Just like Zeratul in the above picture, the protoss art of doing stealthy, slickish, Zeratul-esq builds has all, but slithered away....No worries though, it's time to bring it back! Introducing: ~Retro~, all the old-school builds you loved, with a freshly-scented new twist, or as Zeratul himself would say: "We will do what we must, but we do it for Aiur not you."
And what would the best fit in this scenario be? Well nothing but a few minty well-executed, stylishly new re-discovered all-ins that are guaranteed to not only get you a cheap, easy win, but most likely piss off your opponent as well, let's start with:
This build focuses on hiding 3 Stargates, and getting out a couple of voids without being scouted, so it is essential for you to deny scouting, and hit at the right time, and not a moment too late, or else it loses a lot of it's punch the longer you don't attack. If you get scouted accidently, then you must attack as soonest you can.
My opponent goes for hydras, and spores, but I manage to get enough voids in his base to overwhelm him, so his defense doesn't manage to stop my offense.
9 @ pylon 17 @ nexus 17 @ forge 17 @ pylon 17 @ probe 18 @ gateway 18 @ cannon 18 @ 2x probe 20 @ assimilator wall off completely 4:25 @ second assimilator 4:45 @ third assimilator 5:20 @ 4th assimilator 5:30 @ 1st Stargate (behind mineral line) 5:50 @ 1 stalker (to clear out scouting overlords) 6:10 @ 2nd Stargate (in natural) 6:20 @ +1 air weapons 7:00 @ 3rd stargate (in middle of main base) cut probe production at ~40 9:20 @ move out with 5 void rays set rally point of stargates to one of the void rays in the back
The same build, and execution as in the video above, but my opponent doesn't go hydras, instead he goes for infestors, and I must be weary of them, and split my voids, and try to get them one void at a time, some decent micro at the end by both of us.
I go for the build, while my opponent decides to 3-base roach-ling all-in me, which get utterly annihilated by my voids. Then after that it's an easy win.
This build focuses on dropping an unscouted Stargate near the terran's base without it being seen, and chronoing out 3 voids, and using stalkers as a support. The voids should be used to break the terran's walls, and force his units out of position. You can send the voids for his mineral line, and have the stalkers chip away at the front wall, either way should be an easy win.
Just make sure you keep warping-in more stalkers, and microing your voids, so you don't lose them, because they are the core of the composition.
I do the build, but my opponent does some kind of a 1-base double medivac marine timing, which gets sent out to my base right as my army attacks him.
We base race, because I can't go back to save my base in time, but I manage to run away with my probes, and make another nexus while overwhelming his force.
This build focuses on chronoing out fast stalkers to distract the opponent, and make him play defensively, while slowly getting warpgate and building-up into a 4gate. It uses stalkers only, and it relies on 3 chronoed boosted stalkers, after which warp gate is chronoed and used.
My opponent slips in an oracle in my min line, so I lose a lot of workers, but manage to warp-in 2 stalkers to repent it, while finishing off my opponent.
9 @ pylon 12 @ gateway 14 @ assimilator 14 @ 2nd assimilator put two workers on each assimilator 16 @ pylon 16 @ cyber (when gate is finished) 19 @ second gateway 21 / 3:37 @ chrono-out stalker 3:40 @ start warp gate 4:05 @ send out first stalker to opponent's base 4:06 @ chrono second stalker 4:22 @ third gateway 4:45 @ start two more stalkers, but chrono warp gate now 5:15 @ send out probe for proxy pylon 5: 45 @ start 4th gateway 6:20 @ warp in 1 wave of stalkers & attack enemy base watch out for oracle in your min line if one pops-up then warp-in 2 stalkers at main base to deal with it it's okay if it gets some of your workers, as long as you dont lose all of them
I do the build, and manage to throw off my opponent with my build order so my first few stalkers do quiet some damage. Unknown to me, he proxies a stargate and manages to sneak in an oracle in my min line, getting a lot of my workers.
But after holding it off, I warp in a round of stalker and finish him off.
6 Cannons, oh yea, your ass is grass. Do you even lift?
We probe minerals, we don't lift, leave us alone meanies!
As Zeratul parts ways with us, heading back to his people to await their judgement, he only wishes us well in our future all-ins that will surely be done by a lot of rookie executors.
