?
I agree, this build requires a huge number of archons (especially early on vs attacks around ~14 minutes). DT tech may not be very useful with this opener, though, while HTs can contribute a lot potentially.
God i hate this OP. I've been on 100% PvZ winrate with this for a couple of months now ... this will only make zerg adapt or blizzard nerf mothership and voidray build time or something.
On July 14 2012 18:56 babybell wrote: God i hate this OP. I've been on 100% PvZ winrate with this for a couple of months now ... this will only make zerg adapt or blizzard nerf mothership and voidray build time or something.
nah brah 3hatch muta which i believe all zergs should just start opening blindly, kinda crushes this
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
Phoenix don't do really well against mutas. The reason is because phoenix are pretty much bad against everything except muta, whereas mutas can attack ground. You just make 3 to 4 to help hold off the early muta, after that you're good to go.
On July 14 2012 18:46 Geiko wrote: You say that you can trade zealots but not archons, implying that gas is the limiting factor here. So why not make your archons from dark templars instead of high templars ?
Because that means you can trade less zealots. HT are optimal for this.
On July 14 2012 18:53 oOOoOphidian wrote: There's a reason the OP said 3 hatch muta (or even 2 hatch) is a strong counter that he often loses to.
---
There's a reason the OP said he loses to it.
I don't actually lose to it, it is just the only thing I consider a remotely viable response. I lose to it when I don't scout it or expect it but that's really my fault. You can perfectly defend against it but it's just annoying.
Very interesting, I feel kinda bad about the late upgrades though. Are you sure it isn't viable to start +1 before Stargate and/or go double forge later?
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
What prevents you from making second stargate?
Losing all your probes before that point. There's a reason the OP said 3 hatch muta (or even 2 hatch) is a strong counter that he often loses to.
If you manage to scout the spire in time (not at all a given, but probably what people need to be doing with their phoenix), you can opt for a 3rd base and enough cannons to defend, as well as potentially 2 sg for phoenix or simply go templar. There are other threads on that, though. The important thing is scouting the spire fast enough to take an early enough third, cannons, and the proper tech paths. You can go straight for blink even as you already have the TC.
If you lost probes to it than you're just bad, it's not the build. If you don't see spire you will see the gas count and lair timing. So even if he hides spire you can defend in time from mutas.
1 phoenix and 1 void ray plus zealots against 14+ mutas. There's a reason the OP said he loses to it. Why don't you try the build and see the weaknesses yourself. Seeing gas count and lair doesn't mean muta, it could easily be infestor as well.
On July 14 2012 18:46 Geiko wrote: You say that you can trade zealots but not archons, implying that gas is the limiting factor here. So why not make your archons from dark templars instead of high templars ?
I agree, this build requires a huge number of archons (especially early on vs attacks around ~14 minutes). DT tech may not be very useful with this opener, though, while HTs can contribute a lot potentially.
If you fail to scout where 1400+200 gas goes to you deserve to lose. That's a scouting issue, not build, you're talking out of your ass.
On July 14 2012 20:33 capri1290 wrote: I would like to add that if you are a zerg player and would like to know how to play against these shenanigans watch this video http://youtu.be/yFYswgwLVEo
The thing is though, that that as a 2 base all in, not a 3base macro play like the OP talks about.
That said, I very much doubt this can work, it seems impossible to go for chargelot archon in the lategame, you need to kill those infestors and broodlords and chargelots and archons are both close range units. Double vortex, yeah... I'm not sure. I'd love to see a replay versus a really good zerg doesn't matter if protoss wins or loses, I'd like to analyse how the game goes on.
On July 14 2012 20:33 capri1290 wrote: I would like to add that if you are a zerg player and would like to know how to play against these shenanigans watch this video http://youtu.be/yFYswgwLVEo
This is not relevant as he masses stalkers with immortals (instead of chargelot/archon) and doesn't take a 3rd.
On July 14 2012 18:56 babybell wrote: God i hate this OP. I've been on 100% PvZ winrate with this for a couple of months now ... this will only make zerg adapt or blizzard nerf mothership and voidray build time or something.
nah brah 3hatch muta which i believe all zergs should just start opening blindly, kinda crushes this
dont think its imba at all
Zergs should all go blind 3 hatch muta....? The filth that leaves peoples mouth at this forum. If you have been either P or Z for the last 6 months in this matchup you know this is horrible advice.
On July 14 2012 18:56 babybell wrote: God i hate this OP. I've been on 100% PvZ winrate with this for a couple of months now ... this will only make zerg adapt or blizzard nerf mothership and voidray build time or something.
nah brah 3hatch muta which i believe all zergs should just start opening blindly, kinda crushes this
dont think its imba at all
Zergs should all go blind 3 hatch muta....? The filth that leaves peoples mouth at this forum. If you have been either P or Z for the last 6 months in this matchup you know this is horrible advice.
I agree with Clarity_nl, there are a lot of 2 base all ins that kill a 3 hatch muta build straightway.
So... how do you stop the Zerg from just double expanding once he scouts your mothership, while rushing Hive and BLs? And he just stops your 4th/5th base with 150 supply of roaches since your army can't engage his w/o mothership, which is terribly slow.
On July 14 2012 23:30 Flonomenalz wrote: So... how do you stop the Zerg from just double expanding once he scouts your mothership, while rushing Hive and BLs? And he just stops your 4th/5th base with 150 supply of roaches since your army can't engage his w/o mothership, which is terribly slow.
As the OP explained, build a 200/200 army on 3 bases and attack. If you can expand to the 4th do so, if not, just attack. In theory your army will kill the zerg army.
You have nothing stopping a 4 base roach/ling infestor style in that build. Yoiu delay your third but get no offensive advantage for it so the only thing you're doing is letting zerg take an uncontested 4th or give him an oppurtunity to stop your third some hydra/roach/ling/overseer timing off of 3 base.
The only reason this would ever win is that the opponent doesn't know how to handle the mothership and does a weak attack that fails or stays defensive on 3 base for no reason. Vortex does absolutely nothing except stalling an attack for its duration when you dont have archons. So the only gain from the mothership is cloak and its cost inefficient damage.
Not to mention the fact that when you build your mothership that early you severely gimp your economy. You delay your third until the mothership is out because there is no way you can defend a third while having invested in it but it not being done. You also get something like 5 less probes in the early game. 5 less probes against a zerg that masses drones to atleast 60.
I've faced similar builds like this on the ladder and I lost once to it. Then I beat in in different ways. You just have to know how many hydra/infestors you need to handle the mothership and realise how little offensive potential the protoss has with such a build.
Since i am the one losing in the mutalisk-replay i'd like to add my 2 cents to the whole discussion. First of all i agree with the creator of the guide that this build is very strong. As soon as the mothership is out there is pretty much no way to effectively engage the turteling protoss. Also ARchons in a large enough number tear through pretty much every unit, zerg has. Zerglings, Banelings, Roaches, Hydras, Mutalisks and Ultralisks are pretty much useless. So i think the best way to deal with this build is to completely skip any kind of serious attack. Instead i think slight muta harass to keep the protoss back in his base while getting up 5 bases, mass spines, broods and infestors is the way to go. In the mentioned game i did 3 major mistakes. First of all i moved my spines exactly when protoss engaged. While reburrowing the spines i didnt watch my broodlords and didnt split them well enough. My third mistake was not getting neural parasite. This would have enabled me to at least avoid one vortex by neuraling the mothership. So those three mistakes in combination cost me the game i would most probably have won otherwise. Not viable is mass muta play to deal real damage or even to finish off the protoss. Archons, Cannons and Mothership in combination are just way too strong for that. Thats why i instantly swiched away from mutas when i scouted the fleetbeacon. What on the other hand should be viable is mass roach drops on mulitple locations which of cause requires sick mulittasking. My opinion is that like a lot of protoss strategies (pylon wallins, timing attacks via unscouted pylons, dts) the discussed strategy is very easy to execute but also requires the zerg to make mistakes. Zerg MUST scout the fleetbeacon, respond properly and avoid the mistakes i made in order to win against this build.
Do you have a replay against Stephano style? In that first replay it looks like you would've gotten a serious spanking. Or just a replay against a guy who, you know, doesn't have everything clumped up in the late game, or throws his own units in the vortex even after it's up?
If you're going to say things like "mutas are the only remotely viable response" (not to mention that with your gas timing it makes mutas more likely), or be annoying for no reason when you win (I'm going to assume you knew that guy otherwise you're a real douchebag) you better have a lot better than that to back it up. Otherwise people are going to think you're a joke.
Simple question, if you really have a 92% win percentage against good opponents, why did you chose awful replays?
First of all nice guide, I myself really like mothership plays and I have been toying with mothership builds for a long time doing stuff as mothership recall all in or skytoss play. Here's some thoughts about your guide:
On July 14 2012 01:59 the p00n wrote: Open up with your favorite FFE. I used to dislike FFE, but the maps have changed quite a lot since I formed that opinion. So I re-thought it, did some tests and I now believe that FFE is superior to gateway openings.
I would like to note that 1 gate expand is good for pressure with gateways while FFE is good for teching and superior macro in exchange of huge passivity. In my opinion, you would always want to open stargate off a FFE, you can't get it faster off 1 gate expand, while FFE offers a slight better economy and an easier all in defense.
On July 14 2012 01:59 the p00n wrote: [spoiler]Q: How do I deal with 'stephano-style' 3-base mass roach/ling timing at my 3rd? A: Vortex his army and send in your 2-3 archons (about as much as you'll have) and zealots, he should be around 160 supply and you should be around 90-100. Don't forget to warp in zealots and new archons after you have vortexed his army, it can be quite tempting to just stare at the wonderful vortex with idle gateways but this may result in defeat.
Q: Mass mass mass 3/3 roach kiting on creep? A: A-move with vortex, I know that this sounds like a good counter to zealot/archon in theory but the brutal truth is that it is the worst thing the zerg can do and it is the easiest thing to deal with.
When I saw chargelot archon, I was really interested in how this build would work against roaches. In those two faqs, you explain that you would vortex his army and send 3 archons in, as you later explain you only send 3 to minimize the amount of archons that could get killed by roaches and give them a good trade and that you want to trade mainly with zealots. However, the standard composition of stalker sentry immortal trades so well against roaches that there's almost no losses. I am still afraid that the roaches will simply outnumber my zealot force and trade armies until my army is depleted and he overwhelms me. As you explain, you use vortex to stop that from happening, but I feel like a good player should be able run back a little after the roaches are out of the vortex and start kiting you into oblivion. Detection is also not a problem at high level since he will always have overseers and there's no way to kill them since you don't use blink stalkers.
This leads me to ask the question, how exactly "the brutal truth is that it is the worst thing the zerg can do and it is the easiest thing to deal with" as you state it. I feel vortex isn't enough and you will need forcefields to at least stop the roaches from kiting. Aside from that, even if they trade cost effectively, let me remind you that zerg has better economy against a passive FFE opening like you do. (no pressure, only a light poke with void ray phoenix). Could you please explain some more? Your replay pool is quite small, could you include a replay against a good zerg player going for some serious mass roach style and kiting you on creep?
You cannot kite after vortex because all the units become entangled, it also spreads out the roach dps so the roaches will barely kill units (they have horrible DPS, their strength comes from focus-firing because one attack is 16 damage, after a vortex they won't be targeting the same units but individual units).
Without vortex roaches are going to kite you all day long early game (lategame you just overwhelm him and I don't think it is humanly possible to perfectly kite every single skirmish while you are attacking in other places, too), so what you do is use vortex and immediately kill all the roaches.
On July 14 2012 23:30 Flonomenalz wrote: So... how do you stop the Zerg from just double expanding once he scouts your mothership, while rushing Hive and BLs? And he just stops your 4th/5th base with 150 supply of roaches since your army can't engage his w/o mothership, which is terribly slow.
This. It's a decent build (a bit too decent, but then vortex might be nerfed in HotS..) against non-world top players, but versus someone like Stephano who does know how to handle pvz lategame, it should autolose. Basically it depends on lategame control, if both p and z are near perfect, z should win there
I think anything without banes loses. Chargelots are insanely good vs anything Zerg, ESPECIALLY against anything lategame infestor without real ground support, because you cannot hold off zealots with pure infestor brood corruptor.
If you amove the banes, though, it's gg because they will be negated by the archons.
On July 15 2012 05:51 Mahtasooma wrote: I think anything without banes loses. Chargelots are insanely good vs anything Zerg, ESPECIALLY against anything lategame infestor without real ground support, because you cannot hold off zealots with pure infestor brood corruptor.
If you amove the banes, though, it's gg because they will be negated by the archons.
Banes are actually pretty bad because when a zealot charges into one the baneling explodes before the zealot connects and cancels his charge, so you will have 1 zealot charging through all the banelings soaking up the damage.
EDIT: And yeah, archon oneshots clumps of banelings and tanks infinity banelings.
In your opinion how would stephano's 11 minute max do against this build. Because from personal experience I know that immortals are usually the thing that shuts 11 min max builds down. Can you hold it with zealot archons?
On July 15 2012 06:38 FailCow wrote: In your opinion how would stephano's 11 minute max do against this build. Because from personal experience I know that immortals are usually the thing that shuts 11 min max builds down. Can you hold it with zealot archons?
i think i got this today (im Z) but as for quick, its the longest game ive had for months (40 mins) all bases on map taken ohana(means family dont you know).
Anyway, yeah i was shocked as hell to see the MS but if i were better i would have got corruptors out faster, easily countered by just getting more shit than them by 10 mins and a moving.
Ohana game: 900 gas and no archons out. Void ray is AFK. No cannons.
Daybreak: don't know what you were doing aside from getting pylon blocked, but that's not my build. Twilight council is way too late, templar archives is simply not created at all, why (even though you are at 400 gas?)? Mothership gets chrono'd zero times while both nexus are at 100 energy.
You lost these 2 games because you suck really hard compared to your opponent (and the game in the skytoss topic against this same guy confirms that statement), up to the point where you cannot even click chronoboost on a nexus for an entire 3 minutes or follow very simple build guidelines.
Ohana game: 900 gas and no archons out. Void ray is AFK. No cannons.
Daybreak: don't know what you were doing aside from getting pylon blocked, but that's not my build. Twilight council is way too late, templar archives is simply not created at all, why (even though you are at 400 gas?)? Mothership gets chrono'd zero times while both nexus are at 100 energy.
You lost these 2 games because you suck really hard compared to your opponent (and the game in the skytoss topic against this same guy confirms that statement), up to the point where you cannot even click chronoboost on a nexus for an entire 3 minutes or follow very simple build guidelines.
On July 15 2012 06:38 FailCow wrote: In your opinion how would stephano's 11 minute max do against this build. Because from personal experience I know that immortals are usually the thing that shuts 11 min max builds down. Can you hold it with zealot archons?
yes
Do you have a replay of you holding this against a decent opponent? The 3 replays you provided didnt really show much at all against styles that are common from zergs atm. But from I understand after reading the guide this build is close to unstoppable if you do things right. Thus, you surely must have more replays that show good games?
On July 15 2012 06:38 FailCow wrote: In your opinion how would stephano's 11 minute max do against this build. Because from personal experience I know that immortals are usually the thing that shuts 11 min max builds down. Can you hold it with zealot archons?
yes
Do you have a replay of you holding this against a decent opponent? The 3 replays you provided didnt really show much at all against styles that are common from zergs atm. But from I understand after reading the guide this build is close to unstoppable if you do things right. Thus, you surely must have more replays that show good games?
I only started doing a FFE recently, I used to do this off a 1gate expo which didn't allow for stephano style responses. I tested this exhaustively with a high master zerg friend because my one worry was that if I switched to FFE it would start the game off at 2base P vs. 3base Z which allowed for the 11min roach max timing, which was not possible with a gateway expo. It is not only possible to hold off it is actually relatively easy. Unfortunately I do not have any of the replays as I deleted all the replays when I started playing again (I took a 6-7 month break from sc2 and had many old replays lingering, these were included). I'm gonna ladder a lot in the upcoming days so when I encounter the specific mass roach attack I shall upload the replay (which nobody generally does because void dps doesn't care about theorycraft involving 'ignoring the void and sniping 3rds', shit dies, and people at mid to high master (read: very little people in this topic, but 100% of my ladder opponents) know this intuitively).
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
Phoenix don't do really well against mutas. The reason is because phoenix are pretty much bad against everything except muta, whereas mutas can attack ground. You just make 3 to 4 to help hold off the early muta, after that you're good to go.
On July 14 2012 18:46 Geiko wrote: You say that you can trade zealots but not archons, implying that gas is the limiting factor here. So why not make your archons from dark templars instead of high templars ?
Because that means you can trade less zealots. HT are optimal for this.
On July 14 2012 18:53 oOOoOphidian wrote: There's a reason the OP said 3 hatch muta (or even 2 hatch) is a strong counter that he often loses to.
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There's a reason the OP said he loses to it.
I don't actually lose to it, it is just the only thing I consider a remotely viable response. I lose to it when I don't scout it or expect it but that's really my fault. You can perfectly defend against it but it's just annoying.
Wow why are you such a tool? I apologize that my grammar is not perfect on an internet forum, please provide replays where your opponent opens right into 3 base muta without any prior aggression and show me how you stop it.
It may also help your cause if you stop acting like a child when responding to people with valid questions.
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan?
So people who mistake 'where' with 'we're' who are probably below masters get a reality check and don't take themselves too seriously.
On July 14 2012 17:09 jcroisdale wrote:
On July 14 2012 14:40 Yokoblue wrote:
On July 14 2012 12:59 jcroisdale wrote: Huh why is the first post written like where on 4chan? It just goes on to discredit this build also what level are you doing this build at? I know lots of zergs will go into muta once they see stargate and i don't know how you deal with mutas, considering you are getting no stalkers and turning all your temps into archons.
You scout the spire really early with the phoenix so you just pump phoenix while taking a third with cannon. You almost got the perfect composition and build to counter muta play since you can get range phoenix if you want with ur phoenix and get storm instead of morphing all in archons. Later when he switch you can resume to "Normal play".
tldr: get 2 cannon each base and crank phoenix to counter
phoenix is not the counter to muta how much you want them to be. You just cant produce enough phoenix off of 1sg to combat mass phx.
Phoenix don't do really well against mutas. The reason is because phoenix are pretty much bad against everything except muta, whereas mutas can attack ground. You just make 3 to 4 to help hold off the early muta, after that you're good to go.
On July 14 2012 18:46 Geiko wrote: You say that you can trade zealots but not archons, implying that gas is the limiting factor here. So why not make your archons from dark templars instead of high templars ?
Because that means you can trade less zealots. HT are optimal for this.
On July 14 2012 18:53 oOOoOphidian wrote: There's a reason the OP said 3 hatch muta (or even 2 hatch) is a strong counter that he often loses to.
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There's a reason the OP said he loses to it.
I don't actually lose to it, it is just the only thing I consider a remotely viable response. I lose to it when I don't scout it or expect it but that's really my fault. You can perfectly defend against it but it's just annoying.
Wow why are you such a tool? I apologize that my grammar is not perfect on an internet forum, please provide replays where your opponent opens right into 3 base muta without any prior aggression and show me how you stop it.
It may also help your cause if you stop acting like a child when responding to people with valid questions.
I reply to valid questions, you entering this thread with your monocle and Cuban cigar asking why the OP reeks of 4chan peasantry is not a valid question, it is pointless hating and contributes absolutely nothing.
If you have a valid question I shall answer it. The problem with [G] threads is that the OP usually has to plow through the massive hordes of jesters with distorted ideas, in my case ranging from zerg having the ability to snipe a mothership at 12 minutes with 20 corruptors and immediately remaxing on 200/200 roach, to actually not reading the topic and downloading the replays I have attached (albeit few). Then you have the other people who will think of a very specific strategy that may counter a build and totally disregard the fact that this specific build cannot actually be used due to it losing to everything else. An example would be in a recent 15 CC TvZ build that has been posted here lately, where some random person came in and said it would lose to 7pool. Well duh, but seeing as you have to go into 7pool blind and it losing to everything else, you can disregard that strategy.
I have provided a replay against 3-base muta and explained to you how to counter it.
Thanks for the guide. My only suggestion for trying to limit ridiculous responses is to not sound so over-confident about the build. I have no doubt it's a solid build, but you make it seem like you have completely broken the match up.
One random question I had -- if the Zerg 6-pools you and forces you into an awkward 1 base opener, is this build still something you would transition into, off of a 1-3 gate expo or 1 gate stargate opener? Or do you have a different build for against 6p?
I just played against someone who tried to do this.
This is a cute build, but I think it loses to any 'timing' :
Max roach, roach/hydra doom drops, mutas.
I identified Toss was doing this with his fleet beacon and weird, quick gateway count, so I went with a hydra drop because I recalled seeing this thread and thinking it'd fall to a hydra drop.
On July 15 2012 09:49 JDub wrote: Thanks for the guide. My only suggestion for trying to limit ridiculous responses is to not sound so over-confident about the build. I have no doubt it's a solid build, but you make it seem like you have completely broken the match up.
One random question I had -- if the Zerg 6-pools you and forces you into an awkward 1 base opener, is this build still something you would transition into, off of a 1-3 gate expo or 1 gate stargate opener? Or do you have a different build for against 6p?
I would still transition into it, but just off a gateway expand (cannon in mineral line)
This is an old replay against a 7pooling high master. I opened gateway instead of forge, but the idea is roughly the same.
Going to watch your replay, Belial.
EDIT: He made many major mistakes.
Mistake 1 - entirely skipping the void ray. With the void ray parked outside your base (in the attack path), he would have been able to delay your attack or deal significant damage to your roaches while they were going to his base. Or at least he would have seen it.
Mistake 2 - moving out with his army to clear the xel naga tower, which is when your roach attack hit. You have a void ray for that, and that is also why you don't skip it.
Mistake 3 - not immediately destroying the pylon when he sees the drop. Archons cannot move through single file; he had zero archons helping defend against the drop and in the vortex.
Mistake 4 - not warping in enough units and/or cannons (I guess you can call it poor macro). Plenty of occasions where he had idle warpgates and enough gas/minerals to warp in zealots/archons.
Mistake 6 - overall sloppy execution (can be explained by trying this build for the first few times).
From my games:
It's not really fair to say that this 'loses to any timing' and then provide a replay where the opponent plays like crap (and misses the key element due to mistake #3; the archon toilet). If this was me playing, I would've thought 'woot, game won' as soon as you attacked into my mothership with no overseer, as that delay makes you miss any timing window you probably never even had. Condemned ridge is as open as it gets anyway at the 3rd base, drops are really unnecessary, I would applaud you for wasting the resources on drop tech to do drops on condemned ridge in cross map positions.
or to just sum it up: Everything except Ling/Muta (considering you have storm to defend)
A style like that would only work, if you would: - Focus Overseers like crazy while not losing your mothership - Expand very aggressive, so you can be cost inefficent and/or have a lot of gas for storms/archons - Not open FFE, be aggresive from the start and put pressure at deny expansions like a boss
If you still win with your strat, that means: - Your opponent is just bad.
or to just sum it up: Everything except Ling/Muta (considering you have storm to defend)
A style like that would only work, if you would: - Focus Overseers like crazy while not losing your mothership - Expand very aggressive, so you can be cost inefficent and/or have a lot of gas for storms/archons - Not open FFE, be aggresive from the start and put pressure at deny expansions like a boss
If you still win with your strat, that means: - Your opponent is just bad.
According to previous posts, you are 'TdgAisora'. 1v1 platinum with very little games.
or to just sum it up: Everything except Ling/Muta (considering you have storm to defend)
A style like that would only work, if you would: - Focus Overseers like crazy while not losing your mothership - Expand very aggressive, so you can be cost inefficent and/or have a lot of gas for storms/archons - Not open FFE, be aggresive from the start and put pressure at deny expansions like a boss
If you still win with your strat, that means: - Your opponent is just bad.
According to previous posts, you are 'TdgAisora'. 1v1 platinum with very little games.
Yeah, I'm only platinum 1v1 at that account atm, because I try out playing random. Problem: My Terran is terrible and i have work to do.
But if a strategy is good or bad, just because a person with a big e-penis posts it, then i don't wanna live in that world anymore.
Your strat is really bad against everything (as listed above). For good players, your vortex will just become a bigger forcefield. That's it. And with no units to really fight a zerg, you'll just die.
or to just sum it up: Everything except Ling/Muta (considering you have storm to defend)
A style like that would only work, if you would: - Focus Overseers like crazy while not losing your mothership - Expand very aggressive, so you can be cost inefficent and/or have a lot of gas for storms/archons - Not open FFE, be aggresive from the start and put pressure at deny expansions like a boss
If you still win with your strat, that means: - Your opponent is just bad.
According to previous posts, you are 'TdgAisora'. 1v1 platinum with very little games.
Yeah, I'm only platinum 1v1 at that account atm, because I try out playing random. Problem: My Terran is terrible and i have work to do.
But if a strategy is good or bad, just because a person with a big e-penis posts it, then i don't wanna live in that world anymore.
Your strat is really bad against everything (as listed above). For good players, your vortex will just become a bigger forcefield. That's it. And with no units to really fight a zerg, you'll just die.
He has a >90% win rate in PvZ against players ranging from mid-master to GM. What will you accept as evidence that a build is viable? Must the OP defeat DRG in a bo7 in the GSL Finals?
Please stop spouting nonsense. The build is solid.
or to just sum it up: Everything except Ling/Muta (considering you have storm to defend)
A style like that would only work, if you would: - Focus Overseers like crazy while not losing your mothership - Expand very aggressive, so you can be cost inefficent and/or have a lot of gas for storms/archons - Not open FFE, be aggresive from the start and put pressure at deny expansions like a boss
If you still win with your strat, that means: - Your opponent is just bad.
According to previous posts, you are 'TdgAisora'. 1v1 platinum with very little games.
Yeah, I'm only platinum 1v1 at that account atm, because I try out playing random. Problem: My Terran is terrible and i have work to do.
But if a strategy is good or bad, just because a person with a big e-penis posts it, then i don't wanna live in that world anymore.
Your strat is really bad against everything (as listed above). For good players, your vortex will just become a bigger forcefield. That's it. And with no units to really fight a zerg, you'll just die.
He has a >90% win rate in PvZ against players ranging from mid-master to GM. What will you accept as evidence that a build is viable? Must the OP defeat DRG in a bo7 in the GSL Finals?
Please stop spouting nonsense. The build is solid.
Hmmm, How can you see his actuall winrate? I would like to see validation of that 90% claim. Thanks.
I would still like to see this versus a Zerg that doesnt do the mistakes i made. There should be no way to beat broodlord/infestor/spines/queen without a lucky vortex.
I'm skeptical when someone claims they have a 90% win rate in any matchup - not even top pros manage to achieve this. Leave that part out and let people focus on the strategy itself, it's only inviting them to go off-topic.
On July 16 2012 00:23 Shiiken wrote: I would still like to see this versus a Zerg that doesnt do the mistakes i made. There should be no way to beat broodlord/infestor/spines/queen without a lucky vortex.
Hidden in your statement lies belief in imbalance. Saw this build in action just before. Seems quite effective. Though the player did send zealots everywhere to tear through the zergs far away expos; which i domt believe to be the OPs intentions.
On July 16 2012 00:23 Shiiken wrote: I would still like to see this versus a Zerg that doesnt do the mistakes i made. There should be no way to beat broodlord/infestor/spines/queen without a lucky vortex.
You will always get the 'lucky vortex' off. You can't actually spread enough due to brood lord range and size. If you would spread any more beyond a certain point, the broods would simply be out of range and not participating in the battle at all (unless you have nearly a 360 surround which is unrealistic to expect and probably not even that effective). In a large concave, you can't actually spread your broods out enough to avoid a double vortex from winning the game. All 'you can't win vs bl/inf with a very good spread' replies are therefore pretty silly. It's like someone who's into rocket science proposing 'just adding more power to the engines and moving faster' as a solution to deep space travel, ignoring the speed of light limit. You can't actually do that, it's like saying 'well, 600 roaches would definitely beat your 200/200 composition!'. Nobody says that though, because the concept of 200/200 being the max is easily understood by the average sc2 player. When it comes to these spatial things, most people are oblivious.
Reading through these suggestions is like listening to kids talking about dinosaurs and drawing mountain-sized tyrannosauruses, ignoring the fact that carnivores have a maximum size potential due to some limiting factors (most physiological) inherent to carnivores.
As someone who has been struggling in masters level PvZ lately, this build has really turned the tables for me. I started trying it yesterday and found myself being able to deal with anything the Zerg throws at me. This is definitely a very solid strategy
On July 16 2012 00:23 Shiiken wrote: I would still like to see this versus a Zerg that doesnt do the mistakes i made. There should be no way to beat broodlord/infestor/spines/queen without a lucky vortex.
Hidden in your statement lies belief in imbalance. Saw this build in action just before. Seems quite effective. Though the player did send zealots everywhere to tear through the zergs far away expos; which i domt believe to be the OPs intentions.
Yeah, I wasn't sure how the style was played so I kindda went for the mood of the moment, and used zealots to harass left & right Zerg's expoes while growing my archon ball. For others who haven't seen it, here's the vod:
I hesitate to draw conclusion from so few games though ( it's the third time I play it, all were wins ). For once this game wasn't standard ( Zerg went something like 10-pool on a 4p map where he didn't know were I was. I got the eco lead for free ).
I just played another game where the Zerg went mass roaches, and it seems like I was able to hold pretty well ( last game in the vod ). But he added some infestors very late.
To be totally honnest, I still feel unsecure about this build. There's a lot of room for mistakes since you're so heavily relying on the mothership. Without the mothership, you auto lose when facing brood lords and infestors. But guess what comes before Zerg morphs brood lords ? Corruptors.. and a lot of them. Nothing prevents him from snipping the mothership while you're moving out, even if it's not cost effective. Or he could land a neural parasite and vortex your own units, and you're dead meat.
