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PvP - Phoenix Play -
Hello TL,
+ Show Spoiler +Post 1000 yeaaaah !
Edit : hihi, just saw that the icon for that was a corsair, which is pretty fitting for this topic ^^
Today I'll be presenting a way to play a phoenix-based PvP. Phoenixes have been getting increasingly popular since the latest anti 4 gate patch due to the increase in robo play in tournaments and on the ladder. Phoenixes are one of the most fun unit in the protoss arsenal, as well as being the most versatile unit.
Phoenixes are the ultimate midgame unit in PvP.
- Full scouting of your opponent
- Extremely Mobile
- Great harass unit
- Trade cost efficiently against any units in the game in small numbers (even blink stalkers with correct micro)
When being chased by superior numbers of enemy phoenixes, don't hesitate to use the overload AoE ability to escape
The idea is to be safe from any early game all-in while getting some decently fast phoenixes to scout your opponent and react accordingly.
The aim of this guide is not to teach you how to play early game PvP (read : against 4 gate, or early cheeses). Refer to these threads if you are having questions regarding PvP early game : [G] PvP: Compilation of anti 4 gate builds [G] Protoss FAQs
You'll also find an ongoing discussion about phoenix play in this thread : [D] PvP Phoenix Play
This guide will be devoted to PvP phoenix play in general and not to a particular style of play, so feel free to ask questions in the thread, suggest improvements etc... I'll try to keep it up to date as much as i can. You'll find a 1h coaching session from EGAxslav exclusively on PvP Phoenix play at the bottom of the thread.
Build order :
The opening BO is really a matter of preference. Basically a good phoenix BO is one with a 2 (or 3) gateway defense that is safe against 4 gates and takes a second gas relatively early. You can spend all your income with two gates and a stargate, so it's usually a good thing to stay on 2 gates.
A lot of people advocate for going Gate->Stargate->Gate instead of 2Gate->Stargate. Advantages and disadvantages of GSG compared to GGS are as follows :
- Earlier Stargate -> earlier scouting information
- Faster phoenix production -> big advantage over mirror phoenix builds
- More chronoboost on gateways and less on warpgate -> FE builds more likely against you
- Relies on 3-4 sentries to defend 4 gate -> can fall behind on gas versus a 4 gater who doesn't commit
- Doesn't look like a 4 gate
I'll present 2 opening BOs here. The first one is a reworked version of my [G] Safe PvP - Defensive 3 gate , made to work with only 2 gates in the latest patch. I like it because it almost doesn't cut in your economy (see FAQ section about this) and relies on gateway units instead of sentries to hold the 4 gate. The second one is a one gate Stargate build that EGAxslav uses at high level.
You can do one or the other based on what you scout (fast second gas etc...)
Note that gas stealing is a possibility, but you need to get 3 gates before stargate to be safe form 4 gate, or to pressure a 1 gate FE build.
Defensive 2 Gate into Stargate : + Show Spoiler +9 pylon 11 CB 12 gate -> scout 13 CB 14 gas -> 3 probes 16 pylon (with probe coming out of nexus) 17 core (with probe coming out of nexus) -> Warpgate (3CB) 18 zealot 22 stalker (cut probe production at 24/26) 24 gate 24 pylon 24 gas -> 3 probes 24 sentry - constant probe production until you have 26 probes (+1 scouting probe)
- your sentry finishes as soon as your second gate finishes. make 2 stalkers immediately.
- get a stargate at 5:30
- get 2 chronoboosted phoenix while getting as many units as you can from 2 gates.
- directly scout your opponent's natural with first phoenix while avoiding enemy vision.
- keep making phoenixes
- scout your opponent's base with your 2 phoenix
EGAxslav's 1 gate Stargate : + Show Spoiler +9 pylon Chrono Nexus 12 Gate (slight probe cut is needed to get gate at 12) Scout Chrono Nexus 14 Assimilator Chrono nexus 16 pylon 17 core 18 Assimilator 19 Zealot 22 pylon (get after WG research) 23 Stalker- Chrono 27 Stalker - Chrono 30 Stargate 30 sentry -Chrono 32 pylon 33 gate 34 Phoenix (all chronoes on phoenix from here on out) 36 Robo Example replay : http://drop.sc/74681More info on how to play this opening can be found in the coaching video at the end of the thread.
Reacting to what you scout :
Against almost every build, you're going to need to get a robotics facility at some point. In this part of the guide, two things I'll focus my attention on are robo timing and expansion timing.
The constraints linked to getting an early robo is that you will find it to be completely useless against a good number of builds : Gate FEs, Stargate, Zealot/Archon, 1 base Robo. However an early robo gives you an easy answer to blink all-ins, blink expand, DT builds, and Robo Twilight harass.
This guide will be more centered around the safe style which is getting an early blind robo though I feel getting a robo earlier forces you into a Zealot/Immortal/Phoenix composition while delaying your robo gives you more freedom in the midgame. You'll find that dealing with good blink stalker usage and DTs can be quite a pain without a robo. This is however a general guide on phoenix openings so I will talk about all the possible variants. If you want to be safe, I recommend getting your robo while your second or third phoenix is building. This allows you to have detection in time for Dts, and immortals for blink stalkers. It also allows you to cancel it in time if you are up against a build where you don't need it. If you feel like playing more risky, you can expand faster and immediately get a robo after while relying on gateway + phoenix defences.
DT build - Zealot/archon: + Show Spoiler +You scout a darkshrine, or a suspiciously empty base with a bunch of zealots. Kill two probes and immediately make an observer at your base while walling your ramp with your units on hold position. When the DTs come, FF your ramp every 15 seconds until your observer is out (use the ingame timer !). Warp in additional sentries if your initial sentry's 4 FF won't be enough (but they should be). Always FF the lowest you can on your ramp, and leave units on hold position behind the FF. There is a trick where the DT player morphs an archon to crush the FF and them walks up the ramp with his remaining DT, if your units are on hold poisition, your should be able to FF behind once the morphing archon is dead. Keep sending phoenixes to his base and use all energy you can on probes. I like to stop making phoenixes once I have about 5 because the logical next step for your opponent is zealot/archon and phoenixes don't do excedingly well versus that in big numbers. If you love your phoenix harass however, getting up to 9-10 can really pressure your opponent who will be forced to make stalkers he didn't want to get. 10 Phoenixes can also potentially take out an entire mineral line in seconds if he isn't being careful. Take your expand as soon as your observer is out.
If your opponent has expanded (probably earlier then you), you can start making probes again out of both nexus and you need to do some damage in his probe line with your phoenixes. If you succeed in killing ~5 probes or so without losing anything, you'll both be approximately even in the mid game. You need to keep a keen eye on what he his doing, and react accordingly. If he his not cutting probes, getting a forge, or a robo, you can feel free to probe up. If he his clearly gearing up for a 2 base zealot archon all in attack, then you need to focus on making units. Add gateways as you can afford them. Build a little maze in front of your natural to hinder zealot movement.
Zealot/HT/Archon: + Show Spoiler +Pretty much the same as with DT play, except it will be a bit easier for you. Don't make too many phoenixes though and tech switch earlier because feedback is a bitch against phoenixes You can cancel your robo to expand faster.
3/4 gate blink all-in : + Show Spoiler +The first hint to this will be given by your initial phoenix or units who should spot a proxy pylon near your base. When you then scout his base, to find 3/4 gates and a twilight council with no units, check if he has expanded and leave your phoenixes in his base to see how all-in he is. Meanwhile at your base stop making phoenixes once you have 5 and get some immortals. FF your ramp as soon as you see him trying to get up. You should never let him gain high ground vision. You've got a full minute (4FFs) to warp in units and immortals (use chronoboost on production facilities !). If he tries to break your ramp, he will most likely walk a stalker up the ramp, blink to the side, and blink all of his stalkers to the side of your base. This is where the phoenixes come in to play. A-move your army towards them and with your phoenixes, lift off the first line of stalkers. He'll try to focus down the phoenixes but will take a lot of dps from your zealots and immortals, which is why you should never try to lift the stalkers in the back. Continue chasing after the stalkers, but never let your phoenixes get too far ahead of your main army. If he pulls back and expands, you can go down the ramp and expand yourself. Blink stalkers are extremely bad at setting up a contain since they rely on kiting the army. Use two spare phoenixes to scout what he is doing in his base. once again, adapt your probe production to what you see. Kill 3 or 4 probes with the phoenixes if you can. If he stops making stalkers and goes for a zealot/archon composition, stop making immortals and refer to the previous section. As before, you can either keep your phoenix count at 5-ish, or go up to ~8-10 for more harass heavy play.
3 gate blink expand : + Show Spoiler +This time you can afford to use energy on the probe line. As soon as your phoenixes spot the expand, kill two probes and rally all new phoenixes to his base to kill as many probes as you can. At your base, get chronoboosted immortals. Walk down the ramp with your first immortal and expand. You will be a bit late, but your phoenixes should have killed a decent amount of probes. When you have 2 or 3 Immortals, you can go pressure his own expand. If he has made too many stalkers, to defend phoenix harass you can kill him right there, but most of the time he'll have too many zealots for you to win the fight. Use the distraction from your ground army to kill probes in the main with phoenixes.
1 base colossi : + Show Spoiler +This is an extremely favorable build order win for you. Kill two probes immediately and cancel your robo. If for some reason he doesn't cancel his colossus, then just make 2 more gates, get 5-6 phoenixes and all-in him. If he tries to expand immediately, get 2 more gates and all-in him. He spent way to much money on useless tech robo and robo bay + nexus to be able to hold. Storm in with you phoenix to kill the sentries, then a-move your army for the kill. With your phoenixes you want to lift immortals and zealots ( he won't have more then one sentry) The smart way for him to play it out is to immediately get a twilight council and go for a delayed blink staler + obs. This leaves you more then enough time to expand while you continue to harass with your phoenixes. I like getting a lot of phoenixes in this situation 8-10 to force him into his base while you macro up. You can go up to ~32 probes as long as he isn't expanding, ~40 probes if he expands, and more if he expands and makes probes. In all cases you should be far ahead. Watch out for the all-in DT tech switch. Get a robo and obs when you feel the time is right
Robo Twilight: + Show Spoiler +This is one of the most common opening on the ladder right now because it's very safe and versatile. Players get a robo for observers and mass blink stalkers off of 3 gates. Playing against this style is not easy with a phoenix opener and there is little room for mistakes. The good part is that his blink will be delayed compared to pure blink builds. You therefore have a window of time where you can harass and keep him on the defensive. Now if you haven't lost any units in early skirmishes, your opponent basically spent 25/75 on an obs and 150 on a gateway and 100 on 2 extra probes, which leaves you with 275/75 worth of units more then him. Now of course this doesn't really mean anything precise like : "you can afford to lose 2 stalkers and still be good", but it does show that there is room to squeeze in an expansion (which is basically a big pylon for 300 more minerals as NrGMonk puts it) and still be able to hold the all in. With good micro on both sides, a phoenix based army is almost as cost efficient as a blink stalker army in small numbers. You can either expand directly, and then chrono out immortals, or get an immortal first, and expand later. Immortals before expand is usually much safer though. I only expand before if I have some sort of a lead in army due to early skirmishes for example. If he decides to expand, you should both have the same timing on your expansion. Get an observer out and try to snipe his own observer with your phoenixes. You should be safe from blink harass for a while if you get it. (You can do cute stuff like camping his robo with an obs to snipe observers with phoenix as they come out as well ^^). Where you head to from there is really up to you. If you choose colossus tech you'll have little to deny a fast third from your opponent if he goes zealot/archon. But you can still turtle up on 2 bases and harass with phoenixes. If he his going all in, don't make any probes, just pylons and units. Chronoboost out immortals (you don't have time for an obs. This is when you need to have a good read on your opponent, keep track of stalker numbers and figure out if he is all-ining with stalkers of with a hidden darkshrine). Once you've maynarded some workers, your income should be bigger than his and you'll slowly outproduce him. It also helps that you are defending so you can send some zealots in his mineral line from a proxy pylon.
Stargate Mirror: + Show Spoiler +One of the most intense and frustrating experience is phoenix vs phoenix in PvP. If at any point some player has one more phoenix than his opponent, and "tags" the other guy's phoenixes somewhere on the map, it's an auto win for him (shoots while moving and does bonus damage vs light...). There is only one way to play this out I think : keep massing chronoboosted phoenixes until you have more then him. If you have less then him, camp your mineral line with your stalkers and phoenixes. (This doesn't mean that you can't move out with your phoenixes to scout his expansion timing, phoenix numbers, tech switch etc... It just means that when you move out, you have to be 100% focused on your phoenixes so they don't get "tagged".) If you have more then him, harass his mineral line. Eventually you guys will run out of gas and have to expand with the left over ressources. A good occasion to take double gas and add an additional stargate to make more phoenixes. You can also try to sneak a dt shrine somewhere on the map... Get +1 air attack when you start getting gas income from your second base.
Immortal Expand: + Show Spoiler +You can generally just add 2 gates and all-in him. If you are playing on a map with an easy to defend natural like shakuras, you can also expand later and just go kill all his probes with your phoenixes. Phoenix vs Immortal expand is really a BO win situation.
Gate expands: + Show Spoiler +Usually 3 gate expands, but some times even more greedy, these builds are absolutely not safe versus any sort of early pressure builds (3 gate, 4 gate, 3 gate very fast blink). Ideally, you want to scout them with your scouting probe/ first units, but the players who open like this are usually very good at denying scouting. At the low levels, you don't have to worry about fast expand builds so much, but at higher levels people tend to them more often. If you strongly suspect a fast expand, get your own expand after the 4 gate timing. You can cancel it if you scout something you don't like later on. All-ining is possible if you suspect that your opponent isn't doing the build the way it is supposed to be done. For example if he is getting immortals or an excessive amount of sentries. However, most of the time his expansion will have already paid for itself once your attack comes and good players will hold off your all-in. You need to scout it with your first phoenix (which is why you head directly for opponent's natural with 1st phoenix). and immediately answer by cancelling your robo (if you chose to get an early robo) and expanding yourself. You'll need to pull yourself back in the game with your phoenix harass. If he his going stalker heavy (which he should) you get a robo right after expanding and start getting some immortals. 5/6 gates blink attacks are really common as a follow up to 3 gate expands and you'll need to scout it to prepare for it. Before he reaches his timing though you can easily take the map and pressure his front. This is a great occasion to go kill probes in his main while he is defending his natural.
4 gate Warp Prism : + Show Spoiler +With the rise in popularity of tech builds with sentry defense, more and more players have been trying to get a quick win with a delayed 4 gate with a warp prism. Killing the warp prism doesn't stop the attack as smart players also build a pylon on the low ground to keep reinforcing. In construction
Summary :
Good against :
- 1 base Colossus
- Immortal builds
- Blink all-ins
- 1 base zealot/archon openings
Harder against :
- Blink expands
- Gateway expands
- DT expands
Even against :
- Robo Twilight
- Stargate mirror (duh !)
Late game transitions :
This guide mostly describes mid-game PvP so I won't be dwelling too much on the late game. In any case there are very little late game transitions that are Stargate centric, so phoenix openings usually have a tech switch transition at some point in the game. That transition usually happens after you have secured your expansion and held any pressure/all in.
The current standard way of playing PvP is to eventually go for colossus tech in the late game. This is personally what I recommend as pure zealot/archon compositions have shown to not be very effective.
