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Hi there,
I'M a high Masters player and played a game against a Protoss that really made me think about the match up as it is right now. I haven't found and up-to-date thread so far.
About the game:
ZvP on Echo LE. I scouted his forge opening and went for an economic based route to start off the game. I got a little economic damage due to his gateway-block on my natural but all in all it went pretty ok - means, I got ahead when I finished my third and could saturate my three bases including Gas. I scouted his Stargate-opening (only scouted one though, and I think he instantly built two) and went for an instant Hydra defense and 2 spores at my bases to deny or at least delay VoidRay/possible other toss air harassment.
He sniped my Lair with Voidrays and lost like 4 of them during the process -> I tried to use my army advantage to pressure him.
I know I made a mistake by wasting my hydras there but I did not expect that static defense and reacted to late/thought I could still try to get dmg done 
My problem isn't even about that, it's about the end-game situation where at some point I cant engage in any fight withought having at least 10-15 spores under my army unless I want to get my ass kicked
I added the replay and hope you guys take a look at it before you comment on this .I was streaming the game and was theorycrafting for about an hour with my chat to find mistakes/possible strategies (I found several minor mistakes which I'm not going to mention right now because it would fill up this post waaaaaay too much ). Given my opening I came to only one conclusion that maybe would have won me the game: Go full-retard-spore-mode and place 20 spores at the important choke points on the map (and about 10-15 at my expansions, which could have been attack by his air or split the map in half with them and use like 4 vipers and mass corruptor to only abduct units one by one. I really don't like his kind of playstyle but I think this ends with LotV, although it's similar to the old SH style. This is my first thread so I hope I did everything fine
Edit: I somehow can't find a way to upload the replay. Can I use a filehoster? I just go for it...
REPLAY:
http://ul.to/kjce44jk
REPLAY MIRROR: http://k2s.cc/file/b84b81f00b26a/Toss_air_how_to_beat.SC2Replay
REPLAY Drop.sc : http://drop.sc/399641
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Replay doesn't work.
You're right on what you write in the end. Mass spores is extremely good against that because void rays have lower range than spores, carriers have higher but all interceptors will die immediately, which is very expensive.
You don't have to fight his army straight up. Since all his units have range lower than abduct, all you need is to make vipers and abduct 3-4 units every time, dragging them into spore/corruptors. Even if he has hts it can work because you can hide vipers behind overseers and abduct has the same range as feedback, but vipers are faster and they fly.
Infestors also help because void rays always clump up, so if he tries to attack into spores (which is already bad) you just hit fungals so void rays won't do absolutely anything. Might wanna have some queens as well to transfuse since both void rays and carriers have a ridiculously low damage per hit.
Overall void rays/carriers is just worse than tempests/ hts. I don't think it's supposed to be a good endgame composition at all.
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If they can max out on void carrier you are pretty much dead as zerg. Outside of making 120 spores and 10 vipers to pull them in with fungles and starving them out, you need to attack them over and over again until they run out of money on their 3 base.
Ideally you can keep sniping their third base to keep their gas count low, Or at least delay their third if you can.
You have several options if you want to be aggressive.
1. Roach hydra max with 2 2 upgrades which should hit around 13-14 min. This neeeeeeds to do damage, and can outright win the game most of the time.
2. Roach max with 16-20 queens ----> attack. queens in large numbers destroy void rays. and allows you to bank you gas for a muta or corruptor transition.
3. Roach hydra or ling hydra max with vipers. (no evos, for more vipers)
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The problem is, I can't pressure him in any way because he has 10+ cannons at every base and in order to get them, I'd have to walk up a ramp where i just get destroyed by cannons and his air because my units block each other and his voidrays don't. Additionally he can activate his photon overcharge so I can never attack with a ground force.
I really need you to see the replay, though. I added another link from another filehoster to my initial post.
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Never let it get there, or your dead, kind of like the old school WOL "Zomg how do I beat a 200/200 Collosus army" question.
You hit a timing, I lost to this once or twice and then started studying the Jaedong way of Hydra/Ling all inning any type of cheesy mass Stargate nonsense.
You know what cannons are shit against? Lots of Zerglings with Hydras.
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Simple facts / short answers:
How do I beat a VoidRay / Carrier composition in ZvP?
Queens (mineral dump) + Some Hydras. Rush armor upgrades and range upgrades.
6 Vipers. 1 Parasitic bomb per viper = GG VoidRays.
When you scout VR going down after Parasitic bomb kills 12+ of them, go corruptor.
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Since I only meet carriers once every 500 games, I still have this noob question that I never dared to ask : do you let the AI kill the interceptors first or do you focus fire the carriers?
