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WhiteRa PvZ on MrBitterTv
On MrBitter's 12 week with the pros, White Ra explained his walling off method vs Zerg. (Go to the 16 minute mark). He builds his first two pylons, gateway and core next to his Nexus so that it's easier to defend using probes against early pools.
He then proceeds to create the standard wall off at the ramp with 2 more gateways and a zealot before the 5 minute mark which is when a speedling attack could come. I think he could get the gateways down even faster if he scouted a 10 pool and skipped the 2nd gas until after he got his wall up.
I noticed that no other pro does this.
In my personal experimentation with this, I do feel very safe against 6 pools. I feel like I can defend a 6 pool without a forge due to mineral walk and easy surrounds against lings.
Why do no other pros use this walling off method if its effective? Are there speedling builds that hit before the 5 minute mark? Is white ra's build vulnerable in some way? If so, why haven't we seen Zergs punish him for it? If it's not vulnerable, why aren't other pros adopting it?
Edit:
I just watched some more recent VODs of White-Ra and it seems like he's changed his wall off strategy. Instead of walling off with Gateways #2 and #3, he is now doing pylon and gateway #1 near his base and then pylon and core at his ramp. Gateway #3 completes the wall off at 4:10.
white ra vs nerchio
This is less of a tech giveaway, gets the wall up at 4:10 which is much sooner than 5 minutes, which should make it stronger against early pools, but retains some of the advantage against 6/7 pools.
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It's called habit. Most pro's are used to the normal wall off. It's still vunerable to baneling bust though so if someone recognised it, they may go all in with a bane bust. Most times though, people save baneling nest for desperation or muta bling.
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I'm pretty sure a 6 pool would still have good chances of killing you if your probe micro isn't impeccable, but I don't think Whitera cares for losing 1 pvz out of 10 or 20 on ladder. I have a feeling if he was playing in an important tournament game against a player that he isn't 100% sure never cheeses, he would actually wall off.
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Sheth played agains him a couple of times during his streaming marathon, and he went up with zerglings and did more damage than to a standard wall.
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On June 16 2011 06:13 Legion710 wrote:
I'm pretty sure a 6 pool would still have good chances of killing you if your probe micro isn't impeccable, but I don't think Whitera cares for losing 1 pvz out of 10 or 20 on ladder. I have a feeling if he was playing in an important tournament game against a player that he isn't 100% sure never cheeses, he would actually wall off.
He never walled in NASL... I'd call that pretty important.
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i wall off on ramp because I can defend my main with chronoboosted zealots and no probe pull in the event of an early pool (with certain exceptions)
walls also limit the surface area of the buildings, limiting zergling DPS
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He seems very good at defending rushes, he seems to have very good Probe micro. I remember him defending against July's lings in the World vs Korea showmatch. If I could micro probes to match July's ling micro, I wouldn't wall either.
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Yea if the opponent makes 2 initial zerglings then it's great. But if your opponent makes 4-6+ initial lings and has good micro, he can easily get a probe kill or two and free scouting. Also you are pretty much forced into a 3 gate expo since you need that wall. That means no stargate play, no DT play, no 1 gate expo... And the zerg will be aware of this and cross these off his list of potential dangers.
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it is fine versus an 6 pool but for me it is seems very vulnerable to earlier pools like 8-9 pool where zerg should be able to overpower the defenses thus forcing you to an early forge, which benefits Zerg alot.
that the reason why i walled off again instead going for white ra style.
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I have done the same thing for similar reasons. It's better if you plan to 3 gate expand, IMO. If you're not always going to add 2 additional gateways to wall later, though, you do need to wall with something.
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On June 16 2011 06:13 Legion710 wrote:
I'm pretty sure a 6 pool would still have good chances of killing you if your probe micro isn't impeccable, but I don't think Whitera cares for losing 1 pvz out of 10 or 20 on ladder. I have a feeling if he was playing in an important tournament game against a player that he isn't 100% sure never cheeses, he would actually wall off.
Wow, this post couldn't be more inaccurate...
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On June 16 2011 06:13 Legion710 wrote:
I'm pretty sure a 6 pool would still have good chances of killing you if your probe micro isn't impeccable, but I don't think Whitera cares for losing 1 pvz out of 10 or 20 on ladder. I have a feeling if he was playing in an important tournament game against a player that he isn't 100% sure never cheeses, he would actually wall off.
He actually never wall off with the 1st gate in tournament either.
I've started using this "strategy" and I have to say I feel super safe vs every kind of early pool since I can pull out probes really fast. Also with a good sim city with the pylons and the gate, core or forge (if i get 6 pooled I drop immediately the forge) you can zone the ling attacks.
After that I proceed to wall of with 2 gates.
I lalso like this becouse the cyber core is in a "safer" position in the early game.
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I like White-ra's style, I am doing this alot in my games. If only I could play PvZ decently.
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Of course, the disadvantage of this is that you're showing you have 3 gates which limits the possible builds you can be doing and makes zerg feel safer to drone up
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I agree that this style is better against 6pool, but its not better vs any other sort of aggression at all, when zerg can take advantage of the open main base. It forces you to throw up a forge in some circumstances.
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I also do the same thing also, it allows me to 13 gate safely even if they 6 pool because the zerglings cant attack your pylon/gate because you are able to defend with probes nearby. It can get a little tricky if zerg does make a crapload of zerglings before you put up your 2 extra gates but usually the timings work out that you are able to wall off before they get their queen and mass zergling.
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I don't get why he does it though. He is pretty much forced to get his other gates in order to get that wall which already reveals part of his strategy. I don't question being able to defend 6 pool with his type of defense, in fact I even prefer his setup against 9 pool where defending at the wall can be more annoying.
The problem I have with it though is that he is simply giving away free information as lings can freely enter his base, i like the fact that a wall-in leaves my opponent in the dark about my plans. I also like to put my 2nd gate at the lowground often something which doesn't work as well with the whitera setup.
I think it's just one of those habits pro's have that is actually just bad. However the disadvantages are so small that they won't lose many games over it and they don't bother to change it. Pro's do bad things or just plain bad build orders tons of times though so this isn't really surprising, just look at how many zergs still do extractor trick while 9 ov is strictly better.
Most pro's are pro's because they execute builds well not because they come up with good builds, they have teams and coaches for that anyway.
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On June 16 2011 06:13 Legion710 wrote:
I'm pretty sure a 6 pool would still have good chances of killing you if your probe micro isn't impeccable, but I don't think Whitera cares for losing 1 pvz out of 10 or 20 on ladder. I have a feeling if he was playing in an important tournament game against a player that he isn't 100% sure never cheeses, he would actually wall off.
wrong this building placement makes it stupid easy to defend early pools because you can run your probes around without them getting out of range of your gateway(or forge if you were walling with that)you can keep away from the lings until your zealot comes out. The open area is also nice because when your probes have free moment its easier for them to surround lings and protect your production until defenses come out. 10-12 pool all ins can be trouble though because they produce a lot of lings and can hit before your wall goes up if you're unawares or not crisp in your build order.
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In top level play it's very important to hide your strategy. Not walling tells the Zerg a lot about your strategy and he can just lmao around your base with speedlings, pick off a few drones etc.
You can defend early pools with the normal wall-off too and enjoy complete strategic freedom + don't have shit running around your base.
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i might strat playing like this, adefinitely on 4 player maps at least.
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EPT
