The HotS Protoss Help Me Thread - Page 346

On May 08 2015 09:19 dchaudh wrote:
My question: What advice would you have for deflecting/minimizing damage from a Terran who does a 1-base all in (assuming we do a standard 1-gate FE)? The unit comp I'm facing is typically 15 or so marines and 1-3 marauders at the 8:15-8:45 mark. I'll usually only have 3 stalkers at that point (and a near-complete colossus), which, along with photon overcharge, isn't enough to hold it.

Scouting-wise: I always send my 13 probe to scout for any gas-first builds (though I'm debating sending a probe sooner as this probe gets trapped behind the Terran's wall virtually 100% of the time). Once I've ruled that out, I don't scout until I get my observer (is it a mistake to wait this long to check on Terran's expo)? My observer is ready by 6:45-7:00 (depending on how well I've followed the build) so it gets to my opponent's natural by around 7:15-7:30. If opponent is guilty of 1-basing, I'll stop making probes and throw down a couple more gateways.

As you can see, my build assumes that the Terran is innocent (of doing a 1-base all in) until proven guilty (evidence = lack of expo at natural). However, I'm finding that (i) I'm unable to stop a Terran who does a 1-base all-in, (ii) in roughly 9 of my last 12 PvTs, the Terran has chosen to do a 1-base all-in (I guess this is a trend?) and I've only held it off once, that too only because they executed poorly. (In the remaining two games, they did proxy widow mines, fml.)

Edit: Here's a replay, http://ggtracker.com/matches/5968207

On May 08 2015 12:09 Tiaraju9 wrote:
I spent the last three years of my life believing with certainty that once hydras were in high numbers you need colossus. My mind will need time to adjust.

On May 08 2015 12:40 -HuShang- wrote:


Pre-watching replay
if you dont see an expo with your scout and based on other intel you should be playing really defensive, not teching to col very fast at all. You can defend an attack like this pretty easily with immortals/stalkers/sentry/zealot and a probe pull if you absolutely need to. Start keeping a probe on the map and sending it in after you start your msc. You can still do the 13 scout, but then hide it on the map afterwards. When it goes back in if you see marines then you know its either 1 rax expo or mine drop. If you get in and see a reactor then he opened reaper, it will be arriving really soon or is already there at your base. While defending the reaper with the msc check the terrans gas if its close to 150 mined and there was an expo then you're facing reaper -> factory. You can stay a little bit to see the factory if you want. Could also be mass reaper if no expo or a fast eng build, but these aren't really common. If you see ~100 gas mined then you're facing bio(3 rax). In your case your opponents are doing builds that dont really make sense.

Post-watching replay
Your early game timings need a lot of refinement. Go grab some of the gfinity replays or iem replays. Can be from many many months ago, it wont matter. Just try to find a robo opening and copy it. Your robo is like 30-40 seconds late. So its worth investing time to fix it.

But to answer your original question, your scout got more than enough info to defend without doing what I suggested above for scouting. You saw 2 rax quite early, so you know he has no expansion. Then you proceed to get a fast col bay without any gates. You're just being greedy here, if you make immortals and add 2 gates before getting your 3rd and 4th gas and robo bay this is an easy hold. The build this guy is doing is a wol build without PO.

However, that being said, in this game even if you just PO earlier and attacked with your stalkers and msc you would have held easily. You wouldn't have even have had to pull probes(although that is an option in some scenarios but not really needed here)

On May 08 2015 dchaudh wrote:
Would you recommend that I prioritize getting to a point where I can do this build while hitting these early-game timings

This best I can do for you is this: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-strategy/447483-the-great-book-of-protoss-bullshit

On May 08 2015 12:09 Tiaraju9 wrote:
I spent the last three years of my life believing with certainty that once hydras were in high numbers you need colossus. My mind will need time to adjust.

On May 09 2015 17:47 KingAlphard wrote:
I think this is all there is at pro level. I don't like to bring up this VOD because I think it's more Dark messing up and refusing to get vipers than Terminator having the sickest build of all time. Imo, carriers are bad against zerg in almost any situation, either void rays or tempests are always preferable. I would go stargate oracle --> fast 3rd base --> 3 stargates void rays ---> add high templars with storms --> add tempests.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WapHvdOkbeU

There is also a muta switch in this game, but I think the answer is pretty obvious. All you have to do is to chronoboost out phoenixes from your 3++ stargates, and use your void rays to shift-click down corruptors. Everything shoots up on a skytoss army anyway so that's already a better starting point than most compositions.

On May 09 2015 17:55 Teoita wrote:
I think with the swarm host change this is reasonably valid still

http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-strategy/441482-chargelot-archon-void-ray-pvz

My question is... why do you make tempest for? Or what is tempest good against? Is the supply worth it if Z stays on ground ? Do you always make tempest for your late game?

I tried incorporating carriers and tempests... in my build and I haven't had much success.

On May 09 2015 23:07 KingAlphard wrote:


Tempests are good against everything. But you can't build them from the start because you will lose before you have enough of them.
Once you have enough resources for it, your army should turn into pure tempests + high templars + a few archons to protect your high templars + mothership.

On May 09 2015 22:56 Teoita wrote:
There's a brief mention of an aggressive version of it in an article of ours but otherwise no, we have never written a full guide about it

http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/starcraft-2/477077-wcs-2015-season-1-maps-analysis