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There have been a lot of great guides about how to gain an advantage in the early game, how to transition into mid-game, and how to wind up a Protoss sledgehammer and drop it on Terran's back at 18 minutes. But what happens when you're 20 minutes in and Terran's not dead? I'm going to analyze a few examples from a pro game and some of my own games to explore key subtleties for winning a PvT after 20 minutes. Hopefully, this guide will have tips for players across the skill spectrum. I know I learned some cool tricks from analyzing Parting's templar play.
To start, there's a common notion that the Protoss army is stronger while the Terran army is more mobile, so it's Protoss's responsibility to sit back, perfect their composition, and track Terran down to force big fights. That frame of mind is counter-productive. First, it's often not true. If Terran has time to get 3/3 upgrades, build a bunch of ghosts, vikings, medivacs, and replace some SCVs with MULES for a super-army, he's going to crush you in a straight fight. Secondly, the "which army wins if we ram them into each other" shouldn't matter at all if you play well.
The four pillars of late game PvT are:
Map vision which tells you where his army is, what direction it's moving, how many bases he has, and gives you advance warning for drops.
Mobility which lets you attack where he isn't and defend where he attacks. Pylons, warpgates and warp prisms give Protoss a huge mobility advantage over Terran in late game.
Positioning which lets you stay alive when you're behind and win engagements when you're ahead. Nail storms as Terran moves through chokes, and you stay alive even when you're 80 food behind.
Space control which allows you to limit Terran's mobility through key points. You can lock down zones of the map to defend efficiently or to punish Terran's positioning.
To illustrate the importance of these points, I'm going to start with a brilliant play from one of Parting's replays. In the following image, Parting finds himself in a situation where he's behind in army size, but is able to effectively use a combination of map vision, positioning, mobility and space control to destroy a Terran expansion for free.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/SKKiL.jpg)
Here, you can see Parting is down about 30 supply in army size, and both he and the Terran are establishing their fourth bases. Parting sees that the Terran is pushing his larger army towards Parting's fledgling expansion. If Parting were to sit idly with his army at his fourth nexus, there's a good chance he'd lose the battle and the game immediately. Instead, Parting takes advantage of his excellent map vision to force a trade where he knows he'll come out ahead.
Upon seeing the Terran force begin pushing, Parting immediately swings his army of zealots and archons toward the left side of the map staging a counter-attack. At the same time, he advances the four templar forward to control the ramp on the right side of the map (highlighted by a yellow line). He counter-attacks on the left while using just 4 units to control the space on the right. As it happens, Terran doesn't have sufficient map vision to see this development, so he presses the attack.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/UhegM.jpg)
As you can see, Parting's army is moving to counter-attack down the left side of the map while two of his templar have moved forward to drop the first two storms. Parting will use the templar two at a time, and he spreads them so they can't both be hit by a single EMP. This play makes it almost impossible for Terran to deny storms. By moving the templar foward, Terran will be surprised by their position. And by sending them spread out two at a time, Terran needs four quick snipes to deny the storms. Instead, he eats the full storms.
Then, the next two templar (which were hidden to the right) show up and Terran eats two more storms.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/QqYDw.jpg)
At this point, a third of Terran's army is dead, the rest is in red health, and Terran recognizes that he'll be cleaned up by Parting's defensive reinforcements if he continues pushing. And now instead of threatening Parting's fourth base, Terran's army is simply grossly out of position for defense. While Terran's forces hustle home, Parting kills the fourth base and forces a lift at the third base. At this point, Parting simply pulls back, having turned a small deficit into a huge advantage without a direct army engagement.
So we know from that example how powerful templar can be for controlling space, and that we can use map vision to leverage that space control to gain an advantage in the game. Parting's four templar play to control the ramp was a creative and technical space control mechanism. Here's a less sublte way to control space that even noobs like me can pull off consistently:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/WR6vo.jpg)
You might see that and think, "Oh, that's standard base defense," and you'd be right, but with 3 cannons and 2 templar, you can block off any choke you want. Using just four supply (four supply!) you can make it tremendously inefficient for Terran to move through that space. The cannons prevent cloaked ghosts or marauder hit squads from threatening your templar, and the templar punish a full army bull rush. This method is noob-proof in that it works even when you screw up and don't have map vision.
Getting back to map vision and mobility, there are many other ways to leverage these resources to gain advantages. One of the best and easiest ways to increase your mobility is to put a pylon on the left side of the map and a pylon on the right side of the map, as close as you can get them to Terran's bases without them being spotted too easily. A warp prism bumps that mobility edge up another notch. As soon as you have options to warp in on either side of the map, you can do cute little tricks like warping some zealots in on the right:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/thqkM.jpg)
And then hitting him on the left when he sends his army over to deal with your decoy.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/1uiyW.jpg)
These tactics are simple but effective. Remember that Terran can only kite in one spot on the map at a time and chargelots rock unmicroed MM. If there are three fights happening at the same time, kiting is only happening at one of those fights, which means you're kicking ass in at least two of them.
And if you augment the "hitting where he's not" tactic with a little map vision (controlling your opponent's watch tower for example) you can drop in his main (or if you're using pylons instead of a prism, send a pack of zealots at his third) as soon as he pushes out. I dropped DT's here because I had the tech and I knew he didn't have detection in his mineral lines, but chargelots would have worked great too. As it turned out, this Terran had tunnel vision on controlling his main army, so either drop cargo would have been game-winning.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/qGjvA.jpg)
It's worth noting that in those examples, I chose to attack with small forces while controlling my side of the map with my main army. This is in contrast to the Parting example I showed above where he attacked with his main army while controlling his side of the map with a small force. The right choice will be specific to the situation, but to get everything out of your late-game PvT, you need to set yourself up to be able to make that choice.
In the example where I dropped DT's, I failed to give myself the option of attacking with my army while controlling space with a small force to punish a counter-attack. Instead of keeping my army back at my third, I should have positioned it forward giving me the option of attacking down the right side of the map. Along the left lane, I could have stationed a handful of templar, perhaps with a few cannons forcing heavy losses on Terran if he chose to attack down that path.
This set-up would protect the attack paths toward both my third and fourth bases, freeing me to be aggressive with my army on the right side of the map toward Terran's third and eventually his fourth. It would also tend to funnel his army toward the action on the right side of the map, which limits his ability to deal with my mobility on the left side of the map with my warp prism.
Try watching your own games or pro games and thinking about how map vision, mobility, positioning and controlling space work together to determine who wins the game. Commentators focus so much on unit counts and compositions, but those are such tiny pieces of the puzzle. What matters most is who has more information and who better uses that information to score small victories before that final fight.
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Wow, I like this guide and I think I'll come back to it more. I'll try some strategies in here in some practice games and hopefully they work wonders (which I already have a feeling they will).
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" Remember that Terran can only kite in one spot on the map at a time"
I dreaded the day that you dear protoss would figure this out :D Well done. The high level concepts in the PartinG replay are crucial and I wish somebody would do it for Terran.
