EPT[D] Losira vs Alicia and the future of PvZ - Page 4
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lphoenixl
Canada71 Posts
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babysimba
10466 Posts
On April 29 2011 04:16 truthless wrote: Protoss sort of HAS to move out that early, or the zerg will gain an immense economic lead going into the midgame if he's droning. He didn't actually lose anything other than 3 (or was it 4?) forcefields on that encounter at the XNT, and as I stated earlier he also had enough energy left to FF the entire battle following that. The drone difference was 50 vs 35 after the first engagement in game 1 I believe (I noted it in my initial summary - you can check the actual VOD if you want). Losira had 3 hatches with queens pumping drones and the speedlings over to control the map and plenty of time to react to Alicia moving out, which he obviously couldn't since his army was crippled. I sincerely doubt Losira fell for the void ray as it was firing on overlords and not doing any obvious damage, and it was fairly obvious that Alicia was just giving it away to the queens. Noone at code s level would micro a void ray that badly. He wanted the detection and the hydras regardless, because he knew that the only way he might lose at this point was either to DTs or mass void ray. He had enough of an economic lead that he could play it safe. Alicia didn't have the economy to support a 6gate until way, way later. He had barely enough to support constant warpins from the 3 gates he had as well as probes and adding the robo. Losira was playing SAFE by droning that hard, not risky. He knew that Alicia wouldn't be able to pressure him without rebuilding his sentries and letting them gain energy. Game 2 isn't really a viable discussion since he went stargate and I doubt this is actually holdable off 3gates without constant warpins, and I only really mentioned it since it'd be stupid to leave it out completely. Alicia was already dead after that first engagement, against a player who know how to macro and trade units, the rest of the game is pretty much irrelevant. You don't move out if you are playing greedy. Nexus is planted even seconds before warpgate is completed, with only around 5 sentries. Moving out with just 1 more wave of units without a wall and cannons is just bad decision making. Even if a good zerg player is playing passive, he won't get fooled by that small amt. of units (7sentries + 2 zealots). With that much gas pumped into sentries, the only remaining aggressive strat is nexus cancel wg all-in which would have a much bigger army, not to mention the long rush distance. He did not have enough forcefields to defend, i don't know why are you saying those forcefield lasted the whole battle. If he had a semi wall in to force lings to come from only 1 direction and without those wasted forcefields, he would have more than enough forcefield to hold. 2 forcefields to prevent lings from attacking your units, 3 forcefields to prevent roach from attack anything behind the wall. With your ranged units and 1 cannon wearing down their units, and at least 2 waves of forcefield to buy time for warp in, toss can defend without a single loss of units (not buildings though if zerg is suicidal). | ||
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Xapti
Canada2473 Posts
On April 29 2011 01:44 Mimus wrote: this isn't really a new build, it's just a bit more refined over time. 9 pool definitely isn't new either, and wouldn't say it's particularly good either (more of a gamble).Really excited to try it out :D!! Hurrah for a recent influx of cool zerg builds (spanishwa, 9 pool, this) Anyway, with regards to PvZ and these games, I think that protoss should be getting hallucination before warp gate if they aren't planning to attack, and should only get warp gate for feinted attacks, careful pressure, or 4WG style attack. This is especially the case now, assuming that the 1.33 patch changes will stick, making warp gates considerably less-better to gateways in comparison, in addition to the longer time to get them. With an early hallucinated scout you can spot what they are up to and react accordingly. Conversely, I might be missing out on a bit of info here (due to the style I've been playing zerg recently), but I always thought 2 gate pressure builds into 4 gate expand style was a good way to keep zerg economy in check while keeping a good idea on what they're doing, even though you likely can't get into their main. Yes it's possible for ass speedling to beat this, but speed takes time, plus even with speed, a critical number of zealots are very efficient vs zerglings. If protoss scouts a gas-pool build then they don't need to even do the pressure if they don't think it will pay off. | ||
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Barca
United States418 Posts
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Xapti
Canada2473 Posts