One thing that is good for sure is that since you're relying on archons, you'll have a huge excess of minerals in the late game. Add some pylons and prisms to harass and even if it's not too cost effective, you can snippe a lot of hatcheries while keeping the Zerg busy on his knees. I like that a lot.
Here is a replay of me losing with this build. However, it illustrates very well how you cannot snipe the mothership, even on this broken map.
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Unfortunately it is on Tal'Darim Altar, one of the worst maps in the ladder pool (IMO), so no real weight can be put behind this game. I recently unveto'd it, which was silly.
The only reason I lose this (aside from Tal'Darim Altar being a dumb map with grave positional imbalance, unnecessary rocks at the 3rd and many, many other things) is because I let billions of lings swarm into my main and natural.
On July 16 2012 00:23 Shiiken wrote: I would still like to see this versus a Zerg that doesnt do the mistakes i made. There should be no way to beat broodlord/infestor/spines/queen without a lucky vortex.
Hidden in your statement lies belief in imbalance. Saw this build in action just before. Seems quite effective. Though the player did send zealots everywhere to tear through the zergs far away expos; which i domt believe to be the OPs intentions.
I did this too in a game I played, though I ended up dying to a roach/hydra timing. That's probably one of the best things you can do with the build, especially with warp prism. It also lets you get additional use out of the DT tech. This is actually how most late game toss builds have to deal with BL/Infestor.
I think anyone who has done this strategy or watched it would realize that going HT for archons is awful. This build gets ridiculously gas starved.
good macro kills it. when u say "hasuobs is incorrect", you dont realize how much worse the macro of inferor players is. you beat pros 2 times with this build, well, that doesnt say all too much.
On July 15 2012 09:49 JDub wrote: Thanks for the guide. My only suggestion for trying to limit ridiculous responses is to not sound so over-confident about the build. I have no doubt it's a solid build, but you make it seem like you have completely broken the match up.
One random question I had -- if the Zerg 6-pools you and forces you into an awkward 1 base opener, is this build still something you would transition into, off of a 1-3 gate expo or 1 gate stargate opener? Or do you have a different build for against 6p?
I would still transition into it, but just off a gateway expand (cannon in mineral line)
This is an old replay against a 7pooling high master. I opened gateway instead of forge, but the idea is roughly the same.
Going to watch your replay, Belial.
EDIT: He made many major mistakes.
Mistake 1 - entirely skipping the void ray. With the void ray parked outside your base (in the attack path), he would have been able to delay your attack or deal significant damage to your roaches while they were going to his base. Or at least he would have seen it.
Mistake 2 - moving out with his army to clear the xel naga tower, which is when your roach attack hit. You have a void ray for that, and that is also why you don't skip it.
Mistake 3 - not immediately destroying the pylon when he sees the drop. Archons cannot move through single file; he had zero archons helping defend against the drop and in the vortex.
Mistake 4 - not warping in enough units and/or cannons (I guess you can call it poor macro). Plenty of occasions where he had idle warpgates and enough gas/minerals to warp in zealots/archons.
Mistake 6 - overall sloppy execution (can be explained by trying this build for the first few times).
From my games:
It's not really fair to say that this 'loses to any timing' and then provide a replay where the opponent plays like crap (and misses the key element due to mistake #3; the archon toilet). If this was me playing, I would've thought 'woot, game won' as soon as you attacked into my mothership with no overseer, as that delay makes you miss any timing window you probably never even had. Condemned ridge is as open as it gets anyway at the 3rd base, drops are really unnecessary, I would applaud you for wasting the resources on drop tech to do drops on condemned ridge in cross map positions.
Thanks for the response. So then what do you think beats the build then? And do you think if both players played right (he macro'd better, I had an overseer right away lol), I still would have won?
By the way, I macro'd like a fucking champ that game. i had 83 supply at the 8:00 mark. DRG is the only other Zerg I've seen hit 80+ at the 8:00 mark ^^
On July 15 2012 09:49 JDub wrote: Thanks for the guide. My only suggestion for trying to limit ridiculous responses is to not sound so over-confident about the build. I have no doubt it's a solid build, but you make it seem like you have completely broken the match up.
One random question I had -- if the Zerg 6-pools you and forces you into an awkward 1 base opener, is this build still something you would transition into, off of a 1-3 gate expo or 1 gate stargate opener? Or do you have a different build for against 6p?
I would still transition into it, but just off a gateway expand (cannon in mineral line)
This is an old replay against a 7pooling high master. I opened gateway instead of forge, but the idea is roughly the same.
Going to watch your replay, Belial.
EDIT: He made many major mistakes.
Mistake 1 - entirely skipping the void ray. With the void ray parked outside your base (in the attack path), he would have been able to delay your attack or deal significant damage to your roaches while they were going to his base. Or at least he would have seen it.
Mistake 2 - moving out with his army to clear the xel naga tower, which is when your roach attack hit. You have a void ray for that, and that is also why you don't skip it.
Mistake 3 - not immediately destroying the pylon when he sees the drop. Archons cannot move through single file; he had zero archons helping defend against the drop and in the vortex.
Mistake 4 - not warping in enough units and/or cannons (I guess you can call it poor macro). Plenty of occasions where he had idle warpgates and enough gas/minerals to warp in zealots/archons.
Mistake 6 - overall sloppy execution (can be explained by trying this build for the first few times).
From my games:
It's not really fair to say that this 'loses to any timing' and then provide a replay where the opponent plays like crap (and misses the key element due to mistake #3; the archon toilet). If this was me playing, I would've thought 'woot, game won' as soon as you attacked into my mothership with no overseer, as that delay makes you miss any timing window you probably never even had. Condemned ridge is as open as it gets anyway at the 3rd base, drops are really unnecessary, I would applaud you for wasting the resources on drop tech to do drops on condemned ridge in cross map positions.
Thanks for the response. So then what do you think beats the build then? And do you think if both players played right (he macro'd better, I had an overseer right away lol), I still would have won?
By the way, I macro'd like a fucking champ that game. i had 83 supply at the 8:00 mark. DRG is the only other Zerg I've seen hit 80+ at the 8:00 mark ^^
I don't think you would have won, but things like these are just speculation. Actual results are far more interesting.
I think that the way to go is to command-move banelings behind the protoss army while having tons and tons of roaches behind it. When the zealots are gone, roaches will destroy archons. A problem however is that this is very inefficient so if the protoss just retreats after the zealots are gone and then uses all his gas and minerals on a new army he'll eventually end up with a full archon army and a-move you regardless of your unit composition. Time is on his side as well - if you place 50 spines he can just sneak the mothership in somewhere and mass recall them straight into your main. Prism drops with mass zealots are also nigh uncounterable.
To be really honest I'm not sure. If you can neural the mothership and double-vortex his own army you will win, but that should never ever happen...
^ Well, with a lack of colossi, I think actually it could happen.
I mean you see DRG and pro, code s zergs beat things like carrier mass or mothership rushing using hydra drops or mutas, so I think that's the key to beating this style.
Hydras get 2-shot by archons and don't do well against chargelots either... you need a meatshield for the hydras that are able to deal with the opponent's meatshield, which are zealots. The only thing that shoots to mind is roaches, but roach/hydra doesn't work in practice. The only other options are lings (oneshot in aoe by archon/die to zealots) and infestors (fungals to keep stuff in place).
No, I don't think hydras do well against archons or chargelots, but I think you need the AA against the void rays (and I suppose the mothership too). I suppose a roach drop just plain, or maybe a roach drop with corruptors would be better?
Stargate openings are vulnerable to hydras, which is why you see pro zergs always go for hydras against Toss (i forget what series it was, but some Toss opened stargate and did NOT get colossus before third, and lost his third and a ton of army for it), and Toss always go for colossus before third when opening stargate vs a zerg who gets hydras.
I think there's just a timing window where if you go stargate vs Zerg, you really need colossus or else the hydras will do too much damage. Seeing as you spend all that gas on a mothership and templar tech and charge instead of colossus and army, I think there's some vulnerability to hydras with the build.
Anyways, maybe we can test this stuff out? I think you have a strong build here, and wouldn't be surprised if I was wrong here. I think we're similar level. belial.869@na.
I've been using this build vs plat/diamond for a week now and have only had 3 initial losses due to bad mothership control (getting it sniped by not being used to the delay on vortex) and/or moving out at 160~ supply instead of being more patient as specified in the [G].
I've managed to hold a lot of builds I didn't believe I would, specifically baneling busts off 1 gate without the stargate being done, etc etc. This build is extremely solid as far as I can see, at least at this level.
Can any zerg who've experienced this lately talk about their reactions and what has worked/what hasn't?
On July 16 2012 07:26 the p00n wrote: Hydras get 2-shot by archons and don't do well against chargelots either... you need a meatshield for the hydras that are able to deal with the opponent's meatshield, which are zealots. The only thing that shoots to mind is roaches, but roach/hydra doesn't work in practice. The only other options are lings (oneshot in aoe by archon/die to zealots) and infestors (fungals to keep stuff in place).
Except that Ret style Roach/Hydra busts are the strongest counter to mothership expand builds like this one and that's essentially all that ever happens when I've done this on KR against diamond and masters players. When you skip templar or Colossus, while neglecting stuff like sentries, you simply can't defend those busts, especially when they send extra waves and have tons of overseers. We get it, you're proud of your build, but don't be the guy with the gimmicky build who claims he can beat progamers and knows more than all of them. The build has its advantages and the composition can be useful in many situations, but it also has many weaknesses that good players will take advantage of. Watch Nyast's games using this style to see some of what he had problems with and offer some solutions.
On July 16 2012 07:34 Belial88 wrote: No, I don't think hydras do well against archons or chargelots, but I think you need the AA against the void rays (and I suppose the mothership too). I suppose a roach drop just plain, or maybe a roach drop with corruptors would be better?
Stargate openings are vulnerable to hydras, which is why you see pro zergs always go for hydras against Toss (i forget what series it was, but some Toss opened stargate and did NOT get colossus before third, and lost his third and a ton of army for it), and Toss always go for colossus before third when opening stargate vs a zerg who gets hydras.
I think there's just a timing window where if you go stargate vs Zerg, you really need colossus or else the hydras will do too much damage. Seeing as you spend all that gas on a mothership and templar tech and charge instead of colossus and army, I think there's some vulnerability to hydras with the build.
Anyways, maybe we can test this stuff out? I think you have a strong build here, and wouldn't be surprised if I was wrong here. I think we're similar level. belial.869@na.
I don't care how elitist you exactly are, I just downloaded one replay and was expecting some serious stuff here.
I do realize few zergs nowadays go for ling / speedbane (into mutas, which is irrelevant in this case).
At the 11min mark you have one void, one sentry, one phoenix and one zealot. At the 11min mark, a speedbane ling build has llike... 60 lings and 30 speedbanes, probably some more depending on other tech.
I guess it's not really an issue how thick your "walloff" here is. Your third can be totally ignored here, obviously. Your stuff will get rolled, hard. Before your other gates pop. 11min or 10:30 (which is before stephano style, obviously, and before serious collossus tech) is a good timing for this.
This build really boils down to
- chargelots are very powerful against current metagame zerg endgame composition because they simply rape infestors - vortex + archons is really weird, that's why it won't be in HotS - timing of current metagame zerg aggression, which hits at about 12-12:30
Fantastic build, thanks for the writeup, but as I've been executing the build I've ran into some problems. Most notably, when the zerg is going roach-hydra with quick upgrades and they push out at approximately 12-13 minutes. I'll have a vortex by then, along with some chargelot/archon. As they engage my army, they split their army into three and I'm unable to get a perfect vortex off and kill everything as their army is split. At that point, they simply either kill me with the push, or their next push kills me because I don't have a vortex anymore.
I think this title is a bit misleading, but more importantly not very informative/indicative of the content inside. If the OP wants me to change it, feel free to PM me.
Dude, I just want to say that this build is sick (now that I can execute it a bit better)!
Best part was when a slightly favored zerg got some lings in my base early game and proceeded to offensively gg me, then faced him the game after and DESTROYED him with this. With an offensive GG back ofc
On July 16 2012 08:18 NrGmonk wrote: I think this title is a bit misleading, but more importantly not very informative/indicative of the content inside. If the OP wants me to change it, feel free to PM me.
On July 16 2012 08:18 NrGmonk wrote: I think this title is a bit misleading, but more importantly not very informative/indicative of the content inside. If the OP wants me to change it, feel free to PM me.
What would you suggest?
Why not HUARG's Chargelot/Archon Mothership expand turtle PvZ style?
I was wondering, does anyone have any troubles taking a third vs roaches + overseers? It seems like you don't even have any archons at the time the third is taken. If you got to take it and put cannons up I could see it being holdable but trying to take a third off a void, a pheonix, and MS, and non-charge zealots seems like it would be really tough.
On July 16 2012 12:55 esaul17 wrote: I was wondering, does anyone have any troubles taking a third vs roaches + overseers? It seems like you don't even have any archons at the time the third is taken. If you got to take it and put cannons up I could see it being holdable but trying to take a third off a void, a pheonix, and MS, and non-charge zealots seems like it would be really tough.
I am happy to be wrong however.
How I normally play it, is I make the third but am perfectly happy with canceling it. The goal at this point is to go up to 8-10 gates AND a nexus. As far as I can see, it doesn't matter that much which order you do it in, it's just up to whether they let you have the third or not. While the nexus is building, all the extra gates go down, charge finishes, a void is poking around scouting, and your archons begin. If you can't keep the nexus, sac it and use the money for some more archons. Once you can deal with the army at the third (overseer sniping helps,) just take the nexus right in front of him.
On July 16 2012 12:55 esaul17 wrote: I was wondering, does anyone have any troubles taking a third vs roaches + overseers? It seems like you don't even have any archons at the time the third is taken. If you got to take it and put cannons up I could see it being holdable but trying to take a third off a void, a pheonix, and MS, and non-charge zealots seems like it would be really tough.
I am happy to be wrong however.
How I normally play it, is I make the third but am perfectly happy with canceling it. The goal at this point is to go up to 8-10 gates AND a nexus. As far as I can see, it doesn't matter that much which order you do it in, it's just up to whether they let you have the third or not. While the nexus is building, all the extra gates go down, charge finishes, a void is poking around scouting, and your archons begin. If you can't keep the nexus, sac it and use the money for some more archons. Once you can deal with the army at the third (overseer sniping helps,) just take the nexus right in front of him.
So you are basically hoping to snipe the Overseers with your void + MS + Phoenix and use cloaking to push him back? Can you reliable kill all the overseers before you lose your archons? What if he brought along a couple queens for antiair?
So you are basically hoping to snipe the Overseers with your void + MS + Phoenix and use cloaking to push him back? Can you reliable kill all the overseers before you lose your archons? What if he brought along a couple queens for antiair?
If you can't keep the third, sac it and minimize your losses while maximizing your gate and archon count. You don't need the nexus RIGHT now. You can keep oversaturating your current mineral patches, add 4 or 5 gates, and retake the third when you are able to push him out. If he overstays his welcome, it's even better for you as your 2base archon zealot with cloak is getting better and better than his force out on the map while he's doing whatever (most likely taking a 4th and starting his corruptors) at home.
That being said - how are queens at your third at 9-11 minutes? I'm unsure if that would be brilliant or special ed, but I'm leaning towards the latter.
So you are basically hoping to snipe the Overseers with your void + MS + Phoenix and use cloaking to push him back? Can you reliable kill all the overseers before you lose your archons? What if he brought along a couple queens for antiair?
If you can't keep the third, sac it and minimize your losses while maximizing your gate and archon count. You don't need the nexus RIGHT now. You can keep oversaturating your current mineral patches, add 4 or 5 gates, and retake the third when you are able to push him out. If he overstays his welcome, it's even better for you as your 2base archon zealot with cloak is getting better and better than his force out on the map while he's doing whatever (most likely taking a 4th and starting his corruptors) at home.
That being said - how are queens at your third at 9-11 minutes? I'm unsure if that would be brilliant or special ed, but I'm leaning towards the latter.
Well I just mean, if he just keeps a growing mass of roaches at your door keeping you on 2 base won't things just get worse and worse? Can 2 base chargelot archon really push back a roach army quickly approaching max off a 2 base economy? My concern was him just denying the third all game then overwhelming you.
I used to do chargelot archon in pvz, and to be honest I have no idea why I stopped. It did pretty well actualy. I really like the stargate opening as well, it forces the zerg to kinda clench up which does some free 'damage'
Now that being said, I saw your game vs roach hydra which would be kinda typical of what you would see with what you show (vr, third, etc) and the zerg player played pretty bad, all of the queens were between 50-100+energy, he had 2-0 upgrades, and he clumped all of his shit together for you to vortex. As if that were not bad enough, he engaged your mothership having army twice without detection.
So I'd like to see you play it out vs a better opponent, because I'm skeptical of how it does vs roach infestor, or roach infestor bl in the right hands. I'm not saying it sucks or will get rolled, but I would like to see it against a better zerg, as there's not a ton of micro you can do with chargelot archon.
Edit: Ok, so I actually tried it in ladder, and it was roflstomp easy... I messed up horribly both games, which is sorta expected given that it's literally the first and second time I tried this build, but I still won fairly easily and as I mentioned with huge mistakes. I'll practice this and throw it in the toolbox. Also, I'm not really convinced that this build absolutely needs the mothership.
tempted to try this out myself, but watching the replay vs roach hydra ling it just struck me like the other guy was an idiot. single evo chamber all game while getting melee and ranged units. he actively runs in to vortexs and he rallys badly upgraded lings into a defensive position with cannons and zealots.
do you have any replays vs people who dont like to run into the meat grinder so much?
Fast Mothership into 3rd is indeed extremly solid, at least in my plat. Using it with sky toss build, but recently having some troubles (probably because was not playing for 2 months ^^) so I'll try this build and see how it goes, thx p00n!
I don't see why so many people dismiss this build just because it relies on the MS. I mean, every PvZ that gets to the late game relies on the MS, at the pro level. Yes vortex can be a hit and a miss, but that's a general problem, not a problem with this build at all.
Having said that, I believe this build is very solid. No it won't brake the match up or something like that, just solid, legitimate way to play PvZ.
I just tried this build out for the first time, and it was about the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen. I'm totally going to do this in PvZ from now on. Thank you, the p00n!
(1) Stephano roach max build with good macro and roach micro. Split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots.
(2) Make some relatively early corruptors and just kill the mothership. It's not that hard to kill the mothership if you really commit to doing so, especially before it has 200 energy. Just over-produce corruptors in the early mid-game, split them up into 2-3 groups, and kill the damn thing. Roaches own zealot-archon w/o vortex support.
(3) Broodlord-infestor with very good control. The micro isn't impossibly difficult (split units into multiple groups, fungal zealots and archons, NP mothership if possible), but because Zergs rarely face this composition, they don't get a lot of practice against it. This can be reliably beaten with a normal broodlord-infestor composition, but it requires a good deal of practice that most ladder Zergs haven't put in.
i love the fast mothership, its an incredible way of having a safe third and stop mid game agression. The follow up works fine for me, but im not sure if are better posibilities, archoon and chargelot works in many situations
On July 17 2012 01:17 kcdc wrote: I know of 3 good ways to beat this build:
(1) Stephano roach max build with good macro and roach micro. Split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots.
(2) Make some relatively early corruptors and just kill the mothership. It's not that hard to kill the mothership if you really commit to doing so, especially before it has 200 energy. Just over-produce corruptors in the early mid-game, split them up into 2-3 groups, and kill the damn thing. Roaches own zealot-archon w/o vortex support.
(3) Broodlord-infestor with very good control. The micro isn't impossibly difficult (split units into multiple groups, fungal zealots and archons, NP mothership if possible), but because Zergs rarely face this composition, they don't get a lot of practice against it. This can be reliably beaten with a normal broodlord-infestor composition, but it requires a good deal of practice that most ladder Zergs haven't put in.
For a blue poster, the majority of all your arguments (not only in this thread, btw) are 'totschlag' arguments. I have no idea of the english (or even dutch) phrase, but it is basically an argument that cannot be efficiently disproved. An example would be 'it only works if you believe in it' (thus if it doesn't work you simply don't believe in it, it is still a valid method!). Many, many zergs have fallen with the broodlord/infestor combo, same goes for mass stephano roach pressure. Your argument is just 'better control, hurrrrdurrrr' which is pretty stupid.
Why don't you make a [G] about TvZ where the T only and only uses marines? Marines beat everything on a cost+food equivalent base and theoretically banelings, fungal growth and ultralisk cleave damage never have to hit more than one marine. If a baneling/fungal/ultralisk hits more than one marine, it is not the strategy that is not viable, you simply need better control. I bet you'd have a lot of fun with your totschlag arguments in such a topic.
Your #1 way is a very good example. 'split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots' - yes, it is feasible, but once you split your roaches I will only have to deal with one part of the split up roaches. If you get a good surround, I can throw a random vortex on your concave and I still have to deal with a small part of your army, because the rest is stuck inside the vortex. It is also for this reason why most zergs run their whole army into the vortex once a small part of it gets vortexed - the remaining forces would lose anyway.
Don't forget that roaches have 4 range and are medium-sized units. You can only spread so much before you can spread no more, just like you can only go so fast until (almost) reaching the speed of light. There is a limit to it due to unit size and range.
#3 is the same totschlag argument.
#2 is something I see you do in pretty much every PvZ-topic, and now in this one. It is called 'talking out of your ass', fueled by a lack of understanding about zerg economy (and in this case apparently basic game sense) - you simply CANNOT do that. It is like me saying 'with this new sprinting method you will be able to beat Usain Bolt, his record time is [x] and with this you will reach [x-1]' and you replying with 'yeah, but, y'know, Usain Bolt will just run faster. It is not viable.' You. Cannot. Actually. Do. That. Is it clear?
On July 14 2012 05:18 Belial88 wrote: I got another easy win for you:
- 9 Pylon, chrono only probes - 13 Forge - 17 3x Pylons at ramp = gg
Only way for Zerg to beat it, besides patrolling the ramp (which you can still glitch out if they are using patrol command, or if you bring 2 probes), is to 6-10 pool, in which case you either cannon your main or block the ramp, win.
win win scenario. I dont know why Toss isn't 100% on ladder.
On a side note, good guide. Seems like most of the Toss I play on ladder. They beat me too.
Sounds really interesting I used to mess around with a similar idea. I would like to try this, but after having to sit through 10 hours of pvz, I will puke if I see a Stargate >_< What do you think about vs roach/ling/hydra doom drop?
On July 16 2012 14:26 FLiP491 wrote:Also, I'm not really convinced that this build absolutely needs the mothership.
Why not?
Well, simply put because I can hold my third with cannons + voids + gateways units. It is map dependent, but at 400/400+300/200 for one unit it's something i'd like to avoid from an economic point of view. Also I don't think you need it do deal with anything including brood lords or infestors until the food counts get super high so if you engage early enough you again don't need it. Obviously I'd get one if I got into a situation vs a maxed bl infestor army. 900 pt master. I'm gonna practice a few games, right now I wanna try holding a ~715 third with voids and gateway units +cannons and sim while keeping chrono on weapons. Push immediately on +3. Or something.
Any thoughts on tech switches or anything of that nature with this build? Since I can't really think of a counter composition nothing comes to mind =D
On July 14 2012 05:18 Belial88 wrote: I got another easy win for you:
- 9 Pylon, chrono only probes - 13 Forge - 17 3x Pylons at ramp = gg
Only way for Zerg to beat it, besides patrolling the ramp (which you can still glitch out if they are using patrol command, or if you bring 2 probes), is to 6-10 pool, in which case you either cannon your main or block the ramp, win.
win win scenario. I dont know why Toss isn't 100% on ladder.
On a side note, good guide. Seems like most of the Toss I play on ladder. They beat me too.
Drone drill, toss lose ezpz.
Drone drilling does not work on most spawns on most maps, and Toss can just reinforce the wall. Zerg lose ezpz...
I've actually gone and tested this multiple times though. Drone drilling may break through a pylon, but it won't break through a warping in gateway behind it before the cannon finishes.
On July 17 2012 01:17 kcdc wrote: I know of 3 good ways to beat this build:
(1) Stephano roach max build with good macro and roach micro. Split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots.
(2) Make some relatively early corruptors and just kill the mothership. It's not that hard to kill the mothership if you really commit to doing so, especially before it has 200 energy. Just over-produce corruptors in the early mid-game, split them up into 2-3 groups, and kill the damn thing. Roaches own zealot-archon w/o vortex support.
(3) Broodlord-infestor with very good control. The micro isn't impossibly difficult (split units into multiple groups, fungal zealots and archons, NP mothership if possible), but because Zergs rarely face this composition, they don't get a lot of practice against it. This can be reliably beaten with a normal broodlord-infestor composition, but it requires a good deal of practice that most ladder Zergs haven't put in.
For a blue poster, the majority of all your arguments (not only in this thread, btw) are 'totschlag' arguments. I have no idea of the english (or even dutch) phrase, but it is basically an argument that cannot be efficiently disproved. An example would be 'it only works if you believe in it' (thus if it doesn't work you simply don't believe in it, it is still a valid method!). Many, many zergs have fallen with the broodlord/infestor combo, same goes for mass stephano roach pressure. Your argument is just 'better control, hurrrrdurrrr' which is pretty stupid.
Why don't you make a [G] about TvZ where the T only and only uses marines? Marines beat everything on a cost+food equivalent base and theoretically banelings, fungal growth and ultralisk cleave damage never have to hit more than one marine. If a baneling/fungal/ultralisk hits more than one marine, it is not the strategy that is not viable, you simply need better control. I bet you'd have a lot of fun with your totschlag arguments in such a topic.
Your #1 way is a very good example. 'split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots' - yes, it is feasible, but once you split your roaches I will only have to deal with one part of the split up roaches. If you get a good surround, I can throw a random vortex on your concave and I still have to deal with a small part of your army, because the rest is stuck inside the vortex. It is also for this reason why most zergs run their whole army into the vortex once a small part of it gets vortexed - the remaining forces would lose anyway.
Don't forget that roaches have 4 range and are medium-sized units. You can only spread so much before you can spread no more, just like you can only go so fast until (almost) reaching the speed of light. There is a limit to it due to unit size and range.
#3 is the same totschlag argument.
#2 is something I see you do in pretty much every PvZ-topic, and now in this one. It is called 'talking out of your ass', fueled by a lack of understanding about zerg economy (and in this case apparently basic game sense) - you simply CANNOT do that. It is like me saying 'with this new sprinting method you will be able to beat Usain Bolt, his record time is [x] and with this you will reach [x-1]' and you replying with 'yeah, but, y'know, Usain Bolt will just run faster. It is not viable.' You. Cannot. Actually. Do. That. Is it clear?
Corruptors: Insanity. Good luck transitioning safely out of early corruptors. I'm not sure why anyone thought this was a good idea, even if you kill the mothership you still have to live with a bunch of useless corruptors until you get Hive+Greater Spire during which time Protoss is laughing on 3 bases.
Roach aggression: Trade as efficiently as possible. Zealots are easy, void ray is annoying but not overly impactful, but an archon vortex is going to lead to a fast GG. I don't think this is the smartest way to attack this build, but we zergs do love our roaches.
Mutas: I hate using them in PvZ, but the build skimps on stalkers so the opening is there. The onus is on Zerg to justify the choice of tech with significant damage, because Mutas will delay his endgame considerably.
BL/Infestor/Spines: Not really different from any lategame Protoss vs. lategame Zerg scenario. No blink means it all comes down to vortex. Op makes it sound easier than it is in reality, it's just a matter of who screws up first
On July 14 2012 05:09 Jergen wrote: This build seems awfully similar to http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=271279 with the exception that you're going for Zealot Archon instead of Blink Stalker. Have you tried the latter as well as the former? Seems like +2 blink could give you a good period of strength, even without the fast toilets.
It's funny that he quotes kcdc in the OP of that guide when he is saying good things about the build, and then completely discredits him in this thread when kcdc criticizes the build.
Personally I tend to agree with kcdc that people with decent micro and engagements should be able to break this. I agree that it is easy to say, but then again the burden is on OP to prove that his build can hold a well microed 11 min roach max. So far in the replays I've seen, the zerg's engagement and army control were not really convincing.
p00n, we've had this argument many times. This is the same build you posted way back, except now with a FFE. I've used the build a fair amount, and I have a lot of experience with other mothership archon builds. The reality is that your build works because Zergs at your level don't know how to play against 2-base mothership. But Zerg absolutely can get enough units off of 3 bases to break you while you're doing a super tech-heavy build.
You're teching stargate+fleet beacon+mothership+twilight+charge+twilight+weapons upgrades all on 2 bases, and then taking a third base with a tiny amount of supply and a low sentry count just as Zerg hits their mid-game strength. I used to play this build as my primary macro build, but after a while, I was hitting Zergs that would just mass units and roll me over because I had spent too much on tech to defend my third.
And if you don't think broodlord+infestor with good control can beat mothership+archon, you're not playing people good enough to punish it.
On July 17 2012 05:13 kcdc wrote: p00n, we've had this argument many times. This is the same build you posted way back, except now with a FFE. I've used the build a fair amount, and I have a lot of experience with other mothership archon builds. The reality is that your build works because Zergs at your level don't know how to play against 2-base mothership. But Zerg absolutely can get enough units off of 3 bases to break you while you're doing a super tech-heavy build.
You're teching stargate+fleet beacon+mothership+twilight+charge+twilight+weapons upgrades all on 2 bases, and then taking a third base with a tiny amount of supply and a low sentry count just as Zerg hits their mid-game strength. I used to play this build as my primary macro build, but after a while, I was hitting Zergs that would just mass units and roll me over because I had spent too much on tech to defend my third.
And if you don't think broodlord+infestor with good control can beat mothership+archon, you're not playing people good enough to punish it.
couldnt have said it better, way too tech heavy, if you pick up wins with this is because zergs have no idea how to respond, not because your build is good.
On July 17 2012 01:17 kcdc wrote: I know of 3 good ways to beat this build:
(1) Stephano roach max build with good macro and roach micro. Split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots.
