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Re: Abturn and Xaeldaren
To beat swarm host / hydra you need splash damage and you need map presence. Both of you were late with getting splash damage, and you had zero map presence with your army. Swarm hosts are like siege tanks, powerful when in position, weak when out of position. You want your army a lot further forward against them than you would against faster and more aggressive compositions like roach/hydra or mutalisk. When you are out on the middle of the map, you can kite around the locusts to attack their army from the sides. If you let them get to be in front of your base, you have no room to maneuver, and getting out of that position is going to be very difficult. If you are in that zero maneuverability position, flanking with blink stalkers, proxy pylons, or warp prisms are going to be your best chance of getting out of it.
Abturn, against a 2-basing player, after you do that zealot/sentry push at the front and they have defended, begin sending hallucinated phoenix into his main. This should start at 8:00, and be done every 30 seconds until you see his tech. You should also take both watchtowers with 2 zealots, so you can see any attacks that are coming. If you saw swarm hosts by themselves or with only a small number of hydras or whatever else he had, you could push out onto the map with your sentry/zealot force and delay that push. Once you saw he was going for swarm hosts, you should have stopped making immortals and immediately started your colossus tech. When you saw him take his third and that he was getting an infestation pit with no large army on the map to attack you is when you should have taken your third. Your goal long-term would be to try and keep his swarm hosts pinned back onto his side of the map for as long as possible, until you get a critical mass of colossus to begin pushing forward and to overwhelm him or to transition into skytoss which would be able to defend the vipers and corruptors.
Xael, after you killed his third, he didn't take another one until 12:00. There is no reason to be trying to win with harass units when he is that playing that turtley, and you are that far ahead in economy. If you've got an overabundance of minerals, and nowhere to harass, instead of getting zealots, get gateways, cannons, and lots of expansions for more gas. You could then focus your attention on cutting back on his creep spread with an obs and your void rays. I don't know how much money you threw away on harassment that didn't go anywhere, but it was quite a lot. There was one big engagement where you let your high templar get way too far forward and let them all get killed by the hydras, and then killed his 3rd and 4th, but then tried to go into his main with your voids, which got crushed by vipers. Skytoss is slow and highly positional. Instead of sending all your high templar, just have a hotkey for just one of them, and send that one to hit the hydras, and voids are expensive, so remember that it's better to be overly cautious with them than too aggressive. Once he tried to move out onto the map with his swarm hosts, then you could have warped in a ton of archons at home, and just overran him with a big maxed army. Don't bother getting zealots against swarm hosts though, they're basically useless.
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Not sure if anybody knew this but Ill just throw it out here that you can dodge widow mines by blinking or by warp prism pick up. I just bluff and move forward with my death ball and when I see the widow mines head I wait for like the rocket schlong is out then I blink forward the splash would hit the army if its at that spot but still a way to punish terrans for just massing widow mines .
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Okay, so TL;DR, this is just a post about how I've decided to alter my build orders in HoTS. I am only posting in hopes for critique, not necessarily as to advise anyone of my Gosu'ness. Note: I've excluded Pylon timings and some other fine details for brevity, not because they aren't figured. If I haven't put down a supply timing though, it is because I genuinely do not know the specific food timing, so information like that could benefit me a lot :-)
PvP
This is where I am worst. Currently I am doing a 3Gate/SG 1-base all-in.
13 Gate
15 Double Gas
@100% Gate: Cyber Core
@100% Cyber: Warpgate Research>Stargate>MSC
2 Gateways
@100% Stargate: Air Weapons 1
With this I have 3 Gates and one Stargate. From the Warpgates come Zealots with about 2 maximum stalkers (to conserve gas for VR) and from the Stargate is only Void Rays non-stop for the duration of the all-in.
Standard outcome is that somewhere during this period between 6:45 and 9:45 a 4-Gate or 3-Gate/Robo from the opponent Protoss will hit and I will attempt the hold off with my first Void Ray/Zealot/Stalker composition. #1 priority is keeping the Void Rays alive so I can then macro to 24 probes (then cut probes) and pump out more of this composition until enemy is dead.
Transition looks like me containing him with the Void Rays on his one base while I take 400 minerals that would have been spent on zealot warp in and make a Nexus in my second. Put down a Forge and continue into late-game...