On April 29 2011 06:27 Barca wrote: 3 gate expand supposed to be safest PvZ opening, right? -_________________________- Well safe is always relative. No matter what build a person does, they are balancing late-game potential vs early-game defense/offense. a 3 gate expand build is a slighty more balanced/agressive way of aiming for a long game. The safest early game build would probably be forge fast exand, when it's done on the proper maps. 3 gate expo can have trouble with burrow roach rush in the same way it has problems with this zergling-roach build — it's not a guaranteed win and depends on many factors, but still can result in an advantage for the later game. I think 3 gate expo is getting a bit of a stale build, and while it is quite well-rounded and diverse, running the same build too often by players results in things like this happening. protoss hasn't been doing much innovating it seems, or moreso by that I mean using some old tactics tat were previously innovated, like 2 gate pressure opening, and immortal-zealot warp-in rush. I think this is due to the flat-out domination they've been having with standard play- it just doesn't make them invincible. Edit: I also rather agree with what MorroW said below me here. This style of zerg play is nothing new, which is why it's surprising that it did so well, although I would say the build was quite-well refined and executed none-the-less (and the multi-tasking was fantastic. As a medium masters player I can say it is ridiculously hard to be base-tending while doing important army-control vs a protoss force — amateur players just couldn't win with this build because of that). I think he explained the problems going on related to the protoss that cause the meltdown in 2 games to occur-- it's not like this happens all the time, people have a tendency to focus too much on specifics of just 1 big tournament match when not accounting for the luck factor adn the bigger picture of things (for instance with regards to how zerg won GSL1) | ||
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MorroW
Sweden3522 Posts
metal he just macroed horribly and again forge in main base instead. he had 900 minerals lol... not only shouldnt this build work in the first place if toss makes units and forge in the natural on top of it u autodie vs DT which btw losira was coinflipping the odds of (which is a good choice because zvp is so difficult and u have to take huge risks like that) amazing play by losira and really bad play by alicia. the build is more relying on toss being bad and/or risky rather than being a correct decision vs 3warpgate expansion, not very solid and it worked way better than it should have 3warpgate expo is 100% safe. so is forge expand. zerg has no 100% safe build that can scout everything and respond to everything in time. OP's you write, he had an evo chamber so he had potential to build spore crawlers incase any dts arrive. do you realize your dead unless your spore is a bout 50% complete when the dts arrive? nothing more to talk about than that. its just sad to see every single zvp in gsl zerg is taking ridiculously big risks and even when they get away with it they still loose if toss isnt making blunders like alicia on terminus (expanding and attacking zergs 4th at the same time with sentry immortal vs masshydraling) | ||
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Samhax
1054 Posts
On April 29 2011 06:42 MorroW wrote: terminus he just wasted a ton of energy in middle by panic on top of macroing badly and putting the forge in the main base metal he just macroed horribly and again forge in main base instead. he had 900 minerals lol... not only shouldnt this build work in the first place if toss makes units and forge in the natural on top of it u autodie vs DT which btw losira was coinflipping the odds of (which is a good choice because zvp is so difficult and u have to take huge risks like that) amazing play by losira and really bad play by alicia. the build is more relying on toss being bad and/or risky rather than being a correct decision vs 3warpgate expansion, not very solid and it worked way better than it should have 3warpgate expo is 100% safe. so is forge expand. zerg has no 100% safe build that can scout everything and respond to everything in time. OP's you write, he had an evo chamber so he had potential to build spore crawlers incase any dts arrive. do you realize your dead unless your spore is a bout 50% complete when the dts arrive? nothing more to talk about than that. its just sad to see every single zvp in gsl zerg is taking ridiculously big risks and even when they get away with it they still loose if toss isnt making blunders like alicia on terminus (expanding and attacking zergs 4th at the same time with sentry immortal vs masshydraling) I kind of disagree with what you are saying. But because i respect you alot as a player (your switch was a total baller move) and i'm not 1/10 of your skill. i'm not going to argue with you. If there are some zergs as good as morrow who wants to discuss what Losira did in this match, they are welcome  | ||
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truthless
Sweden120 Posts
On April 29 2011 06:11 babysimba wrote: Alicia was already dead after that first engagement, against a player who know how to macro and trade units, the rest of the game is pretty much irrelevant. You don't move out if you are playing greedy. Nexus is planted even seconds before warpgate is completed, with only around 5 sentries. Moving out with just 1 more wave of units without a wall and cannons is just bad decision making. Even if a good zerg player is playing passive, he won't get fooled by that small amt. of units (7sentries + 2 zealots). With that much gas pumped into sentries, the only remaining aggressive strat is nexus cancel wg all-in which would have a much bigger army, not to mention the long rush distance. He did not have enough forcefields to defend, i don't know why are you saying those forcefield lasted the whole battle. If he had a semi wall in to force lings to