(2) Make some relatively early corruptors and just kill the mothership. It's not that hard to kill the mothership if you really commit to doing so, especially before it has 200 energy. Just over-produce corruptors in the early mid-game, split them up into 2-3 groups, and kill the damn thing. Roaches own zealot-archon w/o vortex support.
(3) Broodlord-infestor with very good control. The micro isn't impossibly difficult (split units into multiple groups, fungal zealots and archons, NP mothership if possible), but because Zergs rarely face this composition, they don't get a lot of practice against it. This can be reliably beaten with a normal broodlord-infestor composition, but it requires a good deal of practice that most ladder Zergs haven't put in.
For a blue poster, the majority of all your arguments (not only in this thread, btw) are 'totschlag' arguments. I have no idea of the english (or even dutch) phrase, but it is basically an argument that cannot be efficiently disproved. An example would be 'it only works if you believe in it' (thus if it doesn't work you simply don't believe in it, it is still a valid method!). Many, many zergs have fallen with the broodlord/infestor combo, same goes for mass stephano roach pressure. Your argument is just 'better control, hurrrrdurrrr' which is pretty stupid.
Why don't you make a [G] about TvZ where the T only and only uses marines? Marines beat everything on a cost+food equivalent base and theoretically banelings, fungal growth and ultralisk cleave damage never have to hit more than one marine. If a baneling/fungal/ultralisk hits more than one marine, it is not the strategy that is not viable, you simply need better control. I bet you'd have a lot of fun with your totschlag arguments in such a topic.
Your #1 way is a very good example. 'split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots' - yes, it is feasible, but once you split your roaches I will only have to deal with one part of the split up roaches. If you get a good surround, I can throw a random vortex on your concave and I still have to deal with a small part of your army, because the rest is stuck inside the vortex. It is also for this reason why most zergs run their whole army into the vortex once a small part of it gets vortexed - the remaining forces would lose anyway.
Don't forget that roaches have 4 range and are medium-sized units. You can only spread so much before you can spread no more, just like you can only go so fast until (almost) reaching the speed of light. There is a limit to it due to unit size and range.
#3 is the same totschlag argument.
#2 is something I see you do in pretty much every PvZ-topic, and now in this one. It is called 'talking out of your ass', fueled by a lack of understanding about zerg economy (and in this case apparently basic game sense) - you simply CANNOT do that. It is like me saying 'with this new sprinting method you will be able to beat Usain Bolt, his record time is [x] and with this you will reach [x-1]' and you replying with 'yeah, but, y'know, Usain Bolt will just run faster. It is not viable.' You. Cannot. Actually. Do. That. Is it clear?
He's just pointed out the weak spots of your strat that btw every bo there is has and you reply in such a manner? Kinda a dick move, bro Ever heard of constructive criticism?
Your #1 way is a very good example. 'split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots' - yes, it is feasible, but once you split your roaches I will only have to deal with one part of the split up roaches. If you get a good surround, I can throw a random vortex on your concave and I still have to deal with a small part of your army, because the rest is stuck inside the vortex. It is also for this reason why most zergs run their whole army into the vortex once a small part of it gets vortexed - the remaining forces would lose anyway.
Just read this again. If the Zergs you're playing are running the rest of their army into vortexes, you're definitely not playing people that know what they're doing. Zerg should just accept that whatever is caught in the vortex is dead. If they do an ~11 minute roach timing to kill your third, you only have 1 vortex at most. Zerg just needs to let those 10 roaches die and kite the zealots and archons with the rest of their roaches while reinforcing. You can't possibly keep up with their production.
Overproducing corruptors to snipe the ms and then transitioning into roach is very possible. I don't know why you always act so incredibly rude when it's brought up, it's one of the best counters to your build and you don't even bother to discuss it. Stop being such a douche to kcdc, he's 100% right and you seem to be ridiculizing his arguments because you have no viable response to them.
On July 17 2012 05:58 Arcanefrost wrote: Overproducing corruptors to snipe the ms and then transitioning into roach is very possible. I don't know why you always act so incredibly rude when it's brought up, it's one of the best counters to your build and you don't even bother to discuss it. Stop being such a douche to kcdc, he's 100% right and you seem to be ridiculizing his arguments because you have no viable response to them.
It all depends on what you mean by "overproduce". You're gonna have to make a ton of corrupters, because with vortex and archons you can't get away with making just 3-7. Corrupters also aren't free, spire takes a long time to build, and chances are you'd be better off just using it for mutalisks. If you DO decide to go for corrupters, it'll take away massively from your roach count, which leaves you vulnerable to counterattack timings and other such aggressive moves from the protoss. Mothership is obviously a big investment, but focusing your entire build around killing it is missing the point, which is that chargelot archon is hella strong, ESPECIALLY before brood lords come out.
This also all relies on perfect scouting, which you can't always achieve with a void ray + phoenix running around sniping your overlords.
This build is obviously not perfect, it has it's weaknesses, mutalisks seem to be a large vulnerability as well as early ling/bane timings, but corrupter/roach is the least of your worries. Regardless of these weaknesses, it is still incredibly strong and a lot of fun.
On July 17 2012 05:58 Arcanefrost wrote: Overproducing corruptors to snipe the ms and then transitioning into roach is very possible. I don't know why you always act so incredibly rude when it's brought up, it's one of the best counters to your build and you don't even bother to discuss it. Stop being such a douche to kcdc, he's 100% right and you seem to be ridiculizing his arguments because you have no viable response to them.
Exactly this. This build has a lot of potential, but there needs to be constructive discussion about it. Being bad mannered to kcdc really isn't helping you win anyone over. Even if you disagree strongly with him, he is a person that everyone on this forum should respect, even though he isn't playing anymore
On July 14 2012 05:18 Belial88 wrote: I got another easy win for you:
- 9 Pylon, chrono only probes - 13 Forge - 17 3x Pylons at ramp = gg
Only way for Zerg to beat it, besides patrolling the ramp (which you can still glitch out if they are using patrol command, or if you bring 2 probes), is to 6-10 pool, in which case you either cannon your main or block the ramp, win.
win win scenario. I dont know why Toss isn't 100% on ladder.
On a side note, good guide. Seems like most of the Toss I play on ladder. They beat me too.
Drone drill, toss lose ezpz.
Drone drilling does not work on most spawns on most maps, and Toss can just reinforce the wall. Zerg lose ezpz...
I've actually gone and tested this multiple times though. Drone drilling may break through a pylon, but it won't break through a warping in gateway behind it before the cannon finishes.
You tried using mineral patches outside your nat? When you spawn north on daybreak, you can use the closest patch on your 3rd to make the trick work, idk about other maps tho. Save camera location helps.
On July 17 2012 01:17 kcdc wrote: I know of 3 good ways to beat this build:
(1) Stephano roach max build with good macro and roach micro. Split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots.
(2) Make some relatively early corruptors and just kill the mothership. It's not that hard to kill the mothership if you really commit to doing so, especially before it has 200 energy. Just over-produce corruptors in the early mid-game, split them up into 2-3 groups, and kill the damn thing. Roaches own zealot-archon w/o vortex support.
(3) Broodlord-infestor with very good control. The micro isn't impossibly difficult (split units into multiple groups, fungal zealots and archons, NP mothership if possible), but because Zergs rarely face this composition, they don't get a lot of practice against it. This can be reliably beaten with a normal broodlord-infestor composition, but it requires a good deal of practice that most ladder Zergs haven't put in.
For a blue poster, the majority of all your arguments (not only in this thread, btw) are 'totschlag' arguments. I have no idea of the english (or even dutch) phrase, but it is basically an argument that cannot be efficiently disproved. An example would be 'it only works if you believe in it' (thus if it doesn't work you simply don't believe in it, it is still a valid method!). Many, many zergs have fallen with the broodlord/infestor combo, same goes for mass stephano roach pressure. Your argument is just 'better control, hurrrrdurrrr' which is pretty stupid.
Why don't you make a [G] about TvZ where the T only and only uses marines? Marines beat everything on a cost+food equivalent base and theoretically banelings, fungal growth and ultralisk cleave damage never have to hit more than one marine. If a baneling/fungal/ultralisk hits more than one marine, it is not the strategy that is not viable, you simply need better control. I bet you'd have a lot of fun with your totschlag arguments in such a topic.
Your #1 way is a very good example. 'split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots' - yes, it is feasible, but once you split your roaches I will only have to deal with one part of the split up roaches. If you get a good surround, I can throw a random vortex on your concave and I still have to deal with a small part of your army, because the rest is stuck inside the vortex. It is also for this reason why most zergs run their whole army into the vortex once a small part of it gets vortexed - the remaining forces would lose anyway.
Don't forget that roaches have 4 range and are medium-sized units. You can only spread so much before you can spread no more, just like you can only go so fast until (almost) reaching the speed of light. There is a limit to it due to unit size and range.
#3 is the same totschlag argument.
#2 is something I see you do in pretty much every PvZ-topic, and now in this one. It is called 'talking out of your ass', fueled by a lack of understanding about zerg economy (and in this case apparently basic game sense) - you simply CANNOT do that. It is like me saying 'with this new sprinting method you will be able to beat Usain Bolt, his record time is [x] and with this you will reach [x-1]' and you replying with 'yeah, but, y'know, Usain Bolt will just run faster. It is not viable.' You. Cannot. Actually. Do. That. Is it clear?
On July 17 2012 05:58 Arcanefrost wrote: Overproducing corruptors to snipe the ms and then transitioning into roach is very possible. I don't know why you always act so incredibly rude when it's brought up, it's one of the best counters to your build and you don't even bother to discuss it. Stop being such a douche to kcdc, he's 100% right and you seem to be ridiculizing his arguments because you have no viable response to them.
It all depends on what you mean by "overproduce". You're gonna have to make a ton of corrupters, because with vortex and archons you can't get away with making just 3-7. Corrupters also aren't free, spire takes a long time to build, and chances are you'd be better off just using it for mutalisks. If you DO decide to go for corrupters, it'll take away massively from your roach count, which leaves you vulnerable to counterattack timings and other such aggressive moves from the protoss. Mothership is obviously a big investment, but focusing your entire build around killing it is missing the point, which is that chargelot archon is hella strong, ESPECIALLY before brood lords come out.
This also all relies on perfect scouting, which you can't always achieve with a void ray + phoenix running around sniping your overlords.
This build is obviously not perfect, it has it's weaknesses, mutalisks seem to be a large vulnerability as well as early ling/bane timings, but corrupter/roach is the least of your worries. Regardless of these weaknesses, it is still incredibly strong and a lot of fun.
You can totally kill the mothership at ~12 or 13 minutes with a handful of corruptors. P's units that shoot up in that window total approximately 2 archons and a couple sentries. Just attack the mothership before it has 2 vortexes and a half dozen archons defending it, and it dies easy.
That said, P will rarely face this problem because Zerg doesn't often make an early spire with any significant roach count. Z would have to scout your build and deviate from their intended build to stomp yours, and since this build isn't common, there's a good chance that they won't respond well.
or to just sum it up: Everything except Ling/Muta (considering you have storm to defend)
A style like that would only work, if you would: - Focus Overseers like crazy while not losing your mothership - Expand very aggressive, so you can be cost inefficent and/or have a lot of gas for storms/archons - Not open FFE, be aggresive from the start and put pressure at deny expansions like a boss
If you still win with your strat, that means: - Your opponent is just bad.
According to previous posts, you are 'TdgAisora'. 1v1 platinum with very little games.
On-topic: I think that most losses to bl/inf with this are due to attacking into spines and not having enough infrastructure up. I present to you two examples - one game where I got beaten very badly by broodlord/infestor/spines, and one where the opponent tried to do the same thing but failed.
I did not make any major mistakes, even in the engagement - my mothership was lagging behind so I was late with my vortex which allowed him to get some few key fungals off, but nonetheless I got rolled pretty hard.
The key here would be to add more infrastructure and bases and simply camp the zerg out, while setting everything up. The zerg will naturally be ahead in setting up infrastructure (spines/spores, creep, etc.) due to your passivity. If you set up stargates and chrono out air weapons/armor from double c-core, while adding bases and a shit ton of gateways, you should be able to win fairly easily.
Here is an example, where my opponent tried to do exactly the same stuff as the guy in the shakuras game tried to do. He also rushes for a lot of corruptors and tries to snipe my mothership. As you will see, it fails miserably. http://replayfu.com/download/JPM3Fm
--
Now shakuras plateau is much easier to spine up, so what we need is a work-around. I ran into this problem before and then solved it by playing it slow (which I did not do in the shakuras game attached in this post). Something that seems like a good idea, would be to sneak my mothership into his main (not at all impossible given that you can clear overlords and that the map is pretty small). Then I could mass recall all my units and still have enough energy left for a vortex (or another mass recall).
Due to his high brood lord count, he will not be able to push too fast, as I will have cannons and he will have very little ground forces.
On July 17 2012 01:17 kcdc wrote: I know of 3 good ways to beat this build:
(1) Stephano roach max build with good macro and roach micro. Split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots.
(2) Make some relatively early corruptors and just kill the mothership. It's not that hard to kill the mothership if you really commit to doing so, especially before it has 200 energy. Just over-produce corruptors in the early mid-game, split them up into 2-3 groups, and kill the damn thing. Roaches own zealot-archon w/o vortex support.
(3) Broodlord-infestor with very good control. The micro isn't impossibly difficult (split units into multiple groups, fungal zealots and archons, NP mothership if possible), but because Zergs rarely face this composition, they don't get a lot of practice against it. This can be reliably beaten with a normal broodlord-infestor composition, but it requires a good deal of practice that most ladder Zergs haven't put in.
For a blue poster, the majority of all your arguments (not only in this thread, btw) are 'totschlag' arguments. I have no idea of the english (or even dutch) phrase, but it is basically an argument that cannot be efficiently disproved. An example would be 'it only works if you believe in it' (thus if it doesn't work you simply don't believe in it, it is still a valid method!). Many, many zergs have fallen with the broodlord/infestor combo, same goes for mass stephano roach pressure. Your argument is just 'better control, hurrrrdurrrr' which is pretty stupid.
Why don't you make a [G] about TvZ where the T only and only uses marines? Marines beat everything on a cost+food equivalent base and theoretically banelings, fungal growth and ultralisk cleave damage never have to hit more than one marine. If a baneling/fungal/ultralisk hits more than one marine, it is not the strategy that is not viable, you simply need better control. I bet you'd have a lot of fun with your totschlag arguments in such a topic.
Your #1 way is a very good example. 'split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots' - yes, it is feasible, but once you split your roaches I will only have to deal with one part of the split up roaches. If you get a good surround, I can throw a random vortex on your concave and I still have to deal with a small part of your army, because the rest is stuck inside the vortex. It is also for this reason why most zergs run their whole army into the vortex once a small part of it gets vortexed - the remaining forces would lose anyway.
Don't forget that roaches have 4 range and are medium-sized units. You can only spread so much before you can spread no more, just like you can only go so fast until (almost) reaching the speed of light. There is a limit to it due to unit size and range.
#3 is the same totschlag argument.
#2 is something I see you do in pretty much every PvZ-topic, and now in this one. It is called 'talking out of your ass', fueled by a lack of understanding about zerg economy (and in this case apparently basic game sense) - you simply CANNOT do that. It is like me saying 'with this new sprinting method you will be able to beat Usain Bolt, his record time is [x] and with this you will reach [x-1]' and you replying with 'yeah, but, y'know, Usain Bolt will just run faster. It is not viable.' You. Cannot. Actually. Do. That. Is it clear?
Thank you so much for posting this build and trying to help struggling Protosses. Looks strong as hell to me after watching all of the replays and I am going to implement it into my own play. I'm sorry that you have to deal with so many people like this, (though I greatly respect KCDC I don't think he made a good argument in terms of the corruptors) but please don't let it discourage you from the innovation process. There are many of us who appreciate it. And, you're probably the most hilarious poster on these boards. Every single one of your posts makes me laugh my ass off.
On July 17 2012 01:17 kcdc wrote: I know of 3 good ways to beat this build:
(1) Stephano roach max build with good macro and roach micro. Split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots.
(2) Make some relatively early corruptors and just kill the mothership. It's not that hard to kill the mothership if you really commit to doing so, especially before it has 200 energy. Just over-produce corruptors in the early mid-game, split them up into 2-3 groups, and kill the damn thing. Roaches own zealot-archon w/o vortex support.
(3) Broodlord-infestor with very good control. The micro isn't impossibly difficult (split units into multiple groups, fungal zealots and archons, NP mothership if possible), but because Zergs rarely face this composition, they don't get a lot of practice against it. This can be reliably beaten with a normal broodlord-infestor composition, but it requires a good deal of practice that most ladder Zergs haven't put in.
For a blue poster, the majority of all your arguments (not only in this thread, btw) are 'totschlag' arguments. I have no idea of the english (or even dutch) phrase, but it is basically an argument that cannot be efficiently disproved. An example would be 'it only works if you believe in it' (thus if it doesn't work you simply don't believe in it, it is still a valid method!). Many, many zergs have fallen with the broodlord/infestor combo, same goes for mass stephano roach pressure. Your argument is just 'better control, hurrrrdurrrr' which is pretty stupid.
Why don't you make a [G] about TvZ where the T only and only uses marines? Marines beat everything on a cost+food equivalent base and theoretically banelings, fungal growth and ultralisk cleave damage never have to hit more than one marine. If a baneling/fungal/ultralisk hits more than one marine, it is not the strategy that is not viable, you simply need better control. I bet you'd have a lot of fun with your totschlag arguments in such a topic.
Your #1 way is a very good example. 'split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots' - yes, it is feasible, but once you split your roaches I will only have to deal with one part of the split up roaches. If you get a good surround, I can throw a random vortex on your concave and I still have to deal with a small part of your army, because the rest is stuck inside the vortex. It is also for this reason why most zergs run their whole army into the vortex once a small part of it gets vortexed - the remaining forces would lose anyway.
Don't forget that roaches have 4 range and are medium-sized units. You can only spread so much before you can spread no more, just like you can only go so fast until (almost) reaching the speed of light. There is a limit to it due to unit size and range.
#3 is the same totschlag argument.
#2 is something I see you do in pretty much every PvZ-topic, and now in this one. It is called 'talking out of your ass', fueled by a lack of understanding about zerg economy (and in this case apparently basic game sense) - you simply CANNOT do that. It is like me saying 'with this new sprinting method you will be able to beat Usain Bolt, his record time is [x] and with this you will reach [x-1]' and you replying with 'yeah, but, y'know, Usain Bolt will just run faster. It is not viable.' You. Cannot. Actually. Do. That. Is it clear?
Thank you so much for posting this build and trying to help struggling Protosses. Looks strong as hell to me after watching all of the replays and I am going to implement it into my own play. I'm sorry that you have to deal with so many people like this, but please don't let it discourage you from the innovation process. There are many of us who appreciate it. And, you're probably the most hilarious poster on these boards. Every single one of your posts makes me laugh my ass off.
Keep it up, we need more Protosses like you.
I love you too bro. I don't think that the majority of the posters are trying to hate on the build just for the sake of hating on it, I think most of them have legitimate concerns but are simply misinformed.
Taking a third is impossible. With that build any 13 minute/14 minute maxed zerg army can be knocking at your 3rd, There are realistically 2 ways to secure a 3rd, and that is with a high sentry count (which if you rush out a fleet beacon you won't have) and stalkers. Or a more delayed 3rd with collosi. making only archons is also not too good of an idea. Archons are real cute but you only need maybe 10 at most for vortexes. Protoss has to break down spine crawler walls and the composition you have suggested most likely will not do the job. Any good zerg player would deny your third and take every other base on the map. Smart protosses need to account for a zerg tech. The zerg may make a small baneling ball aswell. when your opponent is going archon zealot I see no reason not too. Even if you win your initial engagement the zerg will just remax and crush you. Also I am a diamond level zerg and I do know what I am talking about, and frankly the points you made gave you no right to be elitist.
On July 17 2012 09:52 Veloh15 wrote: Taking a third is impossible. With that build any 13 minute/14 minute maxed zerg army can be knocking at your 3rd, There are realistically 2 ways to secure a 3rd, and that is with a high sentry count (which if you rush out a fleet beacon you won't have) and stalkers. Or a more delayed 3rd with collosi. making only archons is also not too good of an idea. Archons are real cute but you only need maybe 10 at most for vortexes. Protoss has to break down spine crawler walls and the composition you have suggested most likely will not do the job. Any good zerg player would deny your third and take every other base on the map. Smart protosses need to account for a zerg tech. The zerg may make a small baneling ball aswell. when your opponent is going archon zealot I see no reason not too. Even if you win your initial engagement the zerg will just remax and crush you. Also I am a diamond level zerg and I do know what I am talking about, and frankly the points you made gave you no right to be elitist.
I have taken thirds many, many times against players far above your skill level. Apparently it is not so impossible?
wow i really like this post. I respected Kcdc too, but i think that their arguments were kind of reckless this time. Im trying this build in all my pvz at this time, but i have timming problems sometimes, i think the fastest u have the third (with your mothership is amazingly easy to defend in many maps), u get the better edge to win the game. I really believe that are better army compositions to especific zerg builds, i think that more replays and more good players trying this would be a good start to improve the build, but just blindly criticism its not a nice nor intelligent way to go.
On July 17 2012 08:58 the p00n wrote: Yes it is indeed very few games, my bad.
On-topic: I think that most losses to bl/inf with this are due to attacking into spines and not having enough infrastructure up. I present to you two examples - one game where I got beaten very badly by broodlord/infestor/spines, and one where the opponent tried to do the same thing but failed.
I did not make any major mistakes, even in the engagement - my mothership was lagging behind so I was late with my vortex which allowed him to get some few key fungals off, but nonetheless I got rolled pretty hard.
The key here would be to add more infrastructure and bases and simply camp the zerg out, while setting everything up. The zerg will naturally be ahead in setting up infrastructure (spines/spores, creep, etc.) due to your passivity. If you set up stargates and chrono out air weapons/armor from double c-core, while adding bases and a shit ton of gateways, you should be able to win fairly easily.
I watched the Shakuras Replay and I thought that there were a couple of potential improvements to your play.
I think that you should have done a lot more warp prism play, and it should have been sooner. Instead of dropping after throwing your army away, you could have gone expo-hunting earlier. A Warp Prism is a mineral sink that takes the supply space of one zealot, so you can afford to have 3-4 of them on the map at a time. Dropping Zealots in each base at once, threatening further warp-ins, is a great way to fight that immobile broodlord army. If you leave the Archons and Mothership in a defensive poture, ready to toilet the Zerg army if it moves out, you're pretty safe. Instead of attacking into siege units stacked on top of base defense with caster support, go attack where your opponent is weak. You already have the chargelot infrastructure; might as well go do damage with them.
I don't know if I necessarily agree with a mass recall, but another option is to use blink stalkers with a spotting air unit (obs/prism/leftover phoenix) to go harass bases. I like the chargelot/archon composition, but if you want some more mobile harassment ability you can make a group of stalkers to go out and do some damage peripheral to the main armies. You already have the upgrades and gateway infrastructure to use them, so it's a very simple addition to the endgame. Something I personally like for Shakuras is building ~8 stalkers from a flipped Prism at a remote expo, forcing the opponent to bring defensive units to chase them, then blinking away. You just have to keep an eye out for infestors before escaping.
On July 17 2012 05:58 Arcanefrost wrote: Overproducing corruptors to snipe the ms and then transitioning into roach is very possible. I don't know why you always act so incredibly rude when it's brought up, it's one of the best counters to your build and you don't even bother to discuss it. Stop being such a douche to kcdc, he's 100% right and you seem to be ridiculizing his arguments because you have no viable response to them.
It all depends on what you mean by "overproduce". You're gonna have to make a ton of corrupters, because with vortex and archons you can't get away with making just 3-7. Corrupters also aren't free, spire takes a long time to build, and chances are you'd be better off just using it for mutalisks. If you DO decide to go for corrupters, it'll take away massively from your roach count, which leaves you vulnerable to counterattack timings and other such aggressive moves from the protoss. Mothership is obviously a big investment, but focusing your entire build around killing it is missing the point, which is that chargelot archon is hella strong, ESPECIALLY before brood lords come out.
This also all relies on perfect scouting, which you can't always achieve with a void ray + phoenix running around sniping your overlords.
This build is obviously not perfect, it has it's weaknesses, mutalisks seem to be a large vulnerability as well as early ling/bane timings, but corrupter/roach is the least of your worries. Regardless of these weaknesses, it is still incredibly strong and a lot of fun.
You can totally kill the mothership at ~12 or 13 minutes with a handful of corruptors. P's units that shoot up in that window total approximately 2 archons and a couple sentries. Just attack the mothership before it has 2 vortexes and a half dozen archons defending it, and it dies easy.
That said, P will rarely face this problem because Zerg doesn't often make an early spire with any significant roach count. Z would have to scout your build and deviate from their intended build to stomp yours, and since this build isn't common, there's a good chance that they won't respond well.
This is the first time I've read this thread, but interestingly enough I went for a similar counter you're describing, although I didn't make a lot of roaches since I scouted the stargate (I'm not a big roach player). Did go for some minor ineffective muta harass as well. Obviously strategy not executed as well as described in OP (high masters) but still might be a nice replay to watch.
I have a question, for kcdc or anyone who can answer this really, how do you kite this? or rather, why would protoss not make sure to micro back against kiting.
the way i read it, though i could be wrong, is that you just fortify the third, make it a position that the midgame zerg ground army will just wash over like water on rocks. The roach max, to my understanding is meant to snipe the third as it finishes, however by that time the mother ship as well as the army/sim city w/cannons should be up.
I get what you mean by kiting, but what i don't get is why the protoss wouldn't just stick near his wall/cannons, since the idea is to turtle off 3 bases until max, he has no reason to leave and should micro back his units to the wall. you attempting to kite only gives him time for WG's to come back off CD, he should easily reinforce his way out of it, by my thinking anyway. he's only attempting to defend a position until he can push out, he has no reason, and in fact, it would be a bad decision, to move out before then.
for example on his game with the roach hydra timing on his third, he's down 80 supply when the attack hits at 12 minutes which is slightly slower than a perfectly executed stephano style, yet he stays in range of his cannons and continually reinforces off his 10 gates, and that's with losing the MS, he keeps the MS alive zerg should do almost no damage. as it is, he loses every probe at the third, but he still holds the third base.
so again, why would protoss allow his units to chase, when all he needs to do is stay near his cannons and continually reinforce of 8-10 gates.
im not attempting to say it can't be done, im just asking clarification on it, please help my lowbieness understand.
Edit: spaced the paragraphs out a bit so your eyes don't bleed
this build is so freaking easy to execute and so fun ! im diamond and i was playing on my bed 40-50 APM maximum ! it was pure ownage !
Thanks its so cool for casual gamers
I guess it wont work vs pro gamer as they can split and micro their units but... IT'S SO FREAKING AWESOME ANYWAY!!!
i heard people telling its easy to counter with corruptors at 12 min before mass archons reached but the principle of early stargate is to pressure and deny scouting from zerg right? so how could he be aware ur on this strat before its too late? (if u hide a little bit mothership )
It seems to me that this build is just beating the metagame. By hiding the fleet beacon, denying scouting with the void ray and then win because the Zerg does not react properly. This build then wins because the opponent makes mistakes and not because of superior skill.
You more or less say this in the title though, just wanted to point it out..
On July 17 2012 17:44 sjurjh wrote: It seems to me that this build is just beating the metagame. By hiding the fleet beacon, denying scouting with the void ray and then win because the Zerg does not react properly. This build then wins because the opponent makes mistakes and not because of superior skill.
You more or less say this in the title though, just wanted to point it out..
Well given how good this build hides the scout, you are put in a favourable position. But in any case, all builds get figured out - but the question is - at what cost?
An interesting thing is that if the fleet beacon isn't scouted, this totally looks like a stargate void/phoenix and 7 gates pressure +1 attack build.
That alone should make the Zerg cautious about dropping an early spire for corruptors instead of preparing with roaches..
I totally agree with that ! the strenght of this build is that it may be seen as the standard play while opening stargate after FFE ! (7 gate +1 allin)
Maybe in one or two month this build will be overplayed and z will make decision to prepare countering this build rather than fear 7 gate allin or they will spend more ressources on scouting !
On July 17 2012 01:17 kcdc wrote: I know of 3 good ways to beat this build:
(1) Stephano roach max build with good macro and roach micro. Split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots.
(2) Make some relatively early corruptors and just kill the mothership. It's not that hard to kill the mothership if you really commit to doing so, especially before it has 200 energy. Just over-produce corruptors in the early mid-game, split them up into 2-3 groups, and kill the damn thing. Roaches own zealot-archon w/o vortex support.
(3) Broodlord-infestor with very good control. The micro isn't impossibly difficult (split units into multiple groups, fungal zealots and archons, NP mothership if possible), but because Zergs rarely face this composition, they don't get a lot of practice against it. This can be reliably beaten with a normal broodlord-infestor composition, but it requires a good deal of practice that most ladder Zergs haven't put in.
For a blue poster, the majority of all your arguments (not only in this thread, btw) are 'totschlag' arguments. I have no idea of the english (or even dutch) phrase, but it is basically an argument that cannot be efficiently disproved. An example would be 'it only works if you believe in it' (thus if it doesn't work you simply don't believe in it, it is still a valid method!). Many, many zergs have fallen with the broodlord/infestor combo, same goes for mass stephano roach pressure. Your argument is just 'better control, hurrrrdurrrr' which is pretty stupid.
Why don't you make a [G] about TvZ where the T only and only uses marines? Marines beat everything on a cost+food equivalent base and theoretically banelings, fungal growth and ultralisk cleave damage never have to hit more than one marine. If a baneling/fungal/ultralisk hits more than one marine, it is not the strategy that is not viable, you simply need better control. I bet you'd have a lot of fun with your totschlag arguments in such a topic.