If he expands, crush him at your convenience for easy-win, so long as you have 1 Void Ray.
PvT
I have great success against PvT mostly because the friend I practice against only really plays Terran and we talk shop constantly. So anyway:
13 Gate
15 Gas x1
@100% Gate: Cyber Core
17 Gas x2
@100% Cyber: Warpgate Research>MSC
@400 min: Nexus
Robo Facility
2 Gateways
@100% Robo Facility: Robo Bay and Observer
Double Gas at 2nd Nexus
@100% Robo Bay: Thermal Lances and Colossus
2 Stargate and begin producing Void Rays
2 Forges and non-stop upgrades until 1/1/1
Build up to ideal composition of: 3 Colossus/Void Rays/Stalkers/Zealots, 38 probes and push behind expanding to 3rd base and 5 Gateways. I find this is slightly dangerous because the timing will end up at about the same time a regular 12 minute drop from Terran will come; so I like to have my observer auto-following his medivacs or at least keeping a very good eye on them. If he is even a little behind on his drop timing, I will push into the front of his base with 3 Thermal Lance Colossus and a deathball of Zealot/Stalker/Sentry at about 12:30. This usually wins the game, but I'm already expanding to my 3rd with Double speed upgrades and more Void Rays and Colossus with deathball coming if it doesn't. Continue into late-game.
PvZ
I have mixed success. Sometimes I absolutely wipe the floor with equal skill Zerg and sometimes they seem to easy-win me. My FFE seems to really lack precision.
13 Forge
@100% Forge: Cannon
@400 min: Nexus
Gateway
Cannon
@100% Gateway: Cyber Core
Cannon if needed/2 Gateways if not
@100% Cyber, if scouting suggests Swarm Host contain or mass Hydras, Robo. If scouting suggests standard play, Stargate.
If Robo, @100% Robo: 2 Robo Bays>Observer>Immortal
Then build up to 3 Colossus/Stalkers/Zealots, 38 probes and push to punish 3rd
If Stargate, @100% 2 Stargates: Phoenixes>Void Rays
Then build up to 7 Phoenix/Void Rays/Zealots/Stalkers/Sentries, 38 probes and push to punish 3rd
I'll stop talking now, but that's the basic outline. Please tell me anything you see wrong
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can someone link me to the current PvT 1-gate fast expand build order?
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On April 23 2013 10:40 apeiro wrote:
PvZ
I have mixed success. Sometimes I absolutely wipe the floor with equal skill Zerg and sometimes they seem to easy-win me. My FFE seems to really lack precision.
13 Forge
@100% Forge: Cannon
@400 min: Nexus
Gateway
Cannon
@100% Gateway: Cyber Core
Cannon if needed/2 Gateways if not
@100% Cyber, if scouting suggests Swarm Host contain or mass Hydras, Robo. If scouting suggests standard play, Stargate.
If Robo, @100% Robo: 2 Robo Bays>Observer>Immortal
Then build up to 3 Colossus/Stalkers/Zealots, 38 probes and push to punish 3rd
If Stargate, @100% 2 Stargates: Phoenixes>Void Rays
Then build up to 7 Phoenix/Void Rays/Zealots/Stalkers/Sentries, 38 probes and push to punish 3rd
I'll stop talking now, but that's the basic outline. Please tell me anything you see wrong
Just making sure, but you're not getting a blind forge at 13 every game, right? Much better to go Nexus first for 14 pool and later. Any more than one cannon is complete overkill too unless Zerg is going to all in.
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I actually am getting that forge at the exact same timing every time. Thank you much for bringing this up; it's the type of thing I was really looking for when posting the above. So, if I understand correctly, 11-14 pool means FFE, anything later than that, NFE?
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On April 23 2013 11:12 apeiro wrote:
I actually am getting that forge at the exact same timing every time. Thank you much for bringing this up; it's the type of thing I was really looking for when posting the above. So, if I understand correctly, 11-14 pool means FFE, anything later than that, NFE?
You still FFE it's just the building placement order changes. In the OP it will link you to 'PvZ the guide' which will explain in detail.