I think the same concept is consistently executed by Taeja in TvZ, dropping in one place to displace Zerg and then attacking CREEP (!!!! it's the secret!!) to consistently control information.
Going to write something about this concept  ))
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Recently I've been doing this kind of stuff as well. Get a few pylons in some spots to look for drops (yes it works) and to warp in zlots/DT's. Also I've been doing a By.Rain / HerO warp prism style with 2 HT and 2 zlots, storm the mineral line with 2 storms, merch to archon and warp in a few zealots. Works quite well.
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oh wow thank you so much. I kind of expected this to be another "deathball and pray" unit-comp guide but this kind of mechanics guide is SO useful at any level. I generally dont read guides if they have a lot of text (I have a small attention span haha) but I read every word here!
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Italy12246 Posts
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I'm really glad you wrote this guide. As you noted, many commentators and players alike focus too much on build orders and timings, which become completely irrelevant when you get to mid-late game. The "management" part of mid-late game is so crucial, but often ignored. I'd like to add some additional tips I utilize among your 4 pillars:
Map vision: Observers. Make them. A lot of them. If you're a player who typically only makes 1-2 observers each game, and doesn't bother to remake them after the terran scans and kills them, try making 3-4. I regularly chrono out 3 observers every game as my first 3 robotics units. And then when I lose them, I prioritize remaking them over colossus. Put them along attack routes, drop routes, everywhere. The game will become so much easier for you when you have a virtual maphack.
Mobility: In addition to pylons all over the map, get in the habit of overmaking gateways so that you can instantly create an army anywhere on the map. This can also help you set up some nice flanks, or allow you to just drop 20 zealots into his main and wipe out his production (barracks/depots) even when it's mined out and you can't do any economic damage.
Also, I want to stress kcdc's point about multiple battles at once. Anytime you're about to attack, or an engagement is about to occur, you should be warping in zealots/dts somewhere else on the map, whether it's next to a pylon near his 3rd/4th, or via a warp prism into his main. It literally only takes 1 second, but has the potential to do so much damage - shift clickclickclickclick, then drag select and shift click into the mineral line.
Positioning: This is difficult especially in the heat of battle, but it's extremely important. As your armies are dancing around each other, keep your stalkers and colossus near each other, and zealots separately so that zealots don't get in the way of stalkers chasing vikings and stalkers don't get in the way of zealots charging into the terran army. Always know where the enemy vikings are, and position stalkers in between your colossus and the vikings. Keep your colossus away from cliffs and water where it's more difficult for stalkers to protect them. This means that when you're walking between your natural and 3rd on daybreak or cloud kingdom, make sure they're not hugging the cliff/edge of the path. When your armies engage, DON'T immediately engage with your zealots. Wait for the MMM ball to get in range of your colossus before engaging with zealots. The terran wants to kite your zealots while being out of range of your colossus, and if you just a-move your zealots into the terran and forget about them, the terran will end up killing all your zealots while avoiding colossus fire while your colossus are dying to vikings. If terran runs out of range of your colossus, PULL your zealots back and wait for him to get in range of your colossus again before engaging with zealots again. Meanwhile, always target fire vikings with your stalkers and don't let them just a-move. So pretty much when the engagement happens you want to quickly shift-click target a bunch of vikings with your stalkers, a-move with the colossus, and then focus on controlling/dancing your zealots with the MMM ball. Use blink to reposition your stalkers so that they're not in the way of your zealots and/or so that they're not directly being killed by MMM.
Another note, when the terran gets a million ghosts and you can't land any storms, you should be colossus heavy (4-6+ colossus), and focus on storming the vikings. You'll never get a storm off the main MMM ball, but it's much easier to get storms off the vikings and they will actually die pretty quickly (especially if you also have archons) and then at least you'll still have colossus against MMM.
Space control: HT all over the map. You never want more than 3-4 templar in a single group, because it just takes too much effort to keep re-spreading them out. A lot of times in late game I don't even have any templar hotkeyed. Everytime the terran pushes forward, he should have to go through 1 templar at a time, eating storms or feedbacks if he's not careful. If he is careful, you only lose 1 HT at a time. Be active with your group of blink stalkers so you can snipe ghosts who stray too far forward to snipe your HT, or small groups of MM that try to snipe your HT.
Also related, while it's not about space control but rather how to use HT, always try to "attack" the terran army like kcdc mentioned with 1 or 2 HTs at a time. It's easy for terran to deal with stationary HT after he scan where they are, but oftentimes you can take the terran by surprise by just attacking with 1 or 2 storms, by themselves, at a time.
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Do you have any plans on perhaps writing something on PvZ or PvP lategame?
Because I'm sure those would be interesting as well^^
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Italy12246 Posts
From monk's op in the protoss help me thread:
How do I deal an opponent once he gets infestor ling/roach broodlord?
- Hide Spoiler -
Note: this section will be expanded upon heavily in the future.
^_^ blue posters are so awesome
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Canada13387 Posts
Ah, so so good. Thanks for the post I look forward to reading it many more times in the future
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Beautifully done; this guide is exactly the sort of thought-provoking, high-level strategy that I love to sink my teeth into.
Speaking from the Terran point of view, this sort of thing is exactly the beautiful game that I love to play with decent Protoss. Not this 'box it and kill him' style, but a constant, rapid-fire dance of various forces searching for a minute edge in positioning. I think as Terran the next level of late-game planning and strategy is sinking some excess minerals into partial turret rings, as well as forward Sensor Towers to give maximum lead time on stopping any drops.
Regarding the HT/Colossi positioning, any Protoss player that masters the basics of what Parting is doing there will do incredibly well against Terrans who do not have balls of steel. As much as Terran requires high combat APM in order to maximize efficiency, I believe that more and more the game will favour Terrans who can hold that in reserve and be patient until the PERFECT moment arises. The number of games I've seen lost by Terrans due to a single impatient strike which runs head-on into a Colossi/HT trap of some kind (or neglects the Warp Prism/DT defense) is just staggering.
Bravo, OP!
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On September 20 2012 06:20 CrazyF1r3f0x wrote:
Do you have any plans on perhaps writing something on PvZ or PvP lategame?
Because I'm sure those would be interesting as well^^
Sure, those are easy.
PvP: Spread your colossi to limit splash damage from your opponent's colossi. The easiest way is to step one colossus forward so that the AI targets that one. And since it's a step forward, the lateral splash from your opponent's colossi doesn't hit your other colossi. Boom, game won.
PvZ: Oh, he got infestors and broodlords? Hope he's not good enough to spread them out against vortexes.
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give me your honest opinion kcdc. Does it favour toss heavily in pvt late game stages?
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On September 20 2012 07:09 j.k.l wrote:
give me your honest opinion kcdc. Does it favour toss heavily in pvt late game stages?
It really depends on the players and the map. There's so much potential for small skirmishes and multitasking overload that the game can always be decided by out-playing your opponent.