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On June 05 2015 03:15 Beelzebub1 wrote:
Never let it get there, or your dead, kind of like the old school WOL "Zomg how do I beat a 200/200 Collosus army" question.
You hit a timing, I lost to this once or twice and then started studying the Jaedong way of Hydra/Ling all inning any type of cheesy mass Stargate nonsense.
You know what cannons are shit against? Lots of Zerglings with Hydras.
I hope you've seen the replay.
He sniped my main and lost a few colossi, i haven't lost a single unit so far. I'm pretty sure my macro wasn't on point this game but still i was up 150 sup vs below hundred but I didn't have any speedlings, yet I think I would still get rekt by his Nexus cannon, his 10+ Cannons at every choke and the 8 Voidrays he still had at that point. Even if I'd make it through the cannons, I would probably still be behind because I can't take a cost efficient engagement there.
Before you comment, please watch the replay. The game could have went completely different if I went another strategy (i.e. mass ling infestor and constantly cancel his third in the making because he had no gate units) but that's not my point. I want to know what could have been done differently in the position I was in after he sniped my Hive because I still felt ahead at that point because I didn't take much economic damage to the Lair/Hive snipe because I had a fourth base already completed, to which I transferred the drones from my main.
I think this is what LotV is about with it's mining concept. You cannot sit on 3 bases and turtle up to 200 supply like he did this game. I had an economic advantage which I couldnt use at all because every fight was so cost inefficient.
On June 05 2015 03:26 Gwavajuice wrote:
Since I only meet carriers once every 500 games, I still have this noob question that I never dared to ask : do you let the AI kill the interceptors first or do you focus fire the carriers?
You have to focus fire the Carriers in big fights. I think the only situation where you don't have to, is when you have so many hydras, that it doesn't matter what you focus and they kill off the interceptors quicker than running under carriers and sniping them (also when they just spawn and don't have 8 interceptors built up already).
But if you have Corruptors, I think their attacks would be wasted if they'd attack interceptors, especially when they do extra dmg to armored classes.
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On June 05 2015 03:26 JCoto wrote:
Simple facts / short answers:
How do I beat a VoidRay / Carrier composition in ZvP?
Queens (mineral dump) + Some Hydras. Rush armor upgrades and range upgrades.
6 Vipers. 1 Parasitic bomb per viper = GG VoidRays.
When you scout VR going down after Parasitic bomb kills 12+ of them, go corruptor.
I'm not sure you realize we are not talking about LotV..
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On June 05 2015 03:33 Maxim wrote:Show nested quote +On June 05 2015 03:26 JCoto wrote:
Simple facts / short answers:
How do I beat a VoidRay / Carrier composition in ZvP?
Queens (mineral dump) + Some Hydras. Rush armor upgrades and range upgrades.
6 Vipers. 1 Parasitic bomb per viper = GG VoidRays.
When you scout VR going down after Parasitic bomb kills 12+ of them, go corruptor. I'm not sure you realize we are not talking about LotV..
LOL, never seen mass Carrier/VoidRay viable in HotS. I thought it was LotV because of that.
Then I think big masses of Queens, some Hydras and good upgrades, and some infestor to lock down VR.
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Did you watch the replay?
Edit: thanks Defenestrator for showing me a proper way to provide the replay! I added a new (third) link on drop.sc to my initial post for you to download the replay!
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This is an older style that got its start around the end of Wings of Liberty and was at its peak popularity at the beginning of HotS.
The thing to remember: mass cannons = mass air and 2 cannons = 1 hatchery = 2 gateways
There's a stronger variation of this where they go void rays plus gateways for zealot harass that I think is even harder to beat. With late game air vs. air, Zerg needs to slowly pick the enemy army using vipers while slowly spreading out with mass spore crawler. You absolutely never dive a mass air army, especially when they have cannons to defend. Without swarm hosts and with perfect play, this style is slightly in Toss' favor, but the thing is you should've been way ahead going into the late game, and his play wasn't perfect. He didn't have enough tempests and he didn't have any high templar.
Your biggest mistake of the game came at around 14:00 when you threw away 25 hydras in exchange for 2 cannons and a void ray. With mass cannons, you can't attack him, but he can't attack you because he won't have any gateways. Because you already have a decent army to defend any harass, the correct response is to double expand while getting vipers. You waited until the 20:00 mark to get your vipers when he already had cannons under his 4th. If you'd had your vipers earlier and a big economic advantage, you could've starved him on three bases, gotten spores at both his two closest expansions by rapidly expanding creep off of the mass queen you should've had from your attempts to defend his early void ray push, and forced him into a fight there that he would've lost.
But fundamental rule: never dive on a maxed airtoss army, force him to come to you. If he sits forever, you can slowly kill him off with infested terrans while advancing your spores and creep further forward.
