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On April 07 2015 22:34 Teoita wrote: You can't react to 3hatch before pool. Either you open forge and cannon rush it, or you open something else and the zerg is just ahead. That said, something stupid and risky like the tasteless build can be ok because it's so odd and unusual that whatever advantage the zerg has might disappear if he gets caught off-guard.
Why doesn't every zerg open 3 hatch before pool then?
Because if you opened forge it falls quite a bit behind a safer opening, and many zergs would rather not gamble in that fashion.
Guys, what would a good wall-off on Cactus Valley look like when going Forge first? I keep accidentally walling myself in when I do Pylon Forge Cannon and I can't quite see an adequate cannon position that doesn't allow lings to slip through even with a Zealot on hold position.
The natural wall on Cactus Valley is only 6 hexes which means 1 pylon (2 hex) + gateway (3 hex) + 1 zealot (1hex) is enough for a wall off. I'm not entirely sure what your question is since you almost never supposed to use cannon as part of the walloff.
a pylon + any 3 hex building is good enough to create a choke
This is what Trap did vs some high level zerg i cant remember atm
Looking at pigbaby's observer zealot style, day9 said something really interesting.
This strategy abuses how efficient mining is in starcraft 2, so you can overbuild workers and then just transfer to your later third when it finishes.
I think its cool how you can be slightly, like 400~ minerals minute behind vs a 3 base opponent who has similar workers to you while you are on 2 base.
My question is, are there any other styles that abuse this as well? IE, rush to 24 probes on minerals in each base and then build up an army to expand to a later third without being too far behind in economy?
I think its cool how you can be slightly, like 400~ minerals minute behind vs a 3 base opponent who has similar workers to you while you are on 2 base.
My question is, are there any other styles that abuse this as well? IE, rush to 24 probes on minerals in each base and then build up an army to expand to a later third without being too far behind in economy?
Double forge PvT is obviously the most popular style that abuses that fact as P -and I love those styles. In other match-ups, you can play in a similar way too :
PvZ : 5 phoenix for harass into quick colossus, adding 4-6th gates before the Nexus if necessary, and going into colossi void ray after taking the third. You need to kill 10+ drones with the phoenix to make for your eco weakness and get blink/+2 very late. Zest was the best representative of that style. PvP : double robo colossi on two bases. See Zest - Rain on Daedalus Point for instance.
I don't think that those styles are very good. Current PvZ meta revolves around taking your third at around 7:00. That allows you to be on 66 probes at 10:00 which is amazing, you can max out on blink stalkers at 14:00 ( and blink stalkers are not that cheap). If you take your third at 9:00 or later you will always be far behind in supply against the zerg. Of course you compensate with better tech in that window of time, but is it worth it? Personally I quit building phoenixes in PvZ "before it was cool", so maybe I got it right. The problem with phoenixes is that they are really expensive, so they delay your third quite a bit, and they are almost useless against both zerglings and roaches (unlike the oracle/void ray combo), so it's easy for the zerg player to delay your third even further.
As for the 2 base double robo PvP, I remember Stardust saying that it's bad. In fact, you can't go double robo and get archons at the same time on 2 bases. Archons are very important especially considering that they are gateway units which can be warped in. You will always have a smaller army than your opponent when you take your third, because you have 2 colossi stuck in production. And if you take your third noticeably later, you might lose engagements even if you have 2 colossi more than your opponent, because you don't have enough archons.
For PvZ, I think it's a matter of personal taste. You don't have to play the meta, especially in lower leagues. Phoenix into colossi is a wonderful style to work on your multitasking (phoenix harass + scouting) and decision making/gathering intel (reacting to vipers, ultras...).
As for PvP, I agree it's usually better to add some archons in the mix while taking the third and then transition into double robo. It's all about reactions in the end, taking a third is always a bit of a risk in PvP -though the defender advantage is actually quite huge in colo wars- and you definitely end up sticking on 45ish probes on 2 bases sometimes.
I'm just coming back to HOTS to have some fun before LOTV and I'm trying Protoss now. I used to be a Platinum Zerg player but my Protoss only has me in Silver right now.
With the current maps in 2015S2, are there any that you would specifically downvote as a Protoss player? I'd rather learn a handful than learn them all, but I don't know which ones to dv at the moment.
On April 17 2015 22:19 Meavis wrote: vaani is pretty harsh for protoss, inferno pool isn't that great either, 3rd on whatever you dislike personaly I gues.
I'm in full support of those 2 vetos. Inferno pools with its "close" spawns as well as the gold (hello every pvz on that map) is terrible and vaani is just weird to play on.
I find this match up very boring.... most of my PvT games consist of T dropping early to mid game and I'm just defending till I feel comfortable to attack. They can take a 3rd so early while dropping.. that I find it hard to take a 3rd safely. From this point I'm just playing catch up in terms of economy and hope that I defend well vs the drops.
Ever tried phoenix/colossus? It's more fun imo. With phoenixes you defend from drops much more easily and you can do a lot of cool stuff around the map.
On April 18 2015 00:09 PiPiGranDe wrote: Anyone having a good win ratio in PvT?
I find this match up very boring.... most of my PvT games consist of T dropping early to mid game and I'm just defending till I feel comfortable to attack. They can take a 3rd so early while dropping.. that I find it hard to take a 3rd safely. From this point I'm just playing catch up in terms of economy and hope that I defend well vs the drops.