But each race does have their advantages. I think Toss is a little more mobile with their warp-in mechanic, but Terran can use medivac mobility pretty damn effectively as well. And while Toss AoE damage is scary, a perfect Terran deathball should beat a perfect Toss deathball if both sides control well and focus 100% on the battle.
Vikings+scans to pick off observers, and then running in cloaked ghosts to EMP everything is so strong.
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On September 20 2012 07:19 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2012 07:09 j.k.l wrote:
give me your honest opinion kcdc. Does it favour toss heavily in pvt late game stages? It really depends on the players and the map. There's so much potential for small skirmishes and multitasking overload that the game can always be decided by out-playing your opponent. But each race does have their advantages. I think Toss is a little more mobile with their warp-in mechanic, but Terran can use medivac mobility pretty damn effectively as well. And while Toss AoE damage is scary, a perfect Terran deathball should beat a perfect Toss deathball if both sides control well and focus 100% on the battle. Vikings+scans to pick off observers, and then running in cloaked ghosts to EMP everything is so strong.
do people still do that? at least 2-3 extra obs behind that army, you should be able to just a - move with your existing army and crush that kind of comp. I do not believe that a perfect terran army can beat a toss army. The deadliest splash damage combined with instant reinforcements, mothership, and archons, nothing beats that.
can you for example give me a perfect terran army and how it should look like?
drops in the late game shouldn't be a problem for toss. Hts, and DTS should clean up pretty well.
EDIT: btw i play mostly protoss and zerg.
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I'm silver league with Terran, so I'm not gonna be much help to you. Try analyzing pro games where Terrans win after 20 minutes.
For drops, I'll say that when Toss is on 5 bases, there's always a vulnerability somewhere. You don't even need to drop--just run small forces everywhere and chip away. Also, putting missile turrets and bunkers or PFs up at remote bases goes a long way toward saving your APM against zealot and DT harass.
As for deathball vs deathball, it really doesn't matter much which side is stronger because deathballing is not an optimal strategy for either player. Out-multitask your opponent and you'll win.
Also, it's worth noting that in the Parting game I analyzed in the OP, the Terran actually came back and won.
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some players get shield upgrades and others don't. what is your opinion on this??
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On September 20 2012 06:31 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2012 06:20 CrazyF1r3f0x wrote:
Do you have any plans on perhaps writing something on PvZ or PvP lategame?
Because I'm sure those would be interesting as well^^ Sure, those are easy. PvP: Spread your colossi to limit splash damage from your opponent's colossi. The easiest way is to step one colossus forward so that the AI targets that one. And since it's a step forward, the lateral splash from your opponent's colossi doesn't hit your other colossi. Boom, game won. PvZ: Oh, he got infestors and broodlords? Hope he's not good enough to spread them out against vortexes.
ahahaha so true~
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On September 20 2012 07:51 INTquovadis wrote:
some players get shield upgrades and others don't. what is your opinion on this??
Get them after you finish the other upgrades. Don't get them if you don't have much economy.
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It's super important to realize that you don't have to attack just because you're maxed, or just because you feel pressure to attack. Get into good positioning, starve out the Terran, but you don't need to go into a better positioned foe "just because."
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Can you or rsvp talk a bit about the balance between the spreading ht vs keeping them in the army for a big fight? Or should I change my big fight mindset entirely and aim for storming to weaken terran army and denying expo instead?
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In my experience, HT around the map > HT with your army.
It seems like the HT with your army usually get EMP'd, but the templar you pull from your nearby pylons and bases usually get of storms. Parting likes to flank with his templar.
I know when I'm playing PvT, fighting his main army is the last thing I want to do. I'd much rather send zealots to all of his bases and storm T's army as it walks around the map to eventually starve him out.
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A few question from a bad player :p.
Do you think it's worth having a couple of HT's at all of your bases to guard against drops? Or only the front most ones? also would you ever put your HT's with your army or seperate but near? it's seems far easier to suffer a nasty EMP if the templars are sitting with your ball.
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This really helps and I hope I remember it for when I actually get a Terran to late game. Since I play PvT less then 10% of the time. It's really sad now when I play against Terrans I fall apart late game because I honestly get sloppy with HT because I just don't play it enough. Terrans if you are reading this play more Ladder games!!!
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What are the best ways to handle super late game engagements after the terran has sacked half his scv's in favor of orbitals and larger armies. I find attacking into a terran who has a larger supply in army with 10-20 ghost nearly impossible no matter what my composition is and no matter how many gateways i have to flood in reinforcements...
(assuming both sides with 3-3 ups and map pretty much split economically)
I guess what im asking is how can i force an engagement or win the game when the terran is playing defensive. It seems much easier for them to control space and force engagements when they have cloak, emp and Nuke's to abuse certain positions.
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On September 20 2012 11:17 CollectiveS wrote:
A few question from a bad player :p.
Do you think it's worth having a couple of HT's at all of your bases to guard against drops? Or only the front most ones? also would you ever put your HT's with your army or seperate but near? it's seems far easier to suffer a nasty EMP if the templars are sitting with your ball.
Templar are good anywhere bio might go. Where it's worth the cost to station a templar really depends on the map and the situation. For example, if you have decent map vision on Cloud Kingdom, it's just about impossible for a drop to get into your main. You can't help but spot the drops with your natural and third, so you don't really need a templar there later on. The same thing happens on Entombed Valley.
Don't put HTs in your ball of units. Even better, don't make a ball of units.
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On September 20 2012 11:57 AGIANTSMURF wrote:
What are the best ways to handle super late game engagements after the terran has sacked half his scv's in favor of orbitals and larger armies. I find attacking into a terran who has a larger supply in army with 10-20 ghost nearly impossible no matter what my composition is and no matter how many gateways i have to flood in reinforcements...
(assuming both sides with 3-3 ups and map pretty much split economically)
I guess what im asking is how can i force an engagement or win the game when the terran is playing defensive. It seems much easier for them to control space and force engagements when they have cloak, emp and Nuke's to abuse certain positions.
I honestly don't know how to deal with the Terran super-army. rsvp wrote up a good discussion on how to control each part of your army to get the most out of it. My advice is to keep trading so that Terran doesn't get a chance to stack 20 ghosts. There should be opportunities to trade when T is on 3 bases, and there will definitely be opportunities when he's on 4 bases.
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On September 20 2012 12:10 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2012 11:57 AGIANTSMURF wrote:
What are the best ways to handle super late game engagements after the terran has sacked half his scv's in favor of orbitals and larger armies. I find attacking into a terran who has a larger supply in army with 10-20 ghost nearly impossible no matter what my composition is and no matter how many gateways i have to flood in reinforcements...
