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Today I ran into this player in 1v1 matchmaking game that did the most dominating unit combo I've faced PvT. I asked him to run some custom games to see if I could figure out a way to beat this but out of 5 games I lost every single one of them. Keep in mind, I knew his build the entire time but tried to keep it as standard as possible to see if it was something I could transition to out of standard play. I realize that there are many different cheeses I could have tried to win vs this but that wasn't the goal. Were both high ranked Platinum players maining our respective races.
I'm really curious to see what NonY / Orb (Maybe on Orb knows best?) has to offer towards beating this.
One of the biggest issues is I don't see me beating this with an FE (Which isn't viable on most maps anyways) so I usually kept it 1 base vs 1/2 base. He seemed to have to strong of map presence throughout the whole game.
The basic concept is to 1 Rak, Reactor marine wall off. Fact next, build the Tech lab and switch it with the Starport when finished. Add a Tech lab for the Factory again and he begins ravens. It denies scouting as well because of the early raven. He usually got a combination of Tanks / Marines / Ravens / Banshees and used the Point defense drone. Sometimes more than 1 which take a LONG time to kill in a battle when the Tanks / Rine are destroying your units. He had good timings and I attacked both times I tried to expand in 2 of the games which I was unable to hold.
I don't really see Collosi holding here, Banshees destroy it and he sometimes even got vikings, or atleast always would when I got some air or Collosi.
http://bit.ly/c85N23 - First time I saw it used, This caught me off guard. Plus I hate this map PvT.
http://bit.ly/b26H6s - I realize my first attack sucked but I think it was an AI issue, the Zlots didn't attack down the ramp but it could have been my error. 4 Warpgate build.
http://bit.ly/aQfGaT - I try a Phoenix build since he was sort of air heavy, and to deal with the Ravens, but he can switch to Vikings so easily. I might have not done this perfectly since I don't normally go Phoenix, but that's why I'm making this thread. -.^
http://bit.ly/bZHT40 - This was the closest I came, I did a 3 Warpgate / tech timing.
http://bit.ly/bXh0AT - I lost an early stalker which was a big mistake, but I stayed 1 base this entire time basically because I felt like I had to. I won the initial attack sort of but I was still to far behind. And he dominated me earlier in the game too and forced me back.
I think he's open to challengers trying to beat this build, if anyone would like to try send him a message @ Orcmaniac.bjjfan
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played this once..
let me tell you that immo/stalker sucks ass 
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I am confused to how you don't break this early on considering he is making ravens pretty early and should only have 1 rax (reactor) and 1 fact producing anything, and the fact should be hellions since he is burning gas on ravens. I may be wrong because I have not watch the reps yet (downloading), and will revise my statement if it seems wrong.
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On May 01 2010 15:58 PaleBlueDot wrote:
I am confused to how you don't break this early on considering he is making ravens pretty early and should only have 1 rax (reactor) and 1 fact producing anything, and the fact should be hellions since he is burning gas on ravens. I may be wrong because I have not watch the reps yet (downloading), and will revise my statement if it seems wrong.
I tried some early harass but like I said I didn't want to anything typically not standard since normally I'm not going to 2 Gate Zlot, or even 1 Gate Chrono Zlot vs terran early on because most of the time that gets destroyed.
I appreciate you checking the replays though.
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I am acutally a top 5 - 10 (depends) platinum terran and i use the exact same build to crush protoss.
It is a very powerful build but not nearly unbeatable, there are some weak points in it. The Terran needs a crucial number of units to really hit you, he will be very vulnerable to early attacks. I lost to a very early blink attack, since marines completly suck against Stalkers. The one thing to keep in mind is that you have to attack before the PDD can be used, so you need to do that very early.
Mass speed Zealots will rape through the terran, since the PDD will not help and Marines and only 2-3 Tanks will die instantly to them.
If you are very skilled you can do some Voidray attack early on, but you have to be very careful to not loose any of them. If you attack with Voidrays you are forcing the terran to make vikings instead of his raven/banshees, if you then expand while attacking him you can easily build a force that will crush marine/tank/vinkings hard.