come from only 1 direction and without those wasted forcefields, he would have more than enough forcefield to hold. 2 forcefields to prevent lings from attacking your units, 3 forcefields to prevent roach from attack anything behind the wall. With your ranged units and 1 cannon wearing down their units, and at least 2 waves of forcefield to buy time for warp in, toss can defend without a single loss of units (not buildings though if zerg is suicidal). I agree, he was dead after the first engagement. I wouldn't say he played greedy. That's pretty much standard timing for a nexus, dropping it just before or just as WGT finishes. Moving out shortly thereafter to clear the nearby XNT if there's no signs of lings in the vicinity of your natural is quite common as well, and there's no guarantee that Alicia isn't 4gating and cancelling his nexus at this point, since Losira didn't scout his base. He wants to force some units instead of drones and that's the way you do it. Deny intel for the zerg. I just rewatched the engagement on Terminus, and yeah, he did waste more energy than I remembered. 6 forcefields (I remembered 4 or 5) and a guardian shield (that I forgot all about). But he did have energy left to spend until the very end of the following engagement as well. I didn't really see at any point what he could've done with a couple more forcefields. A partial wall (like with the forge and a 4th gateway perhaps) would've helped for sure in conserving some of that energy for a potential counter though, and might even have saved his cannon. Would've been a different game for sure. | ||
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Dommk
Australia4865 Posts
metal he just macroed horribly and again forge in main base instead. he had 900 minerals lol.. That mineral build up is there because you cant spend the money fast enough---3/4 Chronoboosted warpgates with Cannons WILL NOT spend 2 base income. In most cases it is put into Probes, Tech and more gateways, none of which would ever be up in time by the time that Roach/Ling rips you apart. People put forges in their main because sometimes it is very easy to have it sniped and the downtime where you can't put down Cannons can mean the end of you. I've being doing it myself lately, but I do agree he should have something there, like another Gateway or double/triple pylon | ||
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WhiteDog
France8650 Posts
On April 29 2011 02:13 Markwerf wrote: Why do people continously try to read too much from these GSL games.. Losira did a very standard roach/ling push which has been done tons of time before.. Pool first, expand and then push around 32-36 drones. You get 1 round of roaches, march these over and then continously pump lings. You have a small mineral build up because 30 drones get more income then you can spend with 2 hatch 2 queen so you can expand during the attack and quickly switch back to droning when you want. Also because the attack only sends over 1 batch of roaches and then only lings it is actually not that relevant how big the map is. If the protoss has a cannon and defends well they are ahead. However alicia didn't defend too well: - he moved out early before hallucination finished. This already costed him a ton of energy and i believe a unit or 2 because he got caught in the middle of the map. 'shark mode' is a good thing and important to stop the Z droning up too freely but on such a huge map it is incredibly risky. 3 gate sentry expand simply sucks hard on these big maps for that very reason imo, you can't boom that fast nor can you pressure safely. There is simply no reason not to FFE or at least 1 gate FE on that map... - his cannon was late and the pylon powering it got killed, the cannon in fact only cost him money. - after the attack he was actually in reasonable shape (behind but still winnable) but he made a horrendous attack at Z's expo and already got his nexus sniped earlier. In a nutshell, the way losira played has already been done tons of times and it's a good tactic but has weaknesses like any other pressure build by Z. If it is defended properly Z is behind alot. Alicia just played bad tactically by doing a stupid opener for the map and choosing a very poor time to move out. Part of that was just unlucky and part was stupid for not getting hallucination faster. His good forcefields only kept him in the game longer but it is not that hard to forcefield well on defense, he just managed to do with very few forcefields which he had to after wasting energy by getting caught in the open. One thing i do agree on, this aggresive style of play is very good for zerg when going roach play. Going roaches and playing passive, ie hitting the supply cap, is just bad. I think the main reason this happens so much is that zerg seems to be the best booming race at first because they can drone so hard and they are the best boomer in SC:BW. In sc2 however P booms best and you have to be aggresive agaisnt them or you just lose (or use a strat with a good endgame like ultra, ling, infestor). There is nothing to add at that post except maybe one thing : This type of all in or semi all in / agressiv build is becoming more and more the future of ZvP. Everytime I see IdrA he is going for this type of agressive play, I don't see any player who does like Morrow did some time ago anymore : overexpanding and teching up while letting your opponent build his death ball. | ||
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ZasZ.