If your opponent is also going for a colossus based army, you are safe to tech up, however against a zealot-archon composition, he can push before your tech investment has paid off in terms of units. It's usually a good idea to get a forge and 3 or 4 cannons at your front. You should also use the forge for upgrades when you feel you can afford the 100/100.
General late game tips : + Show Spoiler + Phoenixes and immortals really shine together in the mid game. If you find yourself in a position where you have a handful of phoenixes with 4 or 5 immortals and gateway units (zealot heavy), you have one of the most effective army composition at that point in time. Use this to pressure opponent's natural while harassing probes in the back. Do not go all-in unless you see an opportunity (he brings a good part of his army in his main to defend harass and you can FF ramp for example). If he has blink and a solid defense, just walk back home.
Against colossus-based compositions you can use a lot of your energy on his mineral line (in engagements, your phoenixes will always have something to shoot at regardless). If you have more than 8 phoenixes, it's also a good investment to get +1 air attack as colossus armor really cuts into phoenixes' dps.
Here are some alternative late game compositions :
Phoenix/DT/Observer : + Show Spoiler +The idea for the composition is pretty straightforward : observers detect other observers, phoenix auto-target observers, and dark templars are cloaked This transition should mainly be done against zealot-archon compositions. The reason for that is that your phoenix don't have any other targets then observers. Also, colossus splash kills DTs even if your opponent doesn't have detection. When engaging, keep observer behind your phoenix so it doesn't get targeted by stalkers in the back. Keep at maximum 8 or so dark templars in your army, with the rest as archons for AoE and FF crushing. Complement with upgraded zealots. Teching to DTs can be quite long, so once again, there's is a timing where you'll be very vulnerable. Forge + cannons can save your day if you feel you won't have DT tech in time. If you are playing from behind, teching straight to DTs with fast double gas at your natural is a good way to catch up and hope to pull yourself back in the game. if you haven't already, check out this awesome game from Liquid'Tyler using this composition http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/AresEffort/TWIR/TWIR_15.zip(game vs peyote) Also, a fun replay of me doing this on the ladder with a mothership + carrier transition. The guy knew me from TL so I felt like trying to do something fun ^^ Carrier transition doesn't work out too well for me though :D
Mothership : + Show Spoiler + Axslav really likes this against any build. The best time to get it is when you decide to get your third. Since you should only get your third if they get their third (which you should see right away due to phoenixes) you know that if they get their third they will not be aggressive anytime soon. Thus, tech to mothership and get your own third. Once your mothership is out your army is extremely strong. The reason why mothership is good against everything is because of varying reasons. Against colossus builds vortex is extremely strong and you can usually snag 4 or 5 colossus. Zealot archon builds don't have colossus, thus your handful of phoenixes will snipe his observer and your entire army will be cloaked. Vortex is also good here, just not as amazing as in Colossus engagements.
FAQ :
How do I micro during engagements ? + Show Spoiler +Order of priority for lifts : - Sentries (one by one)
- Immortals (as many as you can)
- HT/Zealots (one by one)
- Stalkers (as many as you can as long as you still have a healthy amount of stalkers yourself. Else one by one)
When engaging fights, stay over your army with your phoenixes, never fly them over his own army. You want your opponent to have to go near your zealots/immortals if he wants to snipe phoenixes. You can have your phoenixes slightly ahead of your army when you are chasing units, but not by much. If your are breaking a ramp, position your army under the ramp away from opponent's vision. Zealots, in front, activate guardian shield and 1a toward the ramp. Your phoenix get there before the rest of the army and have time to lift off and kill all the sentries.
Don't blink stalkers hard counter phoenixes ? + Show Spoiler +Yes and No. Blink stalkers destroy phoenixes in a straight up fight when in very big numbers so they can easily snipe phoenixes one by one. In small engagements (a dozen or so blink stalkers), a phoenix based army holds its ground against blink stalkers. What is interesting is that both of these armies (blink and phoenix) have a sort of "you can't escape" mechanism to them, so if you engage them, you have to be prepared to lose a good portion of your army. This is why most of the people trying to play a safe standard style will react to your expansion by expanding themselves instead of all-ining as you can never really be sure that you are going to win the fight.
What do I do with my phoenixes when he has his mineral line covered ? + Show Spoiler +Always be active with your phoenixes. This means scouting around the map, clearing watchtowers and stray units, getting glimpses of his army size and position on the map, spotting proxy pylons, etc... Catching stray units with one lift : - 2 Phoenixes kill 1 Zealot (barely, sometimes if you are unlucky with the random fire delay, the zealot gets away with 1 hp. This should be fixed I think because it can be pretty game changing and it seems entirely random)
- 2 Phoenixes kill 1 Sentry
- 3 Phoenixes kill 1 Stalker
- 5 Phoenixes kill one immortal
Only lift stray units with these minimal numbers if you are sure that his army is not near-by. Killing a stalker with 3 phoenix (one lifting and 2 firing) takes a LONG time.
Why do you scout with 2 Phoenixes ? + Show Spoiler +1 Phoenix cannot do any damage and once you reveal your tech, your opponent will be prepared. 3 Phoenixes come too late for scouting DTs
Your 2 gate build cuts probes for 30 seconds. How bad is this compared to greedy builds that never cut probes ? + Show Spoiler +I did an excel spreadsheet with a very simplified model where players keep making probes until they have 26 probes. I supposed only mineral mining and constant income per probe. It results in a mineral loss of about 140-150. I haven't factored in gas, or mineral saturation after 16 so don't take this figure too seriously, it's just a very basic estimate.
Is 2 gates really safe versus 4 gate and aggressive 3 gates ? + Show Spoiler + Yes and No. But mostly yes. Not really against straight up all-in 4 gates that don't even try to hide it. Yes against those fake 4 gates who get an extra pylon or gaz to confuse you because they are delaying there attack by just what you need to defend with 2 gates. Against the obvious 4gates, I would still recommend adding a third gate and delaying your stargate. Same against 11 gate openers with 5 CB saved. Although you can hold them off with 2 gates, you'll need perfect micro, or you'll need to get additional sentries and I don't really like to be forced into sentries.
Replays :
My replays : + Show Spoiler +This is the least interesting part of this guide : a couple of games that I played on the ladder and with practise partners. Everytime I thought the game was interesting, I saved it. A lot of these games are me doing trial and error things, I sometimes go all-in when I shouldn't etc... Some of these games show pretty bad play from my part because it's very hard to play perfectly with the amount of micro that phoenixes require. Mainly just look at these replays if you want to be convinced that phoenixes are quite viable in PvP. I don't have any replays of me losing because I don't think this playstyle has any glaring weaknessess, so everytime I lose, it's because I messed up something and didn't follow what this guide says. + Show Spoiler +
EgAxslav replays : + Show Spoiler + EGAxslav 1h coaching session on phoenix usage in PvP
Concluding thoughts :
Phoenix builds are a safe way into the mid/late game in PvP. Not only are they a very fun way to play, but phoenixes are also the closest thing to a legal map-hack you can get if you remain active with them at all times. As every other build in PvP, it is weaker against some openings (blink and FEs), and stronger against others (immortal based builds). Phoenix play can give you outright BO wins against certain builds, but most of the time, it just sets you up nicely for an even late game PvP. I believe nothing straight up hard counters phoenix play : there is always a lot of room to out-play your opponent.
Once again, this guide is meant to give you a general notion on how to play Phoenix based PvP. It is not meant to provide extremely precise step by step reactions to what you encounter. I will try to keep it as up-to-date as possible, and will include all comments that are reasonable and logically explained, so feel free to post your ideas !
Credits :
I had help from a great amount of people to write this guide, from my practise partners, to forum contributors, to random people I met on the ladder. I included all the ideas I thought were interesting or served to be talked about.
Special thanks to Easytouch1500 who helped a great deal with all the information he had obtained for EGAxslav, providing replays, lategame transitions etc...
Special thanks also to the TL forumers who gave me feedback, namely NrGMonk, Latedi, Nyast, ArcaneFrost.
And a big thanks to all of those who will read this guide and post interesting comments, suggestions, replays ! etc...
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Been looking forward to experimenting more with phoenix in PvP which is currently my most unsteady match up. Seems like a thorough writeup, I look forward to reading it carefully when I get home from work.
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Great Write up! Can't wait to watch some of those replays. Very Thorough
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I've been using phoenixes quite a bit in PvP lately, and I loved the "what to do against XY" section
overall great guide!
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Holy cow. This guide is fantastic. You address everything. In addition to being well written, I love the pretty formatting and the ease of reading.
I love phoenix play, I am so happy to have all this information available.
Thank you!
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Yay it's released Gj, I'll try it out after I see success haha
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Cool guide bro
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Nice guide. I need to experiment with blink all-in I'm pretty terrible at it when using phoenix against blinkers.
Also need to refine robo+obs timing.
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I've been using phoenix for more than a month and since then my PvP have become my best matchup. I hope not too many people will start using it since mirror air is not super fun :p Nice guide though
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Thank you for the write up, I have really enjoyed all of your guides, this one is especially nice because I have wanted a solid phoenix write up for awhile, ty!
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very well done; looks pretty damn comprehensive to me. have you faced many hard 3 gate pushes when using this? it seems like the timing of the 2nd gate is a bit late to assist in getting out that extra stalker to thwart a 3 gate that gets the 2nd and 3rd gates before the 3rd pylon. you mention what you would do if you scout an 11 gate variant, but i've seen hero apply similar amounts of pressure with a 12 gate and 4cbs into a 3gate offense. you might be able to get a sentry out by the time the pylon gets up, but is it possible to hold it from there with only 2 gates up, one which came too late to make anything before WG is done? pm me if you'd like to do some dry runs in the coming days
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On December 21 2011 02:02 Alejandrisha wrote: very well done; looks pretty damn comprehensive to me. have you faced many hard 3 gate pushes when using this? it seems like the timing of the 2nd gate is a bit late to assist in getting out that extra stalker to thwart a 3 gate that gets the 2nd and 3rd gates before the 3rd pylon. you mention what you would do if you scout an 11 gate variant, but i've seen hero apply similar amounts of pressure with a 12 gate and 4cbs into a 3gate offense. you might be able to get a sentry out by the time the pylon gets up, but is it possible to hold it from there with only 2 gates up, one which came too late to make anything before WG is done? pm me if you'd like to do some dry runs in the coming days
I think it would get 1z3s1s out by the time a 3gate hits, should be fine.
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On December 21 2011 02:24 Arcanefrost wrote:Show nested quote +On December 21 2011 02:02 Alejandrisha wrote: very well done; looks pretty damn comprehensive to me. have you faced many hard 3 gate pushes when using this? it seems like the timing of the 2nd gate is a bit late to assist in getting out that extra stalker to thwart a 3 gate that gets the 2nd and 3rd gates before the 3rd pylon. you mention what you would do if you scout an 11 gate variant, but i've seen hero apply similar amounts of pressure with a 12 gate and 4cbs into a 3gate offense. you might be able to get a sentry out by the time the pylon gets up, but is it possible to hold it from there with only 2 gates up, one which came too late to make anything before WG is done? pm me if you'd like to do some dry runs in the coming days I think it would get 1z3s1s out by the time a 3gate hits, should be fine. i'm under the assumption that you are saying wg is finished and you have units from them when a hard 3 gate hits, and that almost never the case if the aggressor's build is tight. i hope i am wrong, as i'd like to see builds like this become more prevalent.
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man your amazing! your 3gate PvP build won me so many games and now this :D
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Wonderful guide, thanks! I've been trying to figure out phoenix builds lately and axslav's build seems super strong. I only have issues with a few things.
As soon as the opponent sees my phoenixes, he makes nothing but stalkers and gets blink, and his ground army quickly becomes bigger than mine since I'm only running off 2 gates and a robo. Do I continue making phoenixes in this situation, or do I stop making them at some point? Same question against a robo+blink opening, do you cut phoenixes and go straight to immortals, or keep making phoenixes while doing the immortals?
I have lots of issues against zealot+archon. Phoenixes seem terrible against this, so I've been testing out void rays as soon as I scout it, but it still seems like my ground army dies every time. Frankly I don't know what the hell beats 1 or 2 base zealot archon attacks besides colossus with sim-city.
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I knew Geiko had something big planned for his 1000th post. I've been anxious to see what new guide he would make after he said he was making some revisions to his defensive 3 gate build. That build has been fantastic as my main PvP build but I always wanted to give phoenix a try. Glad he (or anyone for that matter) finally made a build catered to phoenixes as I find them so strong in the matchup.
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On December 21 2011 02:28 Alejandrisha wrote:Show nested quote +On December 21 2011 02:24 Arcanefrost wrote:On December 21 2011 02:02 Alejandrisha wrote: very well done; looks pretty damn comprehensive to me. have you faced many hard 3 gate pushes when using this? it seems like the timing of the 2nd gate is a bit late to assist in getting out that extra stalker to thwart a 3 gate that gets the 2nd and 3rd gates before the 3rd pylon. you mention what you would do if you scout an 11 gate variant, but i've seen hero apply similar amounts of pressure with a 12 gate and 4cbs into a 3gate offense. you might be able to get a sentry out by the time the pylon gets up, but is it possible to hold it from there with only 2 gates up, one which came too late to make anything before WG is done? pm me if you'd like to do some dry runs in the coming days I think it would get 1z3s1s out by the time a 3gate hits, should be fine. i'm under the assumption that you are saying wg is finished and you have units from them when a hard 3 gate hits, and that almost never the case if the aggressor's build is tight. i hope i am wrong, as i'd like to see builds like this become more prevalent.
Wg isn't finished but you make 5 units before warpgate finishes. So 1z1s1s from gate 1, then double stalker from gate1 and 2 and then two units from warp-in.
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On December 21 2011 03:31 Arcanefrost wrote:Show nested quote +On December 21 2011 02:28 Alejandrisha wrote:On December 21 2011 02:24 Arcanefrost wrote:On December 21 2011 02:02 Alejandrisha wrote: very well done; looks pretty damn comprehensive to me. have you faced many hard 3 gate pushes when using this? it seems like the timing of the 2nd gate is a bit late to assist in getting out that extra stalker to thwart a 3 gate that gets the 2nd and 3rd gates before the 3rd pylon. you mention what you would do if you scout an 11 gate variant, but i've seen hero apply similar amounts of pressure with a 12 gate and 4cbs into a 3gate offense. you might be able to get a sentry out by the time the pylon gets up, but is it possible to hold it from there with only 2 gates up, one which came too late to make anything before WG is done? pm me if you'd like to do some dry runs in the coming days I think it would get 1z3s1s out by the time a 3gate hits, should be fine. i'm under the assumption that you are saying wg is finished and you have units from them when a hard 3 gate hits, and that almost never the case if the aggressor's build is tight. i hope i am wrong, as i'd like to see builds like this become more prevalent. Wg isn't finished but you make 5 units before warpgate finishes. So 1z1s1s from gate 1, then double stalker from gate1 and 2 and then two units from warp-in. i'm talking about a rush that gets to the door at 4:45 and plants two pylons in an effort to get their first warp-in and engage immediately, not one that warps in the first set and then proceeds up the ramp. without a much faster 2nd gate, i don't see how one would have more than 1z1s1s or 1z2s by the time pylons are up
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On December 21 2011 04:41 Alejandrisha wrote:Show nested quote +On December 21 2011 03:31 Arcanefrost wrote:On December 21 2011 02:28 Alejandrisha wrote:On December 21 2011 02:24 Arcanefrost wrote:On December 21 2011 02:02 Alejandrisha wrote: very well done; looks pretty damn comprehensive to me. have you faced many hard 3 gate pushes when using this? it seems like the timing of the 2nd gate is a bit late to assist in getting out that extra stalker to thwart a 3 gate that gets the 2nd and 3rd gates before the 3rd pylon. you mention what you would do if you scout an 11 gate variant, but i've seen hero apply similar amounts of pressure with a 12 gate and 4cbs into a 3gate offense. you might be able to get a sentry out by the time the pylon gets up, but is it possible to hold it from there with only 2 gates up, one which came too late to make anything before WG is done? pm me if you'd like to do some dry runs in the coming days I think it would get 1z3s1s out by the time a 3gate hits, should be fine. i'm under the assumption that you are saying wg is finished and you have units from them when a hard 3 gate hits, and that almost never the case if the aggressor's build is tight. i hope i am wrong, as i'd like to see builds like this become more prevalent. Wg isn't finished but you make 5 units before warpgate finishes. So 1z1s1s from gate 1, then double stalker from gate1 and 2 and then two units from warp-in. i'm talking about a rush that gets to the door at 4:45 and plants two pylons in an effort to get their first warp-in and engage immediately, not one that warps in the first set and then proceeds up the ramp. without a much faster 2nd gate, i don't see how one would have more than 1z1s1s or 1z2s by the time pylons are up
If you see mass cb saved just get a third gate. The second gate isnt that late, you will have 2 extra stalkers close to finished or finished by the time he makes it up the ramp + warpin right after it.