(assuming both sides with 3-3 ups and map pretty much split economically)
I guess what im asking is how can i force an engagement or win the game when the terran is playing defensive. It seems much easier for them to control space and force engagements when they have cloak, emp and Nuke's to abuse certain positions. I honestly don't know how to deal with the Terran super-army. rsvp wrote up a good discussion on how to control each part of your army to get the most out of it. My advice is to keep trading so that Terran doesn't get a chance to stack 20 ghosts. There should be opportunities to trade when T is on 3 bases, and there will definitely be opportunities when he's on 4 bases.
ugh, i hate the idea of "Dont let them get there" the best ive been able to do is to assert map dominance once you hit that 3-3 upgrade (assuming you cant kill them) take the center of the map and spread pylons everywhere with cannons and just do your best to deny bases and trade until the terran runs out of money... but when i fail to deny bases i typically lose.
also incase anyone is wondering how to stop terran from doing mass ghost harass (nukes going off at your expansions) a really simple and easy way to counter is to leave 1 obs + 1 DT at each base. The DT will be able to 2-shot the ghost and since its cloaked the terran wont be able to kill it without guessing its location before hand.
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Teach me how to 10-10 proxi gate PvP in my base... oh wait that's all you do on ladder. oic.
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Could you possibly post these replays from parting?
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On September 20 2012 12:27 GleaM wrote:
Teach me how to 10-10 proxi gate PvP in my base... oh wait that's all you do on ladder. oic.
Tee-hee. I also 1-gate FE and 4 gate a lot. Basically, I like builds where I'll either win or lose early so that I don't have to sit in my base building colossi for 20 minutes.
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On September 20 2012 13:41 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2012 12:27 GleaM wrote:
Teach me how to 10-10 proxi gate PvP in my base... oh wait that's all you do on ladder. oic.
Tee-hee. I also 1-gate FE and 4 gate a lot. Basically, I like builds where I'll either win or lose early so that I don't have to sit in my base building colossi for 20 minutes.
So something/someone/lackthereof pulled you out of retirement eh?
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- I've always found high templars to be very difficult to use correctly. They are slow, blink and sentry spells get tangled with templars so you need to put them on different hot keys which makes it more difficult to move your army around. It just isnt very fun to be struggling just moving around, not to mention positioning.
- Also, if you arent careful, 1 emp just wins the game for the terran. That said, I do believe that both colossus and templar combined would be the optimal army, as shown by every protoss pro player, but it's just so damn hard to use.
- I usually just make 2 robo's for constant colossus production for the late game. In low master league, they arent perfect with army micro or positioning, so it isnt like I need to be perfect either. I just played a game where I balled 8 colossus up with gateway units and just attacked (after 25 minutes of scrappy battles). He had a lot of vikings, but by the time he killed the colossus off, they had done enough damage to sway the battle and eventually allow me to win the game.
tldr: for me, templars are too hard to use correctly and make the game less fun because of it, so I just try to mass colossus and win the game
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On September 20 2012 07:19 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2012 07:09 j.k.l wrote:
give me your honest opinion kcdc. Does it favour toss heavily in pvt late game stages? It really depends on the players and the map. There's so much potential for small skirmishes and multitasking overload that the game can always be decided by out-playing your opponent. But each race does have their advantages. I think Toss is a little more mobile with their warp-in mechanic, but Terran can use medivac mobility pretty damn effectively as well. And while Toss AoE damage is scary, a perfect Terran deathball should beat a perfect Toss deathball if both sides control well and focus 100% on the battle. Vikings+scans to pick off observers, and then running in cloaked ghosts to EMP everything is so strong.
Easier said than done.
Terran does not have super strong AOE damage. You could argue EMP, but it only damages shields. You can just run away or if you are good you can feedback the ghost whereas storm is easy to use and strong as hell. What can Terran do now?
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Nice quick guide kcdc!
A few simple things that is so easy to forget. Especially after a loss
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Norway68 Posts
No wonder i lose PvT late game all the time. I always think in terms of my deathball beats him, a mentality that just dosent work vs the T deathball.
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Really well written! Thanks a lot!
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Thanks for sharing your knowledge with us <3
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On September 20 2012 07:22 j.k.l wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2012 07:19 kcdc wrote:On September 20 2012 07:09 j.k.l wrote:
give me your honest opinion kcdc. Does it favour toss heavily in pvt late game stages? It really depends on the players and the map. There's so much potential for small skirmishes and multitasking overload that the game can always be decided by out-playing your opponent. But each race does have their advantages. I think Toss is a little more mobile with their warp-in mechanic, but Terran can use medivac mobility pretty damn effectively as well. And while Toss AoE damage is scary, a perfect Terran deathball should beat a perfect Toss deathball if both sides control well and focus 100% on the battle. Vikings+scans to pick off observers, and then running in cloaked ghosts to EMP everything is so strong. do people still do that? at least 2-3 extra obs behind that army, you should be able to just a - move with your existing army and crush that kind of comp. I do not believe that a perfect terran army can beat a toss army. The deadliest splash damage combined with instant reinforcements, mothership, and archons, nothing beats that. can you for example give me a perfect terran army and how it should look like? drops in the late game shouldn't be a problem for toss. Hts, and DTS should clean up pretty well. EDIT: btw i play mostly protoss and zerg.
The perfect terran army in the early lategame consists of 30-40 scvs, 160-170 army supply, 8-10 medivacs, viking count determined by your opponents collosi count and basically as many ghosts as you can muster + marines/marauders. The protoss army Will consist of 70 probes 10-16 stalkers, some collosi dependandt on your opponents viking count, a bunch of templar, maybe a couple sentries, some archons (only if the ghost count is not too high). In reality there should NOT be a mothership, unless it is being used solely for recall, which is not useful in a deathball engagement. The potency of EMP makes a mothership not worth getting, as it is barely worth its 8 supply count without its spells, let alone the 400/400 it detracts from your gateway reinforce and the substantial tech route it occupies. The goal for the terran is to disarm the templar and the collosus previous to the engagement or during whilst avoiding splash damage. Whilst difficult it is painfully obvious how possible this is and we all know how hard the bio force combined with supply advantage will roll gateway units & reinforcements. I suggest watching some of Byun's heavy ghost TvP lategame, so in that respect yes if both armies are controlled well I think its generally accepted that the terran deathball comes out on top.
Drops with 2+ medivacs can really still be a problem in the lategame. Proactivity and being able to feedback before the medivacs unload mitigate a lot of this however that in turn can be countered by using medivacs with lower energy to execute drops. DTs defending drops can be countered by scans which should be ample and with the low numbers of units involved its very easy to mitigate the effectiveness of storms. The real clincher to defending this in the lategame is the 20+ gateway count, this is neccesary as obviously protoss needs a method of defending drops, you can mitigate some damage on the terran side using nice unit control and basically garuntee that you will get some damage, be it in structure, economy or simply killing reinforcement units efficiently but ultimately the drops will be defended, you shouldn't see the runaway drops you do in TvP midgame which can just end games outright but that doesn't make them not worthwhile. Coupled with the fact that lategame economies make dropping in multiple locations much more feasible and using drops to distract and attempt to snipe collosi with vikings means dropping in the lategame is a bit underrated IMO.