Hope you guys enjoyed the guide, and the little side story that I came up with. Most of these builds were prominent (some still are?) at a time during WoL, so I decided to rediscover them once again. Discuss the builds, as they are not perfected in any way, just something to get off the ground, and improve with time.
On April 03 2013 14:40 Yuffie wrote: What is your rank in 1on1 ? 3 Stargate on 2 base ( ur pvz build ) can't really be paid from 4 geysirs.. stopped reading after that.
It can actually, by the time you reach the zerg's base (which will be around 10:00 or so) you will have 5 voids leading, and ~3 halfway there, which is more than enough to overpower him. I've beaten a few mid-high masters with this build rather easily, so I can't really be certain how good it is above that level, but it works up until then, as I am yet to lose a game with it unless I am 6-pooled or something.
On April 03 2013 14:39 salehonasi wrote: Why does the first build list a cannon on 18, but no forge?
Edit:I assume it's 17 forge, instead of 17 probe.
Oops, my mistake lol, fixed that, thx for letting me know.
3 gate stargate against terran is pretty good right now but honestly i'd use oracles instead of voids. They are better against marines which will be the relevant unit you face with this type of all-in. You can even detect if they have some sort of widow mine defence if you got a read on that. If you smooth out the build I actually think 2 gates is enough but you need really good macro then so the 3rd gate is fine. The other two all-ins stink to be honest. Two stargates against zerg can be an ok suprise tactic that works well if they only suspect a single stargate or just phoenix. You probably want to send out 1 void first though to kill the overlords on the way and then send the rest of the voids, otherwise they have enough time to just respond with hydra's since voids are so slow. The delayed 4 gate is just bad. You surprise a protoss who doesn't ff and has his msc out of position with stargate but you pretty much lose or are severely behind against most stuff with it. It hits rather late so the msc is well online and DT finish soon after you hit pretty much losing you the game on the spot if he went that tech. 4 gate is not completely dead because with people trying to be really greedy with their stargate openings there are some openings for it. However if you do it you better do it as quickly as possible before msc/sentries have enough energy and more importantly that you hit way before dt can finish.
Aggresive openers will be the key to protoss in HotS I think to fully abuse the power of the MsC with recall. I think it's key though to make them slightly leaner, ie instead of having overproduction with 4 gates etc. you have slight underproduction with just 3 gate but you continue probe production in the meantime. Maybe you have 2 units less with your all-in but you have a viable transition if you recall out. For example 2 gate + stargate pressure instead of an all-in is really good in PvT, you won't kill them on the spot as often but you don't have to, if you can't break them but you can just kill 10 scv's with your oracle and expand you get ahead as well.
I love these guides, Very clear with video tutorials build orders and replays. Really good job on the post!
I also love having a few all-in's to play around with on the rare occasion that i all-in. However the main issue i have is with the PvZ voidray build, is its very scoutable so i think it will be figured out reasonably quickly.
So while this build does a great job of denying scouting there are a few too many obvious signs.
A ling can get this information by running up the ramp. 1: A full wall off without any units is very suspicious. 2: No warp gate research by 7:30-8:00 minute mark. 3: Cybernetics core researching something (combined with the lack of warp gate research).
An overlord might see: 1: 1,2 or 3 stargates. If they see 2 or 3 then the reaction should be the same. But even just seeing 1 stargate with no warp gate and a full wall off should probabaly lend a stronger anti air reaction. 2: 4 Gas with Very few gateways/structures in base.
How to react: So going by your narration of the build zerg have generally been going for hydralisks vs this build vs you. Which is in my opinion is the correct decision. However, the zergs run into the issue where hydralisks are coming out 1-4 at a time around the same time as the voidrays are attacking.
Instead if the zerg scouts a combination of the above information they should have enough time to get out additional queens from their 3 hatcherys (6 should be enough to buy enough time and if they focus fire and have enough heals they should be able to shut the push down) which buy enough time for the hydralisks to get out.
