[G]HUARGH's 90+% winrate PvZ mothership build

the p00n

Netherlands615 Posts

October 02 2011 03:30 GMT

at the time this screenshot was taken, 'birdkicker' was #14 on the NA GM ladder

Due to a rise in popularity, this build is now commonly used. I would like to ask you to refer to this build as 'the super sexy satan build' or 'HUARGH's build'.

Blue posters commenting on my build:
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On October 02 2011 15:45 Anihc wrote:
Why do you have to title it "90+% winrate" build? It doesn't make your guide more attractive, it just makes you look dumber. No build has a 90% winrate.

That being said, your guide isn't that bad. It does need more replays though. I feel like guides should be auto-closed if they have less than 3 replays or so.

Mothership is an excellent unit, but I'm beginning to realize that one of its strengths is that a lot of zerg players are just clueless in how to deal with it. For example, upon seeing vortex a lot of zerg players try to "save" their army by throwing everything into it. Well of course that's suicide for the zerg. But if the zerg just ignores what gets caught in the vortex, they can simply fight out the battle, kill some of your army, and then remax and kill your entire army now that you no longer have a vortex (or even mothership).

Also, I don't like how you default to zealot/archon. Mass roach just shits on it. Roach/baneling or roach/infestor shits on it even more. 1 void ray does nothing to stop mass roach, you will never get your 3rd up or be able to defend it, especially while you're spending thousands of resources teching to mothership at the same time.

There is actually a lot of micro regarding the mothership/archon versus broodlord/infestor/corruptor 200/200 battle. With no micro on either side the protoss wins easy. But if the zerg spreads out his units and doesn't throw everything into the vortex, when archons come out they still have to deal with unvortexed broodlords/broodlings and infestors casting fungal. Not to mention that if the zerg immediately runs away the corruptors that get caught in the vortex, they will NOT all die even if you have 10 archons in there. They will only all die if the zerg is slow and doesn't move them immediately upon the vortex ending.

On October 03 2011 06:38 Anihc wrote:

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You say "five thousand resources" but you still refer to it as "thousands" of resources. Same with 1.3.

Anyway, back to the OP - I still really don't like the heavy reliance on only 2 vortexes. The whole game is banking on the zerg somewhat clumping up their army, and you getting off 2 perfect vortexes to kill their entire army (if it gets to a situation where they have get to mass infestor/bl/corruptor). If you somehow mess up, the zerg can remax much faster than you can regen your energy for another vortex.

On October 04 2011 04:45 Whiplash wrote:
Tried it out vs a GM zerg and he GOT SLAMT (should give u a hint of who I played). It was my first time trying out the build and I did it a bit differently from HUARGH. Feels like with some timing refinements it will be real good. I think by nature this build allows you to take a pretty fast 3rd unless the Zerg is being hyper aggressive or dissects the build pretty well, but your mothership should be out by the time your 3rd finishes anyway so it will be pretty easy to defend.

On October 04 2011 06:08 Whiplash wrote:
http://drop.sc/40263

A replay vs me and Gerbil (very good NA zerg!) he knows its coming. I'm convinced this is a solid build and playstyle, I didn't even execute the build as well as I could have and so much promise shows.

Edit: I also believe that there is a timing toss can do while taking their 4th when they max out (it should be before hive tech) where they can simply run over the zerg.

On October 04 2011 07:01 Whiplash wrote:

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True for sure, I just felt like it wasn't necessary to focus on getting even more archons, but I do agree that having a proper 200/200 deathball is important. I've played multiple other games and I've come to the conclusion that late game u can basically go into whatever style you want as long as it can handle what the zerg will produce. A good zerg will get roach/infestor/broodlord and I think if you add in storm and stalkers to your army composition then you'll be set, but mass archons would work just as good as long as they all get into the toilet.

The power of this build is not necessarily vortex (although it plays a key role), but the fact that the mothership allows an easy 3rd and 4th base which the zerg cannot punish.

On October 04 2011 21:47 kcdc wrote:
High masters, Top 200 in the past. Two attempts, two wins. This feels a million times stronger than anything else I've done in PvZ. This is going to give Z a whine-fest like they haven't had since Idra and Artosis posted that video about colossus (particularly with void ray) being OP.

