|
United States8477 Posts
On September 16 2012 11:14 Salient wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2012 11:11 monk. wrote:On September 12 2012 09:28 monk. wrote:On September 12 2012 09:01 Havik_ wrote:
Is this considered a better, safer macro build than the two base Colossus attacks everyone has been doing?? I like the idea of going Templar instead of Colossus, but it doesn't look as good on paper. Two base colossi attacks are neither safe nor macro builds. Colossi openings and templar openings all have their unique advantages and disadvantage. Neither style is considered better than the other. I will tell you that out of all PvT openings, this, the CreatorPrime openings, and fast colossi into double forge are the three most used in the pro scene. I also believe, they're three of the most stable and "safe". Maybe I misunderstand, but isn't this a high templar opening? I'm talking about the PartinG build with the huge gateway attack at 8-10 minutes--sometimes off of a double expand.
Well, this is a gateway-based build that Parting, a Startale Protoss, uses. You should have been more specific. The Parting 3 nexus build that you're talking about is not that solid, as it has at least 2 solid bo counters. First is a 4+ rax rally of marines after 1 rax CC. You'll notice however that Parting most often does this build on maps where no gas marine rallies are generally bad on against normal builds. This includes Daybreak, Cloud Kingdom, and Metropolis.
The second weakness is again 1 rax CC into cloaked banshee into siege tanks for defense. See Gumiho vs Parting on Metropolis in their GSL game for an example of this.
|
Thank you, Monk  . I called the build "the PartinG Gateway Style" because that's how Day[9] referred to it in his Daily (450). I can see how the question was confusing since this build is also gateway-based and has been made famous by the StarTale protoss players including PartinG. Thanks again for your answer. I'll steer away from the style in Daily 450, and stick to one of the safer builds you mentioned.
|
That double expand 8 gate build isn't very good in my opinion. If T holds, you have a good economy, but you're on gateway tech against MMM which means you're most likely going to take big damage or straight up lose. Timing attacks where you likely lose if they don't work are fine, but IMO, if you're going to do an all-in, you should make it as strong as it can be, and the double expand slows the attack down to the point that T has medivacs and stim. It winds up being a tweener build that's almost all in, but without the strength of a true all in.
|
On September 17 2012 00:47 kcdc wrote:
That double expand 8 gate build isn't very good in my opinion. If T holds, you have a good economy, but you're on gateway tech against MMM which means you're most likely going to take big damage or straight up lose. Timing attacks where you likely lose if they don't work are fine, but IMO, if you're going to do an all-in, you should make it as strong as it can be, and the double expand slows the attack down to the point that T has medivacs and stim. It winds up being a tweener build that's almost all in, but without the strength of a true all in.
its a very economical timing attack which is nearly as strong as a gate attack off of 2 base....
|
Italy12248 Posts
I believe that might be why the 8gate followup was kind of dropped out by the P players doing the 3 nexus build lately, in favour for faster twilight tech and charge or blink, much like iamke55 does in his gateway pressure->third thread. If you can just defend with your massive gateway production, it's somewhat silly to risk your sentries and energy. Sure the attack is strong, but if you want to do something like that i'd also rather do a really fast 2base 6gate that can hit a full minute faster, before medivacs and potentially even stim.
I think the whole "parting gateway style" thing is more of a mid/lategame playstyle than a build. Parting wants to get to 3 bases with storm and lots of gateways a lot of the time. If he can get there with a double expand because either the map favours it (say Atlantis Spaceship) or he knows he plays someone really standard and passive, he'll do the 3 nex opening, if he wants to play it safer he'll do this or a fake colossus (as in, one colo with no range)->templar instead. Eventually both builds can kind of converge to the same mid/lategame point where you have good upgrades and lots of gateway units and storm: you can actually max in around 15 minutes with this build on pure gateway units, which is kind of nice since around that time a lot of terrans try to play aggressively with 2/2.
|
On September 17 2012 02:03 Teoita wrote:
I believe that might be why the 8gate followup was kind of dropped out by the P players doing the 3 nexus build lately, in favour for faster twilight tech and charge or blink, much like iamke55 does in his gateway pressure->third thread. If you can just defend with your massive gateway production, it's somewhat silly to risk your sentries and energy. Sure the attack is strong, but if you want to do something like that i'd also rather do a really fast 2base 6gate that can hit a full minute faster, before medivacs and potentially even stim.