Your #1 way is a very good example. 'split the roaches so they don't all get vortexed and kite the zealots' - yes, it is feasible, but once you split your roaches I will only have to deal with one part of the split up roaches. If you get a good surround, I can throw a random vortex on your concave and I still have to deal with a small part of your army, because the rest is stuck inside the vortex. It is also for this reason why most zergs run their whole army into the vortex once a small part of it gets vortexed - the remaining forces would lose anyway.
Don't forget that roaches have 4 range and are medium-sized units. You can only spread so much before you can spread no more, just like you can only go so fast until (almost) reaching the speed of light. There is a limit to it due to unit size and range.
#3 is the same totschlag argument.
#2 is something I see you do in pretty much every PvZ-topic, and now in this one. It is called 'talking out of your ass', fueled by a lack of understanding about zerg economy (and in this case apparently basic game sense) - you simply CANNOT do that. It is like me saying 'with this new sprinting method you will be able to beat Usain Bolt, his record time is [x] and with this you will reach [x-1]' and you replying with 'yeah, but, y'know, Usain Bolt will just run faster. It is not viable.' You. Cannot. Actually. Do. That. Is it clear?
Thank you so much for posting this build and trying to help struggling Protosses. Looks strong as hell to me after watching all of the replays and I am going to implement it into my own play. I'm sorry that you have to deal with so many people like this, but please don't let it discourage you from the innovation process. There are many of us who appreciate it. And, you're probably the most hilarious poster on these boards. Every single one of your posts makes me laugh my ass off.
Keep it up, we need more Protosses like you.
I love you too bro. I don't think that the majority of the posters are trying to hate on the build just for the sake of hating on it, I think most of them have legitimate concerns but are simply misinformed.
No one hates your build, it's just that better players than you don't think it's very good. You will NOT be able to take a 3rd against a well executed Stephano all-in, no matter how much you want it to be true.
It's hilarious how defensive you are. If you can't take the criticism, just don't make stupid claims and people will appreciate your build for what it is (a fun unconventional build that can catch an opponent off guard).
I don't play at your level since I'm (well, was) only high diamond on Euro Ladder so I would probably lost to you if I face you in the ladder, but I really think you should be way more careful about your statement. The name of the guide is probably true, it will give you easy win, however, saying somethink like "Yeah, every thing Zerg do against this sucks unless muta, meh" is like saying that you broke metagame just by yourself which is not something you should say unless you rape DRG/Stephano & co. When you says "Although I personally think it is retarded to get lair before metabolic boost, some zergs do it anyway. " it's just another bold statement that come from nowhere, if you want to say that Stephano is retarded do it, but you better have good arguments because he often do it and I really don't see how is it retarded.
Anyways, I'm not saying it's either a bad strat or a good one, but consider that this style could be weak to certain timings is a good way to improve it.
- My first concern is the Dimaga style he shown at dreamhack : he goes for fast 3 hatch, then takes gaz earlier than the classic 3 hatch build and goes for ling speed banneling instead of roach. I'm not sure when it hit but it might be something to consider, you just cannot hold bust like this without sentry and you can't rely on the feeling that he will go to the standard BO just because he took a third hatch at the usual timing.
The other problem I can see is that all your build rely on securing the third, and defend all kind of timing on it.
- About the roach max pressure. You say that you can hold your third, and this seems way harder than you say. If you don't try to delay zerg expansion with pylon block and so on, a roach max pressure can actually hit you at 11', which also means that he can attack you at 150 supply and 40 roach on your third at 10'30. Can you really take and defend your third? Because if you can't secure it you're gonna have a hard time just to get out of your base, and mothership archon on 2 base, not really scary. To me, it seems all your build rely on the fact that you could defend your third with one good vortex and that sound gimmicky.
Last but not least, you said that infestor/BL is weaker than mothership archon. That's just a wrong statement, if you consider two player with perfect unit control BL/infestor should always wins.
you just cannot hold bust like this without sentry and you can't rely on the feeling that he will go to the standard BO just because he took a third hatch at the usual timing.
Stargate opening gives you all the tools u need to proper scout the z and see what is coming up ! So this is no feeling at all ! Assuming that the build is not suited against baneling, the early scout by stargate units allows u to adapt ur strategy or to initiate a switch !
if you don't try to delay zerg expansion with pylon block and so on, a roach max pressure can actually hit you at 11', which also means that he can attack you at 150 supply and 40 roach on your third at 10'30
I don't see why u couldn't delay hatch with this build its like all standard ffe at the begining !
On July 17 2012 19:55 Vanadiel wrote: "Yeah, every thing Zerg do against this sucks unless muta, meh"
I don't think mutas is a proper answer to this build. Think about it: you're going for fast archons from templars with a mothership. If you see incoming mutas, you already have all the tech to counter mutas ( except blink ), you're in good shape eco wise ( he can't deny your third if he goes straight to mutas ), there's the fear of a vortex ( meaning he must be cautious when he harass, else he'd lose all his mutas to a single archon toilet ), you've got a stargate, and since the build relies on so many zealots, you can trade them for more cannons to hold any harass.
In fact, thinking about it, I consider this build to be a hard counter to mutas.
On July 17 2012 19:55 Vanadiel wrote: - My first concern is the Dimaga style he shown at dreamhack : he goes for fast 3 hatch, then takes gaz earlier than the classic 3 hatch build and goes for ling speed banneling instead of roach.
I don't really see how this has anything to do with the build. Yeah, it's a chargelots/archon build, but nothing says you can't make a sentry or two early game, especially if you scout something suspicious ( lings speed, low saturation, etc.. ). If you're speaking of bannelings in the mid game as the standard compo, well you have to adapt your own, hold with sentries, sim-city your expos, make a lot of cannons, and try to get as many archons as you can. Archons/templars do really well against lings + bans..
On July 17 2012 19:55 Vanadiel wrote: - About the roach max pressure. You say that you can hold your third, and this seems way harder than you say. If you don't try to delay zerg expansion with pylon block and so on, a roach max pressure can actually hit you at 11', which also means that he can attack you at 150 supply and 40 roach on your third at 10'30. Can you really take and defend your third? Because if you can't secure it you're gonna have a hard time just to get out of your base, and mothership archon on 2 base, not really scary. To me, it seems all your build rely on the fact that you could defend your third with one good vortex and that sound gimmicky.
If Zerg goes for a roaches timing, you'll have a mothership and voidray + phoenix to snippe overseers, so even without vortex he's bound to lose a lot of roaches each time he attacks. You'll be forced to cancel your third nexus, that's a given, but I don't think it's as dramatic as you think. Zerg's gonna lose a third of his army each time to delay your expo by 30s, and if he stops attacking for more than 30s, you'll have a pylon + basic sim city up, which will make it even harder for him to force a cancel.
IMO if there's a weakness in this build, it's got to do with infestors. For ex, I'd like to see how it fares against a speedlings 2/2 + infestors timing, throwing fungals and infested terrans in the mix at like around 14-15'.
you just cannot hold bust like this without sentry and you can't rely on the feeling that he will go to the standard BO just because he took a third hatch at the usual timing.
Stargate opening gives you all the tools u need to proper scout the z and see what is coming up ! So this is no feeling at all ! Assuming that the build is not suited against baneling, the early scout by stargate units allows u to adapt ur strategy or to initiate a switch !
if you don't try to delay zerg expansion with pylon block and so on, a roach max pressure can actually hit you at 11', which also means that he can attack you at 150 supply and 40 roach on your third at 10'30
I don't see why u couldn't delay hatch with this build its like all standard ffe at the begining !
Not saying he can't, but my guess (maybe wrong) is that you have to do so because it seems to me that it's critical to delay as moste this roach bust just to be able to defend, therefore it should be said in the guide as part of the strategy. Some 2 base all in like sentry immortel also requires that you delay at most zerg second base even by putting 2 pylons in the second base and the third, some other rely on very crazy quick warpgate so you can't really invest 100 or 200 minerals in pylon.
About the banneling bust in the dimaga style, it's just that I'm not sure about when it hit, since your void ray don't rush directly to the main to the scout but mainly to apply light pressure and kill overlord, I'm not that certain that you can scout it in times since he waits for Phoenix to scout.
p00n, I think that if you're going to claim that you can hold a third against Stephano style roaches, you should post a few replays of you doing so. Right now, your guide has none which is a big problem for its credibility. Requirements for a qualifying replay:
-Zerg has at least 160 supply by 11:00 (with nearly perfect macro, this can be 200, but we'll give it some slack and require that they're merely macroing well).
-Zerg begins to attack by 11:30 or earlier.
-Zerg doesn't do anything clearly awful in terms of control like getting his whole army in a single vortex or standing his units still or not splitting his forces at all. Ideally, we'd want to see a game where Zerg controls well, including splitting forces threatening both the third and the natural, getting as few units caught in vortex as possible, and kiting effectively while continuing to produce reinforcements, but we'll lower our replay standards to just competent control.
If Zerg gets an infestation pit, a hydra den, a spire, or drops before attacking, don't pick that replay. That 3-base roach timing was watered down by extra tech.
On July 18 2012 00:23 kcdc wrote: p00n, I think that if you're going to claim that you can hold a third against Stephano style roaches, you should post a few replays of you doing so. Right now, your guide has none which is a big problem for its credibility. Requirements for a qualifying replay:
-Zerg has at least 160 supply by 11:00 (with nearly perfect macro, this can be 200, but we'll give it some slack and require that they're merely macroing well).
-Zerg begins to attack by 11:30 or earlier.
-Zerg doesn't do anything clearly awful in terms of control like getting his whole army in a single vortex or standing his units still or not splitting his forces at all. Ideally, we'd want to see a game where Zerg controls well, including splitting forces threatening both the third and the natural, getting as few units caught in vortex as possible, and kiting effectively while continuing to produce reinforcements, but we'll lower our replay standards to just competent control.
If Zerg gets an infestation pit, a hydra den, a spire, or drops before attacking, don't pick that replay. That 3-base roach timing was watered down by extra tech.
I agree with this, having problems with Stephano-pushes aswell. A few replays would be good so that we could deal with them, since Stephano-roaching is the only thing I die to with this build, rest just get owned. My problem is getting sizeable army + mothership + archons at 10-11 min when roach attack hits.
I don't think mutas is a proper answer to this build. Think about it: you're going for fast archons from templars with a mothership. If you see incoming mutas, you already have all the tech to counter mutas ( except blink ), you're in good shape eco wise ( he can't deny your third if he goes straight to mutas ), there's the fear of a vortex ( meaning he must be cautious when he harass, else he'd lose all his mutas to a single archon toilet ), you've got a stargate, and since the build relies on so many zealots, you can trade them for more cannons to hold any harass.
In fact, thinking about it, I consider this build to be a hard counter to mutas.
Mutas don't die to an archon toilet. They spread too quickly, and you take some damage but you just run them away when the toilet pops. All mothership builds like this have the same weakness in that they can only cover one base, so you can attack which one is not covered, run in your lings etc. And after whatever you have or have not accomplished with your harass, you just don't fight his army and base race just like any other muta/ling build.
I don't think mutas is a proper answer to this build. Think about it: you're going for fast archons from templars with a mothership. If you see incoming mutas, you already have all the tech to counter mutas ( except blink ), you're in good shape eco wise ( he can't deny your third if he goes straight to mutas ), there's the fear of a vortex ( meaning he must be cautious when he harass, else he'd lose all his mutas to a single archon toilet ), you've got a stargate, and since the build relies on so many zealots, you can trade them for more cannons to hold any harass.
In fact, thinking about it, I consider this build to be a hard counter to mutas.
Mutas don't die to an archon toilet. They spread too quickly, and you take some damage but you just run them away when the toilet pops. All mothership builds like this have the same weakness in that they can only cover one base, so you can attack which one is not covered, run in your lings etc. And after whatever you have or have not accomplished with your harass, you just don't fight his army and base race just like any other muta/ling build.
If you scout mutas you can sit your archoons near the cannons of the mineral lines, vortex + mass archoon its too dangerous for a Zerg, i think mutas its not a proper respose, sounds more like gambling. Mass corruptor is better to snipe the mothership than a mass of light/weak units that die in a few shoots of the mighty energy guys.
I have more doubts about Kcdc standings about a nice executed stephano roaches, the timming and the macro needed to hold it seems harder. I have played many games against it, and the builds look pretty cool, because u can use forcefield and vortex to split mass roach army, and destroy the lethal timming, but again, in GM level all change. Im sure about the safety of this build in diamond-low master level at least.
I have been playing around with this build against Low master/high diamond, so don't take anything I say too seriously. I think its extremely fun to play with and lets you have a good defensive stance on your transition to full 3 base economy BUT compared to other builds being used in PvZ at the moment the third I could get out is around 10 Minutes which is later than I would if I was doing a 4 gate robo expand off FFE, or sentry immortal expand, which you can have a third down by around 8-9 minutes. Otherwise I love the idea of sitting back and building up a optimal army for early stages of entering lategame, and having full energy on a mothership allows really good use of weird tactics.
Using that build and having the right answer and micro, I have won my last 9 PvZ in Mid Masters.
Almost all zerg don't react well to that build though... I dont like the fact that we stay that passive... I thing it needs some Warpprism harass or something
Using that build and having the right answer and micro, I have won my last 9 PvZ in Mid Masters.
Almost all zerg don't react well to that build though... I dont like the fact that we stay that passive... I thing it needs some Warpprism harass or something
I've actually begun getting out 2 warp prisms for harrassment in the late game. Its important to not get supply capped by zealots, you want to have as many archons as possible and using warp prisms and multipronged attacks once the zerg gets to the late game works great, bc late game zerg is so immobile.
I love the idea behind this build, but it should be tweaked based on the map/what you scout the zerg going for. I'd almost always favor getting a quick carrier out before the mothership, if you feel you are going to need to defend against the Stephano-roach rush or mutas. If the Zerg keeps expoing, skip the carrier.. but having one carrier along with 1 phoenix (3 for muta), a voidray, and whatever archons/cannons you might have up, should help defend vs. roaches/mutas. If anything, it should scare them away for the time being, which is exactly when you should go for mothership. Going for any more than 1-2 carriers though might not be a good idea, as it's only useful to protect you from rushes, not as much with pushes. It's better to make him think you're going mass carrier with your mothership to force corruptors, when in reality you will be getting more archons.
On July 18 2012 15:59 frostalgia wrote: I love the idea behind this build, but it should be tweaked based on the map/what you scout the zerg going for. I'd almost always favor getting a quick carrier out before the mothership, if you feel you are going to need to defend against the Stephano-roach rush or mutas. If the Zerg keeps expoing, skip the carrier.. but having one carrier along with 1 phoenix (3 for muta), a voidray, and whatever archons/cannons you might have up, should help defend vs. roaches/mutas. If anything, it should scare them away for the time being, which is exactly when you should go for mothership. Going for any more than 1-2 carriers though might not be a good idea, as it's only useful to protect you from rushes, not as much with pushes. It's better to make him think you're going mass carrier with your mothership to force corruptors, when in reality you will be getting more archons.
The whole point of the quick mothership is to hold a third base with cloak initially, then with vortexes (or the threat of them) later on as you finish powering up and start massing units. So if you invest into one carrier, you are not going to hold a third base with this build. And if you're seriously suggesting one carrier at that weak point in the protoss's game, I think you're completely missing the point of why you tech the Fleet Beacon. Mothership is insane with chargelots and archons; you want it out in time to hold off maxed ground armies with your mostly melee composition.
I really like the idea behind the build but I can't seem to pull it off. I'm at high master level and I struggle to establish the third. There are two particular scenarios:
1. He did go mutas and lings. This is relatively okay even if he splits up his army but it's incredibly annoying to deal with. 2. He goes roach/ling max and expands behind it. No chance, you just have not enough units to defend if he splits.
As soon as he sees the MS he will build corruptors and snipe it, I can't save it. The only way this build worked out for me is against passive zergs. If a zerg is continuosly attacking, you have no chance to defend it at 2-3 fronts.
I'm testing and increasing amount of static defenses and a canon rush into DT opening to put pressure on the zerg and distract him but it's hard...
Never got so much hate against me. I learn new words since i try that build Really effective build most of the time and btw. very arrogant and non objective poster of this build in my opinion. When your enemy figures out and makes an early agression.... NOOOO, my build is perfect, u cant lose with it :D
On July 18 2012 16:10 ineversmile wrote: The whole point of the quick mothership is to hold a third base with cloak initially, then with vortexes (or the threat of them) later on as you finish powering up and start massing units. So if you invest into one carrier, you are not going to hold a third base with this build. And if you're seriously suggesting one carrier at that weak point in the protoss's game, I think you're completely missing the point of why you tech the Fleet Beacon. Mothership is insane with chargelots and archons; you want it out in time to hold off maxed ground armies with your mostly melee composition.
I get your point.. but what about when zerg has an overseer with their max push? The mothership becomes useless until it gets vortex, and you still lose your third. I suppose it might be quicker to get another void instead vs roach/ling max, but if I can get a carrier out before they hit it should push them back, or at least kill more off. It's worth considering that a carrier can defend a wider area easier as long as it's protected by stalkers/cannons/phoenix. This is why I'd even get one quick if I scout mutas, if I feel I can protect it with the rest of my army. I'd only consider a carrier if I was already going for a mothership, and if I scout incoming pressure that I'll need to deal with before the mothership gets 100 energy. Right after the carrier I'd still get mothership/archons, so it's only slightly delayed. It's just something else to consider for anyone who is trying this build, but can't get the mothership/charge/archon tech up in time, or can't cover enough ground to deal with roach/ling max or muta pressure. The carrier will also provide one more air target later for any corruptors they make, which means your mothership might live longer, or that you'll kill more corruptors with archon splash since they group up while focus firing.
I was thinking a bit, what about just waiting until 13 min or so to take your third? Stephano roaches are fairly allin in that they delay your broodlord tech and 4th base by a lot, and we know that as long as we survive, this army destroys anything zerg can throw at us lategame.
On July 14 2012 05:18 Belial88 wrote: I got another easy win for you:
- 9 Pylon, chrono only probes - 13 Forge - 17 3x Pylons at ramp = gg
Only way for Zerg to beat it, besides patrolling the ramp (which you can still glitch out if they are using patrol command, or if you bring 2 probes), is to 6-10 pool, in which case you either cannon your main or block the ramp, win.
win win scenario. I dont know why Toss isn't 100% on ladder.
On a side note, good guide. Seems like most of the Toss I play on ladder. They beat me too.
Drone drill, toss lose ezpz.
Drone drilling does not work on most spawns on most maps, and Toss can just reinforce the wall. Zerg lose ezpz...
I've actually gone and tested this multiple times though. Drone drilling may break through a pylon, but it won't break through a warping in gateway behind it before the cannon finishes.
You tried using mineral patches outside your nat? When you spawn north on daybreak, you can use the closest patch on your 3rd to make the trick work, idk about other maps tho. Save camera location helps.
Yes, of course I have.... On many maps and spawns, you cannot use the minerals outside your natural, you have to find a mineral patch somewhere far away, in which case you need to use shift+spam right click, on a mineral patch on the opposite side of the map, and time it right. And on even more maps and spawn locations, there is simply no mineral patch on the entire map that will work.
You can try drone drilling, but as I said, against a competent Toss, they will reinforce with pylons and gateways. And in the rare chance that you can actually drone drill this second wall, it will not matter, because by the time you break the reinforcing wall, the 2 cannons are up, you have not mined at all while Toss has been mining the entire time, and you won't be taking your natural for some time, while Toss will.
I have tested this many times, with many people. If someone gets a ramp block with you, you lose (assuming they are competent). The only way to beat a ramp block is simply patrol a drone at the bottom of the ramp (which is why I always pull 2 drones to follow the probe at 16 and micro them to prevent any sort of ramp blocks, as well as try to take my hatch).
If you want to test it with me, Belial.869@NA. But I've tested this many times, I promise you. Drone drilling is worthless.
On July 14 2012 05:18 Belial88 wrote: I got another easy win for you:
- 9 Pylon, chrono only probes - 13 Forge - 17 3x Pylons at ramp = gg
Only way for Zerg to beat it, besides patrolling the ramp (which you can still glitch out if they are using patrol command, or if you bring 2 probes), is to 6-10 pool, in which case you either cannon your main or block the ramp, win.
win win scenario. I dont know why Toss isn't 100% on ladder.
On a side note, good guide. Seems like most of the Toss I play on ladder. They beat me too.
Drone drill, toss lose ezpz.
Drone drilling does not work on most spawns on most maps, and Toss can just reinforce the wall. Zerg lose ezpz...
I've actually gone and tested this multiple times though. Drone drilling may break through a pylon, but it won't break through a warping in gateway behind it before the cannon finishes.
You tried using mineral patches outside your nat? When you spawn north on daybreak, you can use the closest patch on your 3rd to make the trick work, idk about other maps tho. Save camera location helps.
Yes, of course I have.... On many maps and spawns, you cannot use the minerals outside your natural, you have to find a mineral patch somewhere far away, in which case you need to use shift+spam right click, on a mineral patch on the opposite side of the map, and time it right. And on even more maps and spawn locations, there is simply no mineral patch on the entire map that will work.
You can try drone drilling, but as I said, against a competent Toss, they will reinforce with pylons and gateways. And in the rare chance that you can actually drone drill this second wall, it will not matter, because by the time you break the reinforcing wall, the 2 cannons are up, you have not mined at all while Toss has been mining the entire time, and you won't be taking your natural for some time, while Toss will.
I have tested this many times, with many people. If someone gets a ramp block with you, you lose (assuming they are competent). The only way to beat a ramp block is simply patrol a drone at the bottom of the ramp (which is why I always pull 2 drones to follow the probe at 16 and micro them to prevent any sort of ramp blocks, as well as try to take my hatch).
If you want to test it with me, Belial.869@NA. But I've tested this many times, I promise you. Drone drilling is worthless.
Which ones?
I was pretty sure that drone-drill is autowin vs this kind of 3pylon block if you do it right, but I never actually tried practise vs a zerg to see how effective it is in reality.
No, the drone drill is not an autowin vs 3 pylon block. I've made literally over 2 dozen posts saying that, and it says so in my guides as well... (both my zvt and zvp guide)....
You can maybe drone drill, but Toss only spent 300 minerals to pylon block while Zerg loses 90-100% mining for a minute or two, which is more costly. Then, even if you do break out, which, by the way, you can't do on many maps and spawn locations (9'clock metalopolis comes to mind, but there are a lot more, i think bottom right on shakuras too, i recall more on some of the old maps, like typhon peaks, but im sure the new maps you will have just as much trouble too), and even if it's possible on your map, you have to hope it's possible on your spawn location, and many times you can't drill to your natural, you have to use some very, very far off mineral field all away across the map on some random patch so you have to blindly drone drill, but even if the stars align and you get a spawn on a map where you can drill, conveniently or not, it doesn't matter, because all Toss has to do is throw down a reinforcing pylon/gateway.
And, hoping the stars align again, and you can drone drill the reinforcing pylons/gateway, it doesn't matter, because that cannon has finished and is shooting your drones and you can only make lings 2 by 2, maybe 6 if you pooled larva, doesn't matter, it's not enough, and if you don't straight up lose now, you will definitely be too far behind to play the game.
There's a reason why every tournament long ago implemented neutral depots. it's pretty abusive.
Trust me, I have practiced this MANY times, and I have been messaged MANY times by people saying "oh no look drone drill works" and prove them wrong with bronze level protoss cannon rushing skills. I assure you, I have tested this many more times than you have. And all I got was a very frustrating conclusion that there is no way to win if you get ramp blocked. Such a waste of time, i tried so long to get an answer for it, even went 11 pool for like a year because of it thinking 11 pool would get lings out in time to stop it (it doesnt).
On July 19 2012 06:28 Belial88 wrote: No, the drone drill is not an autowin vs 3 pylon block. I've made literally over 2 dozen posts saying that, and it says so in my guides as well... (both my zvt and zvp guide).... You can maybe drone drill, but Toss only spent 300 minerals to pylon block while Zerg loses 90-100% mining for a minute or two, which is more costly. Then, even if you do break out, which, by the way, you can't do on many maps and spawn locations (9'clock metalopolis comes to mind, but there are a lot more, i think bottom right on shakuras too, i recall more on some of the old maps, like typhon peaks, but im sure the new maps you will have just as much trouble too), and even if it's possible on your map, you have to hope it's possible on your spawn location, and many times you can't drill to your natural, you have to use some very, very far off mineral field all away across the map on some random patch so you have to blindly drone drill, but even if the stars align and you get a spawn on a map where you can drill, conveniently or not, it doesn't matter, because all Toss has to do is throw down a reinforcing pylon/gateway.
And, hoping the stars align again, and you can drone drill the reinforcing pylons/gateway, it doesn't matter, because that cannon has finished and is shooting your drones and you can only make lings 2 by 2, maybe 6 if you pooled larva, doesn't matter, it's not enough, and if you don't straight up lose now, you will definitely be too far behind to play the game.
There's a reason why every tournament long ago implemented neutral depots. it's pretty abusive.
Trust me, I have practiced this MANY times, and I have been messaged MANY times by people saying "oh no look drone drill works" and prove them wrong with bronze level protoss cannon rushing skills. I assure you, I have tested this many more times than you have. And all I got was a very frustrating conclusion that there is no way to win if you get ramp blocked. Such a waste of time, i tried so long to get an answer for it, even went 11 pool for like a year because of it thinking 11 pool would get lings out in time to stop it (it doesnt).
I highly disagree with the bolded part. Not only will the protoss lose those 300 minerals but also delay his nexus by that amount as well. this is about 20-30 secs delay unless I'm misstaken which easily makes up for the fact that you've lost mining time. If you brake his wall with drone drill, you will be ahead.
And if it takes you 1 minute to brake the wall you are either doing it wrong or the protoss have invested far more than 300 minerals in the block.
And Zerg's third is delayed, and he's not mining essentially 300 minerals...
16 drones x 40 per minute = 640 minerals... A lot more than the 300 spent on 3 pylons.
If you break his wall with a drone drill, the Toss will simply add a gateway/pylon reinforcement behind it and you can't break it in time and kill the cannon before it warps in and does it's damage (by either forcing Zerg to back off, or killing enough drones to well make up for it, not to mention further denying mining, also if you made a 2nd cannon).
On paper you could possibly argue "well zerg just doesnt take his natural and doesnt care!" but zerg NEEDS their natural. A 1 base zerg contained is just a dead zerg, and it'll be pretty obvious what he's up to (roach or nydus).
I'd argue that the 300 mineral pylon wall-off is worth it if zerg tries to drone drill (hell, it's much worth forcing Zerg to be on 1 base even if he doesnt react to the wall-off at all and just does some 1 base strat) alone, but whatever, if you want to argue that it doesnt work out, that's fine.
I'm simply saying drone drilling is not effective. it doesn't work. Toss can reinforce the wall, you lose. I'd be more than willing to test it, again, with you. Belial.869@na
by the way this has just been discussed ad nauseum in this forum already...
On July 19 2012 07:34 Trusty wrote: Pls dont derail thread with pointless pylon block discussions.
I don't mind some off-topic discussion as long as it doesn't get out of hand or totally sucks up all the attention. It bumps my thread (more publicity) and keeps the forum clean from another discussion thread. If you have any questions or input about the build you can just post in between them, I still read all the replies.
Bellial is right. Never drone drill unless you can do it perfectly and it's an early pylon block (not a 17 food pylon block), even then it's risky cause protoss might be careful and have stopped probe production to afford gate + pylon. There are ways to play against a 3 pylon block without being too far behind but a failed drone-drill = immediate GG.
On July 19 2012 07:34 Trusty wrote: Pls dont derail thread with pointless pylon block discussions.
Sorry, I'll stop (i got the last word, so I guess that's unfair, but maybe reply in the thread that talks about how to do the 3 pylon block, in my guide http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=320038, or just pm me and we can actually test it and ill prove it to you since just talking about it wont change anyone's mind.)
On July 19 2012 07:28 Belial88 wrote: And Zerg's third is delayed, and he's not mining essentially 300 minerals...
16 drones x 40 per minute = 640 minerals... A lot more than the 300 spent on 3 pylons.
If you break his wall with a drone drill, the Toss will simply add a gateway/pylon reinforcement behind it and you can't break it in time and kill the cannon before it warps in and does it's damage (by either forcing Zerg to back off, or killing enough drones to well make up for it, not to mention further denying mining, also if you made a 2nd cannon).
On paper you could possibly argue "well zerg just doesnt take his natural and doesnt care!" but zerg NEEDS their natural. A 1 base zerg contained is just a dead zerg, and it'll be pretty obvious what he's up to (roach or nydus).
I'd argue that the 300 mineral pylon wall-off is worth it if zerg tries to drone drill (hell, it's much worth forcing Zerg to be on 1 base even if he doesnt react to the wall-off at all and just does some 1 base strat) alone, but whatever, if you want to argue that it doesnt work out, that's fine.
I'm simply saying drone drilling is not effective. it doesn't work. Toss can reinforce the wall, you lose. I'd be more than willing to test it, again, with you. Belial.869@na
by the way this has just been discussed ad nauseum in this forum already...
The third is indeed delayed, but not relative to the nexus which is what matters.
640>300. But like I said before, the protoss hardly invests only 300 mineral in this. He is delaying his nexus by ALOT. Also, if protoss reinforces the wall you can afford to lose sooo many drones if you do brake the wall. And assuming that he didn't cut probes really early, his reinforcing buildings will be at low hp once you brakes down the first layer of pylons
I do this strat from time to time and if I succed in getting my pylon block up, I simply win. This may or may not be because zergs know how to handle the situation, I am not sure. The only time I lose is if zerg has some good drill micro.
On July 19 2012 07:34 Trusty wrote: Pls dont derail thread with pointless pylon block discussions.
I don't mind some off-topic discussion as long as it doesn't get out of hand or totally sucks up all the attention. It bumps my thread (more publicity) and keeps the forum clean from another discussion thread. If you have any questions or input about the build you can just post in between them, I still read all the replies.
p00n, are you going to add replays against Stephano style roach timings?