EDIT: Plexa also has a topic on mothership usage, he uses a slightly different approach. You can find it here

Introduction and history
I would first like to tell you how this build came into existence. My handle is HUARGH and I play at the grandmaster level. Since 1.3.4, I have been having a lot of problems with the PvZ match-up from the Protoss' perspective. Pre-1.3.4, I used to be in good shape against Zerg, using a very basic 3gate sentry expo into 3 base colossus. Slowly my winrate in PvZ declined, however, as Zergs adopted new styles which were very hard to deal with. A good example of such a style was the early roach/ling aggression. It was very hard to deal with and nearly unscoutable, forcing you to take precautions which would put you severely behind in a more standard macro game or create vulnerabilities against other strategies such as mutalisks.

Then, infestors got a huge rise in popularity. It became very hard for the Protoss to use higher tier units due to neural parasite, parasite being most deadly against colossi but not entirely useless against immortals or void rays either. Your gateway army would receive chain fungals and before you knew it, you lost all of your units. HT-oriented builds got a rise in popularity, but still didn't seem to work that well in practice, at least not for me - baneling drops, the natural clumping up of units and a rise in ultralisk usage left me wondering what I should be doing.

So I basically looked at how high level Protoss players were playing PvZ, taking oGsMC as a prime example. He was doing a very interesting 1gate expansion, which allows you to start your expansion at around the 5 minute mark as opposed to the 6 minute mark, providing an economic advantage over the 3gate expansion build. Instead of walling himself the 3gate-expo way, with the forge and a 4th gateway, he would wall himself in with his 2nd and 3rd gateway, providing the same defense. What about the early roach/ling aggression? Simple: he would make a stargate right after his 3rd gateway was planted down and chrono out a void, and the time at which the void ray would spawn coincided nicely with the timing of the Zerg roach/ling aggression. With the untouchable void ray, he would fend off the all-in with minimal losses and end up ahead economically. What's even better is that he had the ability to scout his opponent - a role that was filled by hallucination in the 3gate sentry expo build.

Hallucinations can only scout, however. A void ray, in addition to scouting, gives you immediate map control and allows you to do 'clipping' damage in the form of picking off overlords or forcing spore crawlers. You could even deny the third base occassionally. What oGsMC would do, is make up to 3 void rays and then chrono phoenixes in an attempt to take out the 3rd base. Most zergs would throw down 1, perhaps 2 spore crawlers and feel secure against heavy air-play. Not so much with 3 void rays and phoenixes, which make short work of spore crawlers once charged. Queens were useless, too, due to the phoenixes rendering them immobile. This heavy air play was usually followed up by colossus, a logical choice seeing that the appriopriate zerg response at that time was hydralisks, which don't fair too well against colossi.

However, time passed and Zergs got more used to heavy air-play, as it used to be the way to go in PvZ, giving Zergs a lot of practice against all the variations. You could no longer kill off Zerg's 3rd base with mass air. and with the rise of infestor-based play, it was sometimes impossible to survive a simple timing attack consisting of mass lings and infested terrans. I noticed that it was often hard to fully scout the base of a Zerg with a void ray, too, resulting in a lot of silly losses (such as 10 mutas appearing in my mineral line while my colossus is almost finished). Eventually, I changed my build from 3 void rays + phoenixes, into 1 void ray + 1 phoenix, where the phoenix would fly over the Zerg base to scout, giving you 100% certainty.

All together, with this new build, my PvZ winrate went up to 'acceptable' levels, before dropping once again to 20%ish. Being unsure of what (minor) change I was supposed to make next, I sat down and analyzed all my recent PvZs, identifying what made me win and lose them. The results were quite interesting.