Agreed. It's strong to try win early with a bunch of warpgates and forcefields, and it's strong to take a fast third and use some tech and upgrades to defend against medivacs. But if you split the difference, you wind up with an attack that's weaker than the former option and a defense that's weaker than the latter.
I'd much rather have 5 gate production and solid tech to defend medivacs than 8 gate production and no tech.
|
I have been having some pretty good success using this strategy, but my execution still feels sloppy. Would anyone be able to kindly link me to the early game build order? Typically I just do 3 gates then a robo before expanding, but don't know what situations would dictate that I should do something different from this. What are some things to look for to changing this plan? Such as double gas vs 1 gas vs no gas terran and also the rax count.
|
Italy12248 Posts
As i posted, any macro opening will do if your opponent is also opening with a macro oriented opening. Executing the midgame build (6.30 forge, 7.30 twilight etc) against a terran opening gas can be outright suicide against a one base allin as you will invest too much into useless tech that will not pay off in time.
In terms of openings, here's two solid 1gate fe guides; they both work really well vs pretty much any terran opening:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=319339
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=294136 (cut the second stalker for a faster nexus vs gasless and chrono probes hardcore, i do this in my replays i think)
If you scout gassless expand or cc first, you can copy PartinG's exact opening from the replay i attached in the guide: cut out the zealot, stalker and third pylon and get a nexus up at 20 supply. Make sure to not let an SCV eng bay block you though.
Against any gas openings you can't tech as fast as this build does. I honestly don't know how good going for a build like this is in that situation, as if you open 1gate fe it's going to be hard to have a good read on what the terran is doing and you are forced to play defensive and potentially tech to colossus in case of a 1/1/1 allin, if you can get away with it. If you try to open with something ridicolously safe like 2gate obs expand, you might still kind of transition into this build by following similar timings: get a forge and twilight council when it's safe to do so (you see a cc at his nat) and go into the usual 5->7 gateway pattern. Here's a replay of me trying it out, notice how heavily delayed everything i do is http://drop.sc/253836. That said i'm terribad at playing vs gas openings, i'd like to hear from someone like kcdc how to transition more safely into templar play in that situation.
|
This build also works great with a forge fast expand on maps where its viable!!
|
On September 17 2012 07:54 Teoita wrote:Against any gas openings you can't tech as fast as this build does. I honestly don't know how good going for a build like this is in that situation, as if you open 1gate fe it's going to be hard to have a good read on what the terran is doing and you are forced to play defensive and potentially tech to colossus in case of a 1/1/1 allin, if you can get away with it. If you try to open with something ridicolously safe like 2gate obs expand, you might still kind of transition into this build by following similar timings: get a forge and twilight council when it's safe to do so (you see a cc at his nat) and go into the usual 5->7 gateway pattern. Here's a replay of me trying it out, notice how heavily delayed everything i do is http://drop.sc/253836. That said i'm terribad at playing vs gas openings, i'd like to hear from someone like kcdc how to transition more safely into templar play in that situation.
I open 1 gate FE every game vs T, including against gas openings. As for how to transition against a gas opening, it really depends on the opening and what you're able to scout.
You might be able to sacrifice a zealot to see whether he's done a marauder or reactor marine expand. If you confirm that it's one of those builds, you're gonna be fine with this ST 2-base templar play. Bear in mind that the earlier gas can speed up his medivac timing, but less minerals will mean a smaller push.
If you wait for your obs to scout T, I don't think you want to go templar before taking your third. There's a good chance that T will be preparing an all-in, in which case you obviously don't want to tech templar. If it's an expand build that you just scouted really late, I'd plan to get templar after you get colossi, forges, a third in some order.
|
Italy12248 Posts
That's the problem i have vs gas openings. I am not really confortable with colossus openings, and a lot of the time i feel like i'm completely winging it and trying to tech up either too fast or too slowly.