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Remember that Terran can only kite in one spot on the map at a time
Ummm...I'm nowhere near pro and I can stutter-step two groups via the mini-map...Not optimally of course (I would be better if I played more Terran bio though I'm random and I tend to mech as T) and only towards basically the same spot on the map, but it's not especially difficult, IMO.
Not saying that makes these tactics any worse, just merely pointing out that good Terrans can sometimes kite in two places at once (pro players can probably do more groups than this, I've never attempted practicing more than 2) - depending on the location of their armies and the directions they each need to go.
EDIT: In case people don't know about this method of stutter-step/kiting, you can drop in the main and push up the front at the same time and kite away from defending units in the main and towards the front door on the natural pretty easily on some maps (Antiga, cloud kingdom) by right-clicking on the mini-map at the back of the main and hitting s to stop (so they fire). I control both armies seperately but it's impossible for me to click rapidly in very different locations, so I kite both armies (at alternating stop times) towards the same or nearby locations on the map.
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Thanks guys for the kind words.
And I love how people keep commenting about deathball vs deathball. Seriously guys, it just doesn't matter in 99% of games. My games never reach deathball vs deathball. Pro games almost never reach deathball vs deathball. Both sides want to mass expand, split up their armies and do small constant attacks to stop their opponent's mass expanding. Deathballs only happen when you aren't active with your forces.
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On September 20 2012 22:32 althaz wrote:Ummm...I'm nowhere near pro and I can stutter-step two groups via the mini-map...Not optimally of course (I would be better if I played more Terran bio though I'm random and I tend to mech as T) and only towards basically the same spot on the map, but it's not especially difficult, IMO. Not saying that makes these tactics any worse, just merely pointing out that good Terrans can sometimes kite in two places at once (pro players can probably do more groups than this, I've never attempted practicing more than 2) - depending on the location of their armies and the directions they each need to go. EDIT: In case people don't know about this method of stutter-step/kiting, you can drop in the main and push up the front at the same time and kite away from defending units in the main and towards the front door on the natural pretty easily on some maps (Antiga, cloud kingdom) by right-clicking on the mini-map at the back of the main and hitting s to stop (so they fire). I control both armies seperately but it's impossible for me to click rapidly in very different locations, so I kite both armies (at alternating stop times) towards the same or nearby locations on the map.
Interesting, thanks for pointing that out. Still, microing multiple spots from the minimap isn't going to be nearly as effective as microing one spot with 100% focus, and Protoss has an advantage in that they don't have to micro chargelots to trade well. The more you force Terran to micro elsewhere, the less he can EMP your templar, snipe your colossi with vikings, spread his units against splash damage, etc. It's almost always good to send a pack of chargelots at a base before an army engagement.
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Great guide, useful guide for everyone because even high master protosses don't always understand how to play lategame pvt.
Dark templars are the best thing you can get in lategame pvt, 8 dts snipe a planetary/orbital in seconds, and continuous main army attacks followed by a dt warpin at one of his freshest expansion can kill any terran.
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On September 21 2012 00:48 Arcanefrost wrote:
Great guide, useful guide for everyone because even high master protosses don't always understand how to play lategame pvt.
Dark templars are the best thing you can get in lategame pvt, 8 dts snipe a planetary/orbital in seconds, and continuous main army attacks followed by a dt warpin at one of his freshest expansion can kill any terran.
There's always more to learn. I know I wouldn't have thought to do Parting's templar + counter-attack play in that spot on CK, and I'll be looking to add that element to my game now. Every map will have zones where you can gain an advantage if you slow Terran's movement through those zones, and if you plan those tactics out ahead of time, you'll be able to use them more effecitvely in a game.
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Thank you for the guide. This has given me a lot to think about and I'm definitely going to try and add these ideas on top of the templar build your other guide has already taught me.
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I just got an idea -- why is it that Protoss very seldom get a mothership in PvT, but is so prevalent in PvZ? Vortex is never disadvantageous for the protoss to use, especially when you have a few archons in the mix. It either divides the terran army into pieces, or forces his whole army into a single focused position. This would make for really great storms, archon and colossus splash. In addition, it would force a second stim since the first would wear off inside the vortex. Lastly, it could provide a last second panic escape button to allow your army to retreat. All this from the vortex, not the say the least about the possibilities from recall.
I fully expect you guys to just shut it down for whatever reason, but to me it's an interesting idea and something that could be experimented with.
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United States8476 Posts
On September 21 2012 06:34 happyft wrote:
I just got an idea -- why is it that Protoss very seldom get a mothership in PvT, but is so prevalent in PvZ? Vortex is never disadvantageous for the protoss to use, especially when you have a few archons in the mix. It either divides the terran army into pieces, or forces his whole army into a single focused position. This would make for really great storms, archon and colossus splash. In addition, it would force a second stim since the first would wear off inside the vortex. Lastly, it could provide a last second panic escape button to allow your army to retreat. All this from the vortex, not the say the least about the possibilities from recall.
I fully expect you guys to just shut it down for whatever reason, but to me it's an interesting idea and something that could be experimented with.
Short answer is ghosts(emp) and vikings. Both outrange vortex by a very fair margin, so Mothership usually ends up being really useless, really expensive paperweight.
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On September 21 2012 06:36 monk. wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2012 06:34 happyft wrote:
I just got an idea -- why is it that Protoss very seldom get a mothership in PvT, but is so prevalent in PvZ? Vortex is never disadvantageous for the protoss to use, especially when you have a few archons in the mix. It either divides the terran army into pieces, or forces his whole army into a single focused position. This would make for really great storms, archon and colossus splash. In addition, it would force a second stim since the first would wear off inside the vortex. Lastly, it could provide a last second panic escape button to allow your army to retreat. All this from the vortex, not the say the least about the possibilities from recall.
I fully expect you guys to just shut it down for whatever reason, but to me it's an interesting idea and something that could be experimented with. Short answer is ghosts(emp) and vikings. Both outrange vortex by a very fair margin, so Mothership usually ends up being really useless, really expensive paperweight.
Not to mention that it uses 8 supply while Protoss is already 20-30 or even 40 supply down in army by lategame because of the Terran sacrificing a part of his SCVs.
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It's also really slow, so even if it were worth a damn, Terran would just attack where it wasn't. Imagine how useless a mothership would be in a PvZ where you were on 6 bases and Zerg only had speedlings, corruptors and drop tech.
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Great guide definitely going to be doing these things when I can get a working computer to play again.
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wow i lernt alot, thx for tipz
i am goin to implament it al in my gempley
thans for tip
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A game I just played (not great play on either end frankly), but it shows how easy it is to pick a Terran apart just by abusing warp-in mobility. If you watch my camera from 15:00 and on, you'll see that I'm constantly attacking, but I spend almost all of my clicks on spreading pylons and macroing. My camera spends all of about 10 total seconds on his side of the map for the entire game, and I did literally zero micro.
http://drop.sc/256264
My opponent was mid-masters which is about my skill level right now. My APM is still about 15-20 points lower than it was before I quit....