The major reasons why I won and lost my PvZs
While analyzing my replays, I noticed clear trends in my wins and losses. My losses were mostly due to:

• not being able to get my 3rd base up in time or in good shape
• not being able to defeat an army consisting of a lot of infestors, especially infestor + broodlord
• not being able to fight off the second wave of Zerg units after the first big battle

While my wins were mostly due to:

• being able to get my 3rd base up in time and in good shape
• the Zerg simply not making infestors
• something silly; i.e. the zerg taking no precautions against lategame DTs or losing too much to the initial void

I sat down and conjured up possible ways of avoiding these traps. The point of focus was getting my 3rd base up safely, which just did not seem possible. I experimented with somewhat cheesy, risky openings and tried to bypass the issue all together by going for 2 base timings. Although I had -some- success, it felt more like playing a game of chance to me. My play was relying on secrecy and my opponent's suboptimal reaction, making me not feel in charge of the game outcome, kind of like playing roulette. This is still a game of imperfect information; both parties are forced to make certain assumptions at certain points in the game and over the course of a lot of ladder games, you are going to make wrong assumptions every now and then that put you behind. I can accept this, but my play was only focused on these things. Oops, you made an overseer, well I guess that's game. Oops, you found my hidden nexus, I guess I'll leave the game now. Oh no, you made attacking units instead of drones, I guess I'll flame you for not playing according to my distorted idea of how the game should ideally be played.

Enter Mothership
After having tried nearly everything, it was time to play around with carriers, motherships and another race (Terran seemed really nice at this point, mmmmh marines). It was then that I discovered the mothership's amazing defensive and offensive capabilities!

With this build, you will certainly be able to get your 3rd base up in good shape, provided you do not make any silly mistakes (such as letting 30 lings run into your main, you should have a zealot there). I have found a gap in my old 1gate expo into void+phoenix build (described above) where you can churn out a fleet beacon (300/200) and a mothership (400/400), without suffering fatal damage from a zerg timing that would invest these resources in an army.

The basic build order and opening
You should not have an idle nexus. Prioritize building probes and obviously create a gateway + cybernetics core wall at your choke. This will be the build you are going to use against nearly everything the zerg is doing, save 1base cheesy play (roach rush, 7pool, ...,).

• 9pylon, scout with pylon builder, chrono nexus twice after pylon is done
• 14gate
• 15gas, your 3rd chronoboost should be coming up right now - use it on your nexus
• 17pylon, you will not get supply blocked
• cybernetics core, your 4th chronoboost should be coming up right now - use it on your nexus
• 2nd gas (if your opponent gas steals you, use your 4th chronoboost on your gateway and chrono out a zealot, then make your c-core and then make a second zealot, take your gas asap)
• zealot followed by pylon, your 5th chronoboost is coming up - use it on your gateway
• sentry + warpgate tech, all chrono goes on your gateway until you have 4 sentries
• make your 34/34 food pylon at your natural before you make your nexus
• nexus
• place 2 additional gateways at your natural, creating a sim city
• place a stargate, preferably in a place where an overlord is unlikely to spot it (i.e. next to the cybernetics core)
• make a void ray, chronoboost it twice
• get your 2 gases at your natural and transfer probes
• make a phoenix, chronoboost it once, rest of chronoboosts goes on both nexus
• fleet beacon, make sure you have at least one chronoboost left when your fleet beacon finishes
• mothership, continuously chronoboost it
• forge and twilight council
• from here the build branches into different reactions from you depending on what kind of information you have gotten so far, but generally you will be looking to add more gateways, zealots and archons to your mix

Scouting: how to use your scouting probe, your void ray and your phoenix, identifying builds and responding correctly
You are going to 9pylon scout, mainly to try and deny a hatch first. This is all basic PvZ stuff you should be able to do by now (look for early pool, patrol on his nat, make a pylon if he tries to take it, etc.). If he opens speed, you will want to check if he takes guys off gas. The best way to do this is to run your probe to an obscure spot, and then moving it into his base by clicking the mineral patch closest to the gas he has taken. Like this, you should see the natural going down (meaning no 1base play) and the amount of gas he has mined and if he is still mining. Try to check his gas at around 3:50 - some Zergs are either tricky or sloppy and mine some extra gas, your probe could die to lings and you will not know if he has taken guys off gas. The reason for checking if he has guys off gas is to create a mental narrative, allowing you to subconsciously better prepare for his options. If he has not taken guys off gas, this means he is either going for a fast lair (most likely mutalisks), an all-in or fast +1 (very rare). Make sure you check his natural to see if it is actually a hatchery building - although I have never encountered this, it is theoretically possible for him to throw down a hatchery, cancel it and use the creep to make a roach warren or baneling nest. If you have missed this, you can press alt+g (the hotkey for pinging) and mouse-over the hatchery. If it is smaller than a hatchery, then it is obviously not a hatchery. Safety first!