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On June 05 2015 08:47 FlyingBeer wrote:
This is an older style that got its start around the end of Wings of Liberty and was at its peak popularity at the beginning of HotS.
The thing to remember: mass cannons = mass air and 2 cannons = 1 hatchery = 2 gateways
There's a stronger variation of this where they go void rays plus gateways for zealot harass that I think is even harder to beat. With late game air vs. air, Zerg needs to slowly pick the enemy army using vipers while slowly spreading out with mass spore crawler. You absolutely never dive a mass air army, especially when they have cannons to defend. Without swarm hosts and with perfect play, this style is slightly in Toss' favor, but the thing is you should've been way ahead going into the late game, and his play wasn't perfect. He didn't have enough tempests and he didn't have any high templar.
Your biggest mistake of the game came at around 14:00 when you threw away 25 hydras in exchange for 2 cannons and a void ray. With mass cannons, you can't attack him, but he can't attack you because he won't have any gateways. Because you already have a decent army to defend any harass, the correct response is to double expand while getting vipers. You waited until the 20:00 mark to get your vipers when he already had cannons under his 4th. If you'd had your vipers earlier and a big economic advantage, you could've starved him on three bases, gotten spores at both his two closest expansions by rapidly expanding creep off of the mass queen you should've had from your attempts to defend his early void ray push, and forced him into a fight there that he would've lost.
But fundamental rule: never dive on a maxed airtoss army, force him to come to you. If he sits forever, you can slowly kill him off with infested terrans while advancing your spores and creep further forward.
Big big thanks for actually giving me a good answer here
As is said, I knew I made a mistake with the hydras but after I lost the Hive (which was the reason I had my Vipers delayed so much - kinda unlucky there I guess), I thought, I should counterpressure and just then I realized how much static defense he has. But still, his end-game army is so hard to beat that you NEED 20 spores under your army to kill that 
But still you have a point there. I think partly the reason why I lost is because I really have no experience in facing a strategy like this. But this was the only game out of my last 300 or so where this came to use.
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I have faced this strategy multiple times as a masters player. All of the games I have lost against this composition is when I was super aggressive. Since swarm host play is no longer viable (other than harassment), you'd have to use hydras. However, you cannot really stop the protoss from turtling on 2-3 base because there is an incredibly small window when you can take out the third base: before he gets enough units out and before he sets up the cannons at the third's nexus. Most of the time you'll miss this timing. Throwing your army at the protoss is like waves crashing against the rocks on the shore. It does absolutely nothing and you'll just get further behind.
However, there is a better way of dealing with this as others have noted as well as what I've seen from GM streams on dealing with this. Just don't attack him. Play passive. He cannot attack you until he's massed enough voidrays and comes to snipe one of your hatches. By then you'll be ready for him by obtaining map control. You can continue expanding like crazy and tech up without worrying about the protoss attacking you for a long time because he has no gateways and he spent all his minerals on photon cannons.
Crazy as it sounds. I've seen many GMs deal with this by spreading creep all over the map, massing queens, infestors and spore crawlers. Throw in a couple vipers for abducts. Stay next to your spore crawlers and on creep with your queens. Overlord speed should help with a creep spread and you can actually immediately start creeping in front of the opponent's base with a spare queen TLO style. No one is going to come kill your queens or overlords. The protoss army will be straight up bunched in one spot. If they kill creep on one side, spread on the other.
When it comes time to engage, fungal interceptors and void rays as much as you can. Throw in infested terrans with the extra energy. Transfuse queens and just let the spores and queens do as much damage as possible. On several GM streams, I've seen the protoss army simple melt to this composition and honestly, I can't really tell why other than spores plus fungal growth does quite a great amount of dmg. If you clear enough of their army, you can start abducting units left and right without fear.
Whenever I come across across a protoss that goes mass voidrays, I simple just throw a shit load of spores everywhere at each base. When I go hydras, I usually just trade evenly with them and end up where I last started (unless I'm on creep and they mess up).
As far as I can tell this is the best strategy against voidray carrier in Hots. Until Lotv, where we have parasitic bomb. It's similar to playing terran mech. You wouldn't suicide your army into a fleet of seiged tanks. Just don't be agressive and good luck out there.
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Well you basically can't. When he gets 5+ carriers out it is GG because Z doesn't have any AA atm. so I think the only way to beat it is somehow all in (can be hard if he gets 50+ cannons at every base)
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You either need to all in him with a scary 2 2 roach hydra army before 14 min. Or prepare your body for a 2 hour games. deny their 4th as long as your can, and literally make 200 spores, if not more. just keep taking bases making spores, vipers and infestors. and wait.... and wait. You need to wait until they come out into yours spore. If you get bored. Start spelling your name with spores.
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EPT