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Hi Geiko, I've been studying Axslavs VODs and Coaching Sessions during the last couple of days and just like you I've tried to pan this build it out. Therefor I'm thankfull you've done it as well so I always have something to compare it with. I'm not really done yet but I came acorss some things I would like to comment on or just add to the thread.
I'm gonna be bold and try to go Gateway then SG. For anyone who want's some advice on how to hold off a 4 Gate with this build the important parts are:
+ Show Spoiler +4 Gate response
The idea behind this is to FF the ramp whilst your Phoenix keep killing Probes in his main. Here are some general things I've snaped up:
(1) Once you scout anything indicating he might 4 gate just hotkey 6-8 of your probes mining minerals (NOT GAS!). It's only a back up plan but I will go in to detail later on why this is needed. The number is not that important. I say 6-8 since Axslav used 6 in his defense against Incontrol but told his student to hotkey 8. You can chose what you think is appropriate but I think it's good to start off with 8 and cut it down to 6 if you felt that 8 was a bit excessive.
(2) Cut Phoenix production untill you have two Sentries out and spend all that saved up CB for your two Sentries that should come after the Zealot-Stalker-Stalker. Don't spend CB on WG-tech. It won't help you at all since he has 4 Warp Gates and you will only have 2.
(3) If he's doing the 4 Gate with proxy Pylons on the bottom and top of your ramp you really need to snipe his probe ASAP. You do not want Pylons on your high ground. He should be able to pull it off and get both started before the Probe dies. So anytime you see him place that first Pylon on the low ground just grab those probes you hotkeyed and send them towards your ramp. If he backs off and doesn't attempt to come up send them back mining but otherwise you need them. After his Probe has died you can use 2-3 Probes for some extra DPS on his units whilst the rest of them attack the Pylons. Prioritize killing the one on the highground first.
From here on you should be able to proceed with the FF of ramp + killing of Probes once you have 2 Phoenix out if he's stubborn enough to keep up with his 4 gate. You don't want to be making execessive amounts of Sentries as they cut in on your Phoenix production but it's good to know that you need 6 of them to constantly be puting up new FF. The important part is that you do not need 6 of them ASAP. You can add them on whilst getting some Phoenix and warping in Zealots.
(4) Never ever ever in your entire life should you chase him off after holding his 4 Gate. It's just stupid. He can easily have more units behind the inital 3 and can punish you since he will have 4 units per warp in. You will only have 2. Stay on your ramp and let the Phoenix edge out an even stronger economic lead. If you're wondering where his army is just send out a probe. That's a general rule of tumb I've learned from watching Axslav these last days. At anytime in P vs P when he's uncertain about where the enemies army is and he can't scout it with an Observer or Phoenix he sends out a single Probe to do the scouting for him instead of his army. It makes perfect sense. Losing a probe is pretty cheap compared to getting caught off guard by a warp in or Blink Stalkers!
Axslav is also very cautious about his usage of the first Zealot and Stalker. He will check his main and natural for the scouting Probe but other than that he will just walk back up his ramp and play on from there. If he scouts an early second gas and a ton of CB on Probes he might feel comfortable to move out and scout a but further with his Stalkers but don't do that unless you feel comfortable doing it.
Teching to DTs can be quite long, so once again, there's is a timing where you'll be very vulnerable. Forge + cannons can save your day if you feel you won't have DT tech in time.
I don't want to be rude but I'm not sure this is true. It might work on some maps I guess but this was what I thought he said about this sort of timing attack whilst teching to DT:
+ Show Spoiler +Never take the 3d and 4th gases against 1 base all in or any heavy Gateway all in build off two base. There's one exception and that is when you go for Phoenix/DT. If he attacks before the Dark Shrine is done then send all your units and Probes up yor ramp and sack the expansion. By doing this you should be able to survive in time to get the DT's out and then just retake your natural once you have map control.
Just some random tips I got from watching him:
+ Show Spoiler +It's great if you can get him to pull a Probe when your scouting since he's losing mining time and whilst you're doing that as well atleast you're scouting at the same time. That also means avoid attacking his scouting Probe at all costs. You don't gain anything on it. Let him kill the shields on your Pylon if he wants to. Always try to spend one extra CB on probes then he is. You should be able to hold off all aggressions early on with one CB less spent on WG-tech or Gateways. Stop making Stalkers at 2 unless he goes for a Blink build then you can add in 1-2 more. Keep this count low since they're pretty useless in the midgame with theese builds. Instead focus on warping in Zealots with your money. Zealots are great, especially with Charge! Things you should be actively scouting for in the midgame are army composition, upgrades and expansion timings. General P vs P advice: "When in doubt, get Immortals and Stalkers."Specific advice: "When in doubt, pick up the Immortals, they're more expensive then your Phoenix."His great approach to the match up (which is his best btw): "P vs P is easy. The guy who plays best, wins."
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When being chased by superior numbers of enemy phoenixes, don't hesitate to use the overload AoE ability to escape [/center]
I would like to congratulate you into making a really nice guide about phoenix play...However the picture and the sentence REALLY bothers me since it might be misguiding for starters...Also, it attacks my feelings since I am very sad they removed the ability from the game!
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On December 21 2011 03:03 GomJabbar wrote: As soon as the opponent sees my phoenixes, he makes nothing but stalkers and gets blink, and his ground army quickly becomes bigger than mine since I'm only running off 2 gates and a robo. Do I continue making phoenixes in this situation, or do I stop making them at some point? Same question against a robo+blink opening, do you cut phoenixes and go straight to immortals, or keep making phoenixes while doing the immortals? Yeah, you want to continue making phoenixes until you have about 8 in most situations. Alright, in situations where he does not have an expansion and he has heavy blink stalkers you still want to make phoenixes, but don't worry about constant production. You want to prioritize immos>phoenixes. Don't stop chronoboosting your robo until you have at least 3 immortals.
The problem with phoenixes is that they are kinda terrible against mass stalkers. However, your army will be much stronger than his once you have about 4 immortals.
If he does pressure you off of 1 base with his stalkers just get a few sentries out, make sure he doesn't get up your ramp and continue chronoboosting your immortals out. In the meanwhile go sack his probeline. He will either be forced to warp in units at home to defend your phoenixes, making his push weaker. Or sack probes.
I have lots of issues against zealot+archon. Phoenixes seem terrible against this, so I've been testing out void rays as soon as I scout it, but it still seems like my ground army dies every time. Frankly I don't know what the hell beats 1 or 2 base zealot archon attacks besides colossus with sim-city.
Void rays really fucking suck, don't get them. Read the dt/phoenix midgame section. It absolutely tears zealot archon a new asshole. You are extremely vulnerable to timings while you are getting your dark shrine up though. As long as you get past this stage though and have 6 or so DTS then you shouldn't have a problem killing him.
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Great guide. I've been practicing my PvP phoenix play and it's a lot of fun, but I don't have it ironed out yet. This will help a lot.
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I haven't finished reading this beast yet, but I feel like Axslavs version of the 1gate > stargate would do better allocating the 3rd chrono to the gateway like Elfi and pushing with the z/s/s pushing back any probes and faking aggression. When i play with phoenix in pvp using 1gate to stargate I feel like I'm way too passive using the 3rd chrono on my nexus instead of trying to get some control till phoenix are out. Just my experience and opinion before I forget while reading
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It seems like immortal/phoenix is the way to go, with a transition into chargelot archon. Axlav is always really ahead in econ because of his phoenix harass.
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Italy12246 Posts
Just a little note: the phoenix/dt thing tyler did was actually trolling as his account's mmr had been reset and he had to re-do his placement matches. In that one replay Tyler is just so much better than his opponent, it doesn't really matter what he does.
As for motherships, http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=155524. Super old thread but still hilarious (and pretty good), and an immortal/phoenix opening is probably the best way to get there.
Anyway, thanks a lot for the guides! You sir are awesome!
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On December 21 2011 02:02 Alejandrisha wrote: very well done; looks pretty damn comprehensive to me. have you faced many hard 3 gate pushes when using this? it seems like the timing of the 2nd gate is a bit late to assist in getting out that extra stalker to thwart a 3 gate that gets the 2nd and 3rd gates before the 3rd pylon. you mention what you would do if you scout an 11 gate variant, but i've seen hero apply similar amounts of pressure with a 12 gate and 4cbs into a 3gate offense. you might be able to get a sentry out by the time the pylon gets up, but is it possible to hold it from there with only 2 gates up, one which came too late to make anything before WG is done? pm me if you'd like to do some dry runs in the coming days
Thanks, I did put a lot of time into this to make it as complete as possible
Against 12 gate 3 gates with 4 CB on warpgate, as you said, the timing will be 5:45 units warped in. In this sense, it's just like a standard 4 gate but with less units, and less of an advantage for you once you hold it off.
My build gets 1 z + 3st + 1 se before the warpgate timing. Against a 3 gate as you described : -if he warps in on the low ground, his army will be split in half by the FF and I'll win easily -if he wants to get a pylon in my base, he has to run a probe up when he only has 1 z + 1 s to defend it. Either I snipe the probe when he is trying to go up the ramp (2 stalker shot, + 1 zealot shot), or even if he does get the pylon up, he'll need to use his two units to protect it. If he does he basically loses them because I can FF the ramp if he tries to escape and 1 z + 1st + 1se destroys 1z + 1s and I only lose 1 zealot or 1 sentry and damage on the stalker. He can then warp in 3 stalkers, + the reinforcing stalker that is coming, against what's left of my army (1 stalker + 1sentry most likely) + 2 stalkers that finish before he has finished warping in (I get free shots on the warping units), + 2 of my stalkers that come 7secs after his (assuming we both do the builds perfectly). So I think I don't have any problem with this kind of 4 gate. Now with the build I posted, you'll notice that I get my pylon before my second gateway, which means that my 3rd stalker timing should be about 10 secs left. However, you'll also notice that I'm not using all my chronoboost in the build I gave (I have one left over which I keep for chronoing out phoenixes, immortals ... later on). If I see him being very aggressive with his first units, I will chronoboost my 3 rd stalker so it pops out right on time.
But all of this is really pure theorycrafting as the timings are never that precise in a real game and I would be delighted to test it out with you. However I'm only on the EU server (geiko.813), do you have a EU account ?
On December 21 2011 03:03 GomJabbar wrote: Wonderful guide, thanks! I've been trying to figure out phoenix builds lately and axslav's build seems super strong. I only have issues with a few things.
As soon as the opponent sees my phoenixes, he makes nothing but stalkers and gets blink, and his ground army quickly becomes bigger than mine since I'm only running off 2 gates and a robo. Do I continue making phoenixes in this situation, or do I stop making them at some point? Same question against a robo+blink opening, do you cut phoenixes and go straight to immortals, or keep making phoenixes while doing the immortals?
I have lots of issues against zealot+archon. Phoenixes seem terrible against this, so I've been testing out void rays as soon as I scout it, but it still seems like my ground army dies every time. Frankly I don't know what the hell beats 1 or 2 base zealot archon attacks besides colossus with sim-city.
Number of phoenixes as I said in the guide really depends on style. Minimum 5 phoenixes if you want them to be of any use at all, but almost always 8-10 phoenix will always be good if you are active with them (if you just sit in your base and wait for an attack they will certainly not have paid off). However against mass blink stalkers you should really prioritize getting immortals (devote chronoboost to that) and use left over ressources for phoenix and zealots. In particular, 2 base blink timings are a HUGE pain to deal with if you don't have at least 5 immortals.
Void rays are almost never good in PvP compared to phoenixes. One exception to this is very late game compositions where colo + void ray armies are a good response to pure colo armies. Before that, always get phoenixes instead of void rays. Phoenix destroy zealots hard, so they are almost always worth their weight in minerals when dealing with zealots/archon. However like I mentioned many time, if you are transitioning, you can die to these timing pushes. So against zealot archon, I really advise you to get a good sim city and cannons.
On December 21 2011 05:55 Tekakan wrote:Hi Geiko, I've been studying Axslavs VODs and Coaching Sessions during the last couple of days and just like you I've tried to pan this build it out. Therefor I'm thankfull you've done it as well so I always have something to compare it with. I'm not really done yet but I came acorss some things I would like to comment on or just add to the thread. I'm gonna be bold and try to go Gateway then SG. For anyone who want's some advice on how to hold off a 4 Gate with this build the important parts are: + Show Spoiler +4 Gate response
The idea behind this is to FF the ramp whilst your Phoenix keep killing Probes in his main. Here are some general things I've snaped up:
(1) Once you scout anything indicating he might 4 gate just hotkey 6-8 of your probes mining minerals (NOT GAS!). It's only a back up plan but I will go in to detail later on why this is needed. The number is not that important. I say 6-8 since Axslav used 6 in his defense against Incontrol but told his student to hotkey 8. You can chose what you think is appropriate but I think it's good to start off with 8 and cut it down to 6 if you felt that 8 was a bit excessive.
(2) Cut Phoenix production untill you have two Sentries out and spend all that saved up CB for your two Sentries that should come after the Zealot-Stalker-Stalker. Don't spend CB on WG-tech. It won't help you at all since he has 4 Warp Gates and you will only have 2.
(3) If he's doing the 4 Gate with proxy Pylons on the bottom and top of your ramp you really need to snipe his probe ASAP. You do not want Pylons on your high ground. He should be able to pull it off and get both started before the Probe dies. So anytime you see him place that first Pylon on the low ground just grab those probes you hotkeyed and send them towards your ramp. If he backs off and doesn't attempt to come up send them back mining but otherwise you need them. After his Probe has died you can use 2-3 Probes for some extra DPS on his units whilst the rest of them attack the Pylons. Prioritize killing the one on the highground first.