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KCDC I love you. Thank god you play Protoss and give us such good insights. Hahah too bad there's no good blue Zerg and Terran poster like you. Good job.
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I watched the replay kcdc. Really good stuff.
This really showcases a flaw in Terran play that you can exploit, and it pertains even in high level and pro level play. Many Terrans don't split their armies well, or at all like in this example. You will see even pros throw 100 supply worth of units into defending a harass from 2 DTs. This harass heavy play really exploits that, and it keeps Terran contained in their base at a time where they can still make strong timing attacks and/or drops. Hell if you added a warp prism to drop in the main or natural at the same time it would just be adding insult to injury
Also nice defense in the beginning. Proving once again that 2 gates can hold most kinds of early pressure.
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Many Terrans don't split their armies well, or at all like in this example. You will see even pros throw 100 supply worth of units into defending a harass from 2 DTs. This harass heavy play really exploits that, and it keeps Terran contained in their base at a time where they can still make strong timing attacks and/or drops.
The play can be even stronger than just putting pressure on to force them to make a mistake splitting their forces, especially if you have the option to warp-in close to their bases. You get to pick where your next round of forces spawns whereas Terran has to allocate his forces in advance. That means if Terran only commits enough troops to deal with what's already pressuring him, you reactively warp in 10+ zealots to bolster that side of the attack. And if he commits enough troops to beat what's already there plus a potential round of warp-ins, you pull that side of your attack back while reinforcing the other side. And of course if he dedicates enough troops to clean up both sides of your harass + warp-ins, his main army will be very small.
If have a warp prism to warp-in right at the battle, this mobility abuse is even stronger. And if you throw an HT in the warp prism to surprise his defensive task force with a storm (I'm not good enough to do this consistently), it's just about impossible for Terran to react properly.
To give you an idea of how far you can take this mobility abuse tactic, I used to play a style where I would endlessly warp in back and forth on opposite sides of Terran's base, dropping a probe to build pylons while he defended my zealots. Terran wouldn't even be spread out--he'd have just 2 bases to defend, and by abusing my free reign to warp in all over his base and the time it would take for him to swing forces from one end of his main to the other, I'd kill him with nothing but zealots. The style was fun, but as you can imagine, I found that it was ultimately much stronger to use the tactic in late-game where Terran is more spread out, I have the economy to burn through zealots, and I have the tech up to survive a counter-attack.
Also nice defense in the beginning. Proving once again that 2 gates can hold most kinds of early pressure.
Haha, yeah, just ignore the first half. I've only played a handful of PvT's on Daybreak, and I didn't realize you could loop marines around the watchtowers and hit from behind like he did. If I'd put a spotter pylon down there, I wouldn't have taken any damage. But as it happened, he did a really weak rush and I did a really bad defense, so we came out roughly even.
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Something I try to do in large fights against Terrans is to send a Warp Prism with a 75+energy sentry in it behind enemy lines, then use a big zealot warp-in to create large surface area with guardian shield coming from both ends, forming a big surround. Generally speaking, you want shuttle speed and if you could put HTs in there that only makes it better. There's also the option of dropping a colossus or a pair of immortals, depending on how marine- or marauder-heavy your opponent's force is. If you think about it, a Warp Prism is only the price of 2 Zealots and the supply of one Zealot, but it can completely overhaul the power level of about 8 zealots warped in and really mess up your opponent's kiting due to surrounds. I think having a pair of Prisms in major fights is totally worth the supply.
I'm a bit hungover, so hopefully this tactic came out comprehensively on paper...it's really useful; I hope it helps some other people with their games.
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I am actually really surprised by all the players that have trouble vs T, and games going super late and all that. By 15 min you should be on collossus/templar, with 3-3 about to finish. This is a hard comp for T to fight against, since you basically have to kite with 2 groups (bio and viking) plus cast spells with a third (ghost) and this wont work either if you just run out of map. Plus, your upgrades are way ahead, with huge aoe in the collosus, archon nd storm, and no way is T mega maxed at 15 min.
Even if you battle him and dont crush him right away, just use his viking count to plan your next move. If he has a lot of vikings you dont rebuild collos and make templars instead. If he doesnt have vikings then you make collosus.
Medivac push can be a little scary, but a handful of stalkers in main and zealot sentry down low can stop both the drops and gaurd the nat with forcefield. Just make sure you have some vision on the map so if you see an early push coming you have time to respond.
I play Terran and this is the kind of stuff that causes me huge problems. I can hold Ps early pressures, but that 15 minute timing I described is just brutal, especially with instant reinforcing and an upgrade advantage.
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On September 22 2012 10:10 rikter wrote:
I am actually really surprised by all the players that have trouble vs T, and games going super late and all that. By 15 min you should be on collossus/templar, with 3-3 about to finish. This is a hard comp for T to fight against, since you basically have to kite with 2 groups (bio and viking) plus cast spells with a third (ghost) and this wont work either if you just run out of map. Plus, your upgrades are way ahead, with huge aoe in the collosus, archon nd storm, and no way is T mega maxed at 15 min.
Even if you battle him and dont crush him right away, just use his viking count to plan your next move. If he has a lot of vikings you dont rebuild collos and make templars instead. If he doesnt have vikings then you make collosus.
Medivac push can be a little scary, but a handful of stalkers in main and zealot sentry down low can stop both the drops and gaurd the nat with forcefield. Just make sure you have some vision on the map so if you see an early push coming you have time to respond.
I play Terran and this is the kind of stuff that causes me huge problems. I can hold Ps early pressures, but that 15 minute timing I described is just brutal, especially with instant reinforcing and an upgrade advantage.
Deflecting drops and winning with one big push with lots of splash damage is the opposite of what this guide advises.
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Commentators focus so much on unit counts and compositions, but those are such tiny pieces of the puzzle. What matters most is who has more information and who better uses that information to score small victories before that final fight.
This is so true.
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This is a really intelligent guide.
TL needs more guides like this.
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Canada13387 Posts
This has definitely helped me out a lot already, thanks for the guide kcdc
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there really needs to some blue posters like this for terran...extremely interesting read from the other side
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Being a platinum Protoss, there are times where I forget to do things (like getting the warp prism, I have no trouble planting pylons and warping in at certain spots, even in two places, but sometimes I forget warp prisms), but I don't think this has to do with the question.
I don't plant observers in corners of the map, and early and somewhat midgame I feel safe with using the observer on their army, but more lategame-when they start to get turrets, I don't feel safe around their army.
Not thinking this is a rare occasion because it has happened to me a lot, there are times when my army isn't positioned to be able to see drops, or the xel naga towers can't reach it, or he cuts all corners to make me not able to see it, but what are ways to know when a drop is coming or good ways to defend against it? Should I be keeping templars at my base, should I build cannons, or what? I don't feel that it is a good idea to bring my army all the way back, mostly because I give away good map control, or I leave and allow him to get map control or harass something else that's undefended because my army is at a different spot.