On July 19 2012 07:34 Trusty wrote: Pls dont derail thread with pointless pylon block discussions.
I don't mind some off-topic discussion as long as it doesn't get out of hand or totally sucks up all the attention. It bumps my thread (more publicity) and keeps the forum clean from another discussion thread. If you have any questions or input about the build you can just post in between them, I still read all the replies.
p00n, are you going to add replays against Stephano style roach timings?
I will if I encounter opponents who do it, but a stargate seems to discourage everyone from doing so. I could probably get a zerg to do it to me in customs though.
On July 18 2012 16:10 ineversmile wrote: The whole point of the quick mothership is to hold a third base with cloak initially, then with vortexes (or the threat of them) later on as you finish powering up and start massing units. So if you invest into one carrier, you are not going to hold a third base with this build. And if you're seriously suggesting one carrier at that weak point in the protoss's game, I think you're completely missing the point of why you tech the Fleet Beacon. Mothership is insane with chargelots and archons; you want it out in time to hold off maxed ground armies with your mostly melee composition.
I get your point.. but what about when zerg has an overseer with their max push? The mothership becomes useless until it gets vortex, and you still lose your third. I suppose it might be quicker to get another void instead vs roach/ling max, but if I can get a carrier out before they hit it should push them back, or at least kill more off. It's worth considering that a carrier can defend a wider area easier as long as it's protected by stalkers/cannons/phoenix. This is why I'd even get one quick if I scout mutas, if I feel I can protect it with the rest of my army. I'd only consider a carrier if I was already going for a mothership, and if I scout incoming pressure that I'll need to deal with before the mothership gets 100 energy. Right after the carrier I'd still get mothership/archons, so it's only slightly delayed. It's just something else to consider for anyone who is trying this build, but can't get the mothership/charge/archon tech up in time, or can't cover enough ground to deal with roach/ling max or muta pressure. The carrier will also provide one more air target later for any corruptors they make, which means your mothership might live longer, or that you'll kill more corruptors with archon splash since they group up while focus firing.
One carrier won't hold your third base in a million billion years. The DPS helps while sitting on top of cannons, but you're still better off just getting a Mothership and stalling for half a minute while the zerg morphs and moves overseers to his army. That's kind of the point of the Mothership--stalling. The cloak won't solve the problem forever, but it buys time so you can get to 100 energy for a vortex or so cannons can finish or so you can can get another warp-in, or even morph some archons.
If you think about the principle of Sentries forcefielding a ramp to stall against aggression, it's not a permanent solution to the aggression but it helps buy you time to get to that permanent solution, whether it's your warpgates fininishing or an Immortal popping out or whatever. Getting a Mothership to hold a third vs Zerg is a similar concept, just on a bigger scale. I mean, sure, they could get Overseers before the push or as it goes accross the map, just like they could be getting corruptors--but that means it's no longer the Stephano Roach Max and it has completely different (usually later) timings, which often translates to the Mothership having Vortex up in time.
Guy has 55 drones and 4 hatches at 8 mins and floods lings/roaches at me. I mess up dearly, but it is still fairly onesided.
No.. HE messed up dearly, saw a stargate but still continued to make roaches and lings to bust. If he made infestors and took a 4th you would have loss.
Guy has 55 drones and 4 hatches at 8 mins and floods lings/roaches at me. I mess up dearly, but it is still fairly onesided.
This was not really a good example of stephano style roaches at all. He never had more then max 4 mining drones at his third base, meaning he was basically on 2 mining bases. Yeah he had 55 drones, but that is a bit low to begin with, and they were far from optimally spread between the bases. At 10 mins he was 15 ish supply behind what he should have been at minimum doing this. His pressure was just weak.
But, from looking at that I realize that this build should be able to stop stephano style roaches at least on maps where you can only attack from one angle. With the mothership out in time and the void + maybe phoenix in the air to stop overseers it will be hard to break through indeed.
Guy has 55 drones and 4 hatches at 8 mins and floods lings/roaches at me. I mess up dearly, but it is still fairly onesided.
No.. HE messed up dearly, saw a stargate but still continued to make roaches and lings to bust. If he made infestors and took a 4th you would have loss.
I have quite a few replays of me slaughtering anything that is not a mass roach/ling flood (hydras, infestors, ...,), if you've been following the topic at all. Providing a replay of zergs taking a 4th and making infestors would just add another useless replay to the topic.
I suppose my one question is: what if he waits outside your base for you to make you use your vortexes and then re-maxes before you can get to his base?
On July 21 2012 02:37 Borkbokbork wrote: I suppose my one question is: what if he waits outside your base for you to make you use your vortexes and then re-maxes before you can get to his base?
Don't throw away Vortexes. Having cards in your hand doesn't mean they need to be played.
Ever since voidray/colossus was nerfed I've been looking for another easy-win in PvZ and this is it!
One thing I noticed is that it's possible, and much better, to get the fleet beacon before the first Phoenix. This gets the mother ship out slightly earlier which is a big help holding the third in terms of cloaking and earlier vortex.
BTW my record is 7-0 with this build in high diamond
I am a top gold league player, currently working on a soon to come platinum promotion, who always had some troubles with the PvZ match-up. I have worked on some different styles recently, from some Immortal/Sentry based play to Naniwa/Tails 14 Gate 16 Nexus into +2 Blink Stalkers, and upon discovering your topic this morning I must say I was more than surprised. Your choice of vocabulary and quite informal approach to the strategy let me a bit puzzled and I think it is probably why you have received somewhat of a mediocre response so far (from what I have read).
I decided to try your build anyway as I love anything involving a Mothership and I must say it was quite a one sided victory. I turtled on three bases (Map was Cloud Kingdom btw) and fend off a few roach-based push on my third. When I moved out he was completely caught off guard by the mothership (I managed to keep that information away from him using my VR), vortex-ed his roach/infestors army twice and won shortly after.
While I am most certainly not a very good player, your build felt great ingame and I will keep on working on it in the future. Thank you very much for your guide and I hope to see more guides from you in the future.
Guy has 55 drones and 4 hatches at 8 mins and floods lings/roaches at me. I mess up dearly, but it is still fairly onesided.
I litterally laughed at this replay. Is it common for Zergs in EU Master to have 50 APM and god awful macro and decision making? Despite that, he managed to kill everything at some point. If he'd just scouted your 3rd (lol) instead of going with the stupidest nydus at a random location...
Doing this every time in my low-league PvZs and it works very well. So thanks for the build, it provides wins and, therefore, fun, which is the whole point. What I like most is that: - I don't rely on sentries as much as in a gateway-robo expand; - it does not require massive amounts of micro while using it (at least in general - no storm, no ff, no blink micro) - it's using my favourite anti-zerg unit, the archon, which does 1478dmg (I think) vs anything the zerg has - I win a lot more games when using it compared with when using other builds.
Now, that being said, I don't understand why people are being so negative about a good build which works for "everyone". According to TL wiki, master league is about 2% (edit: according to sc2ranks.com, it's more like 4%) of the total number of players and assuming thep00n is roughly mid-masters, and taking into account that he has a very high success rate at HIS level, it is safe to assume that this build, when executed at least as well as he does it, works with very good results for at least 99% (or 98% if you consider sc2ranks.com) of the total pool of players. From my point of view this is impressive for a PvZ macro-oriented build, at this moment. Indeed, it is POSSIBLE for a zerg player to play a lot better than those in the replays and win vs. this build. But isn't this true for ANY build, of ANY race?! Having the zerg go for a stephano-style roach max is not autoloss for protoss if using this build, not in the way of a PvP DT rush vs stargate opener. It might be more difficult to hold, but it is not autoloss. There will always be a bigger fish (i.e.: a better skilled opponent) and this should not be an argument against any build.
TL;DR: we have a PvZ macro build which works for at least 98% of the active players and produces a win ratio of over 80% (being generous). And this is a...bad build?!
I think the issue isn't that it's a bad build, but that it has holes which could be improved. The point isn't that people play without mistakes, but that when major mistakes are made that's often the actual reason for a game's result.
EDIT: I agree that this build is awesome and it has definitely influenced my PvZ style positively, but I think every build can be improved over time.
Guy has 55 drones and 4 hatches at 8 mins and floods lings/roaches at me. I mess up dearly, but it is still fairly onesided.
I litterally laughed at this replay. Is it common for Zergs in EU Master to have 50 APM and god awful macro and decision making? Despite that, he managed to kill everything at some point. If he'd just scouted your 3rd (lol) instead of going with the stupidest nydus at a random location...
Well.... no :D but without watching the replay if he has 55 drones 4 hatches at 8 min its not that bad...?
On July 14 2012 01:59 the p00n wrote: Please do not reply to this topic with criticism if you are below master league. Yes, it is very elitist, but you probably don't know what you are talking about.
I vote that only professional and active sportsmen are allowed to commentate on their corresponding sports events.
Because, obviously, only they truly know what they are talking about.
Oh, that's why we have forum rules from administrators and board owners and not separate user rules for each thread. Go figure.
I find this a great build... but I can't beat stephano roach style, lol. I find that the only way I ever beat it is if I snipe their overseers with voidray/phoenix as they're coming in, or I hide the fleet beacon and mothership and they attack into a cloaked army.
Since gas is the limting factor (especially before the third base, but afterwards also), and since psionic storm is not used "by default", wouldn't it be better to make the archons out of DTs?
Hey all Im a rank 1 Dimaond toss trying to figure out this biuld.. i have lost to mass roach on daybreak, just getting overrun b4 mothership is out. Can this be done on Daybreak?? I have also had trouble with early hydra aggression with the game playing out simular to the replay pOon posted, Mothership dieing etc, except i could never stabilize and he won. Im confused weather you ever make sentries. I think I spent too much gas on sentries to defend 3 third. I will continue to practice this biuld and send in replays once ive got it more refinee. Idea's?
On July 27 2012 21:36 Demosthenes1313 wrote: Hey all Im a rank 1 Dimaond toss trying to figure out this biuld.. i have lost to mass roach on daybreak, just getting overrun b4 mothership is out. Can this be done on Daybreak?? I have also had trouble with early hydra aggression with the game playing out simular to the replay pOon posted, Mothership dieing etc, except i could never stabilize and he won. Im confused weather you ever make sentries. I think I spent too much gas on sentries to defend 3 third. I will continue to practice this biuld and send in replays once ive got it more refinee. Idea's?
When does your mothership complete? And according to the build you produce only one sentry, use cannons to defend your 3rd, since you'll have a ton of minerals anyway.
standard 12min, something like that in the 3rd replay. Only that mid master zerg has bad macro, no macro hatch. With proper macro you can easily max out after the 12 min mark with drops. Then multiple front attacks and you are no where with those zealots.
Basically what does the protoss have at 12 min, a mothership and a very low unit count. Without a Robo even, when the Zerg player can figure out such stuff its over. The blord stuff does not come into play, if you do it properly this build is long dead by then.
This is my build, like you do a ton of stuff wrong and inneficient but I'm quite sure I'm the first one to make a build like this work at a high level. I've done this in the top of GM for like 8 months now, random clanwars and leagues like ESEA...
If you saw that cast by Duncan Trussel it was me doing this vs Ostojiy in ESEA actually, lame you taking credit for it.
@itsNifty, I see your point and I'm still waiting for higher level replays (out of curiosity alone ).
@shinyA,
Unlike you, the p00n put a lot of time and effort in writing down this specific guide and he's being appreciated especially for the guide, not for vortexing zerg units and sending archons in as well. Do you have a similar guide (for this build) on TL forums or what exactly do you want credit for?
Also, if you're as good as you claim to be, you could help answer the questions regarding roach pushes @ 11:30 - 12min (from a GM level perspective). I'm sure you'll get some appreciation as well.
On July 28 2012 01:41 moQbara wrote: @itsNifty, I see your point and I'm still waiting for higher level replays (out of curiosity alone ).
@shinyA,
Unlike you, the p00n put a lot of time and effort in writing down this specific guide and he's being appreciated especially for the guide, not for vortexing zerg units and sending archons in as well. Do you have a similar guide (for this build) on TL forums or what exactly do you want credit for?
Also, if you're as good as you claim to be, you could help answer the questions regarding roach pushes @ 11:30 - 12min (from a GM level perspective). I'm sure you'll get some appreciation as well.
Why would I want appreciation? I didn't do anything for you to appreciate other than the fact that I'm the creator of this concept and I've perfected a build around it for the past 8 months and have beaten every top Zerg that plays on NA with it and have beaten a lot of top Zergs in clan wars and tournaments with it. So I wouldn't say I want appreciation as much as recognition.
What he wrote is a poor build based on my concept and will auto die to a lot of builds and I highly, highly doubt he has a 92% win percentage unless he's like low masters and losing every game in his other matchups.
Off of the top of my head after skimming the OP, you won't live against nonstop aggression with only 8 gateways, when you go archon/zealot you can easily support 11 gateways as you're warping in 50 mineral cost HT's and 100 mineral cost Zealots. There's also like no situation in which you can take your third before your mothership/adding gateways.
Well shinyA, it's not like the OP new you even used this build, so don't be angry at him. Also if you help out with your expert knowledge to all the people that want to use this style, recognition will come easy for you
On July 28 2012 01:13 shinyA wrote:lame you taking credit for it
I'm sorry but I think you perceive yourself as too big of a deal. I generally do not follow unknowns on non-EU/NA/KR servers. And if you have been using this for the past 8 months... I have been doing it for longer than 8 months, and the proof of this is my previous thread backed up with replays that are 10 months old.
Great guide and title! I am going to rule in favor of p00n on the who's build is it question. He did write it down, and it's not exactly realistic for him to expect to know the tactics of every random GM. If you have so many problems with his execution then it's not exactly "your build", it's not like you own archon toilets.
It was probably a bit too wordy though...I think your guide on "getting easy wins" could have been more succinctly summarized: "pick protoss and make sure your at least half as good as your opponent."
On July 28 2012 01:13 shinyA wrote:lame you taking credit for it
I'm sorry but I think you perceive yourself as too big of a deal. I generally do not follow unknowns on non-EU/NA/KR servers. And if you have been using this for the past 8 months... I have been doing it for longer than 8 months, and the proof of this is my previous thread backed up with replays that are 10 months old.
The problem is you're probably low masters, so you not knowing who I am is irrelevant. I've been doing this for a long time and have gotten a lot of people commenting on me doing it, my games being streamed and casted with thousands of hits etc. So when I see someone posting a bad build based on the concept I've been using it's kind of annoying because I can tell you aren't good at it and to be honest it looks like you threw it together in a couple of minutes because there's so much wrong with the way you wrote it and there's tons of auto losses that you would encounter which makes the "92% win PvZ" very, very hard to believe.
Like, even if you did have a 92% win ratio in PvZ on ladder there's no way you could sustain that and still stay at the same ladder rank. Seriously, what league/points are you? If you were winning every PvZ for a relatively long period of time then you would be very high ranked.
Also; "I generally do not follow unknowns on non-EU/NA/KR servers". What does that mean? Would that imply that I'm not on EU/NA/KR? I've been GM on NA for 6 seasons and I have GM MMR on KR, I don't really understand what you're implying by that statement. The only non-EU/NA/KR servers are CN/SEA? ;;
On July 28 2012 01:13 shinyA wrote:lame you taking credit for it
I'm sorry but I think you perceive yourself as too big of a deal. I generally do not follow unknowns on non-EU/NA/KR servers. And if you have been using this for the past 8 months... I have been doing it for longer than 8 months, and the proof of this is my previous thread backed up with replays that are 10 months old.
The problem is you're probably low masters, so you not knowing who I am is irrelevant. I've been doing this for a long time and have gotten a lot of people commenting on me doing it, my games being streamed and casted with thousands of hits etc. So when I see someone posting a bad build based on the concept I've been using it's kind of annoying because I can tell you aren't good at it and to be honest it looks like you threw it together in a couple of minutes because there's so much wrong with the way you wrote it and there's tons of auto losses that you would encounter which makes the "92% win PvZ" very, very hard to believe.
Like, even if you did have a 92% win ratio in PvZ on ladder there's no way you could sustain that and still stay at the same ladder rank. Seriously, what league/points are you? If you were winning every PvZ for a relatively long period of time then you would be very high ranked.
Also; "I generally do not follow unknowns on non-EU/NA/KR servers". What does that mean? Would that imply that I'm not on EU/NA/KR? I've been GM on NA for 6 seasons and I have GM MMR on KR, I don't really understand what you're implying by that statement. The only non-EU/NA/KR servers are CN/SEA? ;;
If you want to prove that you know more about the build, could you do us all a favor and tell us what you know about it? It would be nice to have some more information about the build.
Also, have you considered that there is such a thing as parallel evolution? Sometimes two different people figure out the same concept, independently.
Hey guys, I'm only plat but I've been trying this build, and to my surprise it held (at least, in every game where I didn't really screw up). Defending early rushes is just like a standard FFE.
For late attacks, the mothership pops before big aggression hits, and in my games they didn't scout the mothership so they had no detection. That delayed their attack long enough for me to get up several archons and a pile of zealots. Using the one void ray you can deny them a lot of information. If they decide to attack, by hiding behind cannons, abusing your strong economy, and smart use of vortex and it is quite possible to hold everything I ran into.
Thanks a lot for the post, this is an exciting new take on the match up, and now every time I find a new match I cross my fingers and hope its Zerg!!
Lol this build is trash against anyone who scouts...sorry if that's mean but its my opinion....2 base mothership really? You must have decent mechanics/micro because that's the only way I can see you winning with such a "great build"...
On July 28 2012 01:13 shinyA wrote:lame you taking credit for it
I'm sorry but I think you perceive yourself as too big of a deal. I generally do not follow unknowns on non-EU/NA/KR servers. And if you have been using this for the past 8 months... I have been doing it for longer than 8 months, and the proof of this is my previous thread backed up with replays that are 10 months old.
The problem is you're probably low masters, so you not knowing who I am is irrelevant. I've been doing this for a long time and have gotten a lot of people commenting on me doing it, my games being streamed and casted with thousands of hits etc. So when I see someone posting a bad build based on the concept I've been using it's kind of annoying because I can tell you aren't good at it and to be honest it looks like you threw it together in a couple of minutes because there's so much wrong with the way you wrote it and there's tons of auto losses that you would encounter which makes the "92% win PvZ" very, very hard to believe.
Like, even if you did have a 92% win ratio in PvZ on ladder there's no way you could sustain that and still stay at the same ladder rank. Seriously, what league/points are you? If you were winning every PvZ for a relatively long period of time then you would be very high ranked.
Also; "I generally do not follow unknowns on non-EU/NA/KR servers". What does that mean? Would that imply that I'm not on EU/NA/KR? I've been GM on NA for 6 seasons and I have GM MMR on KR, I don't really understand what you're implying by that statement. The only non-EU/NA/KR servers are CN/SEA? ;;
Have you ever thought that someone else can also have similar ideas but just execute and test it differently or worse than you? if you really want recognition just make a guide about it.
On July 29 2012 15:40 hillman wrote: Lol this build is trash against anyone who scouts...sorry if that's mean but its my opinion....2 base mothership really? You must have decent mechanics/micro because that's the only way I can see you winning with such a "great build"...
How exactly do you scout it in time if the voidray and phoenix kill all the nearby overlords?
Exactly. To scout you they basically have to morph an overseer and then move it cross map, since you should have killed all nearby overlords. That takes some time, and at least in my experience (only about 10 games with this strat) isn't that common of a reaction.
The voidray comes out very quickly, so most of the time when I do this strategy the Zerg thinks I am doing early air aggression and starts cranking queens and throwing up spore crawlers, which really just plays into your hand. By the time they realize that isn't what your doing your mothership should be done or close to done and you should be building a third base backed up by plenty of warp gates and templar archives, and +1 attack (though you have almost no units).
At that point, if they want to punish you they are in a bad position (spores/queens are just dead weight) and if they don't then you just finished a clean transition to an awesome late game army on 3 base at 12 minutes. Either way its bad for them.
Please keep in mind this is only with Plat level opponents, and both my opponents and I make a lot of mistakes. I am consistently behind OP getting everything up, and my opponents are no Stephano (so clearly it works if your micro / mechanics are NOT amazing, assuming you and your opponent are both on an equal level).
I don't see why the strategy would be any less viable if we were both better, or worse - and since it works for OP, it clearly works at a high level.
I think the biggest keys are: 1) Staying active with the VR, spotting any all ins, denying scouting 2) Trusting the build and going straight to the mothership with non-stop chrono boosts. If you get nervous and make some units (when he isn't doing an all in, that is), your dead; you absolutely need the mothership and tech to hold.
Games included - despite getting scouted and many obvious holes and problems with my play the build worked great.
On July 30 2012 21:36 thousand wrote: After researching +3 weapons do you continue with armor or shield upgrades (obviously better for archons)?
Shields, as I usually go into mass air when the game isn't won at this point (i.e. he has one billion spines). Shields benefit archons more and slightly benefit zealots while also benefiting air, whereas ground doesn't do that much.
On July 28 2012 01:13 shinyA wrote: I made this build first, I was first and no one else have had similar ideas, fuck poon for stealing and taking credit
People can have the same ideas, claiming that this is your build only makes you look like a fool. You even claim that he does many things wrong which you do not do, therefore making it two different, but similar builds.
Just get out if you are going to be obnoxious and not contribute to the thread, you are basically spamming.
The same goes for the guy below. I mean what the fuck is the point of your post?
On July 29 2012 15:40 hillman wrote: Lol this build is trash against anyone who scouts...sorry if that's mean but its my opinion....2 base mothership really? You must have decent mechanics/micro because that's the only way I can see you winning with such a "great build"...
The same goes for the guy below. I mean what the fuck is the point of your post?
On July 29 2012 15:40 hillman wrote: Lol this build is trash against anyone who scouts...sorry if that's mean but its my opinion....2 base mothership really? You must have decent mechanics/micro because that's the only way I can see you winning with such a "great build"...
He had an opinion at least... that if you were scouted they could easily counter it unless you had great micro/macro. That's why I posted 2 replays where I got scouted, my micro and macro were both clearly terrible, and the build still worked just fine.
As OP says, this build is actually relatively "easy" in that it DOESN'T require amazing micro.
p00n, what would you recommend if your scouting probe dies before seeing a 3rd? Continuing with the mothership rush against a 2 base all in would be risky, so if you continue as normal until a second probe gets to the 3rd you might be in trouble. On the other hand, if you wall up and he just expanded then you are in trouble when the 12-13 minute push comes.
Also, do you every try a mass recall to get by a spine wall? It seems viable if he doesn't have a large number of corrupters up, though if you run the risk losing due to your inability to retreat.
I would be interested to see this build against a zerg that just sits on 4 bases and maxes on broodlords/infestors/corrupters. My problem is that it's very hard to defend the momaship from corrupters with archons only (assuming the opponent spreads his corruptors). The replay in the first post only show it holding a stupid attack from the zerg, whereas the problem in my opinion is to deal with the super army of zerg.
I watched Shinya do this in ESEA (The first game he linked), and I couldn't believe it worked. I feel like while it is proven to be effective, it is only gimmicky. The games I have seen this win in are generally due to surprise (lack of good scouting), the zerg player making poor decisions after receiving the correct scouting information, or positional failures for the zerg army. To me, this means that a competent, rational grandmaster zerg wouldn't have an issue beating it and thus I wouldn't use the build. It can still win. Anything with archons and a vortex has the possibility of winning in pvz, but I don't think that it will win very many games at the highest level for a sustained period of time if more people used it.
I think what's valuable from this thread is that the build proves zealots and archons can be good against zerg with the right positioning, and as time passes and we figure out ways to make that happen proactively and without mothership aid, we can use a different army composition. I think the fundamental issue with this particular build is that you're trying to do so many things at once--upgrades, teching charge and archons, getting mamaship, and taking a third. But if we instead go for a much smoother game flow, that takes the gimmick nature out of the equation.
What makes something a "gimmick"? To me it is a strategy that only works due to a surprise factor. OP states this is not the case; despite knowing what is coming it works.
For a long time, a FFE was considered a gimmick because people thought there was no way you could survive a range of openings with so few early units. Now it is the most popular opening in PvZ.
To prove this is build a gimmick, figure out how to reliably counter it in a game. If, however, it can reliably be pulled off and adapted to deal with anything the Zerg can throw at it, what makes it a gimmick? To me that just makes a solid, original build.
On July 31 2012 07:01 Primal666 wrote: to any one having truble, upgraded roach hydra are good against this, tried it twice on ladder, but i'm only diamond:S
I really really dont think its good against that... mass roach lose to it and Hydras die to both Archons and Zealot charge... And no protoss is going to let your snipe the mothership with hydras...
So to all the people who haven't tested it out and still wondering if they should because it seems so easy: don't.
this strat is utter bullshit and the only reason why it works is because zergs on OP's level dont know wtf they just scouted and will then be confused and just do random things wich will actually make them lose.
Why is it bullshit? because you could never hold your third with this. you could just drop some roaches in the main and while the army moves into the main you could simply snipe the ms with corrupters you could also simply bust the third and dont stack all your units in a circle to for the toss to get a cortex that catches 20+ units. You could also turtle up play macro game and yet aigan dont stack your units up (zerg from op's replay... putting all your bl's at one place and the infestor under them so you get everything vortexed like an idiot... what is this low master? but the easiest way would be to simply deny/snipe third (wich you cant possibly hold with this if done correctly) or drop.
your shittalking during games hasn't improved either
and yes i am fairly pissed since this thread is pure attention whoring(and maybe ment to piss people like me off?). the tactic is bad and solely relies on the zerg reacting wrong
also this is coming from top 100 eu gm. so dont tell me i dont know wtf im talking about. i know it.
I don't really care about the personal stuff, but thanks for your input on this build! That's what i'm interested in.
you could just drop some roaches in the main and while the army moves into the main you could simply snipe the ms with corrupters
That sounds like a great plan! I'll get my practice partner to try this. Do you know what the approximate timing is on getting 6 or so corrupters, pneumatic carapace, and ventral sacs as well as a roach army is on 3 bases? Knowing the timing would help me plan and I would appreciate it :D
Just based on the upgrades it would be a minimum of 3:10 mins after lair, but It seems like gas might be a problem given that you still have to crank out a ton of workers/roaches. Before moving out you would have to have gotten a spire, produced corrupters, and used them to kill the phoenix and deny scouting, cause the drop won't work if P still has map control. This would reveal your corrupter tech and make P careful with their momma. If you timed it right you might be able to have your roaches close by air to the main right as ventral sacs finishes. SC2 is updating right now so I can't look at the replays, but it sounds like this might hit around14-15 minutes, due to the gas cost, or else you would have a relatively small, un-upgraded roach army from going straight for a ton of gas early game.
One advantage of this push is that P might mis-read it as mutalisk play (given all the gas and spire), and get some useless pheonix. On the downside, if P thinks its mutalisk play they may already have cannons / stalkers in positions that are vulnerable to air, which would incidentally mitigate some of the drop threat.
If I am interpreting you right, the Z build / gas cost would be around: Lair - 100 Spire - 200 Corruptor x 6 - 600 (Note: this is about the minimum it will take to finish off a momma. Keep in mind that the vortex will probably be used to remove 2/3 corrupters from the battle for a while, and motherships have 700 hp. With 3/4 corrupters doing 22 damage per hit (base 20 + 20% from corruption -2 from armor) every 1.9 seconds, it will take an absolute minimum of 21/15 seconds to kill the mothership. If it takes any longer than that there is no way you won't be able to get under some anti air, and even in that time i would expect 1-2 of the corrupters to fall just to the mothership and VR, even if the rest of the army is busy) Glial Reconstitution - 100 Roach x 60/40/20 - 1,500 / 1000 /500 Pneumatic Carapace: - 100 Ventral sacs - 200 4 overseers - 200 Total: 3,000 / 2,500 / 2,000
The earliest timing I could possibly see this happening is 13 minutes, unless I am not getting something. If you could do this attack before 13 minutes, I think you would have P by the balls.
By 13 minutes, In my last game I had 4 archons (2 were still morphing, but close enough), a few zealots, charge, +1, a mothership with 101 energy, an established, mining third with 3 cannons, and 8 warp gates. By 14 mins I had 6 archons, 12 warp gates and +2 13 secs from completion and a handful chargelots (this was after an attack, but I think I lost mostly chargelots, so without interruption this number would be higher). By 15 mins I had 8 archons, about 20 chargelots, +3 attack on the way, and about 16 warp gates.
Please keep in mind that all of there timings are based on my level of play and that of opponents I see in game, if you are gosu you might be able to shave some off the timings for both Z and P.
The only problem with this attack is that it seems like if it doesn't work, Zerg is in big, big trouble as they just wasted so much gas and tech that their upgrades and army composition are going to suck late game.
All my opponents that have tried the other tactics you mentioned failed, probably because they aren't as experienced as you, so I'm not as worried about the other stuff you talked about.
Thanks in advance for more advice on how this would work (and a replay? :D)
you could just drop some roaches in the main and while the army moves into the main you could simply snipe the ms with corrupters
That sounds like a great plan! I'll get my practice partner to try this. Do you know what the approximate timing is on getting 6 or so corrupters, pneumatic carapace, and ventral sacs as well as a roach army is on 3 bases? Knowing the timing would help me plan and I would appreciate it :D
Just based on the upgrades it would be a minimum of 3:10 mins after lair, but It seems like gas might be a problem given that you still have to crank out a ton of workers/roaches. Before moving out you would have to have gotten a spire, produced corrupters, and used them to kill the phoenix and deny scouting, cause the drop won't work if P still has map control. This would reveal your corrupter tech and make P careful with their momma. If you timed it right you might be able to have your roaches close by air to the main right as ventral sacs finishes. SC2 is updating right now so I can't look at the replays, but it sounds like this might hit around14-15 minutes, due to the gas cost, or else you would have a relatively small, un-upgraded roach army from going straight for a ton of gas early game.