From here on you should be able to proceed with the FF of ramp + killing of Probes once you have 2 Phoenix out if he's stubborn enough to keep up with his 4 gate. You don't want to be making execessive amounts of Sentries as they cut in on your Phoenix production but it's good to know that you need 6 of them to constantly be puting up new FF. The important part is that you do not need 6 of them ASAP. You can add them on whilst getting some Phoenix and warping in Zealots.
(4) Never ever ever in your entire life should you chase him off after holding his 4 Gate. It's just stupid. He can easily have more units behind the inital 3 and can punish you since he will have 4 units per warp in. You will only have 2. Stay on your ramp and let the Phoenix edge out an even stronger economic lead. If you're wondering where his army is just send out a probe. That's a general rule of tumb I've learned from watching Axslav these last days. At anytime in P vs P when he's uncertain about where the enemies army is and he can't scout it with an Observer or Phoenix he sends out a single Probe to do the scouting for him instead of his army. It makes perfect sense. Losing a probe is pretty cheap compared to getting caught off guard by a warp in or Blink Stalkers!
Axslav is also very cautious about his usage of the first Zealot and Stalker. He will check his main and natural for the scouting Probe but other than that he will just walk back up his ramp and play on from there. If he scouts an early second gas and a ton of CB on Probes he might feel comfortable to move out and scout a but further with his Stalkers but don't do that unless you feel comfortable doing it. Show nested quote +Teching to DTs can be quite long, so once again, there's is a timing where you'll be very vulnerable. Forge + cannons can save your day if you feel you won't have DT tech in time. I don't want to be rude but I'm not sure this is true. It might work on some maps I guess but this was what I thought he said about this sort of timing attack whilst teching to DT: + Show Spoiler +Never take the 3d and 4th gases against 1 base all in or any heavy Gateway all in build off two base. There's one exception and that is when you go for Phoenix/DT. If he attacks before the Dark Shrine is done then send all your units and Probes up yor ramp and sack the expansion. By doing this you should be able to survive in time to get the DT's out and then just retake your natural once you have map control. Just some random tips I got from watching him: + Show Spoiler +It's great if you can get him to pull a Probe when your scouting since he's losing mining time and whilst you're doing that as well atleast you're scouting at the same time. That also means avoid attacking his scouting Probe at all costs. You don't gain anything on it. Let him kill the shields on your Pylon if he wants to. Always try to spend one extra CB on probes then he is. You should be able to hold off all aggressions early on with one CB less spent on WG-tech or Gateways. Stop making Stalkers at 2 unless he goes for a Blink build then you can add in 1-2 more. Keep this count low since they're pretty useless in the midgame with theese builds. Instead focus on warping in Zealots with your money. Zealots are great, especially with Charge! Things you should be actively scouting for in the midgame are army composition, upgrades and expansion timings. General P vs P advice: "When in doubt, get Immortals and Stalkers."Specific advice: "When in doubt, pick up the Immortals, they're more expensive then your Phoenix."His great approach to the match up (which is his best btw): "P vs P is easy. The guy who plays best, wins."
Like I said, this guide isn't on one particular style. I do believe however that he does get the cannon defense when teching to DTs. The only time I've heard him suggest to sack the natural is when he was behind anyways and was trying to get back in the game but cutting corners and teching straight to DTs.
Regarding the 2 stalkers, I know that he likes to stay at 2 stalkers but I honestly prefer at least 3 or 4, even at the price of one less phoenix. It's a matter of preference really. As long as you know what you want to achieve with the units that you are getting, that is the most important I think. For example, I like using my stalkers to poke his front, control watch towers, etc...
On December 21 2011 06:13 pure_protoss wrote:Show nested quote +When being chased by superior numbers of enemy phoenixes, don't hesitate to use the overload AoE ability to escape I would like to congratulate you into making a really nice guide about phoenix play...However the picture and the sentence REALLY bothers me since it might be misguiding for starters...Also, it attacks my feelings since I am very sad they removed the ability from the game!
Lol, we are all sad Just wanted to put something a little bit funny before my huge wall of text ^^
On December 21 2011 21:19 Teoita wrote:Just a little note: the phoenix/dt thing tyler did was actually trolling as his account's mmr had been reset and he had to re-do his placement matches. In that one replay Tyler is just so much better than his opponent, it doesn't really matter what he does. As for motherships, http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=155524. Super old thread but still hilarious (and pretty good), and an immortal/phoenix opening is probably the best way to get there. Anyway, thanks a lot for the guides! You sir are awesome!
Yes it's not really a serious game, but it sure shows how powerfull this composition can be. I think I have a fun replay of me doing this against someone on the ladder, and then transitioning into carrier mothership ^^.
Edit : here it is That's one of the points of this guide, to show another way of playing PvP which is fun and creative yet very viable.
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Geiko why are you not a blue poster yet? Is this awesome guide #3 for you? And on PvP phoenix which is a very complex strategy. Well done!
Checking out the axslav lesson now, dood was very prepared for the lesson, awesome Q&A in the beginning
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haha awesome guide, really cool to see you included our game on the ladder with mothership, carriers and stuff ;D! keep up the good work!
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Thanks for this; I've been looking for a good guide to Phoenix play.
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Thanks Geiko! This post doesn't sell me at all on early phoenixes in PvP though! In PvP I always try for 3gate blink expand. If I see any sort of defensive play (i.e. cb'ed gateway, depleted cb on nexus, presence of a sentry, a 3rd pylon, all found in your 2 build orders), I keep my 5 or 8 stalkers and just expand while getting blink and probes. If you're not going early phoenix I handle that with blink and cautious probe production, but if you are, you can't have enough to do any lasting damage vs my stalkers and early nexus.
That being said, I usually get stargate after nexus is already half done (depends on stalker production requirements) and then get phoenix. Only after Nexus is near completion do I think it's okay to place stargate and get phoenix!
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Geiko? I expected a cheese build with 95% winratio jkjk
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On December 22 2011 02:21 stokes17 wrote: Geiko why are you not a blue poster yet? Is this awesome guide #3 for you? And on PvP phoenix which is a very complex strategy. Well done!
Checking out the axslav lesson now, dood was very prepared for the lesson, awesome Q&A in the beginning
Thanks that's nice <3
I guess I just don't post as much as I'd like due to work
You can always voice your opinion here if you want : http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=193853
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On December 22 2011 03:46 tehemperorer wrote: Thanks Geiko! This post doesn't sell me at all on early phoenixes in PvP though! In PvP I always try for 3gate blink expand. If I see any sort of defensive play (i.e. cb'ed gateway, depleted cb on nexus, presence of a sentry, a 3rd pylon, all found in your 2 build orders), I keep my 5 or 8 stalkers and just expand while getting blink and probes. If you're not going early phoenix I handle that with blink and cautious probe production, but if you are, you can't have enough to do any lasting damage vs my stalkers and early nexus.
That being said, I usually get stargate after nexus is already half done (depends on stalker production requirements) and then get phoenix. Only after Nexus is near completion do I think it's okay to place stargate and get phoenix!
I'm not chronoboosting my gateways in my build, nor is my nexus energy depleted. In fact it pretty much looks like a 4 gate as I can cancel my gas and go 4 gate anyways (which I often do against players that look too greedy).
Blink rush into expand is an extremely greedy build which can die to a number of things including 4 gate, DT rushes, and 1 base immortal pushes, in that sense, it's normal that you are at an advantage against certain builds (stargate opener for example) and straight up lose to other builds. Also, 8 stalkers is not the critical mass to be cost effective vs phoenix. If you're going to expand and not cut probes, I can go and kill you directly with my 1base zealot/immortal/phoenix army.
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Nice guide! :D
I have a question though. I always thought Blink Stalker allins was the hard counter to Phoenix play. Your guide says to get Immortals but I don't think you can get 5 Phoenixes, a Robo and Immortals by the time their attack comes. Maybe I'm wrong but can you explain this part a little more?
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On December 22 2011 03:56 Geiko wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2011 03:46 tehemperorer wrote: Thanks Geiko! This post doesn't sell me at all on early phoenixes in PvP though! In PvP I always try for 3gate blink expand. If I see any sort of defensive play (i.e. cb'ed gateway, depleted cb on nexus, presence of a sentry, a 3rd pylon, all found in your 2 build orders), I keep my 5 or 8 stalkers and just expand while getting blink and probes. If you're not going early phoenix I handle that with blink and cautious probe production, but if you are, you can't have enough to do any lasting damage vs my stalkers and early nexus.
That being said, I usually get stargate after nexus is already half done (depends on stalker production requirements) and then get phoenix. Only after Nexus is near completion do I think it's okay to place stargate and get phoenix! I'm not chronoboosting my gateways in my build, nor is my nexus energy depleted. In fact it pretty much looks like a 4 gate as I can cancel my gas and go 4 gate anyways (which I often do against players that look too greedy). Blink rush into expand is an extremely greedy build which can die to a number of things including 4 gate, DT rushes, and 1 base immortal pushes, in that sense, it's normal that you are at an advantage against certain builds (stargate opener for example) and straight up lose to other builds. Also, 8 stalkers is not the critical mass to be cost effective vs phoenix. If you're going to expand and not cut probes, I can go and kill you directly with my 1base zealot/immortal/phoenix army. I gotcha but the two build orders you gave show things other than 4gate or DT rushing, like the 24gate and then 24pylon in the defensive 2gate Stargate, or the chronoboost use on Axslav's opening. I was saying most specifically those two builds don't suggest any pressure, and can't have any worthwhile stalker count (2gate vs 3gate) to really threaten or punish anything early on.
The 8 stalkers I get are about when I place nexus, sometimes I get 11 or so, but I 99% of the time poke opponents ramp with those and at that time I am able to see sentry, immortal, etc. I do get more after a few probes are out. My opinion in PvP is that you need most flexible build to do well, and any sort of early phoenix builds don't offer that kind of flexibility.
Oh, and I find that when I use sentries to defend, any strong early push makes me forgo tech in place of more sentries. I don't think that's the best situation you can be in especially if you were teching to phoenix and now have to build sentries.
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On December 22 2011 04:02 K3Nyy wrote: Nice guide! :D
I have a question though. I always thought Blink Stalker allins was the hard counter to Phoenix play. Your guide says to get Immortals but I don't think you can get 5 Phoenixes, a Robo and Immortals by the time their attack comes. Maybe I'm wrong but can you explain this part a little more?
You can lose directly to a blink all-in if you don't scout it and let them get high ground vision. When you scout with your 2 phoenixes, his blink is not finished yet so you have time to prepare at home. Your sentry should be maxed out on energy by that time so you have 4 FFs to hold. If he is not spot on every 15 secs trying to get up your ramp, that can even be 5 FFs with a single sentry and 1min30 of free time for you to get immortals.
Once you run out of FFs you will have 1 immortal and another halfway done with 4-5 phoenixes 3-4 stalkers and zealots. Which is more then enough to hold if you follow the instructions on how to engage. At that point your base is saturated while his is not (depending on how many lifts you decided to use on his probes), he has weak tech tree, and he probably lost more army then you trying to bust your ramp.
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On December 22 2011 04:10 tehemperorer wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2011 03:56 Geiko wrote:On December 22 2011 03:46 tehemperorer wrote: Thanks Geiko! This post doesn't sell me at all on early phoenixes in PvP though! In PvP I always try for 3gate blink expand. If I see any sort of defensive play (i.e. cb'ed gateway, depleted cb on nexus, presence of a sentry, a 3rd pylon, all found in your 2 build orders), I keep my 5 or 8 stalkers and just expand while getting blink and probes. If you're not going early phoenix I handle that with blink and cautious probe production, but if you are, you can't have enough to do any lasting damage vs my stalkers and early nexus.
That being said, I usually get stargate after nexus is already half done (depends on stalker production requirements) and then get phoenix. Only after Nexus is near completion do I think it's okay to place stargate and get phoenix! I'm not chronoboosting my gateways in my build, nor is my nexus energy depleted. In fact it pretty much looks like a 4 gate as I can cancel my gas and go 4 gate anyways (which I often do against players that look too greedy). Blink rush into expand is an extremely greedy build which can die to a number of things including 4 gate, DT rushes, and 1 base immortal pushes, in that sense, it's normal that you are at an advantage against certain builds (stargate opener for example) and straight up lose to other builds. Also, 8 stalkers is not the critical mass to be cost effective vs phoenix. If you're going to expand and not cut probes, I can go and kill you directly with my 1base zealot/immortal/phoenix army. I gotcha but the two build orders you gave show things other than 4gate or DT rushing, like the 24gate and then 24pylon in the defensive 2gate Stargate, or the chronoboost use on Axslav's opening. I was saying most specifically those two builds don't suggest any pressure, and can't have any worthwhile stalker count (2gate vs 3gate) to really threaten or punish anything early on. The 8 stalkers I get are about when I place nexus, sometimes I get 11 or so, but I 99% of the time poke opponents ramp with those and at that time I am able to see sentry, immortal, etc. My opinion in PvP is that you need most flexible build to do well, and any sort of early phoenix builds don't offer that kind of flexibility.
How is getting a gate at 24 indicating that I am not 4 gating ? I'm pretty sure I can do my build like explained in the OP, kill the scouting probe with my stalker, and proceed to 4 gate while being at most 10 seconds late on the 5:40 timing. And once again, I don't see how going for pure blink gives you more flexibility then opening stargate.
Edit : In fact here it is. I only tried it once, but I'm sure I could could reach all units warped in at 5:45 just like any other 4 gate.
Edit 2 : In fact I have a greedy variant of my build which gets pylon before gate with almost no probe cut, this was the build I faked in my replay. If i were to start off using the build in the OP, I could even cancel my pylon and reach a perfect 4 gate with ~45 less minerals due to canceling pylon and assimilator.
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On December 22 2011 04:16 Geiko wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2011 04:10 tehemperorer wrote:On December 22 2011 03:56 Geiko wrote:On December 22 2011 03:46 tehemperorer wrote: Thanks Geiko! This post doesn't sell me at all on early phoenixes in PvP though! In PvP I always try for 3gate blink expand. If I see any sort of defensive play (i.e. cb'ed gateway, depleted cb on nexus, presence of a sentry, a 3rd pylon, all found in your 2 build orders), I keep my 5 or 8 stalkers and just expand while getting blink and probes. If you're not going early phoenix I handle that with blink and cautious probe production, but if you are, you can't have enough to do any lasting damage vs my stalkers and early nexus.