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On April 23 2013 11:12 apeiro wrote:
I actually am getting that forge at the exact same timing every time. Thank you much for bringing this up; it's the type of thing I was really looking for when posting the above. So, if I understand correctly, 11-14 pool means FFE, anything later than that, NFE?
There's numerous posts in this topic talking about FFE vs. Zerg to look over(many of them by me), but yeah, going forge at 13 every game is very bad. You can safely Nexus first vs. a 14 pool, which is what you will see in most of your games. To expand on my comment about the cannons, you have to scout to see if they take a third. If they take a third, stay on 1 cannon. If they don't take a third(by like 5 mins), then it's not a bad idea to add cannons and have a sentry ready(you also have to consider muta/swarm host threat, too, but the baneling, speedling, and roach busts are a serious threat if you don't get out some combination of extra cannons, a MSC, or a sentry)
Edit: Yeah, what the above guy said. I forgot about that guide, but it's listed in the OP and goes into extreme detail.
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Yeah, I had seen the guide, but was definitely looking for something a bit more brief.
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Hypothetical PvZ: 1 Gate expand, establish third with Robotics. See Hydras, Zerg doesn't commit to busting, instead switches to Mutas. How do you even begin to attempt to deal with that without dougle Stargate scouting initial Spire? Is this just a BO loss? Why don't more Zergs go Muta when they see VR turtle? I don't get it, Mutas are so strong against anything NOT ranged Phoenix.
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On April 23 2013 12:12 Supah wrote:
Hypothetical PvZ: 1 Gate expand, establish third with Robotics. See Hydras, Zerg doesn't commit to busting, instead switches to Mutas. How do you even begin to attempt to deal with that without dougle Stargate scouting initial Spire? Is this just a BO loss? Why don't more Zergs go Muta when they see VR turtle? I don't get it, Mutas are so strong against anything NOT ranged Phoenix.
When you mass Void Rays, you usually get mass amount of cannons at your bases. skytoss always wants to fight over cannons.
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On April 23 2013 08:22 rsvp wrote:Show nested quote +On April 22 2013 23:20 Salivanth wrote:
In PvP, if I go for a 1-Gate FE, do I have to cancel the Nexus if I scout 3-Gate Stargate? If I do that, am I then behind?
If I don't have to cancel the Nexus, how do I defend? I just can't seem to make enough stuff. Oracle-based or Phoenix-based, doesn't matter, even when I take like, no damage from the harassment. IMO it is very difficult to hold 3 gate stargate with 1 gate FE. There's no way you're going to scout it before you have time to cancel, unless you somehow luckily slip a probe into his base. The best way to hold is to go stalker heavy with few sentries (1 or 2). During engagements make sure you target pheonixes with your stalkers first. However, this is dangerous because normally you'd need a lot of sentries to hold against gateway pressure, and it can be near impossible to scout between regular gateway pressure and a stargate all-in before it's too late. You might want to upload a replay though, because the way you phrase your question "am I behind" and "no damage from the haraassment" makes me think something else is going on. If someone opens 3 gate star against 1 gate FE the correct move would be for the stargate player to just all-in, unless he opened oracle and it did a lot of damage and he just wants to play it safe. Are you talking about mid-game void ray compositions?
I actually am able to scout it before I have time to cancel, at least on Akilon Wastes. I was able to use a Hallucinated Phoenix. I Chronoboost out a Sentry as my second unit, and Hallucination gets to the enemy base just in time. Here's a replay.
http://drop.sc/326797
In this replay, everything pretty much goes perfectly and I still lose. My opponent loses TWO Oracles for nothing, I scout the 3-Gate Stargate, and I am able to cancel the Nexus.
So, my own analysis is that after making a couple rounds of units, I had to expand. If I didn't, my opponent would simply back off and expand himself, and I'd be behind. I figured he would all-in against an expansion, but he wouldn't try to push up my ramp.
In the end, my army composition is superior, but I lose the engagement because my micro sucks. (I practiced it against a practice partner, and he won 5-0, including the time he took control of my army and I took control of the opponent's.) However, this was an absolutely perfect game before the engagement for me. I'm not going to get that every time. And of course, I'm still unsure if my response/macro was off.