Why queens: Voidrays deal 6 damage with a 0.5 attack speed. +4 damage vs armored and +6 damage charged up. So vs a non armored target it works out to be 12 dps. Queens are biological/psyonic not armored so the bonus damage of the void ray and the charge up wont effect them. Queens have an innate +1 armor each point of armor reduces the dps by 2 In your build you have +1 so it just ends up being 12 dps anyway. Queens have 175 health and are minerals only and wont use up any larvae. They can heal other queens or structures being focused down. Spore crawlers being armored just melt under voidrays. Queens out range voidrays and they deal reasonable damage at 9 dps vs air targets.
So i feel it may work for a while but once zerg's get used to what they need to scout for and how to react better it will probabaly stop working.
- it is probably the first 4gate build I've seen which is using 3 gates only. This is fucking innovative. - your early 2 gas is illogical. You're wasting minerals on assimilator + probe mining time just for having extra gas at a time when you don't use it. - as a result, you are starving for minerals early on, missing probes for many seconds, delaying gates, etc - you hit him @ 7minutes into the game, that's so late it doesn't matter - he plays a lot worse than you did, but that doesn't make your build better
I've done quite a few 3 gate stargate all ins against terran recently, but with oracles instead. Some people actually blind counter oracles and dts by getting turrets based on the fact that they saw double gas, or perphaps didn't see an expansion even if they don't actually see oracles. But in general, a few widow mines are enough to the this push so much that it usually fails me unless the terran goes for a very WoL textbook 1 rax expand and simply gets another bunker, in which case it's usually an easy win.
I'm frankly not sure how a stargate at 3:40 would work out because I start mine at 4:30, but the fact that you start wg at 4:10 is very unusual to me. I mean, I spend 3 chronos on my gates and start warping units much earlier. This all in seems quite vulnerable to aggressive strategies such as proxy widow mine drops.
if you really affort 3 Starportals out of 2 Base, something in your build might be wrong and u stock up a lot of gas before starting production.... With 1 Chronoboost per voidray( and at this time, there is no reason to use chronoboost on probes anymore..) there is no way to build constantly out of 3 SG at the same time . Mb u should switch the build slightly , i see unused potential there.
Why don`t you go for oracel? they would be stronger against hydralisk and queens , and do alsmost same dmg against anything else, whie saving minerals?
3 gate stargate against terran is pretty good right now but honestly i'd use oracles instead of voids. They are better against marines which will be the relevant unit you face with this type of all-in. You can even detect if they have some sort of widow mine defence if you got a read on that. If you smooth out the build I actually think 2 gates is enough but you need really good macro then so the 3rd gate is fine. The other two all-ins stink to be honest. Two stargates against zerg can be an ok suprise tactic that works well if they only suspect a single stargate or just phoenix. You probably want to send out 1 void first though to kill the overlords on the way and then send the rest of the voids, otherwise they have enough time to just respond with hydra's since voids are so slow. The delayed 4 gate is just bad. You surprise a protoss who doesn't ff and has his msc out of position with stargate but you pretty much lose or are severely behind against most stuff with it. It hits rather late so the msc is well online and DT finish soon after you hit pretty much losing you the game on the spot if he went that tech. 4 gate is not completely dead because with people trying to be really greedy with their stargate openings there are some openings for it. However if you do it you better do it as quickly as possible before msc/sentries have enough energy and more importantly that you hit way before dt can finish.
Aggresive openers will be the key to protoss in HotS I think to fully abuse the power of the MsC with recall. I think it's key though to make them slightly leaner, ie instead of having overproduction with 4 gates etc. you have slight underproduction with just 3 gate but you continue probe production in the meantime. Maybe you have 2 units less with your all-in but you have a viable transition if you recall out. For example 2 gate + stargate pressure instead of an all-in is really good in PvT, you won't kill them on the spot as often but you don't have to, if you can't break them but you can just kill 10 scv's with your oracle and expand you get ahead as well.
Hi, thanks for looking through my guide, and now to address your points. I haven't tried out an oracle version yet, but I might, the thing is that although oracles are better DPS wise and do more dmg than voids, they run out of energy, and are really fragile. And the only thing they are better than voids at is against marines, and scvs, while voids with charge are on the same page as oracles regarding everything else (e.g. bunkers, turrets, marauders....) and they have close to 2x the HP of oracles, and don't run out of energy. But I guess I could see why oracles could be considered the better option, I'll give them a try and see how it goes.