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Thanks so much guys this is exactly what I was having trouble with. Protoss blue posters are the best!
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I realize that, its just in my experience the disparity between P and T is at its biggest right at 15 min or so, with the comp I mentioned. Its hard to deflect that push. Not saying its the only way, but just throwing it out there, bc I think its the scariest thing toss can do
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On September 22 2012 19:29 rikter wrote:
I realize that, its just in my experience the disparity between P and T is at its biggest right at 15 min or so, with the comp I mentioned. Its hard to deflect that push. Not saying its the only way, but just throwing it out there, bc I think its the scariest thing toss can do
The entire purpose of this thread is to discuss what happens when that kind of push doesn't actually end the game, so I have no idea why you're beating this dead horse.
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To be fair, the purpose is a little vague, since it doesnt assume how you got to the lategame in the first place. These strategies seem more like what I as a terran am trying to do, i.e. split up protoss army because you cant take it in a straight up fight. Its not as hard for T to deflect the harass attempts bc they just need a bunker with a couple marines and a turret, but yeh, it can be irritating.
In my experience though, toss dictates the lategame with his super army and ridiculous warpgate count, so im kinda surprised the guide was about dink and dunk harass techniques instead of on cornering T and AoE him to death or abusing instant remax.
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Italy12246 Posts
On September 22 2012 20:11 rikter wrote:
To be fair, the purpose is a little vague, since it doesnt assume how you got to the lategame in the first place. These strategies seem more like what I as a terran am trying to do, i.e. split up protoss army because you cant take it in a straight up fight. Its not as hard for T to deflect the harass attempts bc they just need a bunker with a couple marines and a turret, but yeh, it can be irritating.
In my experience though, toss dictates the lategame with his super army and ridiculous warpgate count, so im kinda surprised the guide was about dink and dunk harass techniques instead of on cornering T and AoE him to death or abusing instant remax.
He's linked other guides to get to lategame in the first sentence...
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Links to other guides are not the same as stating explicitly this is what has been done. Just sayin. Anyways, im not trying to badmouth the guide in any way, im just a little surprised about some of the things im reading, and am interested in talking about it a bit so that mb I can improve my TvP.
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On September 22 2012 20:20 rikter wrote:
Links to other guides are not the same as stating explicitly this is what has been done. Just sayin. Anyways, im not trying to badmouth the guide in any way, im just a little surprised about some of the things im reading, and am interested in talking about it a bit so that mb I can improve my TvP.
It doesn't really matter how you get to late-game. I'm just giving some tips and analysis for how to win a game where both players are on 3+ bases and neither one can just go kill the other.
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Yeah, I wasnt even responding to the guide so much as I was the comments of some of the other posters...Im kind of curious how they find themselves in the situations they described, because in my TvP experience, when it gets to the late game, one of us just dies.
Regarding the guide, those are all good suggestions btw, I have fought against them and they can make a difference, since its easier for you to execute than it is for them to defend. The random pylons/obeservers on the map are a big part of stopping drops. Its really easy to spot an observer tailing your army, but an observer out in a dead spot on the map is damn near impossible to spot. One of my big weapons against a toss Army I cant take straight up is to wait for him to push a third of the way across the map and doom drop him, but it only works if you dont get spotted.
Regarding kiting in multiple places, its possible to do on minimap, but in the situations described with the warp prism or proxy pylon harass, its easy enough to switch your rally to the point of attack, and a-move them real quick. Storm dropping, on the other hand, is brutal.
I think its a good guide, my questions were in many ways about some of the experiences people had posted about in this thread.
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I like Partings style a lot. I love templars.
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On September 23 2012 06:01 rikter wrote:
Yeah, I wasnt even responding to the guide so much as I was the comments of some of the other posters...Im kind of curious how they find themselves in the situations they described, because in my TvP experience, when it gets to the late game, one of us just dies.
OK, that's fair. What you were saying makes a whole lot more sense, now.
Regarding the guide, those are all good suggestions btw, I have fought against them and they can make a difference, since its easier for you to execute than it is for them to defend. The random pylons/obeservers on the map are a big part of stopping drops. Its really easy to spot an observer tailing your army, but an observer out in a dead spot on the map is damn near impossible to spot. One of my big weapons against a toss Army I cant take straight up is to wait for him to push a third of the way across the map and doom drop him, but it only works if you dont get spotted.
The way that I personally like to play the late-game of all 3 match-ups is to put pylons all around the map because it's a lot like creep spread; you have vision all over the place, you have easy reinforcement access, and you can even put cannons down to take over territories of interest. I think the Terran (in the case of PvT) should be trying to hunt down pylons, just like he would try to cut down creep spread in TvZ, and for very similar reasons. You can take one dropship around the map and clean up those pylons, killing stuff for free and also actively slowing down the protoss warp-in harassment or positional flank reinforcements.
I actually have been doing something similar to the doom drop, but with blink stalkers, Colossi, and/or Carriers (and preferably also a warp prism, if I can help it). On some maps--especially Cloud Kingdom--I like taking my whole army and just rolling over a cliff into Terran's main and camping his production. The buildings all get in the way of his army, just like force fields, giving me really sick army positioning if he decides to engage. And if I find myself in a point in time when I don't really want to take the fight anymore because I'm at a disadvantage or I want to just recharge shields, I can just blink out and abuse his lack of mobility in the situation. What's he going to do, elevator out? There's an army of ranged units on the bottom of the cliff, ready to snipe the medivacs....
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What do you do against Terrans that just turtle on 3 or 4 bases, and then just spend the next 10 minutes continuously scanning you and observer sniping looking for a hole? It's really hard to prevent observer after observer from getting sniped by vikings, and eventually they make a hole where you have no detection, cloak up the ghosts, emp everything, snipe all your templar, and then completely roll you with 30 vikings + mass marines and losing almost nothing. Even if you have 5 bases and tons of resources and 50 gates, colossi still take time to build and templar need time to get energy, and you just get completely and utterly rolled over.
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On September 23 2012 20:33 Xequecal wrote:
What do you do against Terrans that just turtle on 3 or 4 bases, and then just spend the next 10 minutes continuously scanning you and observer sniping looking for a hole? It's really hard to prevent observer after observer from getting sniped by vikings, and eventually they make a hole where you have no detection, cloak up the ghosts, emp everything, snipe all your templar, and then completely roll you with 30 vikings + mass marines and losing almost nothing. Even if you have 5 bases and tons of resources and 50 gates, colossi still take time to build and templar need time to get energy, and you just get completely and utterly rolled over.