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On April 23 2013 12:24 SkyBlaze wrote:Show nested quote +On April 23 2013 12:12 Supah wrote:
Hypothetical PvZ: 1 Gate expand, establish third with Robotics. See Hydras, Zerg doesn't commit to busting, instead switches to Mutas. How do you even begin to attempt to deal with that without dougle Stargate scouting initial Spire? Is this just a BO loss? Why don't more Zergs go Muta when they see VR turtle? I don't get it, Mutas are so strong against anything NOT ranged Phoenix. When you mass Void Rays, you usually get mass amount of cannons at your bases. skytoss always wants to fight over cannons.
What about more "traditional" play? I feel like you get tech way too late with a Gate expand, and I've been trying my hardest to make it work. But if the Zerg goes Mutas, it really seems like you're up the creek if you don't plan on going VR. While Stalkers are "cheaper" than Voids, you need much more to be able to deal with Mutas. I don't know man, I guess that's why it's all 1G/FFE Sky toss or FFE SG into third.
But then, going Air after a 1 Gate expand leaves you open to a SH all in, wouldn't it? The delayed third could just as well be a response to your Gate opening, and even if you scout it with your Phoenix (or Hallu Phoenix, which still is just a tad quicker, and you already have an SG up by then), the transition to Colossus is rather clunky. But if you go Robo, you run into that same problem against Mutas. I just have no idea how to play PvZ if the Zerg doesn't do Hydra/Roach into lategame.
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On April 23 2013 14:14 Supah wrote:Show nested quote +On April 23 2013 12:24 SkyBlaze wrote:On April 23 2013 12:12 Supah wrote:
Hypothetical PvZ: 1 Gate expand, establish third with Robotics. See Hydras, Zerg doesn't commit to busting, instead switches to Mutas. How do you even begin to attempt to deal with that without dougle Stargate scouting initial Spire? Is this just a BO loss? Why don't more Zergs go Muta when they see VR turtle? I don't get it, Mutas are so strong against anything NOT ranged Phoenix. When you mass Void Rays, you usually get mass amount of cannons at your bases. skytoss always wants to fight over cannons. What about more "traditional" play? I feel like you get tech way too late with a Gate expand, and I've been trying my hardest to make it work. But if the Zerg goes Mutas, it really seems like you're up the creek if you don't plan on going VR. While Stalkers are "cheaper" than Voids, you need much more to be able to deal with Mutas. I don't know man, I guess that's why it's all 1G/FFE Sky toss or FFE SG into third. But then, going Air after a 1 Gate expand leaves you open to a SH all in, wouldn't it? The delayed third could just as well be a response to your Gate opening, and even if you scout it with your Phoenix (or Hallu Phoenix, which still is just a tad quicker, and you already have an SG up by then), the transition to Colossus is rather clunky. But if you go Robo, you run into that same problem against Mutas. I just have no idea how to play PvZ if the Zerg doesn't do Hydra/Roach into lategame.
i think you've run it to a problem i like to call "over thinking". just do your build and deal with the problems that appear when they reveal themselves by either pressure or by scouting information. if you scout swamhost pressure him as much as possible without losing to much and go double robo col. If mutas pressure the zerg as much as you can to lower gas count as much as you can, while teching into double stargate or even 3 stargates depending on how late you scouted it, while trying to get range for the phoenix' but this is really on possible on 3 bases does not really matter what opening happened at all. The key to beating zerg is the 3rd base timing. when toss gets the 3rd base down you can deal with all the problems that arise from zerg.
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I think the current MSC expand into double forge colossus + blink should be added to the OP. It's like Tail's DT drop build, but it includes double forge + twilight instead and a robo bay at the 7-minute mark. I've seeen several pro gamers using it (or variations of it) and it seems to be safe against all terran timings. Early observer scout, 3 stalkers + an obs to deal with drops at 7 minutes, sentries + photon overcharge and an early colossus to hold most pushes. When you get a healthy amount of blink stalkers you get a third, generally close to the 12 minute mark. Parting has just done this build, Tails does it all the time on the ladder, I saw it the other day in proleague, and Artosis/Tasteless has just said people should steal this build after seeing how solid it was (Parting vs Last, GLS).