That being said, I usually get stargate after nexus is already half done (depends on stalker production requirements) and then get phoenix. Only after Nexus is near completion do I think it's okay to place stargate and get phoenix! I'm not chronoboosting my gateways in my build, nor is my nexus energy depleted. In fact it pretty much looks like a 4 gate as I can cancel my gas and go 4 gate anyways (which I often do against players that look too greedy). Blink rush into expand is an extremely greedy build which can die to a number of things including 4 gate, DT rushes, and 1 base immortal pushes, in that sense, it's normal that you are at an advantage against certain builds (stargate opener for example) and straight up lose to other builds. Also, 8 stalkers is not the critical mass to be cost effective vs phoenix. If you're going to expand and not cut probes, I can go and kill you directly with my 1base zealot/immortal/phoenix army. I gotcha but the two build orders you gave show things other than 4gate or DT rushing, like the 24gate and then 24pylon in the defensive 2gate Stargate, or the chronoboost use on Axslav's opening. I was saying most specifically those two builds don't suggest any pressure, and can't have any worthwhile stalker count (2gate vs 3gate) to really threaten or punish anything early on. The 8 stalkers I get are about when I place nexus, sometimes I get 11 or so, but I 99% of the time poke opponents ramp with those and at that time I am able to see sentry, immortal, etc. My opinion in PvP is that you need most flexible build to do well, and any sort of early phoenix builds don't offer that kind of flexibility. How is getting a gate at 24 indicating that I am not 4 gating ? I'm pretty sure I can do my build like explained in the OP, kill the scouting probe with my stalker, and proceed to 4 gate while being at most 10 seconds late on the 5:40 timing. And once again, I don't see how going for pure blink gives you more flexibility then opening stargate. Edit : In fact here it is. I only tried it once, but I'm sure I could could reach all units warped in at 5:45 just like any other 4 gate. Sorry Geiko I edited post after you quoted it. I was saying in general that there are better ways to get phoenix without rushing to them (opinion). I guess it all comes down to preference though, but from my viewpoint (SaroVati PvP Modified 3 Gate Build, no pressure or late pressure, expand get blink) early phoenixes are not the way to go. That being said, I read every word of your post, really liked it, and was convinced that reading it will help me somewhere down the line! :D
EDIT: If you're going for a phoenix build from the start, then switch to 4gating, you will most likely warp those units in at or around your base, since 3gate builds patrol for pylons before warp gate is done.
EDIT to Edit 2: I don't think you can squeeze in your forward pylons if you don't plan to do that from the start, and then we're talking about 4gate vs 3gate not phoenix. I may be confused though :p
EDIT 3: Lemme watch more replays before I comment more :D
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Nice guide, I've been playing phoenix a lot lately (even when I shouldn't) as I really like the style. I differ slightly in opinion on how you should play it though: 1. Phoenix build is a build you should only do when you have a good hunch your opponent is not 4 gating, there is no point in making a phoenix build completely 4 gate proof, as phoenix build is simply not good against that.. It's very hard to differentiate 4 gate from expansion and phoenix build is just not good against either. The solution is simply not to try and force your phoenix build to be 4 gate safe but only to play phoenix when your opponent is not 4 gating or at least doing a very slow version. I simply wait till I see 3 chrono on nexus and quick second gas from my opponent before I decide on stargate. I open gate-stargate-gate with zealot-stalker-stalker from the first gate. If i see they are likely to 4 gate I go robo instead and play gate-robo-gate with zealot-stalker-sentry. Note that since i change stargate to robo (-50 gas + 50 m) and stalker to sentry (+50 gas -75m) both builds are almost identical. ie I only commit by the time i put down my tech building. Also I generally don't go phoenix on relatively close spawns, it just doesn't work well and the 4 gate risk is even bigger.
2. Because of getting stargate greedier i get it faster and i also save a fair bit of chrono to get those first two phoenix super quickly. This allows me to scout much faster which is quite critical against some builds especially dt, (robo) blink and expansion. I also tend to not automatically go robo because I find that makes it harder to hold an aggresive blink all-in (very hard to get an immortal out before it hits) and especially sucks agianst expo and phoenix mirror. A good idea i guess which the guide sort of suggests is to make robo and cancel it against certain things.
3. DT are one of the major weaknesses of phoenix so I think a good suggestion is to make a partial walloff. Make the 3rd pylon covering the ramp and put the second gateway covering a part of the ramp. Then if you scout dt you can immediately wall off using a robo (so it can only be hit by 1 dt) and a cybercore (best hp). It's a more efficient way to fight the DT pressure then always going a sentry imo which doesn't fit the style of phoenix play further on and costs gas you rather spend on more phoenix.
4. Also on maps where the ramp to the natural is narrow (ie shakuras) i like to go forge after stargate instead of robo. Make a cannon on the natural and expand, you're safe from dt and most all-ins then and can conveniently tech to some sort of zealot/archon army focussing on attack upgrades quickly.
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On December 22 2011 04:32 tehemperorer wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2011 04:16 Geiko wrote:On December 22 2011 04:10 tehemperorer wrote:On December 22 2011 03:56 Geiko wrote:On December 22 2011 03:46 tehemperorer wrote: Thanks Geiko! This post doesn't sell me at all on early phoenixes in PvP though! In PvP I always try for 3gate blink expand. If I see any sort of defensive play (i.e. cb'ed gateway, depleted cb on nexus, presence of a sentry, a 3rd pylon, all found in your 2 build orders), I keep my 5 or 8 stalkers and just expand while getting blink and probes. If you're not going early phoenix I handle that with blink and cautious probe production, but if you are, you can't have enough to do any lasting damage vs my stalkers and early nexus.
That being said, I usually get stargate after nexus is already half done (depends on stalker production requirements) and then get phoenix. Only after Nexus is near completion do I think it's okay to place stargate and get phoenix! I'm not chronoboosting my gateways in my build, nor is my nexus energy depleted. In fact it pretty much looks like a 4 gate as I can cancel my gas and go 4 gate anyways (which I often do against players that look too greedy). Blink rush into expand is an extremely greedy build which can die to a number of things including 4 gate, DT rushes, and 1 base immortal pushes, in that sense, it's normal that you are at an advantage against certain builds (stargate opener for example) and straight up lose to other builds. Also, 8 stalkers is not the critical mass to be cost effective vs phoenix. If you're going to expand and not cut probes, I can go and kill you directly with my 1base zealot/immortal/phoenix army. I gotcha but the two build orders you gave show things other than 4gate or DT rushing, like the 24gate and then 24pylon in the defensive 2gate Stargate, or the chronoboost use on Axslav's opening. I was saying most specifically those two builds don't suggest any pressure, and can't have any worthwhile stalker count (2gate vs 3gate) to really threaten or punish anything early on. The 8 stalkers I get are about when I place nexus, sometimes I get 11 or so, but I 99% of the time poke opponents ramp with those and at that time I am able to see sentry, immortal, etc. My opinion in PvP is that you need most flexible build to do well, and any sort of early phoenix builds don't offer that kind of flexibility. How is getting a gate at 24 indicating that I am not 4 gating ? I'm pretty sure I can do my build like explained in the OP, kill the scouting probe with my stalker, and proceed to 4 gate while being at most 10 seconds late on the 5:40 timing. And once again, I don't see how going for pure blink gives you more flexibility then opening stargate. Edit : In fact here it is. I only tried it once, but I'm sure I could could reach all units warped in at 5:45 just like any other 4 gate. Sorry Geiko I edited post after you quoted it. I was saying in general that there are better ways to get phoenix without rushing to them (opinion). I guess it all comes down to preference though, but from my viewpoint (SaroVati PvP Modified 3 Gate Build, no pressure or late pressure, expand get blink) early phoenixes are not the way to go. That being said, I read every word of your post, really liked it, and was convinced that reading it will help me somewhere down the line! :D EDIT: If you're going for a phoenix build from the start, then switch to 4gating, you will most likely warp those units in at or around your base, since 3gate builds patrol for pylons before warp gate is done. EDIT to Edit 2: I don't think you can squeeze in your forward pylons if you don't plan to do that from the start, and then we're talking about 4gate vs 3gate not phoenix. I may be confused though :p EDIT 3: Lemme watch more replays before I comment more :D
Lol ^^ The build described in the OP can be a perfect 4 gate with 60 mineral loss, without being late on anything. I'm pretty convinced that I can win 4 gate vs a standard blink rush (double gate at 30). I'd have to be a little more careful against a 3 stalker rush, but I'm still pretty sure that you wouldn't be able to defend if you're not getting a sentry and getting fastest possible blink. After that I don't know your build order, but I find it unfair that you claim that my builds looks like a tech build when in fact it's designed to make people think twice about being too greedy.
As far as going phoenix after expand, I'm really not convinced. Maybe you could write something up explaining how this works ? Everyone standard build has observers or someway to scout your base at that point in time, and reacting to stargate is very much easier than reacting to 2 phoenix in your base.
if you're on the EU server we could play out a few games and i could try to convince you
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On December 22 2011 04:42 Markwerf wrote: Nice guide, I've been playing phoenix a lot lately (even when I shouldn't) as I really like the style. I differ slightly in opinion on how you should play it though: 1. Phoenix build is a build you should only do when you have a good hunch your opponent is not 4 gating, there is no point in making a phoenix build completely 4 gate proof, as phoenix build is simply not good against that.. It's very hard to differentiate 4 gate from expansion and phoenix build is just not good against either. The solution is simply not to try and force your phoenix build to be 4 gate safe but only to play phoenix when your opponent is not 4 gating or at least doing a very slow version. I simply wait till I see 3 chrono on nexus and quick second gas from my opponent before I decide on stargate. I open gate-stargate-gate with zealot-stalker-stalker from the first gate. If i see they are likely to 4 gate I go robo instead and play gate-robo-gate with zealot-stalker-sentry. Note that since i change stargate to robo (-50 gas + 50 m) and stalker to sentry (+50 gas -75m) both builds are almost identical. ie I only commit by the time i put down my tech building. Also I generally don't go phoenix on relatively close spawns, it just doesn't work well and the 4 gate risk is even bigger.
2. Because of getting stargate greedier i get it faster and i also save a fair bit of chrono to get those first two phoenix super quickly. This allows me to scout much faster which is quite critical against some builds especially dt, (robo) blink and expansion. I also tend to not automatically go robo because I find that makes it harder to hold an aggresive blink all-in (very hard to get an immortal out before it hits) and especially sucks agianst expo and phoenix mirror. A good idea i guess which the guide sort of suggests is to make robo and cancel it against certain things.
3. DT are one of the major weaknesses of phoenix so I think a good suggestion is to make a partial walloff. Make the 3rd pylon covering the ramp and put the second gateway covering a part of the ramp. Then if you scout dt you can immediately wall off using a robo (so it can only be hit by 1 dt) and a cybercore (best hp). It's a more efficient way to fight the DT pressure then always going a sentry imo which doesn't fit the style of phoenix play further on and costs gas you rather spend on more phoenix.
Good remarks,
This is why I put Axslav's opening as well as my "safe" opening to fit everyone's style better. Axslav does exactly what you describe (it's explained more in the video if you feel like listening to it). Personally, I never trust anything anyone does, so getting gas and pylon could also mean that they are aggressive 3 gating you, which you will die to. I personally like being safe versus every thing, even if that means being a little bit behind against greedy builds, and then outplaying my opponents in the late game. At very very high levels, (pro level) i would understand that you need to take risk to get things up faster. Of course I adapt my build to what I see, mainly I get 2 zealots instead 2 stalkers out of the first gates if I feel very safe, or 1 zealot 1 stalker. But from what I understand, you are taking a lot of risk based on the assumption that a player that uses 3 CB on nexus will most likely not be 4 gating you 10 seconds later than normal...
Regarding wall-offs, they are way too vulnerable to robo blink harass, which stargate openings strugle enough as it is to deal with... units on hold position work fine, as well as the robo timing into cancel. I've personally never died to DT builds (except once where I hit g instead of h for my units and got a nice guardian shield ^^ with a dt in my base)
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On December 22 2011 04:44 Geiko wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2011 04:32 tehemperorer wrote:On December 22 2011 04:16 Geiko wrote:On December 22 2011 04:10 tehemperorer wrote:On December 22 2011 03:56 Geiko wrote:On December 22 2011 03:46 tehemperorer wrote: Thanks Geiko! This post doesn't sell me at all on early phoenixes in PvP though! In PvP I always try for 3gate blink expand. If I see any sort of defensive play (i.e. cb'ed gateway, depleted cb on nexus, presence of a sentry, a 3rd pylon, all found in your 2 build orders), I keep my 5 or 8 stalkers and just expand while getting blink and probes. If you're not going early phoenix I handle that with blink and cautious probe production, but if you are, you can't have enough to do any lasting damage vs my stalkers and early nexus.
That being said, I usually get stargate after nexus is already half done (depends on stalker production requirements) and then get phoenix. Only after Nexus is near completion do I think it's okay to place stargate and get phoenix! I'm not chronoboosting my gateways in my build, nor is my nexus energy depleted. In fact it pretty much looks like a 4 gate as I can cancel my gas and go 4 gate anyways (which I often do against players that look too greedy). Blink rush into expand is an extremely greedy build which can die to a number of things including 4 gate, DT rushes, and 1 base immortal pushes, in that sense, it's normal that you are at an advantage against certain builds (stargate opener for example) and straight up lose to other builds. Also, 8 stalkers is not the critical mass to be cost effective vs phoenix. If you're going to expand and not cut probes, I can go and kill you directly with my 1base zealot/immortal/phoenix army. I gotcha but the two build orders you gave show things other than 4gate or DT rushing, like the 24gate and then 24pylon in the defensive 2gate Stargate, or the chronoboost use on Axslav's opening. I was saying most specifically those two builds don't suggest any pressure, and can't have any worthwhile stalker count (2gate vs 3gate) to really threaten or punish anything early on. The 8 stalkers I get are about when I place nexus, sometimes I get 11 or so, but I 99% of the time poke opponents ramp with those and at that time I am able to see sentry, immortal, etc. My opinion in PvP is that you need most flexible build to do well, and any sort of early phoenix builds don't offer that kind of flexibility. How is getting a gate at 24 indicating that I am not 4 gating ? I'm pretty sure I can do my build like explained in the OP, kill the scouting probe with my stalker, and proceed to 4 gate while being at most 10 seconds late on the 5:40 timing. And once again, I don't see how going for pure blink gives you more flexibility then opening stargate. Edit : In fact here it is. I only tried it once, but I'm sure I could could reach all units warped in at 5:45 just like any other 4 gate. Sorry Geiko I edited post after you quoted it. I was saying in general that there are better ways to get phoenix without rushing to them (opinion). I guess it all comes down to preference though, but from my viewpoint (SaroVati PvP Modified 3 Gate Build, no pressure or late pressure, expand get blink) early phoenixes are not the way to go. That being said, I read every word of your post, really liked it, and was convinced that reading it will help me somewhere down the line! :D EDIT: If you're going for a phoenix build from the start, then switch to 4gating, you will most likely warp those units in at or around your base, since 3gate builds patrol for pylons before warp gate is done. EDIT to Edit 2: I don't think you can squeeze in your forward pylons if you don't plan to do that from the start, and then we're talking about 4gate vs 3gate not phoenix. I may be confused though :p EDIT 3: Lemme watch more replays before I comment more :D Lol ^^ The build described in the OP can be a perfect 4 gate with 60 mineral loss, without being late on anything. I'm pretty convinced that I can win 4 gate vs a standard blink rush (double gate at 30). I'd have to be a little more careful against a 3 stalker rush, but I'm still pretty sure that you wouldn't be able to defend if you're not getting a sentry and getting fastest possible blink. After that I don't know your build order, but I find it unfair that you claim that my builds looks like a tech build when in fact it's designed to make people think twice about being too greedy. As far as going phoenix after expand, I'm really not convinced. Maybe you could write something up explaining how this works ? Everyone standard build has observers or someway to scout your base at that point in time, and reacting to stargate is very much easier than reacting to 2 phoenix in your base. if you're on the EU server we could play out a few games and i could try to convince you Fair enough man, unfortunately I'm not on EU! I have a few replays saved with phoenix after expand with the intent on doing a [D] or [G], but I think that's a far way off. Thanks for the discussion man!
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Caveat, ONLY good vs Blink all ins if you're johnny on the spot with forcefields... I mean SERIOUSLY epic with the forcefields.... I mean HALF a pixel off and STILL blocking your ramp totally can STILL kill you... you have to perfectly hit that sweet spot... I've seen axslav do this build a half dozen times vs 1 gate blink -> 3gate blink all in and normal 3 gate blink... and sometimes he just misses the forcefield by a smidge and the Blink toss gets the little bit of ramp vision needed and just insta wins... you have to be mega conscientious with this build.