Small tip: right outside of your natural, there should be a zergling on hold position, which is there to spot for you moving out. See if you can pick it off with your sentries and zealots. Don't overcommit to killing it though! If it runs, let it run and retreat to your sim city.

Your void ray will (or should) always do the exact same thing, every game: pick off the overlord near your base (if any) and make a b-line towards the zerg's natural, following the path a ground unit would take. The reason for this being that you will want to check for roaches being rallied to your base, this would indicate early roach/ling aggression. If no roaches are being rallied, clean the xel naga towers (on most maps in most positions these will be on your way towards the Zerg natural, so you can do this while looking for roaches rallied) and proceed to where the Zerg's 3rd base should be. If no base is here your void ray can do a multitude of things: deny creep spread, deny xel naga tower vision, get a few drone kills by harassing mineral lines (right click drone, hold shift and move-command away) or look for stray overlords. This is mostly a personal preference, I switch it up depending on what I feel like doing/what I feel what would benefit me the most.

Your phoenix will be your second scout at the 9ish minute mark. You will want to fly this over the Zerg's main and natural. Be warned: from my coaching experience, Zergs in leagues below masters have a severe tendency to overreact when they see your initial void ray, and will throw down spores in their mineral lines. Your phoenix can take quite some queen shots, but flying over spores and queens is just too much, you do not want to lose your phoenix. You should still be able to get all the information you need even if he has 2 spores in every mineral line.

Fast 3rd base into whatever
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The 'textbook' reaction. The lair will usually be slightly delayed, probably morphing as you fly your phoenix over it. See if you can force a cancel on the 3rd with your void ray and phoenix. You do not have to force a cancel, it would just be bonus damage. Research charge, +1 weapons and start your templar archives and 3rd base, start warping in moderate amounts of stalkers. The 3rd base is a calculated risk - you have cleaned overlords, the xel naga towers and the zerglings outside of your base and his attention is focused on your void and phoenix at his 3rd. Sometimes you will be able to get away with a premature 3rd base. Your nexus will start at 9:00 - 10:00. If he is a good player and does not mess up, he will be able to deny it. There is nothing you can do, cancel it and take the 100 mineral loss, knowing that it was the right decision on a risk/reward equivalent base. Unless you are 99% sure you can defend it, don't bother because you are very low on military units and cannot afford to lose them. Make 4-5 additional gateways (whether you were forced to cancel or not), your mothership and first archon should pop at the same time, around 11-12 minutes depending on how many chronoboosts you missed. Now you can retake your 3rd base and start making units. So just to clarify: if you cancel the nexus, your 4-5 additional gateways (totaling 7-8 due to you already having 3) will go up before your 3rd base if you were forced to cancel your first attempt, and after your 3rd base if you were not forced to cancel. From here, get +2 weapons and slowly start adding more gateways, zealots and archons. You will want to go pure zealot/archon and whatever remaining units you have from the early game.

Delayed 3rd base (lair first) into whatever
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Same as above. This build is slightly safer against early aggression/timing pushes and heavy air play, but we are not doing that. It offers no other advantages over the above build.

Early roach/ling aggression off 2 bases
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As described above, your void ray should be able to spot the roaches being rallied. This is also the reason why your void ray is supposed to follow this path up to the enemy natural, to look for roaches being rallied. If you spot roaches being rallied, shift+right click them until they are either all dead or return to safety (queens/spores). If he is really committed, warp in units (stalkers) at your base and use forcefields. This is the easiest strategy to beat with this build. Use your game sense to determine how many stalkers you need to warp in, try to warp in as few as possible, as to not delay your forge/twilight council/mothership. If your twi council/forge/mothership is already building, his aggression is later than expected but still requires the exact same response. In every situation as a rule of thumb, employ your game sense to assess the situation and determine the optimal response, keeping the general guidelines of this guide in the back of your head. After the aggression has died out, use your phoenix to scout for his follow-up (usually a 3rd, if that is the case try to deny it and see above). Queue your mothership, build your twi council/forge, premature nexus attempt, get +1/charge/templar archives, 4-5 additional gateways and slowly start adding zealots/archons/gateways.