United States2911 Posts
On April 29 2011 07:24 WhiteDog wrote: There is nothing to add at that post except maybe one thing : This type of all in is becoming more and more the future of ZvP. Everytime I see IdrA he is going for this type of agressive play, I don't see any player who does like Morrow did some time ago anymore : overexpanding and teching up while letting your opponent build his death ball. And I suppose the question then is whether or not this development is good for the game. Should Zerg be forced to be super aggressive at all points in the game against Protoss, even if it works? There's something to be said for the viability of both an aggressive and macro style, but it seems like the macro style is working less and less against Protoss players who know how to defend and build up a macro advantage while harassing. | ||
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Alejandrisha
United States6565 Posts
On April 29 2011 06:42 MorroW wrote: terminus he just wasted a ton of energy in middle by panic on top of macroing badly and putting the forge in the main base metal he just macroed horribly and again forge in main base instead. he had 900 minerals lol... not only shouldnt this build work in the first place if toss makes units and forge in the natural on top of it u autodie vs DT which btw losira was coinflipping the odds of (which is a good choice because zvp is so difficult and u have to take huge risks like that) amazing play by losira and really bad play by alicia. the build is more relying on toss being bad and/or risky rather than being a correct decision vs 3warpgate expansion, not very solid and it worked way better than it should have 3warpgate expo is 100% safe. so is forge expand. zerg has no 100% safe build that can scout everything and respond to everything in time. OP's you write, he had an evo chamber so he had potential to build spore crawlers incase any dts arrive. do you realize your dead unless your spore is a bout 50% complete when the dts arrive? nothing more to talk about than that. its just sad to see every single zvp in gsl zerg is taking ridiculously big risks and even when they get away with it they still loose if toss isnt making blunders like alicia on terminus (expanding and attacking zergs 4th at the same time with sentry immortal vs masshydraling) I definitely agree. I tested this a bunch of times with my teammate today, had the same 9roach timing and everything. If the p has decent simcity at his natural and has a cannon up (which you should make blindly, imo) it's very managable. It might be tougher to hold on a map like xel naga where the distance between your nexus and your ramp is longer because the pylon-forge block doesn't extend as far. Alicia also made the mistake of poking out with that zealot/sentry force.. If you're going to do that, you can't have made a forge.. it's a very specific poke with 6 sentry and 4 zealot, chrono boost on the 3 warpgates to get the zealots out after you get sentries warped in. If you just push willy-nilly into the center with that measley army (especially on such a huge map cross position) you're going to get stomped if the zerg made any units. So yes, it was a risky build by losira but alicia was also playing pretty risky (and less than optimul, clearly). To be honest, I have no idea why the forge was in the main. It makes absolutely no sense; yes the forcefields were great but he had to make three to close the gap between ramp and nexus when he should have needed 1 if he made pylon-forge at the natural. | ||
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Railgan
Switzerland1507 Posts
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WhiteDog
France8650 Posts
On April 29 2011 07:28 ZasZ. wrote: And I suppose the question then is whether or not this development is good for the game. Should Zerg be forced to be super aggressive at all points in the game against Protoss, even if it works? There's something to be said for the viability of both an aggressive and macro style, but it seems like the macro style is working less and less against Protoss players who know how to defend and build up a macro advantage while harassing. It's good and bad. It force zerg to step up their mechanics (well some players don't need that obviously, but I do) and to think more about army composition and transition. It's really fun to play when you have the mechanics, but sometime I suck at it and just get destroyed like shit after my off tempo roach push comes out. On the other side, it's pretty volatile style of play, it's very hard to be cost effectiv in agression with zerg at the moment (with the type of unit we have, one fast unit with low range and one low speed with high range, the best for agressiv play is a fast unit with high range) and I think it should be pretty easy for protoss to just stomp us if they actually play a bit more reactionnary and stop rushing for 3 base colossi. | ||
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Dommk
Australia4865 Posts
To be honest, I have no idea why the forge was in the main. It makes absolutely no sense; yes the forcefields were great but he had to make three to close the gap between ramp and nexus when he should have needed 1 if he made pylon-forge at the natural. I've seen many people start doing it (i.e Kiwikaki). Forge in main + Stalker first to deny overlord scouting plays a lot of mind games, people aren't sure if you are going to Nexus cancel and 4gate them. Then there is also getting caught off guard by Roach/Ling--be it position, lack of units, sentries getting killed or a bad forcefield, if they catch you in a bad spot and your forge is outside your base then you are fucked, it is much safer to have a Gateway there or some Pylons | ||
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lkjewq
United States132 Posts
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crms
United States11933 Posts
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dementrio
678 Posts
On April 29 2011 06:42 MorroW wrote: terminus he just wasted a ton of energy in middle by panic on top of macroing badly and putting the forge in the main base metal he just macroed horribly and again forge in main base instead. he had 900 minerals lol... not only shouldnt this build work in the first place if toss makes units and forge in the natural on top of it u autodie vs DT which btw losira was coinflipping the odds of (which is a good choice because zvp is so difficult and u have to take huge risks like that) amazing play by losira and really bad play by alicia. the build is more relying on toss being bad and/or risky rather than being a correct decision vs 3warpgate expansion, not very solid and it worked way better than it should have 3warpgate expo is 100% safe. so is forge expand. zerg has no 100% safe build that can scout everything and respond to everything in time. OP's you write, he had an evo chamber so he had potential to build spore crawlers incase any dts arrive. do you realize your dead unless your spore is a bout 50% complete when the dts arrive? nothing more to talk about than that. its just sad to see every single zvp in gsl zerg is taking ridiculously big risks and even when they get away with it they still loose if toss isnt making blunders like alicia on terminus (expanding and attacking zergs 4th at the same time with sentry immortal vs masshydraling) You can time the attack earlier (less drones) so that it hits before protoss has a wall or the chance to start cannons, and it does kill people who drop nexus when they have 1 zealot and 2 sentries. The interesting thing about this imo is not losira's build in particular, but exploration of ways to exploit the fact that protoss is blind for a window of time, so the mere fact that certain all-ins exist will force them to play safer making them weaker to 2 or 3 base allins. I don't think you should dismiss these efforts as simply huge risks that paid off, it's similar to how the development of the 6gate helped protoss immensely by wiping out muta play from the metagame. | ||
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Samhax
1054 Posts
On April 29 2011 07:31 Alejandrisha wrote: + Show Spoiler + On April 29 2011 06:42 MorroW wrote: terminus he just wasted a ton of energy in middle by panic on top of macroing badly and putting the forge in the main base metal he just macroed horribly and again forge in main base instead. he had 900 minerals lol... not only shouldnt this build work in the first place if toss makes units and forge in the natural on top of it u autodie vs DT which btw losira was coinflipping the odds of (which is a good choice because zvp is so difficult and u have to take huge risks like that) amazing play by losira and really bad play by alicia. the build is more relying on toss being bad and/or risky rather than being a correct decision vs 3warpgate expansion, not very solid and it worked way better than it should have 3warpgate expo is 100% safe. so is forge expand. zerg has no 100% safe build that can scout everything and respond to everything in time. OP's you write, he had an evo chamber so he had potential to build spore crawlers incase any dts arrive. do you realize your dead unless your spore is a bout 50% complete when the dts arrive? nothing more to talk about than that. its just sad to see every single zvp in gsl zerg is taking ridiculously big risks and even when they get away with it they still loose if toss isnt making blunders like alicia on terminus (expanding and attacking zergs 4th at the same time with sentry immortal vs masshydraling) I definitely agree. I tested this a bunch of times with my teammate today, had the same 9roach timing and everything. If the p has decent simcity at his natural and has a cannon up (which you should make blindly, imo) it's very managable. It might be tougher to hold on a map like xel naga where the distance between your nexus and your ramp is longer because the pylon-forge block doesn't extend as far. Alicia also made the mistake of poking out with that zealot/sentry force.. If you're going to do that, you can't have made a forge.. it's a very specific poke with 6 sentry and 4 zealot, chrono boost on the 3 warpgates to get the zealots out after you get sentries warped in. If you just push willy-nilly into the center with that measley army (especially on such a huge map cross position) you're going to get stomped if the zerg made any units. So yes, it was a risky build by losira but alicia was also playing pretty risky (and less than optimul, clearly). To be honest, I have no idea why the forge was in the main. It makes absolutely no sense; yes the forcefields were great but he had to make three to close the gap between ramp and nexus when he should have needed 1 if he made pylon-forge at the natural. I think nobody is saying that this build is not manageable (3gate expand with forge+gate or 2 gate at the natural to make a choke with proper unit control and you are good). For me the main question is, does this build give you an edge in the mid game against a 3gate expand. Because like the op said, he had a good amount of drones on the mineral line(ofc it's not he biggest eco you can have at this point), a third and he was safe to drone. The only bad point of this build is the low tech. | ||
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MorroW
Sweden3522 Posts
On April 29 2011 07:41 dementrio wrote: You can time the attack earlier (less drones) so that it hits before protoss has a wall or the chance to start cannons, and it does kill people who drop nexus when they have 1 zealot and 2 sentries. The interesting thing about this imo is not losira's build in particular, but exploration of ways to exploit the fact that protoss is blind for a window of time, so the mere fact that certain all-ins exist will force them to play safer making them weaker to 2 or 3 base allins. I don't think you should dismiss these efforts as simply huge risks that paid off, it's similar to how the development of the 6gate helped protoss immensely by wiping out muta play from the metagame. your wrong 3warpgate is safe to 100% vs roach ling allins even if u hit an earlier timing theres a reason pvz standard is 3warpgate expo and if it wasnt safe everyone wouldnt say it was safe. its been safe for over a half year... the only way you can exploit this blind time of toss is to drone like crazy and hope he doesnt attack with 3gate or 4gate with nexus cancel. or dt into expo for that matter. this moment of the game zerg is alot more blind than toss is lol. if u wanan be safe with 3warpgate expo. just warp in units and build probes constantly and add a forge to ur natural to block off. its like the safest most figured out build in the entire zvp matchup tt this is why i rarely post on the strategy forum because most of u cant take my word for it, not even something simple and really figured out thing like this. all i did was drop facts about the game and its not up to agree or disagree, its just math On April 29 2011 07:50 Samhax wrote: I think nobody is saying that this build is not manageable (3gate expand with forge+gate or 2 gate at the natural to make a choke with proper unit control and you are good). For me the main question is, does this build give you an edge in the mid game against a 3gate expand. Because like the op said, he had a good amount of drones on the mineral line(ofc it's not he biggest eco you can have at this point), a third and he was safe to drone. The only bad point of this build is the low tech. the whole point of the build is -to kill sentrys or make them waste alot of energy -make sure they werent risking (aka not buildings units constantly, forge in natural, cannon) -stop any cancel nexus 4/5gate builds -punishing a fake pushing protoss (where they push out halfway take towers and walks home to force zerg defense) weakness -dies to dt -falls behind if toss was safe and u couldnt engage -u engage and lose most ur units if toss just gets forge cannon, then voidray and rally phoenix he denies 3rd base 100% and possibly even wins game right there... or toss didnt build stargate, goes for the 3colossus 5gate+1 timing and kills u cause ur tech was too late, aka no gas or corruptors | ||
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