You should also probably add somewhere that you should almost never get more than 8 phoenix.
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On December 22 2011 05:04 ShatterZer0 wrote: Caveat, ONLY good vs Blink all ins if you're johnny on the spot with forcefields... I mean SERIOUSLY epic with the forcefields.... I mean HALF a pixel off and STILL blocking your ramp totally can STILL kill you... you have to perfectly hit that sweet spot... I've seen axslav do this build a half dozen times vs 1 gate blink -> 3gate blink all in and normal 3 gate blink... and sometimes he just misses the forcefield by a smidge and the Blink toss gets the little bit of ramp vision needed and just insta wins... you have to be mega conscientious with this build.
You should also probably add somewhere that you should almost never get more than 8 phoenix.
It's in there somewhere ^^ stop at 8-10 phoenixes.
You're right that the first FF is hard to place well, but after that, it's just all about looking at your ingame timer and doing t + 15s. You just carefully prepare your FF and wait for him to move his stalker forward. You don't have anything else to do really, and if you don't do it you're dead, so you might as well take your time
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On December 22 2011 04:54 Geiko wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2011 04:42 Markwerf wrote: Nice guide, I've been playing phoenix a lot lately (even when I shouldn't) as I really like the style. I differ slightly in opinion on how you should play it though: 1. Phoenix build is a build you should only do when you have a good hunch your opponent is not 4 gating, there is no point in making a phoenix build completely 4 gate proof, as phoenix build is simply not good against that.. It's very hard to differentiate 4 gate from expansion and phoenix build is just not good against either. The solution is simply not to try and force your phoenix build to be 4 gate safe but only to play phoenix when your opponent is not 4 gating or at least doing a very slow version. I simply wait till I see 3 chrono on nexus and quick second gas from my opponent before I decide on stargate. I open gate-stargate-gate with zealot-stalker-stalker from the first gate. If i see they are likely to 4 gate I go robo instead and play gate-robo-gate with zealot-stalker-sentry. Note that since i change stargate to robo (-50 gas + 50 m) and stalker to sentry (+50 gas -75m) both builds are almost identical. ie I only commit by the time i put down my tech building. Also I generally don't go phoenix on relatively close spawns, it just doesn't work well and the 4 gate risk is even bigger.
2. Because of getting stargate greedier i get it faster and i also save a fair bit of chrono to get those first two phoenix super quickly. This allows me to scout much faster which is quite critical against some builds especially dt, (robo) blink and expansion. I also tend to not automatically go robo because I find that makes it harder to hold an aggresive blink all-in (very hard to get an immortal out before it hits) and especially sucks agianst expo and phoenix mirror. A good idea i guess which the guide sort of suggests is to make robo and cancel it against certain things.
3. DT are one of the major weaknesses of phoenix so I think a good suggestion is to make a partial walloff. Make the 3rd pylon covering the ramp and put the second gateway covering a part of the ramp. Then if you scout dt you can immediately wall off using a robo (so it can only be hit by 1 dt) and a cybercore (best hp). It's a more efficient way to fight the DT pressure then always going a sentry imo which doesn't fit the style of phoenix play further on and costs gas you rather spend on more phoenix.
Good remarks, This is why I put Axslav's opening as well as my "safe" opening to fit everyone's style better. Axslav does exactly what you describe (it's explained more in the video if you feel like listening to it). Personally, I never trust anything anyone does, so getting gas and pylon could also mean that they are aggressive 3 gating you, which you will die to. I personally like being safe versus every thing, even if that means being a little bit behind against greedy builds, and then outplaying my opponents in the late game. At very very high levels, (pro level) i would understand that you need to take risk to get things up faster. Of course I adapt my build to what I see, mainly I get 2 zealots instead 2 stalkers out of the first gates if I feel very safe, or 1 zealot 1 stalker. But from what I understand, you are taking a lot of risk based on the assumption that a player that uses 3 CB on nexus will most likely not be 4 gating you 10 seconds later than normal... Regarding wall-offs, they are way too vulnerable to robo blink harass, which stargate openings strugle enough as it is to deal with... units on hold position work fine, as well as the robo timing into cancel. I've personally never died to DT builds (except once where I hit g instead of h for my units and got a nice guardian shield ^^ with a dt in my base)
Hmm I think phoenix is a build where you HAVE to take some risk as regards to the opening. If you've seen 2nd gas and 3rd chrono you have more time to defend and more time to patrol with your stalker to prevent eventual proxies. You should always let your hunch help on deciding between robo and stargate ofcourse. In PvP there is always a slight bit of build order luck I think, if you want to play completely safe and win on lategame skill mostly then roboblink is the build to go imo, that's even against most stuff and always has a solid chance.
As for the wall-off, I don't think a single gateway is vulnerable to robo blink. You only put 1 gateway as part of the walloff and only add more if you scout DT. Scouting DT is not so hard with a super fast stargate as you can actually see if the twlight council is active or not, with fast phoenix your phoenix fly over before blink can finish so an ineffective council is a pretty good sign of DT. Only then should you add 2 more buildings to the wall off (robo and extra cyber with cyber in the more vulnerable spot).
Arguably it can be hard to see in a flash if the council is active but if you don't see chrono active on it you should take a finer look: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Twilight_Council
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On December 22 2011 05:20 Markwerf wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2011 04:54 Geiko wrote:On December 22 2011 04:42 Markwerf wrote: Nice guide, I've been playing phoenix a lot lately (even when I shouldn't) as I really like the style. I differ slightly in opinion on how you should play it though: 1. Phoenix build is a build you should only do when you have a good hunch your opponent is not 4 gating, there is no point in making a phoenix build completely 4 gate proof, as phoenix build is simply not good against that.. It's very hard to differentiate 4 gate from expansion and phoenix build is just not good against either. The solution is simply not to try and force your phoenix build to be 4 gate safe but only to play phoenix when your opponent is not 4 gating or at least doing a very slow version. I simply wait till I see 3 chrono on nexus and quick second gas from my opponent before I decide on stargate. I open gate-stargate-gate with zealot-stalker-stalker from the first gate. If i see they are likely to 4 gate I go robo instead and play gate-robo-gate with zealot-stalker-sentry. Note that since i change stargate to robo (-50 gas + 50 m) and stalker to sentry (+50 gas -75m) both builds are almost identical. ie I only commit by the time i put down my tech building. Also I generally don't go phoenix on relatively close spawns, it just doesn't work well and the 4 gate risk is even bigger.
2. Because of getting stargate greedier i get it faster and i also save a fair bit of chrono to get those first two phoenix super quickly. This allows me to scout much faster which is quite critical against some builds especially dt, (robo) blink and expansion. I also tend to not automatically go robo because I find that makes it harder to hold an aggresive blink all-in (very hard to get an immortal out before it hits) and especially sucks agianst expo and phoenix mirror. A good idea i guess which the guide sort of suggests is to make robo and cancel it against certain things.
3. DT are one of the major weaknesses of phoenix so I think a good suggestion is to make a partial walloff. Make the 3rd pylon covering the ramp and put the second gateway covering a part of the ramp. Then if you scout dt you can immediately wall off using a robo (so it can only be hit by 1 dt) and a cybercore (best hp). It's a more efficient way to fight the DT pressure then always going a sentry imo which doesn't fit the style of phoenix play further on and costs gas you rather spend on more phoenix.
Good remarks, This is why I put Axslav's opening as well as my "safe" opening to fit everyone's style better. Axslav does exactly what you describe (it's explained more in the video if you feel like listening to it). Personally, I never trust anything anyone does, so getting gas and pylon could also mean that they are aggressive 3 gating you, which you will die to. I personally like being safe versus every thing, even if that means being a little bit behind against greedy builds, and then outplaying my opponents in the late game. At very very high levels, (pro level) i would understand that you need to take risk to get things up faster. Of course I adapt my build to what I see, mainly I get 2 zealots instead 2 stalkers out of the first gates if I feel very safe, or 1 zealot 1 stalker. But from what I understand, you are taking a lot of risk based on the assumption that a player that uses 3 CB on nexus will most likely not be 4 gating you 10 seconds later than normal... Regarding wall-offs, they are way too vulnerable to robo blink harass, which stargate openings strugle enough as it is to deal with... units on hold position work fine, as well as the robo timing into cancel. I've personally never died to DT builds (except once where I hit g instead of h for my units and got a nice guardian shield ^^ with a dt in my base) Hmm I think phoenix is a build where you HAVE to take some risk as regards to the opening. If you've seen 2nd gas and 3rd chrono you have more time to defend and more time to patrol with your stalker to prevent eventual proxies. You should always let your hunch help on deciding between robo and stargate ofcourse. In PvP there is always a slight bit of build order luck I think, if you want to play completely safe and win on lategame skill mostly then roboblink is the build to go imo, that's even against most stuff and always has a solid chance. As for the wall-off, I don't think a single gateway is vulnerable to robo blink. You only put 1 gateway as part of the walloff and only add more if you scout DT. Scouting DT is not so hard with a super fast stargate as you can actually see if the twlight council is active or not, with fast phoenix your phoenix fly over before blink can finish so an ineffective council is a pretty good sign of DT. Only then should you add 2 more buildings to the wall off (robo and extra cyber with cyber in the more vulnerable spot). Arguably it can be hard to see in a flash if the council is active but if you don't see chrono active on it you should take a finer look: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Twilight_Council
Once again it's a matter of preference I tried to show in this guide that you could play safe and yet not be extremely far behind any sort of openings, so I don't believe you HAVE to take some risks. I do agree with you however that it's a totally legit way of playing. 90% of times, 3 CB on nexus is a sign of no 4 gate so you can accept to lose those 10 % of games if you greediness allows you to win 12% more normal games. I guess it's kind of like tight players vs loose players in poker ^^
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wow , what an awesome article It's really cool to see people like Geiko who are HighMaster spending time to share such cool strat It's guy like you who make sc so interesting so please keep writing good articles
Thank you Geiko and thanks to TL as well
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thx geiko <3 pretty good guide
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
very well done ty for doing this <3
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Scouting a stargate with your phoenix really is frustrating. I was looking for a better counter response, but I guess chronoing phoenix is best, because you already invested in stargate and two phoenix.
On my level (high dia/low master on EU) good guides on TL reach the ladder play pretty fast :D
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On December 22 2011 20:32 Ada wrote: Scouting a stargate with your phoenix really is frustrating. I was looking for a better counter response, but I guess chronoing phoenix is best, because you already invested in stargate and two phoenix.
On my level (high dia/low master on EU) good guides on TL reach the ladder play pretty fast :D
phoenix vs phoenix might be the most obnoxious thing that can happen. It's basically like 4 gate vs 4 gate on tal darim, you can't expand and can't do anything else because if you do you lose the unit race immediately and pretty much die. Phoenix do so much damage versus phoenix themselves that having the higher phoenix count is crucial.
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Since I've watched EG.Axslav's stream some while ago (actually right when he started streaming :-)), phoenix-based-pvp has been my standard and I'm pretty successful with it at high masters. I've been collecting quite some experience with stargate play in pvp and I want to share some of my experiences that I feel could be added to the OP or discussed.
There are some suggestions on when to make the robotics facility (after having 2 gates + 1 stargate) in order to hold blink+obs allins or have detection in time vs the potential of dts as well as to stop blink harassment. However, I've found that since I always get 2 sentries at the start (stargate around 4:30min with perma cb phoenix production, only stopped if there is a 4gate) which accumulate some energy over time and since there is some gas leftover if you only stay on 2gates + stargate for a little while until you know for sure if your opponent expands or which tech route he exactly went for there is enough for 2 more sentries (up to a total of 4), I stay on pure zealot-sentry with zealots in a row on hold position and sentries a little bit in the back on my ramp (to prevent them from being sniped from blink+obs while you focus on your phoenix out on the map for instance) i can hold all these blink+obs allins with the use of a single gs whenever they engage and keeping the phoenix over my army picking of (like also suggested by geiko) 2-3 front stalkers. Through gs + phoenix being light you max lose a single phoenix and get 2-3 stalker kills, your sentries are safe in the back and zealots under gs are more or less invincible to stalker fire and expandable anyways. Whenever they use their blink once and didn't get out of range already (blink on top for instance), use ff to trap his units for your zealots. So I've found that unless the numbers of his stalkers get really big (like after expansion) that you don't need to get immortals which often leaves me the option to fit in a forge (if he doesn't expand or i'm afraid to die) to get upgrades for my ground units. Zealots/sentries as well as immortals at some later point all benefit so greatly from them that I had ridiculous matches already where I've lost like 20% of my army and killed his whole army of.
For the opening itself, some might be interested to try out my opening: 9 pylon (scout, i hate cheese :-)) 11 cb nexus 13 gate 13 cb nexus 15 gas 16 pylon 17 cyber (18 with 3rd cb on nexus) (if he uses a 3rd cb on his nexus I'll do the same) 18/19 2nd gas (depends on double pairing of probes, 3rd cb on nexus or not) 19 zealot 23 pylon 24 sentry
from there on i just want to point out the order, because I don't really memorize the supply values there anymore. :-) CB your first 2 sentries (your first 3 units will be zealot-sentry-sentry). Get a 2nd gateway and never ever cut probes. Get your pylon at 31 supply somewhere proxied where it's unlikely to be found but lets you do some zealot warpins for harass to send into his mineral line for later on. Around 10sec ingame time after your opponent's first stalker finishes (check his gate timing and check if he cb his first stalker or not) send a probe up his base to check for his opening. If he wants to go for a hard 4gate allin, he needs to get his stalker over to your base. If he sits up his ramp to deny scouting a hard 4gate is much less likely (just some additional information together with the initial scouting you already had). If it's not a hard 4gate, just get your stargate etc as planned. If it looks like a hard 4gate just get 2 more sentries and you just go super-easy-4gate defense by ffing your ramp forever, adding 2 more gates and after you have enough sentries (6 is perma ff) you warp in 4 zealots from the proxy to his mineral line and push down at the same time. Zealot-sentry always beats stalkers if you use ff + gs right and have zealots in the front. You can also let him up the ramp, ff trap him and rape him. You never need to cut probes at any point, since you can ff him out forever (inbase pylons should have been checked by you already anyways). Even if you missread your opponent and went for stargate after 2 sentries, if you get more sentries asap the moment you see him pushin to your ramp and starting pylons etc you can get them out in time to ff the ramp 24/7. You only need to watch out for not getting faked out while he is teching up greedily, but if they skimp on sentries themselves you can just 4gate them with eco and better units back. Use a hidden probe to sneak up his base, judge his opening andyour abilities to hold, snipe his probe to delay the push or use your game sense. You won't die if you make 4 instead of 2 sentries but you can be behind if the other guy rushed for stargate earlier and faked you out.