One advantage of this push is that P might mis-read it as mutalisk play (given all the gas and spire), and get some useless pheonix. On the downside, if P thinks its mutalisk play they may already have cannons / stalkers in positions that are vulnerable to air, which would incidentally mitigate some of the drop threat.
If I am interpreting you right, the Z build / gas cost would be around: Lair - 100 Spire - 200 Corruptor x 6 - 600 (Note: this is about the minimum it will take to finish off a momma. Keep in mind that the vortex will probably be used to remove 2/3 corrupters from the battle for a while, and motherships have 700 hp. With 3/4 corrupters doing 22 damage per hit (base 20 + 20% from corruption -2 from armor) every 1.9 seconds, it will take an absolute minimum of 21/15 seconds to kill the mothership. If it takes any longer than that there is no way you won't be able to get under some anti air, and even in that time i would expect 1-2 of the corrupters to fall just to the mothership and VR, even if the rest of the army is busy) Glial Reconstitution - 100 Roach x 60/40/20 - 1,500 / 1000 /500 Pneumatic Carapace: - 100 Ventral sacs - 200 4 overseers - 200 Total: 3,000 / 2,500 / 2,000
The earliest timing I could possibly see this happening is 13 minutes, unless I am not getting something. If you could do this attack before 13 minutes, I think you would have P by the balls.
By 13 minutes, In my last game I had 4 archons (2 were still morphing, but close enough), a few zealots, charge, +1, a mothership with 101 energy, an established, mining third with 3 cannons, and 8 warp gates. By 14 mins I had 6 archons, 12 warp gates and +2 13 secs from completion and a handful chargelots (this was after an attack, but I think I lost mostly chargelots, so without interruption this number would be higher). By 15 mins I had 8 archons, about 20 chargelots, +3 attack on the way, and about 16 warp gates.
Please keep in mind that all of there timings are based on my level of play and that of opponents I see in game, if you are gosu you might be able to shave some off the timings for both Z and P.
The only problem with this attack is that it seems like if it doesn't work, Zerg is in big, big trouble as they just wasted so much gas and tech that their upgrades and army composition are going to suck late game.
All my opponents that have tried the other tactics you mentioned failed, probably because they aren't as experienced as you, so I'm not as worried about the other stuff you talked about.
Thanks in advance for more advice on how this would work (and a replay? :D)
I like your post... And its true that the build seems easy to counter... buts its not... What I dont like though is if the zerg spot you doing that... and rush to broodlord... I mean almost pure brood or pure air... I would we be able to kill corruptor - brood with only archons...
I used the build and I always find that there is only a small follow up (Voidrays)
On July 31 2012 23:09 DeathToSquid wrote: Dear Tolazytobecreative
I don't really care about the personal stuff, but thanks for your input on this build! That's what i'm interested in.
you could just drop some roaches in the main and while the army moves into the main you could simply snipe the ms with corrupters
That sounds like a great plan! I'll get my practice partner to try this. Do you know what the approximate timing is on getting 6 or so corrupters, pneumatic carapace, and ventral sacs as well as a roach army is on 3 bases? Knowing the timing would help me plan and I would appreciate it :D
Just based on the upgrades it would be a minimum of 3:10 mins after lair, but It seems like gas might be a problem given that you still have to crank out a ton of workers/roaches. Before moving out you would have to have gotten a spire, produced corrupters, and used them to kill the phoenix and deny scouting, cause the drop won't work if P still has map control. This would reveal your corrupter tech and make P careful with their momma. If you timed it right you might be able to have your roaches close by air to the main right as ventral sacs finishes. SC2 is updating right now so I can't look at the replays, but it sounds like this might hit around14-15 minutes, due to the gas cost, or else you would have a relatively small, un-upgraded roach army from going straight for a ton of gas early game.
One advantage of this push is that P might mis-read it as mutalisk play (given all the gas and spire), and get some useless pheonix. On the downside, if P thinks its mutalisk play they may already have cannons / stalkers in positions that are vulnerable to air, which would incidentally mitigate some of the drop threat.
If I am interpreting you right, the Z build / gas cost would be around: Lair - 100 Spire - 200 Corruptor x 6 - 600 (Note: this is about the minimum it will take to finish off a momma. Keep in mind that the vortex will probably be used to remove 2/3 corrupters from the battle for a while, and motherships have 700 hp. With 3/4 corrupters doing 22 damage per hit (base 20 + 20% from corruption -2 from armor) every 1.9 seconds, it will take an absolute minimum of 21/15 seconds to kill the mothership. If it takes any longer than that there is no way you won't be able to get under some anti air, and even in that time i would expect 1-2 of the corrupters to fall just to the mothership and VR, even if the rest of the army is busy) Glial Reconstitution - 100 Roach x 60/40/20 - 1,500 / 1000 /500 Pneumatic Carapace: - 100 Ventral sacs - 200 4 overseers - 200 Total: 3,000 / 2,500 / 2,000
The earliest timing I could possibly see this happening is 13 minutes, unless I am not getting something. If you could do this attack before 13 minutes, I think you would have P by the balls.
By 13 minutes, In my last game I had 4 archons (2 were still morphing, but close enough), a few zealots, charge, +1, a mothership with 101 energy, an established, mining third with 3 cannons, and 8 warp gates. By 14 mins I had 6 archons, 12 warp gates and +2 13 secs from completion and a handful chargelots (this was after an attack, but I think I lost mostly chargelots, so without interruption this number would be higher). By 15 mins I had 8 archons, about 20 chargelots, +3 attack on the way, and about 16 warp gates.
Please keep in mind that all of there timings are based on my level of play and that of opponents I see in game, if you are gosu you might be able to shave some off the timings for both Z and P.
The only problem with this attack is that it seems like if it doesn't work, Zerg is in big, big trouble as they just wasted so much gas and tech that their upgrades and army composition are going to suck late game.
All my opponents that have tried the other tactics you mentioned failed, probably because they aren't as experienced as you, so I'm not as worried about the other stuff you talked about.
Thanks in advance for more advice on how this would work (and a replay? :D)
I like your post... And its true that the build seems easy to counter... buts its not... What I dont like though is if the zerg spot you doing that... and rush to broodlord... I mean almost pure brood or pure air... I would we be able to kill corruptor - brood with only archons...
I used the build and I always find that there is only a small follow up (Voidrays)
On July 31 2012 07:12 Tolazytobecreative wrote: So to all the people who haven't tested it out and still wondering if they should because it seems so easy: don't.
People don't realize that most of us, read this forum and we're not top players and just want to have some fun with game. I used to play in gold/plat and this build is just great for me. Before I couldn't win PvZ unless zerg was really lame, and now I have much more fun about the game and also my winrate is higher. There are many build on TL. For example planetary cheese as a terran. I wouldn't call it GM build, but I used it in silver, it worked and was really great. So what's the point of all these posts? If you don't like it- don't use it.
I'm pretty sure you beat this easily by just splitting your army in half and attacking both the third and the natural at the same time. The mothership can't be in both places at once and there's no way to defend that without sentries.
What I dont like though is if the zerg spot you doing that... and rush to broodlord... I mean almost pure brood or pure air... I would we be able to kill corruptor - brood with only archons...
In my experience this absolutely destroys pure brood lord. You can stutter step the archons underneath, and broodlings die in one hit. Since most of the damage from broodlords is from the broodlings staying alive, this really cuts into their damage, and you kill brood lords really fast. Also, they arn't fast enough to run away. The only problem is if there are infestors in the mix and you don't have a vortex, then they can fungal your army and you take damage without being able to hit back.
'm pretty sure you beat this easily by just splitting your army in half and attacking both the third and the natural at the same time. The mothership can't be in both places at once and there's no way to defend that without sentries.
This is somewhat true, 2 pronged attacks are annoying and can do some damage, dependent on the map. On a map like cloud kingdom, you basically have to rely on a wall off and 1 sentry to hold of 1 prong while you deal with the other prong. You do take damage, but doing this basically gauruntees you will kill his entire force. I suck so I usually get lings in my probe line when they do this. As long as you can stay on 3 bases, though, things work out just fine.
This isn't a problem on maps like Ohana and condemned ridge, where you can position your army to cover both with ease, these are probably the best maps for this build.
The worst thing about this build for me is that it is messing with my ranking and making me play Terrans and Toss that are way better than me. I haven't lost a game to zerg since I became somewhat practiced with this build.
Wouldn't it be better to use Dark Templar instead of High Templar for the Archons? DT's are 25 gas cheaper so for each archon you save 50 gas. They are more expensive with minerals but gas is what limits this build for me most of the time. Also you could harass with the DT's if you wanted.
6 gas gives you about 775 gas a minute so 300 gas for an HT archon you could get about 5 Archons in 2 minutes. With DT Archons you could get around 6 in 2 minutes. This means less zealots/cannons if you spend all the minerals but i would rather have more archons.
You know I was frustrated with vortex for a really, really long time, but I was inspired recently by a game between CreatorPrime and some zerg on WCS, I think it was, on daybreak (could be some other toss, it was wcs korea on daybreak though and it got to the vortex endgame).
He had 5 corruptors, and they shot down the mothership super fast after they corrupted it. Then, they simple moved back the broodlords when the mothership tried to get close, and they threw down just a moderate amount of infested terrans, and FG, to keep the mothership at bay. 5 corruptors actually takes down a mothership so damn fast, and since it's AA only (corruptors), none of the units in the Toss army will bother to attack those 5 corruptors, since all the broodlings and infested terrans will be target fired first.
Go up to like, 6-8 corruptors, and omg, vortex is so easily dealt with, and worst case scenario you lose 8 corruptors.
On August 10 2012 15:06 Belial88 wrote: You know I was frustrated with vortex for a really, really long time, but I was inspired recently by a game between CreatorPrime and some zerg on WCS, I think it was, on daybreak (could be some other toss, it was wcs korea on daybreak though and it got to the vortex endgame).
He had 5 corruptors, and they shot down the mothership super fast after they corrupted it. Then, they simple moved back the broodlords when the mothership tried to get close, and they threw down just a moderate amount of infested terrans, and FG, to keep the mothership at bay. 5 corruptors actually takes down a mothership so damn fast, and since it's AA only (corruptors), none of the units in the Toss army will bother to attack those 5 corruptors, since all the broodlings and infested terrans will be target fired first.
Go up to like, 6-8 corruptors, and omg, vortex is so easily dealt with, and worst case scenario you lose 8 corruptors.
This is basically how I deal with vortex in almost all of my games with a very high success rate. Lay down a million infested terrans in front of me so that he has to fly over them to vortex me. Spread out corruptors and target the mothership, and it just takes damage very quickly, and he has to rush his vortex out before the mothership dies, and it's usually not a very good one.
Then again, on ladder, players are consistently willing to fly their mothership above infested terrans and let it die instead of pushing slowly with colossus/storm. Granted, a slow push lets my broodlords and spines do their work. Usually they fly over the infested terrans and die or they back away and are forced to vortex corruptors before losing the mothership, because they don't focus fire the corruptors with their stalkers.
However I never face a mothership max +3 push as fast as the one described in this thread. I don't know if I'd have enough energy banked, as well as enough support units or spines (or enough broodlords). Seems like it'd be pretty painful.
On July 14 2012 02:03 9-BiT wrote: Interesting....... I guess? The build looks fun, and yes, it will probably get a lot of cheap wins, but I don't think this is a legitimate build....
On July 31 2012 06:51 DeathToSquid wrote: What makes something a "gimmick"? To me it is a strategy that only works due to a surprise factor. OP states this is not the case; despite knowing what is coming it works.
For a long time, a FFE was considered a gimmick because people thought there was no way you could survive a range of openings with so few early units. Now it is the most popular opening in PvZ.
To prove this is build a gimmick, figure out how to reliably counter it in a game. If, however, it can reliably be pulled off and adapted to deal with anything the Zerg can throw at it, what makes it a gimmick? To me that just makes a solid, original build.
ffe was never really a gimmick
people were doing ffe on steppes of war, while complaining that ffe was impossible on metal and XNC
otherwise agree with you. just ffe was bad example
On July 31 2012 06:51 DeathToSquid wrote: What makes something a "gimmick"? To me it is a strategy that only works due to a surprise factor. OP states this is not the case; despite knowing what is coming it works.
For a long time, a FFE was considered a gimmick because people thought there was no way you could survive a range of openings with so few early units. Now it is the most popular opening in PvZ.
To prove this is build a gimmick, figure out how to reliably counter it in a game. If, however, it can reliably be pulled off and adapted to deal with anything the Zerg can throw at it, what makes it a gimmick? To me that just makes a solid, original build.
ffe was never really a gimmick
people were doing ffe on steppes of war, while complaining that ffe was impossible on metal and XNC
otherwise agree with you. just ffe was bad example
I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that he meant that FFE was considered a gimmick in BW when it was first being popularized as a legitimate strategy by Bisu (also famous for his "gimmick" turned full strategy the dt-corsair). All in all, still good points from both of you.
On August 10 2012 15:00 TankseL wrote: Wouldn't it be better to use Dark Templar instead of High Templar for the Archons? DT's are 25 gas cheaper so for each archon you save 50 gas. They are more expensive with minerals but gas is what limits this build for me most of the time. Also you could harass with the DT's if you wanted.
6 gas gives you about 775 gas a minute so 300 gas for an HT archon you could get about 5 Archons in 2 minutes. With DT Archons you could get around 6 in 2 minutes. This means less zealots/cannons if you spend all the minerals but i would rather have more archons.
Edit: made it easier to read.
I thought the same thing for a while running this build (I've been playing around with it for ages since the first thread was made) and once you hit a critical mass of archons going DT's leaves you in a better position, however....
1. I found that by going dt archons you have FAR, FAR, less zealots, obviously, which makes roach hydra pushes impossible to hold. playing this build I'd say once you first get your mothership and first few archons up, the zealots are actually a more important component of the army for retaining the archons you do have by being used as cannon fodder, and just generally giving your army the padding it needs to survive pure roach, or roach hydra armies- which basically soft counter your unit comp. In the build itself this is okay because you can afford to lose lots of resources in units as long as you're trading your mineral only units- zealots- for his gas units- roach hydra, while retaining your archons. Personally I think the huge hit to zealot count isnt worth slightly more archons.
2. As for dts as a harassment unit, I find they are not needed for this build. Firstly because he's seen your stargate or atleast your void ray clear out his OL around your base, there is a reasonable chance he will have a spore at each base. Sure you can still snipe hatches with DT's, but this requires a big invesment in them to kill things before his army can resposition (as sending 1 dt wouldnt be effective with a spore up) and personally I didnt like this as I felt it was a big risk. As for using dts in their usual role in this matchup, aka tower control and patrolling expos, which I find to be quite useful, you have to realise with a mothership zealot archon army you have a super mobile army with guaranteed safe retreat via either vortex (or perhaps even recall which I dont really use) so you should constantly be out on the map anyway IMO with this build. You can hold towers and patrol expos with even zealots or probes or just have your army shark around the towers which makes dts seem basically useless except for building archons to me (and your army is already cloaked so no point even mixing them in there). The only issue of this map control is ling runbys which can be averted with good sim city and map awareness, and getting your army trapped by mass lings is no problem at all because your army is so cost effective vs lings that he may as well have not even have made them.
So I ditched this idea and now when I do this build I just get the TA, the only time I'll really get a DT shrine is if for some reason he gets so ahead that I cant get a 4th so I just want to mass a pure archon army with my mothership and pray for his bad positioning and my good vortex's vs his endgame army of death.
After having used it several time now i can say that this is a cute legitimate build that helps protoss bypass alot of the annoying midgame shenanigans like defending against infinite waves of roach-ling where one missplaced forcefield can lose you the game etc. It is by no means unbeatable, through experience i have found 4 ways to deal with this build.
If anything this is just a very good macro orianted build that evens out the skill requirment of getting into the early lategame. Every protoss can attest to this: cronoing gates and immortals, stressing about having good FFs etc. With this build you dont even have to worry about overmaking sentires. Its a good build overall and should be explored more.
On July 31 2012 07:12 Tolazytobecreative wrote: So to all the people who haven't tested it out and still wondering if they should because it seems so easy: don't.
this strat is utter bullshit and the only reason why it works is because zergs on OP's level dont know wtf they just scouted and will then be confused and just do random things wich will actually make them lose.
Why is it bullshit? because you could never hold your third with this. you could just drop some roaches in the main and while the army moves into the main you could simply snipe the ms with corrupters you could also simply bust the third and dont stack all your units in a circle to for the toss to get a cortex that catches 20+ units. You could also turtle up play macro game and yet aigan dont stack your units up (zerg from op's replay... putting all your bl's at one place and the infestor under them so you get everything vortexed like an idiot... what is this low master? but the easiest way would be to simply deny/snipe third (wich you cant possibly hold with this if done correctly) or drop.
your shittalking during games hasn't improved either
and yes i am fairly pissed since this thread is pure attention whoring(and maybe ment to piss people like me off?). the tactic is bad and solely relies on the zerg reacting wrong
also this is coming from top 100 eu gm. so dont tell me i dont know wtf im talking about. i know it.
Just to burst your bubble, I know this works until low gm atleast because I have defeated several low gm and high master zergs on ladder with this build. The hardest counter I found to this build is stephano-roach, but it only works on maps that have third and natural far away from each other, such as Cloud Kingdom, Daybreak etc etc.
I have question for op. I am zerg, mid-high master and i am facing this a lot on ladder lately. Either full sky toss either zealot archon mix with air. Question is , are mass infestor witj some roach support good to counter this?i even had hydra/corruptor/infestor army and it got crushed by protoss air. Also detection is impossible.to survive since phoenixes kill my speed upgraded 15 overseers(they are focised easily with plus 3 attacks). Which pressire and late game composition would u reccomend me for this? Im seriously considering bbust every game cuz of this
On July 14 2012 02:13 Arcanefrost wrote: Mothership on 2 bases doesn't work. If the zerg makes fast corruptors he can snipe it before you have the energy to vortex, and your archon count isn't high enough yet to stop them. With your mothership dead it becomes near impossible to take a third, and it only goes downhill from there.
This is incorrect. He cannot have enough corruptors and ground forces. Keep in mind that the mothership has 700 combined hitpoints with 2 base armor and that archons deal heavy splash damage, and you have a void ray in there too. Nothing prevents you from moving your mothership a bit back, corruptors only have 6 range and will be shot at by archons/cannons. His window is extremely limited as well as you will get 50 energy extremely quickly, which is enough for 1 vortex combined with your starting energy.
He just makes corruptors first, snipes your ms as it pops and then proceeds to transition into roachmax which denies your third. Hasuobs also said this once during a cast.
What you are describing is not possible, no matter how much you want it to be. I do remember the HasuObs cast where he said this, but he was incorrect as well (or not using the proper build).
The mothership will pop between 10 and 11 minutes. You will need a ridiculous amount of corruptors before 12-13 minutes (that is when I get 100 energy and can vortex your corruptors, and then instantly kill them by means of an archon toilet. Remember that the few seconds of invulnerability that was added after exiting the vortex is not as relevant to air units, as air units spread much slower than ground units.) Also, I can just move the mothership back.
Corrupters move faster than broodlords so they will probably be saved but on orange hp...maybe yellow with a bit of luck...
The zerg will almost definitely make 4-5 overseers in the mid game. If they don't, they somehow haven't scouted the mothership or don't understand how cloak works.
This strat does not rely on invis, though sometimes it does surprise them in the early game and delay a push at about 12 minutes. Usually they will already know. It is much more reliant on an archon/zealot toilet to hold off early attacks than invisibility.
On July 31 2012 05:02 Jetaap wrote: I would be interested to see this build against a zerg that just sits on 4 bases and maxes on broodlords/infestors/corrupters. My problem is that it's very hard to defend the momaship from corrupters with archons only (assuming the opponent spreads his corruptors). The replay in the first post only show it holding a stupid attack from the zerg, whereas the problem in my opinion is to deal with the super army of zerg.
To you and 100 other people who post stuff like this.
Test it. Test it again. Report back what you have discovered.
On July 14 2012 01:59 the p00n wrote: What if the lair has already been completed? It's possible that he swapped the order of research with zergling speed. Although I personally think it is retarded to get lair before metabolic boost, some zergs do it anyway. read below).
To be frank, you are wrong. Like VERY clearly wrong. If a zerg scouts gas in the nat (and scouts that gas is still being mined in the main, which is standard) then going lair before pool is what's expected.
For the rest of the thread, yes, this build works IF you get ahead early. However, if the zerg defends perfectly, scouts your build, ect, this will not work versus top zerg players.
In the meantime, playing protoss on the side, this a fucking hilarious style ;D
On August 14 2012 13:03 DeathToSquid wrote:This strat does not rely on invis, though sometimes it does surprise them in the early game and delay a push at 10-12 minutes. Usually they will already know. It is much more reliant on an archon/zealot toilet to hold off early attacks than invisibility.
Yeah, exactly. This is why I've been trying to focus more on setting up flanks and other tricks to increase surface area for the chargelots, nixing the mothership alltogether. Something I really like is to constantly produce Phoenixes and use them to pick up a bunch of the Roaches, effectively splitting the army in half so the lots can fight half the army at a time. I also really like using a Warp Prism (and eventually a second one) to build zealots behind the Roach ball and hit it from all sides.
On August 12 2012 22:05 Nawe wrote: I have question for op. I am zerg, mid-high master and i am facing this a lot on ladder lately. Either full sky toss either zealot archon mix with air. Question is , are mass infestor witj some roach support good to counter this?i even had hydra/corruptor/infestor army and it got crushed by protoss air. Also detection is impossible.to survive since phoenixes kill my speed upgraded 15 overseers(they are focised easily with plus 3 attacks). Which pressire and late game composition would u reccomend me for this? Im seriously considering bbust every game cuz of this
Mutalisks.
--
I see a lot of people suggesting skipping the mothership. If you skip the mothership you have to rely on sentries, else you're just going to get kited into oblivion. Vortex is basically one giant forcefield, it entangles your units in his units which allows for maximum surface area and divides the roach DPS over all of your units (the strength of roaches is that they have high damage, which allows for great focus firing and kiting, but low attack speed which makes them bad against single targets (low dps)).
That is 1000 gas. If you have to rely on sentries, expect to be using at the very very least 6 sentries. Lets say you use 7 sentries - then you have 300 gas left for an archon and you can add zealots with however many minerals you saved. You don't get the void ray for early map control, nor the phoenix for nearly perfect scouting information and you eventually have to go into mothership anyway.
That being said, it is actually quite hard to use forcefields correctly with zealot/archon. Seeing as roaches are 4 range and you are melee + 3 range, it is actually you who is supposed to close-in on the enemy, so he can just keep his distance and kite you into oblivion. If you are running stalkers you have 6 range, so in order to get maximum DPS per area occupied the roaches will actually need to close in on you which is what makes FFs effective, as you just cut their army and then move back and kill everything.
Hi, I don't really get it. Do you build templars to feedback infestors? They can just chain fungal ur zlot archon til they die. Also What if his units are spread out? 2 vortexes won't be enough. Thus can you include a replay if possible of you playing against a straight up zerg. I.e going fast 3 base, roach for defense, mass spines + infestors then broods + corruptors + infestors + spines.
Because I don't really see how this army can beat infestor brood corruptors with spine support. Thanks
Coincidentally, I've been doing a similar build but with some variation. Instead of getting pheonixes I get 3-4 voidrays (2nd one after mothership is queued) and go directly into double robo colossi with thermal lance. The voidrays pull back before conventional mutas pop (around 12-13 minutes) and I keep them split between my 3rd and natural to kill overlords that might morph into overseers. Keeping them from making overseers allows me to defend all of my bases with just colossi and invisible sim city. If they do the fastest roach max I lose my first wall before getting my mothership up in position in time with adquate forces but when I get it up they have no means of killing anything since they don't have vision. I rebuild my wall after they are forced back. If they go fast muta, I will know because they will kill my voidray(s) in which case I just immediately warp in 6-7 stalkers and a couple of cannons. It stops the first wave and I just keep warping in stalkers and colossi until I move out and smoke em like hash. The fact that you have 3-4 voidrays by the time they want to greedily take a 4th means you can deny the 4th base quite effectively just by denying creep spread to it and having 4 voidrays.
I haven't tried it with less voids going directly into chargelot archon but I might give it a try
Are there any replays or examples of this working on the pro level? It seems a little too gimmicky to work, but I'm not sure, I haven't ever run into this on ladder. Seems interesting.
Thanks for the build p00n. I think it definitely has promise... compositions that you would think could work to kill it won't because scouting is denied early on and mothership pops pretty early. Zerg is usually afraid to engage directly into the mothership since they can't tell what is under it. It definitely does not seem gimmicky to me.
The only thing I can think of that could potentially stop this is mass mutas. Archon/mothership/zealot is pretty slow so mass mutalisk (with good control) could work. Has anyone tried this?
Sometimes it's good to go for base trade vs mass mutas. What I'm doing is sending zelots with some (not too much) archons to attack, and leaving my mamaship with archons to defend base. He probably will have a lot of spines, but zelots don't die that easly. The thing is to snipe some key buildings and recall if needed. That is ofc when he suprise you with a lot of mutas, if you know it's comming, I guess it's better just to put a lot of canons, get storm and leave some templars and just A move.
Personaly, I have the biggest problem with mass infestor. They make a wall of infested terrans, and just fungal everything that comes close to them. Ofc it's followed by spine crowler wall. Rly no idea what to do there.
Personaly, I have the biggest problem with mass infestor. They make a wall of infested terrans, and just fungal everything that comes close to them. Ofc it's followed by spine crowler wall. Rly no idea what to do there.
I cannot beat entrenched spine crawlers AND a maxed army (infestor broodlord) with zealot archon, and when I've tried it hasn't worked out well. Take more bases, throw up cannons and go for carriers (or recall past the spines, though at that point you are committing to an all in). This is often necessary if your first attacks with maxed zealot archon don't win outright.
Also try doing a lot of warp prism / zealot harass while you get up the carriers. At this point you should have minerals coming out your ears so it doesn't really cost you anything.
I feel like, in some conspiracy, p00n is the only honest Protoss in this thread. The rest of people post here with "sorry to burst your bubble..." just try to cover up the power of this gracefully powerful strategy of simplicity..
Hi, I don't really get it. Do you build templars to feedback infestors? They can just chain fungal ur zlot archon til they die. Also What if his units are spread out? 2 vortexes won't be enough. Thus can you include a replay if possible of you playing against a straight up zerg. I.e going fast 3 base, roach for defense, mass spines + infestors then broods + corruptors + infestors + spines.
Because I don't really see how this army can beat infestor brood corruptors with spine support. Thanks
Shoot I have one. He skips agression and goes straight BL/infester with a few roaches, and has a very hard time. The site I use to upload says replays for the new patch can't be uploaded yet, I will put it up as soon as the site is working. If anyone knows a free site that is working, please let me know...
It's actually similar to something I was doing a back in march, except I was going colossus after a few voids and then a fast mothership, also adding in carriers 1 at a time. While getting shield and air attack upgrades early, also using tons of cannons (the shield upgrades help cannons, ground and air) The reason I made so many cannons because so much gas goes to tech so you can't afford many sentries or stalkers, I continue adding them all game because muta is such a huge problem, I can see the spire and still not be sure because it's often for corrupters or sometimes it's a roach/muta tech switch. I was actually doing gateway opening for a while too, but I stopped after the queen buff because zealot pressure can't do anything now. (it doesn't even force them to make lings anymore) Nowadays, I like to nexus 1st, if possible or I will go forge 1st if I intend to pylon block them.
below is the game that was cast, but the shakurus game (1st on the list) was IMO the best one. I manage to pull it off against a few terrans. A lot of my opponents get pretty angry about the whole thing, some lolzy BM in there.
Kind of funny that after watching these again, I realize how much I've improved
edit: against the terrans, the build orders often didn't go as planned. I had to make adjustments on the fly because of what was scouted.
Also, the colossus before mothership was because I found hydra busts so hard to stop. It was common for zergs to try that after they see the stargate opening because they know your splash dmg will be late.
On August 15 2012 10:01 Spec wrote: I feel like, in some conspiracy, p00n is the only honest Protoss in this thread. The rest of people post here with "sorry to burst your bubble..." just try to cover up the power of this gracefully powerful strategy of simplicity..
pretty much. he doesn't hide the fact that he sits back on 3 bases and then a moves. he encourages it. which is what attracted me in the first place. what's awesome is that it's working on high masters + mid tier GM zergs over on SEA. That is, i've made a few alterations to the build to suit my style.
Okay, so after a month and playing dozens and dozens of games, here's my feedback on the build and how I adapted it:
- I lost a lot to 200/200 timing push, often mixed with hydras. 90% of the time Zerg will scout the stargate, and if you're unlucky, he may even scout the fleet beacon. When Zerg realizes you're not overly agressive, he goes for a 200 timing push, between 12' and 13'. I kept having trouble surviving that.
- so I skipped the initial voidray/phoenix to prefer a robo and an obs for scouting early. Also helps to determine if he's going for mutas. If I see roaches, I chrono immortals. Here's the thing: immortals only cost 100 gas, so it doesn't really delay the rest of the build that much, you'll have a few less zealots due to the 250 minerals cost, but as far as tech and archons go, it makes almost no difference. When Zerg pushes, you have 3-4 immortals, and I find those invaluable to hold the push.
- I totally changed my way to play the end game. I actually encourage Zerg to sit on their ass, take 5+ bases and tech to infestors/brood lords. While they're doing that, I get up to 20 gates and 2 warp prisms. Around the 15-16' mark, as they start morphing their first brood lords, I start multi pronged harass with 10 zealots on a side and 10 zealots on another side. My goal is to snippe tech buildings and hatcheries, and I pretty much ignore any defense. As Zerg is pulling back to defend one side, I keep warping pure zealots on the other side. Meanwhile I'm securing my fourth expo. I reproduce prisms as soon as I lose one.
- I keep using multi pronged zealots attacks during many minutes. I do not warp additional units, or spend any gas at all, on my main army. I even sacrifice my main army's zealots on a triple frontal attack when I see his army off pos. As minutes elapse, I keep my minerals low, and I accumule a shitton of gas.