The PvZ all-in relies on surprise the most yes, I sometime will send out a void to clear out the way as you mentioned, but most of the games I forget to, simple because most zergs don't really have an overlord on the way to their base, but gotta do it more often either way I suppose.
Regarding the PvP game, I am well aware of dts, that's why the first 3 stalkers are chronoed-out, because usually players who go for dts neglect their defense in the process, thus making them very vulnerable to a few early stalkers. And if I don't see any units in his base, and a double gas, I might drop a forge just to be safe, but I haven't had almost anyone go for dts yet, so we'll see.
The MsC still isn't used to the max, and I might try incorporating into my builds someway. Thanks for reading!
I love these guides, Very clear with video tutorials build orders and replays. Really good job on the post!
I also love having a few all-in's to play around with on the rare occasion that i all-in. However the main issue i have is with the PvZ voidray build, is its very scoutable so i think it will be figured out reasonably quickly.
So while this build does a great job of denying scouting there are a few too many obvious signs.
A ling can get this information by running up the ramp. 1: A full wall off without any units is very suspicious. 2: No warp gate research by 7:30-8:00 minute mark. 3: Cybernetics core researching something (combined with the lack of warp gate research).
An overlord might see: 1: 1,2 or 3 stargates. If they see 2 or 3 then the reaction should be the same. But even just seeing 1 stargate with no warp gate and a full wall off should probabaly lend a stronger anti air reaction. 2: 4 Gas with Very few gateways/structures in base.
How to react: So going by your narration of the build zerg have generally been going for hydralisks vs this build vs you. Which is in my opinion is the correct decision. However, the zergs run into the issue where hydralisks are coming out 1-4 at a time around the same time as the voidrays are attacking.
Instead if the zerg scouts a combination of the above information they should have enough time to get out additional queens from their 3 hatcherys (6 should be enough to buy enough time and if they focus fire and have enough heals they should be able to shut the push down) which buy enough time for the hydralisks to get out.
Why queens: Voidrays deal 6 damage with a 0.5 attack speed. +4 damage vs armored and +6 damage charged up. So vs a non armored target it works out to be 12 dps. Queens are biological/psyonic not armored so the bonus damage of the void ray and the charge up wont effect them. Queens have an innate +1 armor each point of armor reduces the dps by 2 In your build you have +1 so it just ends up being 12 dps anyway. Queens have 175 health and are minerals only and wont use up any larvae. They can heal other queens or structures being focused down. Spore crawlers being armored just melt under voidrays. Queens out range voidrays and they deal reasonable damage at 9 dps vs air targets.
So i feel it may work for a while but once zerg's get used to what they need to scout for and how to react better it will probabaly stop working.
Hi, glad you liked my post, and taking the time to look through it and point out some unseen by me flaws. I definitely understand how important scouting is to a zerg in regards to stopping this build, but most zergs so far haven't really been scouting too hard, I've even had games in which the zerg manages to scout all 3 of my Stargates but elicits the same response as my video.
Queens are really good against voids as you mentioned, but they still haven't gotten too popular as to be used as the counter to the build. But if they start being used more often I might make 2-3 phoenix instead of the first 2-3 voids, that way the queens will get lifted up allowing my voids to dmg them unscathed. Or even add in a couple of oracles as well. Not sure about those yet, but so far I haven't really had anyone make more than 3 queens against this, so going to experiment more before changing my build.
Better enjoy it before it stops working as you said.
Uhhhhh, very risky all-in involve pure voids against Z. Any early aggression (e.g. speedlings-banes,) will straight kill you.
All-ins i would preferred immortal-sentry, 7G +2 blink, 1 gas 7G +1 etc.
All all-ins are risky aren't they? And yeah, early aggression puts the damper on my build, but it really comes down to if you scout it or not, although I don't do a great job of scouting my opponent, you can with a probe or a zealot before the wall off is complete, that way you'll know for certain if you're being 2-based bane busted or not.
The all-ins you listed are good, and still the most standard ones, but I feel like zergs have gotten used to them, since they've been used for over a year now, while my build is still rather "new" and unused, so it's good to have as a once-in-a-while tool, but definitely not something you'd use on a regular basis. Thanks for checking out my guide.