There are some numbers you put up in the guide about how many phoenix you need in order to kill different protoss units with just a single lift. When I started playing phoenix-pvp a while ago I did some extensive testing on this and I'd like to clarify his here (maybe you can update his in the OP):
zealot -> 2(3) phoenix: At first I always thought it's kinda random that you need either 2 or 3 phoenix for one lift to kill a zealot and was curious how this can be randomly delaying shots. But then I realised after more and more testing that while phoenix shoot quickly, they don't shoot instant like for instance marines. This means that if you have 2 phoenix and lift a zealot, but the phoenix that is shooting at the zealot is not right next to the zealot in the air at the moment of the last shot before the graviton beam ends, the zealot survives barely. The reason is simply that the phoenix shoots already but before the shots actually reach the zealot the time is out. So if you just click the phoenix that is shooting right next to the zealot in the air, he will always kill the zealot. This situation is really important when you only have 2 or 3phoenix since killing single zealots/sentries/stalkers are worth so much more than another probe kill and often times especially at the start the energy limits you more than anything else (especially if you want to go for an attack soon afterwards you will need the energy for actual combat so your phoenix are not idling around in the battle or because you need to defend some one base allin from your opponent. sentry -> 2phoenix needed (always). stalker -> 3(4) phoenix: like above, if you micro your phoenix to the target, 3 phoenix and one single lift are enough and saves valuable energy immo -> 5(6) phoenix dt -> 2 phoenix
As a last advice (something I missed in the OP) is a section where you mention energy management on your phoenix. You did mention the usage on probes vs allins, but maybe you could add 1-2 sentences about the energy management in battles. You did mention how to use phoenix in combat but often times you need to use them differently based on the phoenix number/available energy. So for instance, if you just did some initial harassment and you see some allin, you not only stop lifting his probes and save the energy for the combat you want to prioritorize stalkers over zealots every single time (sometimes even over sentries), because if all you have got is enough energy for like 3-5 lifts and you get allined, you better use that energy to kill as many units (and most expensive ones) in battle as possible. It makes no sense to rip apart some zealots with the double dmg just to realise that now your phoenix are sitting idle for a while and could have killed more expensive stuff. Warping in 3-5 more stalkers or zealots is a difference. However, (keep in mind that I'm a huge fan of zealot-sentry only composition to go along with phoenix in the early stages of the game) if you have enough energy, you lift and kill sentries first (gs prevents quite some dps from sentries and phoenix, ff can screw you up :-)), then immortals ofc (even if you don't have armored units immortals still do more dps than all other gateway units so the lift is so much more valuable to take them out of combat), then zealots (you kill them more than twice as fast as stalkers and if you are zealot-sentry-based if you ff behind his units and have zealots in front and your phoenix rape his zealots, you win every battle because zealots are the worst enemies in cost efficiency for you as long as you can prevent kiting).
Really nice guide overall, I'm kinda surprised it took people so long to start using it. I've not met many people using phoenix until two days ago, then I checked Teamliquid and see that 2 days ago a thread on phoenix pvp by Geiko has been started ... oh boy, now I know why everyone in master league blindly goes phoenix). However, most people tend to hide them until they have 3-5 and are not safe vs dts, react too late vs fast expand builds etc. They just hope to outmass you in phoenix numbers (which I think everyone hates if you are just down by one phoenix you can lose the game right there, no escape possible once engaged etc).
Update: added (6) to immortal, forgot that originally (the testing I did on this stuff had been already quite some weeks ago, they should be accurate though)
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I've been doing axslav's version of the phoenix build and it seemed really good until i realized that its actually really hard to hold the 4 gates that just get pylons down below your ramp or even close to your base and then just keep trying to go up the ramp, because you run out of sentry energy. Axslav gets 2 sentries pretty fast but his warpgate is really really late and he adds the second gate extremely late as well so he has to rely on really good probe control to hold 4 gates pretty much ever time, because his third sentry is really late. He gets his zealot finished when his core is done for a while so while he chronos stalkers it just makes up for the fact that they were already fairly delayed. Also a gm eu player posted in the 11 gate 3 gate pressure guide that he beat axslav with that as well which makes sense if you just get pylons near his base and force up the ramp. Also, Axslav loses to 4 gate a lot on his stream due to simple errors that are really easy to make, he kills the first couple units then just runs out of force field. I made a new build that looks more like a pressure build ( I think it makes opponent think u r trying to trick them into thinking that you are teching) and it holds 4 gate rather easily i think. I used the build order optimizer to come up with this mostly (its actually useful lol). 9 pylon 11 gate 2x chrono on probes 14 gas 15 pylon 16 core (scout after core) 17 zealot 20 gas 22 stalker and chrono warpgate only from now on except for last chrono 23 pylon 27 stalker 27 stargate 28 gate, u can put down gate before stargate if u want as well if u are really worried but you can hold 4 gate either way 30 sentry(chrono this with your last chrono) with this build you dont need to chrono units because you just get them out faster to begin with then axslav's build. It looks like 3 gate pressure that is getting a fake second gas. Also, if you scout 3 gate pressure I would probably pull from the second gas or have like 2 in each gas and just go defensive 3 gate with a higher worker count and more units to deny proxy pylons. Your sentry finishes right as warpgate does(about 5:30) and you can warp in another right away then after that your other gate is done and you can warp in from 2 gates to easily hold 4 gate without pulling probes. This build gets about 25-26 probes at the time a 4 gate would hit (you almost never cut probes) with a stargate done around 5:35 which I think is fairly close to the same timing as axslav's build if he builds stargate as fast as possible and way faster than geiko's. You have about 200 gas when warpgate is done which is enough for phoenix + robo or 2 sentries whatever you want. You can scout for expo with first phoenix as axslav suggested very fast so if they did some kind of fast expo you will see it right away and can react accordingly. I think this build reveals less than axslav's build, because lets face it if you scout 3 chrono's on probes and an 18 second gas its pretty much a guaranteed tech build while my build looks like 3 gate pressure for a while and might confuse the opponent. You can afford the core scout due to the fact that you get a really fast zealot which helps vs cannon and proxies, which is also when alej suggests in his 11 gate 3 gate pressure thread. (if you scout earlier it hinders your eco quite a bit since you already put up an early gate) Also if you see them play really greedy feel free to spend more chronos on probes to match their chrono energy because they cant have warpgate faster than you if they do so either way you are safe or just not mine from your second gas and try some pressure build.
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+ Show Spoiler +The first hint to this will be given by your initial phoenix or units who should spot a proxy pylon near your base. When you then scout his base, to find 3/4 gates and a twilight council with no units, check if he has expanded and leave your phoenixes in his base to see how all-in he is. Meanwhile at your base stop making phoenixes once you have 5 and get some immortals. FF your ramp as soon as you see him trying to get up. You should never let him gain high ground vision. You've got a full minute (4FFs) to warp in units and immortals (use chronoboost on production facilities !). If he tries to break your ramp, he will most likely walk a stalker up the ramp, blink to the side, and blink all of his stalkers to the side of your base. This is where the phoenixes come in to play. A-move your army towards them and with your phoenixes, lift off the first line of stalkers. He'll try to focus down the phoenixes but will take a lot of dps from your zealots and immortals, which is why you should never try to lift the stalkers in the back. Continue chasing after the stalkers, but never let your phoenixes get too far ahead of your main army. If he pulls back and expands, you can go down the ramp and expand yourself. Blink stalkers are extremely bad at setting up a contain since they rely on kiting the army. Use two spare phoenixes to scout what he is doing in his base. once again, adapt your probe production to what you see. Kill 3 or 4 probes with the phoenixes if you can. If he stops making stalkers and goes for a zealot/archon composition, stop making immortals and refer to the previous section. As before, you can either keep your phoenix count at 5-ish, or go up to ~8-10 for more harass heavy play.
I highly doubt that if someone sees you open phoenix when theyve gone blindly for a blink rush all-in that they are going to sit around and wait for you to get up to 5 phoenix, + have sentries + give you time to make immortals
Blink should be done with a decent number of stalkers before you will have time to really react.
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yeah blink hits pretty damn fast id probably just lift 2 probes and keep 2-3 phoenix in his base and cut as soon as he is near my base in order to afford immortals cause those are the #1 priority.. Lift his workers with that and spam sentries + immortal or as rsvp suggested in a game i watched him play if u want u can just save all lifts after initial 2 and head back to be safer just in case he blinks into your base somehow as well as having vision over his army without needing obs for the faster immortal. Should already have about 2 sentries with full energy cause most safe tech builds get that. U cant afford phoenix sentry immortal. Probably would add a third gate at least as well cause money will stockpile since u cant expo maybe even fourth. After like 2 immortals should be fine to barge down ramp with your 3 or so phoenix killing sentry if hes containing. and at that point if he expanded either counter expo or just go for like a 3-4 immortal 4 gate all in with whatever phoenix u got left.
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On December 22 2011 01:51 Geiko wrote: Like I said, this guide isn't on one particular style. I do believe however that he does get the cannon defense when teching to DTs. The only time I've heard him suggest to sack the natural is when he was behind anyways and was trying to get back in the game but cutting corners and teching straight to DTs.
Regarding the 2 stalkers, I know that he likes to stay at 2 stalkers but I honestly prefer at least 3 or 4, even at the price of one less phoenix. It's a matter of preference really. As long as you know what you want to achieve with the units that you are getting, that is the most important I think. For example, I like using my stalkers to poke his front, control watch towers, etc...
Ah, ok I might of missunderstood what he said. I still think I might try sacking the expansions anyway as I feel it's very easy to die once you've expanded but you're right about there beeing no real particular style that always works. There is usually several solutions to a problem. Especially on maps like Antiga and Shakuras I might expect your solution to be just as viable and probably even better since you don't lose the Nexus and mining time.
Yep, I just wanted to put it in there so that people realise that you should stay low on the Stalker count. I don't think 2 or 4 makes that a big of a diffrence as you say. The important part is that if you overmake Stalkers in the early to mid game your build just derails and becomes really inefficent since they are expensive units that really needs Blink to be usefull in P vs P.
Anyways this build has worked out well in the midgame for me. I still lose sometimes to 4 gate or Blink but that's due to my poor execution of the build so I'm a stick to it.
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On December 22 2011 19:01 iNcontroL wrote: very well done ty for doing this <3
iNcontroL <3 to you too
On December 23 2011 03:24 Fairwell wrote:+ Show Spoiler + Since I've watched EG.Axslav's stream some while ago (actually right when he started streaming :-)), phoenix-based-pvp has been my standard and I'm pretty successful with it at high masters. I've been collecting quite some experience with stargate play in pvp and I want to share some of my experiences that I feel could be added to the OP or discussed.
There are some suggestions on when to make the robotics facility (after having 2 gates + 1 stargate) in order to hold blink+obs allins or have detection in time vs the potential of dts as well as to stop blink harassment. However, I've found that since I always get 2 sentries at the start (stargate around 4:30min with perma cb phoenix production, only stopped if there is a 4gate) which accumulate some energy over time and since there is some gas leftover if you only stay on 2gates + stargate for a little while until you know for sure if your opponent expands or which tech route he exactly went for there is enough for 2 more sentries (up to a total of 4), I stay on pure zealot-sentry with zealots in a row on hold position and sentries a little bit in the back on my ramp (to prevent them from being sniped from blink+obs while you focus on your phoenix out on the map for instance) i can hold all these blink+obs allins with the use of a single gs whenever they engage and keeping the phoenix over my army picking of (like also suggested by geiko) 2-3 front stalkers. Through gs + phoenix being light you max lose a single phoenix and get 2-3 stalker kills, your sentries are safe in the back and zealots under gs are more or less invincible to stalker fire and expandable anyways. Whenever they use their blink once and didn't get out of range already (blink on top for instance), use ff to trap his units for your zealots. So I've found that unless the numbers of his stalkers get really big (like after expansion) that you don't need to get immortals which often leaves me the option to fit in a forge (if he doesn't expand or i'm afraid to die) to get upgrades for my ground units. Zealots/sentries as well as immortals at some later point all benefit so greatly from them that I had ridiculous matches already where I've lost like 20% of my army and killed his whole army of.
For the opening itself, some might be interested to try out my opening: 9 pylon (scout, i hate cheese :-)) 11 cb nexus 13 gate 13 cb nexus 15 gas 16 pylon 17 cyber (18 with 3rd cb on nexus) (if he uses a 3rd cb on his nexus I'll do the same) 18/19 2nd gas (depends on double pairing of probes, 3rd cb on nexus or not) 19 zealot 23 pylon 24 sentry
from there on i just want to point out the order, because I don't really memorize the supply values there anymore. :-) CB your first 2 sentries (your first 3 units will be zealot-sentry-sentry). Get a 2nd gateway and never ever cut probes. Get your pylon at 31 supply somewhere proxied where it's unlikely to be found but lets you do some zealot warpins for harass to send into his mineral line for later on. Around 10sec ingame time after your opponent's first stalker finishes (check his gate timing and check if he cb his first stalker or not) send a probe up his base to check for his opening. If he wants to go for a hard 4gate allin, he needs to get his stalker over to your base. If he sits up his ramp to deny scouting a hard 4gate is much less likely (just some additional information together with the initial scouting you already had). If it's not a hard 4gate, just get your stargate etc as planned. If it looks like a hard 4gate just get 2 more sentries and you just go super-easy-4gate defense by ffing your ramp forever, adding 2 more gates and after you have enough sentries (6 is perma ff) you warp in 4 zealots from the proxy to his mineral line and push down at the same time. Zealot-sentry always beats stalkers if you use ff + gs right and have zealots in the front. You can also let him up the ramp, ff trap him and rape him. You never need to cut probes at any point, since you can ff him out forever (inbase pylons should have been checked by you already anyways). Even if you missread your opponent and went for stargate after 2 sentries, if you get more sentries asap the moment you see him pushin to your ramp and starting pylons etc you can get them out in time to ff the ramp 24/7. You only need to watch out for not getting faked out while he is teching up greedily, but if they skimp on sentries themselves you can just 4gate them with eco and better units back. Use a hidden probe to sneak up his base, judge his opening andyour abilities to hold, snipe his probe to delay the push or use your game sense. You won't die if you make 4 instead of 2 sentries but you can be behind if the other guy rushed for stargate earlier and faked you out.
There are some numbers you put up in the guide about how many phoenix you need in order to kill different protoss units with just a single lift. When I started playing phoenix-pvp a while ago I did some extensive testing on this and I'd like to clarify his here (maybe you can update his in the OP):
zealot -> 2(3) phoenix: At first I always thought it's kinda random that you need either 2 or 3 phoenix for one lift to kill a zealot and was curious how this can be randomly delaying shots. But then I realised after more and more testing that while phoenix shoot quickly, they don't shoot instant like for instance marines. This means that if you have 2 phoenix and lift a zealot, but the phoenix that is shooting at the zealot is not right next to the zealot in the air at the moment of the last shot before the graviton beam ends, the zealot survives barely. The reason is simply that the phoenix shoots already but before the shots actually reach the zealot the time is out. So if you just click the phoenix that is shooting right next to the zealot in the air, he will always kill the zealot. This situation is really important when you only have 2 or 3phoenix since killing single zealots/sentries/stalkers are worth so much more than another probe kill and often times especially at the start the energy limits you more than anything else (especially if you want to go for an attack soon afterwards you will need the energy for actual combat so your phoenix are not idling around in the battle or because you need to defend some one base allin from your opponent. sentry -> 2phoenix needed (always). stalker -> 3(4) phoenix: like above, if you micro your phoenix to the target, 3 phoenix and one single lift are enough and saves valuable energy immo -> 5(6) phoenix dt -> 2 phoenix
As a last advice (something I missed in the OP) is a section where you mention energy management on your phoenix. You did mention the usage on probes vs allins, but maybe you could add 1-2 sentences about the energy management in battles. You did mention how to use phoenix in combat but often times you need to use them differently based on the phoenix number/available energy. So for instance, if you just did some initial harassment and you see some allin, you not only stop lifting his probes and save the energy for the combat you want to prioritorize stalkers over zealots every single time (sometimes even over sentries), because if all you have got is enough energy for like 3-5 lifts and you get allined, you better use that energy to kill as many units (and most expensive ones) in battle as possible. It makes no sense to rip apart some zealots with the double dmg just to realise that now your phoenix are sitting idle for a while and could have killed more expensive stuff. Warping in 3-5 more stalkers or zealots is a difference. However, (keep in mind that I'm a huge fan of zealot-sentry only composition to go along with phoenix in the early stages of the game) if you have enough energy, you lift and kill sentries first (gs prevents quite some dps from sentries and phoenix, ff can screw you up :-)), then immortals ofc (even if you don't have armored units immortals still do more dps than all other gateway units so the lift is so much more valuable to take them out of combat), then zealots (you kill them more than twice as fast as stalkers and if you are zealot-sentry-based if you ff behind his units and have zealots in front and your phoenix rape his zealots, you win every battle because zealots are the worst enemies in cost efficiency for you as long as you can prevent kiting).