- eventually Zerg's eco is getting bad and he goes for an all-in, big final attack. With my 20 gates I instantly warp mass archons. I position my mothership and my army strategically, with a few canons behind ( he'll typically attack at an expo ). Land two vortexes, put archons in it, reprod with 20 gates of blink stalkers..
- game ends here in rage and insults ( some Zergs even say I'm abusing the game mechanics.. all good ! ).
- using this strat I have a 90% winrate when it comes to the late game PvZ. I did lose a few times to base trading, stupid mistakes like having the MS alone in the center of the map ( bad hotkey ), or getting my MS neural-parasited. I'm thinking of adding 3-4 colossi to the army compo while I'm harassing with mass chargelots, this should make NP become a non-issue.
Here's a game as a demonstration:
It's interesting to see how fast the game goes out of control for Zerg. At the 20' mark, I bet everybody would agree he's ahead. He's taking his fifth, he has 11 infestors, 17 corruptors and is going to start to morph BLs, and I have a pretty small army with only 6 archons, 4 immortals, 2 voidrays, the rest is zealots. Yet 2 minutes later he'll rage quit after losing his fourth, fifth, and with zealots in his main and soon to be snipped third.
After watching the game in detail, and thinking about it, I have a few things to say.
Don't you think that if zerg was more aggressive you would have difficulty in holding the attack? If instead of going into passive macro mode he decided to make a few corruptors and overseers and just attacked could you have held? At the very least he could deny your third by a lot. I think such aggressiveness would be a proper response for someone teching so hard.
Even in the late game, had he decided to attack after losing those hatcheries I think without a pretty lucky vortex zerg would win that fight.
TLDR; If nothing else this game really displays how effective mass harass can be against a zerg when they go all out macro mode, but I think this style leaves your main army too thin, and the aggressive teching weak in the early game.
Here's another one that shows harass in end game, with another rage-quit as he loses all his bases except his natural:
In that game, I can easily defend his pushes, however I forget to research charge before I start the harass, normally I get it much faster.
The mid game can sometimes indeed be tricky. You're investing a lot in that mothership ( Stargate, Fleet beacon, MS ) and you won't really produce that many air units. I stay with a single voidray and phoenix for a long time. The voidray is mostly to hunt overseers if he tries to attack with roaches only. The phoenix is to hunt overlords on the map and scout. Pure roaches push isn't scary, but the one with hydras can be. Fortunately it's a bit later, so you can have archons and charge ready ( plus a ton of gates ) at that time.
Also, mutas can be troublesome, and usually end up in a base trade that I win 50% of the time ( that's why my late game PvZ is "only" 80-90% wins, mutas base trade low it down ).
You'll notice that at the very end I'm floating 4K gas. That's not a mistake. I'm accumulating gas until Zerg decides to attack. I can insta warp a shitton of archons as I have 25 gates. In that game I also forgot to research blink and to get a few colossi, but it doesn't matter, there's no way he could have won even if he decided to counter.
Tip top masters/GM level play on SEA here. okay I've been using the build for 3 days straight laddering. I can confirm a 92% winrate vs zerg. Like the OP states, pretty much my only losses are to funky muta transitions which i've failed to scout. Or an early (12 minute - 14 minute) miss vortex (don't play when you're tired). Otherwise, decision making, and patient play carries you to a sure win. I do however, add lategame harass because my apm allows it and i have an excess of minerals. Great guide, great build.
Just encountered this in ladder, it is very effective, and quite difficult to deal with it head on, infestors/curropter is just too much gas invested >><<
how to win as protoss? easy just FF every chance u get against a zerg in early game since we cant do anything about it. And make sure u just stay next to a wall and have global stalkers so u can win with 2 units. 10 min games. EZ PZ
On August 20 2012 13:33 Trollandknights wrote: how to win as protoss? easy just FF every chance u get against a zerg in early game since we cant do anything about it. And make sure u just stay next to a wall and have global stalkers so u can win with 2 units. 10 min games. EZ PZ
it's funny you should say that. This build requires neither.
Ahahaha that was good! I'm politely refraining from critique as I'm not masters, but I just couldn't resist pointing that out! I will say that if you can own top level players, though, then this build definitely has promise, unlike some other builds I've seen on these forums that tried to use mothership. Still, can this build beat the best? All due respect to the masters and GMs of the world, but the better pros are orders of magnitude above them, capable of adapting to wonky strategies mid-series to take the win. The only way to know if the build is fool-proof is if it faces the ultimate test: the pro level.
Ahahaha that was good! I'm politely refraining from critique as I'm not masters, but I just couldn't resist pointing that out! I will say that if you can own top level players, though, then this build definitely has promise, unlike some other builds I've seen on these forums that tried to use mothership. Still, can this build beat the best? All due respect to the masters and GMs of the world, but the better pros are orders of magnitude above them, capable of adapting to wonky strategies mid-series to take the win. The only way to know if the build is fool-proof is if it faces the ultimate test: the pro level.
Earlier on in this thread it had a Protoss vs Ostijiy or however his name is spelled. I don't think it would work in a pro level consistently, but it's definitely a build pros could use in a bo x series.
i have try this build it's great but i do lose to roach max + infestors
The problems in this game have very little to do with his army, but a lot to do with your build and resource management. I would recommend practicing the build, almost all of your problems come from your beginning not being very polished.
Your mothership and archon tech were both delayed quite a bit, and after about 8:40 it seemed that you were floating a lot of minerals and gas. Your mothership came out at 12:40 and you still had no archons, so your 3rd was undefended and everything fell behind. I will try to give a step by step analysis of how this happened.
At first, I really liked your build, and I thought it was ballsy to get the cyber before cannon :D
1) You scout with a zealot, despite having a forward probe. You need to scout for a 3rd earlier because if he is 2 basing you need to change your build, get cannons, etc. Use a probe, as you are so low on units in this build that you want to save them all in case he attacks
2) All of your tech started to fall behind because you got +1, which is not necessary right away. @5:35 you could have gotten a stargate, because of the +1 you didn't start it until 6:40. That means your mamma ship was delayed by a whole minute. You want to delay the +1 and get out the mothership faster.
3)@ 8:00 you could get a fleet beacon. Instead, you get a 2nd void ray, which is relatively useless. The VR is there to take map control and deal with really early roaches, one VR can do this almost as well as 2. Because of this 2nd void ray, your fleet beacon was delayed until 8:40.
4)@9:40 your fleet beacon is done. The mama ship wasn't started until 10:10.
5) Only 2 chrono boosts were used on the mothership. You can use 5 chronos on it, which will drop the build time by 30 additional secs (beyond the 20 secs you sped it up with the 2 chrono boosts)
6) All in all, comments 2-5 delayed your mothership by about 2 and a half minutes. Your mothership came out at 12:30. Assuming you were able to cut into this even a little bit, you should be able to have your mothership at the natural by 11:30 (This is where I am in my games, and I'm in plat not diamond and I usually get cannon before cyber). If you had, then it would have been out in time to defend your 3rd and your late game economy would have been much, much better.
7) You delay the archon tech way too much. Delay the +1, and don't get the second VR, use that gas to get archons out at 11 or so (for me it is usually shortly before the mothership). As soon as you have gas, be putting it into archon tech.
8) At about 7:20 you money starts going crazy, it only momentarily goes down because you have 2 VR and 1 pheonix cued. This problem is never fixed, and is one of the biggest holes in your play.
9)At 8:40 you have money for an expand and cannons, but you don't get an expand (edit: If you are getting tech and producing properly you should not have that much money this early, so my following comment is moot). If you had used the money then you would have had the cannons up in time for the lings, instead they were still morphing. You can even get the pylon and cannons out before the nexus if you are worried about defense.
After losing the 3rd, you are put way behind so I'm not sure how useful further commentary is - the key is not making that early mistake. I'll comment anyways though, just for fun.
10) Your building and army position was off. DO NOT create a narrow choke at the third 3rd, your army is good in the open, not in small chokes (vortex can be great in large chokes, but not tiny ones). The way your army was positioned, if he had attacked the 3rd your zealots would not have been able to engage. Just build cannons hugging your 3rd and leave space so your melee units can attack.
11) Scout! You have no vision once you get into the mid game, so you don't even know he has an army or where it is. Try keeping the pheonix alive and patrol around the map with it as long as possible (I usually don't lost it until he gets out a lot of corruptors).
12) at 14:00 you have 900 gas, and it has been high for a long time!!!!!!! Your gas is never low, try to not let it get above 300 (enough for an archon). Prioritize archons over zealots.
13) During the final fight, your angle was terrible. The fight went so bad that essentially no archons got into the vortex. Because of moving through the choke, all of your units were in in a drawn out line, trickling into his arc. With this build you have to position like a zerg and surround him!! Also, you moved your archons in first. The archons need to be in the back, the zealots are there to tank for the archons. As it was, your main damage dealers all died and you were left with just zealots, which is terrible. Keep the archons alive!!! Mostly I think this was a scouting problem, and you got messed up by the choke you built at your 3rd.
14) During the last fight you had 1300 gas and 800 minerals. This would have been a lot different with 4 more archons and 4 more zealots, esecially if the archons had been in back / gotten in the toilet and your army hadn't been trickling in one by one. Even better, if you had vortexed your ramp while he was moving up you probably would have won the fight despite being way behind where you should have been (due to the early game hit to your economy from losing the 3rd).
15) Later on I don't think you had enough gates for a 3 base zealot archon economy. You want a bare minimum of 12-15 gates on 3 base, as zealots and templar are relatively cheap units (and thus more taxing on your production) 20-25 gates in the later mid game is not unreasonable, with more as you approach maxed. Also, mid game the +2 was delayed.
tl;dr Practice against the comp until you can get out a 3rd, archon tech and a mothership by about 11:30 (alternatively, have more gates/army at 11:30, but no 3rd). Polish your build and stop floating so much money, and you will destroy those pesky zerg!
Take a look at the first replay of FataLe to get a build to practice: I he has a mothership, templar archives, 8 gates, and +1 with +2 on the way at 11:30, with a third on the way.
Guy has 55 drones and 4 hatches at 8 mins and floods lings/roaches at me. I mess up dearly, but it is still fairly onesided.
That wasn't a very refined Stephano style roach max... He never went over 150 supply and this peak was reached at 15:40 =S
In my eyes he actually could have won that game had he reacted properly (even despite the lackluster macro, not saturating his third being the biggest flaw), as soon as Stephano is being attacked by a FFE Toss who went air, he simply box everything he's got and attacks the front between 10:00-10:30,and at 10:20 your Zerg opponent had 24 speedlings just chilling outside a base defended by a single cannon and a gaping hole in the wall the size of a pylon with only one gateway free to warp in = not enough to hold. But he waited 25 seconds instead, without even checking the ramp, and lets your extra gates finish and gives the mothership time to come out.
A well executed Stephano roach style would also be able to back those 24 lings up with about the same number in roaches. I can't really see your build holding that off.
I'm only Diamond but if you can't find anyone else to spar against with the ability to bust out a decent Stephano roach max, I'm willing to give it a shot.
I don't really know what you mean - why would you want to do a base trade? Just... don't lose your base. Really base trades are more about getting out workers, map awareness, scouting, etc. than your army composition in my opinion, but this build should not end in a base trade very often.
I'm only Diamond but if you can't find anyone else to spar against with the ability to bust out a decent Stephano roach max, I'm willing to give it a shot.
Are you on North America? If so, send me your infoto loove_fish@hotmail.com and lets play! I'm only plat so you will probably stomp me but it should be fun :D
My experiences with this build at Mid-Masters level...
- Its great if they are going with a fast 4th more passive macro style play with the late-game Infestor-Broodlord comp in mind. I can win games nearly 80-90% of the time. The 10-20% left out are the games where I will make a mistake and lose as result.
- Its terrible if they're going with a 3-base aggressive build revolving around Stephanos 12 Minute roach max. Like if they just slam into your front at like 11-11:30 with all the roaches they have... Its pretty much instant loss.
I'm only Diamond but if you can't find anyone else to spar against with the ability to bust out a decent Stephano roach max, I'm willing to give it a shot.
Are you on North America? If so, send me your infoto loove_fish@hotmail.com and lets play! I'm only plat so you will probably stomp me but it should be fun :D
On August 29 2012 15:20 Enzymatic wrote: My experiences with this build at Mid-Masters level...
- Its great if they are going with a fast 4th more passive macro style play with the late-game Infestor-Broodlord comp in mind. I can win games nearly 80-90% of the time. The 10-20% left out are the games where I will make a mistake and lose as result.
- Its terrible if they're going with a 3-base aggressive build revolving around Stephanos 12 Minute roach max. Like if they just slam into your front at like 11-11:30 with all the roaches they have... Its pretty much instant loss.
So this build has its ups and downs.
High-Masters/GM level here.
Never lost to any kind of 3 Base aggression (where i haven't fucked up my first vortex). I'm thinking you haven't ironed out the build order. You have to quite crisp in everything. Need a replay to see what you're doing wrong though. The most trouble you should have with this build is muta or spine turtle. NOT 3 base aggression lul.
The thing with 3base aggression vs ANY air opening from Toss is, IMO, that you as a Zerg should attack way before you are maxed out. There is just no reason to wait that long when you can rally everything you got and crush the Toss between 10:00-10:30.
This is before the MS is out and from the replay OP provided vs. the Toss has a single cannon, a single phoenix and a single voidray at 10:00, with just a single warpgate ready for a warp-in. 7 additional gateways are done at 10:40 and the MS pops at 10:50. That's a huge timing window for the zerg to simply walk into the Toss base and kill everything. A 'well' executed Stephano roach max should easily be able to have 20+ roaches and 20+ lings along with reinforcement breaking down the Toss' natural at 10:20, then give these zerg forces 30 seconds of free reign before you can hope to do much about it, please prove me wrong if you feel I am, but I just don't see it working out so well for the Toss.
On August 29 2012 15:20 Enzymatic wrote: My experiences with this build at Mid-Masters level...
- Its great if they are going with a fast 4th more passive macro style play with the late-game Infestor-Broodlord comp in mind. I can win games nearly 80-90% of the time. The 10-20% left out are the games where I will make a mistake and lose as result.
- Its terrible if they're going with a 3-base aggressive build revolving around Stephanos 12 Minute roach max. Like if they just slam into your front at like 11-11:30 with all the roaches they have... Its pretty much instant loss.
So this build has its ups and downs.
High-Masters/GM level here.
Never lost to any kind of 3 Base aggression (where i haven't fucked up my first vortex). I'm thinking you haven't ironed out the build order. You have to quite crisp in everything. Need a replay to see what you're doing wrong though. The most trouble you should have with this build is muta or spine turtle. NOT 3 base aggression lul.
I have a few questions.
1. How many sentries do you typically have by the time you take your third?
2. At what game time roughly do you drop the Templar archives?
3. At what game time do you typically start to make your first archon?
On August 29 2012 15:20 Enzymatic wrote: My experiences with this build at Mid-Masters level...
- Its great if they are going with a fast 4th more passive macro style play with the late-game Infestor-Broodlord comp in mind. I can win games nearly 80-90% of the time. The 10-20% left out are the games where I will make a mistake and lose as result.
- Its terrible if they're going with a 3-base aggressive build revolving around Stephanos 12 Minute roach max. Like if they just slam into your front at like 11-11:30 with all the roaches they have... Its pretty much instant loss.
So this build has its ups and downs.
High-Masters/GM level here.
Never lost to any kind of 3 Base aggression (where i haven't fucked up my first vortex). I'm thinking you haven't ironed out the build order. You have to quite crisp in everything. Need a replay to see what you're doing wrong though. The most trouble you should have with this build is muta or spine turtle. NOT 3 base aggression lul.
I have a few questions.
1. How many sentries do you typically have by the time you take your third?
2. At what game time roughly do you drop the Templar archives?
3. At what game time do you typically start to make your first archon?
Thanks for the help
1. Only one, if you make sentries that aren't necessary you delay tech.
On August 29 2012 18:56 Gyoza wrote: The thing with 3base aggression vs ANY air opening from Toss is, IMO, that you as a Zerg should attack way before you are maxed out. There is just no reason to wait that long when you can rally everything you got and crush the Toss between 10:00-10:30.
This is before the MS is out and from the replay OP provided vs. the Toss has a single cannon, a single phoenix and a single voidray at 10:00, with just a single warpgate ready for a warp-in. 7 additional gateways are done at 10:40 and the MS pops at 10:50. That's a huge timing window for the zerg to simply walk into the Toss base and kill everything. A 'well' executed Stephano roach max should easily be able to have 20+ roaches and 20+ lings along with reinforcement breaking down the Toss' natural at 10:20, then give these zerg forces 30 seconds of free reign before you can hope to do much about it, please prove me wrong if you feel I am, but I just don't see it working out so well for the Toss.
The problem with that is, the Z isn't supposed to know you're going charge/archon. For all he knows once he reaches your base you could have 4 gates worth of sentry stalker + more stargate units on the way. I mean, if Z wants to roll the dice and commit to an attack that he's not sure is going to do damage then that's okay. But it's definitely not the standard response to seeing a Stargate/Star units.
Going for the Stephano Roach max style, you will have the units either way. There is absolutely nothing wrong with walking cross map with your amy and Stephano does so quite often. He mainly wants to check for a third base, if there is one he wants to deny it.. If there isn't, he simply backs off and takes a forth while droning up and teching.
Replay pack 6: http://www.mediafire.com/?otf7hl2bpplz3w9 Stephano vs MC on Cloud Kingdom -> MC opens stargate 1 void + a handfull phoenixes with 4gates to back it up, Stephano counter attacks (forgets roach speed) scouts third base and a bunch of stalker sentry to defend it, no biggie; Stephano backs off and takes a fourth while droning up.
Stephano vs MC on Entomed Valley -> MC opens stargate 1 void + handfull of phoenix with 4gates, Stephano defends the oncoming protoss army with ling/roach and spore/queen, when attack is held off he counter attacks, sees no third, sees plenty of units. Backs off and takes a fourth while droning up.
Stephano vs Parting on Antiga Shipyard -> Parting opens double stargate voidray, Stephano counter attacks with everything that can't shoot up, defends with spore+queen while smashing the front.
Now picture Stephano vs. this 2 base MS rush into zealot archon, he sees a void and a phoenix, defends accordingly.. Walks cross the map, sees nothing, no third base, no units other than the voidray trying to do something futile.. Sends a ling up the ramp, sees nothing but a cannon. GG
On August 30 2012 07:04 Gyoza wrote: Going for the Stephano Roach max style, you will have the units either way. There is absolutely nothing wrong with walking cross map with your amy and Stephano does so quite often. He mainly wants to check for a third base, if there is one he wants to deny it.. If there isn't, he simply backs off and takes a forth while droning up and teching.
Replay pack 6: http://www.mediafire.com/?otf7hl2bpplz3w9 Stephano vs MC on Cloud Kingdom -> MC opens stargate 1 void + a handfull phoenixes with 4gates to back it up, Stephano counter attacks (forgets roach speed) scouts third base and a bunch of stalker sentry to defend it, no biggie; Stephano backs off and takes a fourth while droning up.
Stephano vs MC on Entomed Valley -> MC opens stargate 1 void + handfull of phoenix with 4gates, Stephano defends the oncoming protoss army with ling/roach and spore/queen, when attack is held off he counter attacks, sees no third, sees plenty of units. Backs off and takes a fourth while droning up.
Stephano vs Parting on Antiga Shipyard -> Parting opens double stargate voidray, Stephano counter attacks with everything that can't shoot up, defends with spore+queen while smashing the front.
Now picture Stephano vs. this 2 base MS rush into zealot archon, he sees a void and a phoenix, defends accordingly.. Walks cross the map, sees nothing, no third base, no units other than the voidray trying to do something futile.. Sends a ling up the ramp, sees nothing but a cannon. GG
I don't understand how any of this is relevant to the thread because none of these games involve a fast defensive mothership into a delayed third with a chargelot/archon composition. And who cares what Stephano would do? He doesn't scout much anyways; almost all of his plays are based upon direct reads on the opponent at LAN events.
On August 29 2012 15:20 Enzymatic wrote: My experiences with this build at Mid-Masters level...
- Its great if they are going with a fast 4th more passive macro style play with the late-game Infestor-Broodlord comp in mind. I can win games nearly 80-90% of the time. The 10-20% left out are the games where I will make a mistake and lose as result.
- Its terrible if they're going with a 3-base aggressive build revolving around Stephanos 12 Minute roach max. Like if they just slam into your front at like 11-11:30 with all the roaches they have... Its pretty much instant loss.
So this build has its ups and downs.
High-Masters/GM level here.
Never lost to any kind of 3 Base aggression (where i haven't fucked up my first vortex). I'm thinking you haven't ironed out the build order. You have to quite crisp in everything. Need a replay to see what you're doing wrong though. The most trouble you should have with this build is muta or spine turtle. NOT 3 base aggression lul.
I have a few questions.
1. How many sentries do you typically have by the time you take your third?
2. At what game time roughly do you drop the Templar archives?
3. At what game time do you typically start to make your first archon?
Thanks for the help
1. Only one, if you make sentries that aren't necessary you delay tech.
2. Archives get dropped at 10 minutes.
3. First archon comes at 11 minutes.
I've figured out my problem now.. I was making too many sentries which was delaying my mothership a lot because I would be 200 gas short always.
On August 30 2012 13:29 ineversmile wrote: I don't understand how any of this is relevant to the thread because none of these games involve a fast defensive mothership into a delayed third with a chargelot/archon composition. And who cares what Stephano would do? He doesn't scout much anyways; almost all of his plays are based upon direct reads on the opponent at LAN events.
It is relevant in the discussion regarding how the 2 base MS rush into zealot archon would fare against a Stephano roach max style of play.
p00n was asked to include a replay to his guide of his opponent going for the Stephano roach max style: + Show Spoiler +
On July 18 2012 00:23 kcdc wrote: p00n, I think that if you're going to claim that you can hold a third against Stephano style roaches, you should post a few replays of you doing so. Right now, your guide has none which is a big problem for its credibility. Requirements for a qualifying replay:
-Zerg has at least 160 supply by 11:00 (with nearly perfect macro, this can be 200, but we'll give it some slack and require that they're merely macroing well).
-Zerg begins to attack by 11:30 or earlier.
-Zerg doesn't do anything clearly awful in terms of control like getting his whole army in a single vortex or standing his units still or not splitting his forces at all. Ideally, we'd want to see a game where Zerg controls well, including splitting forces threatening both the third and the natural, getting as few units caught in vortex as possible, and kiting effectively while continuing to produce reinforcements, but we'll lower our replay standards to just competent control.
If Zerg gets an infestation pit, a hydra den, a spire, or drops before attacking, don't pick that replay. That 3-base roach timing was watered down by extra tech.
Guy has 55 drones and 4 hatches at 8 mins and floods lings/roaches at me. I mess up dearly, but it is still fairly onesided.
Everyone who checked that replay, myself included, stood in unison that the Zerg player didn't live up to the criterias of what is known as the Stephano roach max style of play, as such I continued the theory crafting and put forward my view on the matter: vs. air play from toss while doing the Stephano roach style, you will find yourself in a situation where you have a growing army of roach/ling that can't do anything particularly useful in defending the air assault, so you might as well walk across the map checking out what the Toss is up to.
FataLe then told me, counter attacking isn't a standard response when seeing airplay, and the zerg isn't supposed to know what you are up to, so the fact that you don't have an army to defend vs 3 base aggresion isn't an issue with the 2base MS rush build. + Show Spoiler +
On August 30 2012 04:34 FataLe wrote: The problem with that is, the Z isn't supposed to know you're going charge/archon. For all he knows once he reaches your base you could have 4 gates worth of sentry stalker + more stargate units on the way. I mean, if Z wants to roll the dice and commit to an attack that he's not sure is going to do damage then that's okay. But it's definitely not the standard response to seeing a Stargate/Star units.
To back my claims up I checked Stephano's response (because it is his very strategy that we are dicussing vs OP's build) to airplay from Toss. In all those games I mentioned, Stephano went for the counter play to either deny a third, kill his opponent and just get general scouting information.
I claim that any such move from the zerg, vs OP's build would kill the Toss there and then.
Let me rephrase this: none of your evidence is relevant because they aren't replays of this style being used. The only thing that could possibly be relevant to this discussion is seeing a ~12 minute Roach Max attack against a fast mothership build. Without the mothership on the map, the game is 100% different. You can't simulate that kind of third defense; the only thing that acts that way is a mothership.
And if anything, the triple hatch Roach Max strategy belongs to DongRaeGu, not Stephano. He went further in more relevant tournaments than Stephano did, and both players used that style from about the same point in time.
well, found a thread related to what protoss are trying lately
I'm zerg btw, and when I see a gas greedy build like this the easy answer to it is just bane bust the wall for an easy win. I don't see how a toss can hold with just 1 gate and 1 or 2 air units, you need at least 3 sentries to stop it. Why I say gas greedy? well the protoss should play kind of safe adding some sentries or at least scouting first with zealot stalker ( this is also very risky versus a bane bust), this build skips this.
ways of knowing something is being gas greedy?, no upgrade on forge nor chronobusts on the core, only one zealo, very fast third or fourth gas, you poke with an overlord at natural and no sentry or stalkers pushes you back for example.
Do you have any replay where you stop a bane bust with this build?
prefably the 7:20 min bane bust by Zenio
Imo the build is as allinish as a bane bust since it cuts so many corners to tech heavily without units.
On August 30 2012 18:55 ineversmile wrote: Let me rephrase this: none of your evidence is relevant because they aren't replays of this style being used. The only thing that could possibly be relevant to this discussion is seeing a ~12 minute Roach Max attack against a fast mothership build. Without the mothership on the map, the game is 100% different. You can't simulate that kind of third defense; the only thing that acts that way is a mothership.
And if anything, the triple hatch Roach Max strategy belongs to DongRaeGu, not Stephano. He went further in more relevant tournaments than Stephano did, and both players used that style from about the same point in time.
My point being, in the scenario where we have a Stephano Roach max vs. 2 Base MS rush (where the Mothership pops out between 10:40 and 11:10 (from the replays OP provided)) Having scouted airplay and goes for an attack between the 10:00 and the 10:30, the Zerg should in theory, with next to no issues at all, be able to bust the front and do insurmountable damage before the MS even comes into play.
No I don't have concrete evidence of this claim in terms of a replay, and neither does OP as of yet. If OP can't find a practice partner at his skill level, I've already offered my help previously in this thread.
If there's a problem with bust timings, those specific timings can be adressed by rearranging the build order and figuring out what to scout for to see that coming. It doesn't matter if it's a Zenio-eque baneling bust off of 3 hatches or it's 2 base muta or a 12 minute Roach/Ling max-out; all aggression can be thwarted eventually with the right arrangements.
The way I see it? If you use Warp Prisms and proxy pylons around the edge of the map, you can get that same awesome surface area without a fast mothership by warping in chargelot flanks and getting surrounds. You don't need to bend over backwards to handle a roach max-out; you can do it with just chargelots, positioning, and a handful of ranged units.
When you say mutalisks are very annoying , do you mean an auto loss? If Zerg hits timing properly / scouts 1stargate or a fleet beacon, good mutalisk control , proper macro will shut this build down 100%, even if u do just get pheonix off 1 stargate, the void ray is going to prove pointless vs the mutalisks, only will do good vs roaches. When the mothership pops, it will have to wait for 100 energy, so bassically it will be pointless untill then, and even then you will need archons to be able to kill the mutalisk's, and if he controls mutalisks properly, and you miss 1 vortex, you should also auto lose...I'm sorry but this is not a legit build, it is a build where you cross you're fingers and hope for the best...interesting though.
On August 31 2012 02:54 GGzerG wrote: When you say mutalisks are very annoying , do you mean an auto loss? If Zerg hits timing properly / scouts 1stargate or a fleet beacon, good mutalisk control , proper macro will shut this build down 100%, even if u do just get pheonix off 1 stargate, the void ray is going to prove pointless vs the mutalisks, only will do good vs roaches. When the mothership pops, it will have to wait for 100 energy, so bassically it will be pointless untill then, and even then you will need archons to be able to kill the mutalisk's, and if he controls mutalisks properly, and you miss 1 vortex, you should also auto lose...I'm sorry but this is not a legit build, it is a build where you cross you're fingers and hope for the best...interesting though.
I have been a fan of your stream for a while (though I haven't watched it for a couple months or so) and I like the way you think about the game; I respect your opinion because I've seen your play on both sides of the match-up. However, I think that you're oversimplifying the situation drastically. If the protoss is in stargate tech, he is responsible for using his air units to figure out what's coming his way. Even without seeing the spire, the protoss should be able to deduce a spire by seeing things like a lot of speedlings with double evo or no infestation pit or no roaches/warren or a full 6 gases taken; even spine crawlers can be a tell. And even if it's not deduced, he should be able to narrow down the timings and at least have preparation if mutas are suspected.
If there's a suspicion of mutas, the proper response from stargate is to have an initial squad of 4-5 phoenixes on the map, to build a fleet beacon for range, and to go up to ~8 phoenixes to keep the mutas busy while you wait for range. That often means you cancel certain tech structures and upgrades in order to go straight for range. Fortunately, this build (fast mothership) already plans to get a fleet beacon, so you can get range even more quickly and not only solve the muta aggression, but even punish it because they can never move on the map again without some kind of help because one small active squad of phoenixes will tear them all to shreds.
Probably the reason why this build is considered an 'autoloss' to mutas is that:
1. The protoss isn't scouting properly using his stargate, so he doesn't have enough information at hand to narrow down the zerg's tech to mutas and maybe one or two other heavy-ling compositions. 2. The protoss isn't adapting to the situation and directly teching to phoenix range to solve the problem. 3. Phoenix against Muta is a volatile, micro-based fight and it's really easy to screw that up. But eventually, this problem won't be that common anymore, just like how protosses in the GSL used to screw up forcefields on narrow ramps all the time and die to 2Raxes...how often do they mess that up anymore? And to compound the issue, in PvZ the industry standard has generally been to use blink stalkers as the major core unit of your army, and the dynamic of Mutas vs Blink Stalkers is completely different from that of Mutas vs Phoenixes.