- it is probably the first 4gate build I've seen which is using 3 gates only. This is fucking innovative. - your early 2 gas is illogical. You're wasting minerals on assimilator + probe mining time just for having extra gas at a time when you don't use it. - as a result, you are starving for minerals early on, missing probes for many seconds, delaying gates, etc - you hit him @ 7minutes into the game, that's so late it doesn't matter - he plays a lot worse than you did, but that doesn't make your build better
Thanks for viewing my guide, nothing better than a 4gate with 3gates right? The 2 gas is to throw the opponent off making him think you're going for some quick tech, because if they see one gas only, then they might get suspicious, but if most players see 2 early gasses then they quickly jump to the conclusion that it's going to be some kind of a tech opoening (e.g. stargate, dts, etc..), and although it wastes more minerals to take that second assimilator, I think it pays off in itself by fooling the opponent, it's all about the mind games after all.
The attack is a bit late, but keep in mind that I rattled him a bit early on with the quick stalkers, so I was able to attack him that late.
I've done quite a few 3 gate stargate all ins against terran recently, but with oracles instead. Some people actually blind counter oracles and dts by getting turrets based on the fact that they saw double gas, or perphaps didn't see an expansion even if they don't actually see oracles. But in general, a few widow mines are enough to the this push so much that it usually fails me unless the terran goes for a very WoL textbook 1 rax expand and simply gets another bunker, in which case it's usually an easy win.
I'm frankly not sure how a stargate at 3:40 would work out because I start mine at 4:30, but the fact that you start wg at 4:10 is very unusual to me. I mean, I spend 3 chronos on my gates and start warping units much earlier. This all in seems quite vulnerable to aggressive strategies such as proxy widow mine drops.
Hi thanks for checking out my guide. As far as mines go, I haven't really had too many players make them yet, and even if they do they won't have too many of them unless they're still on 1 base by the time I attack. And if they do that mine drop then I will just run my workers away, and send in 1 worker at a time, so they'll only be able to get 4 workers until the next cooldown, and by that time their base should be relatively defenseless seeing as they sent out 4 mines and a medivac to my base that early on.
And you gotta keep in mind that voids have more flexibility. You can send them to the terran's mineral line, if you suspect mines at the front, and each void can take 2 mine hits, so the terran will not only get his mines out of position, leaving my stalkers to take at his wall, but also cost him some mining time, and workers, and if they do that drop on my base which you mentioned, they'll most likely not going to have anywhere near enough defense as they need.
if you really affort 3 Starportals out of 2 Base, something in your build might be wrong and u stock up a lot of gas before starting production.... With 1 Chronoboost per voidray( and at this time, there is no reason to use chronoboost on probes anymore..) there is no way to build constantly out of 3 SG at the same time . Mb u should switch the build slightly , i see unused potential there.
Why don`t you go for oracel? they would be stronger against hydralisk and queens , and do alsmost same dmg against anything else, whie saving minerals?
Hi, thanks for checking my guide. As far as the 3 Stargates go, I've found out that 3 of them are exactly what I need regarding gas income, but as you said I'm not the most consistent chrono-booster, and especially when I'm attacking my opponent, I tend to forget about using chrono-boost, which leads up to extra gas, but if I do use it more consistently I might only need 2 Stargates instead of 3. I just find that microing/controlling your voids in battle to be more important than chronoing them out, but someone with a higher APM than mine (I'm a rather slow player), can probably do both well.
On April 03 2013 16:00 iMmOrTaLiUz wrote: And if there are any more skeptics out there for the PvZ game, here's the info on my zerg opponent in the first video:
On April 03 2013 16:00 iMmOrTaLiUz wrote: And if there are any more skeptics out there for the PvZ game, here's the info on my zerg opponent in the first video:
Region rank Master #259 (1.41% of 18,362, 99th percentile)
And if you click on his bnet profile you will see that he is in the top 8th of his division and 259th in NA, hope that clears things out.
You realize there are people in gm who are absolutely awful and have no idea what they're doing.
Yeah but don't you need to be at least somewhat decent to get into gm in the first place? Otherwise everybody who's absolutely awful would be there. XD
On April 04 2013 03:06 Sated wrote: That 4 Gate has saved my PvP... until people figure out that 4 Gates are still a threat and stop taking stupid risks, at least
Indeed, too many protosses tech to quick stargates nowadays, and it's easily punishable.
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