The thing that annoys me the most though is cloak banshee into ridicolous greed like 3 cc double eng bay and almost no bio units for a long time. I'm sitting there terrorzied by a 1/1/1 allin, cutting probes and all and when my obs gets there he's got all this econ and tech up and i have nothing to threaten it. It drives me insane. Stuff like that is actually why i have been messing around with faster obs openings lately, at least i could still transition into this build which im really confortable with vs a 2rax opening.
|
Thanks for the write-up, Teoita! I enjoy partaking in an aggressive zealot/archon/high templar style while flanking with high templar -- similar to the likes of STPartinG. I find that although they may have ghosts to combat my high templar -- my flanks on the high ground with high templar shred their army to pieces. During all this aggression, I secure more bases and tech to double robo colossus which lets me get the unbeatable deathball.
As previously stated, I enjoy this style as it allows me to be active on the map, to sometimes decide games extremely early in the mid-game if the terran plays greedy, or makes a mistake.
Additionally, I feel like incorporating a warp prism with high templar is an extremely strong tactic. If they have ghosts on the field, that is already a large amount of gas invested into ghost tech -- thus, no vikings can snipe it as if they do have vikings, they have far too little army.
Again, thank you for the write up!
|
I love this guide...It blows my mind how freaking good HT are versus Terran.
|
Did anyone watch game 1 of Rain vs. Taeja today? Rain did something similar to this style, but I think he got his Twilight up earlier and started Charge immediately, I'm guessing in order to have it ready at 10 minutes. He also never made any additional stalkers and did fine against drops nontheless. I'd like to analyze the game, but I can't watch it...
|
Italy12248 Posts
The builds are similar, what Rain did is the more textbook version of safe 2 base templar that has been around for ages while the one i talk about in the guide is the specific adjustment to it made by Startale players.
The two key differences are:
1) Gateway timings. Rain went with the more standard 3-6 gates, while Startale players generally go 3-5-7.
The idea of 3-6 is, simply, you get your 6gates of production around 8.30-8.40 ish to time up your production with a Terran's medivac timing; really straightforward; this production "setup" of 6gate robo+whatever tech has long been the standard in PvT.
The Startale variation gets gates 4-5 sooner and 6-7 later than Rain's build. What this does is it allows you to cut gates 6-7 and focus on units if your obs sees a potential push coming, and to have a bit more production later on if the extra gates aren't needed to defend a more standard medivac timing.
A really good example of this reaction is Squirtle's game on Cloud Kingdwom vs MVP in their GSL finals: Squirtle sees the marine/tank timing moving out, and immediately cuts tech, gets immortals, and most importantly has 5 gates worth of production instead of just 3. This allows him to be completely safe against the attack, and he forces MVP back.
Also, having 7 gates is nice if you are forced to turtle up on 2 bases a bit longer by drops or annoying factories. If you only have 6 gates worth of zealot archon you risk floating a bit of money eventually; so Rain ends up being forced into adding 2 extra gates before his third, which he probably didn't plan to do.
This change in how to set up your production in gateway heavy builds is a really nice and smart adjustment, and as monk posted in this thread i should probably have gone more in depth about it in the guide. I will edit it in sometime.
2) Fast charge vs fast archives: Rain also goes for charge zealots before getting his archives up, while the build i describe goes the other way around. The difference is that he can get charge done just in time for Medivacs, but he can only get 2 templar up so he decides to use them for feedbacks rather than Archons. Again, the fast archon makes it slightly easier to hold pushes before medivacs since you can get it up really, really fast (pre 10 minutes), but both choices are fine.
Other (smaller) differences are:
Since Rain as you say cuts Stalkers, he gets a cannon in his main and goes up to 4 observers really fast, trying to use those to defend against drops. If you look at the minimap at around 10 minutes, he has great vision around any area where a drop could be coming in, so he can afford to have all his stuff at his front. Nice adjustment, and probably based on the map since Antiga is one of the few maps where having 2 observers to spot drops coming to your main instead of one is really helpful.