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On April 23 2013 18:54 vhapter wrote:
I think the current MSC expand into double forge colossus + blink should be added to the OP. It's like Tail's DT drop build, but it includes double forge + twilight instead and a robo bay at the 7-minute mark. I've seeen several pro gamers using it (or variations of it) and it seems to be safe against all terran timings. Early observer scout, 3 stalkers + an obs to deal with drops at 7 minutes, sentries + photon overcharge and an early colossus to hold most pushes. When you get a healthy amount of blink stalkers you get a third, generally close to the 12 minute mark. Parting has just done this build, Tails does it all the time on the ladder, I saw it the other day in proleague, and Artosis/Tasteless has just said people should steal this build after seeing how solid it was (Parting vs Last, GLS).
Rain also does something very similar.
He doesn't get the first forge that early usually - but it's the most solid PvT style you can ever get, I think. Old school double forge style all the way. I especially think blink is more important in PvT than ever to get good mapcontrol and to deny drops. Also, it's not that gimmicky like DT drops or oracle expands - it's just damn solid.
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Italy12248 Posts
Yeah the whole build thingy is definitely in need of an update
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Parting just did a really cool build vs. Leenock, and I wanted to know if it was likely to be a solid build to copy. Here's what I've got from it:
FFE into Stargate
Scouts hydras -> Robo Bay and goes up to 6 gates
Expands around 10 mins or so, gets Twilight Council
Charge + Archives at 11-12 mins.
4th at 13:45, Storm on the way.
Pushes at 15 mins or so with 5 HT's, Storm, 3 Colossi, and a mix of Chargelots and Blink Stalkers.
It seems like a solid build to copy: HT's vs Vipers, the fast Storm to head off Muta tech switches, and a nice push at max. But does it have some hidden vulnerabilities I don't know about, that might be a reason to not do it on ladder?
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Whenever my shrine gets scouted I always cancel it and go templars. I see almost no negatives for going DT drops as long as you get your Nexus early. You guarantee some scans being wasted, drops are less effective with dt defense and DTs provide good ways to deny expansions like burrow. And most times if you get enough gates up + get TA - go for a 8 gate storm timing. Usually does A LOT of damage if not out right kills.
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On April 23 2013 20:04 Salivanth wrote:
Parting just did a really cool build vs. Leenock, and I wanted to know if it was likely to be a solid build to copy. Here's what I've got from it:
FFE into Stargate
Scouts hydras -> Robo Bay and goes up to 6 gates
Expands around 10 mins or so, gets Twilight Council
Charge + Archives at 11-12 mins.
4th at 13:45, Storm on the way.
Pushes at 15 mins or so with 5 HT's, Storm, 3 Colossi, and a mix of Chargelots and Blink Stalkers.
It seems like a solid build to copy: HT's vs Vipers, the fast Storm to head off Muta tech switches, and a nice push at max. But does it have some hidden vulnerabilities I don't know about, that might be a reason to not do it on ladder?
This looked really good, I was working on something like this (stargate --> robo --> gate). The thing that makes this tricky to perfect is your gas. You can see a few pages ago I asked for help regarding something like this, but no reply (sigh). It's so gas intensive you. My only concern was facing a max roach timing without immortals, so if any better player could say how solid this no immortal transition into fast colossus is, I'd be glad to hear.
I wonder if he got any attack upgrades at all. I was thinking about a +2 chargelot drop at about 14-15 minutes with a colossus army to take a third, but since vipers can be out at this point I guess an early transition to HTs is more important.
On April 23 2013 19:30 Bahajinbo wrote:
Rain also does something very similar.
He doesn't get the first forge that early usually - but it's the most solid PvT style you can ever get, I think. Old school double forge style all the way. I especially think blink is more important in PvT than ever to get good mapcontrol and to deny drops. Also, it's not that gimmicky like DT drops or oracle expands - it's just damn solid.
Yeah, I think it was Rain who did it the other day. I guess if you don't need 3 stalkers to defend against drops, you can be greedier and actually go fast double forge and delay the stalkers. But I don't see a point in going early forge like Parting did and then adding another one. Double forge + twilight between 7:30-8:00 is pretty solid. I'd rather go super fast double forge rather than single early forge, otherwise you might as well get your double forge at the standard timing imo. 
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EPT