One thing I like to do is emulate zerg spine/spore creep-based pushes by inching pylons forward in opportune spots (at choke points, at the top of ramps, at potential expansions, etc.) and putting a couple cannons and a HT there; sometimes even a DT as well. This is a supply-efficient way of covering spaces on the map with detection against ghosts, forcing the terran to send more than just a couple of unmicroed units in to handle it. There's a point when territory actually becomes relevant for the sake of just being a road well-traveled, and that's when I like to defend key sections as though they were almost as important as an expansion or a key production/tech structure.
I also think that, once you hit max and the game goes turtley and long, you should go up to 4+ robos. It's not excessive; you're going to be sitting at max and you can spare the money. Then you have the capability to look at your opponent's composition and remax with the correct units, not just gateway units and only 2 robo's worth of Colossi. It's way better to just overmake your production and then be able to build 6 colossi at once, or 5 immortals and a warp prism, or to be able to build 3 Colossi and 2 Observers simultaneously. Nobody ever thinks twice about going up to 15-20 gateways in the late game, but there's a stigma attached to going up to half a dozen robos. Why? It's a 0 supply way to improve your army in clutch tempo situations during long games. Pay the 300-400 gas and get more robos.
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I would like to add to what ineversmile already pointed out. When you get to the late game, once you take an expansion throw down a few pylons next to your nexus and then lay down a bunch of cannons. If you find yourself in a position where he snipes your observers you have this defensive line to fall back to. It's really effective and there's no excuse that when you have 4k+ minerals banked up you don't have at least 6 cannons covering your new mining bases. Also don't power all those cannon with like one pylon. Yes you don't need them for supply, but you still need them for energy. Even pros make this mistake and it's really annoying.
When on the offensive have 1 or 2 observers with your main army and one trailing near by, preferably behind where your retreat path is. If he manages to snipe your observers with the main army you just fall back to the one behind it. So many times terran will think you don't have detection and then he runs into this, and gets all his ghosts feedbacked before he realizes what's going on. Really splitting up your death ball is key for effective late game PvT. You should never have all your detection or HTs clumped up in one spot. The risk is just too high.
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To back my post with a replay, here you go:
http://drop.sc/257308
The relevant part is at 22:20, when he snipes my observers and charges in with ghosts. Forgive the overall noobishness of the game otherwise
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the protosss' in the strategy forum are the best, thanks so much for the help. I always found it hard to engage or even deal with late game PvT, while I can get up the army, often my control or decisions would turn it very one sided against me. Especially against mass mass ghosts, thanks rsvp
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Awesome. A lot of really good ideas here.
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On September 22 2012 06:10 ineversmile wrote:
Something I try to do in large fights against Terrans is to send a Warp Prism with a 75+energy sentry in it behind enemy lines, then use a big zealot warp-in to create large surface area with guardian shield coming from both ends, forming a big surround. Generally speaking, you want shuttle speed and if you could put HTs in there that only makes it better. There's also the option of dropping a colossus or a pair of immortals, depending on how marine- or marauder-heavy your opponent's force is. If you think about it, a Warp Prism is only the price of 2 Zealots and the supply of one Zealot, but it can completely overhaul the power level of about 8 zealots warped in and really mess up your opponent's kiting due to surrounds. I think having a pair of Prisms in major fights is totally worth the supply.
I'm a bit hungover, so hopefully this tactic came out comprehensively on paper...it's really useful; I hope it helps some other people with their games.
I'm having trouble picturing what you are describing. Are you talking about warping in behind a mineral line? or as you say "behind the enemy lines" as in behind the main army, therefore creating some type of sandwich for your main army to crush his. Maybe a quick paint would do the trick.
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Pretty sure he's talking about a sandwich. I've seen Hero use speed prisms to flank T's army with HT which works really well, but the zealot warp-in for a flank is a good idea too.
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Heres a nice little trick for late game PvT:
Scattering a couple DTs into your army can seriously boost your DPS and cause the other guy to make mistakes. If he doesn't factor in the damage or detection from the DT's blended in it can turn a close fight into a laugher. Ive had it happen to me before, so I try to scan the army because if detected its fine. But I don't ALWAYS have scans available, and sometimes I scan and there is nothing there, so I wasted a mule... even within the same game mixing them in sometimes and not others can keep your opponent on his toes, and force him to waste scans or possibly trade very poorly. It works best in the late game because you have enough units and spells going off and whatnot to cover for them, so its more likely to do damage. Even if opponent has ravens or scans always, you just turn them into archons and let him keep wasting scans on your army.
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On September 25 2012 06:03 rikter wrote:
Heres a nice little trick for late game PvT:
Scattering a couple DTs into your army can seriously boost your DPS and cause the other guy to make mistakes. If he doesn't factor in the damage or detection from the DT's blended in it can turn a close fight into a laugher. Ive had it happen to me before, so I try to scan the army because if detected its fine. But I don't ALWAYS have scans available, and sometimes I scan and there is nothing there, so I wasted a mule... even within the same game mixing them in sometimes and not others can keep your opponent on his toes, and force him to waste scans or possibly trade very poorly. It works best in the late game because you have enough units and spells going off and whatnot to cover for them, so its more likely to do damage. Even if opponent has ravens or scans always, you just turn them into archons and let him keep wasting scans on your army.
EMP reveals Dark Templars and lowers their hit points to 40, so they will just evaporate.
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In the big battle thats an issue, but in a side battle, say with his reinforcements or one of your raiding parties its useful. In a lategame scramble where its not max v max the ghost energy goes towards HTs usually. Even in max v max if you spread its not a guarantee they get hit. Theyre not bad as a flanker either, you just dont want to go overboard.
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On September 25 2012 05:28 kcdc wrote:
Pretty sure he's talking about a sandwich. I've seen Hero use speed prisms to flank T's army with HT which works really well, but the zealot warp-in for a flank is a good idea too.
This is exactly what I was talking about. It's kinda hard to time it out so that your flank hits at a relevant time, but if you're savvy with pulling back your main force to delay the fight a couple seconds, the flank hits just at the right time to give you sick surface area for a lot of chargelots.
On September 25 2012 06:03 rikter wrote:
Heres a nice little trick for late game PvT:
Scattering a couple DTs into your army can seriously boost your DPS and cause the other guy to make mistakes. If he doesn't factor in the damage or detection from the DT's blended in it can turn a close fight into a laugher. Ive had it happen to me before, so I try to scan the army because if detected its fine. But I don't ALWAYS have scans available, and sometimes I scan and there is nothing there, so I wasted a mule... even within the same game mixing them in sometimes and not others can keep your opponent on his toes, and force him to waste scans or possibly trade very poorly. It works best in the late game because you have enough units and spells going off and whatnot to cover for them, so its more likely to do damage. Even if opponent has ravens or scans always, you just turn them into archons and let him keep wasting scans on your army.
This is always a good tactic to use when you're rolling in money and you can afford to basically warp in a DT every time you warp in zealots. I like to take DTs and drop them at certain points along my opponent's reinforcement path, so when Bio is rallied across the map I have some DTS cutting them down along the way. You can do this with Zealots, too--or a mixture of both.
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EPT