Rain goes +2 armor before +1 attack. Not the bigget deal in the world and i think it comes down to player preference, but +1 attack finishes sooner and if you are going to switch into colossi and you invest heavily into armor, you will have a slower +3 attack which Colossi really benefit from. Going +1/+1/+2 also is really nice if you want to go double forge later on, as you can get 2/2 and 3/3 together. This is probably the smallest of the differences between the builds.
|
Thanks for that reply. Very insightful.
Do you belive 3->5->7 gates to be strictly superior to 3->6 gates?
Do you think there's a connection between the fact that Rain gets Charge before Archives and the fact that he gets no stalkers at all? I'd think that Charge makes defending drops quite a bit easier.
|
Italy12248 Posts
3-5-7 might be better to defend anything, yes.However, any timing that isn't 3rax medivac is really, really rare these days, so going 3-6 is just fine.
I think on Antiga it might be a good idea to go either Charge or even Blink to defend drops, yes. The area to cover in your main is so freakin huge that just 6 Stalkers might have a hard time covering it all. On the other hand, on maps where drops are easier to hold like CK or Ohana, both are just fine.
|
Hey guys i have an addition to this build. I'm having pretty fun time with this build at mid-high masters and i had an idea while ago and it works actually. When you build your robo and get your 2 initial observers after them make a "warp prism" and send it to the enemy base and hide it. The idea behind this is arround that time mostly terrans push with 2 medivac and their whole army, they try to drop and things like that. Just that time when they are half the road go with warp prism in their base and warp in zealots. This most of the time force terrans to make mistakes like they commit too much to that attack or they get uneasy with attacking or going back. If he goes for an attack to you defend with your everything in your base and keep warping in zealots or stalkers to his mineral line. If he doesn't prepare to get your third with getting storms ready. They might try to drop you with part of their army and send rest back to base too but it isn't a real big deal because you'll have your stalkers waiting.
Now most of the time that kind of harrass wouldn't work against terran because of vikings but with this build terran doesn't feel the need to go any vikings so you can roam with your warp prism freely or if you cause so much mess they make vikings instead of medivacs which is actually good for you too
|
mana uses a very interesing variation of 2 base templar play recently.
his games can be seen here: http://www.sc2win.com/wp-content/plugins/download-monitor/download.php?id=4719
(he is called mouzcctosh ingame, has 9 pvt games of him from last week)
he does: gate-robo-gate-gate, take all gases, then drop 2 forges and a twilight at the same time, then add templar archive as twilight finishes and techs straight to storm (and charge..)
it seems just INSANELY greedy, when you look at his natural with 3 zealots and 1 sentry sitting there, while he researches storm, charge, AND +1/+1 and happily cruises around with his observers.
but if you watch the replays carefully from his perspective he checks very thoroughly that no attack before 10:30 is coming, where all his researches line up ideally.
|
United States8477 Posts
On September 20 2012 05:41 uLysSeS1 wrote:mana uses a very interesing variation of 2 base templar play recently. his games can be seen here: http://www.sc2win.com/wp-content/plugins/download-monitor/download.php?id=4719(he is called mouzcctosh ingame, has 9 pvt games of him from last week) he does: gate-robo-gate-gate, take all gases, then drop 2 forges and a twilight at the same time, then add templar archive as twilight finishes and techs straight to storm (and charge..) it seems just INSANELY greedy, when you look at his natural with 3 zealots and 1 sentry sitting there, while he researches storm, charge, AND +1/+1 and happily cruises around with his observers. but if you watch the replays carefully from his perspective he checks very thoroughly that no attack before 10:30 is coming, where all his researches line up ideally.
Yea, Mana used it against Keen in Up/Down. It looks like an incredibly greedy, incredibly fragile build that requires precise execution. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who's not progamer level. I also don't think it's even viable on a map like Antiga with its short rush distance and huge natural choke.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