Really nice guide overall, I'm kinda surprised it took people so long to start using it. I've not met many people using phoenix until two days ago, then I checked Teamliquid and see that 2 days ago a thread on phoenix pvp by Geiko has been started ... oh boy, now I know why everyone in master league blindly goes phoenix). However, most people tend to hide them until they have 3-5 and are not safe vs dts, react too late vs fast expand builds etc. They just hope to outmass you in phoenix numbers (which I think everyone hates if you are just down by one phoenix you can lose the game right there, no escape possible once engaged etc).
Update: added (6) to immortal, forgot that originally (the testing I did on this stuff had been already quite some weeks ago, they should be accurate though)
Very good points. Like I stated in the guide, It is also possible to expand without the robo as you said, however holding commited blink attacks can be very tricky against someone with good blink micro. If you choose to do this, you need a third gate before expanding though.
I will definitely add a paragraph about energy management when I get the chance to write it.
On December 23 2011 15:59 AlphaDotCom wrote:+ Show Spoiler + I've been doing axslav's version of the phoenix build and it seemed really good until i realized that its actually really hard to hold the 4 gates that just get pylons down below your ramp or even close to your base and then just keep trying to go up the ramp, because you run out of sentry energy. Axslav gets 2 sentries pretty fast but his warpgate is really really late and he adds the second gate extremely late as well so he has to rely on really good probe control to hold 4 gates pretty much ever time, because his third sentry is really late. He gets his zealot finished when his core is done for a while so while he chronos stalkers it just makes up for the fact that they were already fairly delayed. Also a gm eu player posted in the 11 gate 3 gate pressure guide that he beat axslav with that as well which makes sense if you just get pylons near his base and force up the ramp. Also, Axslav loses to 4 gate a lot on his stream due to simple errors that are really easy to make, he kills the first couple units then just runs out of force field. I made a new build that looks more like a pressure build ( I think it makes opponent think u r trying to trick them into thinking that you are teching) and it holds 4 gate rather easily i think. I used the build order optimizer to come up with this mostly (its actually useful lol). 9 pylon 11 gate 2x chrono on probes 14 gas 15 pylon 16 core (scout after core) 17 zealot 20 gas 22 stalker and chrono warpgate only from now on except for last chrono 23 pylon 27 stalker 27 stargate 28 gate, u can put down gate before stargate if u want as well if u are really worried but you can hold 4 gate either way 30 sentry(chrono this with your last chrono) with this build you dont need to chrono units because you just get them out faster to begin with then axslav's build. It looks like 3 gate pressure that is getting a fake second gas. Also, if you scout 3 gate pressure I would probably pull from the second gas or have like 2 in each gas and just go defensive 3 gate with a higher worker count and more units to deny proxy pylons. Your sentry finishes right as warpgate does(about 5:30) and you can warp in another right away then after that your other gate is done and you can warp in from 2 gates to easily hold 4 gate without pulling probes. This build gets about 25-26 probes at the time a 4 gate would hit (you almost never cut probes) with a stargate done around 5:35 which I think is fairly close to the same timing as axslav's build if he builds stargate as fast as possible and way faster than geiko's. You have about 200 gas when warpgate is done which is enough for phoenix + robo or 2 sentries whatever you want. You can scout for expo with first phoenix as axslav suggested very fast so if they did some kind of fast expo you will see it right away and can react accordingly. I think this build reveals less than axslav's build, because lets face it if you scout 3 chrono's on probes and an 18 second gas its pretty much a guaranteed tech build while my build looks like 3 gate pressure for a while and might confuse the opponent. You can afford the core scout due to the fact that you get a really fast zealot which helps vs cannon and proxies, which is also when alej suggests in his 11 gate 3 gate pressure thread. (if you scout earlier it hinders your eco quite a bit since you already put up an early gate) Also if you see them play really greedy feel free to spend more chronos on probes to match their chrono energy because they cant have warpgate faster than you if they do so either way you are safe or just not mine from your second gas and try some pressure build.
My experience with Axslav's opener is very limited so I won't be of much help, however it is very clear that it is not made to work very well against 4 gates, only to survive against it. If you have trouble against 4 gate, you should consider using a build you are confortable with, with 2 or 3 gates and transition into phoenixes from there.
On December 23 2011 16:09 AGIANTSMURF wrote:+ Show Spoiler +The first hint to this will be given by your initial phoenix or units who should spot a proxy pylon near your base. When you then scout his base, to find 3/4 gates and a twilight council with no units, check if he has expanded and leave your phoenixes in his base to see how all-in he is. Meanwhile at your base stop making phoenixes once you have 5 and get some immortals. FF your ramp as soon as you see him trying to get up. You should never let him gain high ground vision. You've got a full minute (4FFs) to warp in units and immortals (use chronoboost on production facilities !). If he tries to break your ramp, he will most likely walk a stalker up the ramp, blink to the side, and blink all of his stalkers to the side of your base. This is where the phoenixes come in to play. A-move your army towards them and with your phoenixes, lift off the first line of stalkers. He'll try to focus down the phoenixes but will take a lot of dps from your zealots and immortals, which is why you should never try to lift the stalkers in the back. Continue chasing after the stalkers, but never let your phoenixes get too far ahead of your main army. If he pulls back and expands, you can go down the ramp and expand yourself. Blink stalkers are extremely bad at setting up a contain since they rely on kiting the army. Use two spare phoenixes to scout what he is doing in his base. once again, adapt your probe production to what you see. Kill 3 or 4 probes with the phoenixes if you can. If he stops making stalkers and goes for a zealot/archon composition, stop making immortals and refer to the previous section. As before, you can either keep your phoenix count at 5-ish, or go up to ~8-10 for more harass heavy play.
I highly doubt that if someone sees you open phoenix when theyve gone blindly for a blink rush all-in that they are going to sit around and wait for you to get up to 5 phoenix, + have sentries + give you time to make immortals Blink should be done with a decent number of stalkers before you will have time to really react.
If you FF your ramp, he'll have no other choice than to sit around while you are making immortals, that's the point of forcefielding your ramp ^^. I'm working on some more replays against blink all-ins since that seems like a question that is frequently asked.
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I feel like as long as you scout the natural with the first Phoenix and his main once you have two that Blink play isn't a big issue. I will always throw down the Robotics Facility after not scouting a Nexus at his natural and whilst it's building I feel like I have time to scout him in time untill I have to chose if I build an Immortal or an Observer. Infact I feel kind of safe but then again I'm only mid masters so the players Blink micro ain't that great tbh. It might be much tougher higher up the ladder. I have to say though that I had someone kill me with a 4 Gate Blink all in but I botched the FF so it was my mistake more then the build.
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This looks effective, and more importantly, like a lot of fun. Can't wait to give it a shot. Thanks a lot!
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Italy12246 Posts
If i may ask, what the hell stops a 4gate phoenix build exactly? You completely wreck the people going robo blink against you and fighting you head on...should the robo/blink guy (usually me) just try to hold his ramp until the opponent expands or throws down a robo?
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On December 24 2011 19:52 Teoita wrote: If i may ask, what the hell stops a 4gate phoenix build exactly? You completely wreck the people going robo blink against you and fighting you head on...should the robo/blink guy (usually me) just try to hold his ramp until the opponent expands or throws down a robo?
When I started experimenting with phoenixes, I only did 2 gate Stargate into 4 gate / Stargate all-in.
You are right that it's extremely powerful against any opener, but except vs immortal builds or colossi builds, I wouldn't recommend doing it because good play can stop it. Therefor I findit much too all-in to recommend it for standard play.
If you hold your ramp and mass blink stalkers, you'll reach a critical mass of stalkers that your opponent can't deal with with only phoenix and gateway units. During the engagements, methodically focus fire the phoenixes who are lifting and you should be fine. If he expands before robo you can kill him, and if he gets a robo you can expand.
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I got a little carried away and went mothership before archon or colossi, don't do that people
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Really nice guide, i've been doing kind of a greedy 3 gate phoenix expo build but this feels much more thought out and safe (plus, i haven't figured out myself all the responces) i'm going to work out on my phoenixx build with this guide in mind and i will post anything noteworthy I come across.
Thank you very much <3
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I watched through the coaching vod with Axslav and it really helped clear up things about the build. I encourage you guys to watch through this. Just the tiny detail of "if he expands early, add a 3rd gate while making phoenixes and all in him, if he stays 1-base, add a robo after 2nd phoenix and expand while harassing" makes things so clear to me. Really simple, easy divergence. Even if you expand around the same time or slightly later, the harassment should keep you even or ahead in economy. The all-in should kill any expand builds, unless they have cannons (a fast expand with cannons is probably the best response to phoenixes, imo, Axslav mentions he has trouble with that in the video).
I find 90% of the time in PvP now, I reach the midgame with an advantage thanks to the phoenixes, no matter WHAT build he did.
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On December 25 2011 10:17 GomJabbar wrote: I watched through the coaching vod with Axslav and it really helped clear up things about the build. I encourage you guys to watch through this. Just the tiny detail of "if he expands early, add a 3rd gate while making phoenixes and all in him, if he stays 1-base, add a robo after 2nd phoenix and expand while harassing" makes things so clear to me. Really simple, easy divergence. Even if you expand around the same time or slightly later, the harassment should keep you even or ahead in economy. The all-in should kill any expand builds, unless they have cannons (a fast expand with cannons is probably the best response to phoenixes, imo, Axslav mentions he has trouble with that in the video).
I find 90% of the time in PvP now, I reach the midgame with an advantage thanks to the phoenixes, no matter WHAT build he did.
Unfortunately, going 3/4 gate phoenix agaisnt FE is like going 1 base roach/ling against nexus first builds. Very powerful all-in but can be stopped by good reaction from your opponent. If you scout the nexus early you're much better off expanding yourself and pressuring the front with units while you harass the main with phoenix. I would only ever suggest all-ining if you scout a finished or almost finished nexus and you haven't expanded yet.
Also, merry christmas to all<3
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Awesome guide. Thanks for putting this together.
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I really enjoy using the pheonix now, thanks!
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I like Grubby's approach (see Day[j] #403) better as it keeps the pressure on your opponent through the entire game. I had this poor guy locked down so hard I expanded to his third and he never even managed to scout it - not because he wasn't trying (he did scout my third), but because I wouldn't allow it.
If you can hold your opponent back to one or two bases, he's toast. End of story. Once you get four phoenix out you just sit back and harass until you feel you have enough colossi to 1-A your opponent and then you do (okay I did get a little fancy with the phoenix but I don't think it was necessary).
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Whats the best response to a phoenix/obs/dt play? I can deflect early phoenix harass pretty easily and FE safely, but when they are sniping all your observers aggressively, it's hard to move out without being stabbed by an invisible psi blade. Do you just have to get a stargate in pvp if they do this build to defend your obs, or just make a ton of observers and micro carefully?
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Italy12246 Posts
On February 23 2012 02:56 quillian wrote: Whats the best response to a phoenix/obs/dt play? I can deflect early phoenix harass pretty easily and FE safely, but when they are sniping all your observers aggressively, it's hard to move out without being stabbed by an invisible psi blade. Do you just have to get a stargate in pvp if they do this build to defend your obs, or just make a ton of observers and micro carefully?
Im pretty sure phoenix/dt (assuming 2base) is basically weak to any timing push known to man, ever, so (i figure) if you see no robo units/robo bay and he isn't trying to get archons or whatever, you should probably just go kill him, trying to hit before the dark shrine completes.
I would need a replay to watch to be sure though.
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On February 23 2012 02:56 quillian wrote: Whats the best response to a phoenix/obs/dt play? I can deflect early phoenix harass pretty easily and FE safely, but when they are sniping all your observers aggressively, it's hard to move out without being stabbed by an invisible psi blade. Do you just have to get a stargate in pvp if they do this build to defend your obs, or just make a ton of observers and micro carefully?
If he is going DT/phoenix/obs you can go for colossi and have at all times 3 or 4 obs with your army. If you try to go zealot/archon or any "only ground" based composition, you will die.
I'm watching the day[9] daily on phoenix PvP and so far it's really interesting, I'll add it to the OP when i finish it.
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@teoita yeah this is probably the correct answer, the trouble was he kept sniping my obs whenever I'd try to peek in his base, so I didn't see the dark shrine till the dt's were already out. by then I was in something of a pinch, as he wasn't going to break my front, but I couldn't move out to prevent him from expanding. I suppose I just need to have better scouting and keep 3-4 obs behind my colossus while target firing the DT's.
Grubby's style is interesting, I like the early chrono on stalkers to prevent proxy pylons.
I really like the idea of phoenix play, but I'm usually left with a dilema:
If you use the energy to kill probes, he just walks up and kills you with a larger gateway force and your phoenix can't do anything about it. If you don't harass, they don't really pay for themselves. I guess the psychological pressure and scouting is useful, but it always feels so fragile.
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Phoenix opening is definitely the future of PvP metagame, it really provides perfect info about enemy's tech and movement, complete map control, constant threat of counter attack keep enemy at home to defend, and having the ability to incapacitate units for a considerable amount of time really help to turn the table in a fight.
in a sense this style of PvP mimics zerg's mutas, the ability to counter attack with ease and snipe off key units like sentries makes 1 base sg one of the strongest play styles, so I really hope to see more diversified sg strats in the pro scene.
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Something interesting I saw on sage's stream.
He opened with a really early second gas, I think 15 off a 2 chrono 12 gate no scout. That gave him enough gas to get warpgate and a sentry after zealot, and put down a stargate before the sentry even finished, and even get a second sentry straight away.
I'm not sure on exact timings as I haven't seen him do it more than once, but it looked really interesting. Because he built the sentries so early, he had four forcefields and 3 gates coming up at the 4gate timing for only 200 gas. Versus another phoenix opening, he'd have more phoenixes early and so would win the air battle.
Downside, of course, is that the second gas telegraphs it from a mile away. I feel like there's got to be something the other guy can do to abuse that, but I was still fascinated.
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I experimented a lot with Phoenix but the builds are really fragile at the beginning so I am staying away from them for most of the time. I love it when my opponents go Phoenix builds because in my opinion, they are pretty easy (yet micro intensive) to play against and allow for you to take an early expansion. I really enjoy playing against but not with Phoenix.
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