League: High Masters.
Any advice/tips?
if you want to play aggressive you can open blink and take your third with a robobay while also getting a warp prism and applying pressure with the blink stalkers to force the terran to stay at home. Usually you will add on your extra gates after the third. So if you opened 3 gate blink then add 5 gates if you opened 4 gate blink add 4 gates.
However, since you said you wanted to play aggressive what you can do is add 2 more gates onto the 8 already after you have saturated your third base(without gasses) or stop probing at around 8-12 at the third and stay on 8 gates and then just pump out zealot stalker and attack.
Every T nowadays seems to open with some kind of WM agression, which comes at the time I have one overcharge, 3 stalkers, 1 obs in the T base, 1 obs at home and 1 in the making. Assuming I know the WM drop is coming (with or without marines at the front) which is the optimal way to position myself to take little to no damage ?
On April 19 2015 20:26 Xaeldaren wrote: Can anyone give me tips on holding stim/combat shield timings? It feels pretty rough on maps with open naturals like Coda or Iron fortresss.
dont spend your photon overcharge too early. You should have one for the stim timing and one for the medivac timing. You should have at least 2 gates and just be warping in from them. Photon overcharge + 5-6 gateway units is more than enough to stop any damage.
On April 19 2015 23:46 [PkF] Wire wrote: Every T nowadays seems to open with some kind of WM agression, which comes at the time I have one overcharge, 3 stalkers, 1 obs in the T base, 1 obs at home and 1 in the making. Assuming I know the WM drop is coming (with or without marines at the front) which is the optimal way to position myself to take little to no damage ?
3 stalkers at the natural and the obs in the main. Since the most standard thing for terran to do is marines at the front and widow mines in the main(although they can do it differently if they want). Then PO the main and pull probes to avoid the widow mines. Your obs should also be here in the main so that the PO kills the mines while you are microing vs the marines at the front with your stalkers.
So, guys... Im coming back full circle... never thought i'll ever ask this again but could you share you thoughts on the following matter.
You scout after 12 gate and see a 4gate coming (assuming you gor for 2 gases) - you actions? (also - a 10 gate response? a 2gate into 4 gate repsonse?) Thanks in advance!
On April 20 2015 18:21 insitelol wrote: So, guys... Im coming back full circle... never thought i'll ever ask this again but could you share you thoughts on the following matter.
You scout after 12 gate and see a 4gate coming (assuming you gor for 2 gases) - you actions? (also - a 10 gate response? a 2gate into 4 gate repsonse?) Thanks in advance!
First of all 12 gate isnt really worth it. There isn't really ever a reason to make your gate on 12. Instead make it on 13.
The 4 gate is a really weak build in hots. You can even make a sentry after a stalker and still have it in time to hold the ramp. Just go something like: stalker -> msc -> sentry -> add 2 gates -> sentry and then try to save your ff as long as you can. Spend all of your chrono on the warp gates. There will be a time when he has 6 stalkers and you only have 2 sentries a stalker and a msc but just ff 1 stalker inside and kill it for free. You should be able to do this 3 times in total and the 3rd time you should already have your warp in so you can forcefield ever more than 1 stalker for free. At this point, if you run out of ff you could just fight his army(you will probably crush it easily) or if your micro sucks you can run back to 2 photon overcharges ;p.
The 10 gate 3 gate is really the only legitimate 10 gate. If you follow my steps you'll hold whatever other version he's doing.
Defence 1: The first way to hold it is to get 2 gates and chrono stalkers after your first one. So you make a stalker and a msc as usual but drop another gate once you scout his early gate and extra chrono. Then, you make 2 more stalkers and chrono them both. Make sure to scout around your base for hidden pylons and then place your stalkers at your natural. Try to kill the probe and do a lot of damage to his units while he waits for his warp in. (warp in is at 5:21 at best) although most likely it will be later but its best to pull back your msc at 5:20 to be safe. Stalkers are the same speed so it doesnt matter if you keep them there. Now you should have 3 stalkers and a msc. Next place yourself at the top of the ramp and chrono 2 sentries and add an extra gate. Make sure you dont get supply blocked here under the pressure. your opponent will have: 4 stalkers and a zealot. However, if you killed one of his units earlier while he was trying to get a pylon up you should have 3 stalkers and a msc vs 3-4 stalkers and maybe a zealot. This means its 4 vs 4 plus you're up a ramp so its an easy hold. If you didn't catch a unit though and he microd well then your sentry should be popping out shortly and you just need to delay him a little bit and then forcefield half of his units out. Note: your warp gate is really delayed with this version so instead of warping in units you continue to use gateways to produce stalkers after the 2 sentries for one round.
Defence 2: The second way is a lot easier but you need to make sure a pylon doesn't get up in your base and you need to scout it coming a lot sooner and you also need to have opened 15 15 which is pretty common these days. What you want to do is just start chronoing sentries and adding gates till you have 4-5 sentries. This will give you infinite forcefield. At least several minutes until your gates are ready. The only problem with this build is that your opponent can fake the 10 gate and then expand so make sure you have a probe on the map checking what he's doing and possibly laying down pylons for a counter attack.
Thanks for the answer! What do you think about teching to voids? or immortals? or canceling your 2nd gas and going for 3-4 gate yourself and holding it with combat units w/o sentries?