Another general thing is that the terran will be strongest when he can build like 3 bunkers for all of his marines. Do not let him bunker up in front of your main to contain you, once you are contained there is not really anything you could do to break it.
Hope that helps.
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Okay, so I watched some of the replays and here is what I saw:
1st Game: He does not actually have any fighting units aside from ~15 cliff marines until about 7:30 in the game. You went like, 4 warpgate chargelot (I am not good with build names). This is where I get confused. You did not have any scouting that he was coming, the force you had (I am pretty sure you had charge before he pushed out, and blink was upgrading while he was moving out) consisted of like ~10 chargelots, 3 sentries, and 8-10 stalkers. As far as that goes, his push would have been DOMINATED if you had attacked him as he moved out, instead of after he set up outside your choke. Even during the attack, if your zealots did not do whatever the hell they were doing on the cliff (???), and just straight up attacked, I think he would have gotten owned there as well. Just like in SC1, if you see tanks, don't let him move out/set up with them. Just because they aren't SC1 tanks doesn't make them useless.
2nd Game: I have not played much on that map because I think it is gay (I main Terran), but you went for early immortals, which I did not agree with considering the large number of marines/air control he had. Pretty much got pushed back because of the unit combination colliding here.
So far (still got 3-5 to watch), I think camping his choke to attack before he sets up his tanks is a game breaker here. 1st games build will beat it soundly I think, as long as your zealots don't screw up. Ill add more as I go :/ (remember this is speculation)
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United States313 Posts
I'll watch the replays in a minute, but initial theorycrafting suggests high templar. I understand that may not be your current "standard" play but the game is still in beta, and its not like beta is particularly old even. What we consider standard today will 99% guaranteed be laughable in a years time. If nothing else the timings will be better understood and thus builds refined to account for the outlayer strategies. If you played those customs, after losing once or twice more, you should've abandoned trying to play "standard" and just seeing if you could beat it. Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results (Einstein).
You said that Raven denies early scouting, I think its more applicable to say he can kill your observer, so watching it as it enters his base is probably a good start for identifying his build. Likewise don't think that just observers can scout, a hallucinated phoenix is much faster and can take a few hits, thus able to get a quick run through his base to see whats up, and less expensive than an observer.
I consider templar tech vs Terran still reasonably standard, many Toss have had success with DT in the matchup. Granted DTs won't help here, but HT with feedback turns the raven into a very expensive, uncloaked observer. I admit I am not deeply familiar with point defense drone mechanics, however if it can be cast outside of feedback's 9 range, and you can't pull your army back a few steps to be out of range of the drone, then maybe point defense drone is even stronger than I had realized. You don't even need storm upgraded in time for the push, feedback seems like it should at least even the playing field, feedback is an incredible response to banshees and ravens. However with the low hp marine and stationary tanks, the natural addition of storm to your force should definitely give you the advantage.
If you are determined to go Robo I'm not sure super hard tech to colossi would answer this problem either. Like all things it needs moderation. Toss anti air via robo is always tricky, and appropriately balance stalker/sentry to colossi ratio without a good look at his army composition is a complete guessing game, and still doesn't account for any tanks. Sure ideally you could have colossi killing marines, immortals taking tank shots and targeting them back, with stalkers killing banshees, but thats a lot of favorable micro on your part and complete lack of micro on your opponents part. Another different approach would be something Day9 did a daily on, I believe in the 90 range, a relatively quick immortal drop. With the lack of army size you could definitely do damage with warp prism + immortals sniping depots/whatever. For the marines to really be effective and cover the whole base its likely they'd need stim, which is more gas not to mention a couple medivacs, once again slowing down the push. Even if you go robo and your obs get sniped early (but you can tell its some form of this strat going on), it may make sense to start templar tech, at the very least charge zealots should do decently against marines/tanks, though at that point the ravens likely start casting defense turret instead. Still it could be worth trying.