2base infestor/ling timing
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Your phoenix will scout this, the cues are no third base, two evolution chambers and an infestation pit. This timing will hit between 11 and 13 minutes, usually on the earlier side of the 11-13 minute range. You should have your mothership out as well as 1 archon when his infested terran/ling timing happens. To counter this, instead of your premature nexus, you are going to build 2 cannons at your natural and warp in additional units, mostly zealots. Delay charge for more warp-ins. If the attack does not come, make sure your phoenix is active to see what it exactly is that he is doing (3rd base? second tech? massing up more units off 2 bases?). If he stays on 2 bases and masses units (REALLY make sure he is staying on 2 bases), add 7 gateways, totaling 10 gateways and play 2base vs. 2base, having your army consist of only zealots, archons and the mothership. If you are adding on your 7 gateways and see he just tried to take a 3rd base, cancel 1 or 2 gateways and get your own 3rd. Slowly add more gateways, zealots and archons. Don't forget to get charge! You didn't get it yet because you needed extra units.

2base muta
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Make 2 or 3 additional phoenixes (not more) to fend off the first wave. After this you will have your mothership out and archon tech. Do not bother with blink or extra stalkers. Use your mothership to defend your main base and your army to defend your 2nd base. You will not attempt a premature nexus, grab your 3rd after your mothership and archon tech is out (11-12 minutes). Start adding more gateways, zealots and archons. Trick: if you can get a vortex off at his mutalisks with your archons nearby, do it and send your archons in. The 'archon toilet' was nerfed in 1.3, but mostly against ground units. Air units will spread much slower than ground units. You can one- or two-shot his mutas as they are released from the vortex. WARNING: if you are a sensitive person you may not want to use this strategy, people will start calling you names for doing this, as it is generally frowned upon. Use game sense to determine whether you need a cannon at your main's and natural's mineral line.

2base hydra/ling drops
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The cues of this build are 2 base, a hydra den, no roach warren and a dancing lair/hatchery. 'Dancing' refers to the animation buildings make when they are upgrading or producing something. Start a game against the computer as zerg and research an upgrade in your lair and hatchery. Make sure you are able to tell the difference between upgrading and not upgrading. When you have identified the build, place your void ray and phoenix in strategical locations, forcing him to either undrop hydras to chase away your void/phoenix from harassing his filled overlords (buys you time) or lose overlords full of units (obviously good for us). Delay charge for units, do not delay your templar archives. Do not attempt a premature nexus. Get your 3rd base after your archon tech and mothership are out or after the drop play has been cleaned up. Start adding more gateways, zealots and archons. Don't forget to get charge.

Tunneling claws timing
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Very rare nowadays. Look for a dancing hatchery or lair and a dancing roach warren. Delay charge for stalker warp-ins, delay templar archives for robotics facility and make 2 cannons at your natural. Make sure he can't just snipe the cannons, you will be very sad. After your obs, archon tech and mothership are out, get your 3rd base and start adding more gateways, zealots and archons. Don't forget to get charge.

Ling/baneling oriented play, usually a follow-up from a 3rd base
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Keep making zealot archon, but research psionic storm and do not transform all of your high templars into archons. If you suspect baneling drops, play defensive and grab additional bases (4th and 5th, get geysers asap). Vortex his overlords/army and mass storm it as they are released from the vortex, do not send your own units in. Start making carriers and void rays. Move back far enough after you have vortexed his army/overlords so that he has to move quite a bit to engage you again, but make sure you are in range to psi storm him as he comes out. Have your mothership further back on hold position - the mothership cannot cast her spells when she is in motion and you will want to cast a second vortex fast after he has taken a lot of damage from storms. Move back again so he has to move a bit to engage you after being relesed from the vortex and storm him again, he will either retreat or lose all his army/overlords, giving you more time to mass air.