On August 31 2012 03:49 kmillz wrote: Still waiting for a replay of a competent zerg going 12 min roach max
I'm ~1k masters on NA. Right now I'm pretty exhausted and therefore not capable of playing starcraft worth a damn, but in 12+ hours or so, after I've slept, I'm willing to play this against the 12 min roach max, just so we can have some actual replays of it in this thread. I'll have to warm up a little bit with this build since I play a much more pressure-based tempo style in general (a lot of 13 gate openings), but I'm very accustomed to chargelots in PvZ so I can probably do the build some justice. At worst, we'll have replays of me getting smashed by the 12 min max, so we can analyze something tangible instead of theoretical nonsense. If a zerg wants to do this, shoot me a PM or hit me up on NA server. I'm ineversmile.950.
How will this build deal with a zerg that just do ling infestor? You cant really expect to establish a third with zerglings trying to stop it and if you show your mothership too early zerg can mass corruptors to stop you. Also, 11:30 roach max is outdated and doesnt even work most of the time anymore so if any zerg still attempt to go for it ESPECIALLY after seeing a void ray is just asking to lose imo.
On August 31 2012 05:00 phodacbiet wrote: How will this build deal with a zerg that just do ling infestor? You cant really expect to establish a third with zerglings trying to stop it and if you show your mothership too early zerg can mass corruptors to stop you. Also, 11:30 roach max is outdated and doesnt even work most of the time anymore so if any zerg still attempt to go for it ESPECIALLY after seeing a void ray is just asking to lose imo.
Why can't I take a third? I have +1 zealots and a mothership with charge almost ready. No amount of multi pronged attacks with lings would prove cost efficient for you at that stage of the game.
On August 31 2012 02:54 GGzerG wrote: When you say mutalisks are very annoying , do you mean an auto loss? If Zerg hits timing properly / scouts 1stargate or a fleet beacon, good mutalisk control , proper macro will shut this build down 100%, even if u do just get pheonix off 1 stargate, the void ray is going to prove pointless vs the mutalisks, only will do good vs roaches. When the mothership pops, it will have to wait for 100 energy, so bassically it will be pointless untill then, and even then you will need archons to be able to kill the mutalisk's, and if he controls mutalisks properly, and you miss 1 vortex, you should also auto lose...I'm sorry but this is not a legit build, it is a build where you cross you're fingers and hope for the best...interesting though.
Nope, not really. With this build you'll more than likely scout muta 90% of the time. If I scout it I have archons, charge, pheonix. That means I have templar tech. I wait 'till storm and push to win. At least, that's from my experience facing muta. Most Zergs don't even want to stick with muta once they see such an early templar archives, but a one that does is signing his own death sentence imo.
On August 30 2012 20:36 Nakranoth wrote: well, found a thread related to what protoss are trying lately
I'm zerg btw, and when I see a gas greedy build like this the easy answer to it is just bane bust the wall for an easy win. I don't see how a toss can hold with just 1 gate and 1 or 2 air units, you need at least 3 sentries to stop it. Why I say gas greedy? well the protoss should play kind of safe adding some sentries or at least scouting first with zealot stalker ( this is also very risky versus a bane bust), this build skips this.
ways of knowing something is being gas greedy?, no upgrade on forge nor chronobusts on the core, only one zealo, very fast third or fourth gas, you poke with an overlord at natural and no sentry or stalkers pushes you back for example.
Do you have any replay where you stop a bane bust with this build?
prefably the 7:20 min bane bust by Zenio
Imo the build is as allinish as a bane bust since it cuts so many corners to tech heavily without units.
let me check timings and i'll get back to you on this
On August 30 2012 20:36 Nakranoth wrote: well, found a thread related to what protoss are trying lately
I'm zerg btw, and when I see a gas greedy build like this the easy answer to it is just bane bust the wall for an easy win. I don't see how a toss can hold with just 1 gate and 1 or 2 air units, you need at least 3 sentries to stop it. Why I say gas greedy? well the protoss should play kind of safe adding some sentries or at least scouting first with zealot stalker ( this is also very risky versus a bane bust), this build skips this.
ways of knowing something is being gas greedy?, no upgrade on forge nor chronobusts on the core, only one zealo, very fast third or fourth gas, you poke with an overlord at natural and no sentry or stalkers pushes you back for example.
Do you have any replay where you stop a bane bust with this build?
prefably the 7:20 min bane bust by Zenio
Imo the build is as allinish as a bane bust since it cuts so many corners to tech heavily without units.
let me check timings and i'll get back to you on this
only possible way to defend this i think is to go zealot sentry sentry. instead of zealot stalker sentry. but it would delay tech considerably. I suppose the only time i'd do that is if i scouted th gas as there is no other tell that they're being aggressive (aside from ling count if I get lucky scout). Or possibly drone count.
any two base all in like the roach ling bust or baneling bust will require specific reaction from the protoss player no matter what build they are doing.
as long as you have the means to scout it, you can stop it.
The OP already mentions it:
I recommend chronoboosting a zealot or keeping your scouting probe alive to check for the zerg's 3rd base. Remember that some 2base all-ins can be quite difficult to hold if you don't scout them in time, and you don't wanna get caught with just one cannon and a sentry now do you? If you see him 2-basing you may wanna spend an extra chrono on your gateway, create an extra cannon, create an extra sentry... you know the drill, seeing as the FFE is a very dominant PvZ opening I assume you know these basics so I won't really get into them.
zenio's bust is much harder to scout. you pretty much need to check the 3rd and sneak into the natural to get the drone count. If you see it, you chrono sentries, add cannons, and reinforce the wall. etc etc. it's not unique for this build at all.
On August 31 2012 03:49 kmillz wrote: Still waiting for a replay of a competent zerg going 12 min roach max
Here are the replays of me testing it out with Ineversmile. We were testing it vs the 200 roach max build. (I think mutas will demolish this build or any sort of early agression since 1g sg is extremely greedy.
Although I managed to beat him with it, I do not suggest doing the roach max vs this build, not because of the mothership, but because of the stargate.
Anytime a toss 1 gate stargate means he will try to get fast third or do some sort of cute all in. With the stargate toss has ALL the map control since Zerg AA is pretty bad in the early/mid game. Behind the 1sg, toss usually can put down a robo to take the third (which is what a lot of them do vs me), meaning by the time your roach attack hits, FF + Immortals will demolish it. I also think the mother ship is not needed since Robo is cheaper and it serve the same function as the mother ship which is to protect the third.
If anything, this build is a gimmicky build that is good in a BoX or vs random people on ladder because it might catches people off guard, but do not expect this to be a go to macro build that will win based on your own play. This build relies on your opponent fucking up, not you successfully executing. Expecting a vortex to hit clumped up broods relies on zerg not splitting.
http://drop.sc/245031 In this first game, i think he just messed up and died. Nothing special.
http://drop.sc/245032 He did better this game, but roaches can run around and abuse the immobility of this build.
In my opinion, this build WILL work, but it is not a good go to macro build. I believe this is what the OP wanted people to see this build as, a good build to use in tourneys/ladder, but dont expect it to work more than once in a BoX.
If anyone want to test this build more vs me just hit me up.
Was the second game clean execution of the build? He started the templar archives when you started attacking, but he could have started it much earlier (floated gas for a while) and having archons in the fight would of course make a difference. Twilight finished at 9:15, but he started the archives at 11:30. Also he didn't consistently chronoboost the mothership, and one of the nexus was sitting at 100 energy. I counted two chronoboosts on the mothership instead of ... six or seven? I don't know exactly how many, but he had more available. An earlier vortex would have made things better for him.
In the first game he comments that his 3rd was too far behind, but in reality he couldn't take it earlier because of those zerglings. In the second game he gets the 3rd base, but 1 void ray, 1 zelaot and 1 sentry can't hold a nexus against zerglings, especially on one gate, before warpgate even finishes. I think the 7:30 third relies too much on luck if you don't have any gateways.
At worst, we'll have replays of me getting smashed by the 12 min max, so we can analyze something tangible instead of theoretical nonsense
On September 01 2012 03:45 Oboeman wrote: Was the second game clean execution of the build? He started the templar archives when you started attacking, but he could have started it much earlier (floated gas for a while) and having archons in the fight would of course make a difference. Twilight finished at 9:15, but he started the archives at 11:30. Also he didn't consistently chronoboost the mothership, and one of the nexus was sitting at 100 energy. I counted two chronoboosts on the mothership instead of ... six or seven? I don't know exactly how many, but he had more available. An earlier vortex would have made things better for him.
No, it wasn't clean at all. I'm too accustomed to opening 13 gate pressure into Nexus and having an actual army to take down the rocks, so reverting to FFE meant I botched a couple practice games (there was one or two more than the replays posted) because of rust. It's not that I don't know how to do a bunch of different FFE variants; I'm just used to different timings and I'm not used to needing to leave a gap in my wall-off so I can take my third without killing rocks (which takes forever). There was a game where I straight-up thought I built a twilight council in time to start +2 when it finished, and then when I went to upgrade +2, apparantly I had no council and we had to remake. It's not like I have bad macro, but I just haven't used the build in a few months because I want to be out on the map applying pressure and not turtling my face off. That's why I announced how much I hate this build at the end of the game; I'm not a fan of opening FFE and playing defensive because it's completely unnatural to my playstyle and to my understanding of how to fight against zerg (as any race).
I did, however, want to show that you could hold the third against a Roach max, if you just play a dozen practice games. That second game was maybe the 4th game we played last night, and I'm pretty sure that if I had built a different sim-city at my third and had an earlier mothership, I would have held that, gone to 200 food and 15 gates, and just killed the zerg. I botched the defense and let lings in everywhere, but that wasn't the build order...that was me being unomfortable because I'm used to having about 20ish 2-2 chargelots and a couple of immortals at that point, instead of the mothership.
In the first game he comments that his 3rd was too far behind, but in reality he couldn't take it earlier because of those zerglings. In the second game he gets the 3rd base, but 1 void ray, 1 zelaot and 1 sentry can't hold a nexus against zerglings, especially on one gate, before warpgate even finishes. I think the 7:30 third relies too much on luck if you don't have any gateways.
You can take a fast third and then cancel it if a bunch of speedlings get made and show up at your third. If it's only 10 or less lings, though, a couple zealots and a void ray can handle the problem just fine. If a bigger commitment shows up, you're only out 100 minerals and you can dump the 300 refund right into 2 gateways and have a transition. It's not that you're banking on the third completing; it's more like you ask the zerg to stop it, and if he does, the commitment is greater than your commitment a majority of the time.
At worst, we'll have replays of me getting smashed by the 12 min max, so we can analyze something tangible instead of theoretical nonsense
This is definitely more tangible
Good. I'm glad there's some kind of replay to this thread. Now maybe someone who cares about this build can show a prettier execution and hold the third in a replay...I just can't stand playing this defensively, and I think the army composition can be relevant without a gimmicky fast mothership. But the gimmick opening holds a blind 12minute roach max; it's just stupid for a zerg to do that attack in the first place because if the protoss isn't ultra-rusty with the build, he's going to demolish the roaches. The key here is that you can trade all day long with Zealots, unlike with Stalkers. That's the power of the unit.
On September 01 2012 03:45 Oboeman wrote: Was the second game clean execution of the build? He started the templar archives when you started attacking, but he could have started it much earlier (floated gas for a while) and having archons in the fight would of course make a difference. Twilight finished at 9:15, but he started the archives at 11:30. Also he didn't consistently chronoboost the mothership, and one of the nexus was sitting at 100 energy. I counted two chronoboosts on the mothership instead of ... six or seven? I don't know exactly how many, but he had more available. An earlier vortex would have made things better for him.
I do not think it was a clean execution and there are tiny things he could have done better. I do believe that it is possible to hold with this build because a cloaked third with cannons/zealots would be hard to bust with roaches especially on maps where nat and third are close to each other (ohana, antiga, etc). However, I am just testing out the 200 roach build vs. the mothership because people wanted to see if you can bust down the toss. It is doable, just VERY hard if the toss execute his build order correctly. Also, like i mentioned in my other post earlier, going roach max vs a Stargate opening is also quite dumb because if toss put down a robo and take fast third, roach max will lose.
On August 31 2012 03:49 kmillz wrote: Still waiting for a replay of a competent zerg going 12 min roach max
Here are the replays of me testing it out with Ineversmile. We were testing it vs the 200 roach max build. (I think mutas will demolish this build or any sort of early agression since 1g sg is extremely greedy.
Although I managed to beat him with it, I do not suggest doing the roach max vs this build, not because of the mothership, but because of the stargate.
Anytime a toss 1 gate stargate means he will try to get fast third or do some sort of cute all in. With the stargate toss has ALL the map control since Zerg AA is pretty bad in the early/mid game. Behind the 1sg, toss usually can put down a robo to take the third (which is what a lot of them do vs me), meaning by the time your roach attack hits, FF + Immortals will demolish it. I also think the mother ship is not needed since Robo is cheaper and it serve the same function as the mother ship which is to protect the third.
If anything, this build is a gimmicky build that is good in a BoX or vs random people on ladder because it might catches people off guard, but do not expect this to be a go to macro build that will win based on your own play. This build relies on your opponent fucking up, not you successfully executing. Expecting a vortex to hit clumped up broods relies on zerg not splitting.
http://drop.sc/245031 In this first game, i think he just messed up and died. Nothing special.
http://drop.sc/245032 He did better this game, but roaches can run around and abuse the immobility of this build.
In my opinion, this build WILL work, but it is not a good go to macro build. I believe this is what the OP wanted people to see this build as, a good build to use in tourneys/ladder, but dont expect it to work more than once in a BoX.
If anyone want to test this build more vs me just hit me up.
Hit the nail on the fucking head.
People keep coming into this thread and yelling nonsense, 'oh this loses to X' or 'this isn't a real build' or 'this wouldn't work at the pro level'
This is a guide to easy wins on ladder in PvZ. OP boasts a 92% winrate, as ludicrous as it sounds mine is closer to 95%. This was never about will this work over and over again, or pro level competition. This was about EZ fucking wins, and this does just that - Giving you an absurd win-rate with little effort applied at all. Sure, the build as flaws what build doesn't? But up until around tip top Masters you'll enjoy a 90% winrate. Who doesn't want that? Oh, and for the record, most Zergs I face over and over don't manage to compete with it until about the 4th try. So it is re-usable, albeit until you face better players.
Looks to me like a simple mothership rush with a little refining. Yeah I'm sure this could get a lot of simple wins, but I feel the wins come strictly from the surprise of the build and relying on your opponent making mistakes. I think I'll give it a pass, I feel it'd be better to practice standard play then to do something gimmicky. Not that I think this build sucks, it's just not something I want to get accustomed to using.
At first I struggled with 3 base muta, but the key is actually to just keep making archons. Try to get 2 archons in every base; they will kill mutas in an AOE in 2 hits. If he stays on mutas and gets a really big flock you might need some more, but early on 2 or 3 works great. All you need to do is warp in a round of stalkers when he swings in to tank some damage and scare him off before he can burn through the archon's shields, and move the rest of your anti air to his closest other target in case he is dumb and tries to press his attack instead of backing off. You can trade amazingly efficiently this way. This has been working much better for me than my old tactic of getting blink and some pheonixes, I feel much safer with just some spread out archons, and they are more useful late game. Mass all the rest of your army by your exposed expansion, and start doing warp prism prism drops, and make sure you always have 6 or so warp gates available to warp in when his mutas come knocking.
If he never transitions out of mutas, build cannons and get storm before you move out. 90% of the time he will just end up trading his mutas inefficiently after trying to harass for a bit in order to open up supply (or due to making a mistake and getting fried by archons).
Edit: The warp prism usually makes his mutas leave and kill it, giving you breathing room, and warping in zealots often lets you snipe a 4th hatch if he is trying to take one. The prism will probably die. Don't carry units in it, just warp in when you get there because it may get sniped while moving out if you lose track of the mutas - so in the worst case you will lose 200 mins.
I'm a gold level player and I've had so many wins with this build it's ridiculous. Just tonight I took a diamond player apart piece by piece after getting to 4 base gas. All I need now is a build like this for PvT and PvP!
1800 pt. toss here, this build has been working really well for me. What I normally try to do though is I turtle on about 2 base until around the 14 minute mark, and then take my third. I also get more warp-gates, about 11-12 on 2 bases. I believe a Protoss here in this thread showcased this vs. GoSuOstojiy. That variation alone has caused me to win a lot of games with this build. I also find that the harder you delay the zerg whilst executing this build; the better -- reason being, you are teching quite hard (archons, zealots, mothership), delaying the potential roach max helps so much in achieving success with this, i.e. I often do a stalker/zealot poke to force more fighting units, perhaps I will get 1-2 more void-rays to pressure the zerg harder and kill more. I also often commit really hard to killing stray overlords, and sometimes I even put the 2-3 voidrays behind their mineral line and kill like 4-5 drones. Everything counts towards delaying the roach max that many people are having trouble with. I feel like once you're maxed on heavy archon/zealot/mothership, nothing can really stop you as long as you engage well. (Perhaps a baneling toilet, but archons fare very well vs banelings + you can get a scout off on that, and get high templar with storm as mentioned in the OP's post.)
Seems like it works pretty well on diamond league. I like to keep building voidrays (up to 10 with upgraded weapons) because they are so effective against corruptors and broodlords. It's so satisfying when they come to raze your third and they don't see anything apart from a mothership ready to vortex :D Ty!
I gotta say when I saw this build I was skeptical, but after trying it 15 or so times, and winning all but one of those games, I'd say it works. Sometimes it works better than others, but it almost always works.
Usually, when I move out, the zerg has mass infestor/broodlord. The zergs typically try to counter this by throwing the mass infested terran into the vortex with the archons, but since I still have zlots going into it, the the infested terran AI auto targets the zlots, preventing the archons from taking damage for the initial phase, which allows the archons to deal massive splash with little to no losses. Anyway, I usually lose almost all zlots in the first engagement and I also don't have any more energy for vortex, which is why I usually try to follow this up by adding about 12-15 stalkers with blink to replace zlots to counter any left over broodlords.
Here's why in my opinion this is a much more effect than a mass stalker + colls + mothership (usually with a couple archons).
1) This build allows you to get out so many more archons than complementing a colls/stalker ball normally allows (12-15 archons typically at least) And the thing is that when you've got 10+ archons going into a vortex, unless they have mass banelings + mass roaches in the vortex, everything, and I mean, everything is going to die in the first two zaps coming out of the vortex.
2) Archon toilets with only stalkers/colls/couple archons aren't scary for zergs (aside from the fact that they can split the zerg army). Without 6+ archons + zlots to tank going into the toilet, there just isn't as much splash damage coming out and archons die too easily without zlots to tank damage while they deal damage.
I theorize that the best zlot/archon/vortex counter would be mass baneling/roach because the banes immediately deal with the zlots, which means that the archons no longer have the zlots to tank for them, which makes you trade roaches for archons, instead of for zlots. And pure roach does okay agaginst pure archon (mediocre trade for both, but since roaches are cheaper...) Any zergs want to test this out?
I'll post a game; I'm in diamond so I hope it is helpful for you. The fast 3rd is my favorite part of this build, I think it is very solid and should be taken as long as he is on 3 or more bases. Make sure to deny vision.
As I've been moving up the ladder I have been transitioning into doing more warp prism drops. Also, I like attacking at about 150 food (instead of 200), as this is usually before he gets hive tech and there is absolutely nothing your army can't roll over (Some good zergs can manage to nullify my mothership and then use properly positioned broodlord infestor roach armies to kill zlot archon late game. These are usually my only late game losses).
Description of the game:
Zerg goes 3 base into muta agression; protoss mothership rushes into zealot archon. Mutas are defended, protoss then transitions into warpprism harass with zealots and 2 big pushes at the front (in one of these pushes protoss loses their entire army; but hurts Z so bad that it is not really a problem). After several trades, the zerg is picked apart, loses his bases and his greater spire while it is morphing. Protoss wins.
If I (protoss) had been better, I would have taken a 4th (and potentially 5th) and cannons to defend while harassing then added on more gateways and a second forge (or added stargates and gotten carrier upgrades). I have ridiculous amounts of money late game for no real reason, I could have used more production and upgrades. Also, the prism harass could have been mirco'd better and I should have seen (and killed) the bottom base.
If zerg had been better he would have kept his mutas alive and harassing for a lot longer, defended the multi pronged attacks more elegantly and put his greater spire somewhere better defended and not so obvious. Also, a neural parasite on the mothership would have really helped him out if he could pull it off, he clearly researched it for this purpose but was never able to use it.
1) If you move to 3 basing, you need to keep that void ray alive (be much more defensive with it). It can help a lot against early roach pressure.
2) Scout that 3rd by 5:30 or so, if he is 2 base all-in you need to know ASAP.
3) leave a wall off at your natural, just warp in the archons outside your nat (unless he gets mutas). Having that wall helps prevent zergling runbuys later in the game. If he had decided to send in 50 lings at any point after you moved out, your base would have been screwed (or at least all the probes and tech he wanted to pick off)
4) If he is going kinda infestor heavy, leaving a few unmorphed templar can be very useful, just feedback the infestors and then morph.
I am in diamond league, and my opponent scouted, and rushed broodlords without infestors. This is the result :D (sorry I couldn't figure out how to put the photo on this post, please check out the link, will not disappoint)
Can we have some replays of that strategy please? I would like to use it on Europe server. I hope that it will work for me :D Hmm A question please, the compo is mainly of Zealot Archon ? no stalker? Should we add some Void Ray ?
What do you do against Fungal? Fungal deny the Spell of Vortex... and what about Mind Control ?
I played against this yesterday and I recognized it and thought I was ready. Except the guy NEVER attacked. It's the most frustrating shit ever to have basically the entire map, endless resources, and have this guy crawling over the map with cannons, mothership, templar, archons for 30 minutes.
If you don't mind long games as P try this. Definitely takes almost no control, macro, or anything, just patience.
On November 03 2012 21:30 zatic wrote: I played against this yesterday and I recognized it and thought I was ready. Except the guy NEVER attacked. It's the most frustrating shit ever to have basically the entire map, endless resources, and have this guy crawling over the map with cannons, mothership, templar, archons for 30 minutes.
If you don't mind long games as P try this. Definitely takes almost no control, macro, or anything, just patience.
(1) Now you know how much it sucks to play against a passive Zerg that makes 70 spines and waits for 3/3/3 and 3/3 air upgrades before a-moving to victory.
(2) Next time, just send some corruptor hit squads after the mothership. If you have spines, infestors and endless resources, you can afford to throw away 10 or 20 or 30 corruptors to kill the mothership. It's not cost-efficient, but once the mothership is dead, you have a nice long window where your army is invincible.
On November 04 2012 02:41 kcdc wrote: (2) Next time, just send some corruptor hit squads after the mothership. If you have spines, infestors and endless resources, you can afford to throw away 10 or 20 or 30 corruptors to kill the mothership. It's not cost-efficient, but once the mothership is dead, you have a nice long window where your army is invincible.
This is the thing most people do against this build, and also the thing you should never do. Mothership should be hidden behind mass archons, canons, and if this fails there is still "oh shit" button aka vortex. So no point to waste gass and minerals like that. It's better to make drops or something.
On November 04 2012 02:41 kcdc wrote: (2) Next time, just send some corruptor hit squads after the mothership. If you have spines, infestors and endless resources, you can afford to throw away 10 or 20 or 30 corruptors to kill the mothership. It's not cost-efficient, but once the mothership is dead, you have a nice long window where your army is invincible.
This is the thing most people do against this build, and also the thing you should never do. Mothership should be hidden behind mass archons, canons, and if this fails there is still "oh shit" button aka vortex. So no point to waste gass and minerals like that. It's better to make drops or something.
Do the corruptor snipe before P has mass archons and cannons.
I do a similar build, but I drop a second star with my fleet beacon, and build about 8-10 voidrays after I start the Mothership. Voidrays are needed IMO if the Zerg spots the third and pumps out a wave of speedlings before the Mothership completes. Plus they do a very good job defending the Mothership from corrupters should an opponent try a Mothership dive. Masters player here btw. But the concept is still something I love. Feels like P needs a metagame transition against Zerg.
On November 06 2012 03:41 Wingblade wrote: I do a similar build, but I drop a second star with my fleet beacon, and build about 8-10 voidrays after I start the Mothership. Voidrays are needed IMO if the Zerg spots the third and pumps out a wave of speedlings before the Mothership completes. Plus they do a very good job defending the Mothership from corrupters should an opponent try a Mothership dive. Masters player here btw. But the concept is still something I love. Feels like P needs a metagame transition against Zerg.
It takes ages to kill zerlings with voids. Why not zelots if you need them anyway? And roach attacks is what kill this build, not speed lings :p
EDIT: UP, you need to watch it in game :p Like other replays.
On November 06 2012 08:36 freizya wrote: how do i watch the replay? when i try opening it on windows media player it says file wont work
You can watch replays by putting them in the documents/starcraft2/youraccountname.charactercode/replays/multiplayer folder and opening them inside sc2; click on the camera button to see all the replays you have saved.
On November 06 2012 10:49 Day9notdead wrote: I see what Finale was thinking "Hyun makes a ton of broodlords so if I just make mass voids I willl win, right? ... right??"
On November 06 2012 10:49 Day9notdead wrote: I see what Finale was thinking "Hyun makes a ton of broodlords so if I just make mass voids I willl win, right? ... right??"
right..
Lol, I can't believe that worked...I can't even remember a recent PvZ where they went mass void rays and won. I actually felt a bit bad for Finale, I felt he has the right builds/ideas to win in his first two games but got caught horribly out of position in one, and let 123129346234513 lings into his base on the other...It was nice to see a P win vs a Z in the late game when the Z has time/money to build his army of choice though, Finale gave us a few good games.
On topic: I tried this build last night and it worked hilariously well. A-moved into a horde of infestor broodlord with hydra support...I killed his whole army without losing a single archon and only used one vortex...backed up to build new zealots to finish off his reinforcements/spines and he quits with no gg, lol.
I executed horribly during the tech up phase and was slow on mothership because of an an early ling run by attempt i had to gateway block which threw me off a bit.....but it showed the power of the composition of chargelot/archon mothership.
I'd been using the immortal/sentry all-in as my go to build versus zerg, but I think I'm going to switch to this. There's something kinda therapeudic about macroing hard to make this huge army, then clicking 1-A.... then taking your hards off the keyboard until vortex is needed, lol. I got to just sit there with a little half-smirk watching his cute little infested terran exploding almost before they're hatched.
I think next time I'm going to get a second forge up and running once I take my third. I feel like having 3/3/3 instead of 3/0/3 would make this even more hilarious.
Some builds are positionally solid, others are not. This one is not. I attempted this build exact as written about eight times and it seems to need an extreme allotment of blind-faith when you throw down your fleet beacon that you won't be attacked. You dont have resources for Sentry to block ramp and the general 'feel' of when your playing is that something is fishy. It's not aggressive, it's scouted at 6:00 minute (good Zerg's will float them in before the fastest Void) overlord float-by and the response is fairly accurate from my opponents. Either your getting attack by Roaches at 11-12 min's, which is possible to hold off but certainly not positionally sound, or your being countered perfectly due to this builds inherent nature. People are smart.
I mean its not a bad build, but not solid.
Zerg seem to be more adept at having correct responses in that that have been constantly conditioned to be the most accurate in a response, and this was figured out pretty well by my opponent Zerg. Yes, you need a ridiculous amount of corruptors, but you know what? They had enough corruptors cause this build is extremely fishy ... 5/10.
I'm glad others have had success with it cause I haven't in GM!
On November 06 2012 10:49 Day9notdead wrote: I see what Finale was thinking "Hyun makes a ton of broodlords so if I just make mass voids I willl win, right? ... right??"
right..
Lol, I can't believe that worked...I can't even remember a recent PvZ where they went mass void rays and won. I actually felt a bit bad for Finale, I felt he has the right builds/ideas to win in his first two games but got caught horribly out of position in one, and let 123129346234513 lings into his base on the other...It was nice to see a P win vs a Z in the late game when the Z has time/money to build his army of choice though, Finale gave us a few good games.
On topic: I tried this build last night and it worked hilariously well. A-moved into a horde of infestor broodlord with hydra support...I killed his whole army without losing a single archon and only used one vortex...backed up to build new zealots to finish off his reinforcements/spines and he quits with no gg, lol.
I executed horribly during the tech up phase and was slow on mothership because of an an early ling run by attempt i had to gateway block which threw me off a bit.....but it showed the power of the composition of chargelot/archon mothership.
I'd been using the immortal/sentry all-in as my go to build versus zerg, but I think I'm going to switch to this. There's something kinda therapeudic about macroing hard to make this huge army, then clicking 1-A.... then taking your hards off the keyboard until vortex is needed, lol. I got to just sit there with a little half-smirk watching his cute little infested terran exploding almost before they're hatched.
I think next time I'm going to get a second forge up and running once I take my third. I feel like having 3/3/3 instead of 3/0/3 would make this even more hilarious.
Cheers,
Ramone
Armor won't give you that much, you main units are archons, and for them shield upgrade is far better. So no point to waste a lot of gass, better make storm/more archons. And you won't have 3 shield also. This build needs to hit before or when the first broodlords are comming. Other way it's just not possible to make it though all those broodlings and fungals. Vortex has low range, and zerg won't let you to use it on brood lords, and your zelot archons combo won't pass broodlings. That's why you can't wait with it, you need to make a timing attack, so upgrades are less important.
Love the build, I got a lot of wins with it in WoL! But wondering now, if you have a variant that is viable in HotS? Feel like this build was gimped to the maximum when they removed vortex.
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/ZFlPn.jpg)
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