Lastly, in regards to early aggression PvT, I've noticed a fair number of Toss going stalker first (in response to potential reaper harass) and push a little/harass with the stalker. Granted stalkers aren't great vs marines or tanks in particular, but this early harass should help give you a feel for what the terran is doing. Depending on the map you can certainly cause a little trouble at the front, realize he isn't hugely defended, and shift into a more aggressive stance, requiring your opponent to get more defenses and slowing his build.
Hope any of this is helpful, like I said I'll check the replays, gl hf.
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Okay finished the replays.
4th Game: This seemed to be a good match. You are able to pressure him, which is great. I actually think you would have won this game as well (1 and 4) if your attacks were better (no offense). You attacked through his choke into siege tanks the second or third time, which killed nothing more than most of his marines and you lost quite a few zealots + stalkers. Harass is great, but if you attack, watch out for the tanks, and try to snipe them if you can. It takes 10 (which at this point is most) of his marines to do the damage that just 1 of those tanks do (not including splash, and in most of the games I have seen, your armies collide and his marines are able to do their job...tank damage so the actual tanks [harrr] can do damage). Then, you recovered and held the middle. You first pulled your probe off the xel naga tower, which I did not agree with as it allows you to see his tanks siege/move, but that is little compared to you attacking into another choke. you had the superior force, but just ran into his army, and he got the arc since you attacked through a choke :[.
5th Game: Rush seemed really ineffective. Marines on high ground are effective against stalkers since they cant abuse their range. He ended up getting a bunker (3) wall with tanks and ravens (abusing smog fog [harrrr again] with tanks) which is pretty much the worst situation you can be in. The game was over here.
Overall the 3-4 warpgate strats seemed to have the most promise, just gotta make sure you attack with the initiative (not through a choke, not when his tanks are sieged, and bonus points for flanking). I feel going chargelot heavy would be good, as his banshee numbers were almost always limited to ~3 so stalkers or at the very least reinforcement stalkers should be able to handle them (that and tank splash should murder his marines). GL with the games :o
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Played vs this a couple times. Stalkers and immortals suck against this, I recommend you getting a zealot heavy composition (like 90% of units = zealots, couple sentries and like 1 or 2 collossus'es).
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Why not go 2 gates, 1 early stalker, tech up to 1 stargate, pump 2 vr's, and push at about 9 minutes with 2 vr's, 4-5 stalkers, and 2-5 sentries? Its not really cheesing, 9 minute pushes are pretty normal. And its not really an all-in, it opens you up to transition into quite a variety of things providing you dont crush him with your initial push.
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Why not templar?
HT can deny ravens energy and sometimes kill them outright. Storm isn't even necessary as a research as it seems to me like all you're having trouble with are the raven's PDD. Additionally, once you do research storm it's very effective against marines and tanks as marines have very little hp, especially once stimmed and tanks can't dodge storm. All that's left to deal with are vikings and they're really only powerful in the air.
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On May 01 2010 17:45 Ryuu314 wrote:
Why not templar?
HT can deny ravens energy and sometimes kill them outright. Storm isn't even necessary as a research as it seems to me like all you're having trouble with are the raven's PDD. Additionally, once you do research storm it's very effective against marines and tanks as marines have very little hp, especially once stimmed and tanks can't dodge storm. All that's left to deal with are vikings and they're really only powerful in the air.
Or you can skip that step all together and just make a lot more zealots.
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On May 01 2010 17:48 PaleBlueDot wrote:Show nested quote +On May 01 2010 17:45 Ryuu314 wrote:
Why not templar?
HT can deny ravens energy and sometimes kill them outright. Storm isn't even necessary as a research as it seems to me like all you're having trouble with are the raven's PDD. Additionally, once you do research storm it's very effective against marines and tanks as marines have very little hp, especially once stimmed and tanks can't dodge storm. All that's left to deal with are vikings and they're really only powerful in the air. Or you can skip that step all together and just make a lot more zealots.
Zealots get evaporated by tanks. If the Terran has good positioning he can block your zealots from reaching the tanks with marines and bunkers.
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Tasteless did a similar build against me the other day, 1 raven for point defense drone + marines and tanks, it didnt seem very strong against warp-gate heavy army with a few immortals mixed in, i was able to hold it off dispite his attack hitting at a good time where my econ from my nat was only just kicking in and i didn't have extra gates down yet.
obviously don't build stalkers against this, get sentry zealot and immortal.