Mid to lategame: how to engage the army and deal with his unit compositions

Mass roach, or mass roach/hydra
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Vortex his army, send your zealot/archons in. Kiting on creep can be very powerful against your composition, by vortexing his army you will immediately send all of your units in melee range, and he will be unable to kite you after being released from the vortex due to your ball of units being entangled in his ball of units, causing maximum DPS

Infestor/broodlord
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Try to get a good vortex off on his broodlords/infestors, use 2 vortexes if necessary. Make sure there is a slight delay between the vortexes, so you can send your zealots/archons into the second vortex after they have killed everything when they have been released from the first one. A vortex lasts 20 seconds, about 10 seconds should do for a delay. Spreading from the Zerg's point is useless due to you having 2 vortexes that you can chain.

Banelings + whatever
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Get carriers and void rays, psionic storm and research blink. Be very careful with your vortex. See 'ling/baneling oriented play, usually a follow-up from a 3rd base' above for additional tips.

Ultras + whatever
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a-move

Replays

http://drop.sc/44333 <-- ladder game against GM league player GLSnute
http://replayfu.com/r/gnLwQr <-- ladder game, fast 3rd with gas steal into roach/hydra/corruptor
http://drop.sc/40015 <-- early roaches into 3rd base
http://drop.sc/40014 <-- early roaches into 3rd base. Notice how my void ray didn't do what he was supposed to do (move towards the zerg nat to check for rallying roaches). I lose a lot because of this. As the game goes on, you should also make a few cannons as a form of static detection at your expo, because else... well... just watch this game.
http://drop.sc/40041 <-- 3base roach/hydra aggression (fun tip: keep 'units lost' tab open while watching).
http://drop.sc/40284 <-- ladder game, more abuse
http://drop.sc/40777 <-- 7pool (ladder)
http://drop.sc/43910
http://drop.sc/43906
http://drop.sc/43909 <-- ladder game, opponent goes for heavy roach/ling aggression early-game, gets creep all the way up to my base and splits his roach/hydra army while kiting them in seperate groups so they keep their concave, I mess up my build too due to the aggression and my poor crisis management in this game
http://drop.sc/43908 <-- ladder game
http://drop.sc/43907 <-- ladder game

User replays

http://drop.sc/40109 (master level)

Shield

Bulgaria4824 Posts

October 02 2011 03:36 GMT

On October 02 2011 12:30 the p00n wrote:
Preface

Hello everyone. I was a GM player in season 2

I checked your profile and you were master...
I think it's better to be honest.

The_Templar

your Country52797 Posts

October 02 2011 03:46 GMT

On October 02 2011 12:36 darkness wrote:

Show nested quote +

I checked your profile and you were master...
I think it's better to be honest.

Maybe He got kicked out near the end of it for inactivity.

the p00n

Netherlands615 Posts

October 02 2011 03:46 GMT

On October 02 2011 12:36 darkness wrote:

Show nested quote +

I checked your profile and you were master...
I think it's better to be honest.

bonus pool got too high --> dropped ('inactivity')

but ty for the detective work always nice to have sherlocks ^^

also could a mod put a [G] in front?

EDIT: ninja'd ^^

gonna go to bed, will answer questions tomorrow!

xx

NtroP

United States174 Posts

October 02 2011 03:56 GMT

Dude was drunk, cut him some slack.

lizzuma

United States301 Posts

October 02 2011 03:57 GMT

sup n00b :D aom represent!

BuddhaMonk

781 Posts

October 02 2011 04:05 GMT

Which nexus do you normally make your mothership at?

TolEranceNA

Canada434 Posts

October 02 2011 04:07 GMT

Thanks for letting blizzard knowing any bug they need to fix

I always though Mothership in the hands of a good player is 100% lethal, contradictory to popular belief.

Yoshi Kirishima

United States10290 Posts

October 02 2011 04:10 GMT

On October 02 2011 12:56 NtroP wrote:
Dude was drunk, cut him some slack.

haha yeah

Anyways really thanks for the guide, gonna try it hahaha mothership ftw xD

NTTemplar

609 Posts

October 02 2011 04:10 GMT

#10

Could you elaborate on how this does against ling/infestor timing attack?

How exactly would you grab that third against it?

IF the answer is that you can't, is this still doable or does it mean you are stuck again at the previous problem of 2base with all the same problems as before?