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On May 01 2010 18:25 Ryuu314 wrote:Show nested quote +On May 01 2010 17:48 PaleBlueDot wrote:On May 01 2010 17:45 Ryuu314 wrote:
Why not templar?
HT can deny ravens energy and sometimes kill them outright. Storm isn't even necessary as a research as it seems to me like all you're having trouble with are the raven's PDD. Additionally, once you do research storm it's very effective against marines and tanks as marines have very little hp, especially once stimmed and tanks can't dodge storm. All that's left to deal with are vikings and they're really only powerful in the air. Or you can skip that step all together and just make a lot more zealots. Zealots get evaporated by tanks. If the Terran has good positioning he can block your zealots from reaching the tanks with marines and bunkers.
Well this is only true when tanks have reached a critical mass, in early game zealots are very good against this. Terran will make go with ~ 3 tanks, marines, 1 raven, 1-2 banshees and 3-4 scvs and he is looking for a good spot to bunker up.
In middle or late game however zealots will be less useful, because if the terran is smart he will stop making marines when he secured his expansion and will start adding a fac with reactor for hellions.
I think High Templar is a very good choice because its effective against marines and banshees, but be careful when the ghosts enter the battlefield.
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On May 01 2010 18:34 Ftrunkz wrote:
Tasteless did a similar build against me the other day, 1 raven for point defense drone + marines and tanks, it didnt seem very strong against warp-gate heavy army with a few immortals mixed in, i was able to hold it off dispite his attack hitting at a good time where my econ from my nat was only just kicking in and i didn't have extra gates down yet.
obviously don't build stalkers against this, get sentry zealot and immortal.
I think people are forgetting about the banshees...
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On May 01 2010 18:43 sob3k wrote:Show nested quote +On May 01 2010 18:34 Ftrunkz wrote:
Tasteless did a similar build against me the other day, 1 raven for point defense drone + marines and tanks, it didnt seem very strong against warp-gate heavy army with a few immortals mixed in, i was able to hold it off dispite his attack hitting at a good time where my econ from my nat was only just kicking in and i didn't have extra gates down yet.
obviously don't build stalkers against this, get sentry zealot and immortal. I think people are forgetting about the banshees...
you have a ton of left over gas from producing pure zealot from warpgates, a lot of sentrys can take the small number of banshees he produces. And besides the more banshees he produces, the less ravens he can have, meaning you can start mixing in stalkers anyway.
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Thats a pretty funky build
Pretty sure your standard "see gas, open voidray" to expand should do OK vs any kind of 1 base terran build
Though not ideal because of marines, you can at least contain him (you need good voidray micro)
Also because he only has marines early on, you can do a lot of heavy pressure with 1 gate 1 stargate stalker/voidray
Failing that, i guess templar tech is required. Feedback is pretty much a godsend vs ravens, banshees, medivacs etc.etc. and ofc, opens up good tech later on in the game.
Personally i am very inexperienced with twilight first openins vs terran
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hummm
number of replays with sentries: 5
number of replays with a guardian shield: 1 - and zealots were in the back while at his choke.
with rines dishing out only 5 dmg against zealots/stalkers, guardian shield takes it down to 3.
about replay 5: one storm on rines, ok - but then feedback
- can be used on banshees (140HP), ravens (140HP) [if they haven't done their thing yet] - and point defense drones (50HP)
in general, more zealots.
i understand one needs stalkers against banshees, which is why i was most interested in the phoenix replay:
again no guardian shields, which also helps phoenixes against those 10x2 @ 2sec vikings, therefore 8x2 @ 2sec. phoenixes do ok'ish then even with an unbonus'es 5x2 @ 1.11sec.
should you have to decide to stand your ground at those PDD, their 2x attack helps draining them faster, too
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Norway28528 Posts
don't you mostly just have to make sure you engage him near his exit point so he is forced to use PDD in an area where you can simply retreat